Gus's play of the pocket 99

[bobby rooney]

Anyone else think he played his set of 99's horribly? I think it is especially bad for an extremely aggressive player to slow down when they have a big hand. They simply don't need to slow down, since their opponents often will not give them credit for a big hand anyway. I can't remember the exact flop, but there were both straight and flush possibilities in a multiway pot, how can a check on the flop be justified?

[Ionphore]

So? He often goes against the grain of standard +EV/-EV situations...
A player like that is not going to always make the correct play in your eyes or someone elses eyes. Only the right play in his own eyes. Who really cares if it was a mistake or not? Pro's make plenty of misread/mistakes. Sorry I am just kind of tired of these post saying someone on tv made a mistake. I personally don't have alot of faith in tv poker these days other then for entertainment value...

[bobby rooney]

I find it interesting to analyze TV hands, although I am well aware that the truth of poker is often contained in the hands they DO NOT show. I'm not one of the Gus haters, in fact I usually like his play. I think his play of this hand illustrates a mistake some aggressive players make of slowing down with big hands. If you are constantly pounding on pots with bets, you should often continue to do so even with a monster, because your opponents expect you to do it whether you have a hand or not. If anything, slowing down will make your opponents suspicious because it seems so out of character.

[durron597]

The announcers had said, though, that Gus had tightened up early on in this episode. I would have thought that he was trying to portray a changed gears image to the other pros, so that his checking actually meant weakness.

Though I still don't like the play on such a draw heavy board.