Stud hi: What's your plan when 3-bet on 3rd by an overpair?

[Micturition Man]

Say you're in a full game and everyone folds to a live A, which completes into you with (8s5c)8d and the 2h BI.

IMO you have a mandatory reraise here as you should be significantly ahead of the A's range, and you have a substantial amount of fold equity (specifically he should fold any non-pair, non-3-flush, non-overcards).

But say after reraising the A 3-bets you.

What is your general plan if...

1. You're sure this means he has AA.
2. You think he very likely has AA but he could have a few hands you currently beat (like A22 or AK9s).

It seems to me that if you know for sure he has AA the best play here is to call all the way down to 7th unless he visibly improves or your cards are super dead on 5th, and then fold 7th if you have not made two pair.

But if you think there's an outside chance he has a hand you beat you can't fold 7th. I wonder if it's correct to fold 5th in these cases, even though the pot is really huge, if you have not developed a somewhat favorable board.

Actually as I write this I think I have convinced myself that you should fold 5th in this latter scenario unless your board has developed somewhat well (e.g. a 3 flush).

It just feels really painful to me to fold on 5th when there are about 5 big bets in there. Stud is such a pot odds sensitive game.

[electrical]

I don't think your split Eights with a little kicker is significantly ahead of a raising Ace's range: pair not necessarily smaller than Eights w/Ace kicker, Aces, Three-flush, three overcards, trips, AKx.

I think the raise is unnecessary because the B-I is probably folding and you'll have it heads-up regardless. I actually think playing at all is bad, since the pot is small and you will not know if two small pair is ahead with any certainty.

Two small is a payoff hand anyway. Why try to make a hand that costs you money when you make it and also when you don't. Fold Third for free and move on.

[Andy B]

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It seems to me that if you know for sure he has AA the best play here is to call all the way down to 7th unless he visibly improves or your cards are super dead on 5th, and then fold 7th if you have not made two pair.

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I think this makes the most sense.

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But if you think there's an outside chance he has a hand you beat you can't fold 7th. I wonder if it's correct to fold 5th in these cases, even though the pot is really huge, if you have not developed a somewhat favorable board.

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This reminds me of an article I've been meaning to write for several months.

[PokrLikeItsProse]

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Say you're in a full game and everyone folds to a live A, which completes into you with (8s5c)8d and the 2h BI.

IMO you have a mandatory reraise here as you should be significantly ahead of the A's range, and you have a substantial amount of fold equity (specifically he should fold any non-pair, non-3-flush, non-overcards).


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Do you think that you have a mandatory reraise here with any playable hand? If not, how do you avoid giving away the strength of your hand? If your strategy is to call down anyways, wouldn't you be better off calling sometimes with your medium-strength hands that have potential showdown possibilities unimproved or lightly improved and semibluff-raising with some worse hands (as well as your best ones) where you want to maximize fold equity?

If your opponent will always continue with a bet on fourth (and perhaps fifth) if you just call, what about sometimes delaying your raise until a later street? Just because a reraise might be +EV (and I'm not claiming that it is), a delayed raise might be more +EV?

[PoorLawyer]

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Say you're in a full game and everyone folds to a live A, which completes into you with (8s5c)8d and the 2h BI.

IMO you have a mandatory reraise here as you should be significantly ahead of the A's range, and you have a substantial amount of fold equity (specifically he should fold any non-pair, non-3-flush, non-overcards).


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Do you think that you have a mandatory reraise here with any playable hand? If not, how do you avoid giving away the strength of your hand? If your strategy is to call down anyways, wouldn't you be better off calling sometimes with your medium-strength hands that have potential showdown possibilities unimproved or lightly improved and semibluff-raising with some worse hands (as well as your best ones) where you want to maximize fold equity?

If your opponent will always continue with a bet on fourth (and perhaps fifth) if you just call, what about sometimes delaying your raise until a later street? Just because a reraise might be +EV (and I'm not claiming that it is), a delayed raise might be more +EV?

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I like the thinking here. If you say you are going to see the river with your 8s and no kicker ( I think I go with electrical on this one and fold this a majority of the time), I think sometimes waiting until 4th or 5th to raise can be a good play...unless you improve you get to act last. If villain is on a total bluff, he might give up right away to a raise (though that seems very rare). If you are going to see the river regardless, might as well buy a free card if you want one. If you get 3 bet you can probably fold.

[Micturition Man]

I think folding 3rd has to be wrong here. If I'm folding 3rd here the A should be completing 100% and showing a huge profit.

As it stands I think the A should be raising a very large % anyway, which is why I think the reraise is profitable.

The hands you listed, except AKx, are all the hands he will be calling my raise with. But that ignores all the hands he'll be folding (any non-hand that has a card equal to or below 8).

I think just calling is a lot more defensible than folding, but I still don't like it because it lets him catch a hand, or catch a favorable board and force me to fold FTOP incorrectly on 5th.

BTW 885 is a 60/40 favorite over a random A upcard. (Though of course the A should not necessarily be raising 100%).

[Micturition Man]

You may be right about the flat-call. The reason I am reluctant to do it though is that I think we have substantial fold equity on 3rd, and also I think our opponent has substantial fold-equity if we just call and let him keep bluffing when he catches some semi-scare cards.

As for the possiblity of folding I talked about that in another post. I really don't see how eight's can possibly be a fold here. If we're folding 8's we're giving the A a hugely profitable steal spot which I don't think is warranted just by having a A up.

[PoorLawyer]

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I think folding 3rd has to be wrong here. If I'm folding 3rd here the A should be completing 100% and showing a huge profit.


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Do we care what the A's profit is? All he is taking from us is our ante, and we in turn will take the antes when we are in the same spot or take his chips down the line.

Certainly if you knew all he had was a random A and we were a 60/40 favorite then raise, but how can you know that? Some portion of the time we are crushed, some portion he may have a smaller pair with a bigger kicker, 3 flush with high cards, etc. It just seems like more often than not you get to the river with the 8s and make two baby pair for the crying call and set yourself back 5BB instead of just moving on to the next hand. I don't think anyone's PT stats would show them all that far in the black, if at all, with hands like this.

If it was someone I played a lot of hands with and knew their tendancies then all this might be out the window.

[Micturition Man]

The point is not that we care what the A's profit is, but that if it is abnormally high in this situation it indicates that we are playing exploitably tight.

Of all the hands you listed the only ones that are bad for us are overpairs to 88 (or roll-ups). These are just not going to be that prevalent in any solid player's distribution here.

Really your argument seems to be that this is a high variance low EV play, which I think is never an acceptable argument in poker. You should be arguing that it is -EV, and I don't see how it can be.

Put yourself in the A's spot. Everyone folds to you and there remain an 8 up and the 2 bring-in. You are getting 1.9:1 on a completion.

What % of your hands are you completing here? Do you really think the 885 should be folding behind you?

I think maybe a lot of you guys are used to playing loose ring game stud where these situations are not common so you can get away with playing them too tight. To me the idea of folding a pair of 8's to someone in that favorable of a steal position is mind-boggling.

[Brad1970]

I say either raise or fold in this situation. And lean toward fold after he 3 bets.

The only argument I would make for a calldown would be if I intended to raise on a later street.