TPTK v. donk and tag

[joseki]

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I'm more worried about a superdraw than a set. After the bet and raise on the flop, a relatively tight and aggressive player with a set is likely to just go ahead and push, especially considering how drawy the board is. I'm thinking his likely holdings are things like KQ, QT, T9, 76, or 65 diamonds, drawing to 12 outs and hoping that BB pads his draw. He might even do this with as little as T9 (OESD) or any two diamonds. It's also just barely possible that he's slowplaying an overpair (if he's fed up with you stealing and getting tricky/trappy) or that he's got QJ/JT and is hoping that you are FOS.

I just think it's more likely that villain is drawing than that he is super slowplaying a set. Since I just improved to the top two I'd bet $25 and call a push. On the river I'm checking behind on ANY card that doesn't give me a boat and I'm making a crying call if villain open-pushes a scare card (this turn bet commits me to the pot). Checking behind is just too awkward considering how many draws there are out there; I'm dreading almost half the deck, and so I don't want to have an ugly decision for lots of money when one of them hits. Deciding if a particular scare card killed me or not is never a fun chore.

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I 'knew' he had a set, but I talked myself into b/c with rationalization along these lines. Maybe it was the best play, but he did have a set of 8's. It might be results oriented, but he really tipped the strength of his hand by cold-calling the flop, I just ignored it.

In hindsight, I wonder if a different flop action would be better. How does the hand play out if I raise more or less? Does a bigger raise force us to discount the drawing hands even further, and make the fold easier? Or, if we flat call the donk, or maybe minraise, is there enough room to find a fold before it all goes in?

[Bill Smith]

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What do you do on a blank and he shoves for a pot sized bet?

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Well, it's slightly more than a PSB, but let's say we're getting 2:1. Sure, there are several possible suited connectors he could have, but as my above comments indicated, I think we have to discount the likelihood of the SC's, especially the 1-gappers. So if there are 6 combos of 88/44, would it be safe to say 3-5 combos of SC's? I think so. All in all, I'd say we're ahead of 33-45% of his hands on the turn.

Now factor in the likelihood that he'd push bluff river. With a good read that villian is doing this with a missed draw most of the time, it's possible this is a good call, because we need 33%. I don't think we have that kind of read, so I fold feeling the call is neutral-EV at best. Getting 3:1 (1/2 PSB) I'm looking him up.

Flame away.

[Snafu'd]

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What do you do on a blank and he shoves for a pot sized bet?

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Well, it's slightly more than a PSB, but let's say we're getting 2:1. Sure, there are several possible suited connectors he could have, but as my above comments indicated, I think we have to discount the likelihood of the SC's, especially the 1-gappers. So if there are 6 combos of 88/44, would it be safe to say 3-5 combos of SC's? I think so. All in all, I'd say we're ahead of 33-45% of his hands on the turn.

Now factor in the likelihood that he'd push bluff river. With a good read that villian is doing this with a missed draw most of the time, it's possible this is a good call, because we need 33%. I don't think we have that kind of read, so I fold feeling the call is neutral-EV at best. Getting 3:1 (1/2 PSB) I'm looking him up.

Flame away.

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I guess the point I was trying to make is that I don't understand why one would check behind on the turn and call a shove (or psb for simplicity's sake) on a blank river. I suppose it does catch draws that missed and decide to bluff but it seems to me you might as well charge the draw on the turn by betting.

[Profish2285]

There really is no way I am checking this turn. I am betting with the intention of getting it in ideally. Like others have said, a tag will not slowplay a set on this board. It is much more likely a strong draw and I dont feel like letting him hit that draw for free. How can anyone honestly want to check behind a draw heavy board with top two?

[You're No Daisy]

Pokey,

Hero just raised the BB's flop bet so villain might be thinking he's raising to price out a flush draw. Now that villain has seen this he could believe that Hero has a Jack or an over pair, hence the smooth call and he's planning on bombing the turn. Does this make sense, or am I giving villain too much credit for being a thinking player?

AC

[Pokey]

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Hero just raised the BB's flop bet so villain might be thinking he's raising to price out a flush draw. Now that villain has seen this he could believe that Hero has a Jack or an over pair, hence the smooth call and he's planning on bombing the turn. Does this make sense, or am I giving villain too much credit for being a thinking player?


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All of the arguments saying that hero is behind are fair and valid. However, there is one overriding consideration that we must take into account: the pot is really freakin' big. With almost 70 BBs in the middle, we've really got to do what we can to fight for this one. I think check/folding two pair on an unpaired, unsuited board is a mistake once the pot is this big. Considering that we cannot lay down the hand we really want to maximize our chances of winning. I like the $25 bet because it's obviously pot-committing yet it still gives us the possibility of saving a small fraction of our stack. If villain continues his slowplay he might just smooth-call the turn and check the river, hoping that we "bluff" the rest of our stack. Yeah, I know it's not a strong possibility, but I've seen it happen many times in the past. Also, we'd have committed an attrocious mistake if we checked the turn, villain spikes his winner on the river, and takes that massive pot from us with a made draw.

That ace screws us -- if villain has a set, he's stacking us. Without a phenomenally strong read I just can't bring myself to fold this hand for a single (roughly) pot-sized bet. Given that, I want this pot, and I'm taking whatever means necessary to try and get it.

[Bill Smith]

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I like the $25 bet because it's obviously pot-committing yet it still gives us the possibility of saving a small fraction of our stack. If villain continues his slowplay he might just smooth-call the turn and check the river, hoping that we "bluff" the rest of our stack. Yeah, I know it's not a strong possibility, but I've seen it happen many times in the past.

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Considering our opponent, I'd say it's a near-zero possibility.

As a matter of fact, checking may hold the greater likelihood of letting us get away with some of our stack. A check on our part looks a lot like Ax-diamonds. If a diamond doesn't hit, SB is likely to suck-bet not imagining we have a hand as big as top two. If a diamond does hit, SB may not even bet at all! I think the benefits of underrepping our hand and playing pot control is worth the risk of giving a free card because the alternative is putting in our stack in a lose-lose situation.

Incidentally, the fact that we're holding the A [img]/images/graemlins/diamond.gif[/img] saves us money because we can eliminate AK/AQ [img]/images/graemlins/diamond.gif[/img] from SB's range. Adding those two, and the possibility those would call a turn push, tilts me towards pushing.

Now, I'm going to admit that in the heat of battle, my stack probably goes in at some point. But, that's the point of post-mortem.