$109 NLHE MTT: 3 bet pot oop, hero call

[Rajten]

pokerstars, $100 + $9 - Hold'em No Limit - 700/1,400 (175 ante) - 6 players
Replay this hand on CardsChat - https://www.cardschat.com/replayer/6253HqtML

UTG (Hero): 116,152 (83 bb)
MP: 28,678 (20 bb)
CO: 122,988 (88 bb)
BU: 95,502 (68 bb)
SB: 22,192 (16 bb)
BB: 108,645 (78 bb)

Pre-Flop: (3,150) Hero is UTG with A♦ 8♦
Hero raises to 3,080, 2 players fold, BTN 3-bets to 9,716, 2 players fold, Hero calls 6,636

Flop: (22,582) 9♠ 8♠ 3♦ (2 players)
Hero checks, BTN checks

Turn: (22,582) T♠ (2 players)
Hero checks, BTN bets 11,517, Hero calls 11,517

River: (45,616) 5♣ (2 players)
Hero checks, BTN bets 47,600, Hero calls 47,600

Player loose and aggresive. Vpip 38 PFR 21, 3b 14 (38 hands)

I thought about 4betting, because of his very high 3bet percentage, but I decided to call, fold seems to weak with suited ace 6 handed.

On turn, I hesitate about folding and calling, I should prorbably fold, because I can be drawing near 0, or villain have signifficant equity versus me and position.

On river, When spade missed and when called turn, I need to call on river, but this sizing look very strong, I am not sure, is it population bluff pot enough often to justify calling.

What do you thing about hand, all feed back apreciated?

 

[Tigroslav]

I would fold A6s A8s A9s and open all the other suited aces. (Advanced stuff I know)
Yes I'm serious.
Once you get a normal sized 3-bet pre
Call or fold are both fine to be balanced.
Try 50/50 distribution.
Checking the flop is a big mistake as it shows weakness,
gives turn+river free and at a serious discount to villain.
I think you should c-bet the flop and take it down.
Its the best course of action to have a high chance
of winning the pot.

If you get called re-evaluate turn.
Try getting to showdown without putting more money in the pot.
Most likely check/fold mode.
If you face more aggression be confident villain has you beat.
Live to fight another hand.

 

[eetenor]

PokerStars, $100 + $9 - Hold'em No Limit - 700/1,400 (175 ante) - 6 players
Replay this hand on CardsChat - https://www.cardschat.com/replayer/6253HqtML

UTG (Hero): 116,152 (83 bb)
MP: 28,678 (20 bb)
CO: 122,988 (88 bb)
BU: 95,502 (68 bb)
SB: 22,192 (16 bb)
BB: 108,645 (78 bb)

Pre-Flop: (3,150) Hero is UTG with A♦ 8♦
Hero raises to 3,080, 2 players fold, BTN 3-bets to 9,716, 2 players fold, Hero calls 6,636

Flop: (22,582) 9♠ 8♠ 3♦ (2 players)
Hero checks, BTN checks

Turn: (22,582) T♠ (2 players)
Hero checks, BTN bets 11,517, Hero calls 11,517

River: (45,616) 5♣ (2 players)
Hero checks, BTN bets 47,600, Hero calls 47,600

Player loose and aggresive. Vpip 38 PFR 21, 3b 14 (38 hands)

I thought about 4betting, because of his very high 3bet percentage, but I decided to call, fold seems to weak with suited ace 6 handed.

On turn, I hesitate about folding and calling, I should prorbably fold, because I can be drawing near 0, or villain have signifficant equity versus me and position.

On river, When spade missed and when called turn, I need to call on river, but this sizing look very strong, I am not sure, is it population bluff pot enough often to justify calling.

What do you thing about hand, all feed back apreciated?

Thank you for posting.

1 A8s is an open utg vs standard V- in this spot there are 2 V with shove stacks so folding is an option.

2 When loose agg V 3 bets us we need to think about how they are going to play on all streets. A8s OOP is a equity realization hand yet a loose agg is going to bet often and can be dominating us Ax better kicker- So realizing equity is going to be difficult and reverse implied odds very bad for us- so folding is fine- Vs weak players we can wait to play top of range vs them.

3 OOP vs wide range means we cannot know what they have and they will bet top pair like it is a set- When the V bets turn it could be all TX hands it could be QJ it could be a draw the issue is how do we call river? The river bluff is accidentally balanced so we have to fold in a tournament to preserve stack size-

Hope this helps

 

[fundiver199]

Preflop
Opening is fine and standard. When facing a 3-bet of this size, a GTO style has you folding at least 50% of your hands. If you open a standard range, then A8s is in the bottom 50% of that range, so the default here is to fold. With that being said solvers often play a lot of hands as partials, which is done for balance and board coverage. So maybe the solver input here would be something like fold 80-90% and call 10-20%.

You say, that you called, because "it felt to tight to fold", and its important to get past these "feelings" and find out, what the actual GTO ranges are, since that should be your starting point. The next issue is your entrepretation of HUD stats. Yes 14% 3-bet is high, but we only get the chance to 3-bet is around a third of the hands, we play. We cant 3-bet UTG, or when it folds to us.

So over 38 hands a 3-bet of 14% is most likely 2 3-bets out of 14 opportunities. And this obviously mean nothing at all. Maybe the guy picked up AA and KK, and he is actually a really nitty 3-bettor. You have no idea at this point, and to separate someone with a 14% 3-bet from someone with a 8% 3-bet, you need something closer to 300 hands rather than just 38. So you dont have information to make any adjustments here, and A8s should mainly have been a fold.

Flop
Checking to preflop raiser is standard, and I dont see any reason to lead out. It will just allow him to fold hands, we are ahead of, and raise hands we are behind to.

Turn
I still dont see any reason for betting, even he checked back flop. He goes for a delayed C-bet of around half pot, and a GTO style has you continuing with around two thirds of the hands, you get here with like this. I will say, its close. You do beat a bluff, but you dont have any kind of draw, and you could be drawing dead, as you already realise. In a lower stakes game I prefer to just fold here, because I think, the population is underbluffing the turn and river, and I just want to stay away from sticky spots, where I have no good plan for later streets. And since the preflop call was questionable, maybe this hand is so bad, you can just let it go, even it might mean, you are slightly overfolding now.

River
Now he bet a little over the pot, which mean, that a GTO style has you folding more than half the hands, you get here with like this. This hand is definitely not among the best 50% of hands, you have, so this is a very clear fold now. As for population tendencies, I dont play stakes this high, so I dont know. But at lower stakes I will say, that when people take a line and sizing like this, they usually have it. And "it" in this case is basically a straight or flush. So I think, you are being way to sticky in this hand, especially since its a hand, that should mostly have been dumped already preflop.

 

[IADaveMark]

Ugh. Not at all pleased with calling the 3-bet OOP. Sure, dude's VPIP is high (although his PFR isn't too out of line... almost feels more like a calling station). And yeah, his 3b% is way high, but you don't have a lot of data on him. 38 hands isn't even remotely close to smooth out the stats.

So, putting that aside and treating him as a rando, I'm assuming I'm up against AA, KK, AK, maybe QQ or AQ. All of those have me crushed. For that matter, A9+ and 99+ has me crushed. And that is a lot wider than would be normal for a 3-bet range.

So you flopped middle pair on a somewhat draw-heavy board. I agree with the check and was not expecting the check back there. OTOH, Villain could have done that with 99, 88, or 2 higher spades.

When the turn hits that makes the flush out there, the straight out there and it brings another overcard to your 8s, why are you calling this? What are you hoping you are up against? If he has a 9 or T, you have 5 outs (12%)—and even those are questionable. If he has spades already, you are hosed. If he has a straight (e.g. QJ is a decent possibility), you are hosed. You needed to let this go at this point.

But not only did you call that 1/2 pot bet where you were likely behind, you then called the full pot bet on the river. Considering that calling the pre-flop 3bet was iffy and then it got worse from there, you lost a ton of chips on this. And no, it doesn't matter what the actual result was on this hand, this is not a good line at all.

 

[fundiver199]

Above I analysed the hand with emphasis on, what the GTO line might look like. This is, because I think, we kind of need to at least have that in the back of our mind, if we play a limit as high as this. However most people using this forum, and including myself, are playing lower limits. And therefore I also want to add a few words on, how to view this situation from a more old-school standpoint.

And basically when we call that 3-bet out of position, then what is our actual plan? Of course life is nice and easy, if we flop a flushdraw, or if we smash the flop with two pair or better. But we only flop a flushdraw 11% of the time, and we only flop two pair or better 4% of the time.

The rest of the time we either miss completely and need to check-fold. Or we flop one pair and end up in sticky situations such as this one. If we flop an ace, we have kicker issues, and if we flop an 8, there are multible ways for us to either be behind or get drawn out on. And of course we are out of position on every single street postflop, which makes everything worse for us and better for the opponent.

So honestly a lot of people, who are relatively new to the game, and how play micro or low stakes games, would do a lot better, if they just made it their default to fold to 3-bets out of position, unless they have some really premium hand. Even hands as strong as AJ or KQ can be very troublesome, when you call a 3-bet out of position.

Of course if we massively overfold to 3-bets, that can eventually show up on peoples HUDs, and it can make us a target. But is that actually a problem in the games, you are playing right now? How many players on your table do you have 300+ hands on, meaning they also have it on you? Likely not many if you are playing MTTs. Maybe a bit more, if you play SnGs or cash games.

But even then we can improve our stats by calling more 3-bets in position rather than out of position, or when people undersize the 3-bet, which was not the case here. Or even when we are opening from CO and get 3-bet by BTN, so that its a late position confrontation, where the 3-betting range should be much wider.

Finally a few more words about the opponent, who you call "pretty loose and agressive". If I put a label on a player with stats like these, I actually dont use the "LAG" label, because the gap between VPIP and PFR is so big. That gap make him look more like a "semi-loose passive". He has likely studied some theory and understand the importance of aggression, but he still need to see a lot of flops and get in there and "play". So he is at least partly a recreational player rather than some super solid winning regular.

In this specific spot that means, that he could be making some moves, but we dont really have enough information to justify picking this as the spot, where we make a stand against him and try to catch him bluffing in a huge pot. And specifically when it comes to facing his 3-bet, I think, we need to put him on a somewhat tight range.

Yes he has 3-bet twice before, so he has that capability. But he has also done a lot of cold calling or limping, and he is on BTN, where he have position postflop, and we opened from UTG (even its only 6-handed), where we have the strongest range. So why did he select to 3-bet us rather than just see a cheap flop and try to outplay us in position? The most likely answer is, because he has a very good hand, and he wants to get value.

 

[Rajten]

Thanks everybody for advices. I played this hand poorly and call on river was wrong. He got Ts9s

 

[fundiver199]

Thanks everybody for advices. I played this hand poorly and call on river was wrong. He got Ts9s

Ok that means, his 3-betting range was actually much wider, than I though, and coincidentally it was probably something close to the number displayed on your HUD. But even against a 16% 3-betting range, A8s is still behind with only 44,5% equity, and equity realisation is going to be poor, because you are out of position and without initiative. But still it does make the preflop call at least a little bit better. On the other hand the fact, he chose this sizing on the river with just two pair, mean, his value range is wider, than I thought, which makes calling the river bet worse. So maybe all in all this hand is not to badly played except for calling that big river bet.

 

[Endwarfin]

PokerStars, $100 + $9 - Hold'em No Limit - 700/1,400 (175 ante) - 6 players
Replay this hand on CardsChat - https://www.cardschat.com/replayer/6253HqtML

UTG (Hero): 116,152 (83 bb)
MP: 28,678 (20 bb)
CO: 122,988 (88 bb)
BU: 95,502 (68 bb)
SB: 22,192 (16 bb)
BB: 108,645 (78 bb)

Pre-Flop: (3,150) Hero is UTG with A♦ 8♦
Hero raises to 3,080, 2 players fold, BTN 3-bets to 9,716, 2 players fold, Hero calls 6,636

Flop: (22,582) 9♠ 8♠ 3♦ (2 players)
Hero checks, BTN checks

Turn: (22,582) T♠ (2 players)
Hero checks, BTN bets 11,517, Hero calls 11,517

River: (45,616) 5♣ (2 players)
Hero checks, BTN bets 47,600, Hero calls 47,600

Player loose and aggresive. Vpip 38 PFR 21, 3b 14 (38 hands)

I thought about 4betting, because of his very high 3bet percentage, but I decided to call, fold seems to weak with suited ace 6 handed.

On turn, I hesitate about folding and calling, I should prorbably fold, because I can be drawing near 0, or villain have signifficant equity versus me and position.

On river, When spade missed and when called turn, I need to call on river, but this sizing look very strong, I am not sure, is it population bluff pot enough often to justify calling.

What do you thing about hand, all feed back apreciated?

Just the last two hands you've posted....

I think you assume villains have the same thought process you have.
It feels like you leverage a pre-flop advantage into the assumption you are ahead on the flop.

I think you are good enough to be able to navigate flop textures.