Small flush draw against a raise - HU high stakes NL
Thanks to HighStakesReport for the hand history.

Game type: 300/600 HU No Limit cash on Full Tilt Poker
Your image: Very Aggressive
Opponent’s image: Very aggressive, a top online cash pro who has been running bad lately
Your hand: 5♦6♦
This hand is taken from actual game play at the 300/600 NL holdem table at Full Tilt. This hand took place between Brian ’sbrugby’ Townsend and Ram Vaswani. You’ll be standing in for Ram Vaswani
You’ve been getting crushed by Brian for several hands in a row. He is playing a very aggressive game raising lots of pots on the flop and turn. Here he raises it to $1800 and you re-pop to $6000 with a medium suited connector. Brian calls and you flop a flush draw:
J♦8♦3♣
You decide to lead out for $10,200. Brian now raises you to $34,600. What’s your play?
This quiz is a bit of a golden oldie - to see how everyone responded a few months ago when the action was on Townsend’s side of the table: view the original quiz here
9.12.07 / 3am
varswani is one of my fave players but he has does get musch credit by a lot of pro’s (especially americans they dont seem to rate him). just seems to obv play pushin with a draw in this spot i chose Call and Lead. just like a do wen im makin a play with air, makes your hand just seem really strong and good players will pick up on it and will fold a lot of hands
9.12.07 / 6am
I think this is either a fold or a push.
This is very difficult as Brians range is very wide here, but his calling is shove range isnt. Oviously Brian wont keep betting if he is blufing so I odnt think calling with the intention of checking is a good idea.
We are letting him bet with better and if we feel we are ahead then we should push.
Because this is so thin, this looks like a shove.
9.12.07 / 7am
I opted to fold here. We’re really not getting the right price to hit our flush unless we know we are getting paid off when it hits. And, I’m not sure Townsend has a big enough hand to pay us off when the flush does hit.
The unfortunate thing about this hand, is that if we decide to play on, we will be playing for stacks without knowledge of where we stand.
If we call and hit, we’re probably only getting called by a hand that beats us.
If we call and miss and lead out, it may win the pot right there sometimes, but it will cost us about $75k to find out we’re beat and we’d then be pot committed to throw in our last $25k. So, if Townsend has a strong hand here, we will be putting in $100k behind. Obviously, if Townsend has a set or TPTK kind of hand, we will have outs, but we’d put in a ton of money behind.
If we call and miss and check, we really can’t like our spot if we face another big bet from Townsend. We’re essentially giving up on the hand if a diamond doesn’t hit. Well, we’re not getting anywhere near the right price to call and then check/fold when we miss.
We could raise here, but again, we’re committing our stack without knowing where we stand. Again, we could get Townsend to fold, but if he calls, there’s no question we’re in pretty bad shape.
Anyway, while a fold may be weak, we’ve only cost ourselves a little over $10k here and we still have most of our stack.
The only thing that I may like here is if we can call and pick up additional outs on the turn. Any 9,7,6,5,4, or 2 will either pair us or give us additional straight outs. If one of these cards hit, then I will feel much better about leading and calling a shove. (Obv the 9 would have had us drawing dead, but we don’t know that).
While there is some merit to calling here and leading the turn, I don’t like the idea of losing two full buy ins on a single hand where I could be way behind.
9.12.07 / 7am
some gud points in there gotta giv cred to varswani for pushin though mind u i know he loves to put the pressure on in those knda hands
9.12.07 / 11am
kind of deceptinve choices, if I am big blind, I can’t call and lead. I am trying not to call, and certainly not out of position. So with Fold or Push, I have enough money to be a threat, I would push.
9.12.07 / 1pm
horseshoer futility teaming beginners bulging programmers curtsies!tablet
9.12.07 / 3pm
Sorry, I see Heads up big blind can/will lead the flop.
I’m still pushing, but now its definitely going to be call and then push to more effectively sell that I hit the turn.
9.12.07 / 3pm
the amount of chips in the pot do not justify a call here. if he has top pair then you have a 32% chance of making your hand. i would at least need 4 more outs to make this call. say another player in middle position called. then i would be getting enough money for my draw. One trickey part about draws though is the turn. If they do have a top pair or 2 pair then they might bet enough to make you fold. So you in all realitly i only have 16 % of snaking this pot. In this hand i wouldn’t be sure if he was bluffing so i would call and check the turn depending on if i hit my hand or picked up a up and down straight draw.
9.12.07 / 6pm
I agree with the DHQ staff but with a caveat.
If an over card comes on the turn, take the lead with a substantial bet (about 50% of the time).
If an under card comes, check. If your opponent checks also, take the lead on the river (about 66% of the time).
9.12.07 / 6pm
It is important to note that Rams pre-flop reraise was substantial enough and could represent a big hand such as aces.
On further consideration, taking the lead on the turn really should work fairly often here.
With only one card to come, you could make a bet that is substantial enough that any draws are not price well enough to call mathematically. I think the bet has to be over 2/3 of the pot or $60,000.
Of course, I don’t want to presume that I can make that bet at those stakes even if it is the best option. I would suddenly realize that these are not just pieces of clay and likely misfire.
He may have tried to sell his hand as AA a little to soon but Ram knows what he is doing so he likely had some read on the player or his betting patterns to play it that way.

9.12.07 / 2am
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