Mike -


Wow...what a hand! It's very, very rare that you flop top quads while half the players like or LOVE the flop (TT flops a full house and is drawing dead to a single card?) and are willing to pay capped rounds to stick around. I'm amazed that a few of those hands paid you off until the river. AQ...sticking around to catch a gutshot straight in the face of flush cards and potential full houses? He should know catching an A is no good with the board paired and that much action. Hell, everyone raising and calling on the flop can't be drawing to LESSER hands. The guy with QJo did flop an open-ender, but he should have mucked it much earlier, IMO. He should have asked himself "why is one solid player raising and one smooth calling?" May be just me, but alarm bells would be going off in my head that the straight's not going to be good, and it can easily be beaten. The guy with QcJc has to be nervous with that many callers that the nut flush draw (A high) is out there....if he suspects so, one of his "straight flush" outs is gone, and he's drawing to a single card in the deck...the 9c (which happened to be in the nut flush drawer's hand.) So he's dead, even though he doesn't know it. And you're right...you'd actually want him to hit it if there's a bad beat jackpot going! I don't think you shoulda called him "jackass," but that's my opinion. The planets were truly aligned to smile on you that hand =)


Anyways, back to my original thought. The concept of "pot commitment" is simply fallacious. It doesn't matter whose money is in the pot, whether it's a lot of your money or a lot of your opponent's money...it's the pot's money, and it's no longer yours. When players say "I had to call...I had a lot of money in the pot," or "I was committed to all that money I put in the pot," I just agree with them while thinking "too bad you can't pull it out if you lose." If I know I'm beaten, I FOLD and wait for better chances, regardless of how much I've shoved into the middle.


You're right about both of your observations. Most (all?) good LL Hold'em players will NOT put themselves into position #1 (as some of your opponents did in the first hand example.)


Position #2 is one we'd all like to be in, but how can you do that and disguise your hand at the same time? I would argue that...it depends (the almighty poker situation answer.) I remember one hand described on here where the flop came up all of one rank, say all 7's. The guy holding the case 7 bet out immediately...and another player said "well we know HE doesn't have the 7, because anyone with the 7 will slowplay it!" One guy had a high pocket pair that suddenly filled up...and the guy with the 7 just kept betting. Another hand on here was among three players. The flop came up 7 3 3 rainbow, and two of the players got into a raising war...with the guy in the middle just calling and calling. It was obvious the two raisers each had a 3 in their hands...but it was equally obvious the caller had 77 for the full (what could he possibly be drawing to?) So it depends.


When you have those mortal nuts, you do not want to hem and haw and say "well, I guess I'll call." Typical tell - acting weak when you're strong. Better players will pick up on this and back off. Sometimes you can just let players do the betting for you (worked wonders in this situation.) However, you could also have bet it as if you had a single King, which means bet it hard "to protect yourself against all the drawing hands out there." All your drawing hands will stick around, and of course the flopped full will too...probably smiling to himself about how he's got the single K dead in the water. If you're in early position, this may not work as well because you may scare out a bunch of weak drawing hands.


I think your check on the flop was good, and if it was a single bet when it came around, you could have checkraised to reprsent a single King (no one will put you on quads, esp. since you smoothcalled preflop...another move I agree with.) Since it was 3-bet when it came around, you could smooth call and represent a draw because a lot of players like this flop and are going to bet it for you all the way. When the flush card hit, you correctly bet out to represent the flush. The nut flush and the full house aren't afraid of you, and they'll happily raise. Great play. Too bad you went to the $20-$40 table and dumped it on one hand (bad bad bad idea.)