It’s a transfer designed to cease the pot getting too massive to your hand, however are you lacking out on worth by pot controlling?
Pot management is when the (normally in place) participant takes a passive line (checking or simply calling) with a great (however not nice) hand to handle the scale of the pot.
There is an previous maxim in poker which nonetheless holds true right this moment – ‘massive hand, massive pot, small hand, small pot’. If you will have a middling hand, the worst factor you are able to do is bloat the pot then face a troublesome choice by the river.
As such, gamers will typically pot management one-pair-kind arms by checking again when checked to, so in the event that they face bets or make bets on the flip, they are going to be smaller. It’s a lot simpler to name a pot sized river guess with a pair of nines whenever you missed a avenue or two of betting beforehand.
Fear of working into a giant hand
Many gamers pot management just because they concern their opponent might need them beat or verify/increase them off a hand as a bluff. This is actually a mistake as not solely do you miss out on worth with good arms you additionally permit your opponents free playing cards to outdraw you (due to this fact pot controlling on dynamic boards is a nasty thought).
You should not concern being reraised as a result of, whereas it might be a bluff, more often than not it means you had been most likely behind anyway.
If you will pot management then you must sometimes play your very massive arms the identical method. You have to typically have units in your pot management vary, in any other case your opponents will spot that you’re attempting to get to showdown cheaply and stress you with multi avenue bets.
Pot controlling is usually a helpful technique, particularly in tournaments the place survival is essential. However, lots of beginner gamers use pot management extra to masks threat aversion of their recreation. If you use pot controlling as a method, be certain to ask your self if you’re lacking out on worth and asking whether or not you as a substitute must be attempting to get one other guess in.
Related Resources
Intro to SPR
Tackleberry with the lowdown on Stack to Pot Ratio
MTT betting
LuckyLukePS with a information to betting in poker tournaments