How do you play the nuts?

okay, kathy liebert and i agree with all of this. however in your first post in this thread you said "I almost always slowplay the nuts". now you're just saying it's sometimes, which is fine. but "almost always" is certainly too much

The thing that I dislike about your reasoning is that most opponents know about slowplaying and they are semi-competent most of the time: they know that once you check and bet the turn on TT2Q for example, they have little chance unless they have connected with the Q. You rely on the opponent catching a card, wich is though. The potential of gain doesn't really increase on the turn against most opponents (against a villain who tries to keep you honest a lot, slowplaying has value). You say gain an extra bet or two but this isn't limit, the most you'll gain from most weak opponents is two small bets on the turn and river, while they might have called a bet on the flop too if they're willing to SD, wich is huge, since the bets on the later streets become exponentialy bigger.

Another point, if you bet the flop, some opponent can put you on air easier than if you bet the turn (on pretty much any card). This doesn't mean that slowplaying is evil, just that it is vastly overvalued: you need to have your opponent have the potential for a second best hand for it to be correct in NLHE. Remember that fastplaying can sometimes be the best deception there is.

And what are you doing playing 22 in a tiny pot ? I hope you were in the BB against one limper

Whenever I have the nuts (except for in rare cases, such as vs very aggro opponents), I will be betting out, to prevent peopple from drawing out on my made hand, and also because if you have a monster, you won't get too much action unless the other person connected with the board somewhat at least, and if you check-raise they will know something is fishy.

Great thread.

Combuboom, great stuff. I think you just single-handedly increased my win rate.

I agree that slow-playing is generally overvalued. With so much poker on ESPN, it's understandable why so many fall in love with the glamor of slow-playing. But, I think this thread makes some great points.

I AGREE WITH JRAD. WHEN THE POSIBILITY ARISES ON THE TURN THAT UR APPONENT COULD HIT A SPLIT ITS TIME TO SHUT IT DOWN BY BEING AGRESSIVE. and why do u lov 4th? or did u mean 5th?
M

YES SIR I AGREE 100% WITH YOU

well depends on the blinds and stuff if the blind r high i would normally min bet then slowplay it unless im up against someone aggresive ill check
raise them

I agree 100% with your statment. I tend to be rivered more than most when making the correct bets.

Depends weather you get them on the flop, the fly, or the coffin. for you know as well as I do they change with every turn of the cards.
Flop, a 1/3 pot bet. sure you have the nuts here but you know it can be cracked. but the third lets those who know how to play you are sitting strong and expensive to play.
Turn, 1/2 pot make them pay top dollar for the one outer.
river all in.

Nuts have to be played and hard!!!

Slow Playing only allows your opponent a chance of improving their hand and we DO NOT want this. Make it expensive for them! Sure you may loose a couple of chips that you may have leeched out of an aggressive player but more often than not they'll come back over the top with any viable hand.

As other posters have said the nuts change on every street! Ever flop quads and have them bust on the river to higher quads? It happens because of slow playing. The only hand that can stand and be 100% sure of winning post flop is a royal flush.

However your betting response must be in align with your table image and how you perceive the other players styles. In other words play them harder than you would an average to good hand, don't be excessive. If the table is full of aggressive players let them be aggressive, build the pot and hope your "Nuts" stand.

ratmandoo, yes I had my flop quads busted after I went all in on the flop. I gave them no choice to fold. By slow playing you get a chance to fold, and like wise for them to fold.
And to let you know what I got busted. holding AhAd, flop comes AsAcQc, turn Jc, river 10c opponent was holding Kc 10d.
now if I would have slow played it and let him bet first and come over the top? well I do believe I would have won this hand.

Well I have a positive ROI and I use the slowplay a lot. I'll even slowplay one pair sometimes. Like if I have AK and the flop comes K 2 9 all different suits, it's a good spot to slowplay. The only danger is if he has something like 77 and hits a 2 outer, or 10 9 and makes two pair or trips. But what happens a lot more often is he will make a second best hand on the turn and then I'll start betting. Remember this though, the only point of slowplaying is to deceive your opponent to thinking you have a weak hand and paying you off on the river or turn. If you have the nuts but it's obvious to everyone you're strong theres no point in slowplaying. Like if you have 99 and the flop comes Q 9 3 and someone bets and the next player raises, there's no point in slowplaying from there on, because you aren't going to fool anyone into thinking you are weak, you just called a bet and a reraise.

It's true that almost every time you slowplay you are risking getting drawn out on, but the times where you win more chips from slowplaying more than makes up for the times slowplaying backfires.

i should add that slowplaying has slightly more merit in online tournaments because most of them are very shallow stacked so it's often not hard to get all the chips in even if you miss a street of value. however in cash games, when the stacks are 100 big blinds +, slowplaying is much worse. the times where you win more chips (like a stack) by fastplaying more than makes up for the times you collect one extra bet by slowplaying -- and this is still often the case in tournaments

Here's a few examples of why slowplaying a big hand will win more chips than betting. From the example earlier when you have 2 2 and the flop comes 10 10 2. Say you raised preflop in late position and got called so the pot is decent sized. Say he has Q J. When he checks if you bet, he's going to fold, so you win a small pot. If you check, there's 6 cards he can catch to make a good, in his view, hand. The turn might come a Q, then he'll bet. You can then raise or call but he probably won't fold. IF the turn is a 5 instead of a Q and he checks it's good to check again behind him. Then you're giving him one more chance to make a hand on the river. Using the slowplay here there's a chance you can win a pot bigger than the size after the preflop betting. If you don't slowplay you will just win your preflop bet, his call, and the blinds.

All you saying "build pots with big hands", you're assuming your opponent has "something"... If for some reason you knew the opponent had K10 or JJ or even 88 in the example, then it's a good time to build the pot and bet on the flop. But remember most flops miss most hands so a lot of the times when you flop a big hand no one else will have anything. And one more thing that we haven't talked about much in this thread is preflop slowplaying. I think the only hands strong enough to slowplay preflop are AA or KK. At short tables I see a lot of players slowplaying AK or JJ-99 and losing a lot of chips. These hands can get beat very easily by rags, even a Q 2 is only a 2.5:1 dog against JJ.

always slowplay and try to get bet into :P then at the last bet, raise all in

"i should add that slowplaying has slightly more merit in online tournaments because most of them are very shallow stacked so it's often not hard to get all the chips in even if you miss a street of value. however in cash games, when the stacks are 100 big blinds +, slowplaying is much worse. the times where you win more chips (like a stack) by fastplaying more than makes up for the times you collect one extra bet by slowplaying -- and this is still often the case in tournaments"

But how could fastplaying win a stack but slowplaying can't? What if you make a full house on the turn and he has the nut flush draw. If you make a big bet on the turn he should fold since it would be the mathematically correct play. But if you check and try to let him make a flush you could win his stack if he hits his flush. Remember this is no limit so even if the pot is small going to the turn or to the river doesn't mean you can't win a decent sized pot. The pot might be $1 going to the river, he makes his nut flush. You bet $1, he raises to $5, you reraise to $15, he calls, and you win a decent sized pot. I think what you're talking about is a situation like this...If you have QQ and the flop comes Q 8 7 with a str8 draw and flush draw8, and he has 88. You are thinking that if you fastplay it will get him to reraise and you can get all your money in on the flop, but if you slowplay a flush or straight card might come so you won't be able to get him to go all in since he'll think his trip 8s won't be good. These situations don't really happen that often but when they do come up, yeah it's better to fastplay. Even if you didn't know your opponent had 88 you shouldn't slowplay the nuts here since there's so many draws.

I just thought of another really good example of slowplaying vs fastplaying. Anyone see the hand of the WSOP with Jerry Yang. He called a preflop raise with KQ suited and was against two players and he flopped a flush. The first raiser was bluffing and had garbage, and the big blind called just because of the good pot odds. On the flop no one had anything, I think one player might have had bottom pair. The BB checked the preflop raiser checked. A lot of people in this thread are saying you should bet here with a King high flush, but then you win the pot and nothing more. So Jerry made the right play and slowplayed. But unfortunetly for him no one made anything much better on the turn. He had position so he saw them both check to him then he bet and everyone folded. But if I were him I'd check again on the turn, then make a small luring sucker bet on the river in hopes that someone made a big or medium pair. If they did they'd most likely call, since it really looks like Jerry is bluffing here. Jerry risked losing chips if another diamond came and one of the opponents had the Ace of diamonds, but he correctly figured that it's just as, if not more likely, that someone will make a playable second best hand on the turn or river, like two pair or trips. You won't be winning a stack here, but you at least win a little more than just the starting pot, and small edges like these can build up.

i stopped reading here. your understanding of the game is really really awful if you can't answer this question. like i said, way back, i expected you're very hard headed and stubborn. it's fine, i'd prefer you to keep thinking your way

didn't read past your first sentence in your last post either, but WOW you can think of an example where slowplaying would have made more money in one specific hand!! hey, i can think of an example where playing 72o would be profitable! when the flop is 222! jesus

yes ben, you're right. you're right and phil ivey, white lime and virtually every respected online player in the world making hundreds of thousands a year is wrong. congratulations

then u get no action and win a small pot that really does not do much for ur stack

"i stopped reading here. your understanding of the game is really really awful if you can't answer this question. like i said, way back, i expected you're very hard headed and stubborn. it's fine, i'd prefer you to keep thinking your way

didn't read past your first sentence in your last post either, but WOW you can think of an example where slowplaying would have made more money in one specific hand!! hey, i can think of an example where playing 72o would be profitable! when the flop is 222! jesus

yes ben, you're right. you're right and phil ivey, white lime and virtually every respected online player in the world making hundreds of thousands a year is wrong. congratulations"


Wow dude are you dumb or something? Gl "playing for an entire stack" when you have QQ and the flop comes Q 2 2 and you're opponent has A K, let me know how it goes. Do you expect to fastplay it and him to go along and reraise you all in with Ace high so you can "win his entire stack"? Again I'm talking about the times where you have a monster hand but your opponent has nothing or has a medium strength hand. I'm not talking about the times when you have a set over set or full house vs flush, it's not hard to play for a stack in these spots.

no need to get hostile but u said in ur earlier post that u always slow play and never fastplay any hands
combu was just trying to help u but obviously as he said ur being very closeminded {or something like that}

Basically, there have to be preconditions before you should slowplay.

1. You have to have a very strong hand with little risk of being outdrawn.

2. The free card you give has to have a good chance of making the opponent a second best hand.

3. You have to believe you'll make your opponent fold if you show aggression but you can win a big pot if you let your opponent stay in the hand.

4. The pot has to be small. If the pot is big you should just try to win it right away.

And when you're playing deepstack poker and you flop the nuts, most of the time all four of these conditions will be true. Most of the time, like in combo's example, you won't made quads on the turn and be up against a full house. That's why most of the time I slowplay.

And the times where slowplaying is BAD, is when...

1. You flop the nuts but your opponent flops a good second best hand. You might slowplay here but your opponent might think he has the best hand and slowplay as well. Here you cost yourself a lot of money by slowplaying instead of fastplaying.

2. You have a good hand, but it's not as strong as you think, and slowplaying could let your opponents draw out on you (but this topic is about how you play the stone cold NUTS, so this one shouldn't apply)

Anyway I've read all your posts combo and all the other ones in this thread but you don't seem to be reading all mine, so I'm just gonna stop trying to argue there's no talking any sense into u.

Being a relatively new player, I'm horrified by the idea of allowing someone to draw to a better hand than I've got.

Therefore I usually try to bet somewhere between 70% and 125% of the pot and take the pot right there if I can. I need more practice before I'm willing to get subtle...

When flopping the nuts, if there is a chance you can be outdrawn to better nuts, play aggressive. Now if you flop the stone cold nuts, play based on the opponents in the pot, but try not to give away the strenght of your hand.

Virtually unbeatable nuts, like flopping monster FH, Quads or SF, slow all the way.

Flopping nut str8 and even nut flush sometimes, I bet pretty hard. Too may times a river hurt me with str8s and flushes to give anyone anything for free. It's better to win small than lose big.

As an exampe, I was doing pretty good at a Pokerstars .50/1 NL ring game once. I had about $250 on the table. Another guy had about $180.

I was dealt KK and after all the preflop stuff, that one player was in it with me. Flop was KKQ. I checked, he checked. Turn was A. I checked, he checked.
River was A. I led out with small bet. He raised. I reraised minimum. He pushed all in. I called. He had AQ and left broke.

Still, a part of me didn't want to end up all in with AA on the board after the river. I did not have the nuts any more.

"As an exampe, I was doing pretty good at a Pokerstars .50/1 NL ring game once. I had about $250 on the table. Another guy had about $180.

I was dealt KK and after all the preflop stuff, that one player was in it with me. Flop was KKQ. I checked, he checked. Turn was A. I checked, he checked.
River was A. I led out with small bet. He raised. I reraised minimum. He pushed all in. I called. He had AQ and left broke.

Still, a part of me didn't want to end up all in with AA on the board after the river. I did not have the nuts any more. "


Nice job. Now imagine he had A J instead of AQ. If you fastplay it here like everyone else in this thread suggests, look at what would happen. He would fold on the flop and you'd win a small pot. You have to slowplay here, like you did.

remember that fastplaying the nuts sometimes will make it easier for you to steal pots that you and your opponent both missed since he will respect you more.

also, you don't always know that your opponent has A-high/no-pair etc when you flop a monster.
scenario: you flop a set on 35Qr board. OMG OPOPNET HAS AK WE BETTER CHECK. turn comes 6. you check, he bets, you shove, he calls, you cry when he turns over 42 (yes, sometimes opponents will have something other than unpaired broadway cards). oh no, where'd our stack go?

"remember that fastplaying the nuts sometimes will make it easier for you to steal pots that you and your opponent both missed since he will respect you more.

also, you don't always know that your opponent has A-high/no-pair etc when you flop a monster.
scenario: you flop a set on 35Qr board. OMG OPOPNET HAS AK WE BETTER CHECK. turn comes 6. you check, he bets, you shove, he calls, you cry when he turns over 42 (yes, sometimes opponents will have something other than unpaired broadway cards). oh no, where'd our stack go?"

Very good point Vanq. If you're playing a LAG style, you should bet the nuts the same way you bet when you have nothing. Because slowplaying is no longer deceptive, since betting aggressively is normal for a LAG player. So only a non bet will make the other players suspicious. So you have to bet your strong hands too, so your opponents don't start figuring you check your strong hands and bet with weak hands/nothing. And if there's any kind of draw on the board you should bet instead of slowplay. But if the flop was Q 7 2 and you flop a set it's a much better time to slowplay instead of the 3 5 Q board.

definitely works in freerolls when you got 5 guys calling you....lol but anyways, whats the point of doing that?

1st like someone said don't remember who i just kind of read quick, you always want to figure out what your opponent has. if your opponent has like mid pair then if u bet big he/she might think you have higher pair, but if you check then he/she if aggresive might lead out and bet, but anyways u get the point.
usually my way of doing it is just to call on flop re raise on turn and then make a value bet or re raise on river. i try to get most i can get out of the pot. well time to go make my poll lol

Why aren't you typing "Kathy Liebert" in all of your posts anymore?

some of you are totally missing the point.

it's not about what your opponets hands are, its about what they think your hand is.

you don't need to let them catch top pair or trips or anything, you just need to disguise your hand. by leading out and possibly representing a bluff. by doing so you get action from middle pair, or a gutshot that's drawing dead, or a flat out bluff.

bugs the shit outta me when ppl slowplay every time they get the nuts and get no value out of it...unless they're my opponets and i lose the minimum then come back and bust them