$10 NLHE MTT: Questionable calls with 88

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AlexTheOwl

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iPoker - 50/100 NL - Holdem - 9 players
Hand converted by PokerTracker 4

MP+1: 30 BB
MP+2: 110.6 BB (VPIP: 21.95, PFR: 7.32, 3Bet Preflop: 0.00, hands: 41)
CO: 44.35 BB (VPIP: 17.65, PFR: 8.82, 3Bet Preflop: 0.00, Hands: 34)
BTN: 48.3 BB (VPIP: 26.67, PFR: 20.00, 3Bet Preflop: 11.11, Hands: 30)
SB: 34.6 BB (VPIP: 14.29, PFR: 0.00, 3Bet Preflop: 0.00, Hands: 14)
BB: 73.5 BB (VPIP: 21.95, PFR: 9.76, 3Bet Preflop: 0.00, Hands: 41)
UTG: 51.5 BB (VPIP: 42.50, PFR: 5.00, 3Bet Preflop: 13.33, Hands: 41)
UTG+1: 18.7 BB (VPIP: 25.00, PFR: 0.00, 3Bet Preflop: 0.00, Hands: 12)
Hero (MP): 135.55 BB

SB posts SB 0.5 BB, BB posts BB 1 BB

Pre Flop: (pot: 1.5 BB) Hero has 8♠8♥

fold, UTG+1 raises to 2 BB, Hero calls 2 BB, fold, MP+2 calls 2 BB, fold, fold, fold, BB calls 1 BB

Flop: (8.5 BB, 4 players) 6♠6♣5♣
BB checks, UTG+1 bets 4.25 BB, Hero calls 4.25 BB, fold, fold

Turn: (17 BB, 2 players) 9♦
UTG+1 bets 12.45 BB, Hero calls 12.45 BB

River: (41.9 BB, 2 players) 2♦

Early in an MTT on ignition / Bovada / bodog.
Would you fold at any (or every) stage here? I think I made at least one error, and possibly more.
Results after we get a few comments.
 
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uavissar

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pre- fine. borderline set mining and you are in position.
flop- ok. you are deep. backdoors. why not. I'd fold if I'm not as deep as you were. You also don't have sufficient history with this player to make an better informed decision.
turn- fold. You beat AK and 77 and that's it.
 
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dpucciarelli

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Well it all depends on how the villain was playing in the Mtt. Was it the first hand against him ? If i were you , i would always re raise in flop and then check call in that situation. Also he is short , maybe i would put him AI in flop. Probably he had Ax and he did not connect anything. What did he have???
 
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kozong

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villain might have overpairs, but it can also be an overcards club draws

so i prefer shoving than calling the turn, or is that a shove already?
 
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AlexTheOwl

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Additional Detail:

The hand before this one UTG+1, the pre-flop raiser, lost half his stack to a set of fives. He didn't show, but he called his opponent an idiot in the chat box.

pre- fine. borderline set mining and you are in position.
flop- ok. you are deep. backdoors. why not. I'd fold if I'm not as deep as you were. You also don't have sufficient history with this player to make an better informed decision.
turn- fold. You beat AK and 77 and that's it.

I agree that the pre-flop call was marginal, but OK.
UTG+1, the pre-flop raiser, was not deep.
There were several players left to act behind me, and the raise was small. So there were many potential callers who could increase my implied odds.
One of those players could also have raised enough to force me to fold. But as you can see from the stats, the table was playing passive.

I also think the flop call was marginal, but OK. A board like that misses most opponents. I would have expected one of the players acting after me to 3-bet pre-flop if they had a big pocket pair. Despite having three opponents, I thought there was a good chance UTG+1 was c-betting with overcards.

I agree that the turn call was bad.
There were 29BB in the pot and it cost 12BB to call, so I needed 12/(29+12) = 29% equity to call.
I was thinking that there was a decent chance that this was a bluff or semi-bluff.
He may have been on tilt. And he had only 12BB left in his stack, early in the tournament. He may have decided it was time to say "to heck with it" (to put it gently).
The amount I needed to call was small relative to my stack
My call closed the action, so I didn't need to worry about folding to a big river bet.
And I had three sevens (I'm not counting the seven of spades) and two eights as outs that would probably win the hand for me, so about a 10% chance of winning on the river even if I was behind now.
I think I was pretty close to having the equity I needed, but not quite good enough.

Well it all depends on how the villain was playing in the Mtt. Was it the first hand against him ? If i were you , i would always re raise in flop and then check call in that situation. Also he is short , maybe i would put him AI in flop.

It says in the hand history above that I had seen twelve hands against this villain.
With two players left to act, I would not re-raise this flop, even though that flop probably missed them. If I was behind, I was way behind.
He is short, but my other opponents have decent SPRs (stack to pot ratios)

villain might have overpairs, but it can also be an overcards club draws

so i prefer shoving than calling the turn, or is that a shove already?

Yes, that was a shove by the villain.
 
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AlexTheOwl

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Results:

UTG+1 shows K♠9♠ (Two Pair, Nines and Sixes)
(Pre 47%, Flop 26%, Turn 86%)
Hero mucks 8♠8♥ (Two Pair, Eights and Sixes)
(Pre 53%, Flop 74%, Turn 14%)
UTG+1 wins 41.9 BB
 
frnandoh

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I think villain is allin on turn

:confused:
 
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16clumsyandshy

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I don't think there's anything questionable with calling the flop. In fact it would be terrible to call pre and fold on this flop. If this is a decent player, I think they know that you are always calling the turn since your pot odds are so good. The 9 also doesn't change much for your calling range. There's a small time where they have two spades (Ax,Kx, suited connectors) but there are maybe only 15 combos of those. There are 33 combos of 99-AA. I don't have equilab open but it's probably not great. It sucks that we don't have many reads on the player other than he might be on tilt. If you think he could be in tilt, maybe 3bet pre and give him a decision for his stack right there. You have the chips to do so.
 
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AlexTheOwl

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I don't think there's anything questionable with calling the flop. In fact it would be terrible to call pre and fold on this flop.

I think my call was correct also. But I think calling a bet with a medium overpair in middle position in a four way pot that was raised pre-flop is marginal because:

- Bets into a four way pot are more likely to be for value (not a bluff) than bets in hands with fewer players. And anyone betting for value here is way ahead of me unless they have 77.
- Future streets are likely to bring overcards that will make it difficult to know where I stand.
- I may need to play the rest of the hand out of position.
- Everyone making or calling a raise pre-flop makes it more likely that someone has a bigger overpair or a full house.
 
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liuouhgkres

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Imo the only mistake you did was turn call. This flop is a dream flop for you, other than boards with sets, you want this kind of boards. If you fold on this board you should fold preflop. On the turn though you don't beat any value bet and it should be pretty straightforward fold.
 
Jacki Burkhart

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preflop is the only real question I have and it's because the raiser is in EP with 18bb. he's not deep enough to set mine and there's no guarantee we get to see a flop.

that being said, I probably still play it exactly like you because hero has a deep stack so losing 18bb doesn't really change the playability of my stack at all.

If I were 30bb deep I would just fold pre. if I were 15-20 bb deep it would be really close between folding and 3b jamming.

As played the flop is a slam dunk call. he can have overpairs or he can have 2 overs,or draws calling is the only option.

turn: this card really shouldn't change much (I know it did in this instance but in general if you were ahead before you still are). I know that if I have AK, overpairs, or clubs on this stack size I'm barreling on this paired board. often on paired boards AK is good anyways (at these shallow effective stacks).
 
mbrenneman0

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I play it the same way. Its polarized but his range is going to unbalanced with too many bluff combos here.
 
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uavissar

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I play it the same way. Its polarized but his range is going to unbalanced with too many bluff combos here.

Which bluffs do you see Cbetting into 3 players on the flop and then continuing on a seemingly brick turn?
 
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uavissar

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Which value hands are cbetting this flop?

Out of the ones that continue flop, the only ones I see continuing on the turn that I beat are AxKx and 77, and maybe (big maybe oop) with a looser player- AcQc, AcJc and lower pairs (33/44/22/88).
So if not a loose player I don't beat much, hence my question (or I'm wrong about the ranges).
 
mbrenneman0

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Out of the ones that continue flop, the only ones I see continuing on the turn that I beat are AxKx and 77, and maybe (big maybe oop) with a looser player- AcQc, AcJc and lower pairs (33/44/22/88).
So if not a loose player I don't beat much, hence my question (or I'm wrong about the ranges).

I think you misunderstood my question. When villsin bets, he is either betting as a bluff or for value (generally) im not asking which hands he bets that you beat, but what hands villain bets that he tries to get value with. AK is not a value hand here. Honestly i think villain is going to be betting QQ+ (12 combos) for value and any thing else he bets is going to be a bluff. So even if his only bluff is AK (16 combos) then hes going to have more combos of bluffs in his range... add AQ and now hes got almost 3 times the bluffs as he does value hands... I think all of villains other value hands like 77 to JJ are more likely to check because nobody else will call him on this board without an overpair or a 6 so he wants to get to showdown. He really shouldnt have any 6x in his range and if he does he probably only bets them half the time because hes either going to go for calls from overpairs or try to trap
 
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uavissar

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I think you misunderstood my question. When villsin bets, he is either betting as a bluff or for value (generally) im not asking which hands he bets that you beat, but what hands villain bets that he tries to get value with. AK is not a value hand here. Honestly i think villain is going to be betting QQ+ (12 combos) for value and any thing else he bets is going to be a bluff. So even if his only bluff is AK (16 combos) then hes going to have more combos of bluffs in his range... add AQ and now is go almost 3 times the bluffs as he does value hands... I think all of villains other value hands like 77 to JJ are more likely to check because nobody else will call him on this board without an overpair or a 6 so he wants to get to showdown. He really shouldnt have any 6x in his range and if he does he probably only bets them half the time because hes either going to go for calls from overpairs or try to trap

First of all- thank you for the detailed explanation. Very helpful.


Maybe I misunderstood you when you wrote "I play it the same way"- which I understood means you would call the turn as well. I completely agree (as I wrote) that hero should call flop. My issue was with the turn call.
Would you call the turn here?
 
mbrenneman0

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First of all- thank you for the detailed explanation. Very helpful.


Maybe I misunderstood you when you wrote "I play it the same way"- which I understood means you would call the turn as well. I completely agree (as I wrote) that hero should call flop. My issue was with the turn call.
Would you call the turn here?

Yes
 
Jacki Burkhart

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Value hands that bet flop and turn: 77+ (43 combos 39 of which beat us)

Other hands that would barrel flop and turn:eek:vers and flush draws.

AK (16 combos)

AcQc AcJc KcQc AcTc KcJc(5 combos)

and a few combos of AQ not the full 16 but maybe 4 more combos for a total of 25 combos of overs and flush draws


Vs that range we have 47% equity and that’s better than the right price to call.


It’s hard to put him on any 9x that would Cbet into 3 people...I mean he really should only have T9s in his UTG range to begin with so I’m using more “standard” ranges since we only have 12 hands on him gotta go with population tendencies. I think T9s is a give up on this flop unless he Cbets 100%. But even if we put all 3 combos of T9s in there we have 45%. If we add another random suited 9 like K9s we’ve still got 43%.


If we somehow knew he had K9s in his UTG range AND Cbet range then obviously everything about his range is way wider and way spewier. So that's actually good for us, not bad for us. Adjusting for what we know now he probably opens all pairs and all suited broadways. If he opens K9s and Cbets it then we can assume he’d do the same for JTs KTs etc and he’s gonna barrel all those with clubs. Knowing he has K9s in his range actually expands our turn equity to 55%. (Because of the other implications about his range)


But even if you want to assume he’s only barreling 9x or better, club draws and AK and folding everything else we’ve got 42% which is enough.
 

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AlexTheOwl

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Let's look at the hero from the villain's perspective.

The hero called a raise in middle position pre-flop, and called a bet on the flop while four-handed.
If the hero is competent he almost certainly has something better than overcards.


On the turn, the best case for the villain is that the hero has a draw, and that draw almost certainly has one, and probably two, overcards. Even if that is the case, a call from the hero is likely.


Is it rational for the villain to bluff or semi-bluff with anything here?
Given the hero's range and the pot odds, a bluff is very likely to be called, and the villain is likely to lose his tournament life.
So far the hero has been passive. A check here might result in a free card that would improve the villain's hand.
 
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mbrenneman0

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Let's look at the hero from the villain's perspective.

The hero called a raise in middle position pre-flop, and called a bet on the flop while four-handed.
If the hero is competent he almost certainly has something better than overcards.


On the turn, the best case for the villain is that the hero has a draw, and that draw almost certainly has one, and probably two, overcards. Even if that is the case, a call from the hero is likely.


Is it rational for the villain to bluff or semi-bluff with anything here?
Given the hero's range and the pot odds, a bluff is very likely to be called, and the villain is likely to lose his tournament life.
So far the hero has been passive. A check here might result in a free card that would improve the villain's hand.

the problem is, not everybody... in fact most poker players dont think about hands the way you do. Thats what makes you a winning player and them not. (im assuming your sharkscope is blocked because youre a winning player) I think its very difficult to assume a player that you have 12 hands (of which we've only even seen him put $ in on 4) on is capable of thinking about your range at all let alone putting you on the correct range... by making these assumptions, you run a high risk of leveling yourself.
 
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AlexTheOwl

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the problem is, not everybody... in fact most poker players dont think about hands the way you do. Thats what makes you a winning player and them not. (im assuming your sharkscope is blocked because youre a winning player) I think its very difficult to assume a player that you have 12 hands (of which we've only even seen him put $ in on 4) on is capable of thinking about your range at all let alone putting you on the correct range... by making these assumptions, you run a high risk of leveling yourself.

I agree with this to a certain extent.
My default assumption is that players are competent unless proven otherwise, especially online where there are fewer ways to read players, especially in tournaments where it pays to be loss averse.


Even if they have never heard the term "range" used in regard to poker, I think most players are going to ask themselves:
- am I ahead?
- if I am not ahead, will the other player fold?
Most, though not all. . .


I'm modestly profitable, but I'd block SharkScope either way. I don't see how having that info out there would be helpful to me. Though obviously I reveal a lot more here than SharkScope does . . .



turn: this card really shouldn't change much (I know it did in this instance but in general if you were ahead before you still are). I know that if I have AK, overpairs, or clubs on this stack size I'm barreling on this paired board. often on paired boards AK is good anyways (at these shallow effective stacks).

missjacki is a competent player, but she's barreling AK on the turn, if I understand this comment correctly. But seeing this from the villain's perspective, I don't know why this would be profitable in this particular hand.
 
Jacki Burkhart

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My coach has been preaching to me that in the microstakes we need to consider players fish until they prove themselves competent. You play to population tendencies until a player shows you that they are different.

That being said if I think of this turn jam from a fishy perspective he’s probably got more value than overs.

Basically you’re giving villain(s) too much credit which is a leak I’m working on myself.
 
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AlexTheOwl

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That's a fair point.

But I think it's more true live than online, and more true at lower buy-ins. $10 is on the border between micro stakes and low stakes.

Though the site itself is generally fishy . . .
 
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uavissar

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My coach has been preaching to me that in the microstakes we need to consider players fish until they prove themselves competent. You play to population tendencies until a player shows you that they are different.

That being said if I think of this turn jam from a fishy perspective he’s probably got more value than overs.

Basically you’re giving villain(s) too much credit which is a leak I’m working on myself.

+1
So true,
One of my worst leaks that I still work on, especially in microstakes.
 
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