Good fold?

Poker Strategy Hand Review
1

3-max SNG, two players left, I have the big stack after filling a straight on the opening hand and a boat a few hands later to get all but 60 of the 3rd place finisher’s stack; he busts on the hand after the full house, and I’m heads up against the remaining player. Stacks are 2060-940.

I’m dealt Tc7s, and the SB limps, I check the BB. Flop is Kc7cJc, giving me bottom pair, flush draw, backdoor straight draw.

I check, V checks.

Turn is Qs, and now I have 4th pair, 77s, with straight and flush draws. I bet 30, v raises to 180, or 2x the pot.

I think about it for a bit and decide to fold. If I have the Ac or Qc instead of the Tc, I think it’s alright to call here, but with bottom pair and a relatively weak flush, it’s probably only marginal to call here.

What’s V raising with here? A lot of hands that are beating me: Two clubs, AT, maybe Kx, especially KQ, KJ, any sets. I’m really only good with this hand if I fill a flush and V is raising with top pair trying to avoid the flush filling, but with 3 clubs on the flop, it seems unlikely they’re raising with top pair. Although, the weak action preflop and no action on the flop probably means that I don’t have anything particularly strong, and he could have been slow playing to disguise his hand strength. I didn’t put him on much, hence my small bet on the Turn to see if he’d come along. I got my answer, though.

I went on to win the game.

2

I think you should check the turn. By betting bottom pair, it is hard to get called by a worse hand. Maybe he’ll call some nut flush draws, OESD, and gutter + weak flush draw, but you block one of the Ts. The worse hands that he calls with have a lot of equity and will likely bet river if you check the river.

On the turn, I would consider a 3bet all-in. You should have more flushes than villain since villain should bet some flushes on the flop. Your hand has straight draw, flush draw equity, and two-pair equity. However, if Villain is the type of player who doesn’t raise light, then I would fold.

3

Its fine to fold here and move on. Don’t worry about over analyzing a small pot with undefined ranges. Better to fold on the turn and keep your huge chip lead than give this guy any oxygen to make a comeback with. Absolutely no need to turn this hand into a bluff and risk doubling villain up here, especially after he made a small raise on your lead.

Nice job winning the game - that’s the goal, not winning every little hand

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4

That’s how I felt about it, too. When V raised, I sensed slow-play/trap, and felt it was wise to let go and pick another spot. With bottom pair, and weak draws, I didn’t want to pay another 150 chips to see if I filled on the river.

If the river’s an Ace, I have broadway, beatable by a flopped flush. Unless the river’s the Ace of Clubs, then I’m only beatable by the Queen of clubs. If the river is any other clubs besides the Ace or Queen, then I can be beaten by the lone Ace or Queen of clubs. I’m only beating a bluff here if I don’t improve, and the odds are pretty good I don’t improve, and even if I have a lot of outs I could draw to, a lot of them could be counterfeited, especially if V’s holding the Ac and suited.

In the final hand, I flopped top two pair, JJ88, on a J87 flop, and flat-called a min-bet on the flop from J6, then V turned two pair, JJ66, bet 3BB (150), I raised to 6BB (300 into a pot of 450), and he shoved on me for 1050 more. I made the call that time, fearful of a set or straight, and fortunately held up. I figured V’s most likely hands there were T9 or 66 if he had me beat, and against a player with a better ranking, those are the hands that I would have expected to shove on me there. Against a weaker player, I’m expecting overpairs, weaker two pairs, and that’s what I got.

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5

I think your bet on the turn here is good as a play you make some fraction of the time, and you could consider making the same move on the flop. If you have anything to increase your equity, bluffs become more profitable. Here, you have some outs to a flush and to a straight, and 5 outs to two pair. Note however that the quality of your “outs” is not that good, and so you could hit any of your outs and still lose the hand to a better flush, a better straight, or something better than 2 pair, and so I think sometimes you want to treat this as a marginal made hand with showdown value. Note also, that a bluff assumes you are behind… here there was a good chance you were not behind (before you bet). But once you bet, villain’s range should collapse some, and a majority of hands that call are probably better than yours. But note that by betting, you are throwing away what was likely a small equity edge over villain’s range, and leaving yourself against a range that is mostly better than yours for everything that continues. But still, I think it is great that you take this line at least some of the time, as it shows you are asking yourself a very important question: “can a bet here be profitable?”

On to villain’s bet… Let’s start by mentioning that it’s not actually 2x pot. Pot is 60. You bet 30. To play, part of the chips in villain’s bet are his call, which takes the pot to 120. Villain’s bet is also reduced by the size of his call, which makes the actual raise 150 into a pot of 120, or a slight over-bet of the pot. Still, over bets are usually pretty polarizing. They are typically made only with very strong hands, or bluffs with equity. Most fairly strong players will not select that sizing with anything in the middle. As you mention, you are behind all the strong hands. Note that you also lose to a lot of the bluffs when you hit your “outs”.

So I agree this should be an easy fold, unless villain’s frequencies are really unusual in some manner that would justify a call or a bluff re-raise.

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