Limit Texas Holdem Quiz #26, Question Two

[Matt]

You are in the cutoff position with Q:diamonds:10:diamonds:. The player to your right has posted a late-position blind. Everyone folds to him, he checks, and you raise. The small blind folds and the big blind calls. The late-position blind also calls. The pot contains 6.5 small bets. The flop comes 8:diamonds: 3:diamonds: 8:clubs:, giving you the third-nut flush draw and a backdoor straight flush draw. The big blind checks, the next player bets, and you raise. The big blind folds and the remaining player just calls. The pot now contains 5 big bets. The turn is the 6:hearts:. Your opponent bets. What do you do?

[Nima]

We just had a debate between Me at Matt.

I was gonna vote fold because I put the guy on an 8 so does Matt.

However after counting the outs and looking at the pot, you have 8 outs and getting 7.5 to 1 on your money to get the flush. So you should call.

We both think raising is a mistake though.


Cheers,
Nima

[Matt]

We just had a debate between Me at Matt.

I was gonna vote fold because I put the guy on an 8 so does Matt.

However after counting the outs and looking at the pot, you have 8 outs and getting 7.5 to 1 on your money to get the flush. So you should call.

We both think raising is a mistake though.


Cheers,
Nima

We realize that nine cards will make a flush, but we decided to devalue two of our outs, counting them as half an out each. Here's why: If our read is correct and the villian holds an eight, the 6:diamonds: is no longer an out since it will make him a full house. The villian will also make a full house if a diamond that pairs his kicker hits on the river. However, we're not 100% certain that he has trips, so we can't discount those two outs completely. An eight-outer is a 5-1 underdog. The pot is laying us 6-1 odds which justifies taking off another card; we also have implied odds if we make a winning flush. If the pot were smaller, a fold would be correct.