Play A Hand With The Triple Threat (Results & Comments)

[grandgnu]

Had the turn card been anything but a Jack, Ace or diamond and he check-raised, I would have pushed right there and taken my chances.

But because it was a diamond and he check-raised, I was no longer certain I was ahead, so I treaded more carefully and was able to get out when that river card hit.

If the river had been another blank (anything other than a Jack, Ace or 9) then I would have likely called his push and taken my chances. But with the flush and possible straight out, I just couldn't.

You SHOULD bet more on the flop; you have a backdoor 2nd nut flush draw and a redraw to a full house, with 7, then 10 outs. The flush/straight draws are the hands you WANT him to call a big bet with, it's +++EV for you. Also, you made a weak turn bet, (200 into a 450 pot) and his raise reeks of stealing. Even if you are behind, you still have BOTH of those redraws. 10 outs to the full house, and possibly 9 outs to the flush. I think you played this hand very weak-tight. Learn to throw some chips around and get some FE, it's one of the more important concepts in NLHE. The combined strength of your outs plus the number of times he folds the A [img]/images/graemlins/diamond.gif[/img] is enough to allow you to push the turn.

[MrMoo]

The main thing I see in this hand is that the flop came very coordinated. You're very vulnerable here but you've also got a big hand. In a situation like this I like to end the hand as soon as possible for a couple of reasons. One, there are a lot of cards that can come which will cause you to make some very difficult decisions. Two, extracting a few hundred extra chips is unlikely to make a huge difference to the results of your tournament.

Overall I don't think the hand was played that poorly. I just think that you can change your approach in the future and possibly reduce the number of difficult decisions you have to deal with.