a questionable play

[patrick dicaprio]

10-20 at the Taj. table was five handed. i get dealt 4J/4 but am not the bring in. I raise the bring in to ten, two folders, one caller, showing a Q in the door. bring in folds.

Fourth street I catch a J. Q checks after catching a blank.I bet he calls.

fifth street he catches a Q. He bets i call. sixth he bets I call. river he checks i check. he shows down Q's and 6's. he says he caught the six on the river.

any thoughts on the hand?

Pat

[SittingBull]

believe he would call a full bet with JQK or TJQ or a 3-flush?
Did U have time to evaluate this player to determine if he tended to be loose,tight,Etc.
I would have to assume that in a 10/20 game,a player usually has a playable hand on 3rd. Whether his hand is marginal or not depends on how loose or tight a player he is.
Was he playing many 3rd Str hands?
Even without knowing the answers to the above,once he over-paired your two under-pair,I would tend to fold the more expensive Str. With T J Q Q or K A Q Q or xyQQ(3-suited), U are a slight favorite. But he could also have a set of Q's or two pair--Q's up--so in this case u are definitely running uphill.
U can determine if he caught a "6" on the river or not.
If his last card is placed on top or the bottom of his other two cards,and he shows 6x6,then it was a river "6".
A show of 66x or x66 indicates a pocket pair. Did U notice the sequence when he turned his 3 cards up?
Happy pokering,
SittingBull
BTW,
What kind of image did u portray to this player?
Tight,loose,semi-bluffer,tricky,creative,Etc.??

[Wombat6]

what was you position relative to the callers and the bring in? What is your likely position through out?

I dont like to play 2 under pairs into a overpaired door card. especially heads up against a tough deceptive player. You are almost sure to lose money there. fold on 5th if not on 3rd.

On third you got to be thinking what could this guy be *calling* with? a split pair of Q's or a pocket pair? three hi cards? two hi cards? He has got to be thinking If this guy is playing a split 4's what kind of kicker does he have. if he has a pocket pair how big is it when he bets out in (?) position. when you bet the J he might be thinking " he bet a jack ? he must have at least J's or probably two pair. So. (him thinking) I'll call a small bet with as little as a small pair, over card kicker and see what comes off. If I hit my doorcard or one of my buried high cards Im good to go unless he gets aggressive or improves.

Also we have NO knowledge of this player . Do you ? what is that knowledge. does it lead you to play in the manner you did?

If you are going to Play a split baby pair you might want a *OVERCARD* kicker or even a *SUITED OVERCARD* kicker at least Live suiteds connecteds to that small suited connected kicker.

Remember when people *give* you information it is usually *BAD* information. my guess pocket 6's with a suited Q to start.

wombat6

[Andy B]

It's not entirely clear from you post, but I gather that you raised first in, and that there were two folds and a call behind you. If you thought that you had a good chance to steal the antes, fine. You're risking $10 to win $8, which is not as favorable as if you tried to steal in a full game or one with a more substantial ante. You're also more likely than usual to be called, because all raises tend to look like steals in short-handed games. Personally, I would have limped in a passive game, raised in a very tight game, and folded against decent opposition.

Having raised and gotten called, you are of course quite correct in betting your two pair on fourth street. When he makes open Queens on fifth, I think you have a fold. I would say that it is fairly likely that opponent started with a pair since he called a $10 bet in a heads-up pot. Even if he doesn't have two pair now, he has a good chance of improving by the river. On the other hand, there are only four cards in the whole deck that will improve your hand. The pot is fairly small, and it's probably going to cost you $60 to call this down. I'd wait for a better gambling opportunity.

I think your opponent made a mistake by not betting the river.

[ACPlayer]

You are risking 60 to win 51+60 less rake and tip = 106.

You can call if the chance that you are ahead less the chance that he will draw out on you plus the chance that you will draw out on him if he is ahead -- compared to these pot odds.

Note that he has 11 cards on fifth and 14 cards on sixth to draw out on you and you have 4 cards on fifth and 4 cards on sixth to draw out on him.

If you are going to be raising split 44 with bad kicker in early position in low ante stud, be prepared to make these laydowns.

See you in AC this week after being gone 2 months!

[SittingBull]

play 2 under-pair against an over-pair--ESPECIALLy if my opponent's doorcard kicked in. I wrote a post "ALWAYS playing as a "MONEY FAVORITE"--NOT always", in the "PSYCH Section" of the forum. It's related to this post.
Happy pokering, /forums/images/icons/laugh.gif
SittingBull

[SittingBull]

kick in,and that he had one over-pair of Q's,do U think it would still be better to fold in this case--even if Pat is a small favorite with his two under-pair against his opponent's one pair of Q's on 5th??
Just wondering, /forums/images/icons/shocked.gif
SittingBull

[Andy B]

Yeah, even if opponent had a small card in the door and caught running queens, I think Pat has a fold. There is still an excellent chance that he's behind (A better chance than with the Queen as his door card; do you see why?). If he's not behind now, opponent has an excellent chance to overtake him. Meanwhile, Pat only has four outs to improve. It's that whole small favorite/big dog thing. If he knows that opponent is going to start checking so that it only costs him $20 to see the showdown, he can play, but I would tend to operate on the assumption that he will have to pay $60 to see the showdown.

If Pat somehow knows that the other guy only has the two Queens, he can continue, but he's going to be playing the rest of the hand in the dark. And he can't know that his opponent doesn't have two pair, or even trips. That's why I think he should give it up.

[SittingBull]

[patrick dicaprio]

i am surprised that no one actually thought what i was thinking on fifth, although i left out some info. when he caught the queen i picked up $40 in chips in my hand and was going to raise. but then i thought better of it. but one of the reasons i posted the hand was to see if anyone else would think of raising. as i sit here now i am convinced that if i raised i would have won the pot. my thought was that since i raised coming in, if i reraised q's then he would know that i didnt fear queens, or that i knew he didnt have two pair.

the game was five handed and it was tight with a lot of stealing. the player in question was a loose caller. i felt at the time that because of this there was no chance that he had queens up. he also was a player who would raise with queens up. i certainly would if i were him. so those of you who wondered whether i had some knowledge of him you were correct.

as far as position i was next to act after the bring in, and raised because i was sure that i would either get a heads up pot or would steal the antes. the J was the second high card, obviously. so the players that folded in between all had low cards in the door.

i dont know why he didnt bet the river. but it is a clear mistake. for a few reasons that i will not elaborate on, i believed that he told the truth when he said that he caught it on the river. one, however, was that he was obviously relieved when i didnt raise.

[MRBAA]

In your place, I would have probably felt my opponent did not have a queen in the hole. But I would have felt it was a strong possibility he had a pocket pair. After all, he called both your "steal" raise and fourth street bet with something, right? When the second queen comes on fifth, you are in bad shape. As others noted at BEST you are slightly ahead. At worst, you are way behind, drawing to only four outs (and with your opponent potentially having a redraw to a bigger house). I'm with Andy -- fold and wait for a better gambling opportunity. Now, you state very definitely that you felt this opponent did not have a second pair. If you can really make this read here, then by all means raise on fifth. The only time I would feel this confident would be against a tilter who is raising everything. Even there, this might not be the spot I'd choose to take him on, as I'm only a slight favorite.

[Michael Davis]

If, and only if, you continue playing this hand, I think it might be interesting to raise on 5th. It seems like a lot of good things can happen here, and if he doesn't have trips, not a lot of bad things can. Am I wrong?

[patrick dicaprio]

i dont agree that you should fold this hand on third. in a five way pot with tight players this hand is certainly profitable. of course the key is to play it correctly, and i am not sure that i did.

i think that once you develop skill at poker it is easy to play too tight at the lower limits when there is a good chance you can make a profit. i think folding this hand is an example of playing too tight.

another problem is that i think you may underestimate how some of these short handed games can result in some raggedy hands calling bets. there is no reason for him to have a pair or even a good hand in this situation. the nature of these short handed games is that people defend often when there is a possible steal, rightly or wrongly. so there is no reason when he catches a queen to think that he had two pair then.

but of course this is an inexact science and you may well be right. /forums/images/icons/smile.gif (now i am getting like the Bull /forums/images/icons/laugh.gif )

Pat

[patrick dicaprio]

despite my thought at the time, i think you are correct that i should have folded. i guess it comes down to the fact that I am either a big dog or a small favorite so i should proceed with caution. that is why i didnt raise at the time, but maybe i should have folded instead of calling.

Pat