Protecting weak hand in a large pot

[marchron]

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I can't do much about the all in fellow. I don't hate my odds of winning against him, because he's sitting there with ATC. That's probably why his presence was glossed over in the posts.

However, the presence of AI villain and dry side pot make check/call the better option, IMHO. I don't think I am folding this in 13-bet pot on the river.

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This hand's been a splinter in my brain all day.

If you check and Villain bets, you have two seperate pots in play, so we should consider them seperately.

First, let's ignore Button and what he has and focus on the heads-up all-in showdown with UTG+1 for the 11.5 BB main pot. You're not giving him nearly enough credit for at least a halfway decent hand. Yeah, if he only had 1 SB at the start and stuck it in preflop, it's probably A2C. But he three-bet preflop, then two-and-a-half-bet on the flop, so unless he's tilting so much that he has complete and utter disregard for his last $3.30, he expects to have a decent ROI for this hand.

What would be his range under normal circumstances? Maybe 99+? Let's add a couple more hands in case he is donking off. Give him 77+ and AQ+. You lose to all the pairs: 77 (3 total hands), 88-QQ (5 hands times 6 ways apiece = 30 total hands), and KK-AA (2 hands times 3 ways apiece = 6 total hands). You chop with any other AK (9 total hands) and beat every AQ except hearts (12 total hands, 11 wins, 1 loss). So by my count you'll be 11-40-9 against his range, giving you 25.83% equity in just that showdown.

Now let's consider the river action HU between you and Button. It's a dry side pot, so calling is laying 1 BB to win 1 BB, giving you only 50/50 odds. Of course, you have an overlay here because some of the times you snap off his bluff, you'll win his 1 BB plus you'll go on to win the main pot versus All-In Boy. In fact, you'll win that 25.83% of the time.

So how often does Button have to be bluffing for you to be +EV to call? Let's set x as his bluffing percentage. Therefore (1 - x) is the times he's got you beat, and .2583x is the chance that you'll win the main pot versus All-In Boy after snapping him off.

So to be +EV, here's your total equation:

x(1) + (1 - x)(-1) + (.2583x)(11.5) > 0
x + (-1) + x + 2.97x > 0
4.97x - 1 > 0
4.97x > 1
x > 1/4.97 = 20.11%

Would Button be bluffing here more than 1 time in 5? I doubt it, simply because he's in position. He's going to take the free showdown a majority of the time, since you've made it clear you have at least AK. For him to bluff, he'd have to legitimately think he can force you off a better hand so that he can stake his claim to the main pot, and that's just not going to happen a lot of the time.

Furthermore, your breakeven bluff percentage is going to be lower, since what would he be bluffing with? AK or AQ, most likely. AJ probably doesn't put that much action in preflop and on the flop, and something even less like KQ would furthermore have absolutely no point in betting, since he's never going to get a call from you with a worse hand and he's almost certainly going to lose the main pot, too. The upshot is that the kind of hand he'd need to bluff with takes cards out of the deck for All-In Boy to have, and those happen to be the exact cards you NEED All-In Boy to have in order draw any share of the pot (remember, that will only happen if he also has AK or non-[img]/images/graemlins/heart.gif[/img]s AQ).

If you check and Button bets, it's probably not a bluff. And if it is, it's probably AK. So you're chopping the river bet, losing the main pot a ton of the time, and only taking half of it if both of you win. If he has AK and bluffs you out, no big whoop, because we've already determined that three-quarters of the time you'll win nothing from this pot, anyway.

If you insist on putting a bet in here, you have to bet it yourself. It's a dumb idea, because he's calling any pocket pair, but it's still less dumb than check/calling because you might get him to lay down AK, stealing his half of the equity from the all-in showdown.