PPT Hand - Explain his thought process

[pokeraussie]

The river shove in this hand makes no sense to me. Anyone feel like sharing what you think his thought process was? Although the river shove is folding out better hands such as any pair that's not a Qx I think it's doubtful that these hands are taking this line. These hands would be checking the flop/turn for pot control and they also make up a small part of JJ's BTN opening range. So if he thinks he is good on the turn he is likely good on this brick river. Considering JJ opened from the BTN his range is super wide which includes a ton of air (it's not like he's worried about losing to a better kicker). Also with the flush card on the river, its a good bluff card, and another reason to check to induce spazz. It seems like the only reason he's shoved the river is to prevent a tough decision, but that in itself does not make it an optimal play.

[jdwanchalk]

The river shove does not make sense, you're right. Only thing he could pray to get a fold from that bets the turn is a pair, but it just makes no sense. He is asking to get stacked by betting and loses nothing extra by check calling, would even make some. No clue. Lol at the commentators, omg he has ace high!!1!1!

[parttimepoker]

Who knows, hand was from 2006 or so. Poker was a lot different.

I assume the SB thinks he can fold out pairs and better aces or something weird like that. Mostly I think he just doesn't want to call again. Juanda, of course, should have no pairs except maybe 22-44 and no better aces after the turn bet.

Hand seems poorly played by everyone, imo. BB can fold all day, regardless of odds (altho he backdoored it, right?) and SB is playing ATo out of position, risking a squeeze from BB and - if he's lucky - getting to play ATo OOP with what looks like 50BB effective stacks.

Juanda fires twice because ... uh ... I guess people folded more in 2006?

[pokeraussie]

didn't realize this was a hand from 2006, saw it had 1/2 million views and watched it on YT.

i think the only poor thing about JJ's play (assuming he was going to fire a third barrel) is the tells he was giving, he looked weak. even if he triple barrel bluffed and was called by ace high and looked like an idiot, i still wouldn't think he played the hand badly.

i'm actually curious why you think it's poorly played on his part. if the SB is 3betting AQ then there aren't a ton of Qx hands that SB can realistically have in this spot. i think his turn range would be something like KQ/QJs/22-88/AJ/AT/A9 so triple barreling this board makes a lot of sense he is folding out a decent part of this range. there isn't much he can do when the play is taken away from him.

the SB didn't backdoor anything (although he had one of the flush cards)

[parttimepoker]

The BB would have backdoored the flush, I think (that's what I said in my reply).

I don't think a double barrel works much here. If someone calls the flop, they're not ditching much of their range on the turn. Juanda would check back a majority of his medium strength range (no reason to bet, say, AK or 88 again here) on the turn, so on the turn he's polarized to air and strong hands. Given that he raised on the button, there's a lot more air than strength - like 10-1 or something - in his range and he has to know that the SB is weighting him heavily toward air since he called the flop.

The turn changes nothing. Juanda is risking something like 30% of his remaining stack on the turn for a bluff that doesn't seem like it's going to work often given that he really can't rep much.

Just because you know your opp can't have much in a spot doesn't mean you have to fire again, and just because you can only win the pot by betting doesn't mean you have to fire again. Sometimes you just have to give up when your perceived range is so wide and the board is so non-threatening that no one is folding anything.

[pokeraussie]

I completely agree that we're polarized in this spot but I certainly think you should be considering triple barrel bluffing a certain percentage of the time, it's just so difficult for the SB to call with most of his range. Considering we opened from the BTN we have a ton of air but it also means there are more Qx hands in our range. Honestly I think cbetting and then giving up on this board is fairly spewy since you are not getting better hands to fold on the flop. If you are giving up on this hand you should be c/f the flop imo. I don't want to come across sounding critical of Juanda I think he was easily one of the best FTP red pros I just love discussing strategy haha.

[parttimepoker]

I don't think there's anything wrong with firing flop and giving up turn, mostly because:

1) It's 3-way, so there's more pressure on the SB to fold with the BB still to act behind (another reason I hate the flat with ATo on this flop), so you can expect more folds to your cbet

2) The pot is fairly large and the board is pretty dry

3) The turn changes absolutely nothing

I would feel a lot better about the triple barrel if Juanda started the hand with 20k and not 10k. If i'm reading the stacks right, he has less than a pot-sized bet left on the river after he fires this turn. That's not a great spot for a TB on a board like this where the turn changes zip.

As for the Q hands in Juanda's range - you can definitely make an argument that he would check back a bunch of queens on this turn to get extra value on river / induce a bluff, especially since his stack is a little shallow relative to the pot on the turn. I"m definitely not betting 100% of my TP+ hands here on the turn.

I don't have time to work out the combos, but I would guess that hands that make top pair or better here are probably about 10% of Juanada's button open range, maybe even less.

Hand strengths are, as always, relative. The SB may not have "much" in an absolute sense, but lots of weak pairs and A high hands are doing just fine against Juanda's range and therefore are strong (potentially) from the SB's point of view.

Anyhow, I still don't understand the river shove.