99 In blind steal situation

[One Outer]

Villain is more or less straightforward in his PF hand selection but I think he's a little laggy postflop. I saw him bluff c/r the turn with air in a protected pot once. I think there's a randomness to his play that I can't pin down. It's possible that he's card dead w/ FPS or on tilt and he's generally better than I give him credit for but I think this is unlikely.

Canterbury Park 6/12 full game

Hero is HJ with 9[img]/images/graemlins/heart.gif[/img] 9[img]/images/graemlins/club.gif[/img]

folds to Hero
Hero raises
3 folds
BB (villain) calls

Flop (heads up, 4 sb):

T[img]/images/graemlins/diamond.gif[/img] 8[img]/images/graemlins/diamond.gif[/img] 5[img]/images/graemlins/heart.gif[/img]

villain checks, hero bets, villain raises, hero calls

I plan on reevaluating on the turn.

Turn (3.5 BB):

T[img]/images/graemlins/club.gif[/img]

villain bets, hero calls

I think the T on the turn makes it unlikely he has one in his hand. In my view I'm ahead here the majority of the time. I want to get three bets in on the big streets but I think it's safer to raise the river as I'm less likely to get three bet when I'm behind.

River (5.5 BB):

4[img]/images/graemlins/diamond.gif[/img]

villain bets
Hero calls

I had to change my river plan. The flush card came in and the 76 got there, so I don't think raising is a very good idea anymore. However, I still think I'm good enough to showdown so I call.

Flame away. [img]/images/graemlins/diamond.gif[/img]

[KitCloudkicker]

its fine.

i was gonna say raise the turn but i think thats a bad idea as i can see a turn 3 bet with a draw here easy as he's gotta know you cant really have a T here.

kit

[One Outer]

How would he know that I can't have a T? It's a blind steal situation. And I think I might play a T exactly like this to make sure I got two big bets out or him in case he was c/r the flop with very little.

[KitCloudkicker]

[ QUOTE ]
How would he know that I can't have a T? It's a blind steal situation. And I think I might play a T exactly like this to make sure I got two big bets out or him in case he was c/r the flop with very little.

[/ QUOTE ]

on a board with this number of draws, a good hand reader would consider it unlikely that you would call the flop and raise the turn with a hand like AT.

[One Outer]

You mean a good hand reader would expect me to three bet the flop with AT?

[KitCloudkicker]

[ QUOTE ]
You mean a good hand reader would expect me to three bet the flop with AT?

[/ QUOTE ]

it seems unlikely for a few reasons.

1) obviously there are overcards to the T. you would want to get the action in now before they come.

2) if the turn is a diamond you forgo the opportunity to raise the turn unless you want to face a tough decision if you get 3 bet.

3) AKd, J9, Q9s, etc all would 3 bet the flop. you arent going to induce folds by 3 betting this flop with AT.

imo, if the board was A85, then the situation is different.

[elindauer]

Hi One Outer,

Poker is a battle between ranges, not hands. Let's ignore your hand for a minute and look at your range. You didn't tell us what your range is at any point in the hand, so I'm going to have to guess. Please correct me if I guess wrong, and we can fine-tune the numbers.


Preflop: {33+,A4s+,A7+,K7s+,KJ+,Q9s+,QJ,J9s+,T8s+,98s,87s}
stox' opening range from the hijack

On this board, I'm assuming you bet your entire range. Given that, the villain can know that you hold no pair over 57% of the time (range calculator result). Given that, and you're likely TAG image to him, he actually can't really be TOO laggy on this board... you're likely folding too often to unbridled aggression.

Now, villain may not know the particulars on this flop, but lets assume that his "laggy postflop" tendencies are a result of his having at least an intuitive understanding of this concept. In this case, we can expect that his check-raising range is pretty wide.

fyi, here are the range results down to your hand (tried to format it a bit, hope it's clear):

* trips: 9 combos (3.4%)
TT(3) 88(3) 55(3)

* two pair: 3 combos (1.1%)
T8(3)

* one pair: 102 combos (38.3%)
----over pair draw: 24 combos (9%)
--------AA(6) KK(6) QQ(6) JJ(6)
----top pair draw: 24 combos (9%)
--------top pair-top kicker draw: 12 combos (4.5%)
------------AT(12)
--------top pair-1 overcard draw: 9 combos (3.4%)
------------KT(3) QT(3) JT(3)
--------top pair draw: 3 combos (1.1%)
------------T9(3)
----middle pair draw: 27 combos (10.2%)
--------middle pair-top kicker draw: 12 combos (4.5%)
------------A8(12)
--------middle pair-1 overcard draw: 3 combos (1.1%)
------------K8(3)
--------middle pair draw: 12 combos (4.5%)
------------99(6) 98(3) 87(3)



This accounts for only 87 combinations of the 266 in your hand, making 99 the bottom of about the top 1/3 of your range.

Clearly, we can't fold.


Now, on to the turn. It's hard to know how to handle your hand here (by default), since we don't know what your range is after you call the flop. Let's assume for a minute that you don't 3-bet any of your hands (ha, not likely!), and that you fold to the flop check-raise with the 1-overcard draws (15.8%, 42 combos), calling with 2 overcards or better.

In that case, you're left with 224 combos, making 99 still an above average hand (top 39% of your turn new range).



The turn card is a beauty, the Tc. This reduces the likelihood that your already wide-ranging opponent has you beaten. You correctly guess that your 99 is ahead of his range, but how far ahead? Let's look at pokerstove a minute and give a range for our opponent.

I threw in a wide range for villain... any T down to about T8, suited Ts, down to T2, any straight draw, any overcard + gutshot draw with the T8, flush draws, middle and bottom pairs, and a touch of randomness.

Against this range, your 99 hold almost a 3:1 edge in equity. I think that any reasonable assesment of villain's range will have you as at least a 2:1 favorite. This suggests you should raise for value. Given that 99 is also one of the better hands in your range, you can raise from a game-theory POV as well. Finally, your actually holding is quite vulnerable, so there are plenty of hands we beat that we are happy to see fold.

Your decision to just call likely leaves you somewhat exploitable by this aggressive opponent. Trapping this much means he isn't paying the maximum when he attacks you on flops like this where you have missed a big % of your range. I think you do better overall to go ahead and make him pay now. He can go ahead and bluff/semi-bluff without fear that you will punish him with good-but-not-great hands.


On to the river... your decision to just call looks reasonable, although you do beat a lot of hands he might value bet (as it appears from his POV that you are calling down with ace high quite often). Let's run it through the range calculator just to be sure.

Let's give him a river betting range with lots of flush combos, lots of tens, some 8s, some 5s, lots of missed straight draws, and a bit of random-bluff-all-the-way:

{Ad2d+, Kd2d+, Qd5d+, Jd7d+, Td7d+, 9d7d+, 8d6d+, 6d5d, 5d4d, AT, KT, QT, JT, T9, T8, QJ, J9, 67s, A8, K8, Q8s, J8, 98, 87, 86s, 85s, A5, K5s, Q5s, 75s, 65s, 54s, A3, KQ, QJ, Q9, J9, 97}


against this range, you win 2 times out of 3! But over 1/3 of his hands are bluffs, so you can't raise for value. Clear river call. Note that I've probably overstated how often he bluffs here as well, since even a laggy player won't bluff all these hands every time he holds them. If we, perhaps, discounted his bluffs by 50%, you'd be about a coin-flip to win on this river, and again can't raise for value. Any way you slice it, you have a clear river call.

good luck.
Eric

[KitCloudkicker]

lindy,

are we then calling a turn 3 bang?

also, if we raise and he calls and donks a diamond river, is it a call?

[One Outer]

Holy crap. That looks like a lot of work. I appreciate your effort on my hand.

It's unclear in the OP but what I'm trying to figure out on the river is whether I call or raise. I'm very aware that folding isn't an option.

It's interesting to see it all laid out like that. I'm essentially spitballing along the same lines as I'm playing. I guessed a 2-2.5:1 equity advantage on the turn in real time so I'm a little surprised to see it is actually three against a likely range.

Just to make sure I understand the main point here, it's that I should be raising the turn because my equity edge is great and and not raising it gives my opponent a chance to take advantage of me by drawing cheaper. I like to think I'm reading this correctly.

Could there be any merit to the idea that I'm losing less when I'm beat and making more when I'm ahead by playing the hand the way I did? Or am I completely misunderstanding the dynamic here.

[elindauer]

[ QUOTE ]
lindy,

are we then calling a turn 3 bang?

also, if we raise and he calls and donks a diamond river, is it a call?


[/ QUOTE ]

Good questions.

First, we note that villain is getting 6.5:2 to bluff 3-bet, and 7.5:1 to semibluff 3-bet. On this draw heavy board, villain will have tons of semibluff 3-betting opportunities, so I think we should pay attention to this number. Our folds need to be rare enough that villain is wrong to 3-bet all of his draws. That means we can fold at most 1 time every 8.5 times we raise the turn. Further, since villain's 3-bets all have good equity vs our turn raising range, we need to fold even less often then that. Let's say something like 1 fold for every 10 or 11 hands we play.

Now that we've decided to fold the worst 10% of our range ot a 3-bet, we ask ourselves... which hands are those? To get at the answers, we need to fine-tune our understanding of our turn range. What hands are in our bet / call flop, raise turn range?


This is a difficult question and gets at your plan for playing your entire range throughout the hand. With what hands are you going to 3-bet the flop? etc.

For now, let's assume that you don't 3-bet anything on the flop, because I think it's an instructive border case. In that case, we should probably raise the turn with, say, A8+, based on the arguments in my first post in this thread.

Range calculator says:

There are 67 combinations in the range {55,88+,AT,KTs, QTs, JTs, T8s+,A8} on this board (Td 8d 5c Tc)

Now, by default, we also want to mix in a few semibluffs and to make our turn raising range more balanced (otherwise opponent gets away by bet/folding too easily). How many hands should we bluff / semibluff raise? Well, let's add some diamond draws because they have excellent equity, and some straight draws because they allow us to have a few bluffs in our river betting range should a diamond hit. Villain will be getting 6.5:1 to call our turn raise, and we have 67 combinations of value raising hands, so let's throw in about 10 semibluff raises for balance.

any J9s(4), 97d, 76d, QJd, Q9d, AQd, AKd, AJd

That's 11 combinations total, and looks like a reasonable range to me.

So that brings our turn raising to 78 combinations. What are the worst 10% of this range that we fold? That's 8 combinations we're looking for. Since we aren't folding any of our draws, that leaves the made hands.

A8 = 12 combinations... oops, that's already too many. So maybe we raise / fold with A8 whenever we hold the 8 of hearts.

Conclussion? Call the 3-bet with 99 by default.

What about our turn range? Well, if we 3-bet more often with made hands, then 99 becomes a stronger part of our made hand range and we should be even more inclined to call.

Finally, can we change our default play to take advantage of this opponent? Let's check the read... laggy postflop, perhaps FPS... nope! We certainly can't fold MORE than the default amount against this guy. In fact, it could lead us to raise more made hands, and call down more 3-bets in an attempt to exploit the fact that his 3-bets skew his range toward draws.


Next post: what if he calls turn, donks river diamond?

good luck.
Eric