The hand reading thread

[ottsville]

Someone in another thread asked about hand reading and I suggested we start a thread for players to post hands and explain their thoughts on each street so we could critique the thought process. This is the thread for that. To get it started, I'll post a hand. The history is goofed up for the converter since I don't have pt installed on my comp yet...but I'll include the relevant data. I'll also say that I am just learning NL after playing limit for the past two years, so my NL reasoning may not be the best, but I will show you how I thought about this hand.

NL25 Hero is playing somewhat tight, but aggressive when in a hand. Table is loose with mostly passive players. This hand is the only one I've gone to showdown with, but it leads up to the hand I want to post for this thread.

Hero is UTG with 7s8s and rses 3xbb, utg1 calls, bttn calls blinds fold - pot$2.60.
Flop comes 4c 5d 6c. Hero bets $2 utg1 folds, bttn calls, pot $4.50
turn 4s hero bets pot bttn calls pot ~$13.50
river Kh hero bets about 1/2 pot, bttn calls. hero wins with straight. UTG1 says "NH"

Several hands orbits later, this hand comes up:
Stacks:
hero $27.60
villain $18

Read: I'm not really paying all that much attention since I'm surfing and doing other stuff. Villain in this hand is UTG1 in the above hand. He's seen more flops than he should, but I don't really know about his cold call range. I'm assuming it's a little loose since he sees too many flops.

Hero is UTG1 with A [img]/images/graemlins/heart.gif[/img]K [img]/images/graemlins/spade.gif[/img]
UTG folds, hero raises 5xbb, MP1 calls, MP2 calls, bttn calls pot ~$5

Since the table was loose, I raised more than normal to get the pot shorter handed. I'd rather play this vs 1 or 2 players than 3 or 4. I got more callers than I hoped and had no real reads on the other players.

Flop: A [img]/images/graemlins/spade.gif[/img] J [img]/images/graemlins/club.gif[/img] 2 [img]/images/graemlins/heart.gif[/img]
Hero bets $3 Villain raises to $6 other players fold...

Ok...he caught a piece of this flop. Now I need to figure out which piece. If he had two pr, this might be a good play to get it heads up with me. If he's got a set, he's usually going to wait until the turn here since the board is dry and he might be able to milk the lp players for a flop call. So I think we can rule out a set here.
Now, my question is what does he put me on? He's seen me raise suitconns small in ep but I've been playing tight since then. A larger than normal raise should tell him that I want to play fewer players. Since he has been somewhat observant(see remark above) I think he should be able to make this connection but this is 25nl and we shouldn't give the opponents too much credit. I did make a smallish continuation bet, but there is an A on the board. If I don't have the A and he does he should assume that I will fold. Any other action should mean that he is beat.

When he minraises I'm thinking he either has a made two pr(AJ) or just an ace. If he's got just and ace I'm a big favorite, if he's got AJ, I'm a huge dog but he may fold to a push fearing a set on my part. He's got about $11 behind at this point and the pot is about $14 and it's $3 to me. If I have any fold equity when he does have AJ I think pushing is good here if I can safely assume that this is NOT a set. I push and he calls.
Turn 3 [img]/images/graemlins/diamond.gif[/img]
River 9 [img]/images/graemlins/spade.gif[/img]

He turns over A3o for two pr and wins.

Now, my hand reading was correct but I gave my opponent too much credit(or he didn't give me enough). He was a huge dog on the flop(just under 7:1) and should not have called. But, I love it that he did.