Raising questions regarding 4 flushes/straights.....

[Gomez22]

OK... let's see if I can make this as non-confusing as possible, because I want to look at both sides of the coin.

SIDE 1

I have the nuts or the second best hand on the flop and the flop is also 4 flush or 4 straight (not for me, though). If, from first position, I bet and someone raises me, whom I think is raising for the draw, should I 3 bet, or not? Should I take into consideration whether it will knock others out or not? (maybe I want them in, maybe I want them out....). I will admit, that I do this alot when able... when the flush/straight cards don't hit, I usually take down a huge pot. The only thing is... if the flush/straight cards DO hit, I cost myself a little more.

SIDE 2

I have flopped the 4 flush/straight and EP bets out.... now... if to his immediate left, I would want to call, right? I don't want to drive players out here. However, if I'm to his right, I want to raise to trap those in between. Now, if I raise in that situation, and am 3 bet, I know I don't want to cap, right? I should call, and if my draw card hits, then start the raising wars (within reason, of course). I DID cap flop betting the other day with flush draw... mainly because I had AKs and the flop was A 8 4, with the 4 and 8 being of my suit... made the flush on the turn.

Just a few questions regarding raising in these situations. If I'm wrong for 3-betting or capping the flop against a suspected draw when I have a good ahnd, please let me know why (Don't think I am, but I have been wrong about alot of things here before).

[Max Weinberg]

When I flop the nuts or close to it, I usually just play it like I have the nuts. They're going to pay to draw out on you, so make them pay in blood. Everyone and their blind grandma know the free-card play, so if he wanted a cheap draw he shouldn't have opened the door to a re-raise. If the table is bad they'll call anything you throw at them, because that's just what they do.

When I flop a good draw, I usually try to keep everyone calling one bet at a time. Raising too early with a draw can shut out people behind you that you could string along for more bets, as long as you keep it one bet to them. This gets me doing all kinds of crazy things like call-raising when it gets back to me (ex. I call an EP bet in MP, it gets raised again in LP, if everybody calls, I'll laugh and call-raise) I disregard this rule though when I'm trying to clean up over-card outs or something like that. Granted, there are a lot of tables where I'd just go ballistic and cap it, because I know that it means nothing to these people whether it's one or three bets back to them. As a rule of thumb though, I try to entice people to stay in by keeping it one bet to them. It's hard to fold a hand for one bet more, but it gets easier when it's two cold.

[Gomez22]

Thanks Max... sounds like you play on some of the same tables I do.

Nice signature line, by the way....... /images/graemlins/grin.gif