a really tough and interesting hand
 

UTG is 21/17/aggro. he plays a lot and is very solid. i've never noticed anything remarkable from him but he's the type that just doesn't give anything up

SB plays a ton, he is 27/18/aggro. he strikes me as relatively unsophisticated for some reason (that could be way off), but very solid and can bluff. before this session i didn't think of him as a 3-bettor/squeezer, but today several times i have called MP raisers in the CO and he's squeezed from the blinds. 2 of the times i took a flop and gave up when he c-bet. we've played a lot together and i don't think he sees me as a pushover. i've played some hands very tricky vs him in the past. but today i just keep folding to him. he used to play mid limit LHE and post on 2p2, but from his play i'd guess he's pretty far-removed from his limit career

the postflop play is very interesting as well, but first i want to look at preflop. i think a case can be made for calling, folding, or shoving.

i have a few questions. what is UTG's range after raising UTG then calling 10% of his stack to a presumably strong 3-bet. and what's the likelihood that SB doesn't realize how strong UTG and i should be? i'd suspect a lot of players wouldn't squeeze with a SC or junk like that.

Full Tilt Poker
No Limit Holdem Ring game
Blinds: $5/$10
6 players
Converter

Stack sizes:
UTG: $980
Hero: $1008.50
CO: $934.25
Button: $2452
SB: $1810.25
BB: $1063

Pre-flop: (6 players) Hero is UTG+1 with Q[img]/images/graemlins/spade.gif[/img] Q[img]/images/graemlins/heart.gif[/img]
<font color="#cc0000">UTG raises to $35</font>, Hero calls, 2 folds, <font color="#cc0000">SB raises to $150</font>, BB folds, UTG calls, Hero calls.

i felt the likelihood of UTG having AA or KK was too high to shove here. i was more worried about him than the SB, who i was ready to take a stand against. also, i felt if i take a flop, my implied odds and great relative and absolute position might make this a good spot to call. if SB bets and UTG calls i'm almost certainly dead

Re: a really tough and interesting hand
 

Yeah I agree with your reasoning preflop, calling seems better by a definite margin.

Re: a really tough and interesting hand
 

the thing though, is if you shove, you will get called ultra light.

Re: a really tough and interesting hand
 

Yeah sure, but there is a reraise and a call already, they figure to have good hands fairly often, and we can play the flop with maximum information if we call.

Re: a really tough and interesting hand
 

[ QUOTE ]
the thing though, is if you shove, you will get called ultra light.

[/ QUOTE ]


what's ultra light? if i'm sb and mp call-shoves i'm putting him on QQ-TT, AK maybe weighted more toward JJ-TT. i don't see him calling with AJ or anything like that. and utg, who could still have AA-KK, makes it so sb is far from closing the action

Re: a really tough and interesting hand
 

Looks good.

If SB leads a low flop then you can probably fold lol.

Re: a really tough and interesting hand
 

whats ur reasoning for cold call pf? because you expect an SB squeeze?

Re: a really tough and interesting hand
 

I also wonder about the flatcall of the UTG raise... You mention he's aggro and plays a ton of hands. Isn't that an argument for reraising PF ?

Re: a really tough and interesting hand
 

Josh, I disagree w/ UTG having a better hand than you a lot of the time. From your description of him, I would expect him to reraise there a large % of the time as he is giving you great odds to come along by not 4-betting. This is the one of the few situation where good (even tricky) players including myself will almost always 4-bet preflop w/ AA/KK. I also do not understand your cold call preflop and would practically never do it in this spot, but since you did I think shoving PF is best. I agree that you will get called by a few hands worse than yours because of your line. FWIW, if you do decide to assume you're behind enough here to just cold call PF, I think you should play your hand completely for set value unless both villains check to you on multiple streets (very unlikely).

Re: a really tough and interesting hand
 

I think your preflop reasoning is wrong. You have a known squeezer in the SB who just attempted to squeeze again. An aggressive UTG as you describe him who just flats call what is apparently a squeeze with AA/KK??? Allowing you to call with implied odds some goofy hand? I think you have the best hand here a big percentage of the time.

First off I would reraise preflop as it would make your life infinitely easier. You take out the squeezer and play poker in position or know you are up against a pretty big hand if 4 bet. What I think happened here is you overthought this because of an aggro UTG. UTG thought process was something along the lines of: Hero has some sooted cards or some high cards and just called, SB is squeezin again I am not letting him squeeze my UTG raise. I am pretty sure if i just call MP will just call also and we all take a flop.