Bink Top 2 OTT; Trying to get Value

I’m always weary of players on a heater as I believe streaks are real.

Maybe it’s just my style, but I like calling and defending from the BB if I don’t fold. I rarely raise, because I’m OOP & it’s kinda a big deal.

With the initiative, I would have led for 150 on the flop. As played, call is good.

I don’t really see it as donking
You led, then he led, now take back the lead.
Bet 200, same thing he bet - familiar - likely called, unless he was on a pure steal. You can never count on villain to bet for you and you don’t want to miss one here.

Villain’s tank check
Makes me think we’re good for sure
Also makes me wonder if a jam will only fold him & might should bet this river small —— how much will he call?

Grunch:

Reads - V doesn't sound like he knows what he's doing. Sounds like he's whaling about, clicking buttons.

PRE - ignoring the reads and the straddle, my normal 3B size here would be 4x (when OOP) + 1x for each caller. That would be 5x, or $175, at a minimum, unless we're sizing up or down for exploitative reasons, or in consideration of our opponents' stack depths.

When we'll be OOP, and V is whaling about, and the SB calls V's open, and we still need to get through the straddle, I'm going bigger. I'm making this $200, maybe $225.

Look - AJo isn't a terrible hand. But it doesn't play super-well post-flop, especially not multi-way. It's easily dominated by the range that calls our 3B. Especially in a raked game, I don't mind just taking down the money pre.

Also - in a ring game, when we're in the BB and this dude is in the CO, we're going to have position on him more than half the time. We could just fold AJo pre, and not worry about getting enough opportunities to out-play him. They'll come.

As for the straddle - did he raise-call a large 3B, or cold-call a large 3B in that other hand? It makes a difference, albeit, a slight one. People don't like to raise-fold, and tend to think they'll have an opportunity to rep a lot of hands when they raise-call a 3B. It's not the same range when they cold-call a 3B. That cold-calling range tends to be stronger.

So...I wouldn't necessarily assume straddle's range is quite as wide as you think here.

FLOP - Guessing CO would have 4B pre with AK, maybe. Not too many hands we're behind. Think I'd just c-bet here. We can get value from all our opponents' worse AX hands. Hard to think they're going to start stabbing wildly with 44-QQ just because we checked. If they do stab at it, and we call, they're unlikely to continue putting money in.

Just c-bet small. Keep all their worse hands in. Bet like $100-$125. If they fold, it's okay. Even if they fold some PP's. The board is paired, and if 77 spikes another 7 on the turn, we're getting stacked. There aren't many run-outs we're going to absolutely love, if an opponent seems happy to continue.

What sort of hand do you think he actually has when V raises pre, tank-over-calls our 3B, and then bets $200 into $490? You said "a lot of his range", but...what's his range look like, in your mind, and what part of that range is stabbing here?

There's no draw on board, and the board is paired, so there aren't any intuitive bluffs. Do you think he's stabbing with some PP's that have SDV? Is he stabbing with air?

Assume he's stabbing with any of it. All of it. Some of it. Does it matter? Is he going to bet again, with any of it, after we check-call?

TURN - The answer to the question above is that he's unlikely to bet again. We should just donk here. Not because we spiked T2P, thought that is nice. The reason we should donk is that we probably already had the best hand on the flop, and we almost certainly have the best hand now, and he's very unlikely to continue betting, whether we had the best hand already, or just made the best hand.

RIVER - What do you think it means when he tank-checks back on the flop?

Do you think he picked up a draw, and was debating whether or not to continue bluffing? Do you think he was betting the flop with air, or whatever, and was debating whether or not he could make us fold if he bet again?

Assume he picked up a draw. KQ, KT, QT, hearts - his hand has no showdown value. Would he bet $200 on the flop, and then check back with those hands, or bet again, maybe for a small size, with plans to fold if we check-raised?

How many of those combos got there on the river? KQ, sure. What heart draws does he have that raise pre, call our 3B, and then stab flop for $200, other than exactly KQhh? Is he raise-calling pre, and stabbing flop, multi-way, with K9s, Q9s, K8s, Q8s, 98s? How many flushes does he have here?

Is he stabbing flop with KQo? For $200? Multi-way?

Assume he was betting a weaker AX combo on the flop, and was worried we have a better AX. What happens if we check river? Does he bet AQ? A9? AT? A5? What if we bet big? Does he call? What if we bet small?

Assume he was just stabbing with air on the flop, but turned showdown value with JX. Will he bet if we check? Wil he call if we bet?

Assume he bet flop with 3x, maybe A3. Would he ever check-back the turn, not wanting you to fold, and hoping / expecting you to lead on the river? How big would he bet if we check again, now that KQ is a straight, XXhh is a flush, and any AA/JJ/TT is a boat?

Your small 3B pre allowed him to get to the flop with a wider range. Your flop check allowed him to stab with a wide range. Your turn check allowed him to get to the river with a wide range.

He could have: worse AX, a flush, a straight, worse 2P, 2nd P, 3rd P, K-high, Q-high, 87dd...literally almost any two cards.

What if we bet small, and he raises? Are we...calling? Folding? What if we bet big and he raises? What hands would we be targeting here?

My take - I wouldn't get to the river the way you did. If you put a gun to my head, and said I have to decide to do...something...I'd probably just check, and hope he bets small. I'd call.

Alternatively, I'd block bet small, like $200, and fold if he raised, but I'd be absolutely sick if he showed AT or JT, or TT, or KQ...pretty much any hand that's worse, or was worse and got there.

That is also my default size when I 3! OOP. In game I was thinking that my very tight image at that moment would allow me to get just as many folds for a little bit cheaper price. My first choice would have been to take it down PF.

That makes a lot of sense to me. I had labeled him as one of the weaker players at the table due to his open sizes not changing based on the number of limpers. I know we make a lot of our money playing big pots IP against weaker players.

During that hand the straddle cold called the large 3! OOP. This suggested to me that he had very little experience playing poker.

I didn't think that I could discount AK much at all. Many players in my pool don't 4! AK generally and I thought that my nitty image made him even less likely to 4! with it. Even though I had labeled him as somewhat fishy, he did seem to be paying attention more than others and had certainly noticed how few hands I had been playing.

I can tell that I'm somewhat "scared money" at this stake. It seems to usually play 3-3.5 times as big as my usual 1/3 game. I'm currently shot taking on the weekends. The 1/4 c-bet seems much better than checking. I get to keep the initiative and get some value from plenty of those hands you mentioned that he would play this way PF.

There were a few things that made me think that is range when he calls my 3! is only a little norrower than his opening range from the CO. The straddle had already called. Because of my small 3!, he only had to call $120 with $345 already in the pot. He had certainly noticed that the straddle was doing very fishy things and might want to play with him IP. He also seemed to be over the moon since winning his recent huge pot. I think that his opening range PF was as wide as 20% of hands and his range getting to the flop was perhaps 15% of hands. I'm assuming he would be folding 22-77 or so and some of the SC's to my 3!. I didn't think that I could narrow his range much at all when he bets $200 into $490 after being checked to. The pot was super bloated and this may have seemed like a good spot for him to stab with anything he gets to the flop with. I think he often stabs with air, PPs and all his Ax; so everything except A3s; lol. I don't know which part of that range I should discount the most. Perhaps the air part.

I think he would probably shut down and check with basically all of that OTT. The pot would be $890 and he would have less than a PSB left to bluff me with. I think he would likely Only bet again OTT if he was either ahead OTF or binked something OTT. Perhaps he would bluff shove the turn some of the time if he turned a FD or a big combo draw. So this makes me think that he's quite unlikely to bet again OTT with a hand that's worse than mine.

This makes so much sense; thank you. As you said, I was probably ahead OTF and now I have pulled ahead of AK and AQ. I've determined that he has basically zero bluffing range OTT and I need to put money in myself. I think that a small bet OTT makes the most sense given that his range is wide and I'm not afraid of any card OTR. I's be curious what bet size others would use when leading on this turn. The pot is $890 with $750 back

I'm trying to stay consistant with my thinking given the assumptions I have made. If I assume he gets to the flop with top 15% of hands and c-bets almost his whole range OTF; and then always shuts down OTT even when he picks up a FD then he has a ton of flushes. I guess all of these:
A2s+, K9s+, Q9s+, J9s+, and 76s+
At this point thinking about and writing about the hand I am doubting my assumption that he stabs uber wide OTF. I really don't know how often he does that with any part of his super wide range here. I do still like my assumption that he probably checks back the turn even when he picks up a FD OTT. I just don't know how often he stabs the flop with KQ. Perhaps I will get a better idea of this as I play more hours with this V.

I think that if I check the river he is only shoving his AK, AJ and AT combos of Ax. Maybe he tries to value bet thinly with weaker Ax for a small size.
If I shove I think he is only calling with AK, AJ and AT. Maybe he calls with AQ. If I bet small I imagine he calls with all his Ax, sometimes with Jx and raises with everything that now beats me.

He very likely checks back OTR with Jx if checked to and maybe calls a small bet with it.

With less than a PSB left OTT, I think there is a decent chance that he would check back on the turn after betting OTF with 3x. I do think that 3x is a rather small part of his range though. A top 15% includes only 4 combos of 3x. (A3s) I think he would value bet OTR small with 3x if checked to.

Your small 3B pre allowed him to get to the flop with a wider range. Your flop check allowed him to stab with a wide range. Your turn check allowed him to get to the river with a wide range.

He could have: worse AX, a flush, a straight, worse 2P, 2nd P, 3rd P, K-high, Q-high, 87dd...literally almost any two cards.

I think I can safely B/F small OTR If I bet $150 into the $890 and shoves I would be getting 3 to 1. No way he is bluffing there more than 25% of the time. I don't think I would consider a bet size between about $200 and AI. Maybe I'm scared to bet bigger and then have a decision after he raises AI with me getting 5 or 6 to 1.

I wound up shoving OTR and V folded pretty quickly. He announced that I probably had AA.. I think that my shove is worse than both checking and block betting $150-$200. I know that fear and greed govern a lot of weaker players decisions. I'm trying to improve as fast as I can and know that I'm playing worse in big pots in this 2/5/(10) than I do at my normal 1/3. In game I was just going for gold against exactly AK (maybe AQ) and a rivered AT. This seems pretty horrendous given that I get called by everything that beats me and only a few hands that I beat.

Thanks docvail; I've been thinking about all your questions for the past 2 hours and am exhausted. This is free coaching as far as I'm concerned. Lucky me.

Getting value involves the risk of villain(s) catching up and beating you.

The most common leak (for many good players too) is betting too big and knocking your opponents out of the pot. The face-up move allows hero to make exploitative folds.

So, there’s a delicate balance in deciding whether to shut out villain now and take it down or give villain some rope to get more value with the risk they catch up and beat you.

Personally, because of my style, it’s easy to make people fold. Therefore, I have to tap dance and let villain hang around at times, and sometimes I get burned trying to get value.

If you want to get better fast…
Play strong hands, in position, with the initiative. It’s almost foolproof!

But people level themselves into playing mediocre hands OOP and never improve. Folding mediocre hands will make your life easier. AJo is widely considered a mediocre or marginal hand in NL Hold’em.

Most people just call me "Doc".

PRE - I don't recommend making plays based on what we think our own image is. Most opponents aren't thinking about us. I try to focus more on what I think my opponents are doing, and how to exploit them. Many call raises too wide, especially when they're defending their blinds or they're in position, so I like to size up against them.

When we checked flop, he stabbed for a bigger size than we may have c-bet. At first, it may seem like a better outcome. But the rest of the hand shows why we probably would have preferred to just c-bet the flop.

The main reason is that we have bluffs when we bet flop for 1/4 pot. We mostly don't have bluffs when we check-call a 1/2 pot stab. We don't expect him to bet again if we check turn, so we should donk, but x/c flop-donk turn looks a lot stronger than bet (small)-bet.

As played, I think I may have just jammed turn. I wouldn't be expecting V to call much. I'd just be targeting his best AX combos and any BD draws he picked up. I think he just folds most of his range. But that's okay. A lot of that range has equity to improve.

I'm sure some may think jamming the turn is a fear based decision. It would be, if the only reason to jam is we're scared of the draws. To be fair, our hand does benefit from some equity denial. But we have multiple reasons for jamming.

We can get called by worse hands that would otherwise be happy to check back, and will only put more money in on the river when they've improved. There are some hands V could have that would call because those hands block some of our thick value. If he has AX, especially strong AX, and played it this way, he may be hesitant to let it go if we donk jam on a card that brings in some BD draws.

As played to that point, and then when the turn checks through, he gets to the river with a fairly wide range. The only new info we have is that he tank-checked the turn.

If he's a thinking player, he may realize we probably didn't pick up a draw after we check-call flop. He probably wouldn't feel the need to protect a thick value hand from being out-drawn. He may just continue betting small for value.

But if he's a bad player, he probably just bets his value hands and gives up with his total air. We'd have to guess what he'd do if he picked up a draw, and what he'd do with showdown value. I'd think he'd check back a lot, with most of his draws and SDV, because we did call a big flop stab, so it looks like we have a hand and we're not folding.

So on the river, I'd be discounting hands that were very strong on flop or turn. Maybe occasionally he checks back turn with AT and runs into aces up. Maybe he has some other AX combos that seemed strong enough to bet on the flop, but not as strong once we call. Maybe he ran into a boat with TT, or was slow playing JJ/3x.

Maybe he stabs flop with some Broadway combo that makes a straight or a flush on the river. But I would tend to discount those hands when the flop is still multi-way.

There just aren't many combos of super strong hands in his range.

To me, his line looks like AX that was happy to stab big on the flop, but suddenly got nervous when we called and the turn comes a Jh, leading him to have an internal debate over barreling or checking back.

When he checks back turn, he opens the door for us to bluff river. He can make a light call if we bet small. We should use a size that all his AX combos can call.

If we check again, we open the door for him to bluff or bet thin. He'll probably bet small, but there's a chance he goes larger than we would have bet. If he goes huge, we should probably give him credit for a big hand, and fold.

I could go either way. Depends on whether or not I think he's capable of raising over a small bet with a worse value hand, like AT, or over-valuing those sorts of hands by betting huge with them.

Bet-folding with our remaining stack depth is icky, so I don't mind checking. Check-folding if we're not sure what he does without worse value also feels icky, so I don't mind betting small.

Fold pre. If Vs are calling your 3bets, you want to fold AJo oop. Your hand is a bluff. Playing AJo oop multi way in a 3bet pot may have thin value but also courts disaster. At the very least, raise more pre to get it heads up.

SPR is 2.2 on the flop, so I just jam flop. Check calling gets you pot committed.

Hand played fine, now shove. There are a lot of combos that beat you, but they're all significantly discounted by either pre, flop, or turn play. You cooler some hands, and bare Ax is put in the blender.

Pre could be a little bigger. Flop might be closer than you'd think, and I would not assume someone I've played 2 hours against is stabbing air here. Probably can't fold TP3K with only the whale left to act anyway, but that's best feedback I have on your thought process since you asked.

We have 84% of pot on a river where V should have a lot of Ax that at least has to think about calling. AQ or AT should have a really hard time folding. Lower Ax might fold but maybe it gets sticky. V has a lot, give him a chance to go on winners tilt.

I think the hand was played fine. No reason to raise flop and donking turn is terrible. You want to give V an opportunity to bluff and SPR is low enough you can gii OTR vs moderate hands.