Re: 2/4 - I see monsters
A lot of the analysis of this hand is bothering me.
As long as our opponent isn't doing something weird with, like, a pair of aces, there isn't a single hand we beat that he should be raising this river with given his previous action. We're basically counting on him to raise the river on the strength of his hand alone -- not it's strength relative to our range. (something that he has not done previously in this hand. His flat call of our turn bet means he's afraid of what we have.) In other words, if we want to three-bet, assuming he's not getting way out of line, we're counting on his entire thought process on the river being "Wow! A full house! Wait til the guys hear about this! I RAISE!"
Many of your analyses can be boiled down to something similar. "Not only do I have a full house, I have the f*cking nut full house!" is what you're saying. "Nothing wrong with losing a lot of money with a hand this strong!"
It's fine if you want to three-bet. But you have to do it for the right reasons -- i.e., you think this guy is clueless enough to play a hand this way. I get the distinct feeling that a lot of you are just repeating some rule that you're a p*ssy for not raising with the nut boat.
Look, there are a ton of situations where you'll want to put in three bets, and five or seven, for that matter, with the nut full house when the only hand that beats you has quads. Even with this specific board, when there are no straight or flushes possible, three-betting here is almost always going to be right.
But this guy has already slowed way down on this hand. He didn't cap middle pair on the flop. He capped two pair or a set, and when we led into him, he got worried that he was behind. He's not putting us on K8 when he raises the river.
Yeah, quads are a rare hand. But I think he has quads here a more often than he has a boat.
Regardless, my point is this: If our river threebet is +EV, it's because our opponent has fallen into the trap of falling in love with the strength of his hand. Don't fall into that trap yourself.
-McGee
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