A good spot to push?

[davidross]

I keep debating whether to tell this from my side or from my opponents because I'm really curious to know what people would do in both cases. My tournament play is very ABC, but I think I missed an opportunity to make a bet that would have been very hard to call. And to make matters worse my 2nd choice should have been a check.

NL qualifier to a wsop qualifier. 14 seats up for grabs and we're on the 1st orbit. BLinds are 10/15. I'm on the button and there is one limper to me. I have KTo and decide to raise and hopefully play him heads up with position. I make it 45 to go, and the BB and the limper both call. FLop is T 7 3 rainbow and the BB bets out 120. Limper folds and it's on me. My first instinct is that he either has a T or JJ, maybe QQ. I think anything better and he would play it differently. So is he ahead of me or behind? I call. Turn is a Q, and he checks. I really didn't think of it at the time but wouldn't this be a good time to push in. If my read is right, how many people would call here with a pair of Tens, or even JJ?

Instead I bet 200 and he called. River was a J and we checked it down. He had AT and I had lost 400 chips. I still can't decide if pushing in would be a good play, I guess it's player dependant, but I think my 2nd choice should have been to check behind, not make a medium sized bet.

[Greg (FossilMan)]

In my experience with online poker, not a whole lot of players are going to fold any hand that beats KT on the turn here when you go all-in. Well, often when they fold you don't know what they had, but I see people call here with AT or JJ all the time, and sometimes much worse. So, pushing in is very dangerous. It's the kind of play that works better in a live game where you can see that the opponent doesn't like that turn card.

later, Greg Raymer (FossilMan)