Another 40/80 Hand vs the Russian

The player that I ended up sucking out on yesterday was the reason I was sitting in this 40/80 game. I didn’t recognize his name, so I sat in and started playing a bit. It quickly became apparent that he was one of the most loose and aggressive players I’d ever played with. My HUD showed him running at something like 45/32/9, which was telling even over a small sample size. I had never seen him fold to a continuation bet, either.

Not that he was terrible. He actually seemed to play reasonably well post-flop, but against good players, I just don’t think it’s going to be possible to show a profit playing 45% of your hands at a 5-handed table. Still, figuring out how to adapt to such aggression was tricky. Here’s a hand I’m still not sure about:

Full Tilt No-Limit Hold’em, $80.00 BB (5 handed) – Full-Tilt Converter Tool from FlopTurnRiver.com

Button ($12588)
SB ($16658)
BB ($16438)
UTG ($24125)
Hero (MP) ($10647)

Preflop: Hero is MP with 9, A
1 fold, Hero bets $240, Button calls $240, 2 folds

Flop: ($600) J, 2, 3 (2 players)
Hero bets $444, Button calls $444

Turn: ($1488) K (2 players)
Hero checks, Button bets $1200, Hero calls $1200

River: ($3888) K (2 players)
Hero checks, Button bets $2800, Hero calls $2800

Total pot: $9488 | Rake: $3

Results:
Button had 8, J (two pair, Kings and Jacks).
Hero had 9, A (one pair, Kings).
Outcome: Button won $9485

On the one hand, if he’s calling such a wide range pre-flop and never folding the flop, A9 has got to be way ahead of his range. I’m betting the flop for value, and I don’t think after doing that I can check-fold the turn since his range is basically the same as it was pre-flop. On the other hand, he’s probably not folding anything I beat, so I decide to check-call.

The only thing that throws me off is his bet-sizing. It’s an awfully big bet in a spot where, if he’s bluffing, he can only expect me to fold random air that’s giving up. In other words, it’s just an awfully large bet size to choose for a bluff in this spot. Then on the river, the bet is suspiciously small, very much looking like he wants a call.

It’s tricky, because I don’t know enough about him to know that those bet sizing tells are accurate. Without a specific read, I’m usually going to default to playing something more like a game theoretically optimal strategy, which means I’m not going to fold Ace-high to a guy who can have half the deck in his hand (the weaker half of the deck, I should point out, since he also had a very high 3-bet %). Then again, once I see the results, the bet sizes are pretty telling….