Close spot in a Heads-Up Match. (2 Viewers)

[MichaelBubly]

Was playing a heads up match yesterday. We're doing a best of 7 game over the next few months with a small wager on the winner. Start deep stacked around 200BB or so and slowly raise to target around a 3 hour time-frame.

This spot was about 2.5 hours in. Seems like a very close spot, although in general my opponent is quite aggressive and takes some very unusual lines with bluffs and value hands.

Stacks:
Hero has 40BB

Villain has 33BB

Preflop:

Hero is first and raises to 2.2BB with

Villain defends.

Flop:



Villain checks.

Hero C-Bets 1.5BB

Villain min-clicks it to 3BB.

Hero just calls.

Pot is about 10BB

Turn:


Villain bets 3.5BB and has around 23BB behind.

Hero calls.

Pot is now 17BB.

River:


Villain goes All-In 23BB.

Hero?

 

[Mrs Poker Zombie]

I see you losing to a lot of hands. For me, too much to call as hero for the tournament.

 

[Poker Zombie]

When villain 3-bet pre-flop, what were you calling with?

Ace-winner, you should be jamming preflop.
Ace-loser you should have folded.

Heads-up you don't dick around with middle kicker. Either you think you're good and you take his chips or you're losing and folding.

 

[ChipMonster]

I would’ve likely been out after he re-raised on the flop. He’s aggressive and showing real strength and your 8 is likely not good enough. He either has ace and better kicker or caught 2 pair

 

[theshepherd]

Agree, too much to call with top pair mediocre kicker.

Wouldnt be surprised if he has AJ.

 

[Jimulacrum]

His preflop defend could be basically anything playable. Not a lot to learn there. The min check-raise leads me to believe the plot was hatched on the flop. The overall post-flop play reads like potentially two different lines:

A. The min raise and the undersized turn bet are weak, like he's mainly trying to take control of the betting while buying himself some fold equity, i.e., a semi-bluff).
B. It's a line designed to look suspicious and rope you in to pay off a flopped monster.

Case A is comprised of basically gutshots (32 combos). There aren't any other real draws on the flop.

A good estimate for case B is that it's comprised of sets (7 combos) and aces up (12 combos). Mainly hands that have minimal fear of being outdrawn. Through a more conservative lens, you could make a case to add bottom two pair (9 combos), even though it's not a monster, but it helps to make my case. Total: 28 combos.

Including bottom two pair has Hero as a 32 : 28 = 8 : 7 favorite. Clear call. This accounts for all the hands that beat A8 on the flop, compared to only the hands that had a legitimate draw on the flop, i.e., that semi-bluffed and then bluffed. The more hands you add to case A—say, pocket pairs and pure bluffs—the more compelling the call is.

All this said, I might have a different take if I were to play against this person myself. Heads-up is a very nuanced game that's hard to analyze off of one hand.

 

[MichaelBubly]

I think I left out a few details that add a bit of context to the spot.

Villain typically likes to underplay absolute monster on flops and sometimes turns. There was a few times earlier in the game he checked flop and turn with a full-house and finally bet river.

He also snap jammed the river. With about 1-2 seconds of consideration which I felt was odd. Especially considering the river changed the board a reasonable amount. Although he did snap-raise a river earlier for a fairly large sizing that I called off and he had it.

My thinking throughout the hand was this:

I thought the min-raise sizing on the flop was odd, although he does like to use small sizings a lot on his reraises. Especially considering the dry board. Could be a lot of hands on this board including single pair holdings below an Ace.

I tanked a while on the turn as I felt this did smell a lot like a stronger ace or aces-up type of hand, but decided to call thinking a lot of his bluffs will continue on this turn. I did consider folding here, but felt I was ahead of too much of his range to fold to such a small bet.

After he snap-jams the river, I was really confused. I strongly discounted AQ and AK as I would expect he would 3-bet preflop at a high frequency. Although AK here makes a decent amount of sense blocking the straight. Also thought bottom two pair would perhaps choose a smaller sizing as some of my top pair holdings have turned aces up.

I was mainly worried about pocket 6s or pocket 2s. Which could easily decide to snap jam any non heart river. But felt a lot of his two-pair and strong top pair value hands would choose a less polarized sizing trying to get a weak ace to call.

I did guess at the time this was probably a pretty straightforward fold in GTO, but against this opponent I was pretty torn.

I ended up calling and villain announced I was good and showed a 10 of hearts.

 

[NeutronHim]

Heads up is a crazy game and I think analyzing it from a GTO-esque perspective is borderline negligent.

That being said, I think (?) we are supposed to station 3 streets on normal no raises with any ace on dry-ish brick boards 100bb, so thats 2.5 + 1.5 + 4 + 10~ 18bb that we need to call off.

We cannot fold flop lmao, heads up is definitely the one variant in which being a nit does not get you paid. I'm all for folding top top in a multiway pot otf to a raise, but heads up we need to be stationing with much worse. (Unless we literally give our opponent no credit for exploiting us, which I find is a bad assumption to make heads up.)

Turn is a mandatory call as well for similar reasons.

OTR we probably need to get out of there, but I think its closer than expected (mostly because in GTO land you are supposed to fast play almost everything and then suck it up and station your capped range in a lot of spots where you have a range/nut advantage.) Most players, perhaps you included, are capable of being a lot less capped than gto so perhaps it makes it an even easier fold.

 

[NotRealNameNoSir]

I'm not folding. Said villain was aggressive, plus the snap jam on the river is a reliable tell that he wants you to go away. Happy with my pair heads up, issa best one.

 

[jpoppaaa]

I'm not folding. Said villain was aggressive, plus the snap jam on the river is a reliable tell that he wants you to go away. Happy with my pair heads up, issa best one.

I’d agree….but OP also mentioned villain often slow plays monsters. I do this often with my home group and will snap jam the river. Typically I agree it’s a sign of weakness, but not always with players that know each other well.

 

[NotRealNameNoSir]

I’d agree….but OP also mentioned villain often slow plays monsters. I do this often with my home group and will snap jam the river. Typically I agree it’s a sign of weakness, but not always with players that know each other well.

Still calling you for these depths heads up. Everytime. Even if you sigh, shrug, say your wife wants you home? Still calling you wit your reverse tells lol.

 

[JustinInMN]

A. The min raise and the undersized turn bet are weak, like he's mainly trying to take control of the betting while buying himself some fold equity, i.e., a semi-bluff).
B. It's a line designed to look suspicious and rope you in to pay off a flopped monster.

Case A is comprised of basically gutshots (32 combos). There aren't any other real draws on the flop.

A good estimate for case B is that it's comprised of sets (7 combos) and aces up (12 combos). Mainly hands that have minimal fear of being outdrawn. Through a more conservative lens, you could make a case to add bottom two pair (9 combos), even though it's not a monster, but it helps to make my case. Total: 28 combos.

Including bottom two pair has Hero as a 32 : 28 = 8 : 7 favorite. Clear call. This accounts for all the hands that beat A8 on the flop, compared to only the hands that had a legitimate draw on the flop, i.e., that semi-bluffed and then bluffed. The more hands you add to case A—say, pocket pairs and pure bluffs—the more compelling the call is.

I am with Jim here, this runout is super polarizing and shouldn't be that helpful to anything he raised the flop with. The value villain has here is aces-up and sets. Maybe some better aces that don't 3-bet pre? Like specifically A9 and AT maybe? And again, as hero, we block a hunk of that as hero. Maybe throw in the couple combos of 62 suited since the pfr was really low.

So think about this as hero, if you fold this river, what are you saying is your calling standard here? Do you need AK? Aces-up? Do you have 66 or 22 in your preflop raising range?

I would worry if you fold here, you are giving villain a line to take any pot he likes unless you are close to the nuts. I guess that's kinda GTOish thinking.

Do you have k-his in your range to raise pre and bet/call raise on an a-hi flop? If not maybe A8 is closer to the bottom of your range and it's okay to pass here?

My instinct is this line looks bluffy, so I would probably draw the line here. If you're right, you will have crippled villain and should win soon. If not, that's poker.

 

[jamjam]

When villain 3-bet pre-flop, what were you calling with?

Ace-winner, you should be jamming preflop.
Ace-loser you should have folded.

Heads-up you don't dick around with middle kicker. Either you think you're good and you take his chips or you're losing and folding.
View attachment 1209039

So basically he should’ve folded pre ?