Mike Caro

So on your K T you bet and get called and think your opponent has trips. So you check the turn. Then the opponent goes all in on the river and you called. Why? If you really thought the opponent had trips you needed runner runner to have a shot at winning. You don't say what the turn was, but there are a lot of ways top pair with a mediocre kicker is beat there. I don't think the flop bet is the problem there, but the check on the turn. If you think you have the best hand and the turn doesn't pair the board or put an A, Q or J, you have to bet the turn big. If you check the turn because you think you are beat and then your opponent jams it on the river, K T would be an auto fold if you don't hit a K or T on the river. What can K T beat except for a bluff? If you get bluffed, so what? Bluffs happen.

The other hand you just mention that you hit an A and the opponent hit a set of 8's on the turn. And you mention that you min bet. If your A had a good kicker, you probably should have bet a lot more. I'm guessing since you specify a min bet that you were playing pot or no limit. If you are playing a 1/2 live game, for example, you need to bet a  lot there if you want pot. If the board is something like A 5 7 and you min bet, you could be min betting a lot of hands. On a board like that I would certainly call with 8 8. And if I hit a set on the turn I'd certainly call any bet you put in on the turn and jam it on the river.

In both cases I think your mistake was not on the flop, but on the turn and river. Especially with the K T hand. I have no idea what the amount of money was or the odds you were getting to call all in on the river, but they had to be spectacularly good, in my opinion, to justify a call. K T doesn't beat much there.

The story has changed since your first post, but as to whether it's all in vs $1 on the river, there is a huge difference. It's not psychological. It's just simple math.

If he bets $1 on the river and the pot is $50 your call has to be right more than 1 in 50 times to be profitable. With top pair and a mediocre kicker, that's very likely the case.

If the bet is all in and it is for more than the pot, and you have top pair and a mediocre kicker, you need to have a good read on the player. You need that call to be profitable a very high percentage of the time (better than 1 in 3 if it's a pot sized bet) for it to pay off. Originally you said you had K T and got beat by K 7 on the river. At the end the board was K 8 2 X 7. So you are beat by AK, KQ, KJ, any set and any two pair. Depending what X is they could have also hit a sick straight on the river. You said that all the community cards were below a K and we know that it wasn't a 10 because you didn't have 2 pair. So that means X is a Q, J, 9, 6, 5, 4 or 3.  5 of those cards connect with the board to make a potential straight. If the person you are up against likes to play suited connectors in late position, there are a lot of ways they could have gotten 2 pair, as well, by the river. I would have been more scared of him holding 8 7 at that point than K 7, but either way, you are beat.

As for AA over 88, if you push on the flop, whether you get called or not depends on the board and what your chip stacks were and how much somebody likes to gamble. As I said before, depending on the board, 8 8 with one A on the board can make sense if the bet is small. If you push hard on the board and he calls with 8 8 and hits another 8, yes, he's lucky and that's poker. But it sounds like you made it cheap for him to stay around.

These days I bet big with made hands for exactly the reason you state. In this hyperagressive day of poker, everybody tries to out do everybody with monster bets. So I use that to my advantage. I have played my share of idiotic hands where people give me credit for playing a lot more hands than I really do, so when I hit, I bet big. I get called more often than is reasonable.

"When one hits top pair on the flop, what is the best way of betting it?  Should I go all-in and try to take it down right there, so no one can draw out on me?"

With the top pair, you want to find out where you stand. It's not enough strength to go all in. (The only exception would be if I sensed weakness and believed I had a good chance to pick up that pot without a contest, and I'd have to be pretty certain of being able to do that.) Otherwise, make a substantial enough bet to shut out speculative hands, or give them a negative expectation if they get stubborn and call anyway with poor pot odds. That's good for your bottom line too. If you're called, then it's up to you to decide if the caller is speculating, has a top pair with a worse kicker, or is slow playing something big like trips.

The problem with going all in with a top pair is that you will get called by anyone holding a set, or possibly even the bottom two pair. Either way, a call is usually bad news. Overbetting just because you're afraid someone will draw out is a certain ticket to the rail. You can't worry about that. If it happens, it happens. C'est le vie!. You just have to take comfort from the fact that Mr. Lucky made a bad call with a long term negative expectation. Stick around and he'll get unlucky, continue to make those bad calls, and you will get your money back with interest.

Sometimes I worry I'm too conservative BEFORE the flop.  What is an appropriate percentage of your hands where you see a flop?  What percentage is too low even for a conservative player?

Warren Tampa said:

I have recently got knocked out of a couple of games, where I had the better cards after the flop.  Somebody catches and bets the Turn, followed by an all-in on the River.  I have tried many bet sizes on the flop, w/little success.

Often there r say, 5 players in the pot w/me.  I had a KT in the BB and so checked.  K82 was the flop.  So I bet the pot to push people out.  One guy hung around, so I checked because I thought maybe he got trips, which is how I got knocked out of the last game.

He checked the Turn and on the River, off came a 7.  The community cards were all below K, so I thought I was good but he went all in.  I have called many bluffs but this wasn't one- he had K7 in his hand, for 2 pair.

The mention of the trips above was where I hit an A on the flop.  That time I had made 2 min raises on the Turn & River.  The villian had pocket 8's & hit trips on the Turn & went all-in on the River and I called. 

In both cases above, I hit a high pair on the flop w/a board that wasn't dangerous (rainbow, no straights).  Once I bet the pot & once I minraised, both times pushing everyone out but 1 villian.  Both times the community cards were innoucuous and there was no heavy betting by the villian until the River.

 

When one hits top pair on the flop, what is the best way of betting it?  Should I go all-in and try to take it down right there, so no one can draw out on me?

Ok…

Betting is a very complex subject, and it is predicated in great part upon the reads you have of your opponents' tendencies. With that said, there ARE some "standard" betting thoughts you should have:

Bet to DENY ODDS, but INVITE CALLS when you feel you hold the best hand.

The reason you want to do this is contained within "The Fundemental Theorem of Poker". This theorem states: "whenever you act in a manner which makes an opponent play other than how he would if ALL CARDS WERE KNOWN, you gain value".

This means that when you are ahead, you want to bet small enough to make an opponent THINK he has odds to keep chasing agaisnt you. That way he puts value into the pot "incorrectly", or in a spot he would NOT have put that money in had he known your hand for sure.

Yes, sometimes he will catch and you will lose, but in the long run the fact you have denied him proper draw odds will result in you seeing a profit on your actions.

If you OVERBET in the thought of preventing people from "chasing you", you "value own" yourself instead…

Your actions either cause opponents to act CORRECTLY, meaning they act in the way they would have had all cards been known, and FOLD; meaning you make nothing more from their "chase", OR…

You are WRONG and are not ahead at all.

In those cases, your overly large bet costs you MORE than a smaller bet would have.

(When a large over bet gets called, and you hold a hand like top pair/T kicker, chances are pretty good your hand is NOT the best btw…of coruse by the time you make that overbet, it is too late.)

Continuing…

"Standard" amounts you need to bet on the flop in NLHE to deny odds to draws IN HEADS UP SITUATIONS are:

8 or 9 out draws = roughly 1/3rd the pot.

(these are your typical open end/double gut straight draws, and flush draws.)

12 out draws = roughly 1/2 the pot

(these are your typical 8 or 9 out draws with 1 over card live)

15 out draws = roughly pot size bet

(these are your typical 8 or 9 out draw with 2 live overs)

The reason why you can bet so small and still deny odds is that in NLHE you get a chance to bet again on the turn for a significant portion of the pot.

An 8 or 9 out draw has roughly a 33% chance to spike by the river, so one might THINK a full pot bet is required to deny odds of greater than 2 to 1. But since you will be able to bet the turn as well (provided a non-threat card comes), you must only deny odds for roughly HALF his full chance to hit…since he only will get to see 1 card, not both…see?

Obviously these a STANDARD AMOUNTS. They are not necessarily appropriate in ALL situations…

Versus opponents who will call more often, You can get more value into by betitng more than this and still keeping in line with the "invite a call" thought.

In deep stack situations, especially if you've shown a "leak" in your game saying you will tend to call large bets when straights or flushes might have potentially filled, opponents may call larger bets on draws for the "implied odds" your deep stack gives them. In these cases, you are better served betitng larger amounts than those above.

Also, if you stick with those amounts I cite in MULTI-WAY pot situations, you run the risk of 1 caller feeding the pot, and making the pot more attractive for later acting opponents come along as well. The effect of this "implicit collusion" (NOT actual collusion, and not against the rules of poker) could be that your become a large net UNDERDOG to the entire field BECAUSE you bet small enough to let multiple people stick around. the sum total of all the potential outs agaisnt you makes you an under-dog…see?

So…

After this ramble, I'm sure you can sense there is a LOT MORE to betitng han simply "jamming to get 'em to fold"! Even though this is quite long, I've barely scratched the surface. Based upon the original post thought, I think you might want to look into some of the benefits accruing to play from POSITION, and some of the drawbacks of betting large when out of position. You also might want to check into "pot control" thoughts, to help you avoid un-warranted committment decisions when you are out of postion.

Overall, I hope this little ramble helps at least a little bit, and GOOD DECISONS!

(instead of good luck!)

:)