All in with Pocket 9's

Hi Everyone,

I didn't know where to put this so as I'm completely new here I thought this would be as good a place as any.

Anywhooooo...........I had an interesting hand the other night and wanted your opinions on it. I've only been playing poker about 3 months but feel I have at least a decent understanding of the basics. Forgive me if I don't have all the terminology or important stuff in the below but I'll do my best.

I'm playing NLHE at a $10 buy in table with 5/10c blinds. Only 3 players at the table. One guy had been very aggressive the whole time. Us other two having to fold more often than not either preflop or on the flop.

Finally I pick up pocket 9's. Only 3 at the table, good hand I figure. I raise the pot to $1. Mr Agressive calls and the other folds.

Post flop comes 2s 5h Jd. I throw out another $1.50 bet so as not to show weakness or fear of the J. Mr Aggressive goes all in.

Now here's where it gets interesting. I feel I have a pretty good read on him thus far. I figure as he only called my preflop raise he probably doesn't have a high pair. So I put him on maybe AK or KQ. I figure there is a chance he's made a pair of J's but after much thought I think it unlikely he woulud have called my preflop raise with J/something else and I call all in.

Out comes the turn and river with no help. He is on KQ, doesn't catch his card and I win a nice $22ish pot.

Now this guy goes off saying I played the hand totally wrong because I called him when I didn't even have top pair. Says he made the right move cause he was on a drawing to top pair hand. Says I'm a fish and if I stay around he will take back all my money yadda yadda yadda. I say I trusted my read and was right. I figured if he hadn't made the Jacks then he would have only had 6 outs to improve his hand to win. That gives me a roughly 75% chance of winning the hand since I don't need to improve. Of course if my read was wrong then I'm out.

Now comes the questions.
1: Do you guys think I made the right move?
2: Would you call and all in bet with a single overcard on the table?
3: Why is it that if he is trying to draw top pair and goes all in that's "considered the right move" but everytime someone calls an all in bet and they are on a flush draw everyone says it's the wrong move?
4: Wouldn't the flush draw have more outs(9) than drawing to top pair(6)?
5: If you are on any sort of draw hand wouldn't you sort of just want to be calling if the other guy is betting big?

So in short, do you think I made the right call or just got lucky? Sorry for the rambling nature of the post btw. I don't expect a point by point answer, just a general outline of whether you all think I made the right call, played the hand right etc.

Cheers and thanks,
Peaceful Kung Fu Fighting Warrior(PKKFW)

First of all, nice play.

1: You got reraised while you hold less then top pair, this is a situation when I will call only if I had a good read on the player, which apprently you did, I would never call a reraise without a very good read on the player, there are a bunch of hands that would not reraise you preflop but have you beaten - Aj,Kj, Qj, JT, TT, 55, 22.

2. Same as one

3. The point here is that there is a big difference between making the bet and calling the bet. When you make the bet (like he did) you hope to buy the pot right there by bluffing your opponent off the pot, and if they call you still got outs. When you call the bet you dont have the option of your opponent folding, so you are just drawing for the hand. In a nutshell you need a better hand to call then to bet.

4. Yes

5. As with everything else in poker, it depends. The textbook answer is call by pot odds, so if you have 9 outs on the turn you want to call a bet which is 1/3 of the pot or less (without taking into considerations implied odds), the long answer is that it highly depends on your read of your opponnent

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Originally Posted by PKKFW

1: Do you guys think I made the right move?

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Yes

Quote:

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Originally Posted by PKKFW

2: Would you call and all in bet with a single overcard on the table?

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Yes, in certain circumstances. TLR alluded to it. Your read was right and you went with it.

Quote:

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Originally Posted by PKKFW

3: Why is it that if he is trying to draw top pair and goes all in that's "considered the right move" but everytime someone calls an all in bet and they are on a flush draw everyone says it's the wrong move?

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Its not. It was a gamble by him that didn't pay off. Maybe if he would have bet less, he might have got u to fold because it looks like he HAS hit the J and WANTS you to call.

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Originally Posted by PKKFW

4: Wouldn't the flush draw have more outs(9) than drawing to top pair(6)?

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Yes. And just to confirm, when he is drawing to 6 outs against your made pair, you will win 3 out of 4 times (excluding a little for runner-runners)

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Originally Posted by PKKFW

5: If you are on any sort of draw hand wouldn't you sort of just want to be calling if the other guy is betting big?

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Depends how big my draw was. If I had an OESFD and I was sure he had an overpair, I would probably bet or raise his bet with it.

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Originally Posted by PKKFW

So in short, do you think I made the right call or just got lucky?

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Yes, you made the right move.

As I read your post I thought for sure he was just trying to scare you off and steal the pot but you knew him better and put him on top unpaired. Still, the outcomes is the same, you made the right move.

good move. with only 3 people, if he's raising preflop every time, and betting every flop, do you honestly think he had the top pair? flop was very good for your, hand ignore that jack. this guy was an idiot - you can't play every hand then get mad when your bluff doesn't work.

Thanks guys. It's nice to have my thoughts on the matter confirmed. Good to know it wasn't a dumb call that worked out.

Cheers,
PKKFW

Most people that berate you for bad plays (or good plays like you made), are not great poker players. For all of you that are good players or aspire to be, don't berate your opponents! You might just scare them into playing better. Also, you will win more money from people who like you or are neutral to you than who don't like you. Ever notice how little most people at a table like the 'table coach'?

Xanadu on the money. The only thing that worries me about your post is that you let the trash talking of an aggressive, tilting bluffer affect the way you view your own play even when it's clearly rational.

There is a slight caveat here - I'm glad you got the read right but even so I think it was a dangerous situation and that folding would have been excusable. As a result, the only play on this hand that I would contemplate more closely is whether you were able to list, as TLR does above, the hands that he realistically might have held that would have beaten you.