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You have fold equity. You can clean up Jack outs. It'd be nice to fold JTo instead of letting it check through. Also, you're getting value when they call. You're also making it correct to call your draw on later streets if you pick up some loose calls here on the flop.

I'm not sure if any of this is coming out right, but I'm pretty sure betting is much better than checking.

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Now there's a quite a few very good players in this thread advocating leading this flop but I'm willing to go out on a limb and buck the trend.


Here's my reasoning.

Is it going to fold everyone on the flop....not likely.
Fold equity is about zero donking into four opponents.

Is the bet for value? Well you're hoping for two calls.
If you're going to get two calls, you could have c/r for value and have cost yourself money.

I think when you get callers in a pot this small, your J outs are going to be dead a good amount of the time.

I also think that you would be very lucky to get just two CALLS.
ie. In an unraised small pot you are much more likely to be up against Qx, Jx etc. If you are going to get two callers, one of those callers has to be MP1, MP2, MP3. Getting only 6.5:1 on a flop call, it's likely that the first caller is likely to have Qx more than any other holding. Now, what do YOU do with Qx on this flop when the SB donks into you....you punish the poor fool and try to get it HU...and if he doesn't play back, you own him.

I think if you are serious about putting any aggression into this flop, and generating any real fold equity, I'd put some serious consideration into c/ring ANY number of callers.

For me, the preferred line is to c/r >2 callers for value, c/c the turn.

Depending on villian, I'd c/r a LP bettor and semi bluff donk the turn.

I don't like leaving all my eggs in villian's basket, which is what donking this flop does.
By checking you get all the information you need to determine the best play. And if the worst thing that happens is this flop gets checked through, I'm a happy Hero.