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Originally Posted by BorisTheSpider
Thinking you're ahead is never a reason to bet.
You can bet for 3 reasons:
1. To get called by worse
2. To make better fold
3. To collect dead money
That's it.
"I' m ahead" is not a reason to bet, because if you're ahead, but worse can't/won't call, then you can't bet for value.
Let's add to this a bit, since I think it would help.
Specifically, in relation to this hand:
REASON 1: You can't really bet for value here - what worse can call? Some weaker hands can call, but not enough for it to be a good value betting spot. You say he's a station, perhaps pocket 3s through 6s can call, but it's a very thin value bet as he has a lot of hands that beat you in his calling range.
He can call with a flush draw or a straight draw, but with a lot of those hands he has quite a bit of equity, at the top of that range he has hands like Jh9h or JhQh that crush you, or AhKh which is a favourite - you can't be betting for value against hands that are favourites to win, that's like value betting 77 here against QQ. Even medium strength draws like JsQs have enough equity that betting for value is thin.
It's also an ugly spot if you get to the river and you've built a big pot by value betting then he raises a busted draw on you with multiple overcards to your pair out on the board, what do you do then?
REASON 2: What better can fold here? You say he's a station, he's certainly not folding an overpair, he's not folding a ten, he's probably not folding an 8 or pocket 9s. He probably can't fold anything here that beats you, so you can't possibly bluff.
REASON 3: You can bet to collect dead money, but since we expect him to cbet the flop, if you think he'll cbet with stuff with little equity like AcJc or something, then you're better off checkraising the flop, since he'll put more dead money in there with his cbet for you to collect. Remember again though, that you said he's a station, so then when he calls your checkraise with 3h6h, what do you do now with a bloated turn pot?
With his weak heart draws, you can't bet to collect dead money, since he's a station and he's never folding them, so then you're betting for value, but again it's not a good spot since if he bluffs the river with a busted flush you can't call, and although you may wish to charge his draws, you can't really do much here in a nothing pot with a hand that may well already be behind.
When you're betting for reason 3, you don't mind him folding a worse hand than yours (like AcJc) since he does have some equity with that to draw out, so you'd rather the hand didn't check down because then you're just giving him a freeroll to catch his 6 outs.
Reason 3 is really the only conceivable reason to bet here that isn't too thin, and if you are going to bet to collect dead money then a checkraise makes more sense than donking.
I'd really encourage you to think about what a bet here can accomplish in terms of the reasons for betting above. If you donked into me on that flop, I'd just raise you no matter what I held, then what would you do?
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