When you have a good starting hand and you’re in early position, what do you do? Do you raise right away and run the risk of stealing the Blinds or just call and hope to re-raise a late position raiser? If you’re a well-rounded player, it is likely that you do both just to add a little variance to your game and make yourself more unpredictable. The wait and see approach is useful and powerful in highly aggressive games but what if no one raises or if it folded around to the blinds? You may find yourself in a bad spot. This is just what happened during a recent $1-$3 no-limit game at my local card room.

I was in the big blind with 2d-5d. The under the gun player simply called and the player to his immediate left, a highly skilled, highly aggressive and tricky player called as well. It was very odd for both of these two players to limp into a pot of any type. Surprisingly, the players all folded to the small blind who also folded and I got to see a free flop with my small suited connectors. Any type of raise and I would have been out of there.

The flop comes as the 2c-5s-4h giving me top and bottom pair. Very interesting. Out of position, I know I should check my 2 pair just to see where I stand and that’s precisely what I do. I check, the under the gun player bets $20, and is immediately raised to $40 by the tricky player. I am putting both of these players on bigger pair higher than the board or overcards. I decide to just call here with the intent of check-raising on the turn. I can tell already that there won’t be any free cards in this hand. The under the gun player quickly calls behind me and there is $129 in the pot and 3 players.

The turn is the 2s. Holy cow. I just hit a full house with a hand that I never would have been involved in. I check again, the under the gun player bets $50 and the tricky players raises to $100. I stop for a second to pretend like I’m making a decision and I put my remaining $150 in the pot. This had to have surprised both of my opponents who both call. There is now $579 in the pot.

All that’s left for me is to wait for the river card which is the 8d. The under the gun player goes all in for his remaining $47 and is called for a $94 side pot. The under the un player shows Ah-3h, meaning he flopped a straight and the tricky player showed pocket Queens. They both looked stunned at my full house as the dealer pushes the pot towards me.

One asks me what I was even doing in that hand to begin with. I shrug my shoulders and remind them I was in the Big Blind and nobody raised me out pre-flop.

What was I going to do? Apologize for their mistake? No way. I’ll let them steam about it and hope they let me into another free hand while they’re steaming about it.

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