This hand happened Sunday night at the MGM Grand. There is a good sLAG who says he is from Texas and that he plays $5/$10 at the Winstar sitting across from me as well as a guy next to him from London who have both been commenting on my nitty play to this point. The table has been playing crazy and I have just been playing lockdown poker as I have had marginal hands OOP and trash hands otherwise.

The guy from London is the villain in this hand. I lost a sizable pot early on against him when I made a bad river call with AJ TPTK against his KK. He is also somewhat tricky and slightly loose aggressive. I saw him open limp in late position with AK twice and raise with some other hands (I'm sure the hands he raised with were worse).

I limp [Kh] UTG expecting a backraise and some callers because that is how the table has been playing. there are 5 limpers and then the guy from London makes it $30 OTB. he has about $320 and I have about $180. I am in the 10 chair and he is in the 7 chair and he shoots the 6 nickels directly at me when he bets. So much so that one of the nickels even crosses the action line on my side, that's how strong he tossed them.

I give him exactly QQ or JJ and given how strong he is trying to act I am leaning towards JJ. I decide to just call for the reason that I believe he is trying to put in a big bet here to provoke me to reraise with AA/KK so he can fold but all I feel he has really done is turn his hand face up to me.

The flop comes 9 high with two diamonds. It was something like:


I assume he's going to like that flop with QQ/JJ so I check. He bets $30. I call.

Turn:

Unfortunately he can't like that card too much. But my theory is still that I want him to hang himself. I also know that he thinks I am the tightest nit on the planet and any bet from me is going to lose him. I check it. He checks behind.

River:

Now this card makes me sick. The ace didn't really bother me but this card obviously does. I check. He quickly bets $30 (he made a similar small value bet on the end with KK on the last pot he won against me). I said, "That's so sick, you have two queens, don't you?" and he immediately replied "Nice hand, good read."

Thought process to this point good? I was trying to play this hand for maximum value. Is there any better line to get more value in this situation? ("don't play like a nit?" lol)

Action on the river?

"I give him exactly QQ or JJ and given how strong he is trying to act I am leaning towards JJ. I decide to just call for the reason that I believe he is trying to put in a big bet here to provoke me to reraise with AA/KK so he can fold but all I feel he has really done is turn his hand face up to me. "

No offense, but this is one of the dumbest things Ive read in a while.

If he thinks youre that big of a nit, he knows youre not calling $30 in a 1/2 game without a big hand. I would reraise all in preflop and hope he puts you on AK. If I didnt do that I would be all in on the flop.

Your line is pretty bad in my opinion.

your preflop theorizing is misguided, to say the least.

either L/RR preflop, or bet/3bet or CR + call shove on the flop.

you can't play like this and expect to make money. this is the absolute perfect flop with which to play a big pot against a preflop raiser. you think he'll fold QQ here. i say he'll play for it all, and he'll do it all on the flop.

jon

Agree very much with check-raising flop all in which would give him about 2:1 on his money for a call. I was sick about not doing it after the hand since I realized he probably wasn't going to continue bluffing later streets when I thought about it later. So basically I shouldn't be losing any value doing that but do give him a chance to make a bad call for a double up when he does have QQ/JJ here.

Disagree somewhat with not being able to smooth call preflop with a strong read and history with the opponent. The limpers were not coming along for $30 (as a look to my left confirmed). Also I put villain as being better than the average live 1/2 donk. I agree with L/RR line against any average tourist here and expect to get paid off most of the time as was the original plan in this hand until the huge overbet and the acting job totally threw me for a loop.

It's unfortunate I'll never know what villain would have done on a blanker turn. I did call quickly on river and he showed [Js] which I believe he gave away with his river speech.

this being the case...you REAAAAAALY need to C/R the flop