Message Board : Mastering the thin river value bet

A few weeks ago on this site I read a post that Ed made about beginning-intermediate NLHE players not making enough thin value bets on the river.  He gave some sort of example that, to the best of my recollection, was something like holding second pair of nines-ace kicker in position on a board with a small pair after the turn gets checked through.    Ed said not only that he would bet, expecting to get called by hands such as a weaker nine, 77 or 88.   What really stuck with me was Ed's assurance that, even if his opponent check/raised him on the river, he would be sufficiently confident he was ahead call the raise!   (That doesn't mean he'd always be ahead, but that he'd be ahead in enough occasions and the c/r would be a bluff on enough occasions that his call would be profitable.)

Well, I want to test my understanding in practice, so here's a hand that came up yesterday where I tried to apply this lesson.

Gold Strike $1-2 NLHE

My stack: $300
Opponent's stack / effective stack: $180

Relevant image/read:   I'm an extremely tight player, but I doubled up to $300 by check/raising a huge combo draw on the flop, so perhaps I'm perceived as somewhat tricky or aggressive.   Opponent seems like perhaps a somewhat competent, somewhat deceptive player.   But I haven't really seen him play enough to make much of a judgment.

I'm one off the button with AQ offsuit.

Preflop:

4 or so limp, I raise to $10, button folds, 5 call the raise.

I should have stopped and estimated carefully, but I was thinking that I needed to aim for the bigger SPRs over 13 and closer to 20.   Of course my raise was the wrong size to do that!   I was thinking that a “standard” $15 (yes, onilne players, 7.5 BBL is very standard for this game) getting called once or twice would end up with a bad SPR of 6-10.   But this was a dumb raise size because I should have known it would get crazy action.

Pot: $60
SPR: 5 (less against shorter stacks)

I can commit if I flop top pair and the board isn't too scary, but I'm against a big field so SPR=5 isn't as safe for commitment as it might be heads-up.

Flop - Qs Ts 3x

Checked to me, I bet $40 - 1 opponent calls

Willing to conditionally commit as long as a 3rd spade doesn't hit.   (An A, K, 9, or 8 might be a troubling straight card but I can't assume every draw is out there.)

Turn - 3s (Pot: $140)

Opponent checks, I check behind.

Pot control.   If he has a flush, I want to minimize his win and give him a tough value-betting decision on the river.   I will probably call a small river bet if a fourth flush card doesn't come.

River - blank

Opponent checks, I bet $50

Reasoning: He doesn't appear to have made a flush, because calling 2/3 pot then checking two streets for no value would be a highly irrational way to play a flush.   Therefore I'm betting for value, expecting to get called by a lower queen, ten, or JJ.

Good value bet or not?

I think it's a good bet too against most opponents.  If your opponent is tricky and will checkraise bluff on the river or varies his play routinely, I'd be less comfortable betting here…

- HJ

I think you have to call here.  4:1 on your money with two pair, top kicker is too good to pass on.  Actually had a hand similiar to this one happen a few weeks ago… I had Ah-Qh, board was As-10s-3h-8s-10c (in that order), hand had played out simliar to yours.  On the river there was about $130 in the pot, opponent had $130 I had $150.  He checked, I bet $50, he check raised all in.  I called, he turned over A-3 for a loser…

He was a pretty bad player though, which I also knew from the start of the hand…

- HJ