03-24-06, LearnTexasHoldem:
Slow Playing Big Hands In No Limit
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My questions are as follows:
1. Should I have check-raised all in on the turn?
2. Although I slow-played too much in this hand, I had a decent read and was beaten by a two-outer. Did I make the correct plays up until the river?
3. When he continued to bet the river, should I have read that he had a hand that could beat me?
I'd like to play more eventually, but I have a wedding to save for. Since this is the only experience I've had, this hand has been haunting me. Any advice you could give would be appreciated.
-Nick
Answer:
First of all, trips are tricky hands to play for a number of reasons. Here are a few:
1. You are always walking a fine line of trying to make money on the hand but not bet everyone out.
2. No matter how you play it, the opponents are generally more cautious, especially if you are playing out of the blinds.
3. More often than not, you are stuck with the trips. This can mean getting nailed by a better kicker or a fullhouse.
When I first read your question and I saw what you had with the flop, my first thought was that you were going to lose to a better kicker. So before I get into answer your questions, let me address that issue: How do you know when you have the winner or not in trips situations? I can't give any exact rules but I can touch on a few points that will help you make better decisions. In limit holdem, if you have the Jack in this hand with any kicker, you are going to the river. In no limit holdem it is isn't that easy. There are a number of extra factors, the first being how much you can lose in the hand if you are wrong.
For example, if you have only $10 left in the $1/2 game it is a no brainer. On the other hand if you have $100 at the $1/2 game, then you need to be more careful -- this is true for both tournaments and cash games. So the general rule is that the less chips you have, the more likely you are to gamble with them. The second factor, which is equally important, is to think about the opponent's play and what he is capable of doing in this situation.
There are plenty of times when it just seems impossible that your opponent would put all his chips in with a hand you can beat. Compare a loose aggressive player and what a tight player might have in the hand above. Notice too that you don't have to know exactly what an opponent has when you fold. A good read doesn't mean that you know John has AJ; a good read is that you know John has you beat. Specifics are nice but not necessary. The third factor is how you think your opponent views your play.
This is important in all hand reading situations, not just this one. You try to look at your own plays through the eyes of your opponent in hopes of understanding the reasoning behind his counter plays. This can be tricky because often the way you play your own hand is intentionally deceptive, so the signals you get back from him are screwed up. Let me give you a quick example showing the difference and how you need to be aware of this when you are making reads: You limp in with AA preflop versus raising with it preflop and in both hands there are fireworks postflop, where the opponent is not afraid at all and wants to go all-in.
When you limp in, the opponent has no idea what you have and might just raise you with top pair good kicker on the flop. Compare that with if with your moves you basically tell him, "I have a big pair" and he still wants to give you a lot of action postflop; that can't make you feel very comfortable. So what all this means is basically this: The clearer your signals are to your opponent the clearer the return signals will be, hence the bigger laydowns you can make, while if you played a hand deceptively, you'll have to go down with the ship more.
In no limit holdem is there anyway to minimize the damage you'll take when you aren't the winner? Two concepts come to mind... The first concept is finding out "where you are at" early in the hand. Sometimes hands are inherently dangerous and it is better to just win a small pot with them than try to milk them since milking them can lead to you losing a lot. A perfect example of this would be a small flush when the flop is all one suite. That kind of hand has the potential to get you in a lot of trouble.
What I might do with that hand is bet out into a number of opponents on the flop with the intention of either winning a small pot right then or routing out who has me beat. Another example would be if having AA when the flop is something really coordinated like 7-8-9. Since the betting gets bigger as the hand progresses, I would prefer having to fold early than later. The second concept is how to defensive bet. Say you are heads up and have been betting the whole way only for a flush draw to complete on the river. The opponent has lots of chips left, as do you. You can play in this spot a number of ways, one of which is the defensive bet. You bet some with the intention of folding if the opponent raises.
The reason is that if you check it leaves you open to a bluff. By betting some, the opponent has to double this amount, which in turn deters him somewhat of trying to run a bluff. Also, if he/she doesn't have the nut flush then there is a chance that you'll get a showdown with the bet for less chips than if you checked and called. And finally if you do have your opponent beat still, you'll make some more money.
Now to your questions:
1. Check raising all-in on the turn would only be a good play if you knew he might call you with a worse hand. One thing that is very important to remember is that we don't play hands based on short-term results. In other words you can't look back at a hand like this and measure the correctness of your play based on its outcome. This would be the same as having AK against A4 and you losing when the opponent catches the 4 on the river for two pair. Him catching the 4 on the river doesn't mean you should have raised, it just means he got lucky. See a lot players assume the reason you raise is to prevent a player from catching the 7 on the river. Not so. The main intention of raising with strong hands is because you want to get more money, not for "protection." Ideally you would raise enough to make the most with the hand but allowing him to still call. And the ultimate measure of whether you played a hand right or now is how you would have played if you could have seen both hands face up. So, if you knew that he had 77 on the turn, would you have raised all-in? I would have only done that if I knew he would call me, otherwise I would just raise enough to milk him more.
2. I don't think you slow played the hand too much. I like the bet on the flop actually. Most players would play this as follows. Check and call the flop. Check and raise the turn. Bet the river. That sequence of actions is too predictable. Since you came out firing on the flop it probably made the guy with the 77 actually think you didn't have it. Then you made the play that someone without a Jack would do on the turn: you checked and called. Right now if we look at the odds, the opponent is going to win less than 5% of the time. And I think that even if he didn't spike the 7 on the river, you would still get more action out of him. Obviously, he was under the impression that his two pair was good; exactly what you were hoping for. You set the trap and caught him. It was unfortunate and unlucky that he ended up winning.
3. On the river should you have folded? I don't think you could have folded. Because you played the hand deceptively, there was no way for you to have enough solid information to make a read and hence a laydown that big.
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