$2 NLHE STT Turbo: pocket 8's with 9 5 9 rainbow flop

[jaded848]

$2 NL HE STT Turbo: pocket 8's with 9 5 9 rainbow flop

Early on so no reads. Not much to say here, just curious about my line.

Full Tilt No-Limit Hold'em, 2.25 Tournament, 15/30 Blinds (9 handed) - Full-Tilt Hand Converter from HandHistoryConverter.com
SB (t1500)
BB (t1500)
UTG (t1500)
UTG+1 (t1500)
MP1 (t1500)
MP2 (t1500)
MP3 (t1500)
Hero (CO) (t1500)
Button (t1500)
Hero's M: 33.33
Preflop: Hero is CO with 8

, 8

5 folds, Hero bets t90, Button calls t90, 1 fold, BB calls t60
Flop: (t285) 9

, 5

, 9

(3 players)
BB checks, Hero bets t200, Button calls t200, 1 fold
Turn: (t685) 7

(2 players)
Hero bets t400, Button calls t400
River: (t1485) 6

(2 players)
Hero bets t810 (All-In), Button calls t810 (All-In)
Total pot: t3105

 

[c9h13no3]

Bet the flop & turn a little smaller (or bigger). You really don't want to put yourself in a spot where you've got 800 behind a 1500 pot. 140 on the flop, 350 on the turn gives you a little more behind so that you're less committed. Otherwise, nice hand.

IMO the only questionable spot is the turn, where check/folding should be an option. But so many players are going to float you on this sort of board with all sorts of stuff, so I think I like bet/folding for like 350 as the best option.

 

[WiZZiM]

Bet the flop & turn a little smaller. 140 on the flop, 350 on the turn

This.

Im not sure, but check/calling a viable line? I don't really like to give up initiative though..

 

[jaded848]

Bet the flop & turn a little smaller (or bigger). You really don't want to put yourself in a spot where you've got 800 behind a 1500 pot. 140 on the flop, 350 on the turn gives you a little more behind so that you're less committed. Otherwise, nice hand.

IMO the only questionable spot is the turn, where check/folding should be an option. But so many players are going to float you on this sort of board with all sorts of stuff, so I think I like bet/folding for like 350 as the best option.

If river had been an overcard, or another 5- could I check/call or would I have to check/fold if the bet was big?

 

[c9h13no3]

Im not sure, but check/calling a viable line? I don't really like to give up initiative though..

Check/calling the turn is kinda ugly because:

1) Our draws have pretty poor implied odds (hard for people to pay us with worse when a 6 or 8 hits).

2) Our opponent will likely v-bet trips+, maybe 66 & 5x, and bluffs. I really doubt we have good equity against that range.

If river had been an overcard, another 5, or anything like that, could I check/call or would I have to check/fold if the bet was big?

Another 5 would be a disastrous card for us, as I think a lot of 5x hands are in villain's range (A5, 54s, 56s, 57s). I think other over cards higher than a J are pretty much blanks. And when villain gets to the river on this board, I don't expect him to have a lot of air hands he can turn into a bluff on this board. So... he'll essentially be betting for value if we check to him.

 

[OzExorcist]

Smarter people than me ITT IMO

Agree with c9 and WiZ about betting smaller on the flop and turn to control the pot size.

As for the alternate river situations, if it's a five I think mostly we're beat. Someone who's been calling you down with Ax might lose their mind and decide they're good / can bluff you off but I don't think that happens too often. Overcards on the river aren't a big concern for me in general and I expect a lot of them would get checked behind. But if one comes and the villain bets, given the action in the rest of the hand I'm having trouble working out what we still beat that can call all the way and bet an overcard river... dunno, I think that any 5 or T-A would have to be a check-fold.

 

[Xavier]

I wouldn't much like being in this spot in this hand after his call on the flop.
I'd be worried he flatted with AA-1010, 55 or has a 9.

Seems pointless betting so much on the flop to me, and I think 140 is ample.

After he calls the flop I don't really like betting again as I think only stronger hands are likely to call another bet except maybe A5 or 66, and I don't think the 7 is even a good card for us as 77 a hand which might have called the flop now beats us as well.

I would check the turn and hope to get to showdown cheaply calling a smaller bets on the turn and river.
If he bets big on the turn I would throw this hand away.
Theres no shame in giving up the 220 we have invested in the hand as we still have most of our stack.

If he called with a hand with just overcards like AK we don't need to stress about giving a free river card, and betting the turn to protect our hand, as he only will have 6 outs to outdraw us.

 

[Xavier]

Check/calling the turn is kinda ugly because:

2) Our opponent will likely v-bet trips+, maybe 66 & 5x, and bluffs. I really doubt we have good equity against that range

Yeah but check calling value bets loses far less chips than c betting into a hand that has us crushed.

 

[c9h13no3]

Yeah but check calling value bets loses far less chips than c betting into a hand that has us crushed.

Um, care to explain how, because that makes absolutely no sense to me.

If we v-bet, we get called by a wider range of hands than he v-bets himself. All his 56, 67, 78, type hands very likely call another bet, but it'd be a stretch to say that villain v-bets them himself. Not betting because 77 possibly hit a two outer is pretty hilarious also.

 

[Xavier]

Um, care to explain how, because that makes absolutely no sense to me.

If we v-bet, we get called by a wider range of hands than he v-bets himself. All his 56, 67, 78, type hands very likely call another bet, but it'd be a stretch to say that villain v-bets them himself. Not betting because 77 possibly hit a two outer is pretty hilarious also.

Hands like 56, 67, 78, 66 shouldn't really call a turn bet imo as you're basically screaming u have an overpair at that point, and they don't have the pot odds against that to call.

More importantly if you bet again you're probably pot committed if he shoves all in over the top, which you need to avoid being with marginal hands early on in sit n gos. I wouldn't be surprised to find he had A9, 109 or 1010, so the risk of betting seems way higher than potential reward, and you should just try to keep this pot small.

 

[c9h13no3]

Hands like 56, 67, 78, 66 shouldn't really call a turn bet imo as you're basically screaming u have an overpair at that point, and they don't have the pot odds against that to call.

Stop having fancy play syndrome. You're in a $2 SnG. If your opponent has a pair, a draw, and he sucks, he's not folding.

More importantly if you bet again you're probably pot committed if he shoves all in over the top, which you need to avoid being with marginal hands early on in sit n gos

I really don't understand why we can't fold... Sure, we'd be getting ~2:1, but we certainly don't have anywhere near the 40%-50% equity we'd need to call another bet. Just because you'd have to fold if your opponent shoves is not a reason to avoid betting in the first place.

Your whole argument is "Oh man, our opponent could have a really big hand!". But he could also have a really weak hand. He's got a distribution of hands, actually. And 88 beats the majority of those hands.

And since I like numbers to back up all the spewy stuff I write about...

We have 62% equity against his calling range on the turn. Also, he likely folds stuff like KQ that have some equity against us on the turn. So not only does our turn bet get called by worse, but this bet also protects our hand from hands that have significant equity against us. And a lot of villain's hands have draws, so he's more likely to pay for that draw on the turn, when he can still win, but could talk himself into folding the river when his small pair just has to be good on its own.

You tournament players would really do well to visit the cash game forums, and learn a bit more about how to play the turn & river.

 

[Slow Roll Poker]

I honestly would have played it just like you did.

 

[Xavier]

We have 62% equity against his calling range on the turn.

I don't really know how that software works but did you include A9, K9, Q9, AA-JJ in that simulation - doesn't look like it.

AA - JJ isn't that likely but possible as some donks will just flat call raises with these hands thinking to be tricky, and donks will occasionally call with hands like Q9 in sit n gos this low.

 

[c9h13no3]

I don't really know how that software works but did you include A9, K9, Q9, AA-JJ in that simulation - doesn't look like it.

AA - JJ isn't that likely but possible as some donks will just flat call raises with these hands thinking to be tricky, and donks will occasionally call with hands like Q9 in sit n gos this low.

Yeah, but then if we widen our opponent's flatting range to include lots of stuff like K9o, we could probably widen it to include other stuff that doesn't have a nine. I'm sure you could conjure up a range where our opponent has us crushed.

Maybe I'm not giving your line enough credit, because this is a fairly close decision. If I had to pick an order, I'd say bet/fold > check/fold > check/call, but they're all pretty close to each other. I just feel pretty strongly that bet/fold is the one that will come out on top most often.

I prefer the bet/fold because at micro stakes, our opponents typically tend to call pretty wide, v-bet narrowly, and they don't bluff often (and when they do, they min-raise the flop & things like that, they don't float much). Also, a lot of our equity is in our draw, which has very little implied odds. If our opponent has a hand like 56 or 44, its pretty unlikely that he'll pay us when we spike an 8 or 6. However, he may call a turn bet.

For a check/call to be correct, our opponent would have to bluff more hands that we have beaten on the turn than he calls with. If, like you suggest, our opponent's range contains a ton of AA/A9 type monsters, then we should check and fold. But once again, given microstakes tendencies, I'd lean towards the bet/fold.