Stars 50K Guaranteed - The Dreaded Min Raise - Page 3

Tackleberry · #21 11-12-2007, 05:15 AM

[ QUOTE ]
[...]A huge % of the hands posted on this board have no reads on players, but people still manage to dole out advice like its gospel.

OP actually gave a pretty specific read on this villian. He's loose-passive, calls all raises and doesn't raise himself. [...]

So...our losse passive, non raising villian puts in a raise from ep. Min raise or not, at this point this is a reasonably tight range. Just call.

[/ QUOTE ]

QFT!

Tackleberry · #22 11-12-2007, 05:28 AM

[ QUOTE ]

[...]if you have the software stove JJ against TT+, AQ, and AK... [...] ... however I do believe that 3-betting for value is the best option available to you (the fact that you force your opponent to give away information by taking this line just adds further value to it)...
[...]

[/ QUOTE ]

Here´s the problem: if Villains raising range from EP actually would be TT+,AQ+, do you really think he limped all the other hands before (according to OP 50% - from any position) with crap only? Why did he never raise ATo from the Button, AJ from Hijack, KQ from middle position, 66+ from anywhere? Did he just not have those hands? I doubt that ...

As jarid said - OP provided us a read - unlike tons of other hands discussed here. Why do you cast doubts on this? OP said, he played a while with him ... why not take Villain as what OP described him - an extremely loose-passive player and judge the hand on the base of exactly this information? And then you tell me again that you are ahead of his range ...

And one last note:

[ QUOTE ]
... if you have the software stove JJ against TT+, AQ, and AK... and come back with the results...

[/ QUOTE ]

Interesting ... did YOU check the results yourself before making this announcement?

equity win tie pots won pots tied
Hand 0: 53.124% 52.08% 01.04% 304987776 6112398.00 { TT+, AQs+, AQo+ }
Hand 1: 46.876% 45.83% 01.04% 268395396 6112398.00 { JJ }

23Suited · #23 11-12-2007, 07:14 AM

[ QUOTE ]

[...]if you have the software stove JJ against TT+, AQ, and AK... [...] ... however I do believe that 3-betting for value is the best option available to you (the fact that you force your opponent to give away information by taking this line just adds further value to it)...
[...]

[/ QUOTE ]

[ QUOTE ]
Here´s the problem: if Villains raising range from EP actually would be TT+,AQ+, do you really think he limped all the other hands before (according to OP 50% - from any position) with crap only? Why did he never raise ATo from the Button, AJ from Hijack, KQ from middle position, 66+ from anywhere? Did he just not have those hands? I doubt that ...

[/ QUOTE ] Curious as to why you would bother to bring this up... this point is actually one against your cause... This means that it is higly likely that the villian in this hand has already had a hand within the range of the hands we are discussing probably quite a bit more then once... regardless of his position he probably limped or called a raise with it... for him to open mini-raise at all suggests a shift in gears IMO... not that surprising as he cant play this style for an entire tournament... the blinds recently went to 100/200 right... and the antes drop on the next level then because I believe this is a PS tourney... not a bad time to change gears and drop your passive game is it???... 

[ QUOTE ]
As jarid said - OP provided us a read - unlike tons of other hands discussed here. Why do you cast doubts on this? OP said, he played a while with him ... why not take Villain as what OP described him - an extremely loose-passive player and judge the hand on the base of exactly this information? And then you tell me again that you are ahead of his range ...

[/ QUOTE ] You arent... assuming OP has the correct read here then jarid isnt even being conservative enough... a truly loose passive player wont mini-raise TT-JJ, or AQ from EP IMO because he will feel he doesnt hit enough on the flop and has to give up too often... so his actualy range would then be QQ+, AK+... which I dont need stove to tell if Im behind that range... but there are 4 problems I have with this...

1. Is that I have never seen any1 play anything remotely close to this with anything resembling success... you cant win in the long run just letting the cards fall as they may and folding that often to any kind of aggression (or the other side of this which is to be a calling station with any kind of made 1 pair hand post flop)... this kind of lack of poker concepts and knowledge leads me to believe there are leaks all over the rest of his game...

2. I dont think his mini-raise here is consistant with the information that we have gathered so far... so I prefer to disgard this information and assign a range much closer in similiarity to what the original poster assigned after the OPs post... one that fits with a normal mini-raiser which includes alot of SPPs and draw hands... which you are way ahead of...

3. I would be willing to assign MPPs 99-JJ as hands I will occasionally see this type of passive player play this way because he feels that they NEVER win for him... his complaint is his own fault because he overvalues these hands postflop he finally got a good starting hand and does not want to surrender it... he only limps so he does not have the ability to thin the field preflop with a value bet (meaning these hands have to hit the flop very hard to be the best hand alot of the time against what would normally be a minimum of 3 other players in all likelyhood... these scary cards are player dependant... some feel AK never hits the A or K and they get attached to it for its strong starting hand value but for the most part MPPs are the most common I see people play as a scary hand where they play it out of the ordinary to protect it against multiple opponents and to get folds because they really dont want a call... basically what I am saying is that this out of the ordinary play if the villian in this hand is truly loose-passive certainly means something... and something very specific but does not necesarily mean I will be respecting a player who clearly has fundamental flaws in his game enough to just assign QQ+, AK like I would if he is a "Good" Loose-Passive player (I'm assuming that such a thing even exists)

4. most of the time when someone who is normally very predictable plays a hand out of the ordinary it is either the nuts or a bluff (in this case it would be a semi-bluff in all likelyhood)... 

[ QUOTE ]
And one last note:

[/ QUOTE ]

[ QUOTE ]
... if you have the software stove JJ against TT+, AQ, and AK... and come back with the results...

[/ QUOTE ]

[ QUOTE ]
Interesting ... did YOU check the results yourself before making this announcement?

[/ QUOTE ] Nope, I dont have stove on my laptop... I did the math in my head fairly quickly and it came out close... I wasnt certain so I guessed... plus I figure if I instigated it as a challenge Id be much more likely to get someone to actually run the numbers... so thanks... anyways if the villians actual range here is TT+, AQ, and AK... then the best +EV play would be too smooth call this preflop mini-raise... with re-raiseing to 1200 being slightly -EV (see the stove numbers below for how -EV it actually is)... the problem is that is WAAAAAYYYY to tight for this scenario and Im just not gonna change my mind unless I meet the guy or I was in OP seat myself MAYBE... if you really have played this guy through the first 100-150 hands of this tourney or W/E you are at right now and this is his first raise... and it is a very unusual mini-raise... so he really is this passive player just as part of his natural instincts... and you can honestly tell me that you think he is good... then I guess I am wrong this one time... but I believe the problem is that your range is wrong (based on a read that doesnt apply very well to an unorthadox play by this villian) and doesnt give you the oppurtunity to make the right assumptions after you make your initial views on the situation... In fact this reminds me alot of players who arent willing to call overshoves against villians in the early stages of a donkament where the guy is shoving all kinds of garbage in his range... just because it is a big bet and its early in a tournament... thats just silly... make the best play... take your profits from the hand... and move on to the next... I think I need to incorporaate this into my play somehow with this many people actually reacting this poorly to it (and forum members are generally the thinking players... I am amazed that more of you cant get past the fact that he mini-raises in EP here... you are all holding your mouse over the fold button ready to fold at villians will... the occasional mini-raise is the equivalent to POKER GOLD 

equity win tie pots won pots tied
Hand 0: 53.124% 52.08% 01.04% 304987776 6112398.00 { TT+, AQs+, AQo+ }
Hand 1: 46.876% 45.83% 01.04% 268395396 6112398.00 { JJ }

Tackleberry · #24 11-12-2007, 07:40 AM

What should I say? My eyes are bleeding after reading your post ... [img]/images/graemlins/grin.gif[/img]

23Suited · #25 11-12-2007, 07:55 AM

[ QUOTE ]
What should I say? My eyes are bleeding after reading your post ... [img]/images/graemlins/grin.gif[/img]

[/ QUOTE ]

MMMk... I will simplify... OP "read" in this situation isnt a "read" at all... it is an observation...if you cant clarify an exact mindset of the villian to go with an observation... you can not end up with a "read" with any pratical application... I cant find much use for many observations... because no 1 observation ever means the same thing when applied to every poker player... to finish this up I will quote my earlier post on why I believe 3 betting is the best play rather then ritorate what I have already said more then once... I do however believe that you can recognize that villian in this hand is highly likely to not be a very skilled poker player... Id go as far as to venture a guess that he isnt even aware of the standard lines for starting hand requirements even at a very basic level which is likely why he chooses to limp all the time... rather then bet for value... I think this fact is made rather obvious by the below quote from the OP... you cant limp 50% of hands and call every re-raise for VALUE... or anywhere near that frequency...

[ QUOTE ]
He's been very active limping like 50% of the hands and calling every reraise. This is his 1st raise of the tournament.

[/ QUOTE ]

[ QUOTE ]
I do believe that 3-betting for value is the best option available to you (the fact that you force your opponent to give away information by taking this line just adds further value to it)... as a side note calling is not -EV but just not the best play IMO... you would need to tread carefully postflop because if you are not an experienced post flop player then you will probably get yourself into trouble far more often then you would like (most of the time costing you more then the 800 chip difference between re-raising the villian in this hand and smooth calling his 400 preflop) also you will often fold the best hand... we have been given no such read that suggests this villian is passive post flop or is uncapable of making a c-bet on the flop whether he has the best hand or not... coupled with the chance that you allow him to outdraw you when you have the best hand... the 3-bet is extremely obvious to me... any comments I made previously about AA and KK were made in regards to the times your opponent 4-bets you all in... If you believe that is his entire range for the 4-bet a fold in that spot would be rather obvious... I mean Jarid what are you re-raising with here... do you smooth call pre with AK???... is your raising range QQ+... or are you smooth calling all of the hands which likely have value against his range... obviously this player is prob not good enough to recognize a difference (considering he limps 50% of hands and he mini-raises) but isnt this exploitable on your part...

[/ QUOTE ]

Doylestown · #26 11-12-2007, 03:41 PM

I apologize for being away from my own thread for this long. I'll be back a bit later to give it better attention. I looked up the entire hand history and I had played with villain the entire tournament, so plenty of hands for those who were wondering. And here's a hand I played the prior level against the same villain. As I said he just wouldn't fold to a raise.

PokerStars No-Limit Hold'em Tourney, Big Blind is t150 (9 handed) Poker Stars Converter Tool from FlopTurnRiver.com (Format: 2+2 Forums)

UTG (t2265)
UTG+1 (t3365)
MP1 (t8320)
MP2 (t2410)
MP3 (t7588)
CO (t4765)
Hero (t14270)
SB (t4395)
BB (t3580)

Preflop: Hero is Button with Q[img]/images/graemlins/spade.gif[/img], Q[img]/images/graemlins/club.gif[/img].
UTG calls t150, UTG+1 calls t150, 4 folds, Hero raises to t750, 2 folds, UTG folds, UTG+1 calls t600.

Flop: (t1875) 6[img]/images/graemlins/spade.gif[/img], 7[img]/images/graemlins/spade.gif[/img], A[img]/images/graemlins/heart.gif[/img] (2 players)
UTG+1 checks, Hero bets t3000, UTG+1 calls t2615 (All-In).

Turn: (t7490) K[img]/images/graemlins/club.gif[/img] (2 players, 1 all-in)

River: (t7490) 2[img]/images/graemlins/diamond.gif[/img] (2 players, 1 all-in)

Final Pot: t7105

Results in white below: 
UTG+1 has Ad 3h (one pair, aces).
Hero has Qs Qc (one pair, queens).
Outcome: UTG+1 wins t7105. Hero wins t385.

JARID · #27 11-13-2007, 12:27 AM

23suited,

[ QUOTE ]
I never stated I thought 3-betting for information was a good play... however I do believe that 3-betting for value is the best option available to you (the fact that you force your opponent to give away information by taking this line just adds further value to it)...

[/ QUOTE ]

Prior, I was only making general observations about some of the responses that were being given from all posters, perhaps you included. I certainly don't intend to project opinions onto anyone.

Addressing specifically your response...

Valuable information as a further benefit: We already have valuable information....villian is very loose and very passive pre-flop....AND calls all raises.

This makes raising bad for several reasons.

1.) If hero would need to "tread carefully postflop because if you are not an experienced post flop player then you will probably get yourself into trouble far more often then you would like", then how is bloating the pot to 9 or 10x a good idea? Your raise will not take the pot down.

Its not just the times he pushes with whatever his pushing range is, its all the times that he will call with his calling range, which is everything. Your positional advantage is completely negated by the fact that villians stack is roughly the size of the pot. Now you risk folding the best hand in a big pot as opposed to a small pot.

QT2 flop and villian pushes into you?
AK4 flop and villian checks to you?

[ QUOTE ]
any comments I made previously about AA and KK were made in regards to the times your opponent 4-bets you all in... If you believe that is his entire range for the 4-bet a fold in that spot would be rather obvious...

[/ QUOTE ]

2.) This is what we dont have a read on. We have no clue what his 4-bet range is???? How do you know TT is not the nuts to him? Everyone pushes AK/QQ. We have no basis for the belief that his 4 bet all-in range is KK-AA.

[ QUOTE ]
I mean Jarid what are you re-raising with here... do you smooth call pre with AK???... is your raising range QQ+... or are you smooth calling all of the hands which likely have value against his range...

[/ QUOTE ]

I rerise QQ+ and AK and call with a myriad of other hands aginst this specific player.

[ QUOTE ]
but isnt this exploitable on your part...

[/ QUOTE ]

I guess, but only if villian decides "I'm not gonna raise any hands all tournament and then spring to life just at the right time to make Jarid play sub-optimally with the best hand".

Seriously, against players with normal or higher raising frequencies, I totally re-raise this. Esepcially if they mix up 3xs with min raises, because min raises usually mean trashier or weaker hands, or hands people are trying to feign strength with. Or, if their standard raise is a min raise and they raise frequently etc..etc...
But here, with the information at hand, calling seems super standard to me. Based on 1 and 2 above, raising presents big time -EV situations.

Finally, if you want to raise for value, I think calling villians push is better than folding to villian's push based on #2 above.

Thanks,
Jarid

23Suited · #28 11-13-2007, 05:41 AM

[ QUOTE ]
I never stated I thought 3-betting for information was a good play... however I do believe that 3-betting for value is the best option available to you (the fact that you force your opponent to give away information by taking this line just adds further value to it)...

[/ QUOTE ]

Prior, I was only making general observations about some of the responses that were being given from all posters, perhaps you included. I certainly don't intend to project opinions onto anyone. Fine with me... Project away... thats kind of the point of these forums... however projecting your opinions in order to help better the understanding of the game for other forum members isnt the problem... its getting people to give serious thought to those opinions that seems to be difficult nowadays... 

Addressing specifically your response... Just going to give you my thoughts on each of the points below 

Valuable information as a further benefit: We already have valuable information....villian is very loose and very passive pre-flop....AND calls all raises. I still dont think we can gather any useful information from this other then that your opponent is rather bad here... Ill elaborate AGAIN on this later 

This makes raising bad for several reasons.

1.) If hero would need to "tread carefully postflop because if you are not an experienced post flop player then you will probably get yourself into trouble far more often then you would like", then how is bloating the pot to 9 or 10x a good idea? Your raise will not take the pot down. You dont need to take down the pot... its a value bet... you want more money in the pot because you have the best hand more often then not... in other words your hand destroys his range of hands... IMO

Its not just the times he pushes with whatever his pushing range is, its all the times that he will call with his calling range, which is everything. Your positional advantage is completely negated by the fact that villians stack is roughly the size of the pot. Now you risk folding the best hand in a big pot as opposed to a small pot. I'll have to go back in check but if I remember the hand correctly villian has 5.5Kish and you have him covered... raising to 1.2K doesnt quite bloat the pot enough to say villians stack is the size of the pot... besides... as I will elaborate on below... YOU control the betting against this kind of player... VALUE TOWN is your best friend... against a loose calling station 

QT2 flop and villian pushes into you? Um... this never happens... if you read up you will realize that you already said this yourself... this guy is just checking and calling... for the most part you decide how much you are playing this pot for post flop... 
AK4 flop and villian checks to you? Check behind because C-betting is bad against a calling station(an example of this is shown in the hand HERO posted just above your post on page 3... where villian limp calls like ~20% of his stack pre from a HERO who hasnt gotten out of hand with just A3o... he hits his A... and HERO decides to c-bet)... What I find most interesting though about that hand is that had villian mini-raise in that rather then limped... and that was the hand he posted... I doubt there would have been any discussion as to re-raiseing for value being the best play... while it plays nearly the same side by side with JJ against this villian when he raises and when he shoves... your reaction will be nearly the same (you lose one overcard that you may have to worry about post flop I suppose because you are delighted when a Q comes and you have QQ because you have flopped a set... this is probably not important though because at 50% he probably isnt limping/mini-raising Qx offsuit from EP... so its not likely to change much)... Anyways, if he has an A or a K in this made up flop situation then he will either bet very small on the turn and/or river or he will just check it down... and judging from the other hand I think it is likely he will check it down... though occasionally you see these guys do the small bet thing once if no1 else is showing interest in the pot and they actually have something like TPWK or better (this has no real relevance against value betting preflop)... this is definatly an unfortunate board for you... about the only thing worse would be AKQ since villian seems to like playing big cards... honestly because I wasnt at the table I dont have any more insight into how you would procede in this spot... however I certainly would If I was in villians seat... impossible not to be able to put together a huge post flop line if this guy is really limp calling into 50% of flops 

[ QUOTE ]
any comments I made previously about AA and KK were made in regards to the times your opponent 4-bets you all in... If you believe that is his entire range for the 4-bet a fold in that spot would be rather obvious...

[/ QUOTE ]

2.) This is what we dont have a read on. We have no clue what his 4-bet range is???? How do you know TT is not the nuts to him? Everyone pushes AK/QQ. We have no basis for the belief that his 4 bet all-in range is KK-AA. I can guarantee you that this guy doesnt play TT as the nuts even with just by the limited information I have right now... doesnt follow any pschology/mindset of this type of player in any way... I dont disgaree with the rest of that... he should be 4-betting all in with QQ+/AK... which you are quite a bit behind that range... precisely why I think value raising his mini-raise from EP preflop has that hidden value of information because your rather predictable opponent will call with hands that dont beat yours and shove hands that do beat you... so... folding if he shoves while playing your hand for value post flop when he calls is the best you can handle this type of player... VALUE TOWN him... as far as the KK+ thing goes... since this is his first raise this may be your worst case scenario... villian playing goofy from EP with the nuts or close to it... usually this is a SUPER-PASSIVE player and I dont think we can define his range to that... however it is one of the possibilities which I tried to bring up in my 4 problems section earlier... under the nuts or bluff comment...

[ QUOTE ]
I mean Jarid what are you re-raising with here... do you smooth call pre with AK???... is your raising range QQ+... or are you smooth calling all of the hands which likely have value against his range...

[/ QUOTE ]

I rerise QQ+ and AK and call with a myriad of other hands aginst this specific player. Kinda backwards... against this specific player you can still re-raise that range because it has great value and your opponent is highly likely to call and I think there are other hands which are certainly good for value to re-raise (such as the JJ that every1 seems to disagree with me on) but playing SCs isnt the greatest approach against this type of player because he isnt really going to bet (not certain that you are saying you would play them against him just felt I needed to say this in case it is in your myriad of hands... pure hand values are much more important and this type of player is normally busted from a tournament when you either hit a big hand or bludgin him to death over a sequence of hands when you have the bigger kicker... SPPs present the same problem as SCs against this type of villian because it is difficult to tell when he has hit his overcard or started with a slightly better PP... this is mostly what I am refering to when I say calling against this player is bad because there is just no reason to play guessing games when this villian is so predictable... Aggression does not work versus a calling station... just playing tight straight forward with your hands will earn you the most chips here

[ QUOTE ]
but isnt this exploitable on your part...

[/ QUOTE ]

I guess, but only if villian decides "I'm not gonna raise any hands all tournament and then spring to life just at the right time to make Jarid play sub-optimally with the best hand". lol... anyways a random example of the exploitation of calling would be on a 4 or 5 card low board where you attempt to get in 2 streets of value because this will cost you more then if you were to raise pre-flop and you will occasionally find him holding a bigger PP which you did not force him to define preflop

Seriously, against players with normal or higher raising frequencies, I totally re-raise this. Esepcially if they mix up 3xs with min raises, because min raises usually mean trashier or weaker hands, or hands people are trying to feign strength with. Or, if their standard raise is a min raise and they raise frequently etc..etc...
But here, with the information at hand, calling seems super standard to me. Based on 1 and 2 above, raising presents big time -EV situations. this still comes down to the range with which villian is doing this... I think it is SUPER WIDE and most of you think it is VERY NITTY... we just disagree... the only way I could possibly change my mind is if I was at the table I think... So I still like raise to 1200... Doyle if you dont mind repost the next stage of the hand... unless this discussion about whether to call or re-raise was all you were curious about with this hand... because I think at this point both sides have expressed thier opinions as to why they re-pop or why they smooth call pre here... 

Finally, if you want to raise for value, I think calling villians push is better than folding to villian's push based on #2 above. I think you hit the nail on the head with his 4-betting range earlier... minus your TT comment I mean... so this would be a huge mistake calling his shove if the best case you could be in is racing against AK... because the slightly larger part of the time you will be up agaisnt QQ+... which has you destroyed ~4-1 (the numbers are as follows... there are 34 ways to make [AK, QQ+] 16/34 are AK while 6/34 ways to make each of the other 3 PPs in that range... meaning 8/17 or roughly 47% of the time villian shoves you will be a slight favorite to win the hand... however about 17.6% of the time he has each of the individual pairs you are up against in this range or the remaining 53% if you prefer... which you are about an 80-20 dog against... you can always just stove this if you want exact #s put im certain folding is right to a shove based on the info provided by HERO against this perticular villian...

Doylestown · #29 11-13-2007, 08:46 AM

Yes the reason for posting was to try to gauge different lines of thinking with respect to how to play this hand. I'll post the results for [censored] and giggles as it was a classic Poker Stars action hand.

For what it's worth I was deciding between a flat call and a very big raise. I don't like a small raise here at all. I decided on a flat call for some of the reasons already mentioned + a few others. One of the benefits of a flat call could be a squeeze play where a blind jams with air. Maybe an all in from a blind gets villain to fold here? I don't know? A detriment to a flat call is we allow the blinds to complete on the cheap as seen in this example.

I'd still like to get some more opinions on what you guys like to do pre flop in this spot.

PokerStars No-Limit Hold'em Tourney, Big Blind is t200 (9 handed) Poker Stars Converter Tool from FlopTurnRiver.com (Format: 2+2 Forums)

UTG (t4230)
UTG+1 (t5555)
MP1 (t6745)
MP2 (t2185)
MP3 (t9763)
CO (t2875)
Hero (t13560)
SB (t4470)
BB (t6775)

Preflop: Hero is Button with J[img]/images/graemlins/spade.gif[/img], J[img]/images/graemlins/heart.gif[/img].
1 fold, UTG+1 raises to t400, 4 folds, Hero calls t400, 1 fold, BB calls t200.

Flop: (t1300) J[img]/images/graemlins/diamond.gif[/img], T[img]/images/graemlins/spade.gif[/img], 7[img]/images/graemlins/spade.gif[/img] (3 players)
BB bets t400, UTG+1 calls t400, Hero raises to t1600, BB raises to t3800, UTG+1 raises to t5155, Hero raises to t13160, BB calls t2575 (All-In).

Turn: (t25990) 2[img]/images/graemlins/spade.gif[/img] (3 players, 1 all-in)

River: (t25990) 3[img]/images/graemlins/spade.gif[/img] (3 players, 1 all-in)

Final Pot: t25990

Results in white below: 
BB has 9c 8h (straight, jack high).
UTG+1 has 4s As (flush, ace high).
Hero has Js Jh (flush, jack high).
Outcome: UTG+1 wins t25990.

gtpitch · #30 11-13-2007, 03:20 PM

After seeing the results I gotta wonder what Villian has been limp\calling with. I put villian with a range of TT+, AT+, KJ+ or so. I would have to think that this was not his first suited ("sooted") ace that he saw. And if you were at the same table the whole tournament (assuming this isn't a turbo) that would mean that you have seen ~70-100 hands with him. Tough spot to be in because after seeing the results I'm not sure you get him off that hand at all. He would probably call your 3 bet preflop and obv planned on shoving that flop with 4 to the flush IMO. That was a classic Pokerstars hand though...