LIVEMAT
Rising Star
Bronze Level
You must have heard somewhere that you should raise to punish draws, or to deny their opponents good odds to chase them. Let's get right to the point: It is good to invest and put money on the table when you are ahead, it's good bet enough to give odds wrong for opponents chase their draws - but you probably should not raise in your opponents even if they suspect they They are on a draw.
In a nutshell: bet to punish draws, but do not give raise to punish draws.
The problem is that when you have a hand that wants to take to the showdown, as an overpair or top pair - and applies raise from your opponent that you suspect is semiblefando (but not sure) is that it has the option to re-raise with their monsters or just to call with draws. This is true for both limit as to no-limit. In fact, depending on the tendencies of your opponent, you can have up to 75% sure he's semiblefando and yet it would be wrong to raise. Let's look at an example:
A flop heads-up where you went preflop against BB. You have AA, the board shows T92 with two hearts and spades. You bet and your opponent in the BB calls. The turn is a 5 of spades. His opponent comes out betting. Even if you suspect that he is semiblefando hoping to pick up the pot against a to-high that has not improved or some similiar hand, you still should not give the raise. If we expect that his range is a big draw (open ended straight draws, flush draws) as well as can be two pair or set, then we have this prediction:
Half the time, you win 80% of the time
Half the time, you get about 10% of the time
On average, it has the advantage. That alone is enough to know that we should not raise. But what if the chances of it being semiblefando were 2/3?
2/3 of the time, you have 80% winning chances
1/3 of the time, you get about 10% of the time
In a nutshell: bet to punish draws, but do not give raise to punish draws.
The problem is that when you have a hand that wants to take to the showdown, as an overpair or top pair - and applies raise from your opponent that you suspect is semiblefando (but not sure) is that it has the option to re-raise with their monsters or just to call with draws. This is true for both limit as to no-limit. In fact, depending on the tendencies of your opponent, you can have up to 75% sure he's semiblefando and yet it would be wrong to raise. Let's look at an example:
A flop heads-up where you went preflop against BB. You have AA, the board shows T92 with two hearts and spades. You bet and your opponent in the BB calls. The turn is a 5 of spades. His opponent comes out betting. Even if you suspect that he is semiblefando hoping to pick up the pot against a to-high that has not improved or some similiar hand, you still should not give the raise. If we expect that his range is a big draw (open ended straight draws, flush draws) as well as can be two pair or set, then we have this prediction:
Half the time, you win 80% of the time
Half the time, you get about 10% of the time
On average, it has the advantage. That alone is enough to know that we should not raise. But what if the chances of it being semiblefando were 2/3?
2/3 of the time, you have 80% winning chances
1/3 of the time, you get about 10% of the time