[W. Deranged]

[ QUOTE ]

Turn comes 3s. It's big bet time now. First player bets and the other two call. I'm looking at 4:1 to hit my flush on the River. A call will give me 11:1 pot odds. I should call, no brainer right?

I start thinking that a raise here will give me 5.5:1 pot odds, still better than my 4:1 drawing odds. Should I call or should I raise?

As I'm thinking this I'm not sure if raising the right move. Then I look at that Ace of Hearts in my pocket, I hear a sexy voice whisper in my ear "Nut Flush" and I raise.



[/ QUOTE ]

There is a giant error in your thinking here.

In situations when you are deciding whether to bet or raise for value (rather than to call), you need to consider whether you have above-average equity , not whether you have sufficient pot odds .

The point is that, when you raise this turn, you are choosing to put extra money in the pot . This only makes sense if the additional bets that you are putting in the pot are profitable. The fact that you could conceivably call two bets profitably here (getting like 11 to 2 or whatever) does not mean that it is correct to raise.

In order to determine whether it's correct to raise, don't compare the size of the total call+raise to the total pot size.

Instead, ask yourself the following question: Am I going to win more than my fair share of the extra bets that go into the pot ?

You have three opponents. Your nut flush outs give you about 20% equity. Your overcards might be good. Say they are worth about three outs. That's 12 outs total. That's slightly more than 25% equity. The average equity for the pot is equal to 100%/the number of players; so here it's 25%. In order for a raise to be correct, you need to be confident that your equity is above average .

We deduced that your equity is probably a little bit above 25% here, but notice that if you raise you might get three-bet and the pot might not have 3 opponents anymore. Because of that fact, your equity needs to be considerably higher than 25% to assure that raising is going to have value. I'd say you would want to assure like 35% to make a raise correct here.

So in my opinion calling is clearly better than raising, as raising is about equivalent to calling if everything breaks your way and is clearly worse if you get three-bet and some opponents fold.