POKER INFO

Overbetting the pot can be a great tool when it works for you, but it can be self-annihilating when done at the wrong times. After watching a friend lose his stack (to my nemesis) with an overbet, I started wondering if he thought he learned that from me. There are times when I may move my stack into the middle, even though it may be larger than the pot, but that wouldn’t have been one.

I overbet in that game earlier, when I flopped bottom two pair. I really thought my opponent had Aces or Kings and would stack off. I didn’t want to wonder, or walk into a set, if a face card hit the turn. He already had bet big on the flop, so a pot-sized raise here would have been half my stack. He knows that if he calls that he is committed (and so would I) for the other half anyway, so the overbet might be more enticing if it looks like a bluff. He folded.

I overbet the pot when opening in a Vegas $1/$2. Everyone does it. If you open with a pot-sized $7, you will get called by everyone. I try not to go too high, but you have to overbet here. I overbet a pot recently on the river when there was no action up to then. There was a strait and a flush on board by the turn, which gave me a set, and the river paired the board. So I check raised, more than the pot; it looked like a bluff because everyone had shown no strength and I got called by the King high flush. “Do you have the Ace?” he asked. I showed him my boat.

I might overbet the turn if I was looking to checkraise the flop but never got the bet I was looking for. With a big hand I still want to play a big pot on the river and get some value. I might overbet all in when my bets don’t work to give me the bet I want now and the bet I want on the turn. Bet sizing is so important.

I might even overbet the pot with Aces or Kings on the right flop if a pot sized bet is greater than half my stack. With that stack, I might go all in with the Ace of clubs on a flop of three clubs… you’re halfway there and a lot closer if everyone folds.

It is not the time to overbet push all in, however, on a flushed flop with a one pair hand (except the Aces with that suit). You only get called if you walk into the nuts, and the same information that is available for $50 that can be purchased for $200.

I try always to remember that my goal is to be called the maximum by a worse hand; I never want to bet so much that I can only be called by a better hand.

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