The SBP Archives - Your less than frequent dose of SBP!

Let's say you're looking down at pocket Jacks. It's a good starting hand, so you decide to raise. Everyone folds save one person, who calls. The flop comes: K-10-5 rainbow (mixed suits). Not a horrible flop for you, but you definitely don't like seeing that over card. Your opponent immediately puts in a 1/3 pot-sized bet. Now you have a decision: Are your Jacks any good?

Hopefully, you've been paying attention to the person you are playing against so you should know whether or not you're dealing with a loose player or a tight player. If you're playing against a chip bully (someone who always raises and re-raises flop after flop) you have to give them less credit on what they have. It takes courage to do so when you're holding what seems like a lesser hand, but you have to stand up to them. They will push your around until you have no chips left. If you're playing against a tight player, and you've noticed this is the first hand they've played in an hour, you can let go of your Jacks with little regret should you decide that's the best course of action.

The above example happened to me at the Ottawa Sun Poker tournament. In my case, I had the unfortunate luck of having the chip leader at my table. He had a huge lead and was in almost every pot: a loose, agressive player. He called my raise, and although I didn't like that seeing that King, I made a simple decision when he bet: "He's not holding a King, I'm ahead." He bet, I called. He bet again on the turn: I called. He checked on the river, and I didn't want to get too cute here so I just checked as well and sure enough, he was holding pocket 3s or 4s and my Jacks held up to take the pot.

Some might say I was being a little risky with my straight calling. Perhaps a better play would have been to immediately raise him right after his initial bet as it would have been a better way to know exactly where I stand, instead of continuing to dump chips into the pot. But I noticed he tended not to increase the size of his bets after each betting round so my stack wasn't threatened. I figured he wouldn't move into me with a huge raise so there wasn't much risk involved by flat calling (unless of course he caught one of the remaining 2 cards in the deck to make his set, but that's hardly a draw you should worry about).

So if you decide you're the one that's ahead and want to stay in the pot, you must be prepared to bet more of your chips. If you just call, your opponent will likely bet into you again in the next round(s) of betting. Estimate to yourself how much you think your opponent will continue to bet, and make a decision if it's worth continuing with the action relative to the size of your stack, your opponent's stack, your best guess as to what hand they're holding and the amount already in the pot. (If there's $1000 in the pot and you have $250 left, at this point you have to decide if you're all-in or out. Flat calling $100 on the turn to only throw your cards away when they bet your last $150 on the river doesn't make much sense). I don't know how many times I've seen a player make a big bet on the flop, the next player hmms and haws about it and decides to call, then after the turn card they get frustrated when the opponent bets into them again and they throw away their cards in disgust. Of course another bet was coming, what were you expecting?! That's why if you think you're already beat or if you're not ready to commit more of your stack to a less-than-stellar hand, throw it away and don't waste any more of your chips.