A ramble, my play, ranges, equity - thoughts please?

BigCityBanker

Ive been thinking about these two hands all day. The first one is just meh for me but i tried to leverage my play in the first one to push through a bluff in the second one and it failed. Im undecided as to wether or not my play in the second is just plain bad or wether or not it has any merit? My feeling in the second hand was that villian should have felt he was crushed by my range and folded. I suppose Ive been reading a little lately about ranges and your equity against certain ranges and wether or not you should continue with a hand.

Both hands are 2/5pl from the Jackpot last night, villian in both is the same person - John O'Shea, a good winning online player whom I thought should deffo have been capable of folding hand 2 given history (hence my play - i wouldnt try this aginst any old eijit). In both hands im playing c.650 villian covers me in both hands. Hand 1 is pretty much the only hand all night (up to the second one) where I had made agressive actions and had to show down.

Hand 1 - 7 handed, table has been playing tight imo. I have been playing very tight mainly due to getting zero hands.

Villian opens for 20 utg with 10h8h, its folded to me in the BB and I call with AQo (pot 42)

Flop Q 10 8r - I check and villian bets 35, i cr to 100. Im not happy about my cr here - i wasnt sure what exactly i was hoping to achieve and once id done it i instantly regretted it. The villian thinks about it and calls. (pot 240).

Turn A - this is prolly one of the better cards in the deck for me and means I can continue with a hand I would otherwise prolly of had to have given up on. I lead for 225, villian dwells for few minutes and pushes, I call. Its not really significant to hand 2 but the river was a 10 and the 1300 odd was shipped his way. Villian said he couldnt understand why I would lead the turn with a hand that beat him - i replied that I had plenty of money to get into the middle with what i felt was the best hand and i couldnt chance that he would do the betting on my behalf.

Hand 2 - Table is playing 9 handed i think. I again have been pretty tight with the exception of one spewy hand which i had to show down. Its about 2 hours or more since hand 1 above.

Villian opens utg+1 for 20 with KsQs, Its folded to me in the BB and I make it 80 with AKo. Villian thinks and calls.

Flop Qh 10h 2c - I lead for 125, villian has a right old think about it and eventually calls.

Turn 2s - I lead for 300 leaving 135 or so behind. I have sensed weakness and uncertainty on the flop and im trying to send this one to bed. Villian eventually sticks me all in.

Firstly, my play. Anybody like my line in hand 2? Is my flop bet weak looking? Should it have been 150? Thoughts? Im well aware of how bad my CR was in hand 1 so id ask people not to focus on that.

Secondly, villian. Im pretty certain his turn play in hand 1 is awful but if anybody thinks otherwise im willing to listen. My question boils down to this. What range should he be assigning me given history in hand 1 and my subsequent actions in hand 2. From reading Townsends in the well thread on 2+2 he talks about your equity against a players range and this dictating wether or not you should continue. I suppose when it boils down Im pretty confident that I wouldnt have seen the turn in hand 2 with KQ and probably wouldnt have seen a flop either? Is this a mistake on my part? Is there a trade off between logic and math? Logic would dictate that hand 2, with KQ, is a fold for me - where is my thought process askew?

all thoughts and comments are welcome and appreciated?

Board: Qh Th 2s
Hand 0: 44.202% { KsQs }
Hand 1: 55.798% { TT+, AQs+, AQo+ } (maybe im way off with my range here)

Board: Qh Th 2s 2c
Hand 0: 43.648% { KsQs }
Hand 1: 56.352% { TT+, AQs+, AQo+

jimmii

Hand 1:
Thats just a little unlucky a bigger raise would have been good but he's probably calling that this time.

Hand 2:
I would have folded the KQ pre-flop and after calling I wouldn't be too happy about going all the way with just the queen. Having seen you check raise a similar flop with AQ he might have thought top pair was good but its pretty brave to still think the same after the turn. Were there any other raised pots where you hit top pair and went to showdown?

Killme00

Hand 1: I would check raise the max on the flop. You made it 100 wanting a call i presume. Thehand played itself from the turn methinks.

Hand 2: I dont like this hand at all. Against John who likes to bet i would prefer to check call the flop. If he puts you on a flush draw and one pair on the flop then he should have raised but sticking you allin on the turn is okay.

BigCityBanker

jimmii wrote:

Were there any other raised pots where you hit top pair and went to showdown?

yes but it was against a shallow stacked player who was gambling/tilting/chasing and it was on a drawy board - his hand was pretty much face up on the turn when we got the money in.

jimmii

BigCityBanker wrote:

yes but it was against a shallow stacked player who was gambling/tilting/chasing and it was on a drawy board - his hand was pretty much face up on the turn when we got the money in.

No real info for him to take from that then. Would be interesting to know his line of thought on that one does he post here at all? I would need a pretty good read to know I was good here but i'm pretty tight so that could be why.

Captain Tom

meh. i think hand 2 is ok vs a good thinking player. realistically your range here is very small (i think we can pretty much narrow it down to JJ+/AK after you flat called with AQ in this exact spot the last hand, and you surely wouldnt play JJ like this). also your betting pattern is pretty consistent with a big hand (in hand 1 you also bet close to full pot with top 2). the fact that

BigCityBanker wrote:

Villian said he couldnt understand why I would lead the turn with a hand that beat him

leads me to beleive he's not very good though. wtf does this even mean?

and fwiw i dont like villians line in hand 1.

Trippie

In hand 1 he knew himself that it was a bad play as he was pissed off for a few minutes after when he called. You could tell from his demeanor that he wasnt happy calling but he just couldnt put you on a hand and i think it was more a case to find out what you had rather than thinking he was good.


In hand 2 as soon as you lead out for the 125 i figured you had Ak as the bet just didnt seem to fit in to the rest of the play and it looked like you were just trying to take it down there and then. I think a check raise probably would of worked much better but then again at the time you didnt know what he had and whether or not he would bet.


You also have to remember at the start of the game you were being sarcastic with a few people talking about putting you're money in with a drawing hand when they would show ak and perhaps it was a lapse of concentration but thats kind of what happened in the end

dvdfan

I dont know what the games play like at that level but anyway you probably will get less biased answers if you dont post results.

I have to say he must know that hes only beating a bluff here, theres more hands that beat him that are in your range like AA,KK,TT,AQ but i dont think you can say he can put you on any range giving 1 hand shown down 2 hours ago. So he cant say to himself that smells of AA or KK because he hasnt seen how you played them and maybe with the lack of info on a very drawy board he felt he might be ahead. Also in the 1st hand you c/r with TPTK, would you normally do this or do you mix it up.

Maybe hes image of your game wasnt what you taught because i dont think he can call if he puts you on the range that you say, so he obviously had you on a wider range or felt you were bluffing. Maybe he had a tell, maybe he formed an image from how you played against shorties or maybe he has some history from another night. The one plus in this hand is it might help you get paid off again against him.

dvdfan

Trippie wrote:

In hand 2 as soon as you lead out for the 125 i figured you had Ak as the bet just didnt seem to fit in to the rest of the play and it looked like you were just trying to take it down there and then. I think a check raise probably would of worked much better but then again at the time you didnt know what he had and whether or not he would bet.

I have to disagree, he 3bet preflop from the blinds and leads with a 3/4 psb on a FD board, it would take some read to put someone on AK from this. Theres no way AA,KK or even AQ would give a free card here.

Hectorjelly

A few points, firstly your opponents think on more than just one level. Just because you turned up with top top in the first hand doesnt mean you will always turn up with top top after that with the same action. If john gives you any credit he must realize that its actually very unlikely for you to turn up with exactly the same strength hand after similar action.

Secondly, you losing the first hand is going to make you more likely to try and go after John and try and get your money back. In his shoes I would probably call you with KQ for that reason alone. Your hand could be a bluff and you have a reason to bluff him.

Thirdly I like your play until the turn in hand 2, but you should stop there. He has to have a reasnably strong hand and trying to get people to fold them is not worth it. Yes if you sat down with him and a pen and paper you could show him that calling against your range is - EV, but poker is very profitable because even good players make mistakes. It looks like he is going to call you here, so dont bluff.

opr

Trippie wrote:

In hand 2 as soon as you lead out for the 125 i figured you had Ak as the bet just didnt seem to fit in to the rest of the play and it looked like you were just trying to take it down there and then. I think a check raise probably would of worked much better but then again at the time you didnt know what he had and whether or not he would bet.

I don't get this ? The story is its been 3 bet preflop the pot is now about 160 and raiser leads out of about 2/3 the pot into a very drawy flop. How in the hell do you peg his range to AK here ?

Opr

BigCityBanker

Trippie wrote:

In hand 2 as soon as you lead out for the 125 i figured you had Ak as the bet just didnt seem to fit in to the rest of the play

I disagree here - its a bloody drawy board i have to charge here if im holding AA/KK/AQ or set. I dont think CR was an option a second time as its less believeable the second time around and also if he has a draw he can peel off a free card and protect himself from the CR.

Trippie wrote:

You also have to remember at the start of the game you were being sarcastic with a few people talking about putting you're money in with a drawing hand when they would show ak and perhaps it was a lapse of concentration but thats kind of what happened in the end

lol - key point underlined. Certainly no lapse of concentration involved.

BigCityBanker

dvdfan wrote:

The one plus in this hand is it might help you get paid off again against him.

bingo (yn)

bops

it appears to me that AK was the only hand in your range that he was ahead of - i think you played it well, but unfortunately he didn't!!

against you if i chose not to fold the flop, i would have deffo folded the turn, you looked strong imo and my Q was dead now also for 2 pair against your AA - that's how i'd be thinking...

some people just don't like laying down TP, and the result in this hand just gives him further reasoning why not to lay it down in the future!!

charlesanto

I can't see how your range should be so small.

You have seen him open raise UTG with 8 10s,
so when you see him open raise UTG+1 for the same amount and it's folded around to you your 3 betting range should be massive.

Trippie

I know it seems strange that i could peg him for an accurate hand but I was spot on on every one of my reads/decisions last night except for one and its nothing specific as it wasnt just the leading out it was a combination of how the way the chips went in, the denomination of the chips,the way the stack was handled, the overall confidence and the bet sizing.

He said later that the only reason he called was because you started talking and that he was going to fold if you hadn't of said anything

Trippie

charlesanto wrote:

I can't see how your range should be so small.

You have seen him open raise UTG with 8 10s,
so when you see him open raise UTG+1 for the same amount and it's folded around to you your 3 betting range should be massive.

Add into this range 2c4c 6h4h J9 aswell

cardshark202

I see you posted hand 1 the other way around on MSNL. I don't like your play in hand 1 as you made it an easy fold for him, well it should have been. Also, give up on the turn in hand 2.

BigCityBanker

cardshark202 wrote:

I see you posted hand 1 the other way around on MSNL. I don't like your play in hand 1 as you made it an easy fold for him, well it should have been. Also, give up on the turn in hand 2.

yeah - I posted it first thing this morning. Was just looking for alternative angles. mixing up my play i suppose!

ianmc38

Hand 2 your thinking is totally wrong unless you keep the same line with the same holdings every time with a bluff frequency of zero. His preflop call is pretty awful though.

Hand 1 I like the turn lead. Its such a bad card for him that I think he'll check behind hands like QT, T8, where as you may get 2 streets of value from him by leading. And i dont think he's the type of person to fold 2 pair either from my limited experience playing with him live.

MrPillowTalk

I dont like your cr in hand 1, basically you have to play for stacks now and you could be crushed.

I hate his pre flop call in hand 2, the game must be pretty spewy if people are calling 3 bets oop with KQ. After that its marginal enough for both of you, I would hate to be in his spot as he will have no real idea where he is at in the hand and I think you should have given up rather than fire the last barrell.

BigCityBanker

ianmc38 wrote:

Hand 2 your thinking is totally wrong unless you keep the same line with the same holdings every time with a bluff frequency of zero. His preflop call is pretty awful though..

Ian, do you want to take a few mins to expand on this a little more?

Pillow wrote:

I dont like your cr in hand 1, basically you have to play for stacks now and you could be crushed....

i know, tis rancid - as soon as i did it i started to kick myself for being a dumbass.

Pillow wrote:

I hate his pre flop call in hand 2, the game must be pretty spewy if people are calling 3 bets oop with KQ. After that its marginal enough for both of you, I would hate to be in his spot as he will have no real idea where he is at in the hand and I think you should have given up rather than fire the last barrell...

he actually has position on me in this hand. Sometimes i find it easier to fire the third barrell than give up - i need to correct this.