How to (or not to) play flush draws...

[Gert505]

$20 buy-in. on UB. (Sorry, I am at work and don't have access to my PT. I will try and make it as easy to read as possible.) Early in the tourney, blinds are at 75/150. Stacks are all pretty average at the table. The big stack is probably 5000 and small stack is under 1000. Hero is in BB with 4000. Villain is in MP1 with 2900. Villain is a good player. I have played against him before. His stats are 22/10/1.8 over a couple hundred hands. He is usually LAG and can be tricky/trappy.

Hero is dealt Q [img]/images/graemlins/heart.gif[/img] 9 [img]/images/graemlins/heart.gif[/img] in BB.

Action is folded to Villain who calls. MP3 calls, CO calls, button and SB fold. Hero Checks.

Flop comes out 4 [img]/images/graemlins/heart.gif[/img] 5 [img]/images/graemlins/diamond.gif[/img] 6 [img]/images/graemlins/heart.gif[/img].

Hero checks, Villain bets 200, MP3 and CO fold, HERO?????

I hate flush draws because I feel like I am not playing them correctly. I believe that Harrington says to just call a bet with a flush draw and to fold if the odds are not in your favor. He also said to throw in a semi-bluff/probe bet with a flush draw to mix it up. But, I read on here that you guys are saying a lot to push/re-raise with the flush draws. What percentage of the time does everyone check/raise , check/push , check/call and bet with a flush draw on the flop in this sort of situation. (I know every situation is different, but estimate it for situations like this.) I would say that my percentages are 20/5/50/25 .

You have more than a flush draw, because you have overcards to the board as well.

I don't know what those PT stats mean, but you make it sound like Villain could have a pretty wide range of hands here. If that's a case, you're a solid favorite against his range. I would lead for about half the pot and see how others respond. Note that this bet does not give straight draws the right odds to play, since some of their outs are dirty.

Is Villain the sort to raise a draw here? If so, you can come back over the top of him and try to take it down now. If you think a raise is more likely to signify him trying to take control of the betting from you, I'd just call and see the turn. If it pairs you, I think you need to lead out again, so that he can't take a free card. If you make your flush, check to him and let him try to represent your hand or take a free card and hopefully catch up a little. If you miss, I'd check and either check-raise all-in or be happy if he gives me a free card.

[Solitare]

You have a lot more than a flush draw here. You could pair your hole cards and you have a backdoor draw to a 9 high straight. 15+ outs drawn twice, assuming the outs are good.

I would play this hand much more aggressively than a simple flush draw.

In the hand you posted there's t675 in the pot going to the flop and villain comes out with a bet of 200. That's just above 4:1 odds, which is what you're looking for as far as odds to draw to a flush. Don't forget to factor in the fact that you have overcards and might be able to count an additional 6 outs if a 9 or Q falls.

What drives my decision in these situations is the table action. If you are in the pot with a few people, like you are here, you need to decide how to get value out of your hand if you hit. That's when you decide between calling and hoping for overcalls, raising hoping to get more money into a pot that you might win if your flush hits or raising to eliminate people from the hand. It's more about why you make these moves in each situation and not a set percentage that I would assign to each move. Consider the possibility that villain bet out 200 on the flop and, instead of folding, you had 2 callers around and the action is now on you. In this spot you might opt to put in a raise and hope that everyone calls around again. If you hit your flush you're taking down a monster pot.

Your position also has a lot to do with how you play it. Checking the action on this flop into villain and letting him bet out might be best for you since you might get the callers between you to commit more chips not buying into his PFR/CB line holding a small-medium PP. This would give you great odds to make a call and you can even consider popping the raise to inflate the pot even more. I especially like this play on a draw heavy type board like this as you could see a dream card like the 2,3,7 or 8 of hearts fall on the turn completing someone elses straight while you are holding the flush that beats them.

In the situation you posted I would probably just call with proper odds to draw to my flush with overcards and re-evaluate on the turn based on the card that falls and villains action. The raise for value isn't as effective here as you are now HU with the villain after everyone else folded. If you miss your draw on the turn and decide to see a river card you could have to call off a large portion of your stack. You want the extra players in the pot to make a raise for value the right play here. As this hand played out I think a call and re-evaluate on the turn is the best move. That way you can keep the pot small and decide on the upcoming streets if you want to commit more of your chips.

Another option that you have when you are in position, which you aren't in this hand, is to raise the flop hoping that villain will check to you on the turn and you can deicde there to either take the free card or bet out. Because you are first to act this line won't necessarily work in this particular situation. If you raise on the flop and then check to villain it's almost a dead giveaway that you are weak since very few players try to go for 2 check raises in a single hand. Yet this is still another option to consider when you are on a draw and want to see 2 cards cheaply. Your flop raise will often be less than a turn bet would amount to and you can sometimes see both the turn and river for a lower total price by using this tactic.

I love HOH and everything that Harrington teaches in his books but formulas like these that he lays out make people too dependent on these fomulas and less dependant on reading players. Psychology is an important aspect of poker and goes hand in hand with the mathematics that drives our decisions. Different situations and opponents should be a factor in deciding which moves to make just as much as the probabilities. I'm appreciative of his examples using his watch to determine frequencies, but my watch only tells time and isn't affected by a players tightness/aggressiveness (or lack thereof). If I were to rely solely on my watch to make my decisions for me I think I would be in serious trouble.

Nice post, Cybr. I had forgotten about the other players in the hand. If you think it's likely Villain will bet this flop, then I like Cybr's line. If the players were between you and Villain, I'd recommend leading out, as your check-call might deter them from coming along.

[Gert505]

Thank you for your post cyber. I think that the right play for this situation would be to just call and re-evaluate on the turn like you said. But I didn't, I re-raised to 900. Villain then went all-in for 1850 more to me. If I call, it leaves me 1200. But the odds are there, even if he has an overpair higher then my Q. I call, and he shows K [img]/images/graemlins/club.gif[/img] 3 [img]/images/graemlins/heart.gif[/img] The turn is K [img]/images/graemlins/diamond.gif[/img] and the river is a blank.

I think stack sizes make this a call because raising is too awkward. I'm check/pushing a good amount of turns, though, if villain can fold.

Well the way it played out wasn't great for you and now you know that. As I might have thought, villain had the OESD with an overcard. If you saw the 2h or 7h fall you were surely going to double up off him. It's very likely that any other heart may have killed your action, but it seems to me that if either of these cards fell villain just wouldn't be able to get away from his straight. The Kh was also probably a great card if it had fallen instead of the Kd, so it turns out that 3 cards would have helped you completely break your opponent and he may have bluffed off the rest of his chips with top pair chasing that straight anyway. Unfortunately, the Kd was one of the few cards that totally killed your overcard outs here and reduced the probability of you having the best hand at showdown. You had 15 live outs on the turn and now you have 9 on the river. You also have to consider the (remote) possibility that villain is playing with a flopped set and any heart that pairs the board may no longer be an out for you. This is highly unliklely in most cases, but you have to decide that based on what you know about your opponent and how he has played similar hands against you. This would be a good time to decide between check/call and check/fold based on the size of villains bet. At this point I'm very glad I didn't commit everything on the flop.