The turn check with a made flush and the river All-in were the costly decisions. Checking gave free cards and let the pot stay small. Raising all-in over SB's overbet lead mostly gets called by the flushes that beat you. Both were -EV; calling the river was better.
Street-by-Street Analysis
Preflop (8/10)
Q♠J♠ is a standard UTG open at 150 BB, and $40 is a fine sizing. Expect multiway calls like these.
Flop (8/10)
Top Pair (Q kicker) plus a Flush Draw (9 outs) is a strong value hand with backup equity. A $100 bet into $170 charges draws and weaker Jx three-way. Good.
Turn (5/10)
The 8♠ gives you a Flush (Q high) on a board that is very coordinated: 6-7-8-J with three spades. Checking is a mistake for three reasons:
- You lose value from sets, two pair, straights and smaller flushes.
- You give a free river card to every single-spade hand, including A♠x and K♠x, which can make a flush that beats yours.
- A bet of roughly half to two-thirds pot builds the pot while you are clearly ahead of most hands.
Checking here looks like your passive postflop habit, not a deliberate pot-control plan.
River (5/10)
SB check-called the flop, checked the turn, then led $500 into $470. That line is polarized toward slowplayed strong flushes and straights. Your hand still beats 974 combos, but the 16 that beat it (7 A-high flushes, 6 K-high flushes, 3 straight flushes) make up a large share of SB's value range.
Raising to $1,360 gets few calls from worse hands, since straights and small flushes fold to the jam often. You get called by exactly the hands you fear. Calling the $500 keeps worse hands in, caps your loss, and still gets you paid by bluffs and thinner value.
Hindsight: SB had A♠4♠, an A-high flush. Calling would have lost $500; the All-in lost about 86bb more.
