Making an Extra Bet

It was early in my $40-$80 limit hold'em session at the new Venetian cardroom, where they play the game at a ninehanded table. One of the great things about the Venetian poker room is that it is located with entrances off both the casino pit and the Las Vegas Strip main door, making it very conducive to "drop-in" traffic, a major factor in the success of any Vegas poker room. On this particular Friday, I sat in a game with several players I'd never seen before - six out of the other eight at the table. You gotta love Vegas!

Being unfamiliar with many of the players in the game, I had started out my session leaning toward playing on the tight side. Before I started being creative in any plays, I wanted to fully comprehend the styles of the players in order to make sure that any creative plays were made in situations that warranted them. After a few laps, I realized that most of my opponents were players of mediocre ability. They were trying to play well, but did not possess any great knowledge level of strategy. Mixed in with the group were an unknown tourist and a couple of regular Venetian players with aggressive styles who were reasonably good hand-readers, but tended to overplay their hands.

About an hour or so in, I picked up the K Q under the gun. With a suited hand, I generally prefer volume, but in poker, you need to make the best play based on the current situation. In this situation, the big blind was a player who over-defended his blinds, taking away some of the value of preflop raising. Also, I wanted to let in players whom I had the potential to outplay, and who would play their second-best hand if I made a hand. In this situation, the conceptual conventional play was the correct play, as no extenuating circumstances called for a change from that strategy.

I called the $40. One marginal player limped in behind me, the small blind called, and the big blind knuckled. We took the flop off fourhanded for a single bet.

The flop came down K-Q-6 with two hearts, giving me top two pair. Flopping top two pair is strong, but some are stronger than others. In this case, there were both straight and flush draws to present danger for my hand, but I was pretty sure that I had the best hand. Because there was no preflop raise, the only reasonable chance of my hand being beat was if someone had flopped three sixes.

The two blinds checked to me and I had two options: try to induce a bet out of the player behind me and then trap one or both of the blinds with a check-raise, or lead. I thought about the likelihood of the player positioned behind me betting. He was one of the players who was trying to play well, which he perceived as playing tight, and he seldom bluffed. I thought it was likely that he would check, and I did not want to give a free card with a uniform two-suited board, so I led at the pot. The player behind me and the small blind folded, and the big blind tossed in a call.

The turn card was the K, giving me the nut full house. Once again, the big blind checked to me.

Fully confident that my opponent was drawing dead, I thought about slow-playing, hoping to gain a bet on the river rather than cause him to fold to a bet on the turn. But this player was a pretty good hand-reader. I believed he thought I would bet the turn, inasmuch as it appeared to be a strong betting situation for anyone who had bet the flop. Since he would read my slow-play, I thought most of the value in making it would be lost, as he would adjust his play to the correct read. I fired $80, praying for a call.

To my surprise, he check-raised me. My first instinct was to raise him back. After all, I had the nuts. But I thought about his likely holdings and how he would play them. If he had a king and I three-bet him, he would read me for likely having a better king and call me down. If I three-bet him and he didn't have a king, he would call if he had a draw (albeit while drawing dead) but fold any bluffs, and call on the river or bet it only if he made a hand. If he made his draw and bet it, I could definitely get two bets out of him, but he would unlikely three-bet me on the river if he made the draw and I had three-bet the turn. If he was raising with a queen, I believed he would fold to a three-bet but either bet or check-call on the river.

If I flat-called the turn, he would likely not put me on a king and bet the river with a bluff, missed draw, or a made draw. If he made the draw and it was a strong one, he would have a greater propensity to three-bet me if I did not three-bet the turn. So, to summarize: If he had a king, the pot would likely play out to the same value. If he had a draw and missed, the pot would likely play out to the same value. If he had a draw and made it, the hand was likely to play out to about the same value. (Many different scenarios were possible here, but I assessed the value of all of them as being close.) But if he held a queen, I believed I would get extra value by not three-betting the turn - at least one bet. Or, if he was bluffing, not three-betting the turn would gain me an extra bet. I thought the future plausible scenarios made flat-calling the turn a higher-value play, so I flat-called.

The river brought the 6, putting two pair on the board. Now, I was sure hoping he held a king and had filled up, as I thought I could likely get at least four bets on the river. But to my disappointment, he checked. I fired, and he paid me off, showing me Q-8 offsuit. I believed the way I had played my hand had made me an extra bet, one that had full value, as my opponent was drawing dead and could not win. For obvious reasons, bets made while opponents are drawing dead have more value than bets made when an opponent is drawing live and may take the pot away from you.

Those extra bets add up. You play poker at the $40-$80 level and bet more than $1,000 per hour with the intent of making a single bet an hour. It doesn't take too many missed bets a session to turn yourself from a winner into a break-even player.

Roy Cooke has played winning professional poker since 1972. He is a successful real estate broker/salesperson in Las Vegas. His books are available at www.conjelco.com/cooke. His longtime collaborator, John Bond, is a freelance writer in South Florida.