PLO - big draw v the current nuts

A hand came up last night that got me thinking about PLO in a bit more depth.

I had AsJh10d7s and opened for 18 in the $600 game. The button (on the tight/passive side) and the big blind (decent) called me, so we took the flop 3-handed with 57 in the pot.

The flop was Jd10s8s, giving me top two pairs plus the nut flush-draw. I bet 54 and got raised to 217 by the button. After the BB folded, it was back to me and with the money in the pot already I had too much to fold. The decision was re-raise all-in or just call and re-evaluate on the turn.

My thinking at the time was as follows:

He must have the nut straight (Q9), but probably not a total monster like QJJ9. Hopefully he doesn’t have any spades (reducing my flush chances). I probably have enough outs to correctly call the rest (365) to see the river even if I miss on the turn. If I hit one of my outs I can give him the chance to put the rest of his money in when in pretty bad shape.

There are a few problems with this line of thinking:

If I hit my hand on the turn it will be obvious and he is unlikely to pay me off.
I am unlikely to be drawing dead on the turn, so waiting for a ‘safe card’ here is silly.
Assuming I don’t make my hand on the turn, I am opting to put a large chunk of my money in at approx 25-30% equity when I could have just lumped it in on the flop at 45-50% [2].

I should have just re-raised all-in on the flop and took the toss-up. (I actually had 48% equity against his hand).

This lead me to the following conclusion about how to play a big draw against the current nuts:

Against the nut straight: the flush-draw + full-house draw should get all-in on the flop [2]
Against top set: straight draws + flush draw should keep some money back in case the board pairs on the turn. If the drawing hand hits on the turn, it will be tough for the top set to fold. If a non-pairing blank comes, it is still likely to be correct to call a PSB on the turn [3].



[1] unless he had something as nasty as Qs9sThTc, then I would really be in trouble with only 28% equity on the flop
[2] unless the money is really deep
[3] this is very different thinking to that required to play NLHE