POKER HAND #48

A LITTLE ONLINE POKER: Though I'm not permitting myself to play in a live game until what I hope will be the Mike Matusow Championship on Thursday, I drifted over to Party Poker last night expecting to play for a few minutes.

An hour later, I had a hand of real interest.

I picked up the 10h-10d in the big blind and raised preflop.

I got two callers.

The flop came down

Ks-10h-7h.

With a flush draw and possible straight draw out there, I immediately bet out. The conventional Super System wisdom is that it's best to bet out when you have a set. I don't think that's always true--if you think you might get raised OR if you're opponent is a draw then it is of course correct to bet. Here was one of those cases.

When the guy to the left of me raised, I put him on A-K because I can't see why he would raise with a few of the hands I was afraid of--the As-Qs or god forbid the 9h-8h or even something like the Qh-Jh.

The next player folded, and the turn came Ah.

This made a possible flush for my opponent if he had two hearts. But like I said, the texture of the play on the fold led me to believe he now had two pair. The difficulty here is that it would be tough to figure out exactly what he had because with either hand, he would show strength.

Because this was online play, I had even less to go on.

While most people would bet out here, I didn't. This is a play I make a lot and it often bothers people. I don't myself know if it's correct. I know that if I bet, and he raises, I'm put to a tough call. And what I don't want to be do is pushed off my hand. I have to make a decision--are my trip tens good?

When he checked behind me, I had to think again.

Would he check top two? With a flush out there, possibly, but I checked to him, indicated that I don't have a flush. In my mind he either has the nut flush or no flush. He might check both.

What I've done here is postponed my decision. When I have to make a tough decision, I'll probably lay it down on the turn. I want to push that decision to a river where either I have one last chance to think about a big bet, or can check it down. If he was actually weak, then I wasn't going to make any more money. If he was actually strong, then I saved money.

As I said before, this flop presented several draws, but again, because of the play on the flop, I didn't think my opponent was on a draw. Now if an A or K hit the board, that would really be a scare card for me, indicating that my opponent had a full house. If a heart came off, I now had the flush, which I didn't think he had--if he had the Ace of Hearts, why didn't he bet on the turn?

The river came off Jd, and based on my read, I immediately bet out. He thought for a second, and then raised about $50 more. At this point I called and was glad to see my initial read had been almost correct--he had the Kc-7c, and had flopped top and bottom pair.

With my read dead on correct, I feel confident going into the Mike Matusow Championship.