incredible folds

[OnTilt18 0]

So often you hear a poker player moan, "Of course he hit his one-outter on the river", or "his gut-shot just had to come." It seems like every "poker story" you hear is about a bad beat. I would much rather hear a story about a player making an incredible read and laying down a monster hand. I'll get it started; this is a story I read somewhere:Phil Hellmuth and Howard Lederer are playing in some tournament, and are seated across from each other at the same table. Hellmuth raises preflop with KJ, and the table folds around to Lederer. Hellmuth and Lederer go heads up into a K J 3 flop. Hellmuth, obviously with top two-pair, bets out about twice the pot. Lederer debates a while, and moves all-in over the top of Hellmuth. Hellmuth, confused as to what Lederer could have, thinks a while, and eventually engages in a conversation with Howard. He claims to "get a strong read on him", and proceeds to fold his two-pair face up! A player at the table barrades Phil, telling him that it was the worst fold he'd ever seen. Lederer flips over his pocket 3's, and tells him it was the best fold he'd ever seen.

[SimonGreen 0]

Great fold yes, i believe this was in a 3 way pot though. Someone moved all-in, Hellmuth flat called, hoping to extract more value - Lederer moved all-in over the top and Hellmuth layed it down.

[semaj550 0]

The best lay down I ever made? Laying down the ignorant end of a straight flush when the fourth straight-flush card came on the river in a tournament.I had 5 6 in the hole and the flop was 8:heart: A:spade: 9:heart: . The other player in the pot bet half the pot so I thought for a second and called. Well, of course I get the 7:heart: on the turn and I'm hoping to bust him out with his A high flush ot TPTK or some such hand. He bets out half the pot and I double his bet. He just calls. The river is the T:heart: and he bets out the pot. Again, I double it. This time he reraises all in (his raise was about twice the current pot). So the pot is sitting somewhere around 4200 and his raise is around 8000 more to me. If I call and lose I'll have about 2000 chips left. I think long and hard and say, "Nice river for your A:heart: J ." I tell him what I'm mucking and then he turns over the exact hand I put him on.

[Blink20 0]

that hand where you layed down the straight flush, that's good that he had what you were thinking, but i wouldn't really call that a great laydown. There's just some spots in poker where you have to pay off a better hand, having a straight flush in this situation is one of them. He could've easily made the same move with just an Ace high flush, because the likelihood of a straight flush is, well, unlikely. That is cool he had the eexact hand you put him on, but i would pay that off every day.

[CheckRaise 0]

you layed down a straight flush thats a terrible lay down. You have to pay the J off bad play

[Kendren 1]

And laying down top two on a KJ3 flop is a great play? He made an outstanding read, made the lay down, and it was right. The theory of the game says it might be wrong, but it turned out to be right. This isn't a strategy thread, it's a thread about great folds, as they turned out. Lay off the guy.

[Kilgore Trout 0]

Great play laying down the str8 flush there are NO hands that MUST be paid off.That being said here is my story.$30 $60 limit I am in the big blind with Q4, lots of limpers and the cutoff is a decent player who limps as well, this is a loose passive (very passive as you will see) game and he is good enough to know that raising will not thin the field much but I could tell he wanted to do something but couldn't. Button calls, small blind calls, I check, and the flop comes down q,4,4, and fast as can be the small blind bets out. The I took a look at the cutoff and knew that he had qq and my only out (the other four) was to my right in the small blind. I laid down the boat to one small bet. The pot ended up huge as the small blind made a boat out of his 4, 10 when a ten came on the river, this also filled a guy with pocket tens, and the 7 on the turn filled a guy with pocket sevens, and when all the dust setteld the cutoff turned over his pocket queens.Strange hand but I was sure I was beat and only invested my big blind.

[SplashMaster 0]

Great play laying down the str8 flush there are NO hands that MUST be paid off.That being said here is my story.$30 $60 limit I am in the big blind with Q4, lots of limpers and the cutoff is a decent player who limps as well, this is a loose passive (very passive as you will see) game and he is good enough to know that raising will not thin the field much but I could tell he wanted to do something but couldn't.  Button calls, small blind calls, I check, and the flop comes down q,4,4, and fast as can be the small blind bets out.  The I took a look at the cutoff and knew that he had qq and my only out (the other four) was to my right in the small blind.  I laid down the boat to one small bet.  The pot ended up huge as the small blind made a boat out of his 4, 10 when a ten came on the river, this also filled a guy with pocket tens, and the 7 on the turn filled a guy with pocket sevens, and when all the dust setteld the cutoff turned over his pocket queens.Strange hand but I was sure I was beat and only invested my big blind.

hmmmm you didnt call one smal bet when the only hand that can beat you was QQ. it was a limp pot, but somehow you figured out that someone limped in with QQ. WOW.I once folded KK preflop when the man under the gun limped in. I looked at him and just knew he was limping with AA :wink: I was also playing 7 card stud 1 time and was dealt JJJ my first 3 cards. a man showing a Q doorcard raised and I quickly folded, knowing he had QQQ

[tworooks28 0]

to the guy who laid down the straigth flush, you may have looked like a genious right there, but what about all the other times where the guys got AQ hearts, A2 hearts, and u look like the possibly the biggest idiot of all time. bad lay down

[Kendren 1]

Great play laying down the str8 flush there are NO hands that MUST be paid off.That being said here is my story.$30 $60 limit I am in the big blind with Q4, lots of limpers and the cutoff is a decent player who limps as well, this is a loose passive (very passive as you will see) game and he is good enough to know that raising will not thin the field much but I could tell he wanted to do something but couldn't.  Button calls, small blind calls, I check, and the flop comes down q,4,4, and fast as can be the small blind bets out.  The I took a look at the cutoff and knew that he had qq and my only out (the other four) was to my right in the small blind.  I laid down the boat to one small bet.  The pot ended up huge as the small blind made a boat out of his 4, 10 when a ten came on the river, this also filled a guy with pocket tens, and the 7 on the turn filled a guy with pocket sevens, and when all the dust setteld the cutoff turned over his pocket queens.Strange hand but I was sure I was beat and only invested my big blind.

*blink* Impressive.Would have taken me at least to the turn to pry that out of my hands if I could have at all.Mine isn't all that great. Had AA in EP, raised 3x, BB called. Flop came A63 rainbow. I bet double my pre bet, he thinks and calls. Turn 7, I bet 3x pre, he calls MUCH faster this time. River K, and for some reason, I KNEW he had the 45. I bet same amount, he's all in for another 7k (my last bet was 5kish) and I lay it down. He showed the 45 and said "Sorry about your set of Aces". I try not to play against him anymore

[semaj550 0]

that hand where you layed down the straight flush, that's good that he had what you were thinking, but i wouldn't really call that a great laydown.  There's just some spots in poker where you have to pay off a better hand, having a straight flush in this situation is one of them.  He could've easily made the same move with just an Ace high flush, because the likelihood of a straight flush is, well, unlikely.  That is cool he had the eexact hand you put him on, but i would pay that off every day.

I probably could have elaborated more but I had no reason to not believe him for the J high straight flush and I wasn't going to pay him off with my chance at cashing in a tournament. This guy had been at my table for probably 50 or 60 hands and I had watched the cards he had been playing. He didn't like to raise anything less than JJ or higher pairs, AQs or AK(s or o). I'd seen him make all of 3 raises in 60 hands and each time time I remember him going to a showdown in a pot he raised preflop he had one of the above hands. So I was 99% certain that he didn't have AK or AQ. On the flop I thought it was possible he was holding AA, AJ or AT or that he was completely bluffing. Either was I was pretty sure that if I hit my straight I'd have the best hand and if I hit my flush it would be pretty easy to find out if he had a higher flush.On the turn I knew for a fact he had AJ or AT of hearts. He made that blantently obvious (when his play in this hand was compared with his other play at my table) but I wasn't the least bit worried about those hands. When he called me there was no doubting that he held one of those two hands.On the river it narrowed my choices down to one exact hand, there weren't any two cards in the deck he could be holding other than A:heart: J:heart:. He'd would have had to have grown some monster balls all of a sudden to be bluffing so deep into this hand and I wasn't about to pay off his J high straight flush.I had a perfect read on him, I knew it and I trusted my read. Why would I pay him off when I was 100% sure of my read? Even if it turned out I was wrong I was so convinced of the read I think it would have been a poor play to not trust it.

[semaj550 0]

Great play laying down the str8 flush there are NO hands that MUST be paid off.That being said here is my story.$30 $60 limit I am in the big blind with Q4, lots of limpers and the cutoff is a decent player who limps as well, this is a loose passive (very passive as you will see) game and he is good enough to know that raising will not thin the field much but I could tell he wanted to do something but couldn't.  Button calls, small blind calls, I check, and the flop comes down q,4,4, and fast as can be the small blind bets out.  The I took a look at the cutoff and knew that he had qq and my only out (the other four) was to my right in the small blind.  I laid down the boat to one small bet.  The pot ended up huge as the small blind made a boat out of his 4, 10 when a ten came on the river, this also filled a guy with pocket tens, and the 7 on the turn filled a guy with pocket sevens, and when all the dust setteld the cutoff turned over his pocket queens.Strange hand but I was sure I was beat and only invested my big blind.

That was an impecible read, my hat goes off to you for it. Not only did you have your cutoff man read correctly, you read your SB perfectly to know that you weren't drawing to a long shot, you were drawing dead if you stayed in the hand. Bravo.

[Scott3705 0]

Great play laying down the str8 flush there are NO hands that MUST be paid off.That being said here is my story.$30 $60 limit I am in the big blind with Q4, lots of limpers and the cutoff is a decent player who limps as well, this is a loose passive (very passive as you will see) game and he is good enough to know that raising will not thin the field much but I could tell he wanted to do something but couldn't.  Button calls, small blind calls, I check, and the flop comes down q,4,4, and fast as can be the small blind bets out.  The I took a look at the cutoff and knew that he had qq and my only out (the other four) was to my right in the small blind.  I laid down the boat to one small bet.  The pot ended up huge as the small blind made a boat out of his 4, 10 when a ten came on the river, this also filled a guy with pocket tens, and the 7 on the turn filled a guy with pocket sevens, and when all the dust setteld the cutoff turned over his pocket queens.Strange hand but I was sure I was beat and only invested my big blind.

I don't know how you can honestly put somebody on QQ in an unraised pot.

[Kilgore Trout 0]

I could tell he wanted to raise preflop but knew it was pointless, and I knew he hit the flop hard, I knew he didnt' have Ace queen, and I knew at this table I was going to have to pay a ton to get to the river to find out, I see it as I posted my blind and flopped nothing so I got out.So for all your examples that don't apply you HAVE outs, I had no outs to the hand I put him on.Playing limit many players are looking for ways to increase their pots won per hour but I contend that the biggest difference between winning and loosing players is not outplaying other opponents more frequently and thus winning more pots, its being able to lay down good hands in tough spots without paying a bunch to see the river before you realize your hand isn't good. In this case I saved about 8 big bets (the action went crazy on the turn and river three bet on turn, capped on river).

[Kilgore Trout 0]

Great play laying down the str8 flush there are NO hands that MUST be paid off.That being said here is my story.$30 $60 limit I am in the big blind with Q4, lots of limpers and the cutoff is a decent player who limps as well, this is a loose passive (very passive as you will see) game and he is good enough to know that raising will not thin the field much but I could tell he wanted to do something but couldn't.  Button calls, small blind calls, I check, and the flop comes down q,4,4, and fast as can be the small blind bets out.  The I took a look at the cutoff and knew that he had qq and my only out (the other four) was to my right in the small blind.  I laid down the boat to one small bet.  The pot ended up huge as the small blind made a boat out of his 4, 10 when a ten came on the river, this also filled a guy with pocket tens, and the 7 on the turn filled a guy with pocket sevens, and when all the dust setteld the cutoff turned over his pocket queens.Strange hand but I was sure I was beat and only invested my big blind.

I don't know how you can honestly put somebody on QQ in an unraised pot.

Play $30 $60 with him for three straight days ten hours a day

[SapphireTiger 0]

people who say laying down the straight flush misunderstand the concept of a great laydown.it's only a bad laydown if you laydown the winner.Who's to say he wouldn't have laid it down if the guy actually DID have an ace high flush. But he DIDN'T...so he must have had a read on him to put him on the cards.

[SplashMaster 0]

people who say laying down the straight flush misunderstand the concept of a great laydown.it's only a bad laydown if you laydown the winner.Who's to say he wouldn't have laid it down if the guy actually DID have an ace high flush.  But he DIDN'T...so he must have had a read on him to put him on the cards.

agree with thatbut the post saying he flopped a fh with q4 and put a player on the other 2 queens left in the deck is silly to mefolding a fullhouse for 1 bet in any limit is not a great laydown. its a ummmm how can I put this gently... A LIE.

[Kilgore Trout 0]

people who say laying down the straight flush misunderstand the concept of a great laydown.it's only a bad laydown if you laydown the winner.Who's to say he wouldn't have laid it down if the guy actually DID have an ace high flush.  But he DIDN'T...so he must have had a read on him to put him on the cards.

agree with thatbut the post saying he flopped a fh with q4 and put a player on the other 2 queens left in the deck is silly to mefolding a fullhouse for 1 bet in any limit is not a great laydown. its a ummmm how can I put this gently... A LIE.

This is a post about great laydowns they are not going to be things that are everyday laydowns, no one posted about laying down an ace high flush against a paired board.Feel free to criticize my play all you want, tell me the math of how dumb this was, in fact you can choose to just not beleive it, that is fine as well, I mean this is just some online forum right? But have some decency, you aren't even berating me as a poker player, you are berating me as a person and that isn't what we come here for.

[SapphireTiger 0]

people who say laying down the straight flush misunderstand the concept of a great laydown.it's only a bad laydown if you laydown the winner.Who's to say he wouldn't have laid it down if the guy actually DID have an ace high flush.  But he DIDN'T...so he must have had a read on him to put him on the cards.

agree with thatbut the post saying he flopped a fh with q4 and put a player on the other 2 queens left in the deck is silly to mefolding a fullhouse for 1 bet in any limit is not a great laydown. its a ummmm how can I put this gently... A LIE.

This is a post about great laydowns they are not going to be things that are everyday laydowns, no one posted about laying down an ace high flush against a paired board.Feel free to criticize my play all you want, tell me the math of how dumb this was, in fact you can choose to just not beleive it, that is fine as well, I mean this is just some online forum right? But have some decency, you aren't even berating me as a poker player, you are berating me as a person and that isn't what we come here for.

oh i was talking about semaj's hand.but the same thing applies here.you can't assume that Trout would play it the same way or the other players would play there hand the same way if the yhad different hands.different circumstances probably would have led to a different situation for trout and he mayhbe would have made a different play.

[Kilgore Trout 0]

I'm not retorting you saphire, I'm talking to spash, but you are right, saphire, if the situation where ANY different I would have played the hand differently, I woulda rammed and jammed that pot Hellmuth style, but then lost to two other hands.

[SplashMaster 0]

people who say laying down the straight flush misunderstand the concept of a great laydown.it's only a bad laydown if you laydown the winner.Who's to say he wouldn't have laid it down if the guy actually DID have an ace high flush.  But he DIDN'T...so he must have had a read on him to put him on the cards.

agree with thatbut the post saying he flopped a fh with q4 and put a player on the other 2 queens left in the deck is silly to mefolding a fullhouse for 1 bet in any limit is not a great laydown. its a ummmm how can I put this gently... A LIE.

This is a post about great laydowns they are not going to be things that are everyday laydowns, no one posted about laying down an ace high flush against a paired board.Feel free to criticize my play all you want, tell me the math of how dumb this was, in fact you can choose to just not beleive it, that is fine as well, I mean this is just some online forum right? But have some decency, you aren't even berating me as a poker player, you are berating me as a person and that isn't what we come here for.

ok your rightif you were telling the truth this may be (regardless of the outcome) THE WORST laydown I have ever heard in any game at any limitit was a limped pot and you had q4you flopped a fullhouse and the small blind bet and you foldedyou said the cut-off had to exactly have LIMPED with THE 2 REMAINING QUEENS you therefore folded because of your god-like read on a limper. horrible logic. there is no one and if the posters on this forum can not back me up here, well I give up, NO ONE in the world can fold here for 1 bet from the big blind. smash please help me here or wrtogod this is silly

[SapphireTiger 0]

actually reading back...semaj's situation is a lot difference than Trout's. I can understand a big laydown when you're put all in...but if it's only one big bet in a limit game. You should have called it.

[SportsW234 0]

I think the greatest lay-down that I have heard of is David Chiu laying down pocket kings at the final table of the Tournament of Champions. Chiu was the chip leader at 1.3 million with six players remaining. Blinds are 10,000-20,000. Chiu on the button makes it 75,000 and small blind, who is a solid player goes all-in for over 500,000 more. Chiu studys the guy, and says, "I salute your good hand," and flips up pocket kings. The guy show pocket aces. Not that's a laydown.

[Kilgore Trout 0]

It was initally one small bet, but I already said once that I knew I could not get to the river without putting a bunch more money in, so I didn't lay down for one small bet, I laid down for$510 (the cutoff smooth called so the flop was only the one bet, fourth and fifth street were capped).I know you guys are not going to let this go, but because I beleive some of you guys are good players I would have to think you would have put the same read on this guy. If you play 30/60 you would know the situation were there are often times loose passive games, and if you are in position with that many limpers you would not raise with qq (again if this guy were a bad player I would have continued), but you would call and PRAY for no ace or king, and if the flop came q44 you would sit up straight and start counting your opponents chips, just like this guy did. However maybe we can come to some understanding.So how about this: Lets say I called the small blind (every player in this hand would have called if I two bet it) AND the cutoff still only smooth called (not likely, but anyway), the turn then comes out, its a seven, the small blind bets, and since I think I have the best hand I raise, the player to my left cold calls two bets, the next player raises, the cutoff caps it, AND the small blind calls the additional three bets!!!, there are no flush or straight draws on this particular board, so at this point any good limit player must know that he is beat by either 77 or qq. (the thinking there being that the players are not ALL calling on the come). Now can you lay it down?Lets say I can'tSo a Ten comes on the river, now this very easy to read small blind is extatic (he had 4,10 remember) and he bets, and I raise still thinking I have the best hand, well now the always calling player in third position RAISES!! (he has ten, ten, and of course has me beat), the next player calls (fearing his sevens full is behind, but he still has me beat), and the cutoff caps it with his queens full, the small blind calls and its two bets to youNow can you lay it down?Sure it's only two bets ($120) more but you have to know with 100% certainty that you are beat at this point.All that being said somewhere in this hand it must become a good laydown in you guys' opinions so where is it?

[Scott3705 0]

I don't know why, but I see a real difference between Hellmuth's lay down in the original post and the two lay downs posted afterwards. In hellmuth's situation, Howard either has a set of 3's or he is on a huge bluff. Phil gets his read and goes from there. In his case, there is really only one hand that can bet like that besides Phil's hand. (I take phil's pair out of possible sets just because he had a pair of them and probably removed it from his idea of possible hands)In the first case about the str8 flush.... Some one is going to make that play with just the A the same way as the J. In this case, he just happened to have the j and figured that he wasn't going to get any action anyway since he had the A in his hand. Results worked out well.... but I still think you can't lay down a str8 flush if a J completes the top end. If you have a 9 and the board is 10 j q k. Fine. then maybe you can lay it down. The queens.... I admit to not being a limit player, but I still find it mindboggling to think that you can put some one in late position who didn't raise pre flop on QQ without him ever acting after the flop. Am I wrong or isn't 30/60 a pretty decent game that people wouldn't be limping with QQ. (I know it was passive and He coulodn't do anything..... ......) Just seems way too out there for this guy.