100nl; bottom 2 pair vs 4-bet shove

Villain is a pretty lag player at 26/17/8, and I've been ~14/11/4 again. This was a full ring table but we're temporarily shorthanded.

Too much?
Any other legit lines you can think of?

pokerstars No-Limit Hold'em, $1.00 BB (6 handed)

CO ($10.50)
Button ($180.65)
Hero ($129.25)
BB ($108.35)
UTG ($164)
MP ($28.35)

Preflop: Hero is SB with Q , 9 .
UTG calls $1, 3 folds, Hero completes, BB checks.

Flop: ($3) A , 9 , Q (3 players)
Hero bets $2.25, BB raises to $6, UTG folds, Hero raises to $20, BB raises to $107.35, Hero calls $87.35.

ChuckTs said:

Flop: ($3) A

, 9

, Q

(3 players)
Hero bets $2.25, BB raises to $6, UTG folds, Hero raises to $20, BB raises to $107.35, Hero calls $87.35.

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Lets see if we can get a handle on villain's wide range.

He didn't raise PF, but was UTG, so could be limping with a monstrosity (but doubtful given his stats). So lets say no JJ+, no AK. AQ is a possibility, but again doubtful. You're likely to see things like this, in order of most likely to least:

1) Combo draws such as QsJs, JsTs, KsJs, Js8s ect. ect. Almost any 2 high spades have some sort of multi-way draw.

2) 99. Obviously a set would take this line.

3) A9 would certainly play this way.

4) AJ may take this line, although, I don't think our villain is this bad.

5) Possibly something weird & unlikely like a limping AQ or another Q9.

Give the fact that we're most likely against a big draw, getting it in on the flop makes the most sense. Only JsTs has a draw that has enough outs against us to be close to a favorite.

Calling and seeing a turn is a bit more risky. At this point it would be hard to get away from a 99, and it would be very hard to get more value out of big draws on the turn. Thus I think by just calling & drawing to a blank turn we end up losing value when a spade comes, still dumping our money off to a set, and many draws that would be 40%ish against us on the flop won't stack off with us on the turn now that they hold a lot less equity in the pot.

I like the way this played out.

Yeah I'm not sure you can get away from this. c9h's analysis was pretty good.. no raise so that makes AK/AQ/AA/QQ very unlikely. This is nuts for AJ/AT but possible so the most likely culprits are 99 (unlikely since you can account for 2 nines), A9, or a combo-draw. or possibly a pair and a draw..say QsKs or QsJs.


I think you played it fine, if he hits his draw you did what you were supposed to do and got the money in first. If you were beat from the start then he played whatever he has kinda weird and I really don't think you see any of those hands here too often especially form someone with those stats. In my experience 26/17/8 players love to shove draws as soon as possible. Sometimes I think they have trouble telling the difference between "four spades" and "five spades"

fwiw I think 99/QQ/AA/AQ/A9/QKs all raise preflop too...

i don't mind it. this is a combo draw really really often. although i think A9 is def in his range. he doesn't have to raise it OOP after an UTG limper. there's a pretty big gap between his VP$IP and PFR. 17% at 6max is slightly lower than mine and i generally wouldn't raise A9 in this spot fwiw

At first glimpse we gotta think that the hand is toast, looking a little more carefully I think that we are good enough times to make this profitable . Against a 26/17/8 means we rule out AA/QQ/AQ/A9 and 99 staight away. The only hands i can see playing back is paired flush draw hands like [Qs] [8s] type hands, worst case being the big combo of J10s. Occasionally a LAG will play AA like this, but its on the rare side.

I think this is always profitable against this guy - my main concern is whether waiting for the turn is better since we scare off a lot of Ax hands this way and aren't really a huge favourite over combo draws. I'm just not sure if it's worth the risk of seeing an ugly spade turn.

IMO opinion waiting for the turn to put more money in is bad. If villian has hands like a Qs6s you are letting villian draw to cheaply. Scaring of the Ax hands isnt as bad as letting villian suck out cheaply, get as much money in as you can on the flop and hope no scare card comes on the turn.

There are so many scare cards that can come on the turn that getting it in now is better.

Yea but much of the power of big combo draws is seeing both the turn and river. If the turn is safe we can safely make him call an unprofitable large bet to see a river card, making the play +EV. The thing is our hand reading skills need to be excellent and we need the disipline to be able to fold our hand to any further aggression if the scare card hits on the turn.

if we were in position, waiting to see the turn would be fine, i'd prefer it. but we're out of position on a terrible board to be out of position

So the turn comes a non-spade 16% of the time. However, many times the scare card could be a K, a J, ect. that are non-spades. Against cards like that, it'll be hard to proceed to showdown through any aggression (and given this guy's aggression factor, there will be aggression).

This is not a BA/WB scenario, because there are so very few situations where we're WB. A9 (but we have 2 of the 9's), and 99 (again, we know where the nines are) are the only hands that have us WB. And I agree with Chuck, that shorthanded, 99 & possibly A9 are getting raised. This is a combo draw 90% of the time IMO, and combo draws will win on this flop between 35% and 48% of the time. Thus, IMO, this is a +EV play.

Waiting for the turn, and hoping for a bigger +EV situation, IMO, is too risky. We will have to really slow down when a spade hits the board, and any King, Jack, Ten, or 8 is also a serious scare for us. That's like 24 cards, which is a lot to dodge! We know we're ahead now, get teh cash in now!

I think we agree on this then.

He called with KTs, hit his flush on the turn, and I filled up on the river.

ChuckTs said:

He called with KTs, hit his flush on the turn, and I filled up on the river.

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I just love it when a plan comes together.


btw, I'm late but agreeing with the play. I'm gradually learning to use the stats to determine ranges to determine choice of action and I agree with the flow of the interpretation here.