$25 a hopefully answerable extraction question

[bozzer]

ok, it seems that i'm probably not playing too staightforwardly by raising here pretty much always.

there are some merits to a call, number 1 in my mind being that he is currently on the road to playing for stacks and we don't want to put him off. but i think that's counteracted by the chance of a flush card coming which either puts us behind or scares him off.

i guess the problem is that i am very successful bluff raising with this line so i might want to think mostly using a different line to get value.

anyway, fairy basic spot. it's provoked by my trying to figure out why i have such a low wtsd % and not a very high w$sd %. i might have to post some more value spots...

[2p2J]

It's a good standard raise on the flop. I'm also guessing he folded and you won on the flop.

[bozzer]

[ QUOTE ]
It's a good standard raise on the flop. I'm also guessing he folded and you won on the flop.

[/ QUOTE ]

yeh obv. i should have posted the hand without my action really.

[Pokey]

Per your request, I'll give this hand a shot. [img]/images/graemlins/grin.gif[/img]

Preflop is either great or horrible, depending on lots of things that are not included in your description. How often you should attempt a blind steal (and, by extension, how wide a range you should steal with) depends entirely on the players in the blinds. The two important numbers are their defense number ("fold SB/BB against a steal %") and their c-bet folding ("% fold flop to a c-bet"). You want these numbers to be large for you to attempt to steal. If the "fold flop to a c-bet" number is high enough (say, over 60%) then you can steal with any two cards until you get caught and have a profitable play, even if he NEVER folds to your steal preflop. Similarly, even if he never folds to a c-bet you can make a profit stealing with any two cards if he defends his blinds too infrequently. When you have two nitty opponents in the blinds (ideally set-miners) you can steal all day and all night, and 75o is perfectly acceptable.

Now, if your opponents are loosey-goosies who call preflop with any ol' crap and continue to showdown all the time, you shouldn't be pulling this with anything less than a premium hand -- position alone isn't enough to make 75o worth playing.

I'll assume you know this and your bet was wisely chosen.

On the flop you check. Period. End of story. Do not bet. At all. In fact, you might want to smooth-call the turn, too.

Why? Well, let's take a look at the situation.

SB leads strongly. That's a pot-sized bet, my friend. What makes that kind of bet? I'd say 66+, AK, [img]/images/graemlins/spade.gif[/img] [img]/images/graemlins/spade.gif[/img], and perhaps a wide range of bluffs, depending on the opponent. Now you absolutely crush the CRAP out of that range.

Recognize that you are not giving a free card, here -- villain just charged himself an unfair price for any draw.

Also, think about the consequences of a reraise:

66/77/88, maybe TT/JJ fold. If you hadn't reraised they would have fired a second value bet and you'd have made an extra $7.

AK/bluffs fold. If you hadn't reraised they might have fired a second barrel and you'd have made an extra $5-$7.

[img]/images/graemlins/spade.gif[/img] [img]/images/graemlins/spade.gif[/img] might call, might fold. A fold is bad for you. A call lets you extract more on the turn. Also, the longer you wait the more your money goes in as a huge favorite, rather than a modest favorite.

QQ+ four-bets all-in, but (barring some VERY strange happenings on the turn/river) you're getting all-in against them no matter what, so it's irrelevant. Also, these make up an extremely small fraction of our opponent's raise considering the preflop action.

99 stacks us no matter what, so that's also irrelevant.

In short, there are some hands that we stack no matter what and one hand that stacks us no matter what. There are also many hands that we can stack or extract MUCH more value from by slowplaying to the turn or river. Villain's OOP and betting -- we might as well let him do it. A raise lets him off way too cheaply.

You've stumbled into a sneaky monster: take a small risk and get a huge payout. Barring strangeness, my default line is "call flop, call turn, push river."

[RedSoxFan]

Pokey- what site do you play at and what's your id? I just want to avoid playing you heads-up. If you play as good as your advice is, you're a monster.