Pf confusion
 

It's 2/4 but these are kinda basic questions so I'm sticking it here.

Party Poker
No Limit Holdem Ring game
Blinds: $2/$4
6 players
Converter

Stack sizes:
UTG: $337.80
UTG+1: $451.01
Hero: $454.10
Button: $423
SB: $367.10
BB: $461.20

Pre-flop: (6 players) Hero is CO with A[img]/images/graemlins/heart.gif[/img] K[img]/images/graemlins/club.gif[/img]
UTG folds, UTG+1 calls, <font color="#cc0000">Hero raises to $20</font>, 2 folds, <font color="#cc0000">BB raises to $65</font>, UTG+1 folds,

Sooooo I'm at the table for the utg+1 80/20(all mr's)/1 drooler. I've been isolating him a ton so my range is quite wide here.

Villain is 28/20/4 so seemingly quite aggro but in the 50 or so hands I've been at table this is his 1st 3bet +he's oop and I raised earlyish. As it's his first 3bet there's obv no light 4bet history I can put to good use here.

What to people think about all 3 options(well sorta 4). I guess folding cant be contemplated these days so it mainly comes down to call or 4bet(and if 4bet standard size or shove). I'll put fold in the poll anyway and see what happens.

Re: Pf confusion
 

What did the donkey do?

Re: Pf confusion
 

Make it 4 bets to go.

Re: Pf confusion
 

I think shove&gt;4bet.

Re: Pf confusion
 

I recieved a PM from another poster the other day which asked this question, among others. I composed quite a long reply to him and thought one section might be appropriate here, so this is a copy-paste from a part of what I sent him. I'm doing this for 2 reasons. One I think it's an appropriate reply to your question, and two I want to vet my theory among my peers.

[ QUOTE ]
Unpaired Broadway Hands

There are two categories of unpaired broadway hands: AK and not AK. AK should be considered different from the other unpaired broadway hands because AK is unique: it’s a significant dog to only AA, against KK it’s a moderate dog, and against all other hands its no worse than a coinflip. The other broadway hands aren’t in the same league, equity-wise. Even the mighty ‘little slick’ KQs is a dog to a measly A2o.
AK is different in another way, too. When it improves on the flop to TPTK and you get the money in, you win far more often than if you made TPTK with any other hand. Domination simply doesn’t exist with AK. You can get in to a reverse-domination situation with AK (ie, AK vs A5 on an A-5-2 flop), but the same is true for all other BWay hands. In fact, all the broadway hands share the same weaknesses except wrt domination. That’s the only real difference once the flop comes.

What this boils down to is a decision about how to handle the BWay hands preflop. The basic question is, continue or fold? For all the hands except AK, I think the choice is clear: fold. The BWay hands are sketchy enough as it is. Add to that the possibility of domination, compounded by the opponent’s ever-narrowing range every time he raises, and the non-AK BWay hands are simply unplayable.

So now the next question is, how big of an impact does domination have on the decision to play AK? In other words, how much of our decision to fold, say, KQ was due to domination? Some, that’s for certain, and I think that with no other considerations we can deduce that it is somewhere between a little and a moderate amount. It will never be the major reason. (The major reason is that we’re probably beat.) So how do we narrow that down? I think it comes down to reads. How likely is it that this opponent is 3betting with a hand that isn’t AA or KK? Against some people the chance is zero; against others, much higher. You just have to know your man. Against the zero chance opponent, again the choice is clear: fold. Against the others it’s a judgement call. But once we decide to continue or fold, we still have to decide how to continue.

Depending on who you are you will have an instinctual reaction about how to continue if you do continue. Some people think the obvious choice is to push. Others just call. (A few people even raise something other than all-in, but without auguring in to this choice too much, I’ll just say that it’s my opinion that this is a bad idea ~100% of the time.) Most people are so established in their thinking that they think the other choice is “BAD” or “ALWAYS WRONG.” I think that thinking is too rigid. If for you the instinctual choice is to push, it can be right to just call. Conversely if you think it’s to call, pushing can be good too. In fact, I think that in general the choice is a fair bit closer than most people think.

Ok, so it’s all-in or call. How to decide? From my perspective, an all-in is a semi-bluff. After all, we don’t have the AA we are representing. We aren’t raising purely for value. In fact we’re not raising for value at all, since any hand we beat is probably going to fold unless they are pot-stuck. So we’re raising with the hope that some hand better than ours will fold. That’s a semi-bluff. As we know, if there is no chance that the opponent will fold then any semi-bluff is –EV.

I think that’s what it all comes down to. If the opponent won’t fold to a semi-bluff, just call. If he will, push. Implied odds are something of an issue when we just call, but not as much as I think people want to believe. Many people say that we can’t just call because if an Ace or King comes, we won’t get any more action. How realistic is that? How often is the opponent going to 3bet preflop and then just completely quit when an Ace comes? Not very often, in fact I’d say pretty much never. Now of course if they were semi-bluffing a hand like 76s they won’t give much or any more action, but then again they would also fold to a push preflop, so that issue is moot. Besides, the 76s will bluff an Ace-high flop more often that 0% of the time, so even here a preflop call is more +EV than the push. But against a hand like QQ we can often get one more bet out of him, maybe even more, especially if we check the flop behind him.

[/ QUOTE ]

Re: Pf confusion
 

I voted for a call, though probably half of the times I fold in this situation. This is higher stakes than I play, but I find that a pre-flop reraise indicates AA, AK, or KK about 80% of the time. Not sure if that holds true at these stakes. The only reason I didn't vote for fold is that you can't show people that you will let your raises go with no contest. Sometimes you'll be at a table with someone who will reraise you on a bluff if they sense that you will fold.

Re: Pf confusion
 

Grunch,

Nice post. This part however,

[ QUOTE ]
A few people even raise something other than all-in, but without auguring in to this choice too much, I’ll just say that it’s my opinion that this is a bad idea ~100% of the time.

[/ QUOTE ]

Can you elaborate further on this?

Re: Pf confusion
 

The major reason why I think a 4bet that is not all in is usually bad is because of postflop stack sizes. You will be left in a position where you will be virtually pot stuck to any hand, and you will be hamstrung in your ability to CB. Another reason is that I think we have limited FE on the flop if we decide to CB, and if we 4bet PF with AK it must be with the intention of CBing the flop when it is wise to do so.

Consider why you 4bet preflop at all. Is it because you think you have the best hand? I doubt it. If you get a call here, it's not from AJ. Rather, a 4bet is a semi-bluff. It's a bet that you'd like to not be called, but if you do you don't mind too much because you have some equity. But where does that equity come from? If you don't hit your A or K on the flop, are you going to quit? If so, wouldn't smooth-calling preflop be better?

I believe that if you are only going to put mmore chips in postflop with AK when you improve then you're better off not trying to forcibly retain the lead preflop. (I'm not saying fold) Conversely if you do forcibly retain the lead preflop, you must CB the flop when it is strategically wise to do so, if you have chips left. But if we just re-raise not all in preflop we're going to have about a pot-sized bet left. Any CB is effectively a push because we won't be able to fold correctly if we underbet and get raised. Moreover we probably have more FE by pushing preflop than we do by potting or underbetting a rag board when the opponent is extremely likely to have an overpair to the board.

Those are basically my thoughts...

Re: Pf confusion
 

paul,

I think in a vacuum, 4bet shoving is good, the problem is 1) balance 2) AQ doesnt call 3) you're turning your hand face up

So for these reasons, I actually think 4betting a standard size with AK is fine. A lot of the time people with AQ/AJ (and worse) will push (I've seen it sooo often). I think it folds out JJ/QQ just the same as a push or at least, nearly just as often as a push.

I really hate calling, altho, maybe if you can float/bluff with good enough frequencies, it could be OK and maybe optimal. I think it requires a read though.

Folding I just don't do

Re: Pf confusion
 

db,

[ QUOTE ]
A lot of the time people with AQ/AJ (and worse) will push (I've seen it sooo often). I think it folds out JJ/QQ just the same as a push or at least, nearly just as often as a push.

[/ QUOTE ]

It seems odd to me that you would suggest that AJ will push but JJ will fold.