Decisions, decisions (conclusion)

If you have not already read the first part of this story, in which I described the decision I faced, you might want to do so now, before reading on.


I thought a long time, and finally folded.

Well, first I threw up in my mouth a little bit, THEN I folded.

I decided he wasn't the type to check-raise the river with air. I thought he wanted a call, which meant that he believed he had me beat. And the hands that actually had me beat weighed more heavily in my mind than the Dumb Guy hands. I just couldn't see him being obtuse enough to value-check-raise with trips in that situation. I decided that he was quite a bit more likely to have a full house, or, at minimum, the ace-high flush, than something that he mistakenly thought was the winner.

He mucked without showing, so I'll never know.

If I had to guess his most likely hand, it would be a suited K-4 (or his kicker pairing whatever the river card was). On the flop, he thought top pair was good enough for a call. On the turn he like his trip kings, but worried about the flush. On the river he finally made his hand, and made the instant decision to go for the check-raise, without really thinking through whether that was the way to get maximum value, whether I could be relied on to bet for him. But flopped two pair with K-10 is also a decent possibility, as is either 2-2 or 10-10 for a flopped set--but if so, he played them very strangely.

But I'll tell you that I'm having pangs of regret about the fold. In retrospect, I really wonder if he had trip kings and he inadvertantly bluffed when he thought he was value-betting. On the other hand, I hate making bad calls, and I like to imagine that I'm better at getting away from second-best hands than most of my opponents. Maybe the laydown was correct. I really don't know.

Frankly, the uncertainty is annoying me more than I should let it. I'm so used to not knowing such things that it usually doesn't eat at me. I shrug and move on. Once in a while, though, a situation is so puzzling that I can't figure it out to any satisfaction, which causes my brain to keeping mulling it over, trying to unlock the riddle. But I know from experience that the second-guessing of myself will pass quickly, and this hand will be mostly forgotten, like the other thousands before it.

And, just for C.K., I have to say this: Stupid crubs.