60-120 hand 88

[mike l.]

another one from a very good game at commerce. i have 88 and raise after someone limps. some cold calls behind me and the blinds call.

the flop is JJT rainbow. i bet and only the blinds call. they are a couple loose aggro hooligans.

turn is 9. checked to me and i check.

river is T. sb picks up his chips like he wants to bet but then says "okay, check". bb checks, i bet.

comments welcome.

[El Dukie]

Standard disclaimer: I suck at limits above 20-40. (Some would say I suck at lower limits, too, but I choose to ignore those people.) But here goes nothing....

I assume you checked the turn because the loose aggro hooligans are the type who like to checkraise, and you're now open-ended and wouldn't mind seeing the river card for free. Seems okay to me.

Might as well bet the river. Probably your only chance to win (seeing as you're playing the board....). You'll fold to a raise...?

[Barry]

When the turn gets checked why not bet? Is it because they would checkraise the turn with nothing and you couldn't fold to since you picked up a str8 draw?

Only you can decide what the BB means by his comment, but once you check the turn you're liable to get called by a ton of hands, none of which you can beat.

[elindauer]

Interesting river decision. After your turn check, they know you don't have a jack. So you can bet that they'd value bet either a jack or a ten on the river. Once it gets checked to you, it sure looks like nobody has much of anything. Unfortunately, their not much of anything probably beats your not much of anything, and at best you chop three ways if you check.

Now, what can you make them fold? Would they fold an ace? I doubt it. I think a loose player is going to look you up with a hand like a weak suited ace after you show weakness by checing the turn. Would they play a hand like K7s or Q3s? Are they really that loose?

So it seems to me that you don't have too much hope of folding a better hand, and the best you can hope for is to knock them out when you would have chopped three ways. Then again, they're aggressive, so you are risking your 1/3 as well to a bluff raise.

All told, I think the reward isn't worth the risk. You're right to suspect weakness, but they are likely just strong enough to keep you from stealing this pot from under their noses.

my 2 cents.
Eric

[andyfox]

I've decided to always bet when checked to on the river when my hand gets counterfeited. I've had two opponents both fold the last two times, so I'm way ahead of the game.

[Barry]

But had you bet the turn?

[andyfox]

Yes, both times.

[Barry]

I think that doing that (or not in this case) makes all the difference.

[Ezcheeze]

Would they call with ace high? If not then there might be enough combinations of hands for them both to fold to make this profitable. If they would call with ace high hands (which seems likely given their descriptions) then I don't think this will work often enough.

-Ezcheeze

[turnipmonster]

[ QUOTE ]

river is T. sb picks up his chips like he wants to bet but then says "okay, check". bb checks, i bet.

[/ QUOTE ]

good bet. in my games sb is almost always folding to a bet after making that move.

--turnipmonster