wow did i play this hand poorly . perhaps its bc i have not much experience with this specific situation, but i do now and hopefully will not forget it for the future. after the hand, i thought about it and came to what i feel is a perfect play for this situation. let me know what ya'll think.


tourny. 45 people. 29 left. blinds of 100. u have 2500. u are dealt Ac8c in the bb. all fold to button, who limps. sb folds. u check.

button has 3300 in chips. u have 2500.

flop comes Jc-7c-3c, giving u nut flush. u check. button bets 500 into 250 pot. how do you extract the most value?




i am interested in your opinions. i feel i have come up with one specific way to play this hand that will extract most chips in the long run. i will be posting my thoughts later tonight.

I think it really depends on your opponent, is he LAG,TAG, Weak Tight, etc.

I would say I smooth call his flop bet regardless of the opponent, a reraise might push him out of the pot and you want him to stay right to the end.

Then on the turn it really depends on what type of player your playing against, a LAG player might take a stab at the pot again, if he thinks you dont have the flush or a he is redrawing to the second nuts. (which in this case I think your best bet is to smooth call again)

I think the best you can hope for here is for your opponent to keep stabbing at it and you call him down, maybe raise on the river looking for a call, or at least if he folds you dont have to show it. The only other scenario where your gonna get all your money in is where someone hits the second nuts and doesnt give you credit for an ace.

completely depends on the type of opponent

stop and go... it's good to cause your opponent confusion

I push.

He's betting like he has a made hand doesn't want you to catch the flush. If you push, I doubt he puts you on a made flush. A made flush would most likely call just call his bet.

It's all player dependant, of course.

ok, lets assume you joined the table 8 hands previous and have no previous knowledge of your opponents

Its also highly dependent on the board cards.

Without knowing them and with no reads, I would assume he was making a stab at a rag flop poossibly with middle pair. A check on the turn is probably not going to elicit a bet unless the turn hits him, but I would try to represent bottom pair or top pair bad kicker. If its another rag on the flop I would lead out with a small bet..maybe 1/4 pot. If its a threat card on the turn I would hope it hit him and check again. On the river you definitely want to lead out. How much again depends on board cards and stacks. If he doesnt have a calling hand he isnt betting into you either, figuring that you cant call unless you have him beat.

You are risking that he flopped a set, and if the board pairs you may be outplaying yourself, but if the goal is max chips period thats one line that may do it.

lets assume the button does not have a big hand, like twopair, a set , or a made flush. bc in those situations u should prolly just pushallin, but with only twoplayers, its more likely he doesnt have those hands.

------so i figure to put the button on one of two hands
1) he is stone cold bluffing
2) he is semibluffing, with a high club, or maybe a pair and club

------and there are two ways for me to BET this hand.
OPTION 1) slowplay, letting him bet every street, finally raising river
OPTION 2) bet the hand , maybe a small raise on flop, but most likely a small bet on turn and on river that he has trouble folding to

so using the above, i see four different ways this hand can play out

SCENARIO A-1
if i BET OPTION 2, and he is stone cold bluffing, he likely will not put one more chip into the pot.

SCENARIO A-2
if i BET OPTION 2, and he was semibluffing, he most likely will have to call my small bets unless he makes a great fold , or another club falls and all he had was a pair w/ no club

SCENARIO B-1
if i BET OPTION 1, and he was stone cold bluffing, then there is a chance he will bluff on fourth, or even fifth, thinking that is his only way to take down the pot, especially if he thinks i may have one club and no club falls.

SCENARIO B-2
if i BET OPTION 1, and he was semibluffing, he still may bet small thinking he is value betting his hand, or he may shut it down.

given these four scenario's, since B-1/2 both give me the chance of recieving more chips from him, while scenario's A-1/2 only give me one chance of recieving chips from him, i would have to say that checking to him all the way is the route that should be taken to maximize value.

this is of course assuming there is no way to tell whether he is stonecold bluffing or semibluffing, which is an easy assumption since its online.

only if either

a. he's absolutely horrible
b. you're absolutely horrible

if he's really really bad, he might overlook that you smoth called a 2x pot sized bet oop and continue betting anything other than the nuts (and since you have the nuts, well... i doubt he's betting)

if you're really really bad, then he might atually believe that you're calling this w/ just a naked a or some other weak hand. then he'd continue betting.

either way, one of you (or both) need to be horrible for this play to be the most EV.

most likely, if he has a small flush, two pair, stone cold bluff, big club, it'll go c/c on the turn

if he has a set, you might get him to go all in

if he doesnt improve, he'll fold to any decent sized river bet
if he improves to a fullhouse, well he's getting all your chips


that brings up a good question... what's the buy-in?

yeah its a small buy-in. but dont act like checking to the bluffer is horrible. u know how some people get when they bluff and you keep checking to them. its like crack to em, sometimes they jsut have to keep bettting at it.