There were two hands that I want to talk about here,  as the title suggests;  in one hand I made a good call on the end,  for a significant win,  and the other I made a bad call where I should have known better.

In the first hand I have 6-2 of spades,  limp in from late position after 2 limpers,  followed by a limp from the button and a raise to $15 from the big blind.  One player folds,  the rest of us call.  I’m probably pretty far behind if the raise from the big blind is from a big pair,  but none of these players are particularly tight and a raise from the blinds doesn’t automatically translate to a big pair.  And,  I’m getting a good price.

The flop is Q 4 2,  with two diamonds and a spade.  It’s checked to me.  The raiser checked,  and there’s only one player left behind me.  Now that raise is looking more and more like AK,  or even AJ or JT,  and I’m considering the possibility that bottom pair is best hand.  I doubt I’d have even called a bet had the original raiser bet out,  but when they check to me I take the lead and bet $30.

I’m not one of those players who think you should always bet the same,  no matter what the strength of your hand.  But I don’t think that makes me predictable.  The $30 was slightly less than ½ the pot,  a relatively small bet.  But I might have made a small bet when I really wanted a call,  even though in this case I didn’t really want a call.  When I make a bet I’ll typically bet anywhere from ½ the pot to 1 ½ times the pot.  Sometimes overbetting,  sometimes underbetting,  and sometimes making a pot-sized bet.  In the situation at hand I was betting mostly for information and I thought a small bet was right for maximizing my information.  Make a little bet and see what they do.  This works better live,  by the way,  than it does online,  because how they do what they do can be as important as what they do.

Anyway,  the button called,  everybody else folded.  I found out that the raiser didn’t have a hand but I now wasn’t sure about the button.  Something that I can’t identify about the way he put his chips in the pot told me he called with a draw.  I’m not sure exactly what it was.  It may have been wrong,  that was my intuition.

The turn brought a 9 of clubs.  Diamonds missed,  I put out $60.  I guess I was being a little tentative.  I still thought I had the best hand,  but I wasn’t sure enough about that to make a commitment.  This wimpy bet on the turn was probably not the best action to take.  If he had a draw he had lots of outs,  and a substantial bet might have won it from a Queen,  bad kicker or from second pair.  I probably should have bet about $150.  But I didn’t,  I went with $60.

He called.

The River brought the 9 of hearts.  This time I checked.  I still thought I probably had the best hand,  but a bet was pretty much pointless because I wasn’t likely to win if he called.

He very quickly,  and very forcibly,  bet all his chips,  about $170.  I called.

He showed JT of diamonds;  he’d flopped a flush draw and missed.  I won it with my deuce.

There were a lot of oohs and ahs at the table after that call.  But particularly after the way he made that final bet I was pretty sure he didn’t have anything at all.  A quick,  forceful bet often means a bluff.  Acting strong means weak in poker.  I think it was a good call,  but it wasn’t magical.

A while later in the game,  I played another hand against the same player.  The outcome the second time wasn’t as satisfactory primarily because I just didn’t play the hand well.

I had a better hand,  an AJ of hearts.  I raised from the button after 4 limpers,  making it $20 to go.  All of them called,  one of them the player who had bluffed the busted flush draw on the river in the previous hand.

The flop was Q T 5,  rainbow with one heart.  This wasn’t a real bad flop for me after they both checked,  so I bet $70.  The previous bluffer called,  the other players folded.

The turn was another Queen and we both checked.  I was prepared to give it up at this point.

The river was another 5 and,  after a brief hesitation,  he bet $100 by carefully sliding a stack of red chips out.

Now I wasn’t sure what to do.  My check on the turn could easily entice a bluff and most of the time it would probably be a mistake to fold after enticing a bluff if I could beat a bluff.  But he knew from the previous hand that I wasn’t likely to lay down a hand that could beat a bluff.

But here’s what I actually thought:  The pot has $340 in it,  counting his last bet.  I was winning $600,  if I called and won that would put me within easy striking distance of a $1,000 win for the night in a $1/$2 blind game,  a very good win.  If I called and lost I’d still be a $500 winner.  So I called.

That was really,  really stupid thinking.

I was thinking about the results for the night,  not about the hand,  and not about what was the most important thing about the hand  --  was I beat or not?

Most of the signs actually pointed to me being beat.  His slight hesitation and carefully pushing the chips out was not what he did when he was bluffing.  On his previous bluff he shoved the chips out forcefully and quickly,  and he shoved them all in.  I shouldn’t have had to think real deeply to realize his hesitation was a quick calculation of how much he could get me to call.

He had fives full and it was a really bad call on my part.

I thought about the call during the next couple of hands and realized my mistake.  Not just the mistake of calling,  but the mistake of thinking of all the wrong things before I decided.

So I just cashed out and left.  When I start making those kinds of mistakes it’s time to go home and take a nap.~~