blonde poker forum

Hi All,

Back into the fore we go, this time it’s a 10/20 NL hand from a while ago

Relevant Notes:

The table has been playing very very aggressive, its 5 handed, and the lineup was us, H@££INGGOL, 2 other solid regulars, and a very loose losing player that had an enormous stack. There was plenty of re-raising preflop and some huge pots. You are only playing the 1 table, you know Hall is playing at least 4, and the other regs are on 2. The “target” is playing only one table


Reads:

H@££INGGOL : $5,900


He is playing his usual style, mixing it up with passive and aggressive play based on both his opposition in the hand and his position against the aforementioned opposition. He randomizes his play sufficiently that its not easy to figure out a likely holding, especially given the depth of his stack. He is a tough player and has been playing well this session.

Loosey Goosey : $11,500

He is probably the main reason the game is running,  everytime he raises preflop he has either called or re-raised if someone has raised his opening bet, he overplays draws and weak made hands, and has tried some horrendous bluffs that have miraculously got there on the river. Most of his stack came from someone that recently left the table, so none of the other players would have much reason to be on tilt/playing a different style then they would generally play. You are hopeful that you can win a big pot against this person

Hero :  $,3,900

You have been playing pretty aggressively in position, and have defended your BB religiously for the last 30 minutes, as the bad player is in the SB and has been attacking your blind. You have played position well, mixing it up between calling and raising when your bb gets attacked, and have steadily chipped up mostly at the expense of the losing player.

Onto the Hand:


Hero gets dealt Jc Jh in the BB

Hallinggol opens for $70 on the button, and the loose losing player in the small blind makes a small raise to $200, action is on you:


Given the reads, what are the pros and cons with regards to re-raising vs calling? Most importantly, you haven’t put in the third raise once this session, so how worried are we with exposing the strength of our hand vs getting more money in the pot against the bad players likely wide range at the risk of playing OOP vs Hallinggol for the rest of the hand.  Finally, what do you do?

Action: Hero just called, and so did H@ll:

Flop comes down 9c 2h 8s, and the loose player surprisingly checks:

Given your read of the player, what do you make of this check? Be aware that H@ll on the button will be as aware if not more so of the players image,  so what would you be thinking about his likely hands in this spot, and what would you do?

More to come on Wednesday!

Fold, I smell pocket 2's

hand on heart, you would fold ?

I have got you figured out all wrong then....

 :D

ok Well i would assume it plays out like so, you pop the pot for your jacks, Now if H@££INGGOL calls you are in trouble, so fold at the first chance you get, but i think after you pot bet it, loosey goosey will reraise. hence fold.

I dont like the check from the loose guy given the info we have.

I would re-re-raise pre-flop and try and take it down there and then. Sandwiched between two players with a good chance of overcards, you're going to make it difficult for yourself by just calling. The button will probably fold, but the small blind is likely to call, leaving you in position with a strong hand against a weak player.

Given that you smooth called, I'd check the flop and re-raise when the button makes his inevitable continuation bet.

I am not disagreeing just trying to clarify in my mind why are you raising here? For value? If so are you looking to get all in if Hall raises you? To get info? You are folding if Hall raises you? If Hall calls you are checking or betting turn both with and without an overcard or a 7 being turned over? 

You raise here if SB calls as well? With him in the hand as well.... ???

This seems like a complicated hand to me. Totalise told me ages ago to try to know what line you are gonna take for the rest of the hand, it is boggling my tiny mind thinking about all the different things that could happen in this hand.

When my mind is boggled I tend to go all check/cally instead of bet/raisey but I am a pretty passive fish.

Im isolating preflop. A small raise purely to get this hu and get rid of H@l.

I would try to isolate pre too, we want to avoid h@l if at all possible even moreso OOP against him.
That said this is indeed a tough spot, if we bet we are likely to face a reraise from a good player in position (with a bankroll to die for lol), especially as he is probably not interested in us too much at this point.
I say check call, horribly passive i know but i am fearful of being outplayed later in the hand if the pot becomes too big.

I'm raising to win the pot pre-flop. If Hall calls then we can take it from there, but if he raises again, then I'm releasing as we have a tight/solid image and are facing a re-re-re-raise.

It's very difficult to know what line you are going to take for the rest of the hand as there are some many different variants.

sorry man, I write bad, I meant on the flop.

From what I know of H@££s play he is quite capable of calling a reasonable raise here as we are signalling our hand (actually overplaying it a touch) and OOP - so raising unless huge will just create a big pot oop and we will have to c-bet any flop (which works a lot until it doesn't and usually chooses to doesn't when we are doublestacked).  Calling limits any info and all 3 players go to the flop with undefined hands - this is prob a better situation for us than setting ourselves up as the target for the other two.

So we have a flop where no one really has much idea what anyone else has, but we are likely to have the best hand.  The good news is that there aren't many draws, so we are probably behind if we get significant action from H@££.  I assume that the sb has checked because he has cunningly observed that you cold called a 10bb raise, so he realises that your range includes a big pair.  Checking seems a bit weak and if H@££ bets and the sb raises we have a predicament, if the sb calls we still have no idea where we stand.  So I'm for betting half the pot after a short pause.  If H@££ raises I think I can find a fold, probably outplayed but its what I deserve for playing JJ OOP with 200bbs.  Incidentally I would probably play the same way with a set (but obv wouldn't fold).
   

My answer is still relatively the same, I'd be check-raising the pot to show strength and to try and take the pot down there and then. Jacks are very vulnerable, especially out of position to a strong player, so I'm happy to win what's currently in the pot. If he sticks in another raise, then I'll probably pass knowing my opponent is playing back at someone with a good solid image, although time taken to play, size of bet and the actions of Loosey Goosey could all sway my decision.

I hate 4 betting pre but if the reason you are playing is because the sb is the Mark of the table then 4 betting to around 600-700 given you said he doesnt ever pass is the best play here. You isolate the value at the table, shut out a decent opponent (ive played Frederik a fair bit and he wont call here v often) and you have position over the Mark.

You dont wanna be re-raising pre and hoping to win it there or you might as well do this with J2os. You wanna swell a pot wth position against an opponent who overplays weak made hands as you have said.

I know you wouldn't get to the flop like this very often, but given how u got to the flop, what would you do from here? and whats ur thinking of the SB's range? at the time after he checked i thought it was kinda polorized to a hand he thinks is the nuts, or nothing, but of course the problem is that you donno what kinda hand this guy will think is the nuts. I think your preflop comments are spot on, I try not to play good players and having hall behind kinda froze me.

That makes sense. My main prerogative of raising pre-flop is to rid the hand of Hall so we're not playing a three-way pot out of position against a tough, tricky player.

i'd be reraising pre flop to isolate our 'target' and let him overplay his weak made hands when/if he makes small pair. im glad to take the pot pre flop as enough in there and wouldnt sit tight and call here as its giving value to player 3 and we would be oop all hand, if no J comes, we dno where we are.

therefore i would reraise pre flop to $700 given that opener was 70, he can only call / shove here with a small range of hands and the loosey goosey can call with anything he wants cos if he flat calls i believe we're definately ahead, if raisy daisy, im willing to go AI pre vs loosey Goosey hoping for 2 overs AK AQ or 99 1010.

but as we have smooth called and got ourselves into a predicament - i would check raise the pot as im expecting button to continuation bet when both of us check to him, try keep pot small by checkin and swell it up when he c-bets, if sb reraises i would smooth call and reasses turn.

hi All, thanks for the responses so far

As you recall, the flop was 9c 2h 8s, and the loose player surprisingly checked.

Action was on us, and what I ultimately ended up doing was betting $400, h@ll called, and the SB folded

What kinda range are we putting H@ll on at this stage? Do the dynamics of the hand change because of what we both know about the SB? if so, how?

Turn comes 2c for a board of 9c 2h 8s 2c and the pot is about $1,400 and our stack size remaining is about $3,300

Whats your line from here? given the way the hand has played, both preflop and on the flop, do you think we will show more profit if we are the aggressor or if we hand that over the h@ll?

Action, hero checked, and h@ll bet $800

Whats the plan for the rest of the hand?

I think he has some sort of made hand as he called your flop bet when the sb could have checkraised and he didn't seem worried about that.  So I think he either has an overpair or a set (slight chance he had 2pr).  With the overpair, if the sb crs and you call, he can fold as he can be reasonably sure he's beaten and if you fold, he gets the money in vs the sb.  With the set he obv doesnt raise the flop.

So I'm going to fold as I dont think there are many hands that I'm beating (TT, a counterfeited 98) and I'm going to put my stack at risk with a call unless I fold on the river i.e. I'm putting in $800 in the hope that he checks the river and that must be bad play vs an agg player.

Call turn, call river.

His range is massive but the 2 on the turn is a huge card. You lose to quads, 9 s full or 8 s full. Your hand is pretty face up which means Frederik will probably try to turn his T9s or 87s into a huge bluff so he bets the turns in situations like this planning on making a big bet on the river to rep the v small range that has u beat. If he has the exact hands that beat you, pay him. Longterm passing postflop here simply will give him too much leeway and he will run over you.

From reading your post im assuming you're putting Holl on a tighter range because the small blind is still behind him after strangely checking and obviously you know the results but if you are using this as a main source of "He must have a set" then its miles off longrun in my experiences with him and infact its situations like these where he tends to try and make big moves later in the hand. Obviously he can still flop a set like anyone can but his range is far from being polarised here and given what small part of his range beats you compared to what huge part of his range you crush, then its simply a case of call, call imo.

I agree with Dubai, the 2 is a huge card and you're only worried about a small range of hands. If he has the full house, then so be it. 9-8, J-9s, T-T are all feasible here. He could easily have a hand like J-Ts also. To be honest, one of the reasons I raise pre-flop is to avoid a tricky situation like this - out of position against a strong player like Hall.

I'm actually going to go out on a limb and guess he has 6s 7s.

hi all, heres the next step in the hand.

After H@ll bets $800, hero decides to call.

This touches on something important with regards to turn/river play.....

given the fact that we called the turn... are we obligated to call pretty much any river? Obviously against a player that will frequently bet turns with no hand but will only bet the river with the nuts, its different, but in this spot, is our river decision decided on the turn, or does it depend on the texture of the river card?


River comes 3h for a board of  9c 2h 8s 2c 3h , pot is $3,000 and we have about $2,500 behind, action on hero

What range of hands does hall have now, can we bet and expect to get called by worse, or by checking turn/river are we turning our hand into a bluff catcher? or are we checking and folding to a river push? and ultimately, what do you do?

Action, hero checks, and H@ll goes allin which covers you, $2500 to call, pot $5,500

Action on hero, and this relates to the previous points...

 are we calling or folding?


Reveal to come on Sunday

and H@ll goes allin - who'd have thunk it.

What to do?  The problem here is that only you can really answer this.  You have some idea, based on your previous encounters, what H@ll puts you on and can determine from that what his range is.  e.g.  Is there any chance that you would slowplay a set here?  If so, his hand could be a set or a bluff with 98 (he knows here that you very likely have an overpair).  I doubt that he would go allin with TT although he might with QQ.  How would you have played AK?  If it was me, I fear that my hand range would be obvious on the turn i.e an overpair, so if I had a history of folding to aggression, I might have to call.  If I had a river-calling history, I might have to fold.

As far as the river card is concerned I would have preferred a card that H@££ should be worried about if my theory about him having a made hand is correct i.e. an ace or a nine or a str8 card.

This is obv a good hand for discussion and I would appreciate you letting us know why you called the flop bet when an AI was likely on the river and indeed your overall thoughts on the hand.

Please click here to see what Hall had:

http://www.blondepoker.com/index.php?q=node/12834 (http://www.blondepoker.com/index.php?q=node/12834)

Intriguing conclusion from totalise too.