$10 NLHE 6-max: 3 streets of value with KK?

Villain is quite passive and seems to play good cards. Is river a fold?


Poker Stars - $0.05/$0.10 No Limit Hold'em (6 players)
Poker Stars Hand Converter Tool from CardsChat.com

SB: $10.28
BB: $13.92
UTG Hero: $10
MP: $7.15
CO: $19.36
BTN: $10.16

Pre-flop: ($0.15) Hero is UTG and dealt
Hero raises $0.30, MP calls $0.30, CO folds, BTN calls $0.30, BB folds

Flop: ($1.05) (3 players)
Hero bets $0.75, MP folds, BTN calls $0.75

Turn: ($2.55) (2 players)
Hero bets $1.50, BTN calls $1.50

River: ($5.55) (2 players)
Hero bets $3.30, BTN raises $7.61 (All-in), Hero...

1st bet bigger on every street.

The progression here should be something like:
Preflop: .40
Flop: $1.10
Turn: $3
River: Shove

As played you have to call the river.

How do you judge bet sizes, like is that standard or should I be changing my bet sizes depending on the circumstances?

When you have what you figure to be the best hand (no reason to believe otherwise here) you should bet as much as you think your opponent will call with worse. Here your overpair figures to be good the vast majority of the times when your opponent calls 3 streets, so you're looking to divide up your stack into 3 bets so you can maximize value. Ideally you want your remaining stack on the river to be smaller than pot size so your opponent is less likely to fold when you shove. Bet sizing at NL is a HUGELY important skill. Almost as important as knowing when to bet imo.

I think the river is a fold.

baudib1 said:

I think the river is a fold.

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Really? We only have $4.15 left and the pot is almost $16. We need to be good 20% on the river to make it BE. He's got to have AQ/KQ that often don't you think?

I feel like in this spot I always call vs. someone who plays like 15/5 and I am never good. We have shown strength on 4 streets and he's still shipping it on us, I don't think we see 1 pair here.

I guess I can't really come up with a stove where we can fold but I hate calling this.

The problem is that the way he played the hand makes the river call closer. If the hand had been played better the river is a very easy shove.

WVHillbilly said:

Really? We only have $4.15 left and the pot is almost $16. We need to be good 20% on the river to make it BE. He's got to have AQ/KQ that often don't you think?

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If he truly is passive he just calls with anything less than 2 pair no? I see a lot of passive in the micros only raise 2 pair +, but only OP can determine that for this villain

Yeah I hate to have to fold river but I think I agree we're not good often enough. Very few fish turn pairs into bluffs and are almost as unlikely to ship river with a naked Q.

That said I agree we should be betting bigger everywhere and shipping river.

A key problem to this hand is that the board gets bigger on the turn and hero keeps firing away; i.e. he's not valuetowning himself with AJ. I'd feel better about it if the flop were Q-high followed by a J.

Now, for villajn to be shipping AQ in this hand he has to get to the turn with it. I'm not saying it's impossible or even unlikely, but there's no draw on this board really other than 87/74 (74/97 got there).

We can definitely bet river and get value from AJ/Jx but a passive player is extremely unlikely to get aggro with 2nd pair.

That reduces most of his range to QJ/J8/65/AA and sets... throw in AQ and a couple of random 1-pairs turned into bluffs...meh, I don't like it.

Hero should not be betting out that consistently.. basically looks like 3-barrel bluff miss. BTN most likely to have QJ Q8 or J8. Would've been a lot easier to check-raise the flop with some muscle

redlogger49 said:

Hero should not be betting out that consistently.. basically looks like 3-barrel bluff miss. BTN most likely to have QJ Q8 or J8. Would've been a lot easier to check-raise the flop with some muscle

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Post less.

redlogger49 said:

Hero should not be betting out that consistently.. basically looks like 3-barrel bluff miss. BTN most likely to have QJ Q8 or J8. Would've been a lot easier to check-raise the flop with some muscle

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hahahahaha