A7o ITM - Call this river?

[Matt R.]

I'm guessing you probably had trash and thought you could steal the pot from villain on the river after his weak flop/turn bets. I think this is a perfectly legitimate play if villain is capable of folding. My other guesses would be 2 clubs or a medium/low pocket pair. I'm going with trash though since I think you may have semi-bluffed with clubs on the weak flop bet or pushed the turn with a pair (or at least checked the river since you probably aren't getting called by a worse hand).

[yabastid]

First thing I thought was villian (you) had a busted flush draw and was trying to steal the pot- I was thinking KcQc/KcJc. I'd be interested to know what happened here.

yabastid

[AliasMrJones]

I had J[img]/images/graemlins/club.gif[/img] 8[img]/images/graemlins/club.gif[/img]. I thought I had enough implied odds to call the flop bet with the flush draw getting 3-1 immediate. I was going to give it up on the turn, but he bet so small I thought I had to call. When I missed the river, being in the big blind I thought there was a decent chance that I hit some piece of the board and if he had nothing as his decreasing bets and then check seemed to indicate, he'd have a hard time calling the bet on the river.

He thought for almost his entire time limit and then called and I thought he surely had a PP or 2 broadway including a T. Seeing his hand, I couldn't believe that he called the river bet. So -- was my play completely stupid? Is there any hope he lays down here?

[Matt R.]

No, I think it works a lot of the time, especially since he can't even beat most other ace-high hands. However, I'd probably semi-bluff push the flop or at least push the turn after he shows weakness. I think you'll take it down a lot more often if you do either of these. Your river bet after he checks looks a lot more like you're stealing after he shows weakness by finally not betting. He'd have a lot more trouble reading you for a non-pair hand if you raised him earlier.

[AliasMrJones]

I considered pushing earlier, and looking back I wondered why I didn't push the turn.

[11t]

Okay, did you notice how your bets decreased on every street? What exactly are you doing?

I push preflop. However I would fold the river, I assume BB has SOME pair or something. You could be outkicked as well.

[11t]

I might be crazy but I don't call raises preflop with ~10xbb and j8s.