Eight-handed pot-limit game with $1 & $2 blinds, playing with a number of players I've started playing a few sessions lately and a few other I've barely played before, but the thing is, my pot-limit experience with most of these players is pretty small. Actually, my pot-limit experience is all-together pretty small, I've played mostly straight limit in my short Hold'em career.


I've got about $180, when I open-raise from UTG ($7) with pocket jacks. Player behind me folds, but next player (MP) calls. Rest of the field, including the blinds, folds. MP is one of the solid player around this table, but also capable of making tricky moves (such as, I think, just smooth-calling with Aces or even Kings here).


Flop comes 7-4-3, two diamonds. I've got the Jack of diamonds. I bet the pot, $17. MP raises the pot by calling the $17 and raising back $51. He's got $71 left, I've got him more than covered. This is decision time for me. I must either fold or move my opponent all-in. With such a hand, that thinking must surely be correct?


The hands he could definitely have, I struggle to come up with any other than TT, AdQd, possibly AdTd and AdKd, although I think he would raised the latter and folded AdTd pre-flop. But all these are likely hands, and I'm in a very good spot against TT, in a good spot against AdTd, while it's about even money (and I've already got quite a bit in the pot already) against AdQd and AdKd.


The hands he could possibly have, poses more of a problem. He could be smooth-calling with AA and KK (most likely the latter). He could even be calling with queens, not neccesarily for slow-playing purposes, but because he may be amongst those who like to 'hit' the flop (Q or no A/K) before he plays it in PLH. I haven't gotten these reads on him yet.


Anyway, I move all-in on him. He thinks for a couple of minutes, then mutters 'well, I'm on my way home then...' as he puts in his last $71. A bit surprisingly, he is a strong as TdTx. Two blanks (one diamond) come off on the turn and river and I take down a nice pot.


But I can't help thinking that I was lucky to hit excactly that hand here. I think many solid PLH players would fold hands like 88 and even 99 pre-flop against an under-the-gun pot-sized raise. I might have hit *the* only hand that I could beat in this situation (except the crapshoot hands of AdKd or AdQd), and I put almost my entire (and his entire) stack on it, 80% of it in one move (when I should know that this *could* be the situation, that I only beat a couple of the hands he could have). I am also disturbed by the fact that when I get this marginal situation working my way, I am almost not getting paid off for my last raise, if you catch my drift.


lars