$200 NLHE Full Ring: Trip Aces on a Flush Board

$200 NL HE Full Ring: Trip Aces on a Flush Board

First of all, this is .01/.02 NLHE, (we should really get someone to add it to the dropdown for all us microstakers). The hand is below, but I'd like to explain my thought process for the hand if that's alright.

I'm sitting in a hand where I look down and see AA in Late Position; Score. There's a minraiser from EP (Score again), so of course I make a standard 3bet of 3xthe original raise. He calls (I'm on a roll), so I'm putting him on either a mid pocket pair, possibly AK or AQ. I get a near dream flop, with AK5 two toned (Boomshakalaka). Not surprisingly the villain leads out for a 2/3pot bet. By now I'm almost certain he's got either AQ or JJ+ and is betting for info, or if I'm really lucky he's value betting his AK/KK; I really don't think he would have led out with a flush draw against the PF aggressor, although he might have one of the hearts as a backdoor draw.

Because I figure him for potentially a very strong hand and don't want to make my hand strength super obvious with a smoothcall after all the PreFlop aggression I showed, and also to protect against a potential backdoor flush, I decide to make 3xre-raise for value, hoping for a call but also content with taking the pot down here. To my delight, he calls.

Then I get into some trouble: the turn comes a heart, and he donk bets the pot All In (WTF...). Now I'm a little confused: Like I said, I didn't figure him for a draw on the flop, and I'm not inclined to change my mind at this point and put him on a flush; however, I haven't seen this guy play all that much so I'm not 100% sure on a call here. Still, I would think that if he had the nut flush or even the nut draw, he wouldn't be betting so aggressively here; essentially I still figure him for top two pair or bottom/mid set, perhaps trying to push me off of a runner flush or putting me on AJ or bottom set.

There's also the possibility that he's putting me on a really big hand, and is semi-bluffing the flush hoping to get me to fold the best hand, although the pot seems really big for a bluff, and I've shown so much aggression that I can't really think he expects me to lay down my hand here after putting in almost half of my stack already. Then again, he could just be a donk, which would mean that all reasoning goes out the window.

Any thoughts? I'll let you know what my decision was after I get a few responses, although I think you can tell from my reasoning which I was most inclined towards. The hand is below, many thanks in advance!

Preflop id make it ~.14-16, but .12 is fine. The flop he makes a blocking min bet, into almost a .30 pot. Id raise it to around .40... Put it this way if he leads that flop for say .20 you raise to what? .60?.. exactly. Your letting him get like 5/1 on hes draw if he indeed is on one. The turn im probarbly calling even though i expect him to turn up with a flush.

I don't understand how the big blind was first to act preflop

call always

I really can't see folding here if you think there is any chance they don't have a flush. Your getting good odds on a call and you got like 10 outs. So you don't have to be right that often to make this a pretty easy call without a super strong read.

You have to make your flop raise bigger. Are you slowplaying? If so, why?

When you flop a set, you should really try to create a situation where you can get your opponent's entire stack by the river. When you're trying to stack someone by the river you need to get at least 10% of their stack in on the flop, and the more the better.

F Paulsson said:

When you're trying to stack someone by the river you need to get at least 10% of their stack in on the flop, and the more the better.

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i think you didn't read stack sizes properly. 40% of his stack is in on the flop. Although I do agree that the flop raise should be bigger here.

As played, it's still a very clear call on the turn. We still have quite a few outs against a flush and villain could easily show up with a lot of hands that we crush.

Many thanks for all the thoughtful responses. I indeed called his shove and he actually ended up showing 23 of spades of all things. He figured me for TPTK or Two Pair and thought he could make me fold. I didn't and ended up taking his stack.

As for the preflop re-raise, I thought that a standard 3bet was 3 times the original raise. Also, I try to play all my hands exactly the same when I play them so as to disguise hand strength. It seems to have worked this time because my villain certainly didn't peg me for AA, even after the Flop re-raise.

In any case, I'm definitely taking to heart all the comments here, and will try and incorporate them into my game. I'm willing to make slightly larger PF raises and re-raises if that seems to be the general strategy nowadays.

Thanks again, and good luck to you all.

BelgoSuisse said:

i think you didn't read stack sizes properly. 40% of his stack is in on the flop. Although I do agree that the flop raise should be bigger here.

As played, it's still a very clear call on the turn. We still have quite a few outs against a flush and villain could easily show up with a lot of hands that we crush.

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Ohhh. I read it as 6 cents, not $.6. Sorry about that.

Tublecain said:

Also, I try to play all my hands exactly the same when I play them so as to disguise hand strength.

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It's a good idea in general. it's probably not really needed at 2nl, though.

Duly noted, I'll be sure to be a little more aggressive with my solid hands from now on. Thanks again for the responses everyone!

I just realized that the comment on my raise being too small was regarding my POST-flop raise, not my preflop raise! I've done that in a couple of posts already... gotta learn to read!

Regarding the size of the postflop re-raise, how much bigger should I have made it with my top set? I figure I don't want it SO big that something like AQ would fold here, but of course also not so small that a flush draw has an easy call. Should I have made it 4 or 5 times the original raise, or perhaps more?

I also want to again thank everyone who posts replies to my hand histories, and in particular to the high rollers who are here helping all us miniplayers out. I'm sure that you have bigger and better fish to fry (literally), so the fact that you take time out of your busy day to sit down and read a hand by a $2NL up and comer means a lot to me.

Many thanks again for all your help, best of luck to you.

T.

Just to be clear: I think your postflop raise was fine, now that I realized that it was from 20 to 60 cents and not from 2 to 6 cents. I misread it.

my opinion is your reraise on teh flop was too weak...needed to be much stronger there cuz you have a strong hand that could get outdrawn...take the pot down here or make him pay if the flush is what he is chasing

cheers and gl
wooter