5/10/25 2500 cap Pocket 9s versus LAG

How does he bet $2400 on the river when the game has a $2500 cap? If the effective stack is higher, you need to give that info to the reader.

I meant the max buyin is 2500. We are 5000 effective

Once you get to the river, the solver suggests you make a small blocking bet.

Of course, the solver also gives a message that it rarely finds itself in this situation, given that it wants you to raise PF rather than call, and also thinks you probably should fold the turn to the overbet.

I like the 3bet pre-flop, especially from the small blind. I understand your comment about not wanting to bloat the pot out of position, yet I’m trying to answer a question where you have put $650 in the middle & now have all your chips on the line.

3bet $180
Some people just keep opening because they can. Nobody ever 3bets them

As played from villain’s view, you just called the little cb and there’s just no way you hit this board, so let’s take it away on the turn. The river just makes this story stronger so let’s make a bet he can’t call. Your passive play has signaled weakness, so he’s out to drive that polarized range.

Calling along usually puts you in the worst situations.

3bet pre
Villain folds - fine
Villain calls - now the flop favors you, not him. You can check & he has no idea where he’s at, but he thinks you’re strong.
Villain 4Bets - now you fold & lose less

As played. I’m not liking it but I’m folding. It fits that category where I’d rather be bluffed than lose my stack.

I like the call pre - 3betting OOP this deep especially against guys like this will prob cost you a lot of money bloating the pot with a hand hard to play postflop. I didn't really follow the first hand you posted but I think if you call the turn you call the river, or just fold the turn. I really doubt he's just blasting off on every board - I'd probably fold the turn for now.

In principle you are at the top of your range except for a ten and your hand is kind of face up.

So is he making a big over bet with qq+ to get paid by 55 66 77 88 99 or is he trying to make those hands fold?

My guess is that he is trying to make those hands fold.

In his shoes I would think you might not even have 99. I'd want to get called by 44 a2 etc. Maybe even a flush.

3bet pre

I disagree with this. Villain opening 95 offsuit on the BTN in a 3 blind game is very obviously much looser opening strategy than he should be using.

Therefore, the most straightforward counter strategy to exploit him is to 3bet a significantly wider range than our typical SB vs CO strategy in a 3 blind format.

This is a very problematic preflop thought process

I’m assuming a CR on the flop is a terrible idea?

i dont play this high but i think CRing the flop small vs this guy has merit given his betting strategy. see how he reacts to action outside of his wheelhouse. if he looks comfortable after the CR you're probably toast. esp if he thinks you're a nit.

idk the history hand and 3x pot ott make me want to fold tbh

tempted to troll block bet the river which wouldnt help u now

if hes bad i guess youd win enough (his sizing rly dont make much sense on paired board / vs sb in general), but i cant tell if hes whale or just aggro from description. the 95o hand where he sizes down to vb flush doesnt seem that whale to me. if he's good you probably never win

The good ol inforaise. They tend to get sniffed out pretty fast, would not recommend this.

I usually hate responses like "it's you're fault for being in this spot because you played preflop differently from how I would, " but your justification for cold calling the SB with a top 10% hand against someone raising super wide from late position was quite literally he's gonna make it hard for me to realize my showdown equity.

Obviously it'd be great to flop another set against this guy (and that seems like a great reason to never fold tres against him), but when you have a hand as strong as 99 I feel like you should have a plan for winning some of the other 90% of flops, including one where you manage to find *another* way to boat up.

But to try to be more helpful, I really think turn/river* come down to how fishy he is. You say he "seems" to like small flop bet and turn/river overbets. How many times has he done it (over how much history)? Is it the actual frequency with which he makes this play that seems unusual or the play itself? Are all the overbets on the order of magnitude of B275 turn bets and almost 2x river bets?

How did he seem to take the set hand? Is he tilted? How's he dressed? How's he shuffling chips? Is he drinking? Do the dealer and other regs know him?

Are YOU a regular? Is this your regular stake? Are you nervous?

*And by "turn / river", I really mean turn. Don't go calling 3x turn bets OOP with split pair until you've made up your mind on the questions above.

IME (including first person experience as someone who uses "unusual" bet sizes) people over-extrapolate based on first impressions of strategies that mystify them, and anyone with a single ounce of awareness of gameflow is going to know that their overbets aren't getting respect and aren't going to try to blow you off a boat on literally the easiest board* in the world to slowplay (against someone who's already slowplayed)--though importantly you haven't mentioned whether the board is rainbow or two-toned. OTOH, if they DO have quads or a big pair, they'll be licking their lips knowing they can get obscene value here.

As they say, "The second one's always value." (Especially if the first one didn't work.)

But if he's just a whale who's mad at you and thinks there's some kind of law against having a hand without any help from the board, then my sense of the situation runs the other way.

Of course my rule of thumb in this sub is that any 5/T+ hand is a punt by villain, so I assume you called and were good. But whether or not results made it a good HH to post on 2p2 isn't a helpful way to decide the right play in-game...

And going back to my first post on the subject about having an actual plan for winning the hand more than 10% of the time: Small raising the flop and block-betting the river both have merit.

weird flat from sb vs lag co, even if it was a timed rake game, it's a mando 3bet unless you have a massive whale in bb or straddle.

I think your history vs him is important, if he did the overbet turn/river line vs you before and got caught, is he more likely to do it again as a bluff or value this time?

If you think he isn't the type to notice these things and just blasts on whatever runout favors him then yeah call, if you think he is a bit aware of his image then it's probably a fold since he is less likely to bluff again? Either way turn is close already, river you can never go wrong folding here.

Also solver does raise flop at a small frequency (10%) so it might not be a terrible option, I like having 99 as a value raise so that we dont only have Tx or 22 for value to balance with our bluffs but then again I would've 3bet 99 pre

I wasn’t thinking of CRing small—should’ve mentioned that—with 230 in the pot I was thinking making it a total of 200-250.

Folding 95o—the winner!—face up in the prior hand seems to indicate he’s fishy, along with not checking behind in the first place. I’m guessing H didn’t show the bluff.

Without critiquing previous streets though it would be helpful to know if the three flush was runner runner, IÂ’m going to crycall the river. IME the Mike Caro maniac to genius plays are rarely seen especially in 2025 and are painfully obvious when they are. Fish usually keep swimming.

I think he has a PP, maybe even a frustrated 22/33 hoping for a call from the nut flush.

I think this is terrible advice. Checkraising a small flop bet like this looks more like weakness than strength. Would Hero CR this flop against this Villain with a flopped boat, a ten, or an overpair? Not likely.

Id never have an overpair from pf action and id often cr a ten small too.
That said obv weird line and only applicable vs certain players. Maybe villain is the wrong type to try it, but obv c/c gets us into weird spots too like this.

I think you're confusing the 95o hand with the set of 3s hand. They're separate HHs.

Well, you need 40% equity to call, so you can't be crying *too* hard.

I stand by my line of questions to get more information on whether or not villain is a total fish, but if we're jumping the gun I might as well throw my speculation out:

Described player doesn't sound like someone with loads of disposable income, like the guys who sold their tech firm for $100M or the slumlords or drug dealers or whoever's favorite pastime is spending mid-figures to make the sniveling simps who work for a living squirm. Maybe he's a trust fund kid or something--again, I reserve the right to change my mind based on OP's answers--but I'm thinking it's more likely he's one of the sniveling simps.

I mean, it's clear he has garbage fundamentals, but it's 5/T/25, who doesnt?!

The next most likely possibility is that OP is visibly sweating through his shirt, and he got lucky smashing a set the one time, but the lag pros are licking their chops knowing he's gonna fold by the river if you put enough pressure on him 9/10.

This seems perfectly likely (if not the most likely possibility) if not for the fact that it's TT2. Like, you've already slowplayed him once, surely anyone with a basic understanding of the game knows that all you need to call is to have a T (possibly the heaviest card in your range) and anyone with the most basic understanding of the game knows they're giving themselves an awful price on this bluff.

What I suspect is going on is that villain has just overbet in the two hands already mentioned, and neither of them were for B275. (Not least of all because jamming over this bet size with bottom set probably wouldn't even be advised). He got unlucky running a bluff into a set the one time, but this time they're sucker bets. Don't be a sucker.

But again, I fully expect OP to come through with a read or tell that should have been included in OP and tell us villain showed 64.

Well is it a bad idea to x/r 99 because villain will tee off on your or is it a bad idea to raise Tx because that keeps villain from teeing off on you?

It can't be both...

In any case, if raising small over a B25 cbet from an LP lag on TT2 seems gimmicky to you, then it's back to the lab again y'all.