What value do you put on this sort of play...?

[PantsOnFire]

NL Holdem, tourney or SnG. Still decent stacks related to the blinds. Everybody's M is good and we're playing poker here.

You are in the BB with AKo. The guy on your right (SB) is playing a little wild, definitely aggressive with some success thus far. It is folded to SB and he raises 3xBB. You call against some desire to reraise. His range here is obviously large.

Flop is AJ7 rainbow. He bets into you pot sized. You call.
Turn is 2. He bets again 1/2 pot this time. You call.
River is 5. He checks. The read here is that there is no way he has an A. He would not check the river.

OK, so maybe that isn't ideal poker. In the end, this is one of those situations on the river where he will likely fold to a river bet. He might have a J and call a 1/2 pot bet but it is more likely he has nothing based on previous reads.

I figure a check, and thus a showing of cards is best here. I'd like to see his trash and at the same time him to see my good hand. It might have the effect of slowing him down later against my BB or other times when I position on him.

Any thoughts?

[veggies]

If you think he will call a half pot bet, bet half the pot. It is a tournament, your goal is to accumulate chips. If you really want him to see you had a good hand, just show him when all is said and done. If he calls and mucks, most sites hand histories will still tell you what he had. I just don't think you should be passing up chips when in a tourney.

[tsearcher]

Seems like the only thing you are showing him is that you are incredibly tight and are afraid to raise.

[PantsOnFire]

[ QUOTE ]
Seems like the only thing you are showing him is that you are incredibly tight and are afraid to raise.

[/ QUOTE ]
You missed my point completely. This is not how I would normally play this hand. I didn't post this and ask "Hey, did I play this OK?".

Sometimes you play out of your ordinary way for advertising purposes. You raise once and awhile with trash. You call with your flush draw and sometimes you raise with it.

However, my question was, can the value I lost in the way I played this hand be made up and then some later on?

So maybe giving an image of incredibly tight and afraid to raise can be exploited. Is the value of that greater than the chips I could have won in this hand? That's the key question because really we are not totally concerned with maximizing the chips won every hand but with the chips won over the course of a session.

If your opinion is that it is more important to maximize the value hand by hand, then that's fine. I appreciate your opinion.

[PantsOnFire]

[ QUOTE ]
If you think he will call a half pot bet, bet half the pot. It is a tournament, your goal is to accumulate chips. If you really want him to see you had a good hand, just show him when all is said and done. If he calls and mucks, most sites hand histories will still tell you what he had. I just don't think you should be passing up chips when in a tourney.

[/ QUOTE ]
Please see my response to tsearcher. My question is whether or not it is +EV to pass up chips here to win more (or lose less) later.

For example, if you have been getting one trash hand after another, you probably need to raise eventually otherwise your table image will be tight as a drum and you won't get paid off when you do get good hole cards. So it is obviously -EV to raise with J8s in MP but you are doing it to set up later raises with premium hands.

I might not have explained this clearly enough in my post but that is what I am getting at.

[tsearcher]

I understand your point. I just didn't explain mine very fully. If you are playing a SNG then you are concerned only with maximizing chips and this kind of advertising is pointless.

Even in a MTT it doesn't make much sense. Let's say you both start the hand with 75BB before posting the blinds. Now villain bets 3BB you call. 6BB in pot, Hero and Villain have 72BB. Villain bets pot on the flop and hero calls.There are now 18BB in pot. Hero and villain each have 66BB. Villain bets half pot on turn leaving him with 57 BB and the pot has 27BB, almost half your stack. Can you see where I am going.

If you really think you are ahead at this point you can stack villain and double up. I can't imagine a scenario where any advertising would be better than that.

Now one thing I don't understand is what are you trying to advertise in the first place?

[AKQJ10]

I don't have a huge problem with it until the river. You're basically trapping against a likely two- or five-outer.

Not betting the river for value is criminal. You've underrepped your hand so it just looks like you're trying to take the pot away. Any ace and many jacks will call a 1/2 pot bet here; the ideal bet size is very read dependent.

Now, against a very peculiar player who would fold a weaker ace to your river bet but check to induce a bluff with two pair or better, checking behind is probably OK. But that's getting on toward 3rd or 4th level thinking, and an opponent that weak-tight yet savvy about inducing bluffs is pretty rare.

[Gonso]

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Now one thing I don't understand is what are you trying to advertise in the first place?

[/ QUOTE ]
I don't either... this definately reads as weak/tight. Here you have a real hand + position on a very aggressive player, and yet you are letting him take control of the betting. This is not the kind of advertisement you're looking for.

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Not betting the river for value is criminal.

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Not me. Having missed an almost mandatory reraise on either the flop or the turn, or both, I don't think the river is a good place for bet here. I say that because you have no idea what your opponent has, since you failed to bet - he could easily have two pair or better.

It's fine if you're willing to call an all-in reraise here.

[Covert Ops...]

I have to agree with Gonso.

With an aggressive player, I would have probably flat called the flop, with the intention of reraising the turn.

The turn is a pretty safe card, although ther is no suit information and there a good chance that it might have put out a flush draw. I think a reraise here is important. there is 18bb in the pot, and he's betting 9bb on the turn.

I think i would be reraising to about 25-30bb here.
This way you get some information from him. If he reraises you, you have a decision to make. He folds and you win, or he calls and could very well check to you on the river.


I think the whole "advertising" that your doing is pretty pointless in a MTT. What if you get moved next hand, or the table breaks to even other tables out.

If this happens, all of that "advertising" you just did ended up costing you chips you should have had.
You should be trying to accumulate as much chips as possible, when you have the opportunities to do so. This was one of them.

I can see doing this "advertising" in a cash game being a little more benificial, as you can control when you leave the table.

[SplawnDarts]

I agree with everything said up to this point about the non-value of advertising. Especially in a short tourney where you will likely never see the opponents again. I'm reminded of something Bob Ciaffone said: There is no advertising budget. Play according to the situation initially at hand (ie. your A game), figure out how others see you, and then make that image work for you by giving them what they don't expect & changing gears.

As far as the actual hand, you should have popped him preflop, and again on the flop or on the turn. Having failed to do any of those, you're now clueless about what he has, so checking the river is probably fine. But the overall line stinks.