Bets

Making bets is pretty much what you do when you play poker. Big bets, small bets, pot-sized bets. The general mistake a lot of people make with bets is that they don’t size their bets correctly. Bets that are too large overly expose your stack, and increases risks. Bets that are too small don’t extract enough value.

When playing poker, its easy to get carried away betting into a pot in the hopes of getting a player off a hand. Sometimes though, it’s good to just recall the fundamental reason to bet. You bet to increase the money in the pot for hands that are strong. You avoid increasing the size of pots for hands that are weak. When you’re firing several barrels into a pot with an average made hand (or even on a bluff!), and your opponents are not folding, you know you’re doing something very wrong.

I think the amount to bet depends on the reason you’re betting. If you’re betting to push your opponent off a hand, you have to know from previous experience the amount and situation he would fold a particular hand to. For example, if you’ve observed that he folds top pair to an 80% pot bet on a possible made flush, you can do the same when you’re in the hand with him in a similar situation. If he folds to 80% pot bets 4 out of every 5 times, you should always make this bet in similar situations regardless of what you’re holding, simply because its profitable to do so. Bets like these also help you read your opponent’s hands better. If he doesn’t fold when you bet 80% into the pot, you can pretty much be assured that you’re up against something better than top pair and you can let go of your hand unless you improve.

If you’re betting to increase the size of the pot for your monster made hand, there are several things you have to note. Bets the opponent calls on a regular basis, your stack size and your opponent’s stack size, the aggressiveness of your opponent and his opinion of your aggressiveness. I was in a situation some time ago, in a $2/$5 live game, when I had JTs out of position against a tight solid player (TSP) in late position. I have a loose aggressive image, with a pretty deep stack ($650 or thereabouts). TSP had about the same amount and called my pre-flop 4xBB raise. The flop came JJ9, with a possible flush draw, a monster flop for me. The only thing you should be thinking at this point is to make as much as you can from your opponent. I knew TSP for a passive player from previous games, so I knew I could not slow-play. I raised $28, 70% of the pot, and he calls. TSP regularly calls me down with a pair or Ace high (because of my loose aggressive image), so I put him on a 9 or a possible flush draw. The turn comes a T which made the flush, but I had the nuts. I bet $60, and he makes a raise to $165. If I went all in or even made a raise at this point, he could barely call me with the nut flush, and anything less would generally fold, so I flat called. This made the pot equivalent to our stacks. The river came a 5, and I made a bet of $300. He calls with the nut flush, and I take down the pot.

This example might not be the best, but I think it illustrates the need to know your opponent’s style of play and also his view of how you play. The turn and river bet was also important imho. The turn bet increased the size of re-raises from possible strong made hands, while the river bet was strong enough to avert suspicions for an extremely strong made hand, while putting enough value for a strong made hand to make the call (2 to 1). Many people might be tempted to check the turn with the nuts, but there’s no guarantee that your opponent would bet in position if he made the flush.

This is a complicated topic, and I’ve barely scratched it, but I hope this gives a bit of insight on the intricacy of making bets in poker.