Deep stacks at 50K/100K

Poker Strategy
1

I’ve decided to start posting some more traditional HH’s here in “Poker Strategy.” I’m going to be posting them in a write up form for a couple of reasons. It’s good practice and I believe it gets you/I thinking about the hand more deeply. Also I will be posting some live HH’s that I have from my sessions, I play 1/3 2/3 and 2/5 and some 1/2 when out of town. Obviously I do not have links for these hands, :slight_smile: More importantly though, I can post HH without results which is absolutely the way it should be done. HH’s posted with results give way to biased/results oriented thinking and definitely affect the analysis we get. Anyway, lets get to it.

Villain is a fairly good regular at these stakes and plays a little higher too, he’s ranked in the low 100’s (narrows the field, lol.) He’s very TAG and doesn’t bluff much(if at all) but is very aggressive with strong made hands and pot controls middling holdings but is sticky. My image is as usual, splashy wild man who plays big pots and isn’t averse to mixing it up with some big bluffs. In fact I’ve been caught bluffing a couple recently prior to this hand. I’m posting this more interested in what you guys think about his play on the flop and turn.

Ayers Rock 2
50K/100K (6 max) we are 6 handed
21.2M effective

V opens utg AdTd, 302K, folds to H btn 3!'s to 855K, blinds fold, V calls
Flop (1.86M) As6h8c, V donks .5 pot 930K, H calls
Turn (3.72M) Tc, V pots 3.72M, H raise 8.5M, V shoves for H’s remaining 11M, H? (results later after some discussion)

What do we think about V’s line. H’s range on the turn? What value raises do we have on this board, what are our bluffs, what is V expecting to get called by/fold out?

3 Likes
2

@1Warlock @love2eattacos @WannabeCoder @ValueFish @Ilovecat

1 Like
3

I love it.

For the hand in question, obviously not a fan of the villain’s donk lead, or the continuation on turn. The button three-bettor will have all of the strongest aces (AK, AQ) and top set that the villain won’t have, since they would be four-betting those when out of position. Maybe he’s trying to bet AJ and get 99-KK to fold… But that doesn’t explain the turn three-bet.

What might, though, is A6 or A8. These hands might be trying to get value from the other aces in your range, or preflop-bluffed 57s or 68s. The problem is that having two pair himself, he blocks a great deal of your value range, and none of the drawing hands he would want you to use as bluffs, so leading out seems like a bad decision.

200BB deep, my next thought is that he’s set-mining. I’d prefer a more passive line in order to trap and get value on such a relatively dry board with 66 or 88, particularly with the ace on the board and all of the aces in your range, but :man_shrugging: . TT probably wouldn’t lead out. Maybe he bluffs this with 77, which is turning a gutter. I could also see this play with 79s that had an open-ender to the nut straight on the flop and got there on the turn.

V’s range is super value-heavy, as you’d expect from a three-bet on the turn. Four straight combos, twelve two-pair combos (six each of A8 and A6), three sets of 8s, and three sets of 6s fall in his value range, for a total of 22. To balance it out, I see only six bluff combos - pocket sevens. The donk lead removes pretty much all flush draws from his range, with the exception of a made straight.

Because you’re ahead of a significant chunk of his value range with top two pair, in front of 16/22 = 73% of his hands while needing just 11/(3.72+8.5+8.5+11+11) = 26% equity, I think this is a call.

2 Likes
4

Yeah, this is one of the more perplexing decisions by V in the hand for me. I consider him too good to be making “see where I’m at bets,” especially vs me when he knows how active I am. I wouldn’t really be expecting him to donk lead pretty much any board ever.

Love the analysis, I have more to say about your post here but I’ll wait to see what more from other posters.

May be giving V’s rang too wide on the turn. If he’s opening A6 and A8 utg 6 max I do believe it’s only suited combos and definitely not calling 3!'s OOP with A6o or A8o so give him 2 combos of each.

What is H’s calling range going to look like as played on the turn here?

5

Haven’t got much time, i’m really sorry. I don’t like V’s line here, so yeah, makes it difficult for me to look at it ; it changes it all of course. I like to check/call flop and check turn again. V is not the 3’better, he’s out of position, a lead is really not great. The sizing is very weird too, not good neither imo.
I’ll come back and maybe reply too, got some things to add maybe.

1 Like
6

Thanks @ValueFish

1 Like
7

Bearing in mind that you block Ad6d and Ad8d, he only has Ah8h or Ac6c if he’s playing this way with suited two-pair combos with an ace. Of course, he doesn’t know that, but it won’t change your decision. Now you’ll be in front of 6/12 = 50% of the hands he’s betting here (both of those combos and the six 77 combos), so it’s still a call.

Also, I hadn’t mentioned it before, but I don’t put 99 or T9s in his range here. Both have too much equity to function as effective bluffs, and I’d much rather see a check-call on the turn. A9s fails as a bet-re-raise because it gets competitors to play too perfectly, getting folds from worse hands and calls from better.

Thinking some more about the villain’s motivations for jamming in this spot, assuming we’ve correctly mapped his range, I kinda like the decision. 200 blinds deep, KQs, KJs, and QJs, might have three-bet on the button (planning to fold to a 4-bet), floated the flop (folding to one street of donk-betting would be an exploitable mistake), and raised on the turn with gutshot broadway draws. Particularly if these were suited with clubs, the added flush draws could give you enough equity to raise on the turn, and would be put in a “sigh-call” spot when you’re under 50% to win the pot.

There are so many bad turns for V with two pair or a set here - any club that doesn’t pair the board, K, Q, J, 9, 7, 5, or maybe even 4 if H was bluffing with 75s - that could make a straight or a flush, equity denial out of position could make this reasonable.

I think every two-pair and set is a mandatory call for the hero. 79s, too, of course. AJ-AK would be in a really tough spot, but would end up in a calling range because you block enough of V’s two-pair hands to give you appropriate odds. If T9s or 98s are in H’s turn raise range, that would be really tough as well - you block one of the straights, two of the sets, and none of the 77 bluffs. 87s would be a fold, since H blocks all of the bluffs and very little of the value; 76s wouldn’t have 3-bet preflop.

As far as weaker unpaired aces, I probably wouldn’t raise them here unless they had a club. I probably end up folding those off, unless I have the option of running it twice.

8

Good idea to run hands this way. Before I look at this hand, I’d like to know what you estimated villains opening range to be. Once we have that, we can work the rest through. If you have history with this player, what is the weakest hand you’ve seen him open UTG? What hands has he showed down with from that position? If you feel like it, what does your 3-bet range look like vs this player from the BTN?

As a first thought, I’m not sure about the preflop 3-bet with ATs. That’s why I wanted your estimation of a TAG opening range. One of the problems I see in going over hands is that people tend to add back hands on later streets that were excluded previously. This leads to all sorts of problems, including the “monsters under the bed” phenomenon.

9

I think he’s a little tighter up top with his range, but it’s wider than it would be at a FR… something like 55+ A2s+ suited broadways (KTs+ QTs+ JTs+) ATo+ KQo QJo suited connecter probably down to like 76s and one gappers J9s T8s

I’m going be 3!'s otb with like TT+ AQs+ A5s A4s ATo+ KQo 98s 87s 76s T8s 97s 86s. My bluff combos look like a lot of combos but 75% are in my calling range and I have a system for weighting them towards 3!'s that is random (sort of.) So ATo AJo KQo and all the suited connecters and 1 gappers are 25% 3! 75% call.

EDIT: My 3! range here is somewhat wide because we’re pretty deep and I’m in position at a 6 max.

1 Like
10

Nice! I’ll break out Flopzilla later and take a look.

11

Sweet!

12

Also, I’m pretty clear with my line, just baffled by his line from UTG. I really did not expect him to show this hand and I’d like to see analysis from you guys, I don’t want this yahoo exploiting me. lol

13

Maybe he’s not quite as solid TAG as you thought? :wink:

1 Like
14

Right… may have been giving him too much credit and folding slightly too often to him.

15

I’m pretty baffled too. I would expect sets and 2 pairs (if V even has those in his range) to be going for a check-raise or slowplaying most of the time.

It’s hard for me to get my head around this flop donk bet because it’s just not a line that makes sense. It’s very, very dependent on the assumptions we make about V’s thinking. Maybe he’s trying to take a stab thinking that you may fold too much on an A-high flop. Maybe he has AK and is like “herp derp I hit, I bet”.

1 Like
16

Maybe it says something about how he thinks about me. Even still though, donk betting this flop with AT after I 3! from the button is a pretty massive mistake. I’m never folding better than AT here and he gets to fold out any of the hands I would bluff with and allows me to correctly call with the parts of my range that can continue. He basically leads me down the path to perfection as I won’t make many mistakes acting after him.

He’s essentially repping 2 pair or better on the flop but why would that lead into me when I 3! him pre. I was so confused by this.

2 Likes
17

If we use @dayman’s estimated range for villain, V doesn’t have 8/6s,7/5s or 9/7s even in his opening range, never mind his 3-bet flatting range OOP. If V had a somewhat wider opening range, does he flat these hands OOP to the 3-bet from H? I would discount these combos heavily, if not entirely.

I haven’t had a chance to look at it through Flopzilla yet but the donk bet on this flop seems just so bad to me that its hard to go further in the analysis. Lots of live players are leading out with weird hands though. Most obvious candidates for leading would be Ac6c or something like Ks8s (which he doesn’t have here). Not good plays but they do happen with enough frequency that they need to be adjusted for. You almost never see people leading out with super-strong made hands on a dry board.

2 Likes
18

especially into the 3!er in HU pots. I do see players live donking with strong made hands on wet coordinated boards though and the good ones doing this are balancing with there strong combo draws that can withstand calling a raise, so fairly deep games around 150 bb’s effective. We were 220 bb’s deep but this flop is fairly static and there’s not many draws outside of str8 draws which as you said should be discounted per his opening range and calling 3! range.

1 Like
19

The problem with this strategy is that it leaves their checking range way too weak. Multiway, leading in with your strongest draws on wet flops is fine because you need to make a hand. Its maybe not the best strategy but its workable. HU, it allows your opponent to play perfectly against you. I call it the “win min, lose max” strategy. Regardless of this specific hand, I’d look to sit with this player and get involved in as many pots in position with him as I could. Blow away his checking range with any 2 cards until he adjusts.

20

Agree, that’s why when you see people doing it it’s not always done that well. If you’re going to have a donking range then you need to have a very well balanced mixed strategy. Mixed strategies are very hard to balance in game especially with everything else you have to think about.

1 Like