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Old 10-26-2006, 12:43 PM
MrWookie MrWookie is offline
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Join Date: Feb 2005
Location: Treating my drinking problem
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Default Re: MLET Challenge: Creemore Springs

Bona,

You're a bloody nit. Putting a CO open raiser at a 2+2 table where people are being forced to play more hands than they might otherwise would on a range of the top 10% of hands is wwaaaaaayyyyy too tight. I'm thinking top 30% minimum, top 40% more likely, and it could be top anytwocards% depending on what his cards look like at his other tables. If they suck at his other tables, he's likely to just play his position here rather than his cards. Your hand is amazingly good here against his range, and the deception value you'll get from just calling is small. I think 3betting here is mandatory.

Your flop donkbet will look uncharacteristically weak to most 2+2ers, so I expect a raise from many more of his hands than just the nuts or good draws. He expects you to c/r with any pair or better or any legit draw, so this donk looks awfully suspicious. I'd put you on something like 2x, 65, weak spades, and occasionally 22, 44, 42, Q2s, Q4s. His A high (a big portion of his range) is good here a lot, and he might get you to fold some of your 2x hands if he's aggressive. If he's smoked, he's going to find out very quickly.

After you just call the flop, the only hands you really have to worry about him betting are the low spades and some less likely low gutshots if he's really gotten out of line. He'll bet his A's almost all the time to get you to fold a 6 outer or perhaps 2x, he'll bet 2x or 4x for the same reason, and he'll be betting anything better for value. He takes a free card there very, very seldom. And yet you donk. Now what does that look like to him? In a battle of good players, it is saying one of two things, one, you're not taking a free card, dammit, or two, I'm looking to 3bet. And occasionally, this 2nd donk is an odd bluff. What this bet will tend to do is get called by just about any made hand that is not KQ or better, get called by draws, and fold some truely hopeless hands. Occasionally good players will semibluff their draws again, but this tends to happen later in the game, not right off the bat. If you get raised here, it's really not all that good for you, so you won't be anxious to 3bet.

All in all, I don't like your plan for this hand, and I think you need a lot of practice playing with good players and learning how they think. Given what I described above, the plans I like for this hand are (assuming you just called preflop):

c/r/cap flop, b/c turn, c/c river (or bet if just called on the turn)
b/3b/call flop, b/c turn (c/c if he capped you), b/c river (c/c if he was the turn aggressor)
or finally
b/c flop, c/r/c turn, b/c river (or c/c if he 3bet you on the turn)

I don't think I like a plan of c/r/call flop, c/r/call turn, b/c river (c/c if he 3bet you), since that plan has you pretty well pwned if he has better than TPTK.

The way you played this hand just doesn't get enough money in the pot when you have the best hand. It only gets as much in as my proposed plans when you have the worst of his range.

Edited to add: In the plan I didn't like, I'm not planning to c/r the turn if he just calls my flop c/r. Instead, it's a plan to forego the flop cap in favor of a turn c/r.
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