Calling down light

Tulalip $1/$3

Villain: MP, $700. I played with him 2 weeks ago... he seems like a solid player, made some big calls; he caught perfect on one big hand to more than double up. He's bet me out of 3 pots in the last half hour, and I don't know whether he had anything or not (though his "nothing" was likely better than mine once). He has yet to get caught in 1 bluff in about 3 hours of play, though I can't imagine he's got a hand each time he fires.

Hero: BB, $550. Typical loose/aggressive post-flop image (more passive pre-flop: I'm willing to see a lot of flops against passive, predictable opponents). I do go out of my way to get into pots with a wide range of hands when against another deep stacked opponent.

1 limper, Villain raises to $15, folds to Hero who calls with As 3h (limper folds).

Pot: $37
FLOP: 835 rainbow

Hero checks; Villain bets $25, Hero calls.

I make a loose preflop call with far-out hopes of some sort of 2-pair/wheel hand. On the flop, I'm making a very light call: I'll often do this on a dry board whenever I get even a piece of the flop, just to see what happens on the turn. If a blank comes and he checks behind, there's a chance he's missed. Here, there's also the possibility of hitting an ace and getting into a big pot against AK/AQ.


Pot: $87
TURN: [835] 9

Hero checks, Villain checks.

I'm actually feeling OK about my hand here: I don't believe he raises with below TT, and he'd bet an over pair here. Obviously, bottom pair is weak, but I think I'm good here.


Pot: $87
RIVER: [8359] 4

Hero checks, Villain bets $45.

I replay the hand, and I can't put him on anything: if this is an over pair, he's playing it very strangely, especially by checking the turn: he's not shown himself to be a tricky player. Highly unlikely the 4 helped him; slight possibility he has 67, but he's not yet to have shown himself to mix it up enough to add that to his range.

I say to him, "Do you ever bluff?" He kind of shrugs his shoulders. And then I either see something flash in his facial expression, or I'm making things up in my head to justify a call. Which is it? Who knows. I'd like to think I did see something, but I can't be certain. I spend most of my time when watching big hands observing those in the pots, trying to discern whether they're confident, strong, weak, scared, etc, just by watching their faces and body language. Is it doing me any good? I'm not sure.

Hero calls. Villain says "Good call," and turns over AQo. I table A3o and take down a $170 pot with bottom pair. He's shocked, he says, "How did you call with that?" and got some "Wow's" from the rest of the table.

How did I do that? Combination of board texture, a possible read, and partially instinct. He either had what he had, or a hand like JJ. I was getting better than 3-to-1 on the $45 bet, and decided that there was at least a 25% chance he was bluffing: if he bluffs 25% of the time, a call here is exactly break-even; if he bluffs 26%, it's barely +EV.

This was the 2nd time I called him down light: on a mostly similar board just after he sat down, I was in position and called a flop bet and a river bet with pocket deuces; I was wrong that time (he'd made an odd raise with QT and hit a T on the turn - and checked it too).

I'm quite happy what this will do for my table image. Once they see this hand, I'm hoping they will be less likely to try to bluff me.

I've been playing a lot of poker lately. I play approx 8-14 hours/week (1 long session most Saturdays). 6 months ago if I had less than top pair on any board, I'd not have thought twice about folding. Not the case today: I use my loose/aggressive post-flop image and scare cards to make bets and raises, and I use my reads and poker instincts to make light calls. I'm not always right, and honestly I've not kept close enough tabs to know whether my light calls have been profitable or not. That would be hard to quantify anyway. It is fun when I'm right though :)