Can he possibly call.

[Huh]

NL .50 and 1.00 blinds online.

I am in middle position with.

A /forums/images/icons/diamond.gif Q /forums/images/icons/heart.gif

2 limpers to me and I raise $1.00, folded to the blinds, who both call, first limper re-raises $2.00 and we lose the second limper. All else call.

I have ~$300 in front of me, the blind has about $50, and the other two players barely have me covered.

$16 or so in the pot.

Flop is Q /forums/images/icons/diamond.gif 2 /forums/images/icons/diamond.gif 7 /forums/images/icons/club.gif

checked to me, and I bet $15, get two callers.

$60 or so in the pot. 9 /forums/images/icons/heart.gif

Checked to me and I bet $30. I get one caller (who I have positon on, but has me covered). $120 in the pot.

River K /forums/images/icons/diamond.gif

Possibly the worst card. Puts up the flush and an overcard.

Early limper bet $100 into me. I am angry at this point, but I look down at the Ace /forums/images/icons/diamond.gif, and decide to test this guy out.

I re-raise all-in $150+, knowing he can't have the nut-flush.

Comments appreciated. I am still new to this, and moved down in limits as other's have suggested, but the bets still get fairly large.

This was the first move I tried to make in a NL/PL game, as things have been working out just betting my good hands, and mucking reasonably good hands to lots of action. Is a move like this a pretty typical play? I am starting to wonder if people have done this to me when I've held the goods, and they had the lone ace.

Thanks,
Huh /forums/images/icons/confused.gif

[Ignatius]

Your limit raise preflop is terrible play. A pot sized raise would have been to $5.50, so you should have raised about $4 in an attempt to take it down, get it heads-up or at least to better define your opponents' hands and charge those small pairs for trying to flop a set.

As for your river bluff: Put yourself in your opponent's shoes: You raised preflop and bet the flop and the turn. Assuming the guy has JdTd or Td9d which is a very plausible hand for him to have: Would you really raise preflop with a weak suited ace and would you really semibluff on turn into two opponents instead of taking a free card? Or would you rather interpret your weak 1/2 pot turn bet as the half hearted attempt to protect top-pair, which it was? And him having two diamonds makes him less likely to put you on a flush in the first place. What you also have to consider is that there were already $470 in the pot laying him better than 3:1 for the call.

All in all, I think that your bluff-raise was destined to fail. He may not like the call, but with half of his stack in, it's very unlikely that he would fold anything but a pure bluff here. In fact, I wouldn't be too surprized to see a hand as low as AK, although a flush or KQ seem more likely.

[Huh]

Seems I have a lot to learn about PL. I think I am going to start buying in for less, or cashing out if I accumulate a good deal of money in one session...
Preflop, I now agree. I saw many making this type of raise with good hands pre-flop, so I guess this was just bad imitation and learned behavior from limit games.

Turn, I don't really know why I picked $30. Typically I would raise the pot in this situation, but this was one of the biggest pots I played in the session, so I was a bit gun-shy. Next time I will grow some balls.

River...He actually folded. Didn't want to post the results yet until I got some responses, but I thought it was interesting given that what I thought was a good move turned out to be a terrible/lucky one.

I can only assume that he folded a bluff, which sucks, cause originally I thought I got him to lay down a King, or a small flush. Nothing like making the right move for the wrong reasons (Actually I guess a call would have been the right move If I put him on some type of bluff).

Thanks for the comments. I am trying to learn PL/NL as inexpensively as possible, and keep ending up in giant pots. So I either need to learn quick, or I am gonna end up broke.

Huh /forums/images/icons/confused.gif