detecting a continuation bet?

[BelfastTheCat]

PP 30+3 NLHE MTT, still only halfway through the first hour, no reads, i had just gotten moved to this table.

With decent position I felt I could call his smallish raise and play the flop as it came. My instinct screamed AK, however after the villian fired nearly a pot sized bet on the flop I thought for awhile and decided to lay it down.

I fear that a large percentage of the time with a flop like this the villian has missed, and i really have the best hand... did I have any other options in ways to play this?

o reraise preflop? - that seems like risking alot of chips.

o not get involved in the first place - that might be a good idea -- nothing invested yet, no chance for 8:1 odds for set value (unless he hits and then the implied odds are worth it)

how would some of the wiser members of the audience played this?
-belfast

Party Poker No-Limit Hold'em Tourney, Big Blind is t30 (10 handed) converter (http://www.selachian.com/tools/bisonconverter/hhconverter.cgi)

BB (t2300)
UTG (t1025)
UTG+1 (t1020)
UTG+2 (t2305)
MP1 (t465)
MP2 (t625)
Hero (t870)
CO (t2950)
Button (t720)
SB (t890)

Preflop: Hero is MP3 with 9/images/graemlins/spade.gif, 9/images/graemlins/heart.gif.
<font color="#666666">4 folds</font>, <font color="#CC3333">MP2 raises to t75</font>, Hero calls t75, <font color="#666666">3 folds</font>, BB calls t45.

Flop: (t240) J/images/graemlins/heart.gif, 3/images/graemlins/spade.gif, 6/images/graemlins/diamond.gif <font color="#0000FF">(3 players)</font>
BB checks, <font color="#CC3333">MP2 bets t225</font>, Hero folds, BB folds.

Final Pot: t465

[Dawdy]

Pair of 9's.. needs to be played stronger preflop.
You arent getting the pot odds to call. Raise or fold.
You are unlikely to improve while AK, AQ and AJ .. infact AT and any other combination above 99 can improve and beat you. Push the weaker drawers out. Hope the flop is below 9 or you trip up.
Calling wastes money... yes once in a while u throw away a pair and see a third on the flop.. but how many times has that happened vs how many pairs have you been dealt? Like many hole cards, a middle pair looks good until u see the flop /images/graemlins/blush.gif)

Sooo I think u did the right thing in folding, I would expect the raiser to have a pair of Jacks and wants to push out the AK, AQ ect drawers who have nothing.

Dawdy

[paulish]

my 5cents, regarding the pre-flop play...

This is a question of how to respond to a mini-raise.

MP2 opens with a mini-raise of 2.5xBB ($75).
Hero is MP3 (a call is 9% of your stack)
4 players (CO, Button, SB and BB) have yet to act.

Unless I have some read, I tend to give mini-raisers little credit, especially in the later positions.

calling
[9/images/graemlins/spade.gif 9/images/graemlins/heart.gif] is to good to be folded. But it's not dynamite.
it's not costing you more than 10% of your stack to call
playing for set-value (like Hero actually did) is a low-risk alternative. If you're gonna play stricly for set value (folding when you flop anything other than a set) then you have to bust him (8.5x75=638) everytime you did make a set (to break even).

re-raising
you can win the pot right there
it's a good (but no dynamite) heads-up hand. But a crap-multiway hand.
gives you the momentum
you get more information
if he re-raises, you have an easy fold.
it's good to smack the guy's on your right on the fingers. Especially when they do something stupid/creative like mini-raising

With [T/images/graemlins/spade.gif T/images/graemlins/heart.gif], a re-raise is easier. With [8/images/graemlins/spade.gif 8/images/graemlins/heart.gif] i woud tend to call. With [9/images/graemlins/spade.gif 9/images/graemlins/heart.gif] and no read on my opponents, I'd smack him on pure principles... but I have to say that I don't think calling is a huge mistake.

Q: If you re-raise, how much would you toss in there?

<font color="blue"> paulish </font>

[jojobinks]

about the original question: how do you detect a continuation bet?

the answer: you can't. that's the point. it's designed to look just like a value bet. that's why you can't really counter it.

this is why you have to make your decision preflop: will you fold if you don't flop well, or do you want to do something else (like push on a ho-hum flop like this one)?