Daily Hand Quiz

unfortunately, there’s no way I have the discipline to lay this down against an aggressive opponent, especially one who’s just recovering from a big loss.

realistically, there isn’t a whole lot you could be up against here. I count probably four possibilities:

1. complete air (obviously always a possibility. how likely is another question – i don’t think it’s that likely here, given the flat call preflop and flop)

2. decent draw. it’s extremely unlikely he’s got 57 or 25 for the made straight, so what’s much more probable here is a suited connector, like 78 of diamonds or spades. a double draw will make a move like this here a lot at an aggressive table.

3. weaker ace. not particularly likely, as i’d probably expect a raise on the flop from an ace that hit, and you’re probably only being called preflop by AQ, maybe AJ since villain is playing loose. this is basically your best case scenario, and i don’t really see it that often here.

4. and of course, the dreaded set. this has to smell at least a little bit like a set, given the preflop action. 44 and 66 are both hands that a mildly tilting player will call a big raise preflop, and the smooth call on the flop is consistent heads up. it’s a strong possibility here that can’t be discounted.

personally, i think a call is justifiable here at 2-1. i’m not particularly surprised to see that he had the set, but then again i look back at the hand again and realize there’s probably no way i could lay it down. if you can, more power to you.

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This strongly looks to me like a slowplayed set, I am folding

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well, the whole “thinking a long time” stuff had me snookered. I put him on A-5. He thought a long time about calling a bet with a crappy kicker, and then the 3 on the turn gave him an open-ended possibility so he took a shot. Another possibility was A-3 where the 3 gave him 2 pair.

The slowplayed set would have nailed me.

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Bad gut feeling about this one all around. I’ll fold and push when I’m sure I’ve got the goods!

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The key line for me was “He’s played a little loose since then, but nothing seriously out of line”. Sounded like he was mixing up his play and looking for the opportunity he got. I had to think for awhile before I voted fold.

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You have to fold here. There’s no way at this high stakes game someone in the BB will call pre-flop raises with A-rag or even 5/7 or 2/5 that would complete a straight on the board. So he’s not betting with two pair or weaker ace and there’s no chance for a straight. He has shown he’s strong both on the flop and with the raise on the turn. It can only be a set or complete air. He’s not going to be raising with a gut shot & flush draw. Something like 7/8 suited has a few outs, (any five, any diamond etc.) but the odds aren’t right for a raise. And since nothing suggests this player would bluff this way, call it a set and cut your loses.

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When I read this how this hand played till now, the BB clearly knows we have paired the Ace, the way we played this, it looks like 90% of the time we have AK, AQ or even AA. His range is a lot wider, but if you read it carefully, we scream that we have an ace and something. Even knowing this, he wants to carefully think about it, and then put himself all in. I would fold slowly, but fairly confident that I was beat.

And if we did have AA, he won’t mind losing set over set.

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Fisher is correct.
Remember, if you keep folding hands like this – you’ll never make any real money, and will be bled out over time.

Great players take stands – you’ll never win what you don’t put in the middle, and there are a lot worse positions you could be in than this one.

Also keep in mind that he should never have called the pre-flop action with 4-4 in the first place. He got lucky and hit that 12.5% set chance and got lucky again when the flush didn’t hit on the turn. He should have folded preflop – should have folded when you bet the turn, he won this one, but that play is a recepie for huge loss over time.

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I folded figuring a flopped set or a A-Rag like A-6 or a D flush draw. Even on a draw thats alot of money to call just to get lucky. If it was a rainbow flop Id be more willing to call.

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I folded figuring a flopped set or a A-Rag like A-6 or a D flush draw. Even on a draw thats alot of money to call just to get lucky. If it was a rainbow flop Id be more willing to call.

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I voted to fold.

I respectfully disagree with Fisher and Joe B.

You’re absolutely correct that you can’t win what you don’t put in the middle, but if you can’t fold one pair for your entire buy in, you’re going to lose a lot more than you win.

Let’s look at ranges: DB raises under the gun; huge range is possible here considering that he’s also the cutoff. We re-raise from the SB? We want to play a big pot out of position against DB? Our range is really AQ+ (probably not even AQ) and QQ+. And, the BB flat calls when there’s action back to the preflop raiser who could re-raise again. The BB cannot flat call here without a very strong speculative hand. He is getting implied odds for a set (as long as DB doesn’t 4-bet) so a pp isn’t out of the question. The only other hand I can see possibly calling is something like medium suited connectors or 1-gappers, but even then, that is generally pretty much spewage against a raise and a re-raise. A pp makes the most sense here.

The flop hits our range pretty hard. Anyone should be afraid of a hand like AK here and yet our opponent flat calls. The flat call is somewhat puzzling. Would the BB call preflop with a hand that makes a nuts flush? KQdd? KJdd? I don’t think so. And, any combo draw would probably re-raise here–such as 75dd or 53dd. And, I don’t see him calling with any of this preflop. Would he have called our preflop raise and this bet with a hand like AQ? AQ facing a raise and a re-raise preflop? Again, I don’t think so.

The only hand that really makes sense is a set, either 44 or 66. He sure the hell doesn’t have 64, A6, or A4. Or, is it possible that he’s just floating here with a hand like 99-JJ? I really don’t think so. Ok, would our opponent flat call with a set in this spot? What makes the most sense? Well, the standard ABC play here with a set is to raise and protect against the obvious flush. But, does he really have to worry? I’d say no. We didn’t reraise preflop with KQdd either so we can’t be on a flush draw. By flat calling, I think he makes a little bit of a calculated gamble:

1) that we’ve got a strong ace and will bet again on the turn.
2) that no diamond hits the turn (about 16% of the time) which would force us to fire again to protect our hand.
3) that we will feel pot committed after another big bet on the turn.

If he re-raises here on that board, it clearly defines that we either have a set or a combo draw. It would put us in a tough spot, but if we didn’t have an ace, we would have to fold (KK for example) and he would lose any additional value.

So, I really think that a set makes the most sense here.

Since we do have decent odds to make the call, we need to make sure that we’re going to win at least 1/3 of the time. Well, against a set, we’re drawing dead (0% wins), against some weird (and oddly played) combo draw, that may have hit the turn, we’re either dead or a decent favorite, and even though a hand like AQ might be in his range where we’re a big favorite, I’m still going to go with a fold here. I think we’re dead just way too often to make a call here.

If we have a read that our opponent has been making a ton of odd bluffs and huge all in moves, eventually you need to look him up on a hand like this, but nothing is described that makes me think that he’s been overly crazy.

Anyway, I like a fold here. You’re right you can’t win what you don’t put in the middle, but keep in mind that every dollar not lost is also a dollar won.

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If an UTG raises 2x BB, then we raise 4x that UTG raise, generally we have shown the table we have a fairly narrow range, especially since “You have been pretty quiet and have yet to be involved in any large pots.” We didn’t care too much for the UTG raise, so we quadrupled it as a re-raise. So what would the table think we have?

Anyways, an Ace comes on the flop, we lead and our opponent, who is set up here to seem to be steaming “thinks and then calls”. OK, now if we had KK, QQ, or JJ, we would likely get a bit cautious here. BUT NO, since we act first, guess what we do, we again “lead for $12,800 into about 20k.”

So the pot is getting pretty big now, and WE are clearly showing we like that Ace. Just as the Anonymous post said. So, now, our supposedly steaming opponent, “thinks, requests time, and then raises you all in for about 38k more”.

I won’t call this ever unless I KNOW this guy makes monster bluffs. He is not really worried about an ACE calling him. Which is EXACTLY what the play of our hand has said to him. AND which we are getting fairly good odds to call for anyways.

Calling here loses your stack 80% of the time.

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It’s a fold. Always think about what your opponent puts you on. In this case, he put hero on an A with a good kicker, so he was looking to get value out of his set, not blow him off the hand.

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