Villain is a pretty good regular. He also plays higher and is well above average for the stakes. We’ve tangled a fair bit in the recent past and have some aggressive history. I believe his turn raising range to be disproportionately semi-bluffs, possibly with as little as a gutshot but probably not with air or a pair. Obviously the more standard line would just be to shove the turn, but I decided to call and try to induce a bluff on the river.
PokerStars No-Limit Hold’em, $4.00 BB (6 handed) – Poker-Stars Converter Tool from FlopTurnRiver.com
Hero (MP) ($563)
CO ($186.75)
Button ($863.60)
SB ($400)
BB ($447)
UTG ($406)
Preflop: Hero is MP with A
, 8
1 fold, Hero bets $14, 1 fold, Button calls $14, 2 folds
Flop: ($34) 8
, A
, 10 (2 players)
Hero bets $26, Button calls $26
Turn: ($86) 5 (2 players)
Hero bets $68, Button raises to $200, Hero calls $132
River: ($486) 10 (2 players)
Hero checks, Button bets $623.60 (All-In), Hero calls $323 (All-In)
Total pot: $1132 | Rake: $3
Even though I called the turn to induce a river bluff, I think it’s a tough decision on this particular card.
Arguments in favor of calling:
1. I took a line designed to induce a bluff.
2. River is a scare card.
3. I’m getting considerably better than 2:1 pot odds.
4. Villain isn’t playing AK this way, so getting counterfeited isn’t relevant.
5. All straight draws missed, and the clubs are a backdoor draw.
Arguments in favor of folding:
1. My hand looks like a draw when I call turn, and the most obvious draw got there. Thus, this may not look like a good bluff card to Villain.
2. The club also pairs the board, meaning Villain will shove most of his turn value range on the river. On a non-pairing club, he might check behind two pairs/sets that didn’t fill up.
3. Villain could have been raising turn with a flopped gutshot and turned flush draw, in which case he got there on the river.
4. Given that I may play club draws this way and many of my other turn slowplays fill up on the river, A8 is the bottom of my range.
As you can see, I did call, though I believe that was a mistake after thinking it through more thoroughly. I didn’t give enough weight to the argument that Villain could have floated the flop with a straight draw and a backdoor draw that picked up 9 outs on the turn. Maybe it’s just bad luck that that happened this time, but those are the draws that ought to be most likely to raise the turn. Add to that the fact that I’ll have plenty of other hands in my range that can call this river, and I think I ought to fold A8, and probably shove the turn with it as well. For the record, that’s usually how I’d play it anyway, I just carried away here with trying to take advantage of an aggressive dynamic.
Results:
Button had 9, 7 (flush, ten high).
Hero had A, 8 (two pair, Aces and tens).
Outcome: Button won $1129
Hey, Andrew:
Do you think villain’s bet sizing on the turn raise was designed to give him the proper pot odds to call if you shoved, or was it just coincidence that his standard raise there gave him the right odds to call a shove (given that he had to figure he had 15 outs, and a shove would have given him about 2.5 to 1 on a call)? Is that kind of bet sizing a bit of a tell for a good player’s hole cards and something to consider when making the decision whether to shove the turn or whether to call that scary river? Thanks for your blog; I feel I’ve learned a lot about NLHE from reading your posts.
Thanks, Chip, glad you enjoy the blog. I would say the sizing was designed not to give himself the odds exactly but rather to make clear he was pot committed so that I wouldn’t try to “rebluff” him with something that’s actually ahead of him. I do think it’s a potentially exploitable tell if people always try to give you room to shove over them when they have strong hands but clearly commit themselves with big draws, but it’s also very possible to use this as a reverse tell. Here’s a post where I explain this concept in more depth. Hope that helps!