2NL 6max - AKo 3b pot in the BB vs station

[daviddem]

This is a spot I encounter regularly: I 3b AK pre, and brick the flop.

Should I cbet here on this rather dry board vs a station? He'll probably only continue with his PP's, FD's, 45s, maybe A4 and A5 and that is less than 42% of his range, so a cbet should be profitable here, unless he starts floating with overs etc?

Should I avoid 3b AK pre OOP vs stationey opps?

UTG is 27/8/0AF over 26 hands
button is 52/5/1.2AF over 64 hands

$0.01/$0.02 No Limit Holdem
iPoker
6 Players
Hand Conversion Powered by weaktight.com

Stacks:
UTG ($1.27)
UTG+1 ($4.31)
CO ($4.58)
BTN ($3.40)
SB ($4.74)
Hero ($2.03)

Pre-Flop: ($0.03, 6 players) Hero is BB
UTG raises to $0.06, 2 folds, BTN calls $0.06, 1 fold, Hero raises to $0.25, UTG folds, BTN calls $0.19

Flop: ($0.55, 2 players)
Hero bets $0.42, BTN calls $0.42

Turn: ($1.39, 2 players)
Hero checks, BTN checks

River: ($1.39, 2 players)
Hero checks, BTN bets $2.73, Hero folds

Final Pot: $4.12

BTN wins $4.05 (net +$0.65)

Hero lost $0.67
UTG lost $0.06

[Shotglass]

IMO I wouldn't quit raising AKo pre against someone with his stats or similar, It's still a fairly strong hand pf and you'll want to build the pot in case you do connect with the flop. If I brick the flop, and it's got several draws, then I'll keep the c-bet to about 1/2 pot.

All in all I think you played it well.

[Razvan729]

i will never cbet air against a 52/2... they are fishes and that flop scares them not.... they will never fold there anything. so here a c/f is better

[surviva316]

all this poker rhetoric aside, put villain on a range, decide how he's going to play that range, and exploit it.

for one, you should prolly have some sort of reads on the 52/5 after having played 64 hands sitting two seats to the left of him. we should have some sort of idea of how he plays postflop or at least like a F2Cb number or something.

a lot of these fish will figure that surely you can't possibly have a hand on a board like this and peel with any piece of the flop (draws, any pair, etc)/any good overs. against these types of players, surely they hardly fold anything to a cbet, so surely cbetting is bad right? well since they're peeling so light and since our hand has so much equity against that continuing range, you can bet small to ENCOURAGE calls with a weak range and then bet larger when cards hit that you can rep (namely J+); (in other words, 1/2 PSB flop and either 3/4 turn reppable turn or 1/2 reppable turn setting up for a river shove).

a lot of fish even as loose as 52/5's won't go messin' around too much as to dedicate 1/3 of their stack to a nothing hand when we 3b pre and continue on the flop, even if it is as raggedy as this one. here a cbet as a semi-bluff should be an obvious play

finally, there are a lot of fish who think you're so FoS on this type of flop that they will make your life difficult with a wide range. they'll raise your cbets with any good overs, a lot of meh draws, shit like A3o and even some air. or they'll call the flop and get fps-y on the turn. this is a lot tougher to deal with than the above two scenarios 'cause even though it should seem simple enough to play back at shitty range with one of our strongest not-made hands, our hand is only a 3-outter against A3o, eg. this is more player dependent, but checking the flop against this type of player is frequently more acceptable.

all pretty general answers, but it's more "plan your hand against villain's range" type talk

[couriermike]

C/f is good against the 52/2/1. Alot of times he'll just check it down with you, and you could still be good.

Another option is to c-bet for value, not minding if he calls, and then check it down unimproved.

Against a tag, I'd def c-bet and follow up on most turns. If he calls twice, which he won't alot of the time, I'd just give up otr unimproved.

As played, just fold the turn. You played the hand good.

On another note:
Putting money in the pot when you're ahead of villain's range, even if you have to fold the hand later, is always good. So 3-betting AK against someone who often calls with worse is very very good, even if you sometimes have to c/f the flop.

[Carroters]

Ohh dat poker rhetoric

"Never fold da top of yo range!"

"I bet to stop him chasing!"

"check and fold is too weak"

"If you fire one you have to fire three."

Uhh why?

"Cos villain is fish"

OIC makes sense now.

"Iz good at poker"

CSB.

[Carroters]

If villain isn't the type to start bluffing at this and is generally lol passive then just c/c down vs his gay bets and fold to a decent sized bet. Otherwise c-betting is fine and gonna show an immediate profit even if he only folds worse hands. Just depends whether we have info on this guy to take a better line like c/f or c/c. Loads of his range will be random overcards, they fold to c bets, that's obv +EV and if we're totally confused as to how he'll play vs a check it's not going to be bad.

I defo wouldn't start firing loads of turns if he calls the flop though, that sounds like an awful idea vs this guy when he's going to have a worse hand or a pair that's almost never folding. Obviously overcard turns are like J Q etc aren't so bad, but this still can be spew vs the biggest stations.

C bet size is thoughtless and needlessly big. He still folds air and worse hands to a 1/2 pot bet and never folds pairs to either, so why burn extra monies. If we get him to peel with worse A high by betting less then our equity vs his calling range goes up and that's not a bad thing vs a passive fish when we get to showdown very often.

[daven]

wtf cbet sizing. Smaller please. $0.28 is good here. Turn and river are fine. Nothing wrong with check-fold river as played.

[daviddem]

Agreed that the 3/4 PSB accomplishes nothing over a 1/2 PSB in this spot with my hand.

Now if I had a hand like JJ or TT, do you think I should also fire only a 1/2 PSB? (My thought is "lots of bad turn cards + OOP... I want him to pay a hefty price for that card").

Guess I am concerned about giving out sizing tells if I bet small with my air and big with my made hands and OK, you can argue that it doesn't matter at 2NL. Some decent opps take notice though.

[daven]

Guess I am concerned about giving out sizing tells if I bet small with my air and big with my made hands and OK, you can argue that it doesn't matter at 2NL. Some decent opps take notice though.

button is 52/5/1.2AF over 64 hands

don't stress sizing tells vs 52-5 whales too much imo
fwiw I c-bet between $0.25 and $0.40 here with my entire range.

[surviva316]

I defo wouldn't start firing loads of turns if he calls the flop though, that sounds like an awful idea vs this guy when he's going to have a worse hand or a pair that's almost never folding. Obviously overcard turns are like J Q etc aren't so bad, but this still can be spew vs the biggest stations.

I mean any A/K gives us TPTK, any diamond gives us 15 outs to the majority of his continuing range, any 5/4 gives us 10 outs to the majority of his continuing range and any Q/J will (depending on reads on how much whiffed Ax, broadways, weak draws and weak 2x/3x peel the flop and how frequently they fold the turn) inspire him to give up on a healthy chunk of his range and we still have 6 outs to the majority of his continuing range.

It's certainly not always good to barrel all these cards all the time against every villain, but you can see how there ARE in fact a lot of +eV options.