O/8 hand ,Man, did I ever butcher this one!

Dropped into WEM (West Edmonton Mall) room last night about 9 and sit into the 4-8 O/8 game. Now normally this game can be accurately described as populated by some of the weakest, loosest O/8 players on the planet, but for some reason last night the boys had taken their aggression pills and the raises were flying! Still lots of callers on every hand; in fact, some of these guys are more LIKELY to call a raised hand than one that is not. We were usually playing 8 or 9 handed, and if I took a flop, that often meant a Family Pot. If I sat out, they fought it out among themselves.


Now, I understand fully that this type of game really stresses the bankroll. Variance is high, I repeat, variance IS high. But the rewards can be astounding. One guy, a good friend, was running all over the game when I sat in, and had about 6 or 7 racks on the table. But, I knew that was only temporary, as he is just an action junky, and I knew it would be only a matter of time.


I am in the SB with this holding: Ac-2c-4s-Jh. Certainly not the O/8 hand of all time, but WAY ahead of the average collection these guys have to enter the pot. Only 1 player folds, action back to me in the SB. I raise. Now some may disagree with this raise, and they may be right, but someone once told me on this very site, that when your hand rates to we well above average, and the players will chase you down with 2nd, 3rd, and 4th nut draws ( as in this game) to jack it up when you feel your hand is worthy. I know I am going to be first to act from here on out, but I was willing to take the risk. Naturally, everyone calls, and 8 of us take the flop of Td-4d-4h.


Not the worst flop imaginable, but certainly not the best, either. I bet out. Reasons: I want to find out right away if I might take some heat, and I figure betting is better than reacting to someone else's bet. Anyone disagree, thoughts?


Fold, fold, my buddy calls, and this might be anything from a pocket pair, to lord knows what, but from what I have seen of his play, is most likely a runner-runner low draw. Seriously. Next player raises, and this guy will make all sorts of weird raises, but will also of course raise for value. Everyone else folds, and the action came back to me.


Now here is my first part of the butchery. I make the horrible play of just calling this raise. If I am going to play, play. Either re-pop this guy NOW with my A-4 and see if he really does have TT, or get out. I suppose he could have the less likely T-4 combo, but as I said, this was the "there are no bad hands, just bad flops" crowd, so anything was possible. Even if I DO get re-raised here, I can maybe still peel one off on the turn and try to catch a runner-runner low to save the day. I have made the pot big, and should be doing all I can to win it. What are the votes here? After my call, it goes fold, fold, my friend calls, and three of us left for the turn.


Turn card comes a black deuce. I check (go ahead and flame away), check, and the flop raiser bets again. Now comes the 2nd part of the mess. I have made my hand pretty much as good as it's going to get, my low is now counterfeited, but like one of the sheep, I meekly call this turn bet. The third player of course calls. The moment I wimped out, I regretted it. Once again, I failed to protect my hand, and gave LHO a 1 BB call for his presumed low draw. But, I am also thinking, what if I checkraise, and the other guy re-raises? Would I have the courage of my convictions to lay it down then and there? Well, I admitted I screwed this hand up, and I was taking the path of least resistance and decided to go call/call. Yecch.


River card is an offsuit 8. NOW my buddy to my left comes out betting! Damn, his runner runner low got there! ( or so I am thinking). Now the other guy just calls! Well, now my thinking shifts gears. Is he smoothcalling to trap an overcall or an ill-advised raise? Am I the best high here? Well, at this point, I can close the action, and despite my thinking that I have the flop raiser beat, I just call one more time.


LHO turns over A-8-8-7, with the 8d7d in there. Eights' full, and his A-7 low is about 58th nut, or something. Other guy mucks. I get sick. My buddy scoops up this nice pot, and I KNOW I have mangled this hand beyond all recognition. You might ask, "How can he get there?" Well, two things. One, as I said, he craves the action, and will chase down anything. And two, I let him get there cheaply.


Lots of errors on this hand, to be sure. Not afraid to admit it. All comments appreciated, and please don't be gentle.


PS Oh, in case you wonder, when the game broke at 3:30 am, my friend has burned back 6 out of the 7 racks,and I had dug my way out from -$150 to +$140. Not much of an hourly earn, but an earn just the same.

Ac-2c-4s-Jh is a nice hand but with a "flop of Td-4d-4h" With 8 taking the flop I would of just checked here. Your low chances are not great and your high chances are probably about the same I would figure. Those five players that dropped probably had 2nd 3rd and 4th best lows but know your faced with a A2s high flush probably with another Diamond or someone with a overpair and a decent low. In this case you didn't see the third players hand probably had a busted hand and decided to call with two pair. Anyway I would think that it wouldn't be a bad idea just to drop here. But I'm not sure but if I stayed I would try and play it cheaply. Obviously you weren't getting your friend out with five racks and an overpair. The other guy didn't seem like he was going anywhere either. As far as eliminating anyone else by raising here I don't think it would of worked.


Just a tuff hand to play. It seems to me these are my biggest losers with these type of flops. Maybe just to suck it up and drop when someone bets on the flop and play the next hand is the better way to go.


Maybe someone will kick in with some numbers and shoot my whole theory to bits which is fine by me.


Paul

I'm not sure I have any comments to make, but I've got some questions. In the games I play, I raise with your hand before the flop, and then sail it into the muck when the first three are turned.


{b}Not the worst flop imaginable, but certainly not the best, either. I bet out. Reasons: I want to find out right away if I might take some heat, and I figure betting is better than reacting to someone else's bet. Anyone disagree, thoughts? [/b]


I don't get this at all. What do you want to find out about taking some heat. Your bet indicates you don't want to check call this hand down. You bet and get raised. Was this the information you were looking for? It doesn't seem like his raise revealed too much information. Worse, you're back to reacting to his raise, which is what you were trying to avoid by betting in the firat place! I think you should have had a plan as to what you were going to do if you got raised before you made the bet. And the plan should have been to fold, or re-pop it or whatever.


Another plan would have been to go for a check raise here. Might have bought a free bet on 4th st. if you were planning to ride this hand down.


Now here is my first part of the butchery. I make the horrible play of just calling this raise. If I am going to play, play. Either re-pop this guy NOW with my A-4 and see if he really does have TT, or get out.


I like your thinking, but are you sure that re-raising will tell you if he has TT here? I have my doubts.


My feeling is that you want to kick yourself for playing this one, but you're not sure where to land the blow.

remember when the pot is big early it pays to knock out anyone that has a chance. this was a big pot early so it would pay to knock out your buddy. if you fall against 4,ten or ten ten so be it. most times against loose people you have the best hand with good redraws here so id push it until i was convinced he had me.

i would have lost two more bets on the end though as i would have raised thinking i had the high and would split with the low or the remote chance i could knock out a bad low and win it all.

I just can't understand all these posters saying that T44 is a bad/indifferent flop for A24J. You're ahead of everything except TT or T4 for heaven's sake. What were you trying to catch so that you'd be prepared to bet, just 356 444 or JJ2? The fact that there is a flush draw doesn't mean too much since a number of the cards which make the flush (A,2,3,5,6,7,8,J of diamonds) also fill you up or give you a solid low draw, and even if a flush comes on 4th street the person who has it can't make too much action on a paired board.


In addition, the backdoor low is quite valuable in a big pot like this. You're 5 or 6 to 1 against to make it, but there are already 16 small bets out there if I understand the post correctly. Note that if your low gets counterfeited, you will necessarily have a full house!


So I would say that you should raise and reraise the flop (if it becomes clear that you're beat you can fold or just try to make your backdoor low really cheaply). You should try to get out all the other backdoor lows so that you own that end of the pot, and you really really must get out all the overpairs, as the result of the hand illustrates (although from the sound of it the player with A887 would have stayed in anyway).


I'm sorry, but people who think that you should surrender this flop for a bet or two must be incapable of playing anything that's not the nuts.


Oh no!! Not again!

The flop raiser had the other four, he told me after the hand. Don't know what his kicker was to justify his raise on the flop, but it was obviously no better than my Ace. And he didn't have T-4, either.

Thanks for the comments, Phat.


You are absolutely right, I should have planned ahead as to what I would do if I was raised on this flop. In retrospect, and what made be most mad at myself, was just calling the raise rather than either bailing out or re-popping him. One thing I didn't mention, and maybe should have, was that most of these players, and this one guy in particular, would have waited until the turn to raise if he did indeed hold pocket T's. I know he should be raising to drive out any runner-runner low draws if he did flop the nut shack, but that's just not how these guys play. They think of it in terms of a HE game, and would slowplay until they were absolutely sure on the river they couldn't lose. So, as perverse as it may sound, this guy's raise on the flop was a clear tell that he DIDN'T have TT. So now, it's even more clear that I should have re-raised on the flop to get it heads-up if possible. If my friend sticks around with his trash, well, I can't help that. I just felt after the hand I didn't give myself the best chance here.

If you can put the guy off of TT by his raise, it makes much more sense to me. One more question: Are there any situations where you have a high hand on the flop and and delay raising 'til a low card hits 4th street so the low draws will chase?

You are understating how bad they play. LOL

Not with these guys. In fact, even if I flop quad's, I will bet the hand right out if there is so much as one low card on the deck. They are going to chase runners anyway, so might as well start the meter running. And if there was a preflop raise, I start betting and raising ASAP even with the current nuts.