Poker Stories: Bluffing into Quads

Have you ever felt like you had a confident read on an opponent, risked it all on a big bluff, and only realized after it’s too late that they were holding the literal nuts? It’s not a great feeling, but these bad beats are the stuff that poker dreams are made of—if you’re on the other side of the table!

In a recent VLOG from PokerfaceAsh, she gets to experience the pain first-hand of making this move. And to make it even worse, it happens on the very first hand of the session.

Photo: Busted Coverage

The Hand

After buying into a $1/3 cash game for $1000, PokerfaceAsh sits down to play some poker. The player under the gun decides to make a straddle of $6 before even seeing his cards to juice up the pot, and it folds around to a tight player in middle position who bumps it up to $35 as an opening raise.

Our hero decides to call with 7h7s, and they head to a flop: AdAhJd, all broadway with 2 to a flush. Both of them check the flop, and ash can’t feel too confident about her little pocket pair.

The turn brings the 3d, and the villain decides to make a small bet of $20. Sensing weakness and wanting to force a fold, the hero raises it up to $75. After tanking for a bit, the villain calls the 75.

Finally, the river brings the Jh, meaning that Ash’s sevens are dead useless. When the villain checks, however, she thinks that he will fold anything but an ace, and, since she can’t win unless she makes the aggressive play, she tries to bully him out of the pot.

Deciding to go for glory, she measures out a big bet of $145. It doesn’t take him long, however, to shove his chips all in, and with a basically dead hand, Ash has no choice but to throw her cards into the muck.

Maybe he wanted to rub it in a bit, or maybe he just wanted to show her that she had made the right choice in folding: either way, when the villain flips over the pocket jacks to show the quads, Ash can’t help but feel a little tilted that she had tried to bluff in this position. When there’s no chance of getting a fold, the bluff just won’t work.