can't believe my luck

[silax]

it happens i know but
i'm bb and have A4 which i check flop is AAK 2 spades and a heart now i'm a little iffy about the 2 spades so i'll slow play it so flop is checked and turn is 8 heart so there's 2 hearts and 2 spades on the table and i'm ok with that i bet the pot as i'm sure i have this and the river is 10 heart he has KQ heart and takes me out. i have a feeling however i would have played this i was heading out.

[mathare]

Why slow play that flop? You're clearly worried about the flush draw so bet out to protect your hand

[mathare]

Looking back on that the caller who won the hand has a lot of outs. Any heart gives him a flush draw, any J gives him a straight draw and J hearts gives him a straight flush if I have sussed it right as one of those Aces on the flop must be a heart. I'm not surprised he called your bet on that basis - he's drawing to the nut flush with a shot at a straight flush too. I think the place to get rid of him was on the flop

[silax]

to tell you the truth matt he was the mtt chip leader and he would have gone whatever i did i calculated i had a 95% win chance after the flop i think or even after the turn not sure now. in hindsite i would have been a lot happier with myself if i had of pushed all in post flop as i had decided then i was going all the way whatever. proberbly played it wrong but would have been the same result whatever

[John]

I think that's a fair and critical self analysis there Silax. :) I would've probably also checked the flop, particularly to the MTT leader. What you have to be aware of in these situations is that the big stacks tend to call you with any hand and in my opinion you did the right thing by checking the flop with caution given to the nut flush draw.

There were a lot of different ways to play the hand, I think you did a pretty good job to be honest.

[mathare]

Chip leader or otherwise my own personal opinion on this is you allowed him to draw out on you by not betting your hand on the flop. Sure, it may all have come out the same at the end of the hand but by not betting you missed a chance to win the hand by him folding.

Never forget there are two ways to win a hand - having the best hand and everyone else opting not to call your bets and sometimes you need to give yourself maximum chance to win by firing out bets.

For me that hand was an easy one to bet on the flop. You should have bet out at least three-quarters of the pot (assuming you were heads up) so as to reduce the pot odds on offer to the other guy. If he continues to draw when faced with those odds he has made a mistake

[silax]

i think from memory matt there were 4 people in at the flop my pot bet took me heads up which is basically what i wanted