LAG Polarizes

I think you should stop doing this honestly. Most of your threads we're debating what your reads mean and somehow you end up taking actions that are in direct contradiction with your reads.

As for the hand, flop sizing seems off but maybe fine from exploit pov vs this villain? We probably check back sometimes which I wouldn't hate vs this villain all though I'm good with betting. Turn standard, river probably fold because we do have better hands to call with that should play the same way, but this is also why I dislike your reads, because how can anyone fold with that description of villain and reading HH3.

I mean ... this is another SB super reads, so we can do whatever thing?

Obvious thing to say: H bets flop very big with no diamond, and no outs if a diamond his turn, then a diamond hits turn. gg.

From the read:

Line seems like H has AK/AQ or worse for most (maybe all) of range?

If V is only calling flops with OESD/dd and flopped TT/88/T8s and shoves everything ... then H has ~30% equity vs. a 20% calling range preflop.
which goes down significantly as V calls wider preflop.

If V calls all one pair hands on the flop and shoves river with everything then H has ~66% equity vs. 20% preflop which goes up significantly as V calls wider preflop.

tl;dr

Is V just spew calling everything pre. planning to bluff all boards T or lower?

Is V just spew calling everything on flop planning on bluffing Q/J/T/9/8/7 and diamonds?

Yeh, almost mentioned this.

This is one of those weird things, where if V has a range that looks like a robot range then the Kd blocks a huge number of flushes, and the Qd blocks a bit less than half that. So your river equity grows like 33-45% vs. his 20-30% preflop ranges.

But if he's just winging it and has a bunch of 76s/65s/etc. and no K6s then the blocker effects are much less.

Also, even with blockers working in your favour, you still need him to call flop wide and shove river wide or it's still bad.

Also though, the other side of that is that a robot should mainly have a diamond blocker when it bluffs. So in that case a diamond blocker works both ways to an extent (blocks value but also blocks bluffs).

If he's bluffing with random combos with no diamond then having a diamond in your hand only blocks value.

Oh yeah, another thing regarding your flop sizing. You need to be very careful against good hand readers about giving away the strength of your hand with your sizing. It's best to use a single sizing with all your bets, or if you are splitting your range into different sizes you need to be careful to do it deliberately in a semi-balanced way. You don't want to play your hand in a face up sort of way against this type of player.

Grunch:

PRE - raise bigger. At least $75. Could probably go to $90 or even $100 if we think V is frequently OOL but likely to continue wide.

FLOP - I'd c-bet for around 1/3 - 40% pot, like $50-$65. Your c-bet is too big in a 3B pot. You're forcing him to fold out a lot of his worse hands, and only continue with his best hands and best draws.

Why are you c-betting so large? Are you trying to make him fold, or do you think he's going to call with all his worse 1P hands?

TURN - So...you're just putting him on flush draws that got there? Why can't he have worse AX?

Don't get me wrong, checking back is okay, but then we're just bluff-catching. We could also bet small, maybe a little less than 1/2 pot, to re-cap him. We could make it $175, which would make the pot $760, and we'll have $550 back. I don't love it, but it's about all we can bet, given how huge our flop bet was.

RIVER - Against most opponents, this would just be an easy fold. Even against this V, it's not an easy call.

If your read is that V is hyper-LAG, and you think he's capable of over-bet jamming as a bluff, or with worse for value, and you want to hero, okay, I guess. Go ahead and hero.

This would be easier if you sized up pre and c-bet a more reasonable size on the flop. If you go $75 pre, and $60 on the flop, you'd have $780 getting to the turn, with $300 in the pot. He'd get to the turn with a much wider range. You could bet $150 on the turn to re-cap him, and have $630 getting to the river, with $600 in the pot.

He can't over-bet as a bluff if you only have a PSB left behind. He's not likely to donk-jam for a PSB as a bluff when you've 3B pre, c-bet flop, and barreled turn.

ETA - @Banana - your bet sizing shapes his range that gets to the next street.

So when you raise small pre, he can continue with a lot more hands, including a lot of suited combos that will flop flush or straight draws on a lot of boards, and you'll be guessing.

When you c-bet huge, you're forcing him to fold a ton of worse value combos, and ensuring that he only continues with strong value and draws to nutted hands. So when the turn completes a draw, you'll be guessing.

If you 3B bigger pre, he doesn't get to the flop with such a wide range. If you c-bet smaller on the flop he gets to the turn with a wider, weaker range. C-betting smaller also gives us more ability to maneuver on later streets.

Remember the time I told you Banana's reads can be subject to interpretation, and are often at odds with his actions or the reveal?

Now you understand.

Re-reading your prior HH's with this V:

HH1 - V didn't bet flop when you checked, and didn't bet river when you checked again. I'd assume he had some sort of SDV and didn't think he needed to bluff. Not sure how much that helps us for the main hand here.

HH2 - V didn't go for thin value or turn his hand into a bluff after you checked to him twice, but it's a 4B pot, so...not sure how much that helps us for the main hand here.

HH3 - V triple barreled off with K-high, over-bet jamming 2X pot on the river when his opponent checked to him three times. Still not sure how much that helps us here.

Maybe if we try hard enough, we can infer that he'll 2x pot jam rivers as a bluff when opponents show weakness by checking back the turn because he did that when an opponent checked to him across three streets, but that doesn't seem like it would necessarily logically follow.

It's just hard to find his bluffs here. Front door diamonds got there on the turn. Assuming his range getting to the turn is just FD's and worse AX, he'd have to be turning worse AX into a bluff.

I suppose he could have some busted straight draws, or even some counterfeited 2P (if he's calling 3B's as wide as T8s pre), but I'm not sure how confident I'd be in giving him a bunch of busted-straight combos that are going to call the big flop c-bet and then decide to run it for 2x pot on the river.

hmm ok thanks everyone.

Result:

This kind of spot really just comes down to whether he's over or under bluffing. I do think diamonds will make up the majority of his value range, but TT and 88 are also clearly in there too. That being said, just because he had it this time doesn't necessarily mean the call was wrong in the long run.

The way I approach these situations is to ask myself if this particular player is more likely to be overbluffing or underbluffing in the particular scenario. Then if it's close enough that I still don't know I rely on whether I have good or bad blockers.

Here I think most players are underbluffing, but at least you had a strong read and reason for making the decision you made. That's poker. Sometimes you make a read and go with it and end up being wrong. All you can do is revise the reads as appropriate and try to make a better decision next time.

Yep, I do and I agree now.

I'm starting to believe these reads are added so we criticize his actions less. How can anyone suggest folding this river purely based on the reads we've been provided? But then reality is, we pretty much never see bluffs here.

Just wanted you to understand my pain.

I'm confused over why you'd be more likely to call with AsKd than AsKc... yea having the Kd or Qd cuts down on V's value but it also cuts down on his bluffs. He's also check-raising a lot of flush draws on the flop (although maybe not after I made this sizing mistake). I think the mistake I made was autopiloting and not thinking about how condensed Vs range is. I was trying to go for it vs AJ or AQ...not thinking that he's not turning AJ into a bluff OTR..so what does he have that bluffs river? JJ-KK 4! pre. So he really only has flushes and boats I think but I had made up my mind to check back turn to induce a river spazz and call on any non-♦ FWIW.

It's pretty simple really. You want blockers to value hands. Kd blocks KQd, KJd, KTd, maybe even K9d. Your own read was that he bluffs randomly with no regard for his blockers:

"V - Very aggressive LAG. Graph looks like a staircase. The kind of guy that tries to read your hand and plays off that and his two cards are almost meaningless to him. Sometimes his read is way off which results in comical outcomes."

Anyway he can definitely show up with some bluffs. QJs for sure is calling flop with a double gutter. There's a good chance he might float with KQ, KJ gutters too. Maybe Tx could call flop then bluff river. JJ and QQ are possibilities. By your own read he bluffs somewhat randomly without regard for blockers or anything, so those are just some examples of hands worse than Ax he could show up with here and decide to bluff.

Overall it's an underbluffed spot though, and Pablito might be right that you're using reads to justify your actions after the fact.

So nobody has commented on this play in the smallest game in the room?

I think this line is massively underbluffed: villain wanted you to keep betting for him on the turn. Figured he lost a street of value and you will probably call.

You do the best job on this forum of describing villains style, but I have a hard time figuring what they think of you. When you show up weak 3betting & 4betting, it’s the opposite of the player pool.

I think this guy that depends on reads has figured you will call. How does he know that?

It’s like crying wolf… if you keep showing up weak, you get no respect when you’re strong. So you subject yourself to more action. Does your graph look like a staircase.

Consider making linear 3 or 4bets and only when you have conditioned the table into overfolding, slip a light bet in there.

For this hand, don’t beat yourself up. Anyone would have trouble making the best decision here. But I do think you should consider that maybe they’re reading you better than you’re reading them.

I know players read me as tight
I get a lot of folds, even when I want calls
But I use this image in productive ways.

What do players think is your image?
How do you use that image?

Hey Banana,

So... In their YT videos Hungry Horse has talked a lot about how checking back the turn induces a lot of river bets, and how the opponents' bet sizing is usually an indication of hand strength. If you ignore your reads on this specific V, that 2x pot jam would indicate we should just fold TPTK.

What's interesting to me is that if I was V and I wanted to bluff after the turn checks through, I would go big, not small. I probably wouldn't try bluffing here, when the flush comes in on the turn and the board pairs on the river, but on a different board, facing a V who will over-fold, sure, I might go for it.

With value, I'd size up or down depending on what range I was assigning my opponent. And that's where I think this V's action gets interesting.

What hands is he targeting for value when we check back turn? If we made a flush, we'd probably keep betting. If we had top set, we might keep betting, or we might check back when the flush comes in.

So, on the river, it doesn't look like we have a flush. If we had top set, we had him beat the whole way and he's just punting into the nuts. Maybe we have 88 and it's just a cooler, but otherwise, it's hard for us to have a hand that's strong enough to call a 2x pot jam after we check back turn.

In order for V to take this line, he has to think you never have top boat, or he has to think you'll check back turn with a flush, or he has to think you'll bluff catch with worse than a flush.

If he was ranging you correctly, and he didn't know anything about your tendencies, he should size down on the river, to target your TP combos to make a crying call.

You could have top boat here, so he's wrong about that. You probably wouldn't check back the turn with a flush, so he's wrong about that. He should be wrong that you'd call off an over-bet jam with just TP.

He shouldn't be taking this line with his hand. This line should only get called by better, and always fold out worse.

So he's either button clicking, or he's got a really good read on you.