It was essentially always going to be HU for that kind of raise, and he's not even throwing an additional $325 at me if I set (the 7.5:1).

If someone is good enough to lay down to a push then's he's good enough to bluff occasionally

Best would be rainbow board without piant so he hasn't hit his set and can't put you on a nut flush draw. Either re-raise or check raise him all-in. Gotta be hard for a good player to call you if he has any respect...You would pick up 30xbb ($150) assuming he potted after his pre-flop raise - do it three times without getting called and you are +EV...

Obviously repping the set vs a big ovepair is suicidal in the $100 6 max I'm playing at the moment (hell those muppets call you dow with top pair no kicker), but in a higher tighter game it may have some merit...

if you're not going to stack him when you have a set...then its time to start bluffing him off his big pairs, at least for a while. if he's folding overpairs to flop raises...then start raising the flop. staying out of his way unless you have AA-JJ/AK makes you way too predictable in my opinion, eaves a lot of money on the table, and allows him to read you like a book. also...what about calling a raise (or raising) on occasion with something like [7s]? i dont play for your stakes...but when players raise extra big with overpairs but are more than willing to fold them...well...i dont let those players see too many showdowns.

jon

Well, that's another obvious option, but the problem I see is simply the frequency with which you do it.

Let's take the pro as an example, and my KK situation. He raises $50 to my right, and I flat call there with KK. As I recall, we had a J-high flop here. He bets out something like $100, and I moved in on him for $600.

I'm risking $600 here, and if he has JJ, he's calling. I don't know whether he'd lay down AA to that bet, but maybe. In any case, I win $150 when I win and lose $650 when I lose. So, I better not get caught with my pants down more than once in four times.

Both of these players are perceptive enough to see how often I'm making this move. If it's much more than "quite rare," these guys will catch you on it. The other player isn't a pro, but he is watching opponents' moves.

yeah. but you dont need to constantly make the move. try it a few times when you hit sets, first.....then if he folds those 2 or 3 times....try it with something else. all you need to do is plant that little seed of doubt that makes him say "hey.....he might not actually have a set here." then you start busting him when you do have a set. it's great that you can read him so well...but if he's reading you equally well then you're not gonna get his money. for starters i would start getting in there with suited connectors and then make this play when you have a legitimate draw. then you have some decent equity in the pot even if he does call your push. i would actually not recommend pushing with a hand that will often hold up in a showdown (i.e. KK from your example). push with hands that are never drawing slim/dead....and push with your monsters.

if he's convinced that when you push you have a set...that's great. but if he's always right...that's not so great. you need to fix that ASAP, in my opinion.

jon

I'm going to back up a little bit on this thread, which I really started with the intention of dealing primarily with the old "loose raiser" problem, but I wanted to be a little more comprehensive and hence started with some tight-os.

Anyhow, I think the first thing to look at is just the question of excessive vs. moderate raises. If the raise is excessive, I think you be pretty cautious about calling with anything where you don't have a high probability of already being ahead. AK imo is bad here, QQ and JJ get more interesting. On those as overpairs (or sets), you put a lot of pressure on your raiser if you put a power play on him. With JJ, of course, you're actually probably behind if the raiser is tight. But that's a bluff that I think is tenable (due to its rarity). I just can't bring myself to put $650 out there as bluff while holding 88 to overcards against any good opponent. With JJ, if you do want to pound it from behind, you at least are working with a 50% probability of having an overpair on the flop. This is a player where you may also not want to re-raise AA but rather give them a free flop because the continuation bet is going to be sweet due to the excessive raise (then again, if they're tight and have as much as $50 out there in a 2/5 game, I don't know whether they'll lay down QQ if you make it $150 to go).

If the raise is kind of "in between," like $35, the decision of trying to set, I think, is going to have to do with how multi-way the pot is. If the guy can lay down and it's likely HU, I think just much one's 22.

But the second, extremely important distinction here is between action raisers and what one might call weak raisers. The action raiser is someone who certainly can't lay down AA and may pursue unimproved AQ for full stack (there are plenty of these guys). THOSE are the players you want to set against.

It's also worth noting that this distinction is still completely independent of hand selection for the raiser. A lot of loose raisers may throw a little bit at the pot with AXo after raising, but then they lay down. So, setting is pointless. But if they'll play for full stack on hitting their X or their A, then you can be all about setting.

To be continued... Hopefully with more good feedback in the interim...

Now for the suited connectors.

Ok, first observation is that you hit your straight draw about 10% of the time, hence 9:1 for the draw. I just don't see any realistic scenario for playing the flush draw aggressively, so I'm just going to discount that as nothing.

I think this also already means that the pot MUST be multi-way for you to call the raise, AND you must have position. The raise also has to be pretty reasonable. As to the multi-way aspect, I think you really need at least 2 callers in addition to the raiser for this move to pay off. And I'm still not particularly sure about it if the raise is bigger than maybe 3xBB (a 3xBB raise in my game will usually get a LOT of callers).

I also think the move is iffy even under these conditions.

Let's take one flop scenario: You're in LP with your 65s, EP makes it $20, and 2 MP players call. If you call, then you're going to have a flop pot of $85 or so. Let's say he bets $60 with a flop of J43. Now you raise to $250.

If everyone folds, you've made $125, and hence not made money on the hand. You need to pull out $200 or more to justify your PF call. But, IF you could semi-bluff effectively both on flush AND straight, you'd be ok (now you hit 20% of the time).

This already means that the call isn't justified against the weak raiser. But, against the action raiser (or balanced raiser), you do get a call here a lot of the time. And even the action raiser is going to have to slow down with anything but a flopped JJ set on the turn.

Now, if you make your hand on the turn (8 outs with 44 cards in the deck makes it a 8:36 or 4.5:1 to hit).

Against a balanced raiser, though, you can continue the semi-bluff on the turn, presumably moving in, as much as is already in the pot. Now you've made over $300 on the hand. But you have to have an enormously accurate read here. True, you still have outs on the river. But you've got to have huge fold equity at this point.

Against an action raiser, you have to check a missed turn, but he pays you off when you hit on the river. So, against the action raiser, you lose $270 2/3 of the time. The river pot is going to be $585, and he calls your $200 river bet. So, your net profit when you hit is $525. Well, that's just -EV unless you can squeeze more than $200 out of him on a hit on the river. You probably can get more out of him if you hit on the turn.

I think my bottom line here is: I don't see how one can make it +EV to call a raise with a suited connector except under the following conditions:

1) Balanced raisers who will lay down a big pair on the turn AFTER CALLING A BIG FLOP BET. And semi-bluffing a missed turn is a very aggressive play to make imo.

2) They're so convinced that you have a set whenever you raise the flop that you can semi-bluff BOTH the flush AND the straight draw. That gives you better odds of hitting the flop than you have with the little pairs (4:1 rather than 7.5:1).

So, I guess I'm advocating laying these things down except under exceptionally circumstances.

Case 2), however, gets pretty interesting, because one of the main functions of the semi-bluff is getting action when you play your set this way. I think this is another case for "shifting gears" in actuality. Basically, you stick with setting for a while, then, if they're no longer calling, you can make the move on the suited connectors. At the same time, you may actually want to lay down the little pairs because you have WORSE odds of hitting those than you do of hitting straight OR flush with the suited connectors.