B&M 3/6 Rivered two pair in huge pot

[mikeca]

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AJo is not a good multi-way hand, so I don’t really like this.

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this was your own quote, why aren't you taking your own advice?

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I thought about folding it when it was 2 bets back to me pre-flop. The 3-better was a LAGgy action Asian player and I didn’t take the cap as indicating a hand that dominated mine.

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SB was the 3-better, he is still left to act - what range of cards do you put him on? Why are you peeling with a hand that has tremendous reverse implied odds? You might be playing to 2-3 outs at best assuming top pair is good (it might not be in such a huge multi-way pot). AK is commonly played this way by passive players in the SB and they usually call down because in their minds they cannot fold such a strong hand pre-flop.
remember you are not closing the action... this is a very dangerous line when you have a hand that has high reverse implied odds.

fold the flop. Remember an A overcard might only be worth 1 out if someone else has a bigger kicker.


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The SB was a LAGgy Asian man. He had already checked the flop as the first to act. He might have been planning to check raise. I don’t recall him check raising any flops. He sometimes check raised on the turn, probably when he hit a draw. His preflop 3-betting range would be pretty wide. I was not closing the action, but all the players remaining to act had already checked. Other than the SB, they were passive players and I would be very surprised if they check raised the flop.

I agree there is a risk here that someone has a passively played AK. UTG+1 is the most likely candidate. He had very passively played a AQo vs my QJ on a Q high board, but he was also betting at flops with second or third pair or air. It is hard to figure how many outs I have in this situation. I should have two A outs or I could already be drawing dead. In playing this hand I was following the SSHE advice that it is a small mistake to call one bet in a huge pot when you might be drawing dead, but it is a huge mistake to fold and cost yourself the whole pot.

Out of curiosity, I ran PokerStove on this hand on the flop board against 2 players playing random cards and 4 playing all pairs, broadways and suited cards. The AJ hand won about 5% of the time. To me that makes the flop peel at 30:1 ok. In a normal sized pot, even after my raise preflop, this should clearly be folded.

There is no question that the SSHE advice about not folding long shot draws in big pots can easily be taken too far, but I don’t think I took it too far in this particular case.

[mikeca]

While results don’t matter, I thought I would tell you the results. I did win this pot, as most people figured, although I felt like a fish who just called along and sucked out on the river. UTG+1 showed red Q2, I think hearts for a bluff. I showed my two pair and everyone else mucked without showing. I suspect the other players that called the river had some piece of the board. I did get one or two overcalls (I don’t remember exactly), so it is still not clear to me if a raise would have made this pot bigger or not.