QQ's on 7K7.

This guy's line (overcall pre then bet massive, multiway on a paired flop) doesn't really seem like the line of a studied player to me, but I could be proven wrong.

I understand the impulse to call the flop after checking, but I honestly think that you can just fold flop to this size. As played, it's difficulty to say what this guy has when he checks back turn and bombs the river, but I would guess it's something value-y, even a bad top pair. I mean, what even bluffs here?

That's get this out of the way first. If he studies, he hasn't learned much. 🙂

I can almost get behind the flop call if not for fact that:

-Button may have made a position bet, but he's betting into 3 other people even though pretty much everyone is in a WA/WB situation.

-Button's bet is nearly pot size.

-There is a player still left to act behind you.

-We have a lower MDF in a multiway pot, meaning the burden of defense is spread among everyone.

Consequently, looks like a fold on the flop. River also seems like a fold, especially with the straights that just came in.

P.S. Did you consider making a 1/4 psb on the flop as the PF raiser with your "obvious" AK?

Would betting a 1/4 psb on the flop be the better play? I figured let someone stab and get a bet out of them while seeing how the action goes behind me.

Lets change my description of him to a thinking player.

If villain limp calls, he's not a studied player. He's a rec.

It's good that you recognize you've given him rope, but you need to pay attention to his bet size. Recs are usually very imbalanced with their size. A half pot to 60% pot monkey bet is way more likely to be a bluff. Pot on flop and river is more likely to be value.

Unless he has been stabbing flop for pot multiway and bluffing river for pot, fold flop, fold river.

I think it's a mistake to over rely on his previous bluff and now just pay him off for pot multiway on the flop and pot on the river.

I also think it is a mistake to range bet the flop 4 ways. Especially with QQ which doesn't need a lot of protection.

I would cbet this, and fold to the large bet as played. 4-ways, you are often way behind a K or 7. You could be good on the river if he is just bluffing, but probably can't call.

the math you're doing here isn't right 4 ways. the mdf gets split between 3 of u so each person needs to defend ~20% of the time vs this (this is why u dont see large bets multiway)

flop is probably close / fold vs this size initially depending how u structure ranges - its the equivalent of u seeing a 2.5x psb from a defense standpoint

It looks like maybe he has KTs or something like that. He bet large on the flop to take it town. Then he was worried you had a better K or maybe AA/KK/7x when you called. Then on the river he is pretty sure he is good and goes large for value and so as not to be bluff raised.

It could also be a 7 and he was trapping on the turn. Could be two big bluffs, but low stakes players don't bluff with psbs that much.

Interesting hand. The large flop bet could be a stab with air, or a weak KX. I could see a weak K checking back turn when we call flop. I'd expect weak KX to just check back river on this run-out. KT and TT seem possible, but so does a lot of just weak KX.

With QQ, double blocking the nut straight, and with 77/KK/TT/99/QJ/AA in our range, I could possibly see jamming here, if we think he's capable of folding TP or even top 2.

Don't think calling makes much sense. Either raise or fold. A line of check-call-check-check-raise is either going to look super nutted or super FOS. I would fold all my KX if I was V. Would probably even fold KT, when we only beat a bluff.

Maybe 5% of the time it'll be some random stupidity trying to bluff it's way out, but a lot of the rest of the time it'll be KJ or K8 or some stupid any2 where you have no idea what they were doing/thinking at any point in the hand but you just torched two pot sized bets when you could have folded the flop.

This is not consistent. If he either has a big hand or air, why would you raise. That is more reason for flat calling, but I would fold.

KX and KT aren't big hands facing a check jam, on this board, the way this was played. Our hand isn't strong enough to call, but it has good properties to turn into a bluff, and this is an under bluffed spot.

Folding is also an option, of course. But it's not the only option, and arguably not our best option.

Yeah, his line sort of looks like KJ/KT/K9/Kxs, so a bluff is worth considering.

That's what I'm saying. We opened UTG, so we'll have the nuts here way more often than he will, when he pots it on the flop and then checks back turn.

Unless he's slow playing K7/K9 on the turn, I think the best hand he can have here is going to be QJ, which we double block. Otherwise he's got a lot of weak Kx, and then maybe some 9x that picked up some showdown value on the turn, and perhaps maybe KT that ran into top 2P.

We could play KK and 77 this way. Maybe AA and A7s. If we have QJs with one of the suits on the flop, we could get to the river this way. Hard for V to have QJ when we hold QQ, so it seems like he's de-polarizing and betting big with thin value. He should fold most hands he plays this way.