Monday, August 27, 2007

Big hand in Canada, need some feedback.

Went up to Canada for the weekend, and got to play twice. First night played for about 1.5hrs and lost ~140. Played ok, but payed off some chick when I was pretty sure I was beat with QJ on a J high board. Got tired and decided to bail before I lost it all.

FF to next day: Got in a nice long session. Sat down at the 1-2 table with 200 buy-in, brand new table. Big action table and I doubled up early with AK on a KJX flop when a guy open-shoipped with K3 after cold calling my 30 re-raise.

About 20 min later the same guy calls 30 again pre-flop when I have JJ. Flop is 742 two diamonds, and he open ships for ~200. I call and he shows AKo, and thankfully whiffs on 4th and 5th streets.

So now I have ~550 or so and our big hand comes up. I pick up AQ, and the guy on my right opens for 10 bucks. He was pretty tight player, and I had been chatting with him a little bit. He was a local, and he knew how to play for the most part. He also respected my game cause he was making comments like, "I'm not going to get into a hand with this guy!" and "You aren't going to be giving that stack away easy, I know that". Anyhow, I raise him to 30, and a mid-stack behind ships for ~70 total. He was a kinda tilty/gambler and I don't think anyone gave him much credit for a big hand. Well the guy on my right just calls the bet. I considered raising again to get him out, but decided with AQ I would rather see the flop.

Flop: K J 10 rainbow.

Yahtzee.

I am OOP. Normally I would just bet out here, but this guy knew I wasn't fooling around when I bet, and I wanted to get all the money in. I decided to check so that he would bet out and commit himself with 2 pair or something like that. He checked behind.

Turn: As

Not a bad card for me. I still have the nuts, but I might be chopping if he has QQ or any random Q. There are now 2 spades on board, (K and A) but I am not worried much about a flush draw. If he had AK or AJ he just two paired, and since I showed weakness on the flop he will probably raise me if I bet out. So I do, I bet 60. Smallish bet into a pot of about 210. I am really hoping to get raised here, he has ~250 behind and I have him covered. He just calls.

River: 5s

Well the last spade got there, but I don't have him on a spade draw (the A and K are both onboard and I am not sure what he is calling 70 preflop with that has 2 non A or K spades). Otherwise I have the nuts and at worst am chopping. I decide to lead for 100, about half his stack. He ships on me and I call. He shows me the 9s 10s for the winner.

I was pretty surprised, but when I looked at it from his side it made sense. He raised with a gambler hand, got raised by me, then got re-popped by a maniac. He called against the maniac because he knew he was coming in light. He probably thought I would fold too. The flop came pretty bad for him, but I checked, so he did too. Now the turn comes, and he has a pair and a flush draw, and I am not showing much strength. He calls my small bet and hits the river where now I start leading into him. He figures to be good and goes with it.

So anyway, someone yell at me or something.

6 comments:

jsola said...

Man it's really hard to put him on a hand that beats you by the river, especially after his preflop call. If he's generally tight and respects your play then his range should be pretty snug here and should have hit that board in some fashion.

I like the flop check, he'll definitely give you some action with AK/KQ/JT/KK/JJ/TT, a huge chunk of his range. Anything else is checking through but doesn't have a draw that can beat you so oh well.

Since he checks the flop I'd start to think he's got something like 88 or 99 or AJ. The turn's definitely the time to hammer it, maybe he's chopping with you now or maybe he's got two pair that he thinks is good. I don't know if he's going to raise you with anything less than broadway, though, so the bet might be too small. Flopped two pair / sets are just going to call for boat outs so you could have charged those hands some more.

He just calls, which can mean a set/two pair that's scared of the four-straight, broadway, or a flush draw. The river just plain sucks for you because there's still a ton of value in betting out, and you have to call his ship on the (very likely) chance that you're chopping with another Q.

I think you played it fine, with the possible exception of betting more on the turn to punish second best hands that are looking for a boat or a cheap showdown.

Marshall said...

I talked with Jeh at lunch today and we both came to the exact same conclusion Joe.

I am the one who is always preaching about proper bets on the turn too... if he has any type of draw, (2 pair, set, fd, hell even if he is "drawing" to a chop) I have to name my price on the turn. If he whiffs I get nothing on the river, if he hits, I probably pay him off no matter what. So the turn is pretty crucial for me to bet like at least 100 if not 150-175.

I don't know if he pays off 150-175 with 2 pair there, he knows I am not an idiot, but at least I charge him to see the river regardless.

The weird thing is that there was plenty of money in the middle for me to just hammer that pot on the turn and not feel bad even if he did get away from 2 pair/set.

Ryan said...

I'm having trouble placing the players in their positions, here. Good Player "opens" for 10 to your right, you raise to 30, and Loose Player ships for 70. Then you are OOP for the rest of the hand. You in SB, LP in BB, and GP on button are the only positions where that all works out. Unless LP limped, GP raised to 10, and you were in one of the blinds.

Anyway, the preflop action is very interesting. GP opens with a 5x raise, then smooth calls after a reraise from a player he respects and a ship from LP. That's a tough spot.

Is it possible to read him as essentially calling LP and not you, and thus realize that shipping it is in order? Based on your read of GP, his call of 70 seems really odd to me, and I'm not sure what I would have made of it at the time. AK tells a solid story with that action, so I would be very nervous about it, and would probably call hoping for a Q-high board or flopped Broadway to make things easy.

As for the rest of the action, if you can't put GP on a two-spade, queen-high-at-best hand, here, then I guess you can just accept that you made a misread that cost you, even though the safe thing to do is "protect just in case" on the turn with a bigger bet.

One question to ask is, assuming your read is correct and that he doesn't have two spades, what makes 60 a better bet than one that prices out flush draws (and set-based boat draws, but I don't think you can put him on a set with his flop check-behind on a scary board)? The answer would be that it causes him to lay down a hand that he would incorrectly call 60 with, i.e., a pair or two pair. AT or AJ potentially fits his actions by the time you are betting on the turn, as do Ax suited.

Still, consider that the board is four to broadway, and that any random Q is the nuts. Is he even calling 60 with two pair or a pair in that spot? I'm inclined to think that the bet size isn't all that relevant at that point. If he has two pair, either he's going to feel like he's good and call a larger bet, or he's going to feel beat and fold to any bet. If that's the case, you may as well increase the bet and protect against a bad read.

Calling 60 on the turn is a mistake for any non-queen hand other than a set or a flush draw, though, and there's no way he's on a set. So again, if you trust your "no spade draw" read, it's a fine bet if you think it might get a call from two pair where, say, 100 to 150 would not.

It really raises the bigger question of, "How far should you trust your reads?" If I had a great answer to that, I think I'd be playing pro by now. (It seems like he has an ace with the queen of diamonds for the mortal nuts. I call.)

Tough hand.

Ryan said...

Another thought: why not go with Martin's "lead-out/reraise is the new check-raise" on the flop, here? That bet of 60 made on the flop would be interesting...if he folds to 60 then he obviously had no piece of it at all, and you weren't going to get anything out of him anyway, short of letting him turn a set or a draw. So, if he folds to 60, you can rest easy knowing he had nothing to pay you off with. If he raises, then he probably has AK, two pair, or a set (or AQ), and you get it all in on the flop.

If he calls, then you put him in on the turn, as the pot has become really juicy, and the board pairing is the only thing that could be remotely scary for you.

jtrey333 said...

As Marsh mentioned, we did talk extensively at Monday lunch about this hand. I really have no problems with how he played the hand *except* for the turn bet.

The main thing to me is that Marsh was playing the riskier end of the risk/reward scale, perfectly fine. The check on the flop was fine to let the guy catch up, and in this situation, he certainly made a hand where he just can't resist drawing, yet is substantially behind. That's an even better situation than the possible two pair/set that Marsh put the other guy on.

But regardless, once he's let the guy feel more comfortable with his two pair/set/flush draw, he's got to make him pay on the turn. He'll call any reasonable bet, as there is ~210 in the pot, and a bet of 100-150 does two things: 1) you have made him pay to try to catch up; 2) you have effectively committed him to this pot, and he will call with an unimproved hand on the river *except* a missed flush.

And so it goes... we're not playing results-oriented here, and just looking at the specific spot of the turn, where over the long run, if Marsh extracts more on the turn, and finds himself this far ahead in the hand, he will have those results to show for it. My analysis: 100-150 on the turn bet.

Sushi Cowboy said...

Disclaimer: I am not a big fan of AQ in the first place. I don't know the full feel of the table but if tight player on my right opens for 10, I don't like going to battle with AQ. I wouldn't throw it away but I wouldn't raise with it either, but that's just me. A cold call for 10 would likely have changed the dynamic of LP shipping for 70 as well. But given the 30 raise and the ship, once tight player flat calls that is screaming AK to me and I hate AQ even more in that spot. OK, so that's my pre-flop diatribe.

Once the flop comes out, I really feel that I have to bet SOMETHING. Let's give LP credit for a random Ace. If the turn comes a Q that can kill action and you haven't built a side pot with tight player. There are a ton of hands in tight player's range that will play with you here. I think letting tight player catch up can be an OK strategy if the pot is just between you two but with a third player all-in on a three card broadway flop, I want to put more chips in the pot; at least a bait bet looking for a re-raise if nothing else. There is already 210 in the pot and half or 2/3 of that could easily go away with the wrong turn or river card. Plus, once the pot is bigger, it allows you to charge more for the turn. I also want to make sure that if the board pairs and I make a crying call that I got more of my money in when I was good.

Granted, 9sTs would not have been on the list of hands I'm worried about here and it would have been hard to put him on a flush so I don't mind paying him off on the end but I sure would have wanted to have gotten more of my money in earlier or gotten him out of what was already a decent sized pot.