$200 NLHE Full Ring: Q8 rivers second nut straight after V calls 2 check raises

[Sam Powers]

Hero is dealt in SB w/ $510 stack

Folds around, hero limps $2, BB w/ $490 stack raises to $9, hero calls

Flop: ($18)

Hero checks, BB bets $5, hero raises to $18, BB calls.

Turn: ($54)
Hero checks, BB bets $35, Hero raises to $130, BB calls

River: ($314)
Hero bets $333, BB calls and is All In

($980)

Do your worst

 

[fundiver199]

Preflop
Assuming there is no ante, I would use a raise or fold strategy from all seats of the table rather than limp-call. Small blind limping is mostly for ante games like most tournaments.

Flop
Check-raising is a fine option here, but I prefer to go a little bit larger like maybe 23$ rather than 18.

Turn
Going for a second check-raise seem overly fancy to me. I would just continue betting having picked up 3 additional outs to the straight.

River
Obviously very lucky to hit the straight. You have a very well disguised nut hand, since you should pretty much only have a straight with clubs and maybe hearts exactly. Time to get some value, and since he has called two check-raises, he should be pretty strong, so no reason to do anything other than jam

 

[gustav197poker]

The check raise of flop makes sense when we are suspicious of bet size. He might as well induce us to raise to continue betting, but he might also have us believe that and he doesn't really have even decent blockers for this texture.
Your line confuses me a bit. Have you played slow queens preflop? If so a solid villain should call OTT with exactly the action-killing combos, like KK + and sets.
At least we want the villain to have more bluffs in his range. But after checking / raising 2 times, BB's range becomes quite short. On the other hand, your hand blocks important semibluffs like J8s; QJs; QKs. Up to 87 suits you block. Each raise you make removes combos from the villain's range and that mostly isolates you with hands that will defeat you in the long run. Put yourself in the villain's shoes. What hands would you call after the turn raise? But before that, what hands would you protect from the BB with a bet turn? It was a considerable size, close to 65% of the pot. Which gives hero 28% equity to call, but if we does x / r, against KK+ the call becomes -EV. Maybe we can bluff our turn raise, but this will be best done when we do not eliminate hands on the flop as in this case, with our first check raise. But definitely in this case the OTT call is the standard play for hero.
The river is a fairway that luckily benefits our range, and now it makes more sense that we can bluff with all of our failed draws. And the call of the villain will also be more standard. The BB could have some AXs of failed flush draws as well, but that's only a small part of his range of call OTT, compared to the values ​​that villain has tried to protect.
Greetings.

 

[Sidetracked]

I agree with fund as far as raise or fold from the SB preflop.

Given your flop and turn c/r, was your plan to jam any river, or only ones that completed your draws?

 

[300HPGOD]

I would prefer what others have said about not limping here but its fine to throw in there once in a while with hands like this that arent strong but have some hidden value and you can call a raise with. I am fine with the flop play and sizing is fine although you would not want to go any smaller than you did here since you really dont mind taking it down here so raising a bit bigger is probably better however your sizing is fine imo.

On the turn I can see going either way here but I do much prefer continuing to bet. One is to get some folds and two is that you really dont want to cede control of the hand and by betting you can dictate what price you want to pay to get to the river. By checking you now let the villain set the price. I dont like check raising the turn there as I think if you are going to check, check calling is better because I dont think you will get any folds unless you go really large here with your raise and as of this point in the hand you still have nothing but Q high.

The river is perfect because in going through this hand I really think villain know what you have minus the Q and 8. I think they have you on a club draw so by betting huge on the river as you did you make it look bluffy and villain will call much lighter here than you think. The offsuit jack is literally the best card in the deck for you as I dont think you would have got paid off with another club. If villain has KQ then they just do. Just because my straight here is not the nut straight would not deter me here from piling in a spot that will look bluffy when I do it.

 

[fundiver199]

If villain has KQ then they just do.

I am certainly not worried about KQ either. For the opponent to call a check-raise twice they should need to have some sort of equity. So the only combo, that would make even a bit of sense, would be KQ of hearts exactly. And if they really did end up on the river with KQ offsuit and coolered us like this, then just make a mental note and dont bluff this person in the future.