€400 NL HE Full Ring: Making a questionable River Call

[kdmeteor]

Game

Hold'em

Game Format

No Limit

Stakes

$2/$4

Table Format

Full (8-10 seats)

Currency

€

In this hand, I opened 12 with in the Hijack (all currencies in €, blinds are 2/4, no straddle or limpers), the CO makes it 30, and BN and me call.

The CO is a super strong player; he's been a pro for 15 years I think. The BN is... well other people tell me he's a big winner, my guess would have been he's a bad/losing reg. But no paticular tendencies I've noticed, just several spots where I'm like "that's clearly a losing play".

Anyway for me this is hand is difficult because I have little very practice against good players live.

Flop comes . It goes check-check-check.

Turn comes . I check; the strong pro makes it 40, BN and me call.

River comes . I check, the pro makes it 70 and the BN calls. In most cases against the field this is actually an easy call because people live just totally overplay hands in multi-way pots; you'd be burning money folding a good top pair here. But this isn't a normal case, and CO would probably not value-bet a weaker Ace here. Although thin value bets are something good players like to do.

Then BN calls, but I don't actually think BN is good, so idk what he does. I also don't think Flushes are likely because of the Ace of clubs in the middle; there aren't that many combinations of flushes villains could have here

Anyway I make the call and

Spoiler

CO had for two pair and the BN had for a flush, so I had the weakest hand. Which makes it easy to be negative on the call, but I think the call was bad either way; in fact I think this was just a blunder? Even if BN does weird things, CO wouldn't bet AQ or worse against weaker players.

I also think this is a losing preflop call from the BN, but I paid him off so joke's on me.

Another play that would have worked in retorspect is a 4-bet semi-bluff. Didn't have the guts to do that in the moment, though I did consider it. I'm honestly intimidated playing against strong players because like I said, I don't have a lot of experience since most of the live field is quite weak. But looking at this, I suspect the preflop sizing from the CO is exploitative against me because he thinks I'm straight-forward enough to only 4bet the nuts and call with most of my range (or actually just fold bc I don't want to play against him OOP), and if so, the counter-exploit would have been to 4bet wide.

 

[fundiver199]

Preflop
AQo is not the easiest hand to have in a 3-bet pot. But its a very small 2,5X 3-bet, so even with the cold caller in between I think, its fine to make a call here. If CO had gone large like to 50, then I would just ditch it though.

Flop
Standard check.

Turn
When it checks through on the flop, it kind of locks like, you probably have the best hand, so I would strongly consider to bet it for value. As played you have an easy check-call.

River
I agree, that there are very few flushes in either players range, and most likely they would also not play AK like this. So the hands, you lose to, are mostly TT, ATs and maybe AA, which CO might slowplay on the flop. But on the other side what are COs bluffs in this spot? It seems very tight to fold top pair second kicker, but you are overcalling in a multiway 3-bet pot, which typically require a hand stronger than just one pair. So I do lean towards a fold here, and the nice part is, that even if you fold, you still get to see their hands, so you get kind of free information.

 

[Station_Master]

What are the stack sizes? Assuming you have the stack depth to 4bet bluff fold, then AQo will work much better as a 4bet against a small size plus a cold caller. Something like 110 should get the job done (assuming stacks of at least 400).

As played I think I bet turn but fold river.

 

[kdmeteor]

What are the stack sizes? Assuming you have the stack depth to 4bet bluff fold, then AQo will work much better as a 4bet against a small size plus a cold caller. Something like 110 should get the job done (assuming stacks of at least 400).

As played I think I bet turn but fold river.

I was playing around 120 BB (500-ish chips); the other two always play with gigantic stacks, 400+ BB.

And yeah, I wish I'd had the guts to 4bet there. There is another strong player in the casino who also thinks I'm way more straight-forward and honest than I actually am (but for some reason I feel more comfortable against him), and so far he's always folded when I 4bet, bluff or value. Until I have to turn a 4bet face up, people will keep putting me on QQ+ if not KK+.