As easy as it sounds, I can’t tell you how many people will bluff away all their chips, or much more commonly, play top pair, top kicker like it’s a full house.
And this occurs at all levels of play that I’ve seen, from micro stakes, to $5/$10 online games, and even bigger in live games. It probably happens at all levels, though I can’t say I’ve personally seen it.
Now, down to the nitty gritty of pot control.
A more refined concept of it is this: The bigger your hand is, the more you want to build the pot. Why? Because your hand has little downside risk, and a lot of upside profit potential. When you have pocket 99 when the board flop A 9 4 in a $5/$10 game, you want a ¾ pot sized bet to be $275, not $75.
But, by the same token, when all you have is KT, on a 10 9 9 board, you would much rather make a ¾ pot bet for a total of $75, rather than $275.
And this is simply because you don’t want to have as much risk exposure when you have a small hand, such as top pair good kicker. But, if you have a monster, you don’t mind having a lot of exposure, because your risk is very minimal anyway.
It all comes back to big bets for big pots for big hands, small bets for small pots for small hands.
Another reason why is this. If you decide to bluff at a pot to take it down, you are going to need to make a much bigger bet to take down a large pot. Also, large pots generally exist because SOMEONE has a large hand (even if that someone is not you.) So your risk exposure is very high, AND it is has a smaller chance of working against big pots. Big pots don’t occur every hand, and when they do, people will often stick around with even a small chance of winning it. Why? Because it is a big pot!
When a pot is small, it is less likely that someone has a big hand, and it will require much less of a bet to take it down.
It is small pots you want to be taking down with bluffs, semi bluffs, etc. Because you DON’T really want to go to war with a bluff. It simply opens you up to a lot of risk exposure, and if someone is fighting back, they probably have you beat.
For example, lets say you are in a $4 / $8 game, and you call on the button preflop with JT suited. The small blinds fold, so there is only the big blinds, and one other limper from mid position. The flop comes down K 7 3 rainbow. Everyone checks to you.
First of all, everyone limped, giving you the smallest pot possible to stab at. A grand total of $28.00. Then, everyone checked. Since most flops miss most hands, this would be a great time to stab at the pot. And whats more, you don’t need to make a full pot sized bet to find out if someone has something. A 1/3 - 2/3 bet will do it. Whats more, a bet in this range doesn’t even have to take it down all the time. A half size pot bet, for instance, only has to take down the pot 1/3 of the time to break even! So you don’t even have to win half the time, and you can still make this play a positive EV play.
So, you bet because your opponent probably has nothing, and you can bet a little because even a little won’t be worth calling with nothing.
Furthermore, if they call or raise, you can probably guess they have you beat with at least a pair, so you can be done with the hand for a relatively cheap bet on the flop.
This is all part of pot control. Remember, pot control is properly sizing your bets to maximize your potential profit, while at the same time minimizing your potential risk. And it’s really all about position and bet sizing. Big bets for big hands, and small bets for small hands. Take the uncontested pots for cheap, otherwise, let them go. And hope for a big battle when you hit your full house, because a big hand should have a big bet to go with it. |
