I think you're mistaking balance for optimal responses. It isn't about balance, it's about optimal responses. It is possible for two actions to have the same EV (check and bet for example) so a mixed strategy is feasible. However, this isn't an argument against optimal responses. Again, I really don't want to derail, so if there's interest perhaps a new thread should be opened.
My thought processes "AT THE TIME" were as follows:
PRE FLOP:
1) My standard raise from the CUTOFF would be 525 for all raising hands, (475 if Early Table Position). So my action with KK was a standard open from the CUTOFF and as such, a bet of 525.
Flop: 7h7c8c
POST FLOP:
2) My preferred play here is a check/call here for pot control against 7x hands and to allow worse hands to bet. He bets 1,100, I happily call.
Turn: 6c
POST TURN:
3) Again, I check/call again here, a flush has potentially got there. However, he doesn't have to have a flush and I also do have the Kc. He bets, 2,200, and I, "not quite so happily call"
River: Ac
4) OK, so I've got the NUT flush, but it is a paired board. I decide that I am probably ahead, but he will likely have showdown value (a worse flush possibly or trip 7's), so I felt I should lead out. I bet 5K
5) When my opponent, makes it 12K, I'm in a very tricky situation, I decided to "sigh" call. I felt at the time it was a bad call, and when I reflected upon it at a later stage, I can see that, clearly, it should have been a fold.
My opponent showed As7s for a winning full house.
THIS IS MY REFLECTION OF THIS HAND, AT A LATER DATE, OUTSIDE OF THE HEAT OF BATTLE:
Clearly my opponent was polorised, it was either a bluff or a full house. So I think we can remove likely flushes as a scenario. Which means a full house or possibly a 7 turning into a bluff. However nearly all 7x hands on this board have made a house. It is feasible that he may call pre with, 76s, 87, 97, A7s, only 97 doesn't make a house. As the hand played out, I can't see how it can be a bluff, so when he made it 12k, I should clearly have folded.
OK, I am happy with my play pre flop, post flop and post turn, I'm fairly fixed in the view that this, for me, was the correct play. Clearly I should fold to his re-raise on the river. However, where I really come unstuck, even after reflection, is, should I have check called the river, or was it right, against his range to lead out?
I'm happy for people to have differing flop and turn thoughts, but mine will not change on this.
However, I am very keen to hear peoples thoughts on the, "Do I lead out on the river question, or is it a check/call?"
I appreciate both responses. I would like to take the discussion further but I feel it's a slight derail. I don't really want to turn the thread too far away from its original purpose, so I'll depart. If another thread on the topic arises then I'll post there. Thx Posted by percival09
I value your input on this percival, as you are clearly very knowledgable in this area.
However it may be best addressed on a separate thread, as the main point I was trying to convey, is that people should have an open mind as much as possible, and perhaps consider that their "fixed view" may not have considered all the nuances that exist.
However I am quite a hypocrite on this, as you will note, that my views on the flop and turn play of hand three are unlikely to ever be swayed. However, that is not to say never, but there is only so much I can re-consider each time, and the part I want to address is solely the river play. (BTW, I don't mind people having their own discussion re my flop and turn play, but I do not feel it necessary or useful to defend it)
you're more likely to get him putting more chips in light without betting, which looks very strong. It also means you are maintaining pot control for when he has the house, which as you say is in his range.
great thread G I like check/call on the river you're more likely to get him putting more chips in light without betting, which looks very strong. It also means you are maintaining pot control for when he has the house, which as you say is in his range. Posted by GELDY
Yeh, it's a tricky one, you may well be right, but a lot of players will just check behind with a 7 or a lower flush.
It is sometimes difficult not to be results orientated. In hindsight, I should have left it open for discussion after the turn, without revealing the result.
I'm not saying your opinion would change, but, lets say he called with a lower flush, either 7d9c or a made flush on the turn that got counterfiet and called my bet, would people then say it was a good lead out?
I don't know, but perhaps in these scenarious I should give it a day before revealing the "result".
Thanks for the feedback Lars, and I'm not suggesting in any way, that your answer is results orientated.
I'm just stating that, if I don't provide the result, then we know for sure that people's responses, are indeed based upon the only facts that were known to me at the time.
Blocker value bet on the river defo makes sense to me, if we check i think we miss out on value against a few hands that will sigh call river that would most likely check back, i don't think checking induces enough bluffs/thin value bets as opposed to the calls blocker betting will get against the same hands, and we can be very comfortable folding against a polar raising range that is massively weighted towards value, 7x calls/folds and is never going to turn the hand into a bluff ( i don't think) hard for oppo to have a flush and if they do the best holding is qx flush so they just snap off in this spot and never raise for value (unless v good reads on oppo massively over valuing hands ). The raise on the river is polar to like absolute junk of which apart from complete airballs and maybe a very odd semi bluff cant really think of anything maybe like 56 without a club could make some sicko bluff raise on the river here but yeah basically nothing in the bluff end of oppos range here and we are beat by all the value.
I think there's already been a lot of very interesting discussion on this thread already and think all the people contributing are doing so in a positive and good manner.
In hand 3 I think the river play is the most important aspect of the hand and that whilst there are different options throughout the hand this is the most important decision point.
I think it makes sense to donk lead this river for value. The problem for check calling this river is that many value hands we beat, trips, straights, weak flushes, are likely just to check back, whilst all the value range that bets has us beat. I also think if we are thinking about what hands he plays like this, its going to be extremely value heavy if he does bet the river after we check, as his weak showdown hands like straights and trips just check and its extremely difficult to think of hands that he plays this way that gets to the river and doesn't have any showdown value, unless the villain is capable enough to turn the weakest portion of showdown value hands into bluffs on the river, to balances for the time he value bets. (I don't think we can assume this to be the case) By leading out we can get sigh calls off stubborn weak showdown hands that would check back, or flushes we beat. Once we get raised I can't imagine a viable combination of cards villain can have that we beat, so I think a disciplined fold is probably the play.
I really like this sharing of hands and think its fantastic your submitting hands that you actually think you misplayed as well as those you played well.
I like the river lead and yeah it's probably a fold on the river, as Groggy said, I jus think it's reallly hard to come up with a combo that we beat when he raises the river, and even if we come up with a couple it'll be a lot less than the combos of FHs. It's the kind of spot that in-play I probably end up calling in-play feeling like I have to even though I'm sure I'm beat then feel stupid afterwards when I get shown the inevitable house.
Fwiw, I haven't seen it mentioned yet but I deffo prefer a flop bet as oppose to a c/c. There are just so many hands we can get value from on this flop, hands where it's very likely he chooses to just take a free card and we miss a bet. There's also quite a lot of ugly turn cards where even if we haven't been outdrawn, it will end up killing the action/making it hard for us to get value from worse.
Agree with most of the replies so far. The lead looks good to me for value, the hands you might hope to get value from are just likely to check behind on this river. Any call of the 12k reraise obviously has to be based on a pretty strong read and is quite opponent/situation specific and in this spot probably a sigh/fold.
Just posting to say I too am enjoying this thread. Really hope you stick with it and keep giving us your thoughts on each hand. You will get 'experts' disagreeing with you on a lot of decisions and what not, but that is part of the course when these things come up.
Just a couple of basic questions from me (as I don't play live as much as I would like).
Do you always rack up in your head what is in the pot if you are in the hand?
It amazes me that some views given already are an essay to how you should/could of played a hand given the maths etc etc. Surely sometimes you just have to go with your instinct/feel for the situation due to not having very much time before you have to act?
Flop/turn seem very opponent dependant, i also agree that the river is a bet fold, the only way i would bet call was if you donked out a very small bet (around 3k or less) in hope of repping a blocker bet with a small flush and inducing a bluff raise.
It amazes me that some views given already are an essay to how you should/could of played a hand given the maths etc etc. Surely sometimes you just have to go with your instinct/feel for the situation due to not having very much time before you have to act?
I find the instinct/feel stuff really interesting when it comes to poker, I think this is why studying these spots is important and effective in improving quickly as a player. I think Your "gut instinct, feel" is a subconscious accumulation of positive and negative reinforcement in these spots, for example you might bet call in a spot 20 times and lose 16 times, then because of the repeated negative reinforcement in that situation your brain learns not to do so though experience, so over time you naturally become a better poker player just by playing over and over but its a much slower process, obviously this varies massively player to player based on so many different variables in the skillset of a human such as how quick they naturally learn from mistakes etc.
This (I think) explains why some poker players can absolutely boss the game "naturally" as the skillset they have allows them to adapt/ find solutions alot quicker than the "average" person through experience. Studying these spots just speeds up the process so instead of learning after the 20th time you are confident by say the 5th time, so its just bringing closer how accurate the connection is between your subconscious reaction (gut instinct/feeling etc) and the technical conscious analysis you make in the short time you have to make a decision. I think this explains why in really close spots even bosses decide to go with an initial "gut feeling" as they are basically reverting back to the subconsciously accumulated info from years of playing.
I wasn't going to comment on this hand, but it's like I've got an obsession and can't stop! Anyway pre, flop and turn are all fine ofc. I am mostly betting flop but x/c is fine too and is something I would do some of the time.
However, I'm not sure that leading the river is my preffered play. When you lead out, your hand looks exactly like what it is - either nut or 2nd nut flush (probably expects you to have AKc or AQc) a fair amount. Do you have any bluffs that play this way as I can't really imagine too many? So if villain is good, do you think he will pay you off with 7x (of which as you pointed out very few are non-FH anyway!) or a low flush (Tc or lower? - he might also fold his J high flush)
Which means, we're only really getting value all the time from a Q high flush - and that's a hand that will likely bet for value itself after you check. He might also go for thin value with a J high flush if he thinks you are going to lead K/Q high flushes here. So vs his value hands that we beat, we likely get almost the same value from betting as checking. But by checking we also:
- Allow him to bluff
- Save ourselves money/a decision if villain decides to go for a raise after we lead.
If we think our opponent is such that he will almost never be bluffing river or capable of thin value-betting a J and is v likely to call quite a few worse hands then I think we can make an exploitative lead on the river. You never gave us any reads for this hand, so maybe that was what you thought at the time in which case I do like your river bet. Theory/range wise against a good opponent is where I would not like it.
As played, it's an ugh spot that I'm probably not capable of folding except when I'm playing my A game! Too much good odds/sigh call. But I agree with what's been said about his range here.
I 100% think a flop lead is the best for two reasons, for value obviously because he will check back so many hands that we beat that would feel obligated to call. And it also serves as a nice blocker bet because he would have to be a total maniac to raise bluff. You raised pre and c/c two streets and then led the river. You look immensely strong so any raise we can be 99% certain we are beat by a FH.
As for the flop, I think we can bet this and get called by a lot of worse hands like PP's, draws and floats so we are missing value here. By all means we can pot control turn.
Hi all, just answering some of the collective questions in this one post.
Unfortunately I didn't record any notes about the player on my phone. This leads me to believe, he was probably a standard/solid player. It wouldn't have been the same guy as in the K3o hand as he was on the button when I was in the cutoff and on this occasion, I was on the H-Jack. Also if it was the same guy, I'm sure i would have recorded it. I have no vivid recollection of the scenario, so I just have my limited recording to go on.
It looks like most players think the river was a lead, although it appears a mixed response still, so the jury is still out.
I will briefly address why I check/called the flop, rather than lead. Although, as I alluded to before, I am more concerned about/interested in, the river dilemna.
So, reasons for check/calling flop.
When this deepstacked, if I lead on this flop and I am re-raised, it is a very difficult situation. My opponent may have any of the following:
1) 7x
2) Full House
3) Flush and/or Straight Draw
4) Lower Pocket Pair
5) Bluff (These ar quite good spots to re-raise bluff imo)
6) 8x
I would be oblidged to call the re-raise, but still with no idea which of the above he has.
I would absolutely expect him to bet on most turn's and river's, and each of the bet sizes will be significantly inflated due to the initial flop action. So one of two things could happen. 1) I lose a MASSIVE POT 2) I get bluffed off the hand
By check/calling the flop, I can get to showdown without too bad a dent in my stack. This to me outways the benefits of betting that have been suggested (ie getting value against worse and protecting my hand against a draw.
Clearly, in this scenario, if I led out on the turn and was re-raised, it could have ended up being more of a set back than it already was.
So I feel, I played this hand well on flop and turn, but poorly on the river.
If I'd have check/called or bet/folded the river, and just lost 9K in total, I' would have considered that a successful outcome.
So the river was either a check/call or a bet/fold, but not a bet/call. So I lost 7k more than I needed to, however, it could have been a bigger set back, if the pot was inflated due to a flop lead.
I listened to someone coaching (albeit broadly) say, when you're not sure if you should check or bet, just bet. His reasoning was that by the river few players are inclined to turn thin value into bluffs and may pay you off. The flip side is that when they raise for value we have to be prepared to find the fold. This bit is the bit I have a problem with sometimes! I think roughly to call the flop raise we need to be right 33% of the time, doesn't sound much but when you deconstruct his range here (in game) as some have above, you'd probably find that there just aren't enough bluffs to make this call be at least break even.
1) I think this is a standard call pre flop in a multi-way pot at this blind level.
Flop: 5s6h7d
POST FLOP:
2) So I flop the NUTS. Being first to act in a five way pot, I check to disguise my hand strength, with a reasonable confidence level, that someone will bet for me.
3) The original raiser then makes it 800, with both the HJ and Button folding, I'm happy to just call to keep my customer. I'm also more than happy when I see the BB call.
Turn: 7h
POST TURN:
4) Not overly enamoured to see the board pair, I check, still fairly confident that I am ahead, BB bets 1.5k, (This looks like a possible 7 to me), UTG+2 calls (overpair maybe), I decide to make it 8k, and they both fold.
5) I had to keep playing this recording back, because 8k seems uncharacteristically big, for me, in this spot. I've no idea why I made it so much. There is an element of "protection against potential rivered flushes or houses" in the bet, but I think 6k would have been more appropriate.
Obviously there was a concern about the board pairing again, but I still think that 8k was too much. There must have been some condition/dynamic that caused me to go to 8k, but unsure what that was. Maybe I was thinking if I make it 8k and someone comes over the top of me, I will know I am behind.
Feel free to comment on any part, but particularly interested in thoughts regarding the sizing of the turn bet.
Morning Graham. Just posting to say I too am enjoying this thread. Really hope you stick with it and keep giving us your thoughts on each hand. You will get 'experts' disagreeing with you on a lot of decisions and what not, but that is part of the course when these things come up. Just a couple of basic questions from me (as I don't play live as much as I would like). Do you always rack up in your head what is in the pot if you are in the hand? It amazes me that some views given already are an essay to how you should/could of played a hand given the maths etc etc. Surely sometimes you just have to go with your instinct/feel for the situation due to not having very much time before you have to act? Cheers, Alan Posted by MAXALLY
Hi, thx Alan.
When I first started playing live, I had this same problem. I was always asking the dealer to spread the pot, so I could count it. Later, realising that this was really "novicy" I started to get a better feel for it. So it became naturally more instinctive.
I think this just comes from experience mate. I would say, that if you struggle, try and calculate it in BB's. So if a guy min raises and gets 4 callers including the blinds then there is 10BB's, plus probably 1BB in anties, in the pot. It's easier than counting big numbers.
Incidentally, since then, I sometimes ask the dealer to spread the pot after my opponent has bet on say the turn, to make it look like I'm trying to see if I have the odds to call on a draw, when in fact I have a made hand. So I may do it for deception.
Comments
I like check/call on the river
you're more likely to get him putting more chips in light without betting, which looks very strong. It also means you are maintaining pot control for when he has the house, which as you say is in his range.
Really enjoying the thread btw.
However, I'm not sure that leading the river is my preffered play. When you lead out, your hand looks exactly like what it is - either nut or 2nd nut flush (probably expects you to have AKc or AQc) a fair amount. Do you have any bluffs that play this way as I can't really imagine too many? So if villain is good, do you think he will pay you off with 7x (of which as you pointed out very few are non-FH anyway!) or a low flush (Tc or lower? - he might also fold his J high flush)
Which means, we're only really getting value all the time from a Q high flush - and that's a hand that will likely bet for value itself after you check. He might also go for thin value with a J high flush if he thinks you are going to lead K/Q high flushes here. So vs his value hands that we beat, we likely get almost the same value from betting as checking. But by checking we also:
- Allow him to bluff
If we think our opponent is such that he will almost never be bluffing river or capable of thin value-betting a J and is v likely to call quite a few worse hands then I think we can make an exploitative lead on the river. You never gave us any reads for this hand, so maybe that was what you thought at the time in which case I do like your river bet. Theory/range wise against a good opponent is where I would not like it.
As played, it's an ugh spot that I'm probably not capable of folding except when I'm playing my A game! Too much good odds/sigh call. But I agree with what's been said about his range here.