Posts Tagged ‘ace’

Suppose that an elephant has made it two bets in the second position before the flop and then a jackal in the fourth position has called the two bets. Now you call on the button with 0-0, and the big blind calls as well. The flop is 0-0-0, and the big blind checks. The elephant bets and the jackal raises. What do you do? You have flopped the "nut" (best) flush draw. If another heart comes off the deck, then you have made an ace-high flush.

This is a reasonably strong flop for your hand. With this strong draw, you'll make the flush about one-third of the time, and occasionally you may win simply by hitting your ace, so you must either call the two bets or raise it to three bets to go. My instinct in this case would be to raise. Who knows what the jackal has in this hand? He may have a flush draw or a straight draw, in which case you have him beat with your ace high at this point. Your raise may eliminate the elephant (who may have the best hand!) and get you one on one with the jackal, whom you may have beaten. The worst-case scenario for you, if you make it three bets to go, is that the elephant makes it four bets to go and you end up having to call one more bet.

In general, I recommend playing a nut-flush draw very aggressively on the flop, especially when you have position, as you do in this example. This hand all but requires that you call a bet with it on fourth street, and if it were mine I would want to put in a lot of bets on the flop and then bluff at the pot on fourth street even if a bad card comes off.

Alternatively, I'd put in a lot of bets on the flop and call down one opponent on the end with my measly ace high if there's any chance that this opponent was drawing to something as well. Sometimes the size of the pot that you create by playing the nut-flush draw aggressively will necessitate your calling on the river with merely ace high, because the size of the pot may tempt other players who are on inferior draws to make desperation bluffs at you. You win these often enough, with your ace-high river call, to justify this play.

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Tags: ace, casino, jackal, poker, pot

• Playing A-x Suited On The Poker Flop – Hit It Or Fold It Part2 (0)
• Playing Small Poker Pairs – Good Flops (0)
• Playing A-x Suited On The Poker Flop – Hit It Or Fold It (0)

In the discussion of preflop situations, I said that if no one else has raised the pot before the flop, and you have A-x suited, then you should make it two bets to go. In general, if you've done that but missed the flop, you should bet out once anyway, thus representing that you've hit it. If an opponent calls your bet on the flop when you've missed the flop, prepare to fold your hand soon. There is no need to get too involved with A-x suited if you miss the flop, and no warrant for bluffing off too much money with this hand. If you're the raiser before the flop, then take one "shot" (bluff) at the pot and give up if you get called.

Where someone else has raised the pot before the flop, I've been recommending that you just call his two bets. In general, if you've done that but then missed the flop, then you should fold your hand. Again, there's no need for you to get involved in such a pot by calling or raising. Just throw your hand away, save some chips, and forget about it.

With A-x suited you'll see a lot of different flops that hit part or all of your hand. You may have [*»|-p»j when the flop comes down J-10-7; this one is trouble for you (because you hit just enough of the flop that you may decide to play on until the end and lose a bunch of chips). You may have [*»j-[VJ when the flop comes down A-7-4, a terrific flop for you. You may have 0-P»] when the flop comes down 8-7-2, a reasonably good flop for you.

You may have when the flop comes down 7-5-2, a strong flop for you (top pair with top kicker). Finally, there are dream flops for 0-[3 like H-El'S (ace-high-flush) and A-A-7 (top full house).

So there are a lot of ways to hit A-x suited, some of them good and others bad. The interesting thing is that you may win your biggest pot with the 7-5-2 flop! Why? On those two "dream flops" I just mentioned, how much action can you expect to get from other players? You already have most of the cards that would get someone interested in playing. But on the 7-5-2 flop, people may sense a bluff and try what they think is a resteal (they raise on a bluff because they believe you're trying to steal the pot). In poker, you never know which hands or flops will win you the biggest pot of the night. Just be prepared to play your hand as well as you can.

I'll never forget a pot I once played holding A-7 at the World Series of Poker. The year was 1994, and we were down to about 40 players left in a no-limit Hold'em event. First place was $220,000, and as with any WSOP event, both money and history were at stake.

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Tags: ace, casino, full house, poker

• Playing A-x Suited On The Poker Flop – Flush Draw (0)
• Reraising Before The Poker Flop Leads To Betting On The Flop (0)
• Playing Small Poker Pairs – Terrible Flops (0)