[Ignignokt]

Yes, online I raise this in a heartbeat.

In a B&M there are jackpots up the wazoo, so no one of the 5 callers who holds a 3[img]/images/graemlins/spade.gif[/img] or 9[img]/images/graemlins/spade.gif[/img] is folding that flop, no matter what their other card is.

My thought was not of the straight flush UNTIL BB, an apparent thinking player, bet out on the river.

First, of all my opponents, he was most likely to have a 3 or 8 of spades, as the BB.

Second, he would have had good reason to just call the turn, with two players behind him, including a loose (but not insane) caller and someone who was obviously willing to call on that flop.

Edit: Then there was the possiblity that I get sandwiched between BB and MP2. (My read on MP2, however, included a wide range of hands that I wasn't particularly scared of. If I had been heads-up with him, this thread wouldn't have been necessary.)

If so, the river's where he's going to make his move - too much chance in a B&M game of it being checked around.

For the record, while my heart sank, I knew I couldn't live with myself if he turned out to have pocket fours, so I raised. He thought for a second, looked at me, and 3-bet.

I ONLY called the 3-bet due to my uncertainty about the newness of what, in retrospect (based not only on this hand but also his later play) was a rock-solid read. (He had 73 with the 3[img]/images/graemlins/spade.gif[/img], which even gave him a rationale to call the flop with his TP).

And here's B&M for you: he almost just called my river raise because HE was scared I had something like A8 of spades.