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Posted by awood88: Poll 36: In what situation(s) should you check with the nuts on the river?
Should you always bet out or raise with the nuts? Outside of collusion and cheating, is it ever more profitable to check?
A nice easy question for you.
In the WSOP you are breaking the rules for checking the nuts on the river. Failure to bet with a hand that cannot be beaten can lead to a penalty.
I remermber Darwin Moon getting a stern warning for doing it a couple of years ago. They only let him off because he didn't know that you weren't allowed to do it.
So I'm actually gonna say you must never check the nuts on the river.
Joined: May '11
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Actually you can check the nuts on the river provided you're not the last to act. There is an argument that you were giving the opposition an opportunity to make a bet. What you couldn't do is then just flat call their bet. You must raise otherwise it would be deemed to be soft play.
Joined: Jan '10
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only check when first or middle to act AND someone always bet before. Never check when anybody just check forever at that hand. check raise of course , looking for more profit , waiting someone bluff or bet with best pair or medium two pairs.
Joined: Apr '09
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Always frustrating checking the nuts from EP and then having it checked down and you have to flip it over like a goof.
Also - online - the amount of times I see people check/call the absolute nuts on the river as last to act is unbelievable, more often than not I don't suspect collusion either, just stupidity.
Joined: May '08
Location: Germany
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If you know your opponent is very aggro, and will very likely try to buy the pot when you show weakness and check to him. Having a scare card on the river helps with this one.
Joined: Nov '11
Location: Poland
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It happens sometimes... when you see that your opponent play aggresive and steal the pot, and I have Ace Sometimes it's the kicker and opponents check/call with almost nothing... or they waiting for straight/flush/etc...In eg.
I have , Opponent have something like ,
And the cards are: , and opponent wait for flush... when they see K as river, they practically always bet, because they want to bluff that they had K And you check it - and you win with Ace kicker
The same situation happens when opponent waiting for straight.
Joined: May '08
Location: Lithuania
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it's a strategy and as any strategy it might work or not. surely very important here is how aggressive r your opponents, what happened in the hand up to the river. as jess mentioned it's really lame to check the nuts just to see the table checks back at you but super sweet when you see raises & reraises after your check- usually i wait a bit, maybe write something like "i have the nuts dudes, should i call or fold"
Joined: Mar '11
Location: Canada
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I can't believe that ANY tourney wouldn't allow you to check the nuts on the river, provided you're not the last to act. Seeing as how it's your perogative to play how you want.
Joined: Apr '09
Location: Australia
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Posted by retribution: I can't believe that ANY tourney wouldn't allow you to check the nuts on the river, provided you're not the last to act. Seeing as how it's your perogative to play how you want.
It used to be against poker rules (in almost all rooms / casinos) to check-raise. If you checked on any street, then you were only allowed to call, it was considered against the spirit (and rules) of the game to check a strong hand and then raise when someone else bet.
That said, I completely agree with you and I wouldn't be surprised if whoever wrote that made a mistake and in fact the rule is probably only against checking/calling if you're last to act.
Joined: Jan '12
Location: Australia
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Posts: 155
Your allowed to check the nutz out of position on any street but in position its not allowed and should not be. Why would you even bother checking the nutz in position on the river? Your loosing value by not betting. If someone unknowingly does it i don't mind this but when its done maliciously i cant stand it. Had some guy do it live as his friend was at the table and in the hand and he did not want to play a big pot with him. This was a pub pokerfreeroll so i kept my mouth shut because he was new to the game and i don't even know if he knew that he had the nutz or knew he was not allowed to do it.
However, I think i have checked the nutz on the river once out of pure accident at a 1/2 cash game at the casino i play. I misread my hand through my poker sunglasses once and it was obvious i was there alone so nobody said a thing. But i have rectified that now and now have the perfect glasses i use for playing and this has not happened since.
Edited by Redvulture61 (27 September 2012 @ 09:48 GMT)
Joined: Apr '09
Location: Australia
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Posted by rbdflyboy: never... can't extract value with a check. Even with one caller it's worth a bet.
Maybe you're missing the point.. If it's the river and you're first to act, you may possibly extract MORE value by check-raising against an aggressive opponent.
Joined: Feb '08
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I think you're all forgetting one situation. What if it's a cash game and the board is KKK5K and you have AQ? You have the nuts but who is going to call with less than ace? If you haven't already reached the point where you have passed the cap on rake, then both players going all-in with the nuts will only cost you chips in rake and neither will benefit. Even if you value bet you are only going to get called/raised by another ace and you create the possibility of paying even more rake where there is nothing to gain.
Also if the board is the nuts itself. You could bet hoping your opponent doesn't see but I think this is bad etiquette, certainly live when the dealer has to split the chips going all-in.
Other than that I don't think you should ever call with the nuts split or otherwise when last to act. Who can forget when Chad Brown flat called the nuts in NBC HU since he felt there was no way Kristy Gazes could be playing anything other than the same nut hand.
Joined: Apr '09
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Posted by awood88: I think you're all forgetting one situation. What if it's a cash game and the board is KKK5K and you have AQ? You have the nuts but who is going to call with less than ace? If you haven't already reached the point where you have passed the cap on rake, then both players going all-in with the nuts will only cost you chips in rake and neither will benefit. Even if you value bet you are only going to get called/raised by another ace and you create the possibility of paying even more rake where there is nothing to gain.
The trick is in this situation to bet allin so that it would cost the villain more (in rake) to call you than it would to fold (and lose initial investment). Mind you most people are dumb enough to call anyway. You would need to click the timer and type into chat "you know you'll lose money on rake if you call me" before shoving.
Joined: Aug '11
Location: Portugal
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Imo only when you know your opponent has nothing and playing very tight and you want to see if you can extract some value out of him and you are most certain he's going to fold to a bet or if you, in a more risky way, have a read on your opponent and you know he's very likely to try to pull a bluff because he fights for every pot, or he has a hand and isn't afraid of betting. Then you can call if his bet is big enough or you can try to make it bigger by raising. Ofc i think in both situations you must have an actual info about the opponent and it depends alot on the way the flop and turn were played. Like many say, poker is about the players and not the cards, how many times you check raise someone and he folds and you can't extract value from your hand, or you bet and you get reraised by someone with rags. It's all about your opponent imo.
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It always depend on the way your opponents were moving til the river. If they were always beting and you were just calling them, the best is to keep the same check, so they can bet and then you can think about raise to all-in. Those chips are already yours because you have the nuts, reraising won’t do you nothing wrong, it will only be better because you can make them put even more chips at the table. If it was you who was betting from the beginning and have them just calling you, most probably they will keep doing the same til the end, so you should keep the bet, even if low, to bring more chips to the pot. If you bet too much, you can scare them, and if you only check you can have them also checking, which isn’t as much profitable.
but never check the river 
, 
, 
, and opponent wait for flush... when they see K as river, they practically always bet, because they want to bluff that they had K
but super sweet when you see raises & reraises after your check- usually i wait a bit, maybe write something like "i have the nuts dudes, should i call or fold"
