Value Betting Ace High on the River

If it is a lag and he doesnt raise fl or turn in this case theres a fair chance hes sitting on a worse ace, i dont expekt him to call down with a weak king, he might be on 22, but I would expect him to raise fl with that or any other pair since the board doesnt hit our range at all. It looks like a float on fl with overs or somekind of draw + highcard (A2 or A8) overs with backdoor fd or somethin, so there should be some value betting AK if he calls turn aswell and the river pairs the board or something. He could call down AQ AJ and not raise it pf cause of position aswell and hes got fair equity on those hands i recon, so there are those hands aswell. But I havn't checked the actual maths behind it. Not sure why its on a beginners trivia though. imho...

Say Jd comes on the river. Yes, he could call down with AQ, A9, A8, A3, A2. A7, KQ, K9, K8, K3, and K2. (I'd discount at least AQ of the above, since this hand might have raised somewhere along the line.) But he has to figure as well, what can he beat? I doubt that he calls with the weaker kings.

The problem is that he will call down (or raise) with A4,A5,A6,AT,AJ,K4,K5,K6,KT,KJ,Q4,Q5,Q6,AQ,QJ, etcetera, etcetera too. It gets worse the looser he is. If he is loose (and passive) enough to be hanging in there with J2 (which, after all, is an overcard to the board and a gutshot), then the river bet is exceptionally bad.

We have to be able to exclude at least all hands that hit the flop (no check-raise) from his range. I'm trying to say that the read (Ax - missed board) must be very accurate for a river bet to go in.

Sure, the Ax combinations are the ones that perhaps best fit his play, but there are so many others he could play this way. Against a passive 80% calling station a river bet is a big nono. Against a 40% fish, it's just as bad, but for other reasons. They love trapping with sub optimal holdings (that beat us).

The list of hands that beat us if he calls is much longer than the list of card we beat if he calls. I think that the check behind is trivial if a jack falls on the river. It is less trivial if the board pairs as you say, but still too thin to bet in my opinion if he is really loose.

I rarely play AK aggressively on the river, but there are spots, like in big 3-way pots where there might actually be some fold equity. One might force someone off a small pair or a split, but the the conditions have to be just right, and the pot large enough to make it worth the try.

Out of position, a bet/fold certainly seems better than a check/call.

/Johan =

I don't think a lag would call down loads of hands on this board, I think he'd prolly raise tons of hands, I know I would. However of the hands he might play passivly and call down, I think ace high is a majority, and the rest of em, highcards/missed gsdraws, which he would fold on the river to a bet... when I run it through equilab its a pretty solid valuebet on the river. But then again we might have different views on lags and our reads might not be the same, but I'de valuebet this one if played b/c b/c fl and turn. Against a loose passive player I wouldve checked behind on the river unless I had some read on him calling down K and Q-high or something

I don't understand why you would expekt him to raise AQ somewhere down the line but not a hit on the board or a pp or draw, raising that one makes little sense imo.

I think I would play c/c on the river out of position and let him bet (unless he checks behind alot) his no-showdownable hands, he might even try to bet A-high thinly, some people just fire anything in that spot, but I guess thats down to reads again.

I don't expect him to raise with AQ. I wrote that I'd discount the possibility of AQ because a 3-bet preflop, or a check-raise for value on the flop on his part isn't impossible. He is, after all, agressive.

What you get from Equilab is what you put into Equilab

The problem with check/calling oop on the river is that he might not bet the hands that you just put him on (mainly A+rags).

But yeah, it mainly boils down to reads. I stick to that you need a very solid read to bet on the river. So we don't disagree in principle.

[EDIT: Damned! My keyboard skips every second key I press - and the spell checker doesn't work. Please pretend you don't see the spelling errors.]

/Johan =

I like Valuebetting a blank river

If my opponent's a LAG I'd have expected to hear from him by the turn if he has some kind of draw.

If the river bricks off his range is super weak pairs and A-Highs and we beat all of the A-Highs so I think this is a super-solid value-bet.

But Agree this doesn't sound like a beginner's hand, at micros you're not going to be up vs Good LAGs, or even bad ones that much.