Some months ago, I made my annual trip to Casino Baden in Austria. Traditionally, Casino Baden has been the host of the seven-card stud
Poker European Masters for many years. Since 2005, it also has been a member of the
European Poker Tour family. Not being much of a seven-card stud player, I decided to stick to playing only in the
EPT event.
After having a disappointingly small field in 2005 (just 180 players), the 2006
EPT in Baden attracted 331 players.
Not having had all that many good results lately, I planned on playing tight. In my opinion, I had left too many tournaments too early due to an overly aggressive game.
Slowly building my stack
Before we come to the hand that I want to analyze, I will provide a quick update of how my tournament began. Until level four, my stack fluctuated between $9,000 and $17,000. I didn't play any big pots in the beginning. A few of the relatively small pots I played went as follows:
I flopped a set in the big blind. My bets of $150, $300, and $1,000 were all called, and I won the pot. A bit later, I raised with K-K, and the big blind called. The flop was 9-8-5 with two spades. He checked, and I checked. The turn card was another 5. He checked, I bet half the pot, and he called. The river was the 6
, he checked, I checked, and he showed me 8-7 for a straight.
After four levels of play, our table broke and I was moved to a table with a lot of chips. I won a decent-sized pot in a hand with no surprises. To my right, an aggressive player made it $600 to go and I raised to $1,800 with K-K. Michael Keiner, an excellent German tournament/cash-game player (and
Card Player Europe contributor), went all in for $3,800. The original raiser folded, and I called him. He had queens and got no help from the board, and I was up to $16,000.
A difficult decision
In level seven, with limits of $200-$400 and an ante of $50, I raised to $1,400 with the K
9
from middle position. The big blind, with a $50,000 stack, called. The flop was 9-6-3 rainbow, he bet out $1,500, and I called. The turn card was an 8. He bet $2,500, and again, I called.
On the river, I was happy to see another 9, but there also was a backdoor flush. He checked, and I found myself in a difficult situation. Should I reopen the betting or not?
To find an answer, I had to ask myself questions like:
• What am I going to do if he check-raises me?
• If he does check-raise me, am I really beat? (That is, could I then safely fold?)
• Would he raise me with a straight now that the board had paired, and with the possibility of a flush out there?
• If he really had a full house, would he go for a check-raise on the river instead of betting himself?
• If I were to bet, what would be a good bet? Assuming that my opponent's hand would be second-best, how could I extract the maximum value?
• What is his idea about my hand? This actually may be the easiest of questions to answer: He probably puts me on a high pair, I guess.
There were many questions that I couldn't answer, simply because I didn't know the player. So, the best option was probably to play it safe and just check the river. After all, the pot had grown to $11,500, and I had something like $17,000. Betting could have some clear drawbacks, almost regardless of the amount I would choose to bet.
But the problem was that in this hand, because of the way he acted, I really had the feeling that I had him beat. He could have just a 6. He could have a pair of sevens or eights. He could have a 9, with probably a worse kicker. Actually, I saw a lot of possible hands for him to have that could pay me off. And most importantly, going by my reads has usually brought me good results, meaning that I should trust these reads rather than play chicken. So, I decided to make a small bet of $3,000. It was a bet that he would have to call with two pair.
Then, he reached for his chips and raised, but only another $5,000.
Now I felt sick and happy at the same moment; sick because of the fact that I had reopened the betting, and happy that he hadn't moved all in on me. I was now faced with a bet of "just" $5,000 more - while almost certainly I would not have been able to call an all-in raise.
But now my odds were $22,000 for only $5,000. With my hand as strong as it was, how could I possibly fold? So, I called - and I was happy to see him show me A-5, for a total bluff. Up to $36,000 now, I felt great. I was in great position to go far in the event. In the end, I finished in 30th place, just out of the money.
Some months later
Now, some months later, I am still considering if I had played this hand badly and had been nothing more than lucky; or, that it had been correct to go by my reads and play my hand in the very risky manner that I chose.
Hands like this I find to be most interesting - when you are faced with difficult decisions that could be wrong if you have misjudged your opponent's hand. Now just imagine how it would be when you have nothing to think about. The game just wouldn't be as interesting, would it?
Rob Hollink is the 2005 European Champion, after winning the EPT Grand Final. He is one of the few players who excels in both tournaments and cash games, both live and online.
