The Hand
Hi Everyone! Hope the holidays were great, it’s good to be back. And now, for the first hand of 2008… This one was from a $345 buy-in tournament I played at Mountaineer Casino in West Virginia recently.

I was at a fairly tight table. There were only 2-3 players that I would consider loose and passive. We started with 10,000 in chips and this hand came late in level 2 with the blinds at 100/200. I hadn’t played at all, other than the blinds, and looked down at Ah/Qh in late position.

There was one limper before me and I made it 600 straight. The next two folded and the BB called, as did the limper. The flop was 2h/Kh/Kc. Not terrible, but not great either. The BB bet out 400, very small considering the flop. The limper calls and I did also, as my odds were decent.

The turn was the K/d. This time the BB checks and so did the limper. Now I had a decision to make. What would you do?

Winner: Chris C., Wooster, Ohio
I think you have two options here:

1. You bet out about a third of the pot, there’s 3100 in there so I think 1200 or 1300 would be about right. This kind of bet is deceptive because it looks like a value bet that wants a call.

2. You check and take one off to see if you hit your flush, but even if you do, you could possibly have run into quad kings because of the tightness of the table.

I like betting out in this situation you can more than likely steal this pot with option one, and if you are raised you can get away without too much damage. So bet out and see where you are.

Robin’s Response:
Well Chris, I had gone with option one and bet out 1000, roughly 1/3 the pot. I did want to see where I was I was at, but didn’t get the clear response I was hoping for. The button did fold, but the BB called. I was hoping they’d both fold or one would raise.

The river was the Ad. NOW the BB bet out 1000 into an over 5000 pot. I did feel that even though I filled up, I was looking at quad kings, BUT did give a crying call. And yes, my opponent had a K/8 off-suit and had called my pre-flop raise and got lucky.

I was up against one of the only players that really didn’t know the game very well. He was not being clever with his bets…he just didn’t know what to bet and eventually gave all my chips away…but not to me! I ended up making it to about 25th place… no cash out.