Betting after the River!

General situation! Playing a SNG tournament, I'm in the Big blind and I pick up a crummy hand like 6-10 or other of the sort. The big blind is $50 and there are 3 callers before me. One is the small blind, so the pot is $200 before the flop. The flop comes K-5-2. Checks all around. Turn is a 7. Checks all around, River is a 6. I bet my pair (table min. $50) and take the pot with 1 caller( calls with Ace High). I seem to be winning a lot of pots like this. My question is, Should I be betting more after the river than the table minimum? And if my card hits on the turn instead of the river should i bet it then? I usually check the low pair to the river in this situation.

This situation would have been a good opportunity to bluff. It's not a good hand to bluff with but doing this eliminates some players who have nothing, nothing to chase or don't want to invest the certian amountchasing. The player with the ace might have called you but the river would have gotten you the win and you would have raked in a few more chips.

Good question. The only problem is what if Ace high is King high. Then you just got slow played. If you bet the min. and Ace high would've raised another $100. Would you have called?

With 5 people in the pot, this is a really scary time to raise with that six. It's true that a K probably would have bet by now, but a 7 might not have bet on the turn (but would likely call this small raise). Nice win, but I'm not sure this would be profitable against four others that often. I don't see people with better hands folding to a bet like that, meaning that you're only looking at profit from people calling with worse hands.

In the river you can either do a value bet or a bluff. That´s the main reason of why i don´t like betting in the river with medium strength hands. Generally, if you bet in the river you are going to be called or raised by a better hand or your opponent is going to fold with a weak hand. If you analize that, there is no point in betting with a medium strength hand. What´s your propose on that bet? If it´s making more money by getting some callers, that´s pretty of difficult, because you need to be called by someone who holds a worse hand 6s. If you want to make your opponents fold with better hands, that´s nearly impossible with that bet. As Paulsson said, someone with 7s probably would have checked-call there.

So why did you win money with that move? First of all i would like to know what was the buy in of the SNG. On that play, it happened the opposite to one of the reasons of why i don´t like betting in the river with those hands. You were called by an opponent who had a worse hand than yours. Actually, he called with nothing. That´s pretty strange, unless you were playing low buy in. The only reason i may find of why your opponent called, is that he paid to obtain information.

In my opinion a check would be a better play there. Yes you won $50 more, but for me that isn´t worth enough compared to the risk of being called or raised by a better hand or just make your opponents fold and obtain the same as a check. You said that you have won lots of pots like that, but i don´t like being results oriented, so my answer to your first question is no, you shouldn´t be betting more than the minimum. In fact, you shouldn´t be betting there.

Now in relation to your second question, i think that if the turn showed a 6 instead of a 7, then yes, it may be a good time to bet there. You hold second pair and in the flop everybody checked. Now in the turn the SB checked and it´s up to you. A 1/2 pot bet should be enough to see where are you standing or to take the pot right there.

p.s: Long time ago i made a thread abour river betting. You can read it here.

I would just call. You will only get called by an inferior hand, and reraised by a superior one. Sometimes a check can save you more money in the long run than the little extra value you may win. Not often a small bet like that won't get you in trouble with a reraise.

What happened to the person who got a set of 5s or 7s and is slowplaying to the max hoping someone will stab at the pot so they can reraise.

I like feeler bets on the turn, but not on the river.

Calling is the worst option here if you are gonna bet with a weak hand BET! I am not saying go allin you technically are semibluffing, you likely don't have the best hand but also quite likely nobody has a monster so you very easily could outplay them here. Just balance risk versus reward if you get reraised let it go and don't OVERbet it to begin with

[quote=Jesus Lederer]
So why did you win money with that move? First of all i would like to know what was the buy in of the SNG. On that play, it happened the opposite to one of the reasons of why i don´t like betting in the river with those hands. You were called by an opponent who had a worse hand than yours. Actually, he called with nothing. That´s pretty strange, unless you were playing low buy in. The only reason i may find of why your opponent called, is that he paid to obtain information.


It was a $5 + .50 buy in. Thanks for the input.