If I could get some thoughts on my play in the first two hands here that'd be great.
This guy was a weird reg type. All of his decisions were snap decisions, and it was kinda weird to play against. He'd been a little bluffy in the match so far (~150 hands), and he'd been showing a lot of his bluffs. His bluffs had kind of been in obvious spots - he'd bluff raised an A63dd board in a 3-bet pot right after showing me another bluff, so he doesn't necessarily slow down once you know he can bluff. His 3-bet had shot up in the last 40 hands or so, and he'd also started going on in chat about how terrible I was despite the fact he was slightly up in the match.
So I defend here given we're deep, he's 3-betting a lot, and I don't think he's very good. He tended to try and get to showdown with marginal value hands and didn't ever seem to think about value betting even remotely thinly. I think calling the flop and turn are standard here against this guy, and on the river I figured that he probably flats AJ and maybe AQ this deep preflop, and he probably isn't overshoving a weak Ax hand. Also he doesn't value bet thin, and also my hand is well defined as a weak made hand that will find it hard to call this overbet so I didn't think he'd do it for value.
This guy 3-bet quite a lot (~18% over 130 hands), but wasn't a barreler at all. I decided to raise this flop as I think he can spazz out with worse sometimes, it's really hard to play if I flat, and I'm not doing badly against anything.
On the turn we have pretty much exactly pot left. I figure he's flatting the flop with a lot of one pair hands that are now under the K and shove. I'm obviously repping a flush or set/straight pretty well too.
I included this as I was really pleased with it as it means I'm thinking and concentrating better than I have been doing. This guy check raised around 55% but was fast-playing all strong hands. I don't think there are any worse hands I get three streets of value from (aside from the worse Ks, but it's more often that he has a better one), and it's going to be really tough to play this to a check raise as he is doing it with K8+. I'd been checking a ton of flops back against him and he was leading turns so I figured this is a good spot to balance.
On the river I figured that his hand is face up as a bluff catcher, and I can't ever have Kx in his eyes, so overbetting is the best play as he'll think I won't overbet with anything less than trips, but I can't have trips so I'm repping a tiny tiny range of 99 and QQ. Overbetting is something that had pretty much completely disappeared from my game because I've been to lazy to think enough to do it so I was really happy here.
Re: Hand 1.
ReplyDeleteDo you think with a made hand that he might be bet a bit larger on the turn to make the river not so much of an overshove? Or is this not really valid in HU play?
Hand 1:
ReplyDeleteVillain has to be 3betting an unbearable amount for me to defend T9o and even then I don't i'd not be thrilled about it. If he is bluffy it also means he will put you in uncomfortbale situations when you hit top pair, but if he really is 3betting a ton and is straight forward post flop seems like you can justify it.
On the flop PSR is 8 and you could technically raise call it off but stack are a little awkward for that. You flat which is fine. He bets half pot on the turn and thus you call getting a good price and you are confident he will double barrel semi bluff (AK/AQ/AJ/KQ/QJ types) air and draws (87,75,53,42,T8,T7,A5.A3 etc.).
On the river you need to be good 38% of the time if I am calculating it correctly? ;) It is a superb bluff card for him and he knows this. He also should know that any Ace should be treated as the nuts as your range for calling 2 streets is less weighted to containing Aces. Therefore I would not be surprised for him to turn up with any Aces, any sets, any two pairs, and maybe even something like KK/QQ/JJ that are using the Ace to level you into calling with a 9 (though admittedly much less likley). However, given he half pot, half pot, shove I think I am more inclined to let him have it, unless this has been his standard and he is incapable of shoving the river thinly. His line doesn't look like he is trying to blow you out - basically he babys the flop babys the turn then overbets the river. So why does he baby the flop and turn? Is he drawing to his AK/AQ or is he keeping you in the pot with a set or overpair?
Against some people I love to hero call the river and this seems generally like the opponent to do it against. However, I think your reads need to be clearer for me to give a definitive answer as to what I do on the river though. Like how often he is 3betting? What hands he has shown down? How has he played flop and turns in 3bet pots?? What hands have you showndown? A loving to bluff as a read doesn't always equate to tripple barrels 165bb deep in 3bet pots.
Also re hand 1, whether or not he can have AQ/AJ or even lower depends on how wide you are defending deep. Making the assumption he can't have these in his range is what I view as hangover of ranges from 6max that doesn't necessarily equate to HU ranges.
ReplyDeleteHand 2: I'd raise the flop all day long. When he calls though I think i'd check the turn as a lot of his pairs that didn't want to play for stacks on the flop, now pick up a flush draw and he won't fold them.
Hand 3 i'd only check the flop if the gameflow was that he'd been leading a ton of turns when I checked back and my adjustment was now going to be to raise turns so that I can get to showdown easier.
ReplyDeleteGiven that your read is he check raises flop, this is a great spot to get check raised. I think you are under valuing your hand a ton when you say you don't want to get check raised.
I feel like it's hard to describe a hu hand properly, but I definitely think you raise some good points. The only thing I'd say is that I'm fairly confident this guy wasn't value shoving light to outlevel me - maybe he'd shoved AK sometimes, but I really don't think he's shoving A8 (even though they're the same strength, i don't think he's thinking that well). Plus he flats a lot of those weaker Ax hands anyway.
ReplyDeleteI guess I just feel like he gets to the river with very close 100% of his 3-betting range, and then we can take a bunch of better made hands than mine out when he overshoves. This leaves a huge weighting towards hands that are bluffs.
In fact, let me try and do some maths on it...
Let's say that his value range on the river is 22, 96, A4, AK, AA. I don't think he 3-bets small pairs often so I'll just put in 22, same with Ax. This comes out as 2.5% of hands that he can shove for value on the river (taking out duplicate cards).
I only need to be good 37% of the time (768/2076). Let's say he's 3-betting around 15% here (I think it's higher at this point in the game, hence defending so light, but we'll use 15%). Some of that range will be made hands that don't overshove the river - KK-TT, AQ, J9. Again, I'm just using AQ and J9 to kind of rep other Ax/9x he could have. This is 3.3% of hands.
Assuming he double barrels twice with 100% of his 3-betting range (which I actually think is probably true), he gets to the river with 15% of hands. When he shoves, we take that range down to 11.7% (taking out the 3.3% he won't shove). Out of this 11.7%, 2.5% is value. This leaves 9.2% of hands that he has available to him to bluff with.
Given we only need to be good 37% of the time, he'll only need to shove as a bluff with about 1.5% of hands (1.5 : 2.5 is the same ratio as 37 : 67). Therefore, if he gets to the river with 9.2% of hands he could bluff with, then he only needs to bluff 16% of the time to make it a profitable call.
Obviously he might not double barrel 100%, but it will be quite close to that. And given the way he was calling me terrible, and the fact it seems like I'll have to fold a lot so it's a good bluff card, I feel like he'll definitely turn the air part of his river range into a bluff often enough to call.