Texas Calculatem and Poker Office Blog

After some hits taken in NL, and watching some failed PSB plays by Juice, I've done some pondering about the protection offered by betting the pot to protect against flush draws.

Suppose you have AsKc pre-flop. You do the standard 4BB raise and there are 3 callers.

The flop comes Ah 8h 2d. There are 16BB in the pot.

You have TPTK and your biggest fear is going to be someone drawing their flush. Anyone with a flush (hearts) draw is 4.2:1 to hit their hand on the turn, or about 2:1 to hit their flush by the river.

Suppose you bet the pot (i.e. bet 16BB) to protect your hand against the flush. This will offer the first caller 2:1 pot odds on their call. Suppose one player with a flush draw decides to take this offer and calls. Everyone else folds.

The turn is 3h, and there are 48BB in the pot.

So, the villain has completed his flush. However, having protected your hand, you assume that the villain has missed and bet the pot again (48BB). The villain calls.

So to summarise...

- at the flop there were 16BB in the pot.
- you put in 16BB to protect your hand on the flop
- on the turn you put in 48BB to protect your hand as you assumed no one with a flush would call.

Assuming the villain only calls the turn bet if he hits his flush on the turn, he's received a 4:1 payoff (wins 96BB for the 16BB flop call) for calling your initial PSB. And this doesn't include anything extra that he'll get on the river.

So... What does this all mean? If there is a flush draw on the board, and you have TPTK, then you do need to bet the flop to protect. However, if a scare card comes on the turn, it will be hard to fold. Also, if you're out of position and check the turn, opponents in late position may bet to bluff you out of the pot.

A smaller bet on the turn would not really help either. If you bet half the pot then the villain will be getting 3:1 odds on a 4:1 proposition. So this will be profitable if the villain hits their flush and sucks a bit more out of you on the river.

What does this rambling post all mean? Well, it basically states that if you BTP (bet the pot) on the flop and turn, you're giving your opponent(s) atleast 4:1 odds. That's enough for flush and straight draws to be profitable. However, if you show weakness on the turn, then the pot can be easily stolen from you.

An email that the Acorn sent me suggested a 3/4 pot sized bet to protect one's hand against flush draws.

Anyway, I'm going to leave this open for discussion and await some thoughts from my fellow bloggers and other loyal readers.