Red Chip Poker: Late Position

Facing a Turn Check-Raise in a ThreeBet Pot.

(Villains flaw)

(Difficulty rating)

(Heros exploit)

It is just about midnight, and I am at my favourite kind of table. It is active,

lots of limped pots, and everyone is particularly chatty. Villain in this hand
has made himself the focal point of conversation by bemoaning all of his
bad investments over the last year. Of course, he complains about losing
$20k while wearing a $10k Rolex at a $1/$2 table.
$1-$2
MGM
11:30pm
7 handed
MP

Image:

Action:

Hand:

Starting
Stack:

Villain

$9/Call

$325

Button

Hero

$30

Covers

Villain has been entering lots of pots, some by raising and some by
limping. We have been at the table for almost two hours and have never
seen him three-bet or four-bet pre-Flop. He has not shown any aggression
post-Flop, but is impressed if anyone runs a bluff. We have not seen him
run any bluffs himself. We assume that a player who is noticeably impressed
by bluffs will be more apt to show them when he makes them. The fact that
he has not shown any bluffs acts as reassurance that he has not run any.
However, absence of evidence is not evidence of absence.
This is a standard three-bet for value. Villain is unlikely to be
positionally aware which leads us to assume:

Villain is not opening any stronger from early position than any
other position
Villain will not consider position before calling the three-bet

Due to these assumptions, we expect this three-bet to be profitable. He

is a bad player and will give our three-bet action with a wide range of hands.

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Hands

The more hands he calls our three-bet with, the better our AK performs.
When our three-bet gets called we will have a positional edge, card edge,
skill edge, and the initiative.
Main Pot: $63
Villain

Check/Call

Starting
Stack:
$295

Hero

$40

Covers

(MP2)

(Cutoff)

Range:

As with all unpaired hole cards, AK is only going to hit a pair or better
on the Flop about a third of the time. Against a bad player we want to start
going for value immediately. Villain could have Flopped any one of several
second-best hands in many different ways on a board like this. Villain could
have hands like AQ, AJ, JTs, and numerous draws.
Our roughly two-thirds pot-sized bet is typical. We expect he will
continue with any pair (e.g. Ax, JJ, Tx,) for $40. Our bet also charges draws.
Against a bad player it would be criminal to check and miss a value bet.
Main Pot: $143
Villain

Check/???

Starting
Stack:
$255

Hero

$95

Covers

(MP2)

(Cutoff)

Range:

The Three of Hearts on the Turn is a total brick to the board. This card
does not fill up any draws, it does not add any realistic draws, and it does
not improve Villains range. Since Villain is a bad player, it is also
reasonable that he will call this $95 bet with plenty of second-best hands. If
he called the Flop with Ax we can assume he would continue calling, and he
may talk himself into calling with Tx as well. Bad players are also notorious
for drawing incorrectly, so he could conceivably continue with Spades and
QJ as well.
An important, yet often overlooked, aspect of this hand is the bet size.
We chose $95 because we wanted to keep the bet under $100, but we also
wanted to maximize value. Why are we focused on keeping the bet size
under $100? Pricing psychology states that $100 is an important price-point.
By going just underneath it, the bet can be perceived as being significantly
smaller. When trying to get called, it is beneficial to go just below important

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Red Chip Poker: Late Position

price-points like $50 and $100. This is an exploitable bet sizing tell, but the
players we do this against are never going to notice.
Main Pot: $143
Villain

Check/$225

Starting
Stack:
$255

Hero

$95

Covers

(MP2)

(Cutoff)

Range:

Uh oh. Our goal with this book is to give you the tools to do both
complicated analysis away from the table, and to also recognize correct lines
in real-time. With enough practice and off-table exploration, your instincts
will improve at the table where it matters most.
From here we will simplify the math by using reasonable round number
approximations much like you would at the table. We know the last $30 is
going in on the River, so if we are going with this hand we will need to put
in about $150 more. We want to know what we stand to win for that $150
investment. How many $150s can we win?

$150 in the pot to start the Turn

$100 from our Turn bet
$250 once he check-raises
$500 total (Or 3 $150s)

We are getting 3.33:1 on our call.

Next, we have to ask ourselves a question: Are we ever ahead here?
Answering this could tell us what to do. If we are always behind, and must
fold, then we are done with calculations.
Let us first assume we are always against AT or A9. No, even better, let
us assume we are against T9. That is the best situation we can hope for if
we are behind to a better hand right now.

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Hands

Our hand:

Board:

Their hand:

Our outs:

Winning chances estimated:

Winning
chances
exact:

8 Outs * 2% = 16%

18.2%

If that is the case, we need to spike an Ace, King or Three. Eight outs
is about 16% equity which means we need ~5:1 on a call. We win one time
for every five times we lose. We would need to win more than five to one if
we are against the weakest of two pairs. Considering that Villain can have
sets or Two Pair with an Ace also; it only gets worse for us. If Villain is
unadventurous and tight, we can assume he has a better hand and we must
fold since we are only getting 3.33:1.
An important consideration of this hand is Villains change of
momentum. If he had a flush draw on the Flop, how would he play it? If he
would play them aggressively, then he likely does not have as many flush
draws on the Turn. If he would check-call the Flop with flush draws, why
would he become aggressive on the Turn? His line with a flush draw does
not make sense given the change from passive actions to aggressive ones.
Would he check-raise semi-bluff the Turn with a flush draw? We doubt it.
Let us make a few hand reading assumptions and see how our AK
fares:

Sets, two pairs: AK has 7% equity

Sets, two pairs, AsQs, AsJs, QsJs, 8s7s: AK has 24% equity
Sets, two pairs, flush draws, AK, AQ, AJ: AK has 56%
equity

The three ranges used above vary from strong to wide, but all of the
included hands are reasonable. If you have different ideas of his range, use
Flopzilla to try them out. The more time you spend running scenarios in
Flopzilla, the better your estimates become in real-time. We would not
expect a good player to call a three-bet out of position with hands like QJs

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Red Chip Poker: Late Position

or A9s, but a bad player is capable of making these mistakes. Given the
exact pot odds we need 25% equity; if we have more it is a call.
At this point we need to decide which range he is check-raising with. So
far, we view Villain as a passive player. All of his actions in this hand have
been passive thus far. When a passive player gets aggressive, especially on
the Turn or River, it is because they have a strong hand or, at minimum, a
hand they perceive as strong.
Some will look at this hand and say, Well he could be playing a draw
aggressively or think that his AQ is best and check-raise it. We, however,
would argue that a player who wants to play a draw aggressively is more apt
to do so on the Flop. The kind of mental block that would lead him to play
a draw passively on the Flop, is the same mental block that makes us think
he would not play a draw aggressively on the Turn. Playing a draw
aggressively on the Turn can be a winning maneuver; however, if he is
capable of this move, there are other moves we would expect to have seen
from him earlier in the session. We have seen none of those moves yet.
Because of this, the simplest explanation is the best: he has a hand.
Even if he does play some of his big draws aggressively on the Turn,
along with sets and two pairs, we are behind equity-wise to the range as a
whole. That is unless we can add either bluffs or combos of AQo/AJo. Can
we discount those combos as well?
Think about the flow of the hand. If Villain had AQo, and called a
three-bet out of position, and check-called the Flop, is he really going to
check-raise the Turn? He did not four-bet it preflop, so he did not want to
explode the pot size there. Then he did not donk bet or check-raise the
Flop, so he did not want to explode the pot size there either. Again, the
mental block that would lead him to play AQo passively is the same mental
block that makes us think he would not check-raise the Turn with it.
Against sets, two-pairs, and big draws, we have 24% equity. There are
also only 15 combos of those hands. Any other combo we add to his range
we either crush or chop (AK). Here is the important part, if we add just one
combo of AQo into his range our equity jumps from 24% to 28% making;
this a profitable call. Add two combos of AQo into his range and our equity
jumps to 32%.
We assign a range, figure out our equity, and then make a decision. If
we assume he has a strong range with some big draws and a few combos of
other hands, this is a profitable shove. If we assume that his range is strong
and does not include draws or other combos, then this is a fold.
In this hand I decided to fold, thinking his check-raising range was too
strong. I flashed him my King as I mucked my hand and he happily showed
me 99. He proceeded to lose everything an hour later, but bad players do
that.

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