1/2: Top two facing turn bet from nit
Feel like a little girl check-folding top two to a nit’s baby turn bet… but here we are..
1/2, $300 max
I open UTG to $15 with KsQd, get 3 callers (including a known nit on the BTN).
Flop ($60): KhQsTh
Top two, let’s gooo. I cbet $35 into $60, BTN and SB both call. I’m a lil nervous already that one of them flopped the joint.
Turn ($165): 3h
SB checks, I check (ugh), and the nit on BTN bets $70 into $165 with $90 behind. SB folds.
Now I’m sitting there with top two, ego bruised, feeling like a complete little girl for considering a fold to a not-even-half-pot bet… but it’s a nit. And nits don’t bluff. Ever.
Flushes got there. Straights already there. Sets make sense. What am I beating? KJ/QJ maybe?
I tank, sigh, like a sad child. Felt awful.
Someone tell me it’s okay to fold top two when a nit sneezes chips at you.
7 Replies
Maybe you need to first consider what the Villain's range is for overcalling on the BTN after an EP raise and a couple of callers?
Also, how confident are you in your assessment that this particular nit never bluffs, especially since he could now have picked up the nut flush draw on the turn?
Your probably shouldn't open raise with hands like KQo if you're going to be this MUBSy.
H needs 1:2, or about 1/3, to continue. 165 in pot now, nit's bet and projected river bet = 160, H needs to match that.
So, what range can we give V that'll reach 2:1? Top two versus the made flush, H has like 9%, and is hating life. Add enough Ah Broadway offsuit combos, and things get better. Is a nit calling pf with something like AxQh? Or KxQh? Probably. Are they just calling with JhJx? Maybe. And so on.
It's not that much of a stretch to give enough semibluff combos with decent equity, along with made flushes like QJ/98/87/76(?) to hit 33% equity for H.
But H does need to ask if V is enough of a nit or not to see if those semibluffs are off the table.
“ Feel like a little girl…”
“ Now I’m sitting there with top two, ego bruised, feeling like a complete little girl…”
“ I tank, sigh, like a sad child. Felt awful.”
Without a doubt, these comments are the most important part of your write up, and the biggest opportunity for improvement.
There is zero room for this type of thinking in poker, you will not get good at poker adding narratives to the game that have no strategic meaning. Especially narratives that belittle yourself as a person based on your play.
Take the ego out of it, make the best decisions you can based on logic.
After thinking about this further, I actually like a chunky pot size flop bet. It's not like someone with 77 is calling anyway, so let's get anyone with a flush draw, Jx, Kx, pair+draw, or worse 2-pair to put the money in now.
After thinking about this further, I actually like a chunky pot size flop bet. It's not like someone with 77 is calling anyway, so let's get anyone with a flush draw, Jx, Kx, pair+draw, or worse 2-pair to put the money in now.
Concur, plus most 1/2 Vs with the straight are scared of flush draws, and so will go after a healthy cbet like a marlin after a squid. H can b/f with confidence they're way behind.
Maybe a lil different comments from other responses...
15 open pre. is _big_ ... and you still got 3 callers. GTO charts don't pure open KQo for 2.25bb and you went 7.5bb. The fact Vs ranges are probably terrible doesn't change the fact we shouldn't have this either.
I understand you can easily sit there for 30m+ and not see anything that looks as good as KQo, but it's still not that great UTG 9 handed. Esp. worthy of note is that anybody randomly calling A5s on the BTN is technically in front, and when the flop misses us they can "bluff" us a huge amount because we are crushed.
Flop size is fine, I might even x sometimes (planning to x/r, unless I see something worrying) ... not having the Qh is a big reason not to bet pot IMO. Also people love to rando call AJo/J9.
You shouldn't be _that_ worried about people already having you crushed, when they just call a half pot bet ... but you should be worried about how the board is going to run out and what your "monster" will look like on any A/J/9/h
Turn is std. terrible runout 101, would check even with the Qh ... probably just range check with two callers.
"nit" label needs more thought, but I would be sus of anyone who thought most people at 1-2 who over called preflop and called flop against an EP bet on KQT had a range that top two has 30% against when the nut draw hits. Also you are still OOP and need to check 100% of rivers, and hopefully have 4 outs. There is a very small range where BTN bets this size on turn and doesn't shove river on a brick, and calling river brick shoves is a huge punt without reads that V is bluffing a lot (IMNSHO you can x/c turn, x/c brick river, win but still be punting vs. ranges).
Needs to be remembered that BTN has SB behind as well, and lots of SB can x/r flushes here and even if not BTN needs to also not think that's likely.
Turn size sucks a huge amount as well, in a void of hopium it looks like he could maybe have AhQx/AhTx but again that implies he doesn't think about being raised, and is even AhQx for protection here when I'd only ever label it as a bluff. I find it difficult to believe randoms we've tagged as nitty are playing even (3 whole combos of) AxQh this way. People spew betting KT/QT here are way more likely to raise flop, but after it checks to them on the BTN may decide to bet for value/protection ... but then (again) if their logic thinks that's good are they slowing down on 2c river? QhTx is maybe the best tripple range merge but what "nit" overcalls QhTx preflop?
Pretty much all flushes auto play this way, even AhJx looks pretty std. here. TT is at least as likely to play this way as any of the mergy semi bluff combos. we beat.
Imagine you have QhJh here and check ... how often do you think nit bets for you?
tl;dr Would sigh x/f turn without much better reads.
Grunch:
PRE - the $15 open from UTG at 1/2 seems a tad large to me, but you got 3 callers, so maybe it isn't. Maybe you could go even larger, which seems insane, but whatever. It's table-dependent.
FLOP - yeah, we flopped top 2P, but we've got 3 callers behind us, any one of whom could have AJ or J9, or occasionally TT. I think it's best to proceed cautiously here, and start with a check, to see what happens.
If you want to bet, I'd either bet much smaller, like $15, or much bigger, like full pot. This $35 into $60 size doesn't do much to define our opponents' range when they call. All we're doing is bloating a pot that we may have to surrender if we check and face a big bet on a later street.
When we bet small, we'll be inducing raises from better hands, but keeping their continue ranges wide, and the SPR higher going to the turn, allowing ourselves a bit more room to maneuver. When we bet big, we'll often just take the pot down here and now, but when they continue, it'll often be drawing slim.
When we bet 1/2 pot and get two calls, I'd be putting flush draws and pair + a draw into their ranges more than 2P or a set, and I'd be hoping to dodge a lot of scary turn cards.
TURN - yep, that's a terrible card. Checking seems like the obvious play, but I think we could block bet around 1/3 pot, with plans to fold if we get raised. I'd probably bet $50-$55 here.
We know we only have 2P, but V doesn't know that. We could have a monster. If we bet 1/3 pot, it's really hard for him to find enough bluffs, especially if he's truly nitty.
As played, V's $70 bet into $165 with $90 behind looks kind of milky. But I think we need to be very confident in our read before we fold. We still have equity to improve to a boat, and the river might get checked down if he doesn't have the nuts.
I hate calling the turn with plans to check-fold unimproved on the river, but it's not a terrible play, especially if our read is that V is a nit who won't attempt a double-barrel bluff or value bet with a worse hand.
We've got around a 8% chance to improve when we're behind, and we won't always be behind. We're getting about 3.35 to 1 odds to call, which I think means we only need him to check back the river around 22% of the time, if we're never check-calling.
If he's betting a worse KX for value, we could potentially cooler him if the case K comes out. Ditto if he's doing this with QJ or QT and the case Q comes out. I'd like it better if we were deeper, but we're still getting 4.64 to 1 implied odds with the $90 he has left behind.
