[the shadow]

Thanks Lloyd, Giga, MLG, and Che!

OK, let's look at it from the villian's perspective.

P/F: He calls a standard-size raise from the BB with QTs. OK.

Flop: He flops a straight and decides to go for a C/R. OK again. I'm a little surprised by the size of the raise, but it looks like he wants to bleed hero and not risk scaring him off.

Turn: The 7d doesn't scare villian and probably won't scare hero, who clearly has some piece of the board. Villian bets a little less than 1/2 the pot. Still trying to bleed hero. Still OK.

River: This is the action that has me thinking. Villian certainly isn't thrilled to see a 3d diamond hit the board. He checks. My question is why? Is villian scared of hero filling a flush? Or is villian changing tactics and trying to trap? Given that villian's been trying to bleed hero, I doubt that it's the latter.

That in turn raises two questions for me. First, what would villian do if hero pushed, as many posters had argued? Sure he's pot-committed, but he just before he hit the call button, he might have 2d thoughts like Giga did. I voted to call the turn and check the river, but it seems to me that the full history leaves it an open question as to whether the hero should have pushed the river.

Second, should villian have pushed the river, despite the 3d diamond on the board? It seems to me that villian would have to put hero on Kd-Jd for him to stick around in the hand this long. Since the odds of hero having that hand are long, I woulda pushed the river if I were the villian.

The Shadow