Bad beats and Good beats

Today was a pretty wild and swinging day. I played for about 3 and a half hours earlier in the day and was breaking even after an hour or so and then came the dreaded bad run. It lasted for about 2 hours and I decided to quit and take a breather rather than chase 5 buyins back.

The bad beats that made me quit were actually over the course of a few hands :-

(8 Handed, $4000 20/40 NL game)
I pick up TT in early middle position after two people have limped for $40. I limp also and the button then makes it $240(6*BB) to go. Both limpers call and I also decide to call. We all have $4000 stacks.

The flop comes :- KT5.

A good flop for my hand. The first 2 limpers check, I also make the obligatory check to the pre flop raiser. He bets out $680 into a $1020 pot. The first limper then raises to $1680, the next limper folds and it is up to me facing a $1680 reraise. The player who made the raise is how shall I put it, very dodgy and could easily have a vast array of hands here which I crush. I have an easy decision versus this guy but I am slightly worried about the pre flop raiser but not overly so as he probably only has AK, AA or a bunch of other hands he might bet out with once everyone checks to him like any A.

I push all in for my entire stack, the raiser calls fast and I put him on KKK, AA or AKx. The limp reraiser calls instantly also turning it into a $12300 pot.

The cards are turned over before showdown on this site so I see in fact that the initial raiser has 74 and the reraiser has AA.

Oh my, nice reads. Lol. At least I had the limp reraiser beat as I suspected I did. Impossible to put the initial raiser on a flopped flush however.

The turn is the J and the river is the 2. No improvement for me and a very oddly played AA scoops the $12300. I got a small bit of satisfaction from seeing the 47s not win either, I have to admit =)

This type of bad beat is what I call a situational bad beat, one in which you are behind but you have to play for all your money because you are going to be winning way too often to fold.

The next hand is what made me quit for the session, it felt like a movie script hand!

(5 Handed, $2000 10/20 NL game)

I have to quickly explain a hand before the bad beat for it to make sense.

I pick up AA and raise $80, it gets folded round to a half stack who goes all in for $1200 with 99. I call it and win the pot building my stack to approximately $3200.

The very next hand I pick up AA again. Someone else who has a $4000 stack raises to $80, I reraise to $280. Everyone folds back to him and he quickly makes it $780, another $500 back to me. Now normally I would never push here even though I'm 95% sure he has KK because it makes it too easy for him to fold (people can actually fold KK up here especially to a 1.6* stack). However, because of the previous hand where I had AA I decided that since he has KK now he is going to find it impossible to laydown not believing I can have AA twice in a row. I push all in and he calls instantly. The pot is $6400 and the cards get turned over and I see that I am indeed up against KK. The flop is 373. The turn is a 4. The river is a very painful K. I was already down a lot =). I quit soon after.

I recorded my losses and went and did some other stuff. I came back later on and started up again. I got going pretty good from the off and then the following hand happened, this is the good beat :-

(4 Handed, $2000 10/20 NL game)

I have a $2800 stack at my table which is comprised of myself and 3 good players, no fish here. I pick up KQ in the BB and the first player in makes it $100(5*BB) to go which is called by one other player and myself.

The flop comes TJ6. I check and the initial raiser bets out $280, the other player in the hand folds and I decide to see the turn. I call. The turn is a 9. The bingo card. I check to the raiser. He pauses and bets $780, a strong bet. I pretty much have him on a set here, the bet seems too confident for just AA or KK. I decide to push him all in fully expecting a call from any set. He pauses and calls, the pot is now around $5800.

The river is a jack. He has hit the bingo card, the jack of diamonds, giving himself quad jacks =(

So why is this a good beat you say? Well I forgot to tell you the suits on board.

The flop read TJ6.
The turn was the 9.
The river was the J.

And in my hand I held the KQ.

=)!!

My straight flush beats his quads >_<

I recovered my losses for the day and managed to finish around even which made me happy enough for the day.