My Take
Hey Foxwoods,
Here is my take on the hand. And, FWIW, I've given this a ton of thought and am almost positive that I'm right (can't wait for Ray et al. to disagree with me now that I've said that... [img]/images/graemlins/grin.gif[/img]).
The greater the skill level of your opponent, the more reasonable checking becomes. There are two reasons for this. One is that a skilled opponent will be able to lay down his boat some percentage of the time when facing a bet. Throw the pot odds out the window. What hand other than KK puts in a big bet on the river here, given the previous action? The second reason is that a skilled opponent is going to check-raise bluff (with his 99/22) some percentage of the time. He knows what you have. More importantly, he knows what you DON'T have. And, he knows that you know that he COULD have quads. But, what percentage of the time will an opponent bluff here? I don't know, and neither do you. Meaning that, whether you decide to call a check-raise or fold to it, you have the potential to be making a HUGE mistake. Though it won't happen often, the magnitude of the mistake that you might be forced to make, coupled with the fact that you won't even always get paid off when your hand is good, might mean that you check.
But, it does not appear that your opponent fits this description perfectly. First, you already know that he has trouble laying down hands. Second, if he were good enough to lay the hand down, wouldn't he do it (or at least consider it) on the turn? So, the fact is, it looks like the opponent is calling a moderate bet on the river almost every time. Given that it is 6-1 that he does NOT have quads, you give up too much by checking behind here.
So, how much to bet? IMO, the larger the bet, the more likely it is that your opponent folds. And, as you pointed out, the larger you bet, the larger his possible check-raise, the larger the pot, and thus the larger the mistake that you might make. So, you want to extract as much value as possible without opening yourself to a decision for your entire stack. I think the best amount is an even $1000 or so (the pot has $2660 before you bet). I think that a little more is fine, as is a little less. I think that any amount much larger than $1500 is a mistake, with the magnitude of the mistake increasing with the size of the bet.
So, to answer your question, I like the bet amount OK. Sort of a "blocking bet" in position... I think you could have accomplished the same thing by betting a little more, but what you did is better than checking and far better than betting $2000 or so. It was a tough spot to be in at the table, so I think you handled it well.
Nice hand, and great post.
ML4L
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