Hand-reading (part 2): The answer

So if you’ve read part 1 of this series you’ll know that the board is now reading A-A-Q-Q-6 and my opponent has bet $700 into the $900 pot. With pocket Threes I have no hand, but I’m having trouble putting my opponent on a hand that could bet here. He could not realistically have a Queen here because he knows that no worse hand would call his river bet and no better hands would fold – so he would undoubtedly check the river and either call or fold if I bet. Betting with a Queen has no value, and this opponent was strong enough to know it.

The same logic can also be applied to 6-6 now. If he flopped the under full house and was trying to slow-play, he had to be annoyed with the turn and river, as he is in a situation where again, no worse hands would call his river bet and no better hands would fold. So once again, if he had Sixes full, he would almost certainly check to me and react to my river action.

Hidden bullet?

What about an Ace though? Well, while it is certainly possible that an Ace would bet the river, it is more likely he would check and give an aggressive player like myself some rope to hang myself. But even setting aside that argument for a moment, what hand could he have with an Ace that could have called before the flop and on the flop? Well, this particular opponent would almost certainly have reraised my late-position preflop raise if he had A-Q or A-A. If he had A-6, he would have just folded before the flop. And no other hand containing an Ace would have called my flop bet. So putting that all together, I could be sure that he did not have an Ace, a Queen, or Sixes full.

So what did that leave him? His only possible hands were a pocket pair of some sort, or a hand containing a single Six. Of course, both of those hands had been counterfeited by the Aces and Queens. Therefore, it is likely that he felt he now had to bet to win the pot, turning his hand into a bluff.

The grand finale

Of course, I knew that whatever junk he might have had, he still had to have a better hand than mine. I could only play the board, and if he had a single card in his hand higher than a Six he held the better showdown hand. But from recreating the play of the entire hand, I also believed with close to complete certainty that he had a hand that had been counterfeited and could not stand any heat. Moreover, he could not be sure that I did not have an Ace myself (as I would play any Ace in a very similar fashion). Therefore, I raised his river bet to $2,000. He instantly folded, showing pocket Tens.

So what is the moral of this story? Against tricky opponents, it can be very misleading to try to decipher the strength of their hands based on their actions at a single point in the hand. However, if you evaluate the play of the entire hand and consolidate the information you gather at each street, you can make optimal decisions with relative ease and accuracy, allowing you to make big plays with confidence.

Read Part 1...