The Poker Quiz

You are playing in a live $1/2 NL cash game where most players have between $200-400. From middle position you limp into the pot with A 10. A player two seats to your left raises to $7. The button calls and you call. The flop comes 10 7 3. You lead out for $14 and both players call. The turn is the 2. Still with top pair/top kicker you bet $20. The original raiser pops it to $55 and the button folds. You call the raise. The river brings the Q. You check and he bets $120.

The Solution

Call.

Replay this hand in your head…what hand is your opponent trying to represent? He is not telling a consistent story with his bets and it looks like he is trying to buy the pot with a poor bluff. He made a small-ish standard opening raise for a deep stacked $1/2 game which means he could have a wide range of hands. But then you took the lead by betting 2/3 the pot in first position. He flat called behind you. Then he raised you after the 2s came on the turn? How could that card have helped him? Did he hit a set of deuces? Possibly, but he probably would have folded them after your flop bet. Did he hit a set or possibly held an overpair on the flop? Again, probably not, considering he didn’t raise on the flop with two clubs and an opponent to act behind him. Looks like air to me…

Then a Qc comes on the river. Not a very good card for your hand, but not a bad one either. After you check, your opponent sees another opportunity to take the pot. The problem is it’s a tough sell to represent that the Qc helped his hand. It doesn’t look like he has a club flush at all and he already trying representing a hand from the turn. If we thought he had nothing on the turn, do we really think that the Queen hit him?

He took two chances to bluff at the pot, but both times he was doing so blindly – bluffing without purpose, without having an idea of what hand he was representing. To pull of a successful bluff you first have to pick a specific hand and convince yourself that you are holding it before you try convincing your opponent. Call him down and pick off his bluff, because the only feeling better than pulling one off yourself, is correctly analyzing a situation and catching someone in the act.