$1.10 NLHE MTT: $$1.10 NLHE MTT: Calling with top pair Ax on the river

Here I am calling a river bet with A6s on the river. I would like to know what Ax are good calls here. In hindsight I feel A6 is not that good, but not sure what kickers would be best to call with. Also maybe I could bet the turn.

https://www.cardschat.com/replayer/824CkXTh7

Cheers,

Big Red

It partially depends on your read on your opponent. At these stakes people are usually way too wild or too tight. Against an UTG opponent you probably shouldn't be calling with less than 2 pairs. His triple barrel here is not a very good play since usually he isn't getting called by worse on the river.

I don't like this call on the Turn.

Even if I had AJ or better, I would not feel comfortable to call 3 barrels just with a pair.

Calling the UTG's raise preflop is probably fine, but you are hoping for a flush. Calling down high pair with a junk kicker is not ideal.

After the flop, you have two choices. Calling isn't one of them. Calling negates your positional advantage and gathers you no information from their continuation bet. You can fold and save further chips since the flush is impossible now. I would advise a raise. This lets you know how strong villain's hand is and gains you control of the hand. If villain re-raises, you can bet they have a better Ace or possibly a double draw (68c) or set. If they call, you have the option of checking the turn and seeing a free river card.

Back to your question. I think calling down top pair is dangerous with any but the highest kicker. But after calling the flop, you have to (at least) call the turn with high pair and an eight out draw. Once villain bets the river, you are getting over 2 to one for your call.

My advice would be fold or raise flop, or at least raise the turn and shove the river. Calling from position shows you're weak, so only do it when you are really strong.

You had a nice suited hand from a very good position against an aggressive play from a very difficult position. I would not follow that betting with A6s. I would like something stronger and more competitive!

I believe this is a flop pre flop unless you have a read or stats that the UTG player is loose and even in that case I advocate a fold. There are just too many hands that you will be going up against which are beating you and then a lot of hands that are still beating you when an ace flops. Your real only outs are diamonds but that is no where near good enough to be calling an UTG raise.

With that being said, as played, I would call on the flop but it is close. With no flush opportunity for us and only a 6 kicker we are going against a bigger Ax a lot. We are hoping for a large pocket pair 99-KK for the villain which is possible but if that is the case they will check the turn.

On the turn as played you need to fold here. I know you picked up an open ender here but you are only 20% or so to hit it with one card to come and you are behind here otherwise. You are beating nothing that is double barreling except bluffs and even though it is possible, a bluff is not likely with now counting pre flop this being villains third street with an action move. Best to fold here. If you call the turn then definitely have to fold the river when he bets unless it is super small. Even then I would almost know we are beat but would call it if it is small enough. In the hand as played it is definitely a fold on the river.

Depend on your opponent style, you can call AX at flop, but at turn, if you opponent is standard player, you just call with at least AQ+. And unless your opponent is super fish aggressor, you have to fold with most AX at river, he can have set, two pair or better.

Preflop
This is where, all the problems in the hand begin. A suited rag ace like A6s is NEVER a call from this position, and especially not against an UTG open. Kicker domination is a huge issue against a tight range, as the outcome of this hand illustrate. Also when you call, 4 players behind can put in a squeeze, which will force you to fold without seeing a flop.

So first of all STOP pushing that call button all the time. Given that the open comes from UTG, this is an easy fold most of the time, but if you have HUD-data or other reads suggesting, that Villain fold to much to 3-bet, you can attack him. I would maybe 3-bet this 20-25% of the time and fold the other 75-80%.

Flop
You brought yourself into this situation, where you hit an almost perfect flop for your hand, so you are kind of committed to call at least one bet, but your hand is already no more than a bluff catcher. If I find myself in this spot after defending my blinds for instance, I am definitely not looking forward to the turn and river.

Turn
You picked up an OESD, which kind of commits you to call once again.

River
Your straight draw missed, and now you frankly have a very easy fold. An UTG raiser has all the AK, AQ etc. of the world in his range, and how often do people actually tripple barrel bluff in a micro stakes tournament? Its nowhere near as often, as people make hero calls, and getting away from a river situation like this is key to long term success.

A6 and A7 are the worse aces in the entire deck - not from a kicker perspective but from a playability perspective, you simply cannot use both cards often enough to realize any equity and most of the time on A hi flops with EP raisers we are crushed as was the case here.

You have to realize that the UTG open range should be pretty strong. From a gto perspective should be something like AJo+ and A9s+ as far as any Ax goes - so when we flat such a bad Ace - even in position - we want to be mindful against stronger plays we are likely beat.

We have to call our villans cbet on the flop - we are ahead of non Ax hands like KQ, big under pairs like QQ and KK and we are ahead of some looser Ax opens like A3s and A4s - so folding to one bet with top pair would be over folding here and we would become exploitable.

When we pickup the open ended draw on the turn we have to call turn bets as well - aside from a 6 its probably one of the best cards in the deck for us to see come out.

The river bet is where we need to realize this is a snap fold - we got ourselves in this spot and need to know how to get ourselves out cleanly. Think in terms of our villans opening range - then think of what hands they triple off with on a board like this that we beat...do we really think villan has A2, A3 or A4? Do you think they are tripling off with KKs here after getting called on two streets? The reality is that we beat practically no Ax our villan bets for value and they just do not have many bluffs on this runout the way this hand was played. I think we are beaten here 95% of the time and unless you had some note on villan being a spazz - this is a snap fold.

Firstly, thanks to everybody for their input. I was very reluctant to post hand histories for a long time, but now this is my second I have to say I am learning so much from it that I will be doing it a lot more!

300HPGOD said:

I believe this is a flop pre flop unless you have a read or stats that the UTG player is loose and even in that case I advocate a fold.

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fundiver199 said:

Preflop
This is where, all the problems in the hand begin. A suited rag ace like A6s is NEVER a call from this position, and especially not against an UTG open. Kicker domination is a huge issue against a tight range, as the outcome of this hand illustrate. Also when you call, 4 players behind can put in a squeeze, which will force you to fold without seeing a flop.

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Jon Poker said:

A6 and A7 are the worse aces in the entire deck - not from a kicker perspective but from a playability perspective, you simply cannot use both cards often enough to realize any equity and most of the time on A hi flops with EP raisers we are crushed as was the case here.

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Again I am surprised by responses that I should fold pre-flop, but that is certainly the consensus here. I think in general this is a weak part of my game when I have hands I would RFI with, but facing a raise I am not sure what to do with the mid-range of these types of hands. I don't want to 3bet and don't want to fold so I end up calling, which I now see is the worst option of all.

bigredwolf said:

Again I am surprised by responses that I should fold pre-flop, but that is certainly the consensus here. I think in general this is a weak part of my game when I have hands I would RFI with, but facing a raise I am not sure what to do with the mid-range of these types of hands. I don't want to 3bet and don't want to fold so I end up calling, which I now see is the worst option of all.

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I tend to 3bet the worst Ax hands in the deck - but vs an UTG open like this, I'm just not 3betting my villan very often at all because of their range strength. If villan had been in the lo jack seat and I was on the btn I would 3bet A6s all day long - but then when called we also have to consider relative hand strength when we pair up vs our villans 3bet call range - so in a nutshell we still have to play post flop accordingly.

Flatting here with the A6s is fine - I don't think this is a 100% 3bet or fold spot - we just have to realize that we are basically going to the flop looking for 2 pair or better here because we are going to be dominated a good portion of the time - can't fold top pair to a small bet on the flop - so call is good :: then the turn gives us more equity with an open ended straight draw so we are forced to call again :: the river bricks, villan triples off and we have to realize here that we really don't beat anything except a bluff. As I eluded to earlier - the Ax hands we beat are A2-A4 and the chances of villan tripling off these aces for value is practically never - so we have a bluff catcher on the river, all the other times we are beat.

You are not the only one making these mistakes, but not learning and not growing from them is an even bigger mistake. Post hands, ask questions and keep working. You will be on the right track in no time

bigredwolf said:

Again I am surprised by responses that I should fold pre-flop, but that is certainly the consensus here. I think in general this is a weak part of my game when I have hands I would RFI with, but facing a raise I am not sure what to do with the mid-range of these types of hands. I don't want to 3bet and don't want to fold so I end up calling, which I now see is the worst option of all.

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There is something called the GAP concept in poker, which basically mean, you need a stronger hand to call than bet. In this case the pot was opened by UTG, so first you need to determine, which hands you would open UTG. And then your range for giving action must be tighter than this, unless you are in the big blind and getting a really good price like a min-raise.

So first off all would A6s be an open UTG? And I would say most of the time no. There are some situations, where I might do it, if the table is very passive, or there is a huge fish in the blinds. But folding A2s-A7s UTG is certainly going to be fine as a default, especially when stacks are somewhat shallow like 70BB or less.

And please note, that the important is, where the Villain is seated, not where you are seated. This mean, that if you are on CO or BTN, there is going to be a huge difference between the range of hands, you raise first in, and the range of hands, you give action with, when someone else has already raised, especially if that raise came from early position.

CO and especially BTN are also the seats, where it makes most sense to have a cold calling range. This is because, you are sure to have position on everyone postflop, and only 2-3 players can put in a squeeze bet. If on the other hand you are UTG+1, and UTG has entered the pot, then a ton of players can either squeeze or call behind, and for that reason it is often best to never cold call any hands at all, or maybe you can occationally call with a hand like AQ or 99-JJ, but that is just about it.

A-x is a difficult hand to play and you didn't play it correctly. You were too passive and therefore you never knew where you were standing. You should have raised on the flop. If he calls and continues to bet I would have folded on turn (unless I had proper odds for a straight draw but not with such a bet as he made). But most probbably after a raise he would have checked the turn, giving you some interesting possbilities to outplay him with your position.

Neither he did play the hand correctly. He invested a lot in one pair with medicore kicker. But he was out of position and couldn't really afford to check on turn. He should be afraid of some kind of a set in your hand but I guess he is just brave.

Whatever it the situation it's rarely a good decision to call (unless drawing with proper odds). Ok - you can sometimes call once but if your hand doesn't improve you shouldn't continue to call. If you really wanted to continue with this hand on turn, given that you had some outs for a straight (some more outs for two pair or trips) I would consider large re-raise, even all-in. But calling there was just bad and against odds.

Your river call was even worse. I mean - what were you thinking? Your hand was good enough only to call a bluff. But there was nothing to indicate a bluff there. He wasn't drawing and missed the draw, anything that could induce a bluff. Ok some people on this level could play pocket kings this way but this is terrible poker. If you want to win you can't play same terrible poker. If he played pocket kings let him have it. You will find better occasion to take his chips (not to mention that if you raised the flop he would most probbably fold kings - even he would).
I have a feeling that you just started chasing and couldn't stop. If you fold on river even after this bad seqnece of plays you would still hold more than 20k chips - you would lose only 1/5 of your stack - hardly noticeble. After that call you were left with only 1/3 of your stack. Was it worth it?

Sorry for criticizing you like that but you have to seriously reconsider your gameplay if you want to be a winning player.

Delfino said:

Your river call was even worse. I mean - what were you thinking? Your hand was good enough only to call a bluff. But there was nothing to indicate a bluff there. He wasn't drawing and missed the draw, anything that could induce a bluff. Ok some people on this level could play pocket kings this way but this is terrible poker. If you want to win you can't play same terrible poker. If he played pocket kings let him have it. You will find better occasion to take his chips (not to mention that if you raised the flop he would most probbably fold kings - even he would).
I have a feeling that you just started chasing and couldn't stop. If you fold on river even after this bad seqnece of plays you would still hold more than 20k chips - you would lose only 1/5 of your stack - hardly noticeble. After that call you were left with only 1/3 of your stack. Was it worth it?

Sorry for criticizing you like that but you have to seriously reconsider your gameplay if you want to be a winning player.

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If you are writing a post at the end of it you feel genuinely sorry for what you have written I suggest the appropriate action is not to submit the post

Thankyou

Well this must be doing me some good as I have made the final table in the PS CC freeroll two days in a row since I did this!

LFG!!:top:

Good for you!

erik_lima said:

I don't like this call on the Turn.

Even if I had AJ or better, I would not feel comfortable to call 3 barrels just with a pair.

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On the turn he had an open ender as well...

This is a tough one overall. It really depends on the type of player this guy is. If the villain is really aggressive than you have to call down with worse than top pair sometimes. Either way, fine to call pre flop, fine to call flop, turned an open ender... river call just depends on your read of the villain. Since he plays A10 like this, he might play A3s the same way. Not sure. I can see myself finding a call there on the river against some of the guys in the small stakes games tourneys I play.

Kush said:

This is a tough one overall. It really depends on the type of player this guy is. If the villain is really aggressive than you have to call down with worse than top pair sometimes.

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I don't agree. If the villain is agressive you should raise him not call. Just don't call it leads nowhere. You won't get the information you need and you won't put pressure in him. It's better to raise flop and eventually fold on turn than call flop, turn and try to guess river with no information whatsoever.

Delfino said:

I don't agree. If the villain is agressive you should raise him not call. Just don't call it leads nowhere. You won't get the information you need and you won't put pressure in him. It's better to raise flop and eventually fold on turn than call flop, turn and try to guess river with no information whatsoever.

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That's not really how you should think about it. You have to think about your opponents entire range. If the villain is aggressive and you raise him, you fold out all of his bluffs. In this exact spot, if you raise him on the flop and he calls, what does that mean? He could have a club draw. If you raise and he calls you on the flop are you folding the turn with an OESD? The river is a tough spot as I said before. If I had zero read on the villain I might fold, but I definitely would call against some of the LAGs I play against.

Kush said:

That's not really how you should think about it. You have to think about your opponents entire range. If the villain is aggressive and you raise him, you fold out all of his bluffs. In this exact spot, if you raise him on the flop and he calls, what does that mean? He could have a club draw.

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If he had a club draw he just made a terrible mistake. Instead of seeing a cheap turn he had to invest a lot of money into the pot. Your goal in poker is to make your opponent make the biggest mistake.

If you raise and he calls you on the flop are you folding the turn with an OESD?

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It depends on the size of the bet. I would count my outs assuming that I'm behind. His call and bet after a raise means a very strong made hand. I'm pretty sure nobody (except total maniac or an expert) would bet his draw second time facing possible another raise.

The river is a tough spot as I said before. If I had zero read on the villain I might fold, but I definitely would call against some of the LAGs I play against.

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The river should not be a tough spot. If you bid it correctly you should have plenty of information to tell what his hand is pretty precisely. Because we called twice already we don't know anything. That's the problem.

For example if we raise, he calls, bets the turn and we also call, and then he bets the river I'm 90% sure he has very strong hand (a set or two pair at least). Even a total maniac would not bluff out his stack this way. With the actual hand he had he would had either folded to our raise or checked at least turn or river. If he did so we would either get a free card to our draw or we would have a chance to bet on him and put him under a very tough decision on river. He would have probably folded a weak ace then.

The more tough decision the villain will have to make the more we will earn in the long term even if sometimes he makes the correct decision. Just put pressure on him in every spot. In that deal we had advantage of the position and we never used it.

One more thing. If I played the hand this way and I had an image of a good player and the villain was also pretty good player (at least capable of lying down a top pair) I would seriously consider all-in raise on river. This is because a double call from a good player seems like slowplaying a monster (good players rarely call). But I wouldn't do it on that flop - although there is straigh possibility but two busted flush draws just invite to bluff. And also the stacks were too small for that, villain was already pot-commited so he would have obviously called that. So not in that hand.

Raising to "find out where you're at" is not a good strategy. You should be raising for value or raising as a bluff or semi bluff. I guess it would be raising as a semi bluff in this spot, with plans of folding on later streets of you don't improve. The problem with that is you have a marginal made hand. Which is generally a call, sometimes a fold. This is a $1 online tournament and there are a lot of maniacs. People in these games c bet close to 100% on the flop. The flop is a mandatory call because of that reason alone. Open ender on the turn... River is a tough spot. In a $1 online tournament I'm calling the river probably 75% of the time actually. If it was much deeper in the tournament, I'd be more likely to fold, but the blinds are 300/600 and there are tons of maniacs and just really terrible players in these games.

Raise on flop would be a raise for value. I have top pair and might be against pocked kings, queens, etc. so I obviously can't fold it here - it's too early. So I have to raise. How would you call calling here? I raise for value with the top pair hoping that he folds anything like a bluff (continuation bet), pocket pair (solving my problems in later streets), weak ace (which might be a better hand than mine). If he calls I can put him on a hand like AQ-A10 or maybe a strange draw, possibly also high pocker pair. If he calls and continues to bet I put him on AK, AA or maybe a lower set (which is unlikely). For me this is pretty obvious poker play. Am I wrong here? By just calling I'm not only not able to force him off a better hand (like say the one he had) but also I can't narrow his range in any way. He can believe I'm on a draw and continue to bet pocked queens and I will have tough decision later on river (like in this case).