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(This concept comes up in various poker games and, in fact, has another illustration on third street play in razz.
For instance, take the situation previously mentioned, where you are debating reraising on third street, knowing that if you don’t reraise, your opponent will incorrectly call on Fourth Street poker should it come bad to him and good to you, but it you do reraise he would no longer be making a known poker mistake by calling on fourth street.
Reraising would add so much to the pot that you would both be forced to come again regardless of the cards you caught.
Likewise, if you have an extremely good three-card hand and his appears to be fairly weak it is extremely important that you do reraise him since you will be forced to come anyway on fourth street regardless of the outcome, but by putting more money in the pot he will incorrectly think that he should come on fourth street although he catches a bad one and you catch a good one, when because of the strength of your hand, he should have folded.
This procedure of creating a situation either by the way you play the hand or by manipulating the size of the pot to give your opponent a chance to make a mistake on a later round is a very advanced strategic type of poker play that has never before been discussed in print.)
In Case No.2, where you catch a good one and he catches a bad one, it is clearly correct for you to bet even if you have secretly paired your hole card, and in most cases he will be making a bad call if he calls.
In Case No.3, where he catches a good one and you catch a bad one, while cut and dry, is one of the most important situations in razz poker.
It is your major money maker because unless there has been a double raise on third street, or your hand is extremely good in that it is low and very live, you should fold when he bets.
(*Notice that I call folding a hand a money making play. In poker it is truly correct that money saved is money earned.)
Those players who automatically come again on fourth street when they have started with a good three-card hand are costing themselves a lot of money.
When in doubt in this situation throw your had away. It can never be more than a minor mistake in the most severe situations. All you can do by calling is get yourself in deeper hot water most of the time*.
(*In close decisions, a major factor in determining whether to call is the ability of your opponent. Thus, as an example, if you opponent bets an 8-7 showing on Fourth Street into your Q-6-5-2, you should call if you know that he will incorrectly call you on fifth poker street should you catch a baby and he catches a bad one.)
Against a good player who would not make this call, you should fold on fourth street. This general principle of basing your decisions on whether to make a marginal call based on the strength of your opponent comes up frequently in razz.
Finally, we come to Case No.1 where you both catch good cards. This case can be separated into those cases where you catch a good card, but have secretly paired, and those cases where you haven’t paired. We also must consider who has the lower board and thus bets first.
If you have the lower board, have to bet first and have not paired and you are up against two other low cards showing, there is no set way to play.
In fact, it is important to mix up your play. Your three options are to bet, to check and call if he bets, and to check-raise if he bets. Against many players I frequently check and call, thus making them suspect that I have a pair.
Those players who put a lot of stock in their reading ability and who have high suspicions that you have paired when you play it this way can be trapped very badly.
For instance, if you check into and then just call when he bets, you may make a six or seven low on the next card while he catches a bad one. You have a virtual cinch but because he thinks you only have a four-card seven against his four-card eight he will continue to call you all the way.
Your play of checking and calling on Fourth Street may have made you three double bets against players who tend to put a lot of stock in your weak play. This play is very profitable.
Of course, another advantage to this play against players who are a little bit more leery of your trickiness is that you can check and call when you have paired up and they won’t automatically think that you have paired up since they have seen you trap others with this play.
Thus, the play of checking and calling with the very strong four-card hand, besides having its own value, allows you to check and call when you have paired up without automatically giving away your hand.
The play of coming right out poker betting with this hand when you haven’t paired up is certainly okay, especially if you suspect your opponent might have paired on fourth street.
If you win the pot right there that is fine, and if he wants to call you with a pair that is okay too. Check raising is okay once in a while.