“Tight and aggressive,” “Don’t be a calling station,” “it’s either raise or fold,” “protect your hand,” etc. I could go on for awhile, there are quite a few of these catch-phrases or poker-wisdom-tidbits, and a lot of them suggest that raising is better than calling. In a game as complex as poker, there aren’t any “nevers” and “always’s” but generally, raising seems to be popular among experts. For good reasons, one can presume.

The beginner will think of raising as something you do in mostly two situations: When you (think you) have the best hand, and when you’re bluffing. The more experienced players will recognize that there are many different reasons for raising and have a much more nuanced picture of the action than just “best hand” and “bluff.” Right?

Interestingly enough, the beginner has the right idea. “Best hand” and “bluffing” are actually the two main reasons to raise, but where the novice will see a situation as either/or, the expert will look at a situation as a probability of the two combined. The first example that comes to mind is that of an unimproved AK in a heads-up pot on the turn. You raised preflop, got one caller. You bet on the flop, and he called again. Should you fire again on the turn?

Let’s for a second ignore what the board shows or any read you may have picked up on your opponent (both important in shaping the decision whether to bet again or not, of course) and just focus on the essential: There is a chance that your hand is still the best. There is a chance that if you bet, he will fold a better hand (e.g. bottom pair). These chances may be big or small, but they’re there. Betting again on the turn, in this example, is the correct action when you believe the combined chances of these two events outweigh the mistake you’d be making in raising with the worst hand and being called.

There are a lot of good things that can happen when you raise. To name the primary ones:

1. You may make a better hand fold (wohoo!)
2. You may make a worse hand call (wohoo!)
3. You may “buy the button,” meaning that not everyone folds, but you get last position.
4. You may, if you buy the button or are already in last position, choose to take a free card on the next round.
5. You may “buy yourself outs,” or making someone fold that, while he’s not a favorite over you, makes your winning chances in the pot in total bigger.
6. Your raise may help define your opponent’s hand better and that can improve your decision-making further down the line in the hand.

There will be many times where, in a multiway pot, you suspect that your hand is unlikely to be best, but raising will still be the best option. This will be because of a combination of good things that can come from it. #1 and #2 are the two most powerful reasons to raise (as even the beginner knows), but their likelyhood can be of varying degrees. In combination with other reasons, however, you may discover that raising is exactly the right move to make.

I also want to go off a bit on a tangent here. What constitutes “the best hand” isn’t necessarily obvious, especially not to a beginner. The most common example for when somewhat counter-intuitive raising with the “best” hand is correct, is on the flop with an ace-high flush draw and many people are in. Your hand (ace high) is very unlikely to be the “best” hand, if for some reason the dealer went on strike and you all had to show the absolute value of your hand as it stands on the flop. But of course, Hold ‘em is a game of seven cards, not five, so the “best” hand can only correctly be defined as the hand that has the largest chance of winning once all the cards are out. Other definitions (”I had a pocket kings!”) are narrow-minded. Having nine outs to the nuts, and two cards on their way onto the felt, gives you a fairly solid chance of winning the pot. If you have many other people competing for it as well, you can raise for value. “For value” is the more correct way of phrasing “raising with the best hand.”

I find that most online players these days understand the idea of raising with a flopped flush draw for value. Other, not quite so obvious, situations exist as well of course. Like if you flop an inside straight draw, two overcards and a backdoor flush draw. With many other people in the pot with you, your hand may actually be good enough to raise with. And we haven’t even taken into account any of the other nice perks that raising might give you, mentioned in the list above.

And that’s the real lesson I’m trying to convey here: Raising is right in many borderline situations, because of the accumulative chances of good things that can happen. People who see it as an either/or situation will miss a lot of the juicy stuff in the middle. Especially if they have a read and decide to stick to it. “He’s on a flushdraw, I raise” or “My QJ missed the flop, maybe I can bluff and make him fold K-high.” Smart poker means weighing these two probabilities and figuring out if the combination is a winning move.

If there’s one thing poker teaches us, it’s that everything is possible - some things are just very unlikely. Figuring out which side of the percentage barrier you’re on is the tricky part.