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ME Final Table
CraigSG1
Member Posts: 1,826
Hi,
Im convinced I made a mistake but I could always be being too hard on myself.
Ive never played with the villain before but have noticed he is very active and agg, min raising most hands and always betting. I was immediately suspicious when instead of his normal min raise he 3x so I just had a gut feeling he was stronger but obviously I can't fold AQ.
As played, what do you do? I think I played it perfectly up to this point but again, if im wrong please say. I want to know howe many would do what I did?
Im convinced I made a mistake but I could always be being too hard on myself.
Ive never played with the villain before but have noticed he is very active and agg, min raising most hands and always betting. I was immediately suspicious when instead of his normal min raise he 3x so I just had a gut feeling he was stronger but obviously I can't fold AQ.
As played, what do you do? I think I played it perfectly up to this point but again, if im wrong please say. I want to know howe many would do what I did?
| Player | Action | Cards | Amount | Pot | Balance |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| CraigSG1 | Small blind | 2000.00 | 2000.00 | 146379.00 | |
| mattprawn | Big blind | 4000.00 | 6000.00 | 296983.00 | |
| Your hole cards |
| ||||
| saints4eva | Fold | ||||
| yozacooper | Raise | 12000.00 | 18000.00 | 221698.00 | |
| gimpazoid | Fold | ||||
| CraigSG1 | Call | 10000.00 | 28000.00 | 136379.00 | |
| mattprawn | Fold | ||||
| Flop | |||||
| |||||
| CraigSG1 | Check | ||||
| yozacooper | Bet | 21000.00 | 49000.00 | 200698.00 | |
| CraigSG1 | Call | 21000.00 | 70000.00 | 115379.00 | |
| Turn | |||||
| |||||
| CraigSG1 | Check | ||||
| yozacooper | All-in | 200698.00 | 270698.00 | 0.00 | |
Comments
As you may be aware I am by no means an expert, but going to jump in first with my thoughts.
The 3x raise could be strong AK, top pairs. Or a less strong, mid pocket pair, suited rag ace / connectors.
Would they be betting if this flop hit 2 pairs or above, maybe not so at this stage I would rule those hands out.
The Six is the pivotal card. The shove after this would indicate to me that they bet a hand stronger than yours on the flop or hold Ace 6 or pocket 6’s
It’s likely at this stage that the best you can hope for is a 3 outer queen.
Neck on the line. I am putting them on A6s, pocket 6’s or Aks, Ajx, thought am usually wrong.
Fold.
It seems to me that the OP believes the Villain is raising with any 2. And many people raise higher when they do not want a call, rather than when they do.
I have to say I don't like the call with AQ. I am 3-betting with AQ far more than calling-want to induce a lot of folds, and take control of the hand. Reraise to 35-40,000 then shove on the flop. I want to be the first to be all-in on that flop-not the 2nd.
You are going to get bullied off that hand a lot, purely because he is the aggressor. As played, you probably have to fold. But he is never putting you on a hand as strong as AQ.
I am no expert and AQ is my bogie hand, me i would have called pre and jammed the flop and hope that the villain aint got AA.
Run good Mate
Congrats on the deep run last night mate. Great result, especially from a free entry.
If your read is correct and you think he is only 3xing his strongest hands then flatting is definitely supportable. That said, I still think I prefer 3-betting, especially as we're out of position, but either option is fine IMO given your read. 2x open and AQ is a mandatory 3-bet. Generally, 3x opening late on in tournaments is pretty bad, IMO
As for post-flop, flatting flop seems fine, jamming won't achieve much - doubt we'll get called by worse.
We actually don't beat much value here with our AQ once villain bets the turn. We lose to AK, AJ, A9, AA, JJ, 9s, 6s. We only really beat weaker Ax hands (which based on your read he probably doesn't have) or a combo draw hand like Kc10c. Having the Qc in our hand blocks a few of the likely combo draws which we can be ahead of though.
Think I fold also given how the hand has played out. Expect AK a lot here from the villain. Don't beat yourself up over it though Craig - many people will go bust in this spot.
As greenbear says here you have picked up a hand that is a good 3bet fold candidate. When you hold an ace and a queen you make it less likely opponent has AK, AA, QQ, AQ, all hands which he will call/jam on you with. If he puts you in it's an easy pass. Something like 34k-38k
As played flop is not exciting and turn is just a fold, especially with the Qc, some of his only realistic bluffs are going to contain that card. You should never beat a value hand either. I suspect you have plenty of AJ 99 JJ that you flat pre with too that are easy calls if you didn't fast play flop. I imagine ATs is the worst hand you get to the turn with, maybe KJs, so AQ isn't so high in your range.
I think trusting your gut in poker tends to serve you well in general. I think you are right to suspect strength when somebody who you know always min raises suddenly 3x's. If you decided in the moment you were going to trust your read and fold preflop here I really wouldn't hate it. On a site like sky poker making exploits at the right time can net you a lot of money. Especially a read like bet sizing where opponent has consciously decided to go bigger and you notice this.
The villain did indeed have AK and I quickly called even though in the moment I knew I should fold.
I didn't want it to be just a case of I knew he had AK and just because he had AK I was right to want to fold if you know what I mean.
It was one of those daft, tired mistakes and I knew in my gut I should fold and I usually do go a long way to trusting my gut.
I didn't want to 3b OOP to an aggressive player and I felt folding was too weak but I admit I never thought to raise fold in this spot; he is generally only ever going to go all in with AK and strong PP so yes - that is an option I will definitely use a lot more.
I guess I just wanted to keep in all his weaker Aces and weaker Qs but like I said, im not sure why but I made a quick decision that had I just thought for even 1 second I would have found the fold like I normally would have. All down to tiredness, I would love to play bigger games but my work life makes it almost impossible if I want to sleep!
Disagree with your read on the 3x open CraigSG1 - larger than usual opens often indicate hands that are generally ahead pre but will hate a lot of flops - middling pairs 88-JJ. They're trying to buy a fold to avoid not knowing what to do when an overcard flops.
The small blind is a position where the vast majority of the time we want to fold or raise. We can flat much more often in the big blind when we close the action and know we can see a flop.
We usually want to 3-bet bigger in the small blind but in a final table spot like this with ICM playing a big role we can actually use some smaller sizings and I quite like something like 34k here i.e. something under 3x the open raise.
Obviously we hate life if we can 4-bet jammed on as would have happened here but it does enable us to get away from the hand pre-flop. With ICM it just makes sense to fold AQ in that spot.