[25NL] Top pair top kicker (AQ) in position

[Shrooma]

UTG is running 36.4/12.9/0.6 (VPIP/PFR/Agrr total) on 65 hands

PokerStars No-Limit Hold'em, $0.25 BB (6 handed) Hand History Converter Tool from FlopTurnRiver.com (Format: 2+2 Forums)

CO ($25)
Hero ($48.60)
SB ($9.20)
BB ($26.15)
UTG ($41.40)
MP ($24.65)

Preflop: Hero is Button with Q[img]/images/graemlins/spade.gif[/img], A[img]/images/graemlins/diamond.gif[/img].
<font color="#CC3333">UTG raises to $1</font>, <font color="#666666">2 folds</font>, Hero calls $1, <font color="#666666">2 folds</font>.

Flop: ($2.35) 2[img]/images/graemlins/club.gif[/img], Q[img]/images/graemlins/club.gif[/img], 4[img]/images/graemlins/spade.gif[/img] <font color="#0000FF">(2 players)</font>
<font color="#CC3333">UTG bets $1</font>, <font color="#CC3333">Hero raises to $4</font>, UTG calls $3.

Turn: ($10.35) 3[img]/images/graemlins/heart.gif[/img] <font color="#0000FF">(2 players)</font>
UTG checks, <font color="#CC3333">Hero bets $7.5</font>, UTG calls $7.50.

River: ($25.35) 6[img]/images/graemlins/spade.gif[/img] <font color="#0000FF">(2 players)</font>
UTG checks, Hero...

My questions here are the following:

- Would you 3bet pre-flop to find out more about his hand, considering a 4bet to be KK or AA?

- What would you do on river, considering this guy is extremely passive?

- Other comment on any street is welcome

[barryc83]

$17 on river. vtown baby. sometimes 3bet here, like if ive seen him raise KJo UTG or something I def 3bet.

edit: bet more if you think he'll call it.

[Quester]

Your opponent is a good candidate to 3-bet preflop, but calling is fine.

Bet the river to get value from hands like 88-JJ, KQs, etc. Maybe half pot or something around there.

[CobraGoat]

I like to 3bet AQ IP a fair amount, but from an UTG raiser who doesnt raise THAT much for how loose he is, i like the call IP.

Otherwise, I am VBing this river for 15-18 and hoping to get called from 9-JJ.

[Nonfiction]

I reraise preflop, rest is standard

[cooker3]

I 3 bet pf.
Everything else seems ok.
I'd value bet the river considering his af stats

[Bowlboy]

I like how hero plays this preflop. I could be wrong but here's my line of thinking. Before I 3bet preflop I like to consider both my fold equity and my implied odds. Whether or not we can raise for pure value here totally depends on reads imo. If I figure I have plenty of fold equity either preflop, or on the flop then I'll go ahead and 3bet this hand. Sometimes I'll flop the best hand but I can represent other overcards on the flop and fold out medium-big pocket pairs on the flop like 99-JJ.

With this particular villain that is'nt the case a lot of the time. Because his AF is so low, that tells us he does a lot of calling and will probably call a lot more often with 2nd best hands because he was the preflop raiser and cant get away from say JJ on this board. The low aggression is often an indicator that we have good implied odds by making a hand and value betting it, as OP did in this hand.

Another reason I like flat calling preflop is we are up against a weak opponent. The more money that goes in preflop, the less profitably we can outplay them post flop. I want to see a flop here because I'll make money off of villain when he has JJ and I flop TPTK but I'll lose my 3bet and possibly a cbet if I miss the flop and dont improve on the turn a lot of the time.

Another observation I've made is players with villain's stats are trying to play a somewhat tag game preflop maybe based on some books that they've read but are really clueless on the flop, so they end up with what harrington calls fear of flopping. Players that fear flopping will often 3bet their Aces and Kings and some other hands like QQ and AK all-in, and sometimes they'll 4bet with an even wider range like TT and JJ forcing us to fold a hand with great odds of extracting a lot from these hands.

As far as 3betting preflop for information - to see where we our hand is - we dont need to pay for this information preflop. Villain raised pre, so he has someting. He makes a weak less than 1/2 pot cbet on the flop. This info costs us nothing. I think it's fair to say that AA and KK are'nt likely here? QQ might be a possiblilty not wanting to scare him off though unlikely as well. Most likely holding for villain is KQ, JJ, TT, maybe 99 imo.

Hero played the hand well, I do hope he value betted here.

Sorry for tl;dr but I had the time and have been doing a lot of thinking about this sort of thing lately. If this makes no sense I hope to hear some feedback why cuz I'm just trying to learn here. [img]/images/graemlins/smile.gif[/img]

[Fiksdal]

Good job Bowlboy, more responses in this forum should be like the one you just made.

Fwiw I think the most marginal decision in this hand is preflop, given reverse implied odds against what seems to be a somewhat tight range for villain. (88+, AQ+, AJs+)?

With the low PFR numer, folding crossed my mind, but 3betting also certainly did (cuz we can let it go to a 4bet.)

Anyhow, given that we have position and an edge over villain postflop (he is extremely passive and likely horrible), calling here is certainly reasonable.

[Shrooma]

Thanks for the reply's, they are very helpful.

Now for sure we will bet for value on the river, but how much and why?

Half the pot (Quester)?
2/3 pot? (Barry, Cobra)?
pot? shove?

I can expect betting half or less than the pot here will maximize probability of villain calling with KQ/JJ/TT/99 here. Shoving would only be called by a better hand (set, KK,AA)

[AFennewald]

3 bet pre if this was a normal bet size i'd be more inclined to just call. As played fine check river he has busted draws here mostly.