Playing Strong Hands in Poker
Most newbie players consider that waiting around for strong hands is what poker is supposed to be about. Certainly, that is part of the game too, but it is by no means the main thing one has to accomplish.
A strong hand in itself is no guarantee that one shall cash in on it too. The real skills are called upon only after the strong hand has hit.
Many people have set strategies for when they come across a monster, but I'm not so sure it is a good idea to embark on something this rigid. Whether one should slow-play a hand or bet out on it depends on a set of factors that rigid strategies will never be able to compensate for. The best approach to the matter is the following: set a goal to yourself, which in this case should be getting your opponent pot committed on the river.
Achieving that is by no means easy, and the road leading up to it depends a lot on the reads you're able to make on your opponents.
Let's suppose that you have the nuts and another player, which you have read for an absolute maniac bets. Should you check-raise and trap him? When faced with a maniac it is generally a better idea to let him hang himself, that is let him pot commit himself, because of you keep on calling, an you're in a NL game, he's likely to do just that. This is the easier scenario, you need to make sure though that he is indeed maniac-enough to follow through, that is he'll look past your constant calling without catching on to this pretty obvious tell.
Most people aren't this dumb though. You need to influence them a bit to get maximum value out of your monster. The best point to tamper with the system, is the turn. The turn is where you make the decisive move tapping him. If he makes like a top pair on the flop, you're not likely to run into trouble when you raise him on the turn. That will not only allow him to live up to his character, it will also give him a good reason to do so. Doubling or tripling his bet on the turn sounds like a good move and one that smells of a bluff. If he calls that, you're highly likely to be able to trap him for good on the river on an all-in.
If your opponent is a good (tight aggressive) player though, things are different. The main landmarks of the problem remain the same (the goal, and the best time to act) but all other data changes.
The thing about solid players is that they're readable when it comes to betting patterns. No matter how good actors they are, and no matter that they master the game to perfection, they just need to make the due moves (bets) in order to achieve their goals. That is just about the only thing that can give their intentions away.
If you bet into one of these guys, and he calls you, you can be almost a 100% sure that he's a sitting duck. That means that he too probably has a hand which he figures might be better than yours. If you have the nuts in this situation, you have the "perfect hand", which you'll be able to fully exploit too, if you know how to make the best of the situation. Again, the turn is the stage you have to make your move on. Make sure you draw enough of his stack into the pot then, that it'll make perfect sense for him later to go all-in.
As you can see, playing your monsters for maximum profit is not nearly as easy as it may seem. There are lots of such hidden subtleties in poker one has to learn one by one in order to become a long-term winner. Another example of a very lucrative yet seldom-recognized edge is rakeback. Make sure you don't overlook such edges, and make sure you stay on top of your game all the time. Whenever you feel you're unable to accomplish that, the time is right for a break. |
