Posted 14 November 2005 - 07:33 AM
I've seen a lot of players make this type of bet/call play when they are drawing to a flush or open-ended straight as a modified free card play. With two opponents on the flop (assuming he has a flush draw), his bet (1) puts him in the driver's seat, (2) builds a pot if he hits his hand, and (3) disguises the fact that he's playing a draw so that you are less likely to think he's got the flush if it hits. When one folds, the other raises, and his flush card doesn't hit the turn, he has to play slightly more defensively. However, he can't just check-call or he runs the risk of you making a bet that will price him off his draw. For example, if you make a 1/2 pot bet, he would only be getting 3-1 on a hand when the odds against him hitting are 4-1, which makes it a mistake for him to call unless he is convinced he can make that up on the river if he hits. To avoid this problem, some players will make a bet on the turn like he did to slow you down and keep you from pricing him out of chasing his draw. He makes a negligible bet of about 1/9 the pot. While the bet has no real chance of winning him the pot there, it slowed you down. Rather than making a "standard" raise of 1/2 to 2/3 the pot, you made a much smaller raise based on his bet. The primary problem that I see with only raising to 8 on the turn is that you are giving him odds to call if he's drawing to a stronger hand. With his bet and your raise, the pot is up to $31.75 and it's only 5.50 to him, which equates to about 6-1 pot odds plus any money he can squeeze out of you on the river if he hits. If he's drawing to a flush (very possible) or straight (unlikely), he's getting great odds to see the river and should absolutely try to suck out on you. I agree with pokerplayer24 that you should have raised more on the turn to price out a draw. If you raise him half to two-thirds the pot, he's making a mistake if he chases that draw. With $23.75 in the pot after his bet, I'd make it another $15 to see the river. If he calls, he's getting less than 3-1 odds when the odds are 4-1 against him hitting his draw. Given the way the hand played out, there is a very good chance that he was playing a flush draw and made his hand on the river. I'd check behind rather than risk running into a check-raise that would put you to a very difficult decision.