Daily Hand Quiz

Check-call for me personally.

We have a ton of showdown value here. Our top pair good kicker is well disguised. Checking makes gives our opponent the opportunity to bet a wide range of hands we beat including weaker aces, second pair hands and missed draws representing the flush.

We do miss out on extracting value from players with weak aces that would check through because of the made flush but might call a thin value bet.

I think this missed value is outweighed by the times our opponent will bluff at this river card. As said the ace is disguised so the queen becomes an overcard to the board as well as completing the flush. Plenty of players will take a stab at stealing the pot when checked to in this spot.

The other reason not to lead is that we really don’t want our lead to come back at us raised.

Check – fold: Too tight.
Lead – call: Too loose.
Lead – fold: Too weak.
Check – call: Just right.

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This is messed up…. why raise at the turn when u didnt raise the flop???? esp when ur opp got position on you… u have to raise on the flop, otherwise you have to commit to your check on the flop and check the turn to keep the money low because of your bad position… Anyway,,, on the river,,, Id bet out and put just a little bit more than my previous bet on the turn.. that way my opponent will either fold, or raise big when he has something or just call (and win or lose, its an amount i dont care much to lose, and if i win, its a great pot) free money to play poker at: pokerstrateg y.ccom/u2YAUB

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I agree.
In this spot and regard to how this hand was played, check-call is the best option.
I wouldnt play AJ like this on flop and turn whit straight and flush draw out there and against two opponents, but if i decide to play hand like in this example i ll defintly check-call river, because in most cases ill induce bluff with checking.
I dont like option leading with bet. Hand is played very strangly and opponent might ( but not so often ) re-raise and then problem starts cause in that situation its little bit more possible that he has stronger hand then he is bluffing. I dont like that situation and to be forced to fold better hand ( specially if he shoves ).

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Voted check-call. Perhaps the hero wanted to disguise the A after the flop, but don’t like the lack of a c-bet, nor the light turn bet. That may have kept the v alive, so a lead may get raised. Imo there is a good chance the v has a flush based on the turn call (vs. a raise); believe the v would have raised with an A here.

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Lead-fold for me. I think villain is checking behind here too often to not get value for what is probably the best hand. We played it slow, now we have him on the line when it looks like he’ll be calling and we’re going to let him get out of it for free? The only reason you check the flop is to disguise the ace…..now he’s calling because he doesnt think you have the ace. Go get that money!

If he raises, thats a different story….could be a bluff, but we’re probably beat and its best to lay down.

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The lesson here…if you raise, hit top pair, and the flop potentially gives someone a four-flush, DON’T CHECK IT! Horribly played, but hey, I guess that’s what makes for a good quiz, eh?

Checking the flop on a drier board might make sense to disguise the A and perhaps induce a 2nd pair bluff, but here, it’s awful.

The call on the turn could be a flush draw, but it could also be 2nd pair or something. I don’t think opponent has a baby straight, as they’d likely be wary of the spades and raise you.

In any case, a lead here sets opponent up for a good bluff. We’ve misplayed the hand a bit, so check-call and try to minimize the damage.

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Checking the flop was a mistake, and betting approximately $0 on the turn was a mistake. I would not have played the hand this way, but now that I’m here I like to bet/fold the river. We’re likely to extract more value out of Ace-rag or a medium pocket pair and we’ll lose the same amount to a flush as we would check/calling without risking the villain checking behind.

Next time be more aggressive on the flop and turn, though.

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samo2 Reply:
July 22nd, 2009 at 2:20 pm

John,

A couple of questions: Don’t you think that Ax would have raised the light turn? Do you think a medium pair will with an A and Q on board?

Thx, samo

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Lead-Call

At $5/10 cash medium stakes, the players shouldn’t be to noobish. If my opponent had 2 pair he would have reraised the turn, and my turn bet was so small I don’t think I can exclude pair with straight draw, middle pairs, flush draws, weak aces from my opponent’s range. It would have been nice if Staff had included which called and which had folded in a more definate manner as the standard range for F’s position is much wider than E’s. For the purposes of this response I will assume from the ordering that E called first and F folded. With the Ace of spades and the Queen of spades out on the board, the number of hands for which it is standard to call an EP raiser hands from LP that would have a flush is severely trimmed. With the line of the hand I bet for value on aces with inferior kickers. If I am raised, since I have been unable to discern any pattern from the strength of my opponent’s holdings based on his lines ie raise, call, fold, resulting in his ‘random’ image, and I have a decent hand, I’ll call to pick off bluffs and if its not a bluff, then at least I have some information that didn’t cost me my stack.

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I don’t get the bet size on the turn but don’t mind the check on the flop as much as some of the posters, just as a way to mix up play now and then. The issue is that if we choose to play the flop in this way the turn bet should have been at least 2/3 to 3/4 the pot since we didn’t get any donk bets out of anybody. That said, I think it’s hard for them to put us on a decent ace at this time. The crime was letting the flush draws draw two times and not charging enough when we finally decided to lead. Back to post flop for a sec, it isn’t always so bad to make it look like we don’t like the ace on the flop, especially when we draw a bet from A9 or A10 or a suited low Ace in the process. A better ace was likely to have raised preflop so this isn’t such a horrible play in that view. We faded a spade once but letting it go twice at a horrible price leaves us in a bad spot.

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