how much to bet?
Okay, here's a hypothetical for you. Suppose it's a $1-$2 NL cash game, there's one limper to you in middle position, you go $10 with AA and get one caller in late position. There's $25 in the pot, and let's suppose the two of you have lots of cash and exactly the same amount.
Flop comes Ah Ts 9s. How much should you bet to protect against the draw? Or, how likely are you to try to bring him along for a few more dollars? If he does turn a straight or flush, how much will he have to bet to push you off your re-draw? Would it matter much if you had the As? And finally, suppose you both started the hand with only $100 in front of you -- what would that change?
Most importantly, with all the above questions, is also "why?".
Cheers,
Flop comes Ah Ts 9s. How much should you bet to protect against the draw? Or, how likely are you to try to bring him along for a few more dollars? If he does turn a straight or flush, how much will he have to bet to push you off your re-draw? Would it matter much if you had the As? And finally, suppose you both started the hand with only $100 in front of you -- what would that change?
Most importantly, with all the above questions, is also "why?".
Cheers,
Comments
check this thread:
http://pokerforum.ca/forum/viewtopic.php?t=59
majority were saying to make a big bet, or check with the intention of check raising.
To me (and I guess I'm considered conservative) if I even bet allin and I'm against 2 spades and/or up & down straight draws (maybe even open end str8 flush draws) then they have a ton of cards that can help them, and I've just made the pot that much sweeter for them to call..and it's close to a coin toss for the winner....mind you in my scenario there was more than 2 players, and in your case, you'd have to consider the chances of that flop helping your one oppenent.
I probably open with a pot bet. If the turn brings a straight or a flush, I might check hoping he thinks I'm waiting to check raise.
This doesn't change anything per se. In fact this information is *required* to answer the question since it is a question of implied odds. This is relates to the whole deal of people saying that stack sizes are important in NL.
Another important piece of information we need to know is what you are going to do if the turn (or river) is a scare card. I put the river in brackets because I think we might suppose you will move all-in on the turn if no scare card falls. Unless you are trying to be fancy.
As an example, one set of assumptions we could use is:
(a) the AA goes all-in on the turn no matter what card falls (this includes any scare card)
(b) your opponent will fold on the turn if he misses
(c) your opponent will fold on the turn with a flush draw if the As falls (this just simplifies things-- now both draws have 8 outs)
(d) the draw has no straight flush potential (this is just to simplify the calculations a bit)
If both you and your opponent know these to be true we can compute the exact implied odds (from the drawing hand's point of view).
There are 8 outs, and 47 unseen cards. So, you have a 8/47 = 17% probability of hitting your draw on the turn (which is what matters according to assumption (b)).
The full house/quads re-draw is a 10 outer on the river. So it will get there 10/46 of the time, or 22%.
The probability of hitting the draw on the turn and not getting re-drawn out on is 15%. [19% * (100% - 22%) ]
Let $x be the flop bet.
When you hit your draw on the turn will win $25 + $88 = $113 net if your hand holds up to the full house/quads re-draw. When you miss your draw on the turn, you lose $x. When you get re-drawn out, you lose $88.
So, the expected value of calling on the flop is:
(+$113) * (15%) + (-$x) * (81%) + (-$88) * (4%)
= $13.43 - (0.81) * $x
To get the cut-off point between where calling and folding are each correct, set this equal to 0. You get $x = $16.58.
So, about $20 should get the job done. An overbet of $30 to $40 will make it *very* incorrect to call.
Note that these assumptions are not necessarily realistic, but at least we can see how these calculations go.
And for this example, the "why?" part is simply answered. Bet more than $17 and your opponent isn't getting the correct implied odds to call. Therefore, your opponent is making a Fundamental Theorem of Poker style mistake if he calls.
Personally, I would check on that flop.
ScottyZ
Why would you check that flop but not the flop that I linked to in my post above? They are nearly identical situations.
Your board was T98, two suited. Not only does this make a made staright a posibility, it gives almost everyone (except AA, KK, or AK) at least a gutshot. I'm not willing to give a free turn card here.
There was no Ace on board. One possibility (with the AA) I am hoping for is that I will get put on KK through JJ and get a shot taken at me.
You had two opponents. This, together with the first point, means there are many more combined outs, and the scare cards are "more scary".
These hands are quite different, and I advocated betting strongly on the more vulnerable hand, and slowplaying the less vulnerable one. (In both cases of course, I think I have the best hand at the time.) That's pretty standard I think.
ScottyZ
Obviously it depends on the type of player your opponent is and the game but with a big bet like that and no callers, its unlikely he'd call with anything less than high pocket pairs or AKs, AQs. I doubt he'd call with suited connectors like QJ, 78, maybe KQs. So on the flop, either he thinks he's ahead with pair of ace, or if he's got a high pocket pair, he thinks he's way behind and you won't get much value from him anyways. So I'd bet out strong (maybe even all-in). Either he'll pay you off or he would have folded to a smaller bet anyways. And this way you make him pay for drawing if he does indeed have AsKs, or AsQs.
I disagree with this statement. The reason for going all-in would be to push him off his flush draw. An all-in bet would give him even money (assuming the 25 in the pot is small compared to their stacks). Flush draw's 3:1 underdog. Its a bad move on his part if he does call. However, if you just make a small bet or pot sized bet, He'd be getting enough implied odds to be correct. For instance, if you both have 100 left and you bet 25. He could think that the implied odds are 5:1 for him and would no doubt call you. So I think that that actually the opposite of that is true.
And the only way it'd be a coin toss (he'd actually be favoured) is if he does indeed have up and down flush draw (unlikely). So with all that said, I'd probably go all-in on the flop.
If I have the As however, I might be inclined to slowplay it as its even more unlikely he'd have 2 spades and I've got a backdoor flush draw.
Well, I don't feel like crunching too many numbers exactly, but here's what I was thinking.
First take the $100 stack scenario, no As.
If the guy has decent 8-out draw he needs around 5:2 odds to call, so Scotty's right that a $20 price to draw is in your favour. You're ahead, do you want him to call and miss? Absolutely. So you bet $20 and he calls.
If he misses he'll fold to whatever decent bet you make on the turn. But suppose he turns the 3s. Bad. Now if you check he bets all in $70, and your choices are
* fold and lose $30, or
* call $70 more to win $135 on a 10:34 draw.
The second choice is
(10/44)*$135 - (34/44)*$70 = $30.68 - $54.09 =
- $23.41
Better than folding, but 3/4 of the time you lose all $100.
With the As and ignoring straight flushes the redraw is much better -- 17:27. The call at the end is
(17/44)*$135 - (27/44)*$70 = $52.15 - $42.95 =
$1.20. That's +EV, but barely.
I think that a bigger bet on the flop is necessary to protect your hand. But then, a scary turn comes only 1/3 of the time, so it doesn't have to be very big. Anything $25-40 seems right. It's a question of greed -- would you be happy with just a $15 profit from flopping a set of Aces? :?
With smaller stacks you don't have to bet as much, as you'll be able to get correct odds to call even if he hits on the turn and bets all in. But if the stacks are bigger then if he hits he can increase the price of redrawing so high that it becomes worse than folding. In this case a correspondingly bigger bet on the flop is required to protect against the draw.
So here's question number 2 (in the no As case) with simplified (but ballpark correct) odds.
Suppose it's post-flop on the above hand. There's $25 in the pot and you've both got stacks of $X. He has 4:1 odds against hitting his draw on the turn, and if he misses he'll fold. If he hits then you have 3:1 odds against re-drawing on the river, and if you miss the river you'll fold. How much should you bet on the flop in order to take away his implied odds?
If he misses he'll fold to whatever decent bet you make on the turn. But suppose he turns the 3s. Bad. Now if you check he bets all in $70, and your choices are
* fold and lose $30, or
* call $70 more to win $135 on a 10:34 draw.
The second choice is
(10/44)*$135 - (34/44)*$70 = $30.68 - $54.09 =
- $23.41
Better than folding, but 3/4 of the time you lose all $100.
My bad, that's wrong. Your $30 is in already, so
folding costs nothing extra, whereas calling costs $23 more on average, so folding is correct here.
The $20 bet on the flop is not enough to allow you to call in the 1/4 of the time the turn comes with a
flush.
The thing to realize is that if you are making a decision on the flop (for example) it doesn't matter who put that money into the pot in the previous rounds. [Perhaps someone came buy, threw $100 on the table, and said "Play for it boys!"] Only the current size of the pot matters. (Well, the fact that you were the bettor, raiser or caller in previous rounds affects some other kinds of decisions of course, but I am talking about just odds calculations here.)
The main idea is that the decisions associated with money already in the pot have already taken place, so you have already taken that particular mistake (or possibly correct decision)
The money already in the pot does represent money you can win in terms of EV, but does *not* contribute to the loss portion of an EV calculation.
ScottyZ
Incidentally, the EV of folding is easy to calculate. It is always 0.
ScottyZ
Let's say, the stacks are both size $y (or equivalently, the smaller stack is $y). I used $x already...
My EV calculation for calling on the flop becomes
(+$y + $13) * (15%) + (-$x) * (81%) + (-$y + $12) * (4%)
= (0.11) * $y - (0.81) * $x + $2.43
Set this equal to 0 (the point at which folding becomes better than calling) and we get
$x = (0.14) *$y + $3.00
So, the idea is that if your initial stack $y is very large (so large that the $3.00 is small in comparison to (0.14) * $y), you should bet at least 14% of your stack to make calling incorrect.
In the example above, $y = $100, so we saw that you should bet more than $x = $14 + $3 = $17.
Note that if the stacks are very big, a pot-sized bet of $25 isn't nearly big enough. For example, if the initial stacks are $y = $1000, you need to bet more than $140 to make it incorrect to chase the draw. (Don't forget the assumption that the AA will go all-in no matter what the turn is. This assumption starts to become much less realistic because moving all-in on the turn for around $850 would now be a substantial overbet into the $300 pot.)
ScottyZ