I'll open it up with a statement and an example. Statement: I'm inclined to slowplay these things a lot, and I'm not completely happy with this.
Now an example from a few days ago: I limp with KQ and the flop comes AQQ (2 diamonds, I believe it was, but the suit doesn't really matter). I'm in MP here and just bet out something like 2/3 of the pot, getting one caller. Now comes the clincher!!! The turn is another Q. Ok, no way I can be beat at this point (AQ did worry me a bit with my KQ, but I doubt I could have laid it down, just wasn't sure how hard I was going to play it before the turn). I check, and my opponent bets half the pot. I call. Now the river brings the third flush card. I basically try to sell my hand for about half the pot, which is now pretty decent, and I figured that the A, which I assume my opponent has, will still call that one. What happens? Believe it or not, my opponent moves in, and I obviously call. And even more insane was the fact that this guy was betting his flush on the river!!! With THAT board??? No way I had less than a boat there. Oh, well, I'm not complaining.
Anyhow, in the "the nuts" category I'm pretty much putting any hand where there's no reasonable way to get outdrawn--AXs and you flop the flush, AA or KK and you flop top set with a rainbow board, stuff like that.
I guess what I do like about slowplaying there in tournaments is that you can consistently win a decent amount without risking a fold all the way around. But I do think another option is to sizeably overbet the pot, like double or so--maybe even all-in, although it's just awfully rare that raising to, say, $100 on a $6 pot gets any callers (the rare case that it does might actually be more profitable in the long-run, however).
The more reasonable options in my mind are:
1) checking in the hope that someone will catch up or bluff at it.
2) make a weak-ish bet (1/3 to 1/2 of the pot) with the same intention and allowing possible drawers to stay in while building the pot.
3) bet pot. this to my mind "looks" more like you have a solid hand that needs protecting. On the flop in my example, I would generally assume that someone is betting a hand like AX (including AJ, etc.) rather than the trip queens.
4) sizeably overbet the pot (maybe 1.5 to 2 times pot) in the hope of looking like a bluff. This is certainly a good start on getting someone's whole stack involved IF they take the bait on the flop (in my example, I wasn't sure I had the stone cold nuts until the turn). On a suited board, it might also look more like you have just the A of the suit rather than the made flush, not sure about that. I generally don't do this because I feel like my table image is usually quite tight, and I hate to waste my monster by folding the fiel. But it's probably worth trying against some LAG-ish opponents who like to throw chips around. For a tight player, a bet like that is also "out of character," so there might be a decent chance, I think, that they'll take the bait if they have some kind of hand.
Anyhow, I think which option to choose certainly will have a lot to do with the particular table, but I'd be interested to hear how others approach this kind of thing. One thing worth noting on some of these, while I do call them "the nuts": even if you have AXs on a suited board, a set might play you and CAN realistically outdraw you with the full house. So, you do have some problems in situations like that: Is your opponent calling or raising your bets with a suited connector? Or have you been outdrawn if the board pairs?
Objectively, I wonder whether just sticking with a pot-sized bet shouldn't be the rule rather than the exception. A question that one might also ask (say, with a hand like top set with KK or AA) is: Do you have the deck crippled?
I guess that's really the decisive issue here. If so, maybe indeed check and let the field catch up or bluff. But if it's possible that someone does have a bettable hand (or draw), go ahead and bet pot.Statistics: Posted by Aisthesis — Sun May 01, 2005 10:22 pm
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