Playing Ace-King Offsuit After Missing the Flop
DECISION POINT: In a no-limit hold'em tournament, you raise preflop with A♠K♥ from middle position and get two callers, the hijack and the button. The flop comes J♦7♦10♠, and the action is on you.
PRO ANSWER: When deciding whether or not to continuation bet on the flop after raising preflop, you should analyze a few factors. First, you should consider whether or not you have a hand strong enough to take to showdown as well as your hand's chance of improving on future streets.
In this case, you currently have just ace-high, but have some outs to improve to a straight (the 4 queens) or top pair (any ace or king). Given this board, we should heavily discount the top pair outs as well as the queen of diamonds, since we shouldn't be willing to put in significant chips on those cards. Overall, you don't hold a strong hand or draw in this situation.
Given that you don't have a strong hand or draw, how likely are you to win this pot uncontested if you continuation bet? Factors that influence the chance of bluffing successfully include the number of opponents, the board texture, and position. In this case, you are out of position facing multiple opponents on a highly coordinated (easy to hit) board. This makes betting as a bluff unprofitable.
Since you don't have a good hand, a good draw, or the ability to bluff profitably, you should not continuation bet in this spot. You should simply check and be willing to fold to any standard bet.
Checking is the best play.
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