Betting the nuts

Here's a poker etiquette question for you. Is it OK to bet the nuts?

This seems like a no-brainer to me, but I took so much grief one night last week at the Roxy, the humble little card room by my house, that I'm curious about other players' thoughts.

I was in a $3-6 game, up a few chips after an hour or so, when I flopped a set of 7s from early position with about six players in the pot (standard for this game). I check-called the flop of Q-7-3. The turn was another queen, giving me a boat. I checked again, the original better bet, the guy next to him raised, we lost a couple and when it got back to me I three-bet it. The other two called. I'm pretty certain I'm best at this point and unless another queen falls I'm not too worried.

The river is a 7, giving me four-of-a-kind and -- discounting the highly unlikely pocket queens -- the stone nuts. So I bet out. Now the guy to my left raises, and the other player cold-calls! So I pop it again and they both groan as they call. Weak queen, weaker queen for second and third place. Boo-de-hoo. I scoop.

I figure that's that, but they both start bitching right away about what a jerk I am. "What, you need to jack us for another bet? You've already got quads!" And like that. This continues, I'm not joking, for the next hour, until I leave.

Now, in my country when you have the best hand you're supposed to bet it. Seems to me that's the whole point, especially in a stupid suck-out game like this one where you can't protect your hand and the rake will kill you if the Q-3 offsuits don't. Besides, if the dumbass complainer in Seat One didn't want more money in the pot he didn't have to put it there. He raised me!

So I just said, hey man, I tried to tell you what I had by three-betting the turn and betting out on the river.

I should also mention there is no bad-beat jackpot in this place, so that wasn't a consideration, although I did win a $148 bonus for the quads in a Monte Carlo-style jackpot they have. Also these other players aren't longtime playing companions who give me air, or vice versa, as a courtesy (another play I don't get).

So what do you think? How would you have played it?