Playing a Straight on a Three-Flush, Paired Board
This week I have another tournament hand analysis for you, a hand in which I flop a straight although both the board and my opponent's actions turn the situation into a difficult one.
The blinds were 1,200/2,400 with a 300 ante, and I had the biggest stack at the table with more than 210,000. A loose-aggressive player opened the action with a raise to 5,000 from middle position and the button called. Dealt 5♠4♠ in the small blind I called as well, as did the big blind.
The four of us saw the flop come A♣3♣2♣, giving me a straight. I discuss in the video the merits of leading with a bet here, but I decided to check and in fact it checked all of the way around.
The turn brought the 2♦, pairing the board, and this time I did lead with a bet of 14,000 into the pot of almost 23,000. Only the LAG player (the original raiser) called, bringing the pot up over 50,000.
The river was the Q♦. What would you do here? Check? Bet? I checked, and my opponent made a big bet of 50,000, almost exactly the size of the pot.
Now what would you do? Take a look at how I decided to play it (and hear my explanation), and see how things turned out:
Would you have played this hand differently? Let me know in a comment below.
Jonathan Little is a professional poker player and author with over $6,300,000 in live tournament earnings. He writes a weekly educational blog and hosts a podcast at JonathanLittlePoker.com. You can follow him on Twitter @JonathanLittle.
