How to play a set of tens with a horrible board

[Martin Aigner]

I don´t play much NL ring games, but yesterday I was almost forced to. I just arrived in Vegas and my room at the Orleans wasn´t ready. So I sat down to play some poker. The list for the 10-20 HE was pretty long, but there was a vacant seat at the 2/5 NLHE, 500 max buy in.

So I sat down, knowing that I´m no expert at all in NLHE cash games. For the first hour or so I didn´t play too many hands, since a) I didn´t get any playable holdings and b) lots of hands were open raised preflop to something like $60!!! Anyway, the action cooled down a bit, and I won a nice pot making a big bluff on the river. My stack was up to about 900, when the following hand appeard:

I´m UTG with TT and call $5. UTG+1 mucks, UTG+2 (agressive, but average at best player) raises to 15, 2 players muck, LMP raises to 30, rest folds, I call 25 and UTG+2 calls 15. Stack of UTG+2: about 300, Stack of LMP is about the same as mine. LMP sat down about an hour ago and he played lots of hands, hardly ever betting or raising, mostly calling. His mini reraise cried for a huge hand for me. He definetly was no player who would muck AA for all his money on a flop such as T73, you get the picture.

Anyway, the flop comes QJT rainbow. What´s my best action here?

Martin Aigner

[Martin Aigner]

I decided to play the hand cautiosly and checked. UTG+1 checked and didn´t seem to excited about the flop. LMP bets $60, having a heavy heartbeat. I put him on AA, KK at minimum, likely AK, QQ, JJ.

Since I didn´t put UTG on a checkraise I decided to call the $60 to see what happens next.

Poor play?

[Martin Aigner]

UTG+2 called $60 too, I was pretty sure she had an A for a gutshot.

Turn: QJT 3, no flush possible

I decided to check again. UTG+2 checked, LMP bet $200, leaving me with a big dilemma. I took quite some time to make a decission and noticed that his heartbeat slowed down pretty much. I thought this to be sign of him not being 100% happy with his hand after all, since it became clear to him that I had some sort of a real hand (maybe a set, maybe some sort of straight, two pair minimum). Now I was pretty sure that he didn´t have the nuts with AK, but with any other holding he couldn´t be too happy neither. What´s my action here? (I saw that UTG+2 was about to muck her hand)

Note: I think I made a mistake here, showing me once again, that I´m well advised not to play too much in NLHE ring games.

Martin Aigner

[Guin]

I would have bet out on flop assuming only caller could be AK... that pot sized bet would have taken the hand down right there and saved you a lot of trouble. LMP is probably on KK so has the draw on top of an overpair... you could call turn and push river....

Tough spot but I think you are right to ask others for flop play help on this one.

Regards,

Guin