Value Info Turn Bet
You’re in position with AQd on the cut off. UTG raises to 4x the big blind and you simply call. You have position as the dealer folds, but the small blind calls. The flop comes 8c-Kd-Qs rainbow. You now have second pair with the nut kicker and a backdoor runner flush draw.
The SB checks and the UTG raiser fires off a pot sized continuation bet as is expected. Now, with second pair you’re looking ok here. You probably don’t have the best online poker hand, but you can call safely depending on the type of player you’re against. If you’re against a robot like player, your call may not mean much, but if you’re against a thinking player, your call may mean intense strength in the hand.
The turn comes Kh, giving your two pair, but destroying your flush possibility. However it’s a good card for you still. Its considered a scare card, and here’s where we get into the info gathering. If your opponent bets hard, it’s quite likely he has the K. But he checked. So what does that tell you? Well either he’s slowplaying his K or he doensn’t have it. This is why you’re going to make a bet here. You have the power, with his check to set the price of your own showdown. So a small bet, about 2/3 of the pot will give him the opportunity to reveal the true strength of his hand and reraise you, or just call you and reveal that he is scared of the king. Most likely you can put your opponent on a draw when they just call here. It’s not likely he’d continue to check and let you bet with a straight possibility out there, open-ended and likely to hit 40 percent of the time.
So you’ve value bet your Q and overrepresented your hand on the turn. You got the info you needed, and you put it in his head that he may need to back off of the aggression. Essentially you stifled a bet from him on the river and ended up giving him only a shred of hope to beat your poker hand.
Since he checks on the river, you can safely check behind if the river comes innocuous or not, since you’re not sure you have the best hand here anyway. All you were wanting to do is not lose value, while at the same time protect yourself from the danger of him having trips here. And you do that by overbetting your hand on the turn to garner information and get value when he decides to call with weaker hands. Keep this in mind when you visit a casino online.
