Full Tilt Poker
Pot Limit Omaha Ring game
Blinds: $0.25/$0.50
6 players
Converter

Stack sizes:
UTG: $149.15
UTG+1: $92.95
CO: $38.65
Hero: $104.65
SB: $95.75
BB: $127.60

Pre-flop: (6 players) Hero is Button with 7 9 8 9
UTG folds, UTG+1 raises to $1, CO folds, Hero raises to $3.75, 2 folds, UTG+1 calls.

Flop: Q 8 A ($8.25, 2 players)
UTG+1 checks, Hero bets $8.25, UTG+1 calls.

Turn: 9 ($24.75, 2 players)
UTG+1 checks, Hero

checks or bets?

What kind of stats do we have on villain? Specifically his c/r %.

You sure would think he would bet TJ here wouldn't you?

This is not the best spot to give a free card, but I could make a case for it depending on question #2 above. He could very well be putting you on AAxx and looking to play a big pot here. If I am checking here I would be calling pretty much any non club, T, or J river.

Villan's WTSD% would be a factor for me too. In the absence of other info I bet it.

He is an unknown. No stats.

In that case I wouldn't have raised in the first place. I won't raise anyone until I have 2000 hands on them and PT tells me exactly how to proceed.

I agree with both of those. Bet. Puke when raised but ship it in anyway and hope to hit our what ~16 outs?

Checking is way too weak.
Potting is overrepping our hand. We lose value against AQ and some weaker draws, and we pay off JTxx too much.

I bet ~$14, call a raise, and fold the river unimproved.

Would you two call this flop bet with a lone dubgut str8 draw and no spades in this situation.

Probably not.

What point are you making?

Paaaleeease. Do I ever make one? I can never answer taht question. I was just curious.

I thought you were building to something.

The problem we have is that if we check we are going to face an horrible river decision a lot of the time, and we give a free card on a super draw heavy board. I don't like checking behind with a set+fd here. It's just way too weak imo.

I don't like potting here because then we are just value bluffing. He may fold a set, he may shove a draw.

What are we left with?

I just don't think he is folding much for turn half pot that he called a flop pot with. Either way we are going to be faced with a tough river decision, but if we bet and get called it could be a much more expensive decision.

Exactly. We get a ton of value by betting the turn.

We also make it much less likely he is going to bluff the river by betting the turn.

The simplest way to play this, ensuring that you never get out-played, is to check the turn and call most rivers. Many villains will bluff a missed draw on the river after you show weakness, so this probably makes up for any value you miss by not betting the turn.

Also, your hand has pretty bad negative implied odds, so making the pot bigger on the turn could be dangerous.

In any case, I think checking, betting the full pot, and betting $15 all have a positive expectation and are all approximately equivalent in value here. Which one is better in the specific situation would depend on the characteristics of your opponent, and since you said villain is an unknown there is no right or wrong answer.

I'm not convinced that there's much value to betting the turn. Most draws that villain would call the flop with have enough outs to call the turn as well. And when we get check-raised by JT, we lose value.

I see your point about the chance of him bluffing the river, but the other way of looking at it is that checking the turn could encourage him to bluff the river too frequently.

Personally, I think it would really suck to bet the turn and get called and then see villain fire a full-pot bet when the river is an ace or a spade.

You do realise that we still make a ton more value by betting though? Even if he has odds to call, it's still WAY better to bet than to check.


Example: (ignore rounding errors)

Suppose pot is $100 and he has 33% equity.
If we check it down he makes $33.
If we pot the turn, he has to call $100 to get 33% of a $300 pot, so he breaks even.
If we half pot the turn, he has to call $50 to get 33% of a $200 pot (=$66), so he makes $16.

By half potting the turn we make $17 more than by checking, and by full potting it we make $33 more than by checking. Even thought he is correct to call, we make money by betting anything at all. We are still putting money in as a favourite, so we retain the majority of that money.

I'm not saying that in this case checking is bad, because implied odds need to be accounted for as well as that JTxx possibility. I'm just making sure you're aware that whether he is correct to call the turn or not should have no bearing whatsoever as to whether we should bet.

Yes, I understand what you're saying. I agree that if we could go all in here, it would absolutely be correct to bet, but with such deep stacks, I'd be more inclined to play it safe by checking.

If we bet and get raised , are we calling or pushing?

If you bet the pot, a raise will put you all in anyway.

Simo suggested betting about 1/2 pot, calling a raise and folding river u/i. That's probably the best way to play it if you decide to bet.

If we bet half pot , a repot will practically put us all in too.

Pot is $24 , we bet $12 , a pot raise is $60? It will leave us $30 on river.

Bet , call a raise , fold river UI line is never working in this hand.

Meh, I can't see us being c/r bluffed on the turn. If he raises he has the straight. If he calls he doesn't.

I guess I don't really hate bet/folding given that we have no idea how live our FD would be.

I just really don't like checking here.

Bet folding with this much showdown value? Bet/folding is like giving up a good hand just for not to look "passive".

If we are gonna bet and fold to a raise , why aren't we checking turn and calling river aprox. for the same price as bet/folding and at least see a showdown?

By checking turn , we get value on river by 2 ways : He can bluff OR we can v-bet if checked to.

I am for betting turn too , in fact i made a big bet on turn there but checking started not to sound like a bad idea at all.

Agree. Bet/folding is easily the worst option available here.

What were the results?

I bet turn around $20 , he repots and shows JT without redraws , i miss river.

I didn't do the exact math but i think i have the right odds to call the raise on turn with the number of outs i had and small possibility of having already the best hand.

Before I read the replies, here is my say:

I think a bet-fold to repot is what I would do. Basically the only draw that hit is JT9x, I think FE is really high here, not to mention you have a big draw if he flat calls. If he repots, AAxx/JTxx seems very- very likely and a fold is pretty easy IMO. Uhhh, I guess I don't see anything else to it.