$2 NLHE 6-max: QKo Strong Enough for SB 3-Bet Range?

Is QKo strong enough to be a part of my SB 3-bet range? How could I have played this better?
Thanks



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CO: 103.5 BB (VPIP: 6.67, PFR: 6.67, 3Bet Preflop: 10.00, hands: 15)
BTN: 100 BB (VPIP: 30.00, PFR: 20.00, 3Bet Preflop: 4.00, Hands: 73)
Hero (SB): 103 BB
BB: 41 BB (VPIP: 19.10, PFR: 17.98, 3Bet Preflop: 6.06, Hands: 93)
UTG: 138.5 BB (VPIP: 26.92, PFR: 19.23, 3Bet Preflop: 0.00, Hands: 53)


Hero posts SB 0.5 BB, BB posts BB 1 BB


Pre Flop: (pot: 1.5 BB) Hero has Qh Kc
fold, CO raises to 3 BB, fold, Hero raises to 7 BB, fold, CO calls 4 BB


Flop : (15 BB, 2 players) Qd 5d 6h
Hero checks, CO bets 11 BB, Hero calls 11 BB


Turn : (37 BB, 2 players) 9d
Hero checks, CO checks


River : (37 BB, 2 players) 9c
Hero bets 18 BB, CO calls 18 BB


CO shows As Qs (Two Pair, Queens and Nines)
(Pre 76%, Flop 87%, Turn 93%)


Hero shows Qh Kc (Two Pair, Queens and Nines)
(Pre 24%, Flop 13%, Turn 7%)


CO wins 69.5 BB
1 BB was deducted from the pot for the jackpot.

just bad beat

Should only be 3-betting KQ in the BB if you think your opponent calls with many QJ, AJ type hands. The more standard play is to call KQ from the BB to ensure your opponent has those QJ type hands in his range.

Your opponent is very tight preflop. In this situation, I wouldn’t fault you for folding outright. 3-betting against this player seems foolish.


Also, bet the flop.

I think that 5 handed, KQo is strong enough to 3 bet, especially from a CO raise. I do not like the small 3 bet size, you need to bet 3.5x or higher as you will be OOP for the rest of the hand and want to discourage weak A high hands to fold.

You both flop top pair, so that is kind of an unfortunate situation. I would have fired 3 barrels. You may have gotten him off of AQ by 3 betting larger pre flop, betting all 3 streets, making sure that you size correctly to get a close to pot size all in bet for the river.

I think it depends a lot on the opponent. You do not have many hands on him, but until now it looks like he's a tight player. With that in mind I think you could fold because in these situations you mainly can get money in the pot postflop only when you are beaten, on the contrary he will fold. So it is generally not a big profit.
If you 3bet though I would size it bigger, as it's been said around 3-3.5x the open raise size.
With your kind of min raise, I don't think you achieve much in terms of value or information.



That being said, I don't think it was a terrible hand, I like the pot control on the turn and you decide to call the river with your bluff catcher. With these type of players you will mostly loose, but it's a reasonable call at that point I think.

Another way I would probably play it would be to donk the flop and when he reraises fold and in case he calls probably check fold the turn.
I wouldn't fire 3 barrels because if he calls more streets I think the bottom of his range would be KQ at worse, but maybe I just think too tight. And it would depend mainly on your table image if you can convince him you have something better than AQ.

I would note that he only called pre and would attack with tons of 3 bets if he is simply calling that hand ... when he calls 3 bets I would bet lol crazy on low card boards and play safe on broadway boards

I would agree that calling is standard, calling for value, if you 3bet it’s 3betting for bluff. Given he most likely does not defend enough 3betting is ok, except when you 3bet to that size he has to call everything and when you are out of position and 3betting for bluff you want him to fold by having a size like 10bb or so.

He isn’t super tight, even though it looks like that. Typically small PFR-VPIP difference with relatively high 3bet just tells you that he knows how to play the field. His range should be close of 30% (if you see his RFI) and might go as high as 32-35. Generally speaking opening 100% does not mean the same villain will call wide, especially with those stats, quite the opposite. Btw he can read you stats and tries to adapt, so your stats have a large meaning.

Kudos to Braveslice. +1 to everything he says.

Villains aren't just robots with stat numbers attached to them. They evolve and learn and change their strategy to fit the meta. Also we have a whopping 15 entire hands on him. He might not even be tight. Read the fine print 'fore you label villains.

your stats on the villain would suggest he is very tight so 3 betting kq wouldnt be correct but your sample size of hands for the villain is way too small so i dont really fault your play pre-flop

I would fold KQo but 3bet larger with KQs when facing unknown. Against standard BTN open, will 3bet with KQo.

7BB is too small and CO could call with whole range if his range is reasonble like 23% RFI

You guys realize this thread is 8 months old, right?

c9h13no3 said:

You guys realize this thread is 8 months old, right?

Click to expand...

=) No at least I did not

on the micros KQ is a very weak hand to raise with and even more weaker to 3bet with, on SB u need to be paying a very tight range on the raise side 10+ and AK or play pockets pairs for set mining.