Here's a hand from tonight that I pretty much played by the book, but I wonder if more wasn't possible.

A fairly decent player at the table raises up front to $25, and I'm on the button with 88. We both have moderately deep stacks (I'm at around $800, and he has about $1,000). First, this guy is really more of a tournament player. He's raised to $50 with 88 or 77 before (a rather bad play, I think--the tournament influence becoming much more clear), and he has raised to $15 with KT (I think he was in LP or something). The $25 raise typically means something fairly solid, though, I think.

Also, not long before that, I raised TT as overpair heavily on a flop of something like 872 or such (2 to a suit)--raised pot, initial raiser checked, and loose player to my right fires $25 into a $100 pot. I make it $150, and he moves in for about $400 altogether. Against this player, I should have more seriously considered calling, but I folded it (he said he had A8 and was probably telling the truth). So, in any case, I've been making a lot of raises here, including semi-bluff raises.

Now, the loose raiser has a few callers, and with 88 in my hand, the flop comes 885. Well, it doesn't get much better than that. I had also been chatting a bit with the one good player at the table (who was seated to my left) on a hand where he had flopped quad deuces.

I played this pretty much by the book with the slowplay, and he kept betting into me: $50 on the flop, I think, then $100 on the turn, which is an A, and $120 on the river, which is yet another A. At this point, I'm REALLY hoping he has AK and move in. He folds.

Ok, this is pretty much ABC here, but I think this hand had more potential in actuality. It's OBVIOUSLY one that I'd LOVE to play for full deep stacks, and that's rare. Regardless of whether that actually happens, I have some serious questions here about the slowplay.

I really do think (as my opponent said) that he wouldn't have bet the initial $50 if he didn't have an overpair. So, particularly in light of the kind of plays I've been working to set up, why not just bump it to $200 right there? That's definitely the play I'd make on 99 or TT with that flop, and he needs to raise. The ace showing up probably didn't really influence anything at all. He knew I didn't have one, and I was optimistic in hoping that he did.

But, if I bump it to $200 on his flop bet, he actually needs to move in with his overpair, which presumably would have been bigger than my 99 or TT. The more I think about it, the more I think slowplaying in this situation may have been a poor play.

Any opinions?

Basically, the bottom line is to get a lot of chips in there while he still has a hand. The hope of the slowplay is that he already catches one. With the raise in front of me, I have reason to believe that he already has one, and it's really more likely that his hand is going to get worse rather than better.

With truly correct play from the overpair, I just get a flat call to the $200, I suppose (giving me free cards to the river when I have something like 99-QQ, the bigger of which probably didn't need to catch up anyway--I'd guess he had JJ). But I do offer him several opportunities for mistakes rather than just milking and hoping he improves: 1) He can re-raise me right there. 2) He can call a bet of another $150 on the turn or start thinking he's ahead and raise me. 3) If he does just call the turn, we have a pot of $700 and essentially HAS to call the river.

While I might have made less on the hand (I certainly pick up the $200, I think--he has to call that or I'll run him over with too many other hands), I really tend to think that a raise in this situation offers more potential than the flat call. I think I played it too routinely--the critical issue being that he probably already has an overpair here and is very likely to overplay it.

Cloutier talks about a hand like this in his book. He actually raises a flop like TT5 with two tens. He knew the guy would slow down if he only called...so he decided to raise to make it look like he held a pair (not quads of course.) The guy played back at him..and he got all of his money.

If you raised the flop he might have reraise with something like QQ. The turn card might have scared him. Or mabe he was bluffing the whole time. Hindsight is 20/20 isn't it

If he has an overpair the best play is to raise, but if he has AK you would be glad you just called and allowed himn ot hit the ace at the turn. It goes both ways.

I think I would just call, because theres a good chance he has something like JJ and the turn is another undercard. Then you can raise and hope he really likes his jacks.

Its tough to win a monster pot with quads though, unless the cards fall exactly right.

Saturday night Sunday morning i had quads two or three times, so I got a little practice at playing them.

Against one opponent, I just bet them all the way down, and got paid. The other guy I knew to be a very weak player that moving him off top pair is impossible, I check raised the flop, and then check raised the turn, and put him on the river which he called.

I don't think there is a best way to play it, however I think a raise on the flop won't scare him off, if he calls you lead the turn, for the bet that you think will entice him to play back into you. It is really hard to get paid on quads unless they have the boat or the opponent is a complete bonehead.

lol, yes, to some extent true. But there's also a big difference between raised and unraised pots (as well as opponents).

If you have 22 on a flop of 822 in an unraised pot, it's just very hard for anyone to get excited yet, so you do need to at least give them some chance to catch up.

In a raised pot against a decent player with a flop of 885, sure, AA can put you on a set, but there's some variety here of what's bettable, and AA actually beats quite a few of these. Moreover, following through with a pretty decent raise on hands that have a very good chance of being behind (with the intention of folding to additional heat) sets up your monsters really well--specifically, going ahead and raising strongly here with hands like 99-QQ, particularly if your opponent fails to bet full pot into that flop.