The movers picked up my things on August 26. They delivered them on September 25. I’m finally moved in and back online, and apologies for the long silence after all the hundred-thousand-hands-hype, but things have not exactly been smooth on my side of the keyboard. Major moving bad beat. For your own reference: I used Nationwide (who is just a broker) and Cross Country Van Lines. Avoid both of those at all costs. Moving on…
I’m out in Oakland, and have played at two new poker rooms. Perhaps at some point I’ll review them for you. In the mean time, I’ll be getting on with other promised posts, and maybe tossing out a few other items as well. Here’s one for you: file under ‘What Was He Thinking?’
I have $400, the big blind, and pocket 5s. The button has about $300, and MP has about $120. The game is (work with me) a 1-1-2, 4 to open, $200 max buy, $200 spread-limit hold’em game at the Oaks Card Club in Emeryville, CA.
About half of the table had limped in for $4, and the button made an oversized raise to $24. This was the third time I’d seen him make a big raise late in the preflop action after lots of limpers, and I was now convinced these were steals with weaker than usual hands. I called with my pocket 5s as did three others (evidently I wasn’t the only one to notice the button’s habits), resulting in over $100 in the pot.
The flop was K-8-5 rainbow, a great flop for pocket 5s. It checked around to the button who bet… $20. Very weak. This told me that the button had almost certainly missed the flop and was just making one last desperate attempt to pick up the pot. I called, as did MP, and everyone else folded.
The turn was a Queen, putting two hearts on the board. I checked, MP checked, and now the button bet out $100. Time to make my move. I check-raised the maximum and made it $300 to go (spread-limit, remember, not no-limit), which was enough to put both players all-in. MP thought about it for a long time, then called. He had less than $100 left though, so it wasn’t exactly a huge call. Then the button called too.
The river was the ace of hearts–potentially an awful card–for a final board of Kx-8x-5h-Qh-Ah. I turned up my set of 5s. No one was particularly surprised. MP turned up KQ for top two pair. No one was particularly surprised except the people who thought maybe he’d been on a heart draw or straight draw. And what did the button have? What had the button put almost three hundred dollars into the pot on the turn with? What did the button over-call with after seeing a huge check-raise and call?
I’ll put the answer in the comments.
Posted by Beck as Poker, Poker Strategy at 5:39 PM PDT