nl AJs oop against aggressive opponent

[omgwtfnoway]

effective stacks are 50bb
opp is the button, raises ~70-75% of his hands.
so the button raises to 4xbb and i have AJs.
my line is to reraise to ~20xbb and call a push because i think we may be a little too deep to reraise allin. what do you think? in this situation i think he'd shove with 55+, AT+, KQs and maybe KQo and KJs.

also, if you agree with the preflop line, assuming he calls (unlikely?). what are your thoughts for the flop? should i be willing to get allin w/ 2nd pair TP? overs and a backdoor flush draw?

[omgwtfnoway]

i should add that my opponent is very loose in calling 3bets, that's why my raise is so large.

[APXG]

If you are 3betting to 20bbs with AJs and he flatcalls this light like you specified, you are essentially pushing 100% of flops with 30bb behind and 40bb pot. Without too much metagame considerations, if he is calling with most of his 70-75% range, this is very profitable. It certainly depends on your history with him / image, etc - I assume he will pick up on the stop-n-go nature of this play pretty fast.

50bb is a pretty tough stack to effectively 3bet with. Ideally you would want a set up where you could standard c-bet your preflop 3bet or check-raise all in flop, but neither of these plays can be executed in conjunction with a 3bet only 50bbs deep, as the smallest we could keep the pot is 24bb, which still commits our 38bb stack without effective defense and him allows to autobet 12-15bbs on any flop we check and take it down. Check-raising all in with A high is pretty marginal and he knows this - thus the autobet.

If you feel confident postflop vs this villain, I would forgo the 3bet and leave yourself 46bb in 8bb pot. If not, your plan sounds fine, though I would raise to 17-18bb and autopot any flop. This is exploitable if villain tightens preflop 3bet-calling range, though, or if its already tighter than most of his 70-75%.

The odds to call a shove preflop are ridiculous - I think you are breakeven against something like 88+,AQ+, which he is shoving like always, but probably many others if he's as crazy as you say. Shoving 55 or KJ into a 20bb with 50bbs is pretty suicidal, but of course I have no clue who this guy is.

[jay_shark]

If you re-raise to 20X the BB and he shoves all in with the aforementioned hand range , then your hand has a 40.5% equity . If this opponent shoves all in , then you'd be getting about
(4+20+50) :30 pot odds which is 2.46:1 .

Since you have a 40.5% equity , you would need pot odds of at least 1.46:1 to make the call correct .

2.46>1.46 so clearly if you raise 20XX the BB , then you must call his shove !! The only time I would shove all in is if I expect this player to call with many second best hands .

The question now becomes , is it better to raise to 20XBB or to smooth call ? Since you've added the fact that he's a loose caller , then raising will certainly increase your EV more than smooth calling .

Remember that he'll shove with only 8.4/75=11.2% of all hands that he would raise 4xBB with . The rest of the time , 88.8% of the time , he'll call your 20xBB raise which is money in the bank . On the other hand if your opponent is significantly better postflop than you are , then it's not too bad to just call .

If your opponent does call , then there will be 44BB's in the pot and you're oop with 30BB's left. Since your opponent is a loose caller , you should be prepared to shove all in with any flop .

[APXG]

Jay,

Agreed completely as we essentially made the same post, but what does flatcalling OOP against an opponent who is BETTER than you postflop and raises 75% of his hands accomplish?

His ability to extract an edge postflop against you depends on small pots and big effective stacks, and you are essentially handing this to him out of position. The biggest obstacle for me against a player I feel good against postflop is him pushing all-in. I can no longer bluff him even if he's weak, nor can I find out any info (a major postflop edge) if he pushes 100% of flops like OP has the option to.

[omgwtfnoway]

so against an opponent who is lag from the button i'm always going to play AJs.
against a player who plays poorly postflop i can call for pot control and extract value.
against a player who will play a tight range aggressively to my 3bet (JJ+ AQ+) i should also call, not for pot control but because my raise has less (maybe negative) value. (not sure about this one, seems a bit too weak for to me)
against a player who will react loose-aggressively to my 3bet or plays very well postflop i should overbet raise the pot for value and call an allin based on the pot odds. if my opponent smooth calls i'm shoving most flops.
did i get that right?

what about a player who will be tag against my 3bet and plays well after the flop? against this player i don't know whether i'd rather take the same line as above, raise smaller and fold to an allin or reraise allin.

[jay_shark]

This is my thinking .

If you raise 20XBB and check fold if you don't hit , then a great player will win the pot with a bet often enough to make a re-raise from you negative EV . A successful player has to recognize when a stop and go play may be the best alternative . That is , to shove all in even with only ace high which would probably be the best hand anyway .

Let me summarize :

If this player would call your shove preflop with the top 75% of all hands , then shoving is clearly better than raising 20XBB . However , if he's the type to raise and call your re-raise but fold around 90% to your shove, then it's preferable that you re-raise . Lastly , if you raise to 20XBB but check and fold if you don't hit , then re-raising can only decrease your EV .

[APXG]

[ QUOTE ]
so against an opponent who is lag from the button i'm always going to play AJs.
against a player who plays poorly postflop i can call for pot control and extract value.
against a player who will play a tight range aggressively to my 3bet (JJ+ AQ+) i should also call, not for pot control but because my raise has less (maybe negative) value. (not sure about this one, seems a bit too weak for to me)
against a player who will react loose-aggressively to my 3bet or plays very well postflop i should overbet raise the pot for value and call an allin based on the pot odds. if my opponent smooth calls i'm shoving most flops.
did i get that right?

what about a player who will be tag against my 3bet and plays well after the flop? against this player i don't know whether i'd rather take the same line as above, raise smaller and fold to an allin or reraise allin.

[/ QUOTE ]

1. Against an opponent who opens 75% on the button and then only calls / overshoves vs. a 3bet with JJ+,AQ+, you should be 3betting with essentially any 2, and certainly AJs. Line is 3bet to 12bb, fold to preflop shove, check-fold flop. Same applies even if your 3bet is bigger.

2. Plan vs. a loose 3bet-caller is correct. You're shoving 100% of flops.

3. Against a TAG 3bet calling range its tougher and requires better feel because a flop bet commits us, but the rough plan is checking a lot of flops that squarely hit our opponents call range - which is essentially broadway flops that miss us. Any other flop - bet 20bb into 24bb pot with 38 behind and call a push, especially rag / uncoordinated boards where you have 6+ outs. There's other lines here though that could be better depending on your grasp of the match / reads / feel / etc., so more exploring on your own will leave you better prepared.