The SBP Archives - Your less than frequent dose of SBP!

If you're involved in a hand, you have some choices to make when it's your turn to act: check or bet, or, if someone has bet before you, call, raise or fold. But I want to take the time to discuss what your try to accomplish when you're first to act and you do indeed bet.

Betting is a very powerful action in no-limit hold 'em. You should know in advance what you're trying to accomplish by betting out:

1) If you're bluffing, you need to bet a strong amount to cause other players to fold. If, for example, the pot has 1000 chips and you bet 100 into it hoping your opponents will fold their hand, this will likely not happen. The pot is so big that, even if they're unsure whether or not you have a good hand, the pot odds almost make a call mandatory. I would bet out at least 1/2 the pot if I was trying to get others to fold, or whatever amount you've observed is enough to get your opponent to muck their cards.

2) If you're trying to protect your hand (i.e. getting players drawing to a flush or straight out of the pot) you must, like the previous example, bet out a decent amount that would make it a mistake (from a mathematical viewpoint anyway) for them to call you bet. If, for example, the pot is 1000 and there are two hearts on the flop, you might make it a 1/2 to pot-sized bet (500-1000) if you think there's a heart flush draw and you want players to fold. You're making it too expensive for them to continue.

3) If you're trying to build a pot, in other words, you have a strong hand and actually want people to call your bet, you might want to make your bet on the lighter side. A 1/4 pot-sized bet is a good size if you have a hand like a set or top pair with no apparent draws. (You might decide to check, hoping to induce a bet from your opponent, but for this post we're evaluating betting only).

4) If you want to bet to "see where you stand," betting out at the pot can help you determine where you are. For example, if you have pocket 10s and the flop comes K-8-3 and you decide to check, if your opponent then bets he/she may have paired their King, but maybe not. A bet before will go a long way to determine if your hand is still best, and you might decide your done with the hand if you're raised or called. But again, betting 10% of the pot won't tell you where you stand. Bet a decent amount that's enough to make your opponent consider folding if they think they have the inferior hand.

Seems elementary, but enormous blunders can be made if you bet too little or too much depending on what you're trying to do. Make sure you have a game plan before you put your chips in.