Happened during a recent sit-n-go on Pstars. My read on the villian is fairly tight, not extremely aggressive.


Poker Stars $5.00+$0.50 No Limit Hold'em Tournament - t100/t200 Blinds + t25 - 3 players
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SB: t6130
Hero (BB): t4835
BTN: t2535

Pre Flop: (t375) Hero is BB with 5 Q
BTN calls t200, 1 fold, Hero checks

Flop: (t575) Q T 9 (2 players)
Hero bets t400, BTN calls t400

Turn: (t1375) 9 (2 players)
Hero bets t800, BTN calls t800

River: (t2975) K (2 players)

I have two questions in particular. First, should I have been more aggressive on the turn, raising to something like 1000 or 1200? Secondly, my read on the player was that he was coming along for the ride with a (made) straight draw or (busted) flush draw. I felt he was going to bet either way if I checked, so would it be to my benefit to go ahead and shove here?

I'm probably checking this turn, hoping for a check behind, and calling a small bet
The flop is so drawy that he can call you with a lot of hands who will probably check behind the turn, in order to take a freecard (so you must play carefully on river) + we don't want to build a pot with top pair no kicker
As played I think we really beat nothing by the river (maybe a pair of ten, not sure he would have called 2 streets with)

I'm meh about betting the flop here with TPNK, especially against a somewhat tight opponent, because if we assign him a reasonable preflop limping range, it's very likely that he'll call and (if an at least somewhat threatening turn card peels) we'll be out of position in a big pot with a medium strength hand.

I check/call flop (unless the bet size is unusually large for him) and lead about half pot* if the turn card is unlikely to have helped him (non- 9 7 6 5 4 3 2, plus probably any non- A or Q – 27 of 47 total possible turn cards).

And obviously shut down if he calls/raises turn, and probably also if we check and he bets turn into a threatening board. This advances towards showdown with our medium-strength hand while maintaining pot control, albeit at the expense of not pricing him out of draws.

* - depending on pot size at this point and effective remaining stacks.

Thanks for the response, a few questions:

1) We are three handed, do you not want to shut the hand down on the flop with any reasonable hand?
2) Should the fact that my opponent is down to an M of 6 sway my decision toward playing fast (as he would looking to get his chips into the pot in a marginal situation)?

Has he limped a this high a blind level before?

I want to say 600 on the flop and jam the turn. I like top pair HU with a smaller stack. And it avoids the situation you find yourself in here...getting almost 4:1 if he shoves the river.

As played, I probably check-fold the river. He's called two streets and he's a fairly tight player.