1000+ BB Pot in 2-2 PLO? What do you think of my play?

Other than this being a fold/punt pre this is well played.

The turn is better for you than him as you should in theory have way more JT combos and do have a leading range. He should be checking turn very often with this card and your lead puts all his AA without backup into a blender and majority just have to fold as he has too much behind to play for.

River can go either way. I prefer the lead as checking would require him to turn AA into a bluff. That said, I’m not sure he knew he was and him just value betting it is a punt. So I guess the check is ok if he’s dumb enough to value bet a naked AA here or he’s capable of turning it into a bluff.

Keep in mind too sometimes you yourself run into JT here from a good player.

Think you played it very well and your thought process is really good - to me the only argument could be the river. I mean if he has AA 100% of the time I would just jam the river myself. The turn brings a ton of draws and your turn donk along with a river jam should get AA to call a lot. I'm not sure why he jammed the river - definitely a blunder by him.

Thanks for the comments. Question. In a live game why is it a fold? If I was in position a bit better? I guess the thought process for me...and specifically against this villain who I've played multiple times is he has AAxx. I know two of his cards. I have single suited gapped rundown. It's likely completely unblocked or close with his AAxx. Super deep. I guess moreso asking why is this an obvious punt pre to call? Thanks for the suggestions. I'm not actually sure why I checked the river. It wasn't scary. I didn't expect him to bluff...it was definitely a blunder and when I called him and his tablemate told me I should definitely fold haha. Do we think he'd call if I shoved river? I think he thought only way he can win is if he bluffs...as he knew I'd never bet the turn worse than two pair.

Nice play except you shouldn’t let him check back the river.

The answer is pretty intricate but it boils down to 2 basic concepts.

1. Good players will not allow you to play hands like this profitably.

2. This hand has a difficult time realizing all its equity and therefore, when you are ahead, you will often be forced to fold out your equity as the money goes in because the hand doesn’t stack enough nutted properties/potential.

Look up “equity realization”

How would you play villain's hand postflop?

A well-played hand, imo.

I find that it pays to have very limited capacity to be shocked at the poker tables. A halfpot cb on a very dry board with AA should not be a shock. With a 2 on board and no flush nor straight draws, your range can't go to war very often. You appear to have been shocked twice in the same hand! That's a lot of shock. Maybe you have higher reserves than me but indulging i n shock is akin to consciously subjecting our emotional self to ride the rollercoaster of variance. Expect awful play and you won't be shocked.

So isn't a reasonable adjustment to a table full of live players including the villain, to move some folds into the call bucket?

Saying you know two of his cards is quite the assumption, he wouldn't raise QJT9 or other nice run downs. He wouldn't raise good kings?

Also you said he's not a nit, so which is it. Someone only raising AA is definitely a nit

As far as how opponent “should” have played his hand, it depends on the individual hand properties. He has a pair blocker and this board I would label as unpaired and dry. He is OOP and deep. On these boards he can bet. He has 2 options. Half pot and pot. Both are viable here. I would bet pot with a FD/FD blockers combined with a SD/SD blockers and pair. So hands like AAJx, AA6x, AA2x, AA with a 7, 8, 9 or T, all with FD or FD blockers and a BDFD.

I would bet half pot with hands that don’t mind calls and can handle multiple streets. So think like AA98, AAJT, AA78 all with nut flush draws.

Check all other AA and AA with no relevant blockers. Throw some AA with a FD in your checking range. I’d use ones that don’t have a pair blocker. So like AAKQ with a NFD, AA33 with a NFD etc.

This is just the AA portion. You should obviously have other portions of your range to like DS rundowns that hit the T or wrap around the 5 and they need to be played with the same nuance.

As far as Wazz question. You can absolutely exploit your opponents if you feel they are making bigger mistakes that turn losing plays into profitable ones. These should generally happen while IP but you can’t go too crazy with hands that have poor visibility and realization. That said, if a player is punting with repeated 100+bb/100 mistakes that turn all your -20bb/100 loser opens into now +EV opens you can play them. Just gotta remember that multi-way you are splitting that equity with the other winning players in the pot and it also requires you to play correctly to capture that additional EV. If we don’t know how to play correctly, it doesn’t matter if our opponent is making huge errors, as we aren’t able to capture the EV and we just become someone who is also spewing EV out to the actual winning players at the table.

Address a couple things. Firstly, shocked in the sense I was surprised. No emotional reaction dont worry 😀. Just felt he was going to make a pot quite big moving forward, where he is basically going to be playing in the dark. Moreso, in a live setting as online c bet frequency here must be quite high. I just felt after his flop bet…he was asking for a bloated pot where post flop he is going to have a hard time knowing where he is at.

WPNdonk- he only had AA. He would not have done this with good KK or QJT9. The funniest part was he limp potted and the whole “I didnt get my option” ordeal made it even more obvious if you somehow weren’t paying attention. Well now you paid attention. He’s not a nit in the sense he’s not afraid to put money in the pot and give action. But, he’s not spewing pre. He is only limp potting here with AA. 100/100. A good opponent would be very tricky, but that is not him. A nit would not be punting that river bet.

Another question. When I checked river, again specifically against this opponent-I believed he would not call. So, only way to get more value was to check and see if he bluffs. I would never do this against other opponents or 6 max online as I’d need to be balanced at certain frequencies and follow up a river bet from my turn. I don’t think I’d check in other spots against other players because as you all brought up…cant let him check back AA. Good point.