Slowplay Yourself Into Oblivion

I like to slowplay on occasion, just like anybody else.  But I use it much more rarely than most folks do.  If there's any draw on the board, even if I have a great hand like trips, I will bet it and take the smaller pot rather than check and give the free card that beats me to my opponent.  I'm more likely to slowplay when the flop is complete garbage, I have a monster hand, and realize that there's no way my opponent will call anything unless he can catch up.

(One hand I almost never slowplay is a straight.  It is just way too vulnerable to draw-outs.)

Here's an example from a recent hand that proves my point.  It was a $2/$5 no-limit table.  I was the "cutoff" seat with pocket Queens; the big blind had pocket Nines.  Preflop, it was folded all the way to me, so I raised it to $15.  The button called (I don't know what he had) and so did the big blind.

The flop came Ace-Nine-Deuce -- all Hearts!  Now, here is where my opponent (the big blind) lost the pot.  He had flopped a set of Nines on a draw-heavy board -- and checked!!  I can promise you, with all those hearts and the Ace overcard, I wouldn't have called a one-cent flop bet.  So the flop was checked all the way around and we went to the turn.

Guess what?  The turn was a Queen.  So now I was set-over-set against the guy.  And now that he was basically drawing dead, that's when he put in his bet.  He put $15 into a $45 pot (way too little for so many reasons).  Me, being no dummy, immediately raised the pot ($60).  The button folded; the big blind called.

The river was the Ace of Clubs.  So now we were looking at full house over full house.  The big blind bet roughly $60; I raised to $160; he went all-in for about $400 (I had him covered), so I called and took the pot.

He had nobody to blame but himself for losing a pot that should have been his.  Granted, the flop pot only held about $45, but if you'd asked him whether he would have rather won $45 or lost over $500 I can guess what his answer would have been!