[Sunny Mehta]

Hi CMAR,


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If this was true, it would never be correct to call a PFR with a small PP.

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In fact, it IS a big leak to call large pf raises with small PP's trying to "set mine" against good players. Most of the time you end up overestimating your implied odds.


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Button only needs to call 6bb. Since MP1 is coming along, pot on the flop is 30bb.

This is really no different than if UTG and UTG+1 limp and MP1 raises to 6bb and button calls with 44 or 9Ts. Well, except button has better pot odds to call in our re-raise hand.

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Better "immediate" pot odds dictated by his own decision to raise in the first place is not the best way of analyzing global NL expectation. But I do agree that the player in between makes it closer. (Keep in mind that hero had no idea the player in between would limp/coldcall a 3-bet.)


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So even assuming button plays "no set no bet" and folds any flop, regardless of texture, if he doesn't hit his set, he's getting priced in.

If you make a standard cbet of 20bb every time (as you did in this hand) that puts the pot at 50bb.

If you have AK and fold to button's raise when you don't hit and he has a set, button's wins 44bb for his 6bb call or 7.3:1.

So even when you have AK (or any other hand you cbet/fold) and fold, he's almost getting odds to set mine anyway.

If you stack off every time you flop overpairs then he's calling 6bb to win 120bb or 20:1 which more than makes up for any loss of EV when you have AK(etc) unless you're limp/re-raising all the time, in which case you're vulnerable to being 4-bet by anyone with half a brain. Or you're going to tell me you never cbet when your AK/etc misses. Which would be even more exploitable...

And what about when your AK hits TPTK vs a set?

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Sure if the button will only call with small pocket pairs, fold all other hands, fold any non-set flop, never stack off with a smaller overpair, etc., perhaps there are better lines. Because clearly most opponents have a perfect formulation of your range and play accordingly perfect to the Fundamental Theorem of Poker. [img]/images/graemlins/wink.gif[/img]

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I don't generally limp/re-raise but I don't think it's a bad play. However you have to make a real re-raise and force your opponents to make a mistake if they want to see a flop.

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I fail to see how those two things have the correlation you are taking for granted.

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As played, this hand is butchered except for very specific circumstances - villains fold too easily to 3bets/limp re-raises. Which is true of just about no live games, anywhere. And in which case we should be making this kind of play with a HUGE range of hands. And we've just wasted a lot of the value of our KK because we could probably have extracted a lot more value by playing in more straightforwardly instead of folding out button prematurely.

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I'm not sure I understand what you mean. A) Live players are bad and play too loose to begin with? I agree with that. B) You're saying to raise bigger to "punish" them? I don't agree. Most live players exhibit the tendencies to play too loose/passive EXCEPT when you make big threatening bets. For example, a typical live player might raise small on the button with like KJs and then willingly call a small reraise (but fold to a big reraise), and then continuously (and even unknowingly) call off his stack in steady increments postflop with one pair. Which is why it behooves you to hit your target SPR in that case.


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I realize a big part of the point here is to extract maximum value when your opponent flops a TPTK type hand or holds a smaller overpair.

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Amongst other things, yes. That's a huge part of his typical range and his proclivities that you're ignoring in favor of a "FTOP Perfect" opponent.


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However, you generally don't have to outplay yourself (FPS) to do that if your opponents are so bad they're calling 3bets with KQ.

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Eh, depends on how bad, but not sure I agree. Bad live opponents are VERY sensitive to specific dollar amounts. (i.e.- they deem bets "big" or "small" not by any kind of logical ratio, but simply by its dollar amount)


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Nor do you have to put yourself in massively -EV situations in order to keep them guessing.

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You put yourself in positive EV situations for many reasons, some involving range balance/info control, and some involving straight value.


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Yes, if you're going to limp/re-raise, do it with AK and 78s sometimes too. But why wouldn't you make a proper re-raise with those hands as well?

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I don't exactly know what you mean by "proper". To me, the "proper" thing to do is always different based on your opponent's range, his perception of your range, his stack size, the other players at the table, the gear he's in, the gear the table's in, and whole host of other factors.


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If we're making the small re-raise to fold villains out cheaply, then why are we stacking off so easily post-flop?

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To both parts of your question: you're not, necessarily.


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If we're raising small to keep worse hands in, why are we stacking off so easily when any reasonable player's range is crushing us if they want to play for stacks? None of this makes any sense.

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The first part of your sentence is incongruent with the second part imo.


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A big part of learning to play FRNL well is learning when to fold overpairs.

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I don't agree. You could teach a novice to play full ring live NL profitably at low stakes and never even mention "folding overpairs" as a bedrock strategy. Furthermore, there are a whole host of fundamental mistakes that I see players make that are WAY bigger leaks than folding overpairs. Again, it totally depends on game conditions and player types, but in many games it's probably profitable to never fold strong overpairs.


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Putting yourself in situations where you can't fold your overpairs and you give your opponents odds to head-hunt against you is beyond horrible.

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CMAR, I think your post was well stated and obviously very thoughtful, I just think in general it overestimates typical opponents' ranges, implied odds, and tendencies. Totally game theoretic approaches to analyzing hands are great thought exercises, but they can end up in never-ending cycles of "well then he could just do THIS" and "well then he could counter by just doing THIS" and so on. At some point it becomes crucial to just define the actual player's likely range and proclivities - and then usually the answer gets a lot clearer.

Take care,

Sunny