[bicyclekick]

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Definitely don't 3-bet preflop FWIW.

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Wow, you say that with a lot of authority and from what I've heard you are a very successful player, so there must be something I am missing. What is your cutoff for 3-betting Ax here and why?

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Unimproved postflop, with A7o and the lead, you'll rarely be getting better hands to fold or worse hands to call (incorrectly), meaning that if you reraise preflop it's got to be for value. Your equity with A7o vs a button opening range is around 52-53%, which generally isn't a big enough edge to push for value.


You know how when you're on the turn/river you need well above 50% equity to raise purely for value (67% when they're always reraising correctly and never folding)? The same applies preflop, in that you need well above 50% to reraise for value because you re-open the betting (the fact that he/she may delay reraising better hands by opting not to cap is meaningless if we're going to autobet the flop anyway).


So basically I'm saying the nature of A7o is that reraising = value raise, not a bluff, and that A7o isn't strong enough to value raise.


Of course if you had QJs, hand with similar equity vs a button opening range, the benefit of taking the lead is that you'll frequently bluff out better hands postflop.


In answer to which Ax I'd 3-bet, I'd only do it if I felt that the value was there - my test is whether I'd be able to correctly value bet the river unimproved much. So probably AQ/AJ (which are around 60% equity in this spot), but if the opponent doesn't check behind the flop much, then I'll tend to call these hands preflop anyway.

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This is one of the best posts I've seen on here in a long time minus the fact that I really don't want my opponents understanding this.

Keeping pots small when out of position is a very important concept most up and coming players don't fully understand, partially probably because they haven't played enough of them vs tough opponents who will fully take advantage of their positional advantage.

They have been beating games because while it's a mistake, many of their opponents are making the same mistake plus many other larger mistakes. I really feel like it's one of the main things holding a lot of otherwise good players back.