Sometimes, luck

Another usual day of hands and no hands and no action and nothingness.  I was down a bit when the most interesting hand of the day occurred.  I was down 75 but had reloaded to about 225.  I was in my usual 4 seat.  

There was a loose-aggressive player in the 7 seat.  I thought he was a good player.  Him and I had been battling a bit.  We were involved in a few hands, one in which I showed down a 78c to take down a pot with a board of AK3A.  He got his revenge later, putting me all-in when I was unprepared to make the move.  He had won a few big pots, showing down quads and 2 sets.  He had some hands, but played them well.  I'm going to call him Clive.  So Clive had been aggressive on all parts of the game.  He took down pots a lot.  Raised a lot.  Ok, so the hand.

The table had gotten tight for about 5 minutes.  There were a couple people missing and there were 2 chops on 2 of the last 3 hands.  I was in the cutoff and it was folded to me.  I was fearing another chop, so I decided to play the 3d 4h.  I limp and the button folds and the blinds call/check.  Pot is 6.

The flop is 3s Kc 3c.  

SB check

BB check (Clive)

I bet 7.

SB fold

BB raises to 22.

Now this guy is tricky.  I knew I had the best hand, as he made lots of raises and bets.  I had a decision.  Should I raise or call?  I didn't want to shut him out of the pot, and I didn't want him to do something crazy on the turn to shut me out of the pot.  I was in position, which is always good.  I finally decided to just call.  A raise here, I thought, would have ended the pot.

The turn is the 9c.  Not a good card.  It brought a flush but beyond that, it couldn't have changed the hand very much.  This time Clive bets right out.  He bets 45.  Before this bet, the pot was 6 +22 +22 = 50.  Now, it is 95.  The action is to me.  A 45 dollar bet.  ???  I just could not put this guy on a hand that I was afraid of.  Maybe he had a better 3.  I thought it was more likely he had a K of some sort.  Maybe he had K9 and he thought his K now beat my K.  I still thought my hand was good.  My stack had about 200 left in it.  I raised to 110.  He insta-shoved.  WOW.  Not what I was expecting.  He had a lot of chips.  About 400. After my 110 dollar bet, I only had 101 left in my stack so I just bet over 50% of my chips.  Now, am I supposed to be able to fold?  I thought my raise had me committed.  I said that I could not fold so I rolled the rest of my chips into the pot and Clive showed the Ac2c.  

I thought he played the hand extremely well.  He had me.  Check raised the flop and led right out when he hit the flush.  It was well done.  I obviously had a flush in mind but from the history of this player and the way the hand was played, I just didn't think that's what he had.  I was wrong.

Of course, poker hands don't end on the turn.  There is such thing as 5th street - the river.

After all this, the chips were in, I got outplayed and then there was the river.

The Kd.  ;)