Another costly hand for me.

Pysterman

Anything wrong here?

Pysterman	Small blind		£0.05	£0.05	£10.97
benmadz21	Big blind		£0.10	£0.15	£15.13
	Your hole cards	A J
gazza369	Call		£0.10	£0.25	£3.95
Pysterman	Raise		£0.35	£0.60	£10.62
benmadz21	Call		£0.30	£0.90	£14.83
gazza369	Fold
Flop
		9 7 A
Pysterman	Bet		£0.45	£1.35	£10.17
benmadz21	Raise		£0.90	£2.25	£13.93
Pysterman	Call		£0.45	£2.70	£9.72
Turn
		3
Pysterman	Check
benmadz21	Bet		£1.00	£3.70	£12.93
Pysterman	Call		£1.00	£4.70	£8.72
River
		10
Pysterman	Bet		£2.35	£7.05	£6.37
benmadz21	Call		£2.35	£9.40	£10.58
Pysterman	Show	A J
benmadz21	Show	A 7
benmadz21	Win	Two Pairs, Aces and 7s	£8.69		£19.27

BorinLoner

Surely you must win some hands sometime. Otherwise you're far too unlucky to be playing poker.

I do have a question about your river bet: You seem to have decided to take a pot-control line on the flop and turn, then lead out on the river. Is that just a blocker-bet? What I'm really asking is, would you have laid it down to a raise?

Pysterman

In Response to Re: Another costly hand for me.:

Surely you must win some hands sometime. Otherwise you're far too unlucky to be playing poker. I do have a question about your river bet: You seem to have decided to take a pot-control line on the flop and turn, then lead out on the river. Is that just a blocker-bet? What I'm really asking is, would you have laid it down to a raise?
Posted by BorinLoner

I used to win a few hands, from time to time. I'm having an extremely bad time of late.

Why did I bet out the river?

He re-raised me on the flop. I flat called, suggesting that, at the very least, I wasn't c-bet bluffing, i.e. I had something.

Since my flat call on the flop showed some weakness I thought I would continue the story by check-calling the turn. (There was also an element of pot control here as I didn't want to bet out and be reraised again with just top pair.)

However, his turn bet was very small, only about 1/3 pot.

I (incorrectly) interpreted this as weak and assumed I was probably ahead on the river*. As such, I didn't want to risk checking the river and have him check behind, so I bet out, hoping for a call with a slightly weaker holding.

(* I didn't think a flush/straight drawing hand would reraise me on the flop at this level. I assumed it was a hand that had connected, e.g. 2nd pair, that was trying to catch me c-bet bluffing.)

In answer to your question, had I been reraised on the river I would have re-interpreted his small turn bet as a value bet and, given that he had also reraised on the flop, probably folded with my top pair.

Looking back at this now I can probably find faults in my logic... but it's so difficult with only 15 seconds to bet when you've a few tables open. Basically, my gut told me that there was a good chance I was ahead on the river so I just bet for value.

BorinLoner

As it played I was wondering if your bet on the river was to polarise your range and therefore only be raised by a near-nuts hand or be called by weaker, bluff-catcher hands. You'd played it on the flop and turn in a way that looks very much like a flush draw.

The issue I have with your logic is that you decided on the turn that your opponent was weak and therefore decided to bet the river for value. That's fine when the river is a blank card - a card that doesn't improve any likely holdings - but this river was not a blank. The river in fact is a really bad card if you thought you were ahead on the turn, since it brings in all the flush draws and even some straight draws. A ten is also a card that will make a two pair hand often, since it features in so many playable pre-flop hands - AT and 9T being the ones to worry about here. Ruling out the flush draw because our opponent raised the flop is a little adventurous too, I think. There aren't many hands now that can call your bet that you still beat. Lots of two-pair hands have been made and your Jack kicker doesn't beat many aces anymore.

I think the call on the flop is a slight problem. We're out of position with a good ace, but not an unbeatable one. It isn't really a massive hand. If we call here and we are ahead, we're going to struggle to get value out of position and if we're not ahead we're going to struggle to know it. I think I'd 3-bet with the intention of shutting down if we don't take the pot down. If he 4-bets, we fold and if he calls we assume he's got the flush-draw.

This is such a tough hand to play out of position.

grantorino

I definitely fold flop to a decent size raise

c/f river