FullTiltPoker Game
$0.25/$0.50 - No Limit Hold'em

Hero ($19.45)
Villain1 ($40.45)
Villain2($104.35)

hero is dealt T T

hero raises to $1.75, villain1 re-raise to $4.50, 3 folds, villain2 calls, 2 folds, hero calls.

flop 3 4 3 (3 players, pot is $14.25)

hero?

both villains seem to reasonable. hero has $14.75 behind. whats his play?

You have to lead, but I give the chances that you are ahead to be in the realm of slim to none.

Who re-raises?

TT+ for sure, sometimes AK, rarely AQ. But even scarier, who cold calls? With a raisor and a re-raisor, JJ & QQ are going to cold-call.

so why does he have to lead?

If you were willing to call preflop, then I'm assuming you think villian 1 is capable of reraising preflop with Aq+ and 99-. Therefore, you caught a pretty good flop and will likely get villian to bet and you can C/R and get 'em all in. If you think villian has you beat here more than often, then don't call the raise preflop.

Why not call for set value? I doubt players at this level often dump overpairs, especially KK or AA to a 10XX board. Hero owes $2.75 to a pot of $11.50 preflop, laying hero slightly better than 4-1 immediate odds to hit his set. If we assume hero gets paid off a vast percentage of the time hero sets on the flop, which I do not think is illicit at these levels, hero has more than enough implied odds to make this call for set value preflop with $14.95 behind. Assuming one call when hero sets, hero is calling $2.75 to win 26.45, which is better than 9.5-1.

Of course, this line assume one of these players has an overpair and cannot get off of it. I do not know these players, and thus I do not know if these stipulations hold in this particular example.

I'm gonna trust your numbers...
+EV in this scenario is
3.5-2.4= 1.1
assuming we're paid every time.
Small edge but I guess it's good enough. I still think it's too close to make a really strong case for a set or forget type play.

Yeah, I am not saying one necessarily should play this hand for set value. I just think it is a possibility.

On the off chance that the raisor is AQ and the cold-caller is AT-AK.

Otherwise, he might as well have folded to the pre-flop raisor after someone else cold called. If he checks, he cannot call a bet. If he does not bet, he loses this hand every time.

I'm not saying it's a good play, I'm just saying that in order to continue playing the flop how he chose to play the hand, the course of action that most closely corresponds to his pre-flop play is to lead.

Hero doesnt have the stack to lead. He's gotta make a decision on whether or not he's good on that flop.

ooo. this is bad logic. leading is very bad here. If we're assessing villians' ranges as those that we're ahead of, then C/R a single bet and C/F to 2 bets is really the way to go here. if we're not ahead enough to be willing to get 'em all in on this flop, then (besides folding preflop) we should C/F any bet.

Leading= called by bigger hands and folded by hands that we're ahead (and likely are betting this flop)
C/R = all in by bigger hands and all in against hands that we're leading against.

If some one wants to say, well we're not sure he's gonna bet. That's fine.

thanks for the input.

im not the hero in this hand. im actually villain1. but the hand had me thinking about how i would play it if i was hero.

i don't mind the call pre-flop but i'd really be playing the hand set or fold. if villain1 (me) doesn't have him torched you have to think the lp cold caller has got it.

I'd rather lose money sticking to my plan, than to win a hand by switching up in the middle. 9 times out of 10, switching up from your plan is -EV. As I said, it's not the optimal play, but it's the play that most closely corresponds to his pre-flop action. One thing is for certain, if he doesn't lead, he loses for sure 98% of the time as he cannot call a bet given the circumstances.

villian2's monster stack severly widens the range

Hero needs to reraise preflop if he thinks he has the best pair. If that sounds reckless, then I think betting this flop is nearly as reckless.

What was his plan preflop?

If he doesn't lead, he's calling and he's not losing 98% of the time.