A cash game hand history, any comments welcome...

[snowing]

An interesting hand (well I thought anyways), do you call on the river?

NLH cash game. My stack: $120, blinds 0.5/1. I am on the button.
Villan $29.5 He is in the cut-off.

Action: All fold to the cut-off. Villain limps. I limp on the button with AdKc. SB folds, BB checks.

Flop: 3s 9c Ts

Not very interesting for me. Everyone checks to me, I check also.

Turn: [3s 9c Ts] Ac

Reasonable card. Checks to me again and I have a go at the pot betting $3 into $3.50. BB folds and villan check raises instantly to $10. I deliberate and just call.

River: [3s 9c Ts Ac] Js

Ugly river. Villan insta pushes for $18.50. Pot is now ~$40. Do you call?

Relevant History: Villan seems to play very tight in early and mid positions. Had come to the table very short (~$20) and instigated a push over the top policy versus raises. He was called twice and each time he showed very strong hands (KK/AK).

Villain has habitually limped in the cut off and has done so each of the previous 3 rounds. In the first he limped, I limp behind with 88. Flop 335, checks to me, I bet, he calls, turn [335]6, he check raises me, I call, river J. He pushes. I call (oops, bad play I know but it was only a ¾ pot sized bet) and he shows QQ. Next round he limps in C/O. I make an oversized raise with KK on button. He calles and passes to a continuation bet on and A74 board. Next round he limps in the C/O again. I call on button with Ac9c. Flop 7c5cAs (nice). He bets pot, I raise ¾ pot, he calls. Turn 9d (nice). He bets half pot, I push, he passes.

My image: Pretty tight I expect. I haven’t played a lot of hands and have won most of the pots I’ve played without having to show my cards. It is probably evident that when I do play a hand I tend to bet it rather than passively check call.

Back to the hand in question: a dangerous board against a slightly fruity player. I’m thinking I’m losing in this spot but can’t be sure. I deliberate and then say what I have and does he have 2 pair? He says ‘try calling and see’. Still stuck with what to do. It seems likely that I’m losing but the pot is $40 and its only $19 to call…


I know its only a smallish pot but I think these sorts of situations seem to make or break a session. Its fairly easy to make money with the nuts and not too difficult to avoid doing your bollocks with nowt, but I find if I do well in these mid-sized pots during a session I tend to do well and if I do poorly in these I end up with a losing session.

Any help or critique of the play would be useful… I’ll respond later with the results and my thinking….

[Enygma]

Pre-flop I raise this, can't understand limping here. I make it $5-$6.

On the flop (as played) I'd check.

When he insta c/r the turn I'd set him all-in.

[peligruso]

You probably got to fold the river.

Why you limping so much? In 4 hands you had AK 88 KK A9 all in position and you only raised once.

[snowing]

Yes, raising pre-flop more often is probably a good idea. I probably raise over 75% of the time in that spot with AK, this time i felt like mixing up my play a bit. I don't mind taking a flop with a decent hand in position. Limping three out of four hands on the button looks a bit weak i guess, but having seen the button open limp in the cut-off with QQ and play it cunningly, then limp-calling my pfr next time round when i had KK, i think i had made a decision to play a few cagey pots with this guy by playing flops. The blinds to this point had played ultra-ABC (probably why he kept limping in the cutoff) - unless they had a hand they wouldn't punish limping and i felt i knew where i was with them.

(the flop check i'm sure is pretty standard)

The turn is probably where i messed up the most. With deliberation i should have just pushed against his check raise on the turn and put the decision back on him. I'm strong at that point and the ace didn't really fill any draws unless he hit 2-pair with A-x. To add to this there are a LOT of bad rivers for me (clubs, spades, straight cards, two pair cards) and i won't actually know where i am. Pushing the turn probally gives him a tough decision unless he's flopped a set or two pair.

On the turn (which i will now state for the record i had totally wrong) i suspected strongly that i might be beat by two pair (AT being a candidate or other A-x). If not i figured him for a hand i was a long way ahead of (say AQ, KK etc...) that had little chance of outdrawing me. In these spots i don't mind calling the turn and a reasonable river bet. If he has me beat i don't necessarily lose as much as if i push (he will pass zero hands that are ahead) and if i am winning i might pick up an extra bet on the river (& he won't call a push).

The trouble here is if hes check-raising with a fruity draw of some kind, then i can easily let him catch up. And i have also have a hard time telling which dangerous rivers he's hit and which are safe - putting myself in a tough spot if he does something like, say, insta-push the river.

The river analysis is where i'm having trouble working out whether a call is a good idea or not. In the end, to be honest, i used a dodgy combination of the fact he insta-pushed the river and typed something into the chat box to come up with a decision to call. I'm wondering whether there was a more logical way of arriving at an answer.

[noidea]

Ok you need to iso the CO like 100% of the time with any decent hand.you print money isoing limpers and c betting flops.

only reason id ever limp is to induce an iso from the blinds so i could 3 bet/get it in.

but dont worry about that just raise.