Which one are you?
For many of us, poker is a game of extremes. In any given hand, you can know you’re carrying the winner, or be fairly positive you’re behind. You’ve got to know how to handle these situations to bet, call and raise properly.
Knowing What’s Up
Many veteran poker players are aware of the concept of being too far ahead in a hand or being too far behind. Unfortunately, many of these same players don’t understand the principles behind this concept and are stuck in the rut of always betting out with their good hands. So to understand being way ahead or too far behind in a hand, let’s define both situations.
A Situation
If you are holding 8d-8s on a board of As-8h-4c then you’ve most likely got the nuts in this situation so a raise is totally within reason. However, you also have to consider that your opponent’s only chance of being ahead of you is if they have pocket aces. So they’re either way behind and will fold to any raise or they’re way ahead of you with trip aces and will gladly invite a raise from you.
Pot Control
This is where the familiar concept of pot control shows its head again because your only chance in a hand where you’re way ahead or way behind is to control losses and gains. You’ve got to realize that these situations are not the best ones to try and build a huge pot so checking and small raises are definitely options when you’re way ahead or behind.
Betting Out
Of course some people will still want to bet out in these situations because they want to maximize their gains as much as possible. But once again, realize that the only people who are going to be calling or raising your bets are the ones that are already ahead of you. Likewise, those who have nothing will simply fold to any big raises.
The key is to wait for other situations that arise when you can extract as much money from an opponent as possible while controlling pots in hands where you’re too far ahead or behind.
Tags: Poker Hands, Tips
