blonde poker forum

Playing a cash game, 25p/50p PL Hold em last night with about 9 players at the table and a hand something along the lines of this came up......

I have  Jc Jd on the Button and around £90 in my stack, before the action gets to me there is a call and a pot raise, its then folded to me and its about £2.75 to go so I reraise the pot.  SB calls and Fergus8, who had been playing semi tight but extremely aggressive, reraises the pot again on the BB.  UTG+1 calls and has been playing everyhand like a maniac since he sat down and is pretty easy to read, the original raiser folds and it costs me around £11 to go so I call.  SB calls also, he is friends with UTG+1 and although seems to be a better player and not so much of a maniac he has still been playing every hand and calling bets with very little.

Flop comes  Kh Qc Jh making my set

SB is 1st to act and bets the pot, Fergus 8 reraises the pot and doesnt have much left, the next guy goes all in and its on to me.  I have about £75 left to call and its and the indications are that the guy to my left and Fergus 8 are bothing putting all their money in the middle also to make it a £200+ pot.

My read is that the guy to my left is weak, has an Ace and is looking for the T for the straight but I dont want to discount him having AT and an already made straight.  I have the other guy immediately on a flush draw and Im putting Fergus8 on a premium hand either AA, KK, or AK.

So Im up against straight draws, flush draws and possible bigger sets.  What, in your opinion, is the correct play here?  Call or fold?

If I get a few replies Ill tell you what everyone had and what happened.

I think if your ever going to fold a set of jacks it would be here but I'm not convinced I could. To be fair when I left Fergus had tightened a fair bit so I would definitely be worried about him having KK or QQ here. You could also be up against 9 10 as well as A 10. Fold then swear loudly when everyone flips up KQ AK and QJ  :D.

I think I cry for a bit then fold, theres so many draws out there that one will probably hit and you could already be beaten.  Once the cards are turned your going to feel very clever or very stupid.

Woudl it not be closer to a £300 pot? Basically 3x your original 90 plus some dead money in the middle. So its costing you 75 to win 300 so the in terms of pot odds, the ready made straights and flush draws dont really matter cause you will turn or river a full house (according to WPT hand simulator) 34% of the time. Seems a bit high and someone will probably correct me but as I see it, the only hand you are actually scared of is QQ or KK. If you put Fergus on one of them, fold and wait for another hand. If your happy to gamble, put it all in. I think you could still possibly be ahead or at the very least, have a good few outs left.

Changed my mind but left the above there just in case people wanted to see it. I would fold based on the fact that if anyone had KQ, QJ, KJ, then they have some of your outs and you could actually be drawing just about dead if someone turns a straight, flush or have already got a straight. I'd definitely say fold now.

This is an extremely tough one.

Obviously you're first thoughts should be what you think Fergus has, he is the easiest of your 3 opponents to put on a hand a) because you know a bit about him and b) because he was the third aggressor preflop.

When there have been 2 raises in front of you and you are in the bb, there are not many hands that you should be looking to re-raise with in this position. If I looked down at QQ, I may even be inclined to fold in this position with the original early position raiser (never mind the utg+1 limper) still to act after me. Again, AK is not good enough to re-raise with as he will have to play the rest of the hand out of position, and will probably have to put his chips in on the flop whatever flops and as we know 70% of the time there aint gonna be no ace or king. Therefore, logically the only 2 hands (maybe 3) hands that he could realistically have based on his preflop betting are: AA, KK (maybe QQ).

Ok, now the other 2 players preflop action means it is difficult to put them on a hand. One thing is for certain, they do not have AA, KK or QQ. If you say the were loose, or maniacs I would also struggle to put them on AK, as loose/weak players would probably have pushed ak a lot more preflop. The UTG+1 limper likely has suited connectors, or maybe a small pair. But when he pushes in on the flop the small pair argument is discounted, so I would put him on either a low flush draw or maybe even the made baby straight with 9t in his hand.

The SB has continued to play the hand despite an initial 2 raises in front of him, if he's calling those 2 raises, as a weaker player as you say he is, he would have no problem calling that third raise. Based on his preflop action, and his subsequent action on the flop, I'd probably put him on AQh or something along those lines.

Which leaves you to your decision....

If Fergus has KK or QQ you're beat. If the UTG+1 has 9t/at you're beat (although u have a limited amount of outs to boat up). If SB has AQH he has a decent chance to catch you.

This really is a tough judgement call on your part, and I don't think that anyone who wasn't there can accurately come to a decision. Fergus might have AA (although if he does I think he's played it badly on the flop), and the other 2 may be drawing at the straight or the flush. The amount of money in the pot means that it is tough to let it go, but no amount of pot odds can save u from drawing dead, or close to dead, if Fergus has QQ or KK.

Folding is a probably a good option here, but.... if you call and lose you can always recount the story of that time you lost a 200-300 quid pot when you flopped trip Jacks and ran into some **** with whatever! Hope it went well for you...

You're reads are back to front if you believe fergus8 to be holding AA KK or AK. Whilst he does stumble accross these hands occasionally, he could have any hand with a K or a Q in it, with a shitty kicker. This is judging from his play last night mind you... and not the play the night before.

IMO regardless of that, you call here. I know you're reasons for folding but theres 300 in the middle and you are 75 to call. You know that two guys are certainly playing with rags. And fergus with re-re-raise with a bare ace (or Q7)..........

Having said that, I did make a silly laydown of trip 9s to a re-raise of £16 because I was damn sure Steven Tracey had KK on a K99 board :)

My first impressions of this hand is that you are beaten by a bigger set. What I do in these scenerios is look at all the betting that has occured so far. I believe the pre-flop betting gives you the best indication of what you are up against. The guy that bothers me the most is Fergus8 based on his pre-flop betting. Has Fergus been re-raising preflop like this a lot because purely on his actions pre-flop alone AA and KK look most likely. Not many guys would go as wild pre-flop with lesser hands like AK or QQ.

I hate to fold sets on the flop, however this would probably be one of those rare times. The pot is offering you a good price something like 3.5/1 but I believe the chances of being up against a bigger set or even the made straight are too high for me to make the call. I'd wait for a better spot to stick my money in.

mjrevie is probably right, it probably is around a £300 pot.  I never counted the pot out in full at the time because I knew it was costing me all my cash to call and knew a call would be worth it for the pot and Fergus had been playing very solidly the whole game (completely opposite of his tournament play :P ) and No limit Id maybe have him on a high card with a weak kicker if he goes all in on the BB but a pot sized raise on the BB when he knows for sure 2 guys will call with any 2 cards just doesnt indicate anything other than a premium hand to me.  Fergus was well up for the night so I also dont think he;dbluff it pre-flop for this much witht he intention to bluff it later.

What happened in the end?

He folded like a big fish and everyone showed their rags, anyone that plays against fergus 8 will tell you that.

So what was the winning hand then??

For once, Billy the fish is right.  I folded.  UTG+1 had a small flush draw, I dont remember what the SB had but he didnt have much, I think maybe KT offsuit.  Fergus had AK which held up to take the pot.  To rub salt in the wounds the Q paired on the turn to give me the full house and the straight draws and flush draws wouldnt have mattered.