The Hand
This week’s hand is from a game I played at a West Virginia Casino’s Card Room. It was awhile ago, but an interesting hand. The game was a wild 2/5 NL game, but here’s the kicker…it had a forced $10 straddle, so it made a lot of action in the game.

I had about $800 in front of me and the rest of the table had between $400 and $1400. There were two limpers for the $10. Two guys folded and the next player raised to $40. The next two players called and I was on the button. I knew this is going to be a giant pot and decided to call with a 10d/Jd. The SB folded, but everyone else called. There was 7-way action and $282 in the pot already.

The flop was Qd/Jh/2d and I liked this flop. The BB checked, as did the original two limpers. The original raiser without hesitation pushed all in for $600 and everyone folded around to me. It was decision time… What would you do?

Winner: Jason S., Federal Heights, Colorado
This is a tough decision which I think is totally dependent on your willingness to gamble and your read on the other players. On that board you have a flush draw and a pair of jacks with a backdoor straight draw. This hand is a slight favorite against an AA, KK, AQ, and a slight underdog to AQ with the ace of diamonds. I would assume that the initial raiser probably has a hand in this range if he’s willing to raise with all the callers pre-flop and push all-in for $600 to protect his hand. (Having never played this player I am giving him the benefit of the doubt that he doesn’t have a Q10 or worse.)

This looks like a standard bet to take down the pot now or take a gamble against one other hand, and many hands that you wouldn’t want to see seem unlikely i.e. KJ, AJ, QJ, 22. The only hands that I would really be worried about that seem likely given the way he played, would be Ad, Kd where as our opponent has two overs and a gutshot straight draw plus the remaining 7 diamonds to make his hand and QQ. At this point in the hand 2 players checked and our opponent who we believe is about coinflip with us has raised $600 into a $285 pot. If we call $600 we would be getting about 2 to 3 on our money meaning if we will win more than 33% of the time this will be a profitable play in the long run. If our opponent has a set of queens than we are only going to win about 30% of the time and we wouldn’t be getting the right odds.

This is where our read and our willingness to gamble comes in to play. We will make money on this play in the long run but you have to ask yourself are you willing to risk $600 on a coinflip? Did any of the early position players check with the intention of re-raising? If I am going to call I’m going to re-raise all in to $800 to discourage any more players and also because I am committed to this pot if I call $600 anyway. That means the pot will be $1600 and a call would be $800 giving any player behind me 2 to 1 on their money. This can be a very dangerous situation because we assume we are 50% to win against the one opponent who has a pair but if anyone behind you has QJ, 22 or an ace high flush draw, a call is almost eminent and we are drawing very thin and are going to be at risk to lose a lot of chips in this hand. If we were correct and the raiser had aq and someone behind calls with a better flush draw we are about a 9 to 1 dog. It’s very hard to put these players on a hand because it’s a loose table and big pots attract many hands so these hands are not out of the question by any means.

In conclusion, I don’t think there’s really a bad play in this situation but since you asked what I would do, I would probably fold. Even though I wouldn’t be too concerned with the two limpers, and I have already said this would be a winning play in the long run, I wouldn’t be willing to put $600 in on a coinflip. Not only do I think I can get my money in better, I am allowing my opponent to get all his money in on a coinflip which means he will make money off this play in the long run also. I am only invested $40 or 4 bets and if my opponent overbets the pot often I can wait for a better hand to play against him in position and possibly double my money with a huge advantage.

Robin’s Response:
Jason had a really long, well thought out answer that I will condense on the air due to time issues.

Okay Jason, everyone folded around to me and after short consideration I did decide to fold also. Dollarwise, I did not feel that I was pot committed… I only had $40 invested in this hand and did not want to commit another $600 if I was even marginally behind. By my opponents actions (body language, tells etc) I knew that he had a very strong hand, which he actually showed me after I put mine in the muck… pocket queens!

There were so many excellent answers this week…not just call or fold…but a lot of thinking. Thank you all for your responses!