Hey all - I know I just posted a hand about underaggression. And that was probably even a 'quality' hand ... take a look at this situation.

Ultimate Bet 1/2 Hold'em (10 handed)

Preflop: Hero is Button with , .
1 fold, UTG+1 calls, 1 fold, MP1 calls, MP2 calls, 1 fold, CO calls, Hero calls, SB completes, BB checks.

Flop: (7 SB) , , (7 players)
SB checks, BB bets, UTG+1 calls, MP1 raises, MP2 calls, CO folds, Hero calls, SB folds, BB calls, UTG+1 3-bets, MP1 caps, MP2 calls, Hero calls, BB calls, UTG+1 calls.

Turn: (13.50 BB) (5 players)
BB checks, UTG+1 checks, MP1 bets, MP2 folds, Hero calls, BB folds, UTG+1 calls.

River: (16.50 BB) (3 players)
UTG+1 checks, MP1 bets, Hero calls, UTG+1 raises, MP1 calls, Hero calls.

Final Pot: 22.50 BB

Results in white below:
Hero has 7s Ks (flush, king high).
UTG+1 has 4h 4s (straight, six high).
MP1 has 6d Qd (two pair, queens and sixes).
Outcome: Hero wins 22.50 BB.

OK, I don't normally play K7s - but I was in position, and it was a family pot, and the table seemed really loose. My concern (as it has seemed to be with many of my hand posts) was about the hardcore LAG seated at MP1, who was ramming-and-jamming nearly everything he held. However, this time, it was probably solely because of him that I was able to (correctly) stay in the hand.

Or maybe I was not-so-correct? Help me out guys. I know these posts seem horribly novice (or at least *I* think they would appear to be novice), but I need some reassurance. My near-meteoric rise in BR has been plagued by a slow streak that has lasted for a while, so I'm getting the swift ass-kicking back to reality that I'd been expecting for quite some time now - I was quite sure it would be hard to sustain an 8+ BB/100 in the long run at 1/2. I just want to catch any grave mistakes before they turn into serious leaks in my game.

[FWIW - I'm still playing well within my BR (now at ~450), according to my calculations - following the formula for RoR, I am at a 0.30% RoR, which is well within my acceptable region. Also, though I still have a relatively low sample size - only ~4k hands, my SD appears to have converged, so I think I can pretty confidently rely on my calculations.]

I am certainly not much on your call preflop but with this lineup of monkeys I might be tempted as well.

On the turn I really dislike you only calling the bet, crank that baby up and punish everyone to the max that is in there with two pairs or sets or weaker flushes. If no one pops you back you know for certain that you are in the drivers seat. If you get three bet that is bad news but call it down.

Don't worry about things seeming novice. You want advice and that's what we are hear for.

I still fold this hand preflop even is everyone on the table calls. You are really only playing for the flush, 2 pair or trips. If you hit trip kings, you could be in a lot of trouble so the only flops you are looking for are 77x, K7x or 2 or 3 spades. This won't happen enough to justify calling, even on the button so I just fold it and be done with it.

Postflop.....with the amount of action happening, I call the 2 bets and then the cap when it comes back to me. On the turn, you have the second to the nuts and you called. You need to raise that and cap it if he three bets. At 1/2, I see many people playing many weaker hands strongly on scary boards. I don't stop pumping this pot at any point any any typical 1/2 player. They could have a set or the ace of spades so you want them to pay as much as possible for their hands. Raise that turn, reraise if you can and bet and raise the river as long as it doesn't pair the board or put a 4th spade. In this case, ram and jam that pot.

OK - so I shouldn't have been worried about the then? I guess my difficulty with ramming-and-jamming on the turn was that I feared others being on the flush draw as well. There's sort of a more philosophical question here: how on earth can you make any kind of reads when you've got the Gus-types at your table? I was under the impression that with this type of player (who could have very easily not had 2 pair, but rather, a weak ), it's safer to just flat-call. Certainly if I'd had the , I wouldn't have cared about how many extra bets to throw in - but since I was already playing a pretty crappy hand (on which I freely admit I happened to get quite lucky), and there was a good chance it was just second-best, I figured it would be safer to lower my net investment in that particular pot.

The other thing that gets me about this type of situation is the fear of scaring off other players - I realize this is generally not a bad thing to do when you may only have a second-best hand - but then, since I don't play this type of hand with any regularity, would it have even mattered? Because in the long-run, I don't really expect to try and maximize EV for this hand, I already know I'm not going to play it enough times for the notion of EV to really even apply with this hand. In this situation, I think my goal was to try and maximize just that one specific pot.

Again, I think the situation (and my betting strategy) would have been very different if I'd managed to have the .

Thoughts? I fear that I could be missing some big strategy concepts here, so please correct my thinking if I've made a mistake.

You can't always fear someone has the nuts but is someone has the , you want to make them pay as much as possible without a hand. Make them pay through the teeth on the turn for a draw that is likely to miss. If another spade hits, you just check call. Same thing with the board pairing. With this many people staying in, its likely for someone to have a set or two pair so you also want to make them pay. If they have those hands, they are likely calling any bets on the turn so make them pay. If they have less than that, they may call one bet on the turn but nothing on the river. Making the chasers pay on the turn and river will get you more money than trying to keep the couple people drawing dead on the turn in.

Norton, I have to agree w/ you.

50k hands I am + 0.15 bb/hand with K,9s thru K,2s on the button.

I definitely play it from the button for 1 bet with multiple callers.

My requirement is that I want 5 people in the pot.

Preflop call is absolutely standard.

On the flop, the only close decision is when it is bet and raised to you. And the question is not folding or calling, it's calling or raising. I think it's table dependent based on how likely you are to get bet into again if you make your flush. Calling probably worked out better in this case because it got raised and capped again behind you, but they were all along for the ride either way. But basically with a draw to the second nut flush you have a ton of equity in this pot and there's no way you can fold for any number of bets, unless someone flips over Ax of spades. In fact, with a draw to the nuts here it would be an EASY three-bet.

The one value to raising on the flop is that when MP1 bets the turn and you raise again, it makes it a bit less obvious that you have a flush. I think you need to raise the turn here anyway.

Raise the river. When you call and UTG check-raises, reraise. Stop looking for monsters under the bed.

NT