Odds

It’s so important to know your odds of winning the hand. It’s one of the key ingredients between being a winning and losing player. Here’s a hand that I folded that may seem crazy, but was the right move.  I’m dealt QdKs in early position and limp in. The SB folds and the BB checks.

Flop.

 As 6s 9c

The BB and I both check.

Turn.

Qs.  

I picked up middle pair and the nut flush draw. He checked the ace on the flop, so I’m probably good. He may have an ace with a weak kicker, but I can’t always assume the worst. I’m betting, but the BB bets out. Huh? So I try and piece together his hand. He doesn’t have the Ace. The Q didn’t help, so he either hit the flush or was slowing playing a set. But if he has a set, the 3^rd spade would probably slow him down, so I put him on a made flush. Either way, I’m currently beat. But wait you say, you have to call, you have the river card to get a higher flush. True, but is that the right move. No. There are 13 spades in the deck, 3 are on the board and I have 1. That leaves 9 left. That’s not even considering the spades that were folded or if the BB has 2. So let’s say I have 9 outs, which gives me an 18% chance ‘at best’ of a spade coming on the river. There was $5 in pot preflop and his $4 bet makes it $9. If I call his bet, I’m putting in about 44%. In the long run I just won’t spike the flush enough times to make this a profitable move. I folded my cards face up and he showed his flush. I shouldn’t have been, but I was surprised when everyone reacted like I just threw the winner away.