5-10 hand, classic "Rounders" tell

[Adverb]

5-10 game, raked 10% to 5$

I hold 9 [img]/forums/images/icons/club.gif[/img] 10 [img]/forums/images/icons/club.gif[/img] on the button. Folded to the cutoff, who limps. I limp, both blinds call, and we are 4-handed for the flop.
Flop comes: 8 [img]/forums/images/icons/club.gif[/img] 5 [img]/forums/images/icons/club.gif[/img] 2 [img]/forums/images/icons/club.gif[/img]
Checked to cutoff (player to my right), cutoff bets, I raise, blinds fold. The cutoff player stops and sits back from the table. He looks concerned and says "Let's see how much you like those clubs," and 3-bets.

In two earlier hands, this same player, using the same act (sits back, sighs, and makes a statement regarding his opponent's hand) showed down an extremely strong hand. There is no reason whatsoever to suspect that this player is capable of reversing this tell, in fact the "tell" resulted in extra profit in the earlier hands.



What do you do?

(I'll post what I did in a reply)

[SoBeDude]

Even if your read is correct and you feel confident he has a big hand, it doesn't mean he has a flush. He could have a set.

And he also thinks you'd probably wait until the expensive street to raise with a made hand so all the more reason to suspect his raise does not represent a flush. I don't know the player or his range of raising hands. He might have a set or two pair, or maybe an overpair, or he's holding the flush ace.

Reraise him.

-Scott

[Adverb]

I mucked it immediately.

Reasons:
1) I thought it most likely from his tell that he had a suited ace.

2) Even if I am wrong about the ace, he limped, and I believe most suited combinations I could beat he would have raised with attempting to steal the blinds. I saw his limp first in from the cutoff as a from of slow-play.

3) Even at random there are 22 suited hands that beat me and only 6 that I can beat, whereas calling down will cost me $25 to win 84$ (after considering rake and toke). I am getting 3.36 : 1 odds for a 3.67 : 1 proposition, even ignoring that the only hand I think he would limp with that I can beat is 6 [img]/forums/images/icons/club.gif[/img] 7 [img]/forums/images/icons/club.gif[/img] . Furthermore, most hands I can beat still have at least 1 out to a straight flush with 2 cards to come, further lowering my price slightly.

4) Even if he only has a set, which I seriously doubt, he still is slightly better than 2-1 to beat me.

5) If I'm right he will most likely go on some form of tilt.

I mucked it face up. He spent the rest of the night repeatedly trying to get me to believe he had a lower flush. He was a cocky sort, and when I first mucked, he looked shocked and then immediately denied he had a better hand, but when I challenged him on it he refused to show it. His demeanor changed after that hand, and when I left he was down quite a bit. He would call me down with anything after that, as he seemed convinced I was going to bluff him.

[Adverb]

Accidently left out of the original post that this was a young player who had seen "Rounders" too many times and had a touch of FPS (fancy player syndrome).

[Dimich]

My guess is he holds one big club at most. Probably an ace, perhaps a king. I would cap the flop. If no club on turn I would cap that too. If no club on river I would bet if he checked and raise if he bet.

His act was likely aimed at getting you to stop raising and letting him see the river the cheapest possible.

[rigoletto]

Horrible lay down!

[CrackerZack]

completely agree.

[hutz]

If you read his open limp as a form of slowplay, why would you then limp with T9s?! Even if you didn't think it was a slowplay, do you routinely call with T9s after one limper (even on the button)? I don't.

Getting past the pre-flop play, I can see no way in which laying down this hand in this situation is a +EV play.

Even if he only has a set, which I seriously doubt, he still is slightly better than 2-1 to beat me.

He's 2:1 against beating you. You have the upper hand under almost any scenario unless you are dead certain he has a higher flush (not flush draw) than you. Who wouldn't want to get even money against a heads-up opponent in that situation?

[Adverb]

This player was not capable of that level of deception. The identical act was used twice before, both times he shows the nuts. If not for his act of commenting on my hand and sighing, I would have been re-raising. Also, this was a live game and since we were heads up there was no cap.

If this were online a cap here is automatic, but with a reliable tell like this one, and no cap, it is a different story. His 3-bet is unprotected, unlike online. Also, this player, while he thinks he is tricky, just likes to slowplay. I don't think he was capable of 3-betting there just to get to the river. In fact, that 3-bet may have been the first 3-bet at that table that night by anyone other than me.

I doubt this player even understood the concept of why a three bet with a high club would be a good idea. The 5-10 game at the casino I was at was not exactly sophisticated. People bet when they had it, checked when they didn't. Not a lot of raising.

[Adverb]

Maybe I should have added that these players were really, really weak and passive. This was not a 5-10 on paradise(it was Caesar's Indiana, BTW).
I limp with 9Ts because I know this player would "slowplay" something like A3o, or worse. His "I have the nuts tell" was not his only problem, as far as giving his hand away goes. Also, the player in the small blind always called, and I don't think anyone ever raised from the big blind. I was guaranteed 4 way action on the button against very weak players with 9T suited

He is 2:1 against beating my flush if he holds a set, but by my reckoning a set was the worst hand he could have held, and it is very unlikely. So in the 1 or 2 percent of the time he has a set, I still only hold slightly less than 66% of the pot equity. When he has a random flush, I have at best 10% pot equity, maybe 20% if he has a random suited hand.

I crunched the numbers by hand (and somehow managed to misplace my notes) and weirdly enough, even knowing he has a flush, if the top flush card changes from an 8 to a J I have odds to call if I can't narrow down what possible suited cards he held.

Again, this assumes I know he has a flush.

I don't think I have ever made a laydown like this before, but I have never seen a tell that clear before, either.