What’s Your Play? Suited Broadway on the Turn

This is a continuation of a multi-street What’s Your Play? For discussion of the pre-flop action, please see this post. Flop action is here.

You’re at a 9-handed $2/$5 NLHE table with $600 effective stacks. UTG is very loose, especially pre-flop, and the whole table is salivating over him. UTG+2 is tight-aggressive bordering on nitty.

UTG limps for $5. UTG+2 raises to $20, and the action folds to Hero in the CO with Qs Ts. Hero raises to $50, UTG waffles a bit and then calls, and UTG+2 quickly puts in another $30.

Flop ($151 in pot after rake) Ks 8d 6d. UTG and UTG +2 both check without much hesitation. Hero bets $75, UTG folds, and UTG +2 calls.

Turn ($301 in pot) Jd. UTG2 checks, $475 remain in the effective stacks. Hero?

Leave a comment below with your thoughts and preferred action. I’ll do my best to respond to comments over the next few days and will post the next decision point on Monday.

21 thoughts on “What’s Your Play? Suited Broadway on the Turn”

  1. im betting turn, planning to bet/fold turn if raised and planning to empty the clip on the river, if we go 150 its going to be 325 into 600 on the river. I’m unsure whether we should bet diamond rivers, but I’m planning to bet rivers that are otherwise blanks, as lots of hands turn a diamond draw to go along with it and I’m unsure whether a jam gets hands like 9d or Td on the river to fold their flush, but on reflection maybe they do.

  2. Barrel baby!

    Conceptually, I would bet the smallest amount possible that will fold out his range and discourage him from making a play with draws. We can continue to represent our AA/AK or better like hands that make it very hard for him to continue with his one pair hands. We also want to keep this bet small enough so that we aren’t priced in to call if he raises and leaves us with what is likely 8 or less outs to call.

    Something like $140-$150. this bet reps strength, allows us to fold if raised, and leaves room for a third barrel on the river. It also is enough to discourage him wanting to get it in with weaker pair + flush draws. I would bet even less if you think it will tell the same story (but I don’t think it would).

    I’m ready to barrel the river if called as I feel the high end of his range gets it in on the turn. I’m barreling diamonds as well as I severely discount his range of Ad hands at this point due to the bet sizing preflop, the preflop call, and the flop check/call.

    last point, note that UTG+2 is checking a very dangerous board. Unlike on the flop, where I feel UTG+2 is checking his entire range, his check here polarizes his hand. Most of that high end range is getting it in with a check/raise all in. For him to check/call trap turn he would need to have a hand that is usually a solid pair with flush draws or a made monster. It’s hard for him to play anything slow to the river as the Ace of diamonds makes up a big part of your range if he doesn’t have that card.

    I will stop rambling now…

  3. I’m thinking we continue the plan Andrew laid out on the flop and bet $150.

    This is perhaps the most interesting turn in the deck. One thing the smaller sizing on the flop does is it keeps the villains’ calling ranges somewhat more open than they would be otherwise, especially for UTG2 who has relative position after our cbet. As a result I’m expecting him to have more of a folding range, especially on a somewhat scary turn like this. I’d be surprised if any combos of 99 and TT continued here, and QQ would almost certainly have to have a diamond to continue (and he may have considered a preflop 4b with that hand). I’d also expect hands like KQ with no diamond to seriously consider a fold here and to very possibly end up folding to a river barrel. Even if a hand like KhQd ends up calling turn, again I think he will often fold to a river shove.

    So I’m keeping with the plan of betting half pot again here, planning to fold to a raise and barreling most rivers. I would most likely check back diamond and K rivers, but I’m planning on firing on most others. While the half pot/half pot line may seem unappealing to inducing a fold, I’d also keep in mind that 2/5 players are more likely to look at the absolute value of the money involved, rather than the bets relative to the pot size, especially someone with nitty tendencies as UTG2 purportedly does.

  4. It’s an interesting turn for a couple reasons. First it really only gives us 6 clean outs on the river to the non-diamond A and 9’s. Since there aren’t really any draws UTG+2 has in his range we should have him on a range of sets, TP, and medium pairs.

    I think TP’s and medium pairs are most likely with sets discounted and some flushes in his range. Action I would expect on the turn with the 3rd diamond is a little problematic because I expect the top of his range to be check calling and check raising, and all of his 99/TT/QQ with a diamond to have a pretty low calling frequency. I don’t see his range as ever being weak.

    So we are left with what looks like an easy decision of bet turn shove any river, but in fact I think this specific turn leaves us with so little equity that we have to fold 100% of the time to a check raise unless we just stick it in. So really we are either sticking it in with possibly 0 equity vs flushes and in terrible shape vs AK/AAd/KKd/sets etc, or betting and getting shoved on or as I said folding out the bottom of his range.

    I think it it optimistic at best to think a nit calls a 3bet, a flop bet, and then just check folds this particular turn a lot. We have exactly 1 combo of AKdd as played, and he can even be blocking that. There really isn’t any sizing on this turn I like, $150 makes the pot $600 with 300 effective. What are we doing when he donk shoves the Ad or the As? Now we have 3:1 odds. Sick spot. Can we size smaller on the turn? $100? Still a $500 pot with 350 behind, and 350 to win 850 if he donk shoves.

    Betting here with the intention of actually hitting a 6 outer, or having a non-diamond come on the river to make a questionable bluff against is very high risk/reward.

    Our hand is the same as 9Ts, we have no showdown value vs his range and the Jd just greatly limited our outs on the river. I think betting here is actually a big mistake because there are just so few rivers that are going to improve us, and we are now setting up an incredibly bad spot if we get check raised or donked into. If we had AKdd here, would we be betting? Probably, but we would have to size small because what is in his 3b calling range that is going to call? QQdx? JJ/99/88? I think our value bet here would be small enough that checking would be fine a lot of the time. We can have AA or KK here pretty easily as played even when we check. So I would expect that we are NEVER getting led into on the river by non-flushes, and that by checking we can get a pretty solid read on his holding.

    I elect to check back and will save my barrel depending on the river.

  5. On this particular turn, I think that the plan to bet 150 is disrupted. Villain’s range is pretty strong on this turn. His Kx hands are still top pair, which I wouldn’t expect him to fold on the turn, (maybe he’ll fold to 3 barrels), KJ and JJ certainly aren’t folding and may k/s, which sucks, and he has a few flushes too. The only hands that I expect villain to fold on this turn are TT and 99; the combos without a diamond will likely fold for a small bet, like $100, but those with a diamond would probably take a good price.

    Because we have little fold equity on this turn, I like checking back, and I think that we still have some opportunities to bluff the river if we do so. On brick rivers, I expect villain to valuebet KJ, sets, and flushes, which caps his checking range at KQ. If you shove the river for 1.58x pot, he sighs and folds. On diamond rivers, I’d expect villain to bet nut and 2nd nut flushes most of the time, but he may check the Qd and worse. Betting 135 or so will fold out his non-flush hands. Crucially, villain always has showdown value once he c/cs the flop and the turn is a diamond, and I wouldn’t expect the player as described to turn his hands into a bluf, even with the bottom of his range (i.e., 99).

    On the offsuit A river, bet small, like 115. On a 9, I’d make it 230. I’m happy to be super imbalanced here because a nitty 2/5 player is really going to play the absolute strength of his hand in this spot, in my experience.

  6. For those suggesting check turn and potentially bluffing river… How would you play this turn if you had AA or AK no diamond instead?

    Honest question not rhetorical

  8. He could have something like KT-KQ at best unless he is slow playing a set or KJ.

    I think we have to target KT and KQ. I think we can be $150 here. He will fold anything worse, raise anything better, and possibly fold the KT/KQ here and if not, he will likely fold them by the river. Especially if the river comes with another scare card that brings a flush, straight, or ace.

    This is very similar to the article I wrote about pros triple barreling amateurs in the WSOP Main Event. The only way to win from OOP when you call the flop with a bluff catcher is call three streets with it. Many times, we fish find ourselves calling 2 and finally becoming believers on the river. The only way for UTG to win in this spot is to call all bets with KQ (which he likely wont) or to resist raising some of his strong hands on the turn (which he likely wont).

    Bet $150 on turn and shove river. If raised, we can do the math to see if we are getting a good price to beat KJ or a set and then call or fold depending on what the math dictates.

  9. I doubt anyone will agree with this, but here’s what I’d do. Bet $200, with the intention of giving up on all non-diamond rivers that miss the straight draw. If the river is a non-diamond A or 9, we shove. If it is ANY diamond, we shove. And yes, it would be bluffing $275 into $700

    Here’s my thinking. As was mentioned, Hero still has an uncapped range. He can have high diamond, AA KK JJ. Villian called us with something real on the flop. If villian calls another $200 now, he either has a good hand willing to play for stacks (sets, AK, flush) or the nut draw or close to it ie QQd KdQ.
    If the river is a diamond and villain checks. Then we shove. He will be getting good odds on a call, but I think its worth the risk. Live players seem way more scared of flushes than they should be. Especially nits. Other than a A or 9, a diamond is our best river. Villain may just let it go facing 4-flush and an all in. Even for good odds.

    If the river is non-diamond A or 9, then we shove. This is obv. best case scenario. We will probably get looked up and win.

    I didn’t do a great job explaining my reasoning here, but basically its worth the risk to either get him to fold now with a 2/3 pot bet (which will work a lot of the time), or bluff the river offering him like 5 to 1 on a call. But only bluff the 4-flush rivers.

    If the river is just a blank non diamond. Save your 3rd barrel, no point. Without the glooming doom of a 4-flush staring him in the face, we don’t have enough left to get a fold. ALso if he calls the turn bet, he isn’t just going to muk the river if its a blank. He may be a nit, but everyone is very aware of how difficult it is to call off OOP for 3 barrels. If he calls turn, he will be anticipating the river shove. Which is why we only continue if we hit the straight, or the diamond is there for a scare card.

    The downside to this line is that we just plain lose a lot of the time. He will soemtimes call and we will check back the river only to be shown KQoff or 1010d. But its like drawing a line in the sand without having to actually risk whole stack, sometimes. I just don’t think he would call turn and then fold river often enough, unless of course the river is a diamond that he doesn’t have.

    With this line we could argue why not bet smaller on turn to save a larger river bet.. But in actual play, I just don’t see it making any difference. 325 into 600 or 275 into 700. Either way I still think we get calls from his decent hands on blank rivers. And folds from all non-diamond hands if the river 4-flushes.

    • Other than JJ and KJ (which will both just shove turn quite possibly), how often do you think Villain is calling turn with a hand that doesn’t contain a diamond? How often do you think he continues with KQ no diamond when every better hand is in Hero’s range?

      • I think villain could call turn with no diamond with AK, KQ, QQ, KJs, all sets. Its true every better hand is in Hero’s range. Thats really why I like the $200 barrel. But the issue is that villain isn’t going to just give up every time he has KQ here. He will need to stack off with it sometimes if he is going to play it out of position like this. Hero can still have hands 99, AQ, QJ hands that villain is ahead of. Thats why I don’t think we should shove river if its a blank. If he called us on the turn, he will likely call a river blank. Betting larger on the turn makes this more true. But thats a good thing because we aren’t planning a naked bluff on the river. We also put a little more pressure for immediate turn folds with a somewhat larger bet. We could even go $225 on turn. Villain of course will want to continue with pairs that include a diamond like KQ, but him folding offsuit KQ isn’t a given. He’d have to put hero on just a specific handful of hands to fold KQ just because he doesn’t have a diamond. C-bets don’t get the respect they used too. Hero’s $75 on the flop doesn’t solidify that he has a good hand, even a tight villain isn’t going to muk tp 2nd kicker all the time. ALso if Hero DID have AA,KK,AK with or without a diamond this is a reasonable line (except the shove river on diamond part)

  10. Andrew I’ve read your post and it seems that you don’t think the UTG2 has a strong hand since he didn’t 4-bet preflop. If that is the case, a J shouldn’t change anything (unless he has JJ) and UTG2 shouldn’t be able to call an over-bet shove on the turn. Plus even if he has JJ for a set, you still have 9 outs to a straight worst case scenario. If you assume that his range very likely doesn’t have high pairs or an AK then the likelihood of him calling a shove should be minimal, making this play profitable. Is it necessary to bet that much to win the hand, and can we bet smaller to achieve the same result? I am not 100% sure but I don’t see what he would call the flop and fold to a smallish turn bet with. Therefore, I think we should bet strong. I don’t think worse hands are calling our smallish bet anyways since players usually play their real hand strengths on the turn and I think we need to make a strong bet to have someone you think has a marginal hand whom called a flop bet to fold on turn.

    However, I am still having a hard time imagining what a tight aggressive and borderline nitty player would raise UTG2 preflop, call a three bet and call a flop continuation bet on a Ks 8d 6d board. This play doesn’t seem tight aggressive at all to me unless he flopped a monster and knows you will three barrel. Also, you mentioned other players will give hero more credit than he deserves.. If that is the case, and UTG2 thinks you have a very strong hand what is he calling you with? Only things I can assume are non AA high pairs and flush draws since he would have most likely three bet the flop with possible straight and flush draws out there. You mentioned that UTG2 is probably isolating the UTG with a smallish raise but is it that realistic at his position with a capable hero on the Co? Also, he got good odds to call you preflop but why did he call you on the flop? What range of a tight aggressive and borderline nitty player would call a three bet preflop and call a c-bet then check the turn?

  11. I think the most likely range for UTG+2 is a top pair hand with or without a diamond – KQ, although KJ will be much stickier now. I think he may still have QQ in his range too, peeling one bet on the flop. He’s going to be uncomfortable calling a decent bet on the turn for this reason as sets, made flushes and AK/AA are in our range I believe, so I would either shove with semi-bluff equity here plus max fold equity, or perhaps more reasonably bet about $165 and shove non-diamond turns depending on reads and player history. Notice that if UTG had called, I’d be putting more flush draws in his flop-calling range as compared to UTG+2, but it’s of course conceivable that UTG+2 turned a flush with hands like KdQd.

  12. First time posting, and sorry if I am repeating anyone, haven’t read any comments above. I am a recreational player, and mostly play 1-3 NL live. First off, what does UTG+2 call mean? I would say now his range mainly looks like K10 suited, KJ suited, KQ, 99-JJ, possibly QQ. He may have some combinations of 88 and 66 but some (most?) could have check raised or led out on flop. I don’t think there are very many drawing hands we are worried about. Possibly J10dd, but he might also may play fast on the flop. Even K10 and KJ MIGHT not be in the hand at this point given his nittiness, but if they called preflop, they likely would at least call one bet on the flop. The Jd turn improves a few of his hands, JJ now has a set, KJ now is 2 pair, and K10 now has a gutter. However, our range is still stronger than his, (we could have every hand he has, + KK, AK, AA), not to the mention that our actual hand improved here to an open ender. I don’t think we have to worry a ton about the third diamond, as I mentioned above I don’t think he has very many diamond draws on the flop. I would bet about half pot here i think ($150), leaving us $325 behind for a reasonably sized river shove. I don’t think a bigger bet folds almost anything out that a half pot bet does (ie i think he folds all non-top pair hands to a half pot bet, but calls almost all Kdx hands to a 2/3-3/4 pot bet). What about something like KQ no diamond? I still think a half pot bet should fold here, knowing how tough a spot villian will be in on the river. I also think now that 3 diamonds are on board, we will hear from any sets or 2pair on the turn, and I don’t think he is likely to bluff too many single diamond hands here, given his nittiness + the fact our range consists of so many strong hands still. I guess my main worry would be hands like 1010 or 99 with one diamond, but I still think given how strong our line is, they will be folding, as we could easily have a bigger diamond in our hand. I would be bet folding here. I will do this with the plan that I also would likely shove blank rivers, as I think even Kx hands could find a fold to three streets of aggression given the nitty nature of villain.

  13. Great post Andrew. Interestingly for me it comes at a time when I’m working on following through with aggression in my game. But with this hand the nit in me is coming out! IMHO – the whole reason we got involved in this hand with QT was because UTG is loose and UTG+2’s pre-flop raising range might be a just a little wider than normal because UTG is in the pot. Now we three bet pre – UTG+2 check called the flop after we took a stab – and UTG is gone! If UTG+2 is truly tight-aggressive then we can’t be good here! I’d check the turn. I’d call a river bet if the river is a non-diamond that completes my straight. Other than that – I’m done.

    As I think about this hand as I work on aggression I like the 3 bet pre – but it makes the effective stacks shallow quicker. I like this line of play if the starting stacks where a little deeper because we would have more options post flop. Also – with the given stacks we could have flatted pre and thus kept the stacks a little deeper giving us a little more room post flop.

    I appreciate all comments if I’m being is too passive\nitty. You can be brutally honest – I can take it! This is what I’m working on.

    Thanks!

    • Thanks for the comment. I think I can be honest without being brutal. A lot of what you say is very reasonable. The one thing I’ll point out about pre-flop 3B vs call is that you’re ignoring the possibility of winning immediately. Sure if you bluff and get called in two spots you’re going to wish you’d just called the first time around. But even a loose player isn’t cold calling a 3bet every time he limps UTG, and if he folds there’s a fair chance UTG2 will just pitch it there, and even if UTG2 doesn’t get out you’re just heads up on the flop with a capped range against an uncapped range and also slightly deeper stacks than we have here. You’re only comparing the pre-flop call to one of the worst case scenarios for the 3b (albeit one that will come up reasonably often).

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