No man's land on the turn

The problem here is if we call and hit our straight we likely won't get paid off if we lead out with a jam. We might get paid for a block sized bet but that does not make the turn call worth it. Also there are now 2 flush draws out there so we could hit our straight and lose to a flush (even an A high flush where we are trailing on the turn.

The other problem here is that the turn bet is like 33% of our stack. So its not that its pot committing but we are only getting the right price to call if our draw had more outs. Like it was also a flush draw.

Because Villain is a young GTO Solver I will now sometimes call on the turn and see what happens. But given the implied odds and the draws out there I likely would fold especially given the fact that we might not get paid off if we hit.

Given the bet size it really can’t be a call. Given your stack size it can’t be a jam.
Fold.

However, there is probably an argument for leading this turn at about 3-3.5k. We have a lot of two pair hands in our BB defend range here.
Fold to a raise obviously, but it may get us to the river at a price that works.

I likely call, but I'm not loving it. With two flush draws out there he could easily be semi-bluffing. If we don't improve we check river and hope he checks back. If he goes all in on the river we'd be getting a pretty good price, and would have to decide if he's capable of triple barrel bluffing.

I don't see the point in leading turn. Our overall range is pretty weak and he has a big advantage because he can have all the strongest Ax. We might have more 2 pair combos, but that's a small part of our overall weak range.

Also just to touch on the theory... If we don't sometimes call turn with a weak ace he could likely bet any two cards profitably. Our hand with additional outs is going to be one of the first combos we would use as a bluffcatcher. We would fold hands like A2, A3, A4, A5, etc. before we would fold this combo.

Calling feels optimistic. It may not be pot committing but it’s pretty damned close and almost turns our hand face up which reduces the likelihood of us getting value on the river.

I like betting turn because I think we should do that with a strong hand like a set, or straight on a board that now has two flush draws.
Whilst our overall range might be weak we have 66, 77, 88, 99, 8 10s, plus some 2pair hands including 67 and A6/7/9.

I'm probably looking to check raise turn with those stronger hands you mentioned. I would expect our opponent to be barreling pretty aggressively.

When you think about it we're probably calling at least one flop bet with lots of weak pairs like 7x and 6x. I'm assuming you would fold all those to the turn bet. Then if you fold all the weak Ax I referenced in my post above (like A2-A5) AND you fold an ace with an open ender... that's just way too much of your range to be folding.

What are you doing with a flush draw? A flush draw isn't loving continuing vs this size either.

If we're not calling with at least some bluffcatchers our opponent can just run us over here. We don't have nearly enough 2-pair plus to be folding almost all of our Ax.

I'm aware check fold is theoretically bad due to MDF. I do think this guy was planning on going for it on the river either way based on earlier hands with him. The problem is that we are only high twenties against the good Aces. It seemed unlikely that he would snap bet flop against two players with a flush draw, I can only think of 3 OESD combos, and his turn sizing takes out worse value. So even against someone who knows GTO, I thought he was too heavily weighted toward value to call off our entire stack.

I'm liking turn block to prevent him from putting us in a spot with the PSB. GreatWhiteFish, sure, he probably will figure he is ahead, but is he ever raising our lead with AJ here considering 3 of 4 cards are smashing our range?

It's tough to say exactly how he would respond to a turn lead, but he can definitely still put you to the test for all your chips. There's a chance he just jams over the lead with two flush draws out there.

Saying this board "smashes your range, " is definitely overstating things. You're calling pre with almost any two suited cards. There are some strong hands in your range, but there are many more weak bluffcatchers and he still has many more strong Ax than you do. To me a small lead looks like exactly what it is... A scared hand trying to set its own price.

The other problem I see with leading is that it makes your checking range that much weaker and less protected. If you think you should lead here, what hands are you check calling with? You're going to end up folding almost always when you check.

If you think you should fold this hand after you check, what's the worst hand you're calling with? You're pretty high up in your own range with top pair plus an open ender.

Also, I think you're reading too much into the flop bet-sizing tell. He might have just bet quickly because he's range betting. Not that he should be range betting, but I definitely don't think you should be excluding flush draws from his range purely due to the speed of the flop bet.

This is great feedback, appreciate it. I felt like calling down was probably slight +EV, but folded because of 2 factors: 1) the timing tell (agree it's not a huge deal), 2) I felt I had an edge over the field (I usually don't this late in a $600, but there were several maniacs still at the table). I generally don't use solvers much postflop but did feel I was at a disadvantage here. Some study is likely in order.

Now that I think about it, it does seem wrong to assume he will triple with every combo, although that is what he is setting up for. He may check back bad rivers, or keep bluffing when we get there, so call and re-evaluate isn't as bad as it seemed at the time.

Ok so I ran the heads up solve in GTOw and it's a pure call. V's bluffs seem primarily to be straight draws like T9s, 98s, and non-nut flush draws. The problem is that betting a hand like T9s against 2 players in most of these FL live events is torching. However, he may not be adjusting enough for these dynamics, or may have just figured out I was a nit and gone for it.

At least from a theory standpoint you should call turn because you're beating all the bluffs and if you're not ahead you still have outs. But on the other hand this pot has gotten huge in a hurry.

I'm wondering if we should do something different preflop after SB calls. Might be more profitable to bluff-squeeze or even just fold as a second player in increases the chances we're dominated.

As it's played, I doubt you're ahead of any value, but with now two flush draws on the board, you could be ahead of some semi-bluffs or combo draws or even 88. Tough spot. I think we're supposed to call but I'm not really happy about it.

I ran a chip EV preflop solve through HRC, and it had us calling very wide including calling all Ax (except the strongest that were raising). Lots of other junky hands were calling as well. SB was also calling wide.

I do wonder how HRC computes equity realization in these relatively deep stack spots. It seems like we will often underrealize our equity being sandwiched between the other two players, and this hand is a good example of that.

That being said the ranges are just wide in this spot. CO should be raising more than 35% of all starting hands. We just can't be folding top pair plus a strong draw to a double barrel when their starting range is so wide. We don't have enough other strong hands to continue with.

For what it's worth I'm convinced much of my winrate comes from spots like this (from villain's perspective) where people just massively overfold. I barrel extremely aggressively in these types of spots and this thread has me convinced I can barrel even more.

So in response to this - first thing is that it's after late registration has closed, meaning it's not really chip EV but probably more like ICM50. Hence my preflop thoughts - heads up I would just call, earlier in the tournament I probably just call. Here I'm thinking about the downside of calling as well as the possibility of whether we can pick up the pot preflop with a squeeze.

Postflop, it really depends on a few things. I think part of the assumption here is that people won't bluff as frequently multiway, and that players at smaller stakes tend to play more straightforwardly in spots like this, or at least that they're not going to have GTO-optimized bluffing frequencies. However, I don't know how accurate those assumptions are. Plus, the bet sizing is larger which suggests a more polarized range - villain is not value owning himself here.

From a theory standpoint and with two flush draws on board that can be bluffed, it's certainly a call. I think the question people are really trying to figure out is if villain is bluffing as often as he should be here.

Regarding whether they are bluffing enough, I would expect that if anything they would be over bluffing. I say that for a couple reasons.

1. Between two flush draws plus various straight draws there are a lot of natural bluff candidates. People typically find these types of bluffs, even multiway and at lower stakes. This is especially true after the SB folds and they're only up against the BB. I think people (correctly) recognize that the BB will have a lot of hands that struggle to call a second barrel. On the other hand I find that under bluffed spots tend to be the ones where you really have to reach to find bluff combos, which is not at all the case here.

2. I think given how wide preflop ranges are our opponent should have some pretty thin hands that want to go for thick value. I find that people at lower stakes don't tend to find the thin value bets, which further skews their range towards bluffs. It's easy to make a big bet with draws and maybe something like AK, but lower stakes opponents might check back or bet smaller with something like AJ.

Also, just in case I wasn't clear in my first post. I think we can all agree that we can't fold all Ax all the time in this spot? If you accept that premise, it just makes sense that our combo (along with Axdd) would be some of the first bluff catcher combos we would want to call with, since we have the additional draw equity in case we're behind.

(replying without reading....)

pre i'm folding this hand 3ways. if this was heads up i would defend and so we'd be in the same spot.

i think there's merit to xring flop vs a late opener, i think u dismiss all air and even second pairs and can take it down right away. any resistance, a call or a raise you can slow down safely f or xf. no one really takes this line with weak Ax bc you can let opp hang themselves or you value own yourself, but for the most part in my exp, a xr works really well and even gets hands like JJ to bow out early.

i'm not always xring tpwk but i like it here.
xcalling works too. as played i think we have to xf turn. not getting correct odds to draw, prolly def not getting paid on a 4liner if it comes in, oop. He's saying he's better than us OTT, and just like you said 'is this the hill we want to die on with 50+ bigs?

Def a better spot out there. I expect disagreement on a flop xr but if villain bet say 6k ott we'd be okay calling that. I'd rather spend that 9k on a flop xr, tho my xr sizing would be smaller in practice.

after reading a lot of solid reasons to lead turn, i want share that in my xp i feel turn donks, probes, leads w/e, are generally weak. i feel you really need a history with a player before you start leading turns, and you needs a history of both strong value, weak value/draws and air. i'm super suspect vs any unknown who donks turn after xc flop. i will default into calls and raises mostly. at times a donk can even give air enough leverage to make a winning play.

Why do you think check-raising to fold out hands we have crushed is a desirable goal?

to win the pot immediately and avoid situations/bets like this ott.

If you think villain is going to keep firing worse hands, then the turn is an easy call.

We're trying to make the most we can with our hands, not just give ourselves the easiest decisions.

it's not just worse hands bc worse hands make up only part of his turn betting range.

furthermore villain may or may not cbet with hands under top pair. but hands can develop and continue and i just don't want to give any hand a reason to cbet.

a small xr may even get a hand to xb ott that may have otherwise bet.

i'm not 100% dedicated to a flop xr but i will argue in favor of it with you so as to better understand why i'm wrong or right. and so thank you for taking the time to contrast with me.

simplifying the decision process is key i think to making money in all forms of poker. As far as maximizing in this specific spot, it's not like we have strong value and slowplaying to get villain to bet worse, bc sometimes he has us crushed and sometimes we have him crushed, and we're both a little live. i think in these messy spots the aggressive actions are favoured. in a cash game, deeper stacked with a regular i can see pot control with bd equity. Here i think you have to xmuck turn without reads.

with all sincerity, please help me understand how calling this turn for that amount with that specific hand is +ev let alone the highest ev. i guess this assumes villain his firing high % of bluff / semibluff? Solver solves for solvers, and you have to be sure villain is barelling enough bluffs, no? seems counterinuitive to let the bet proceed, either by calling and not raising villain's less than premium draw out or failing to prepare and avoid ahead of time.

i don't disagree with adding hands to xring range. i think have a weak ace in there is good sometimes if not mandatory, a 'mandatory sometimes'.
if we're behind we dump our hand and lose less than paying that turn bet and potentially facing rvr decision (yikes). Do you think we can get paid on a 4liner oop when any straightener fits our range?

ur best hope is he xs back rvr. with 2 flush potential flush draws and weak holdings ourselves, if he barrels off you are burning turn bets bc you are forced to fold so many rvrs.

When he's bluffing you want to let him keep bluffing. By raising you allow him to play perfectly. He continues when he has you crushed and folds bluffs. River will be a difficult street to play (for both players), but that's where the money is made.

bc the bluffs are not total air but are usually live, by calling semibluffs do we not allow him to play perfectly/ realize his equity?

i feel the turn bet is too steep while hoping to hit, or hoping for a rvr x back. i think we can agree we're not paying 3 streets. but the more i think about it, it's too weak to xf tpwk + oesd after xc otf. tough spot, interesting hand.

thanks for entertaining my question. i appreciate your time and response.

I think this a call. It's uncomfortable but you're actually really high up in your range. Depending on how much AQ-AT you 3bet pre, this may be your best one pair hand. Especially if this is a young studying player who perceives you as tight, I would defend this on turn and call down a decent amount of rivers. I agree with 5th suit, while donking benefits your exact hand, its going to complicate your strategy and make it harder to play.