Why Playing for Small Poker Pots is Profitable
Winning the big money is the ultimate goal of every Poker player of course, be it in cash games or the tournaments. However, what most do not realize is that winning big money often comes when playing the small pots.
If you read Poker strategy guides, both in books and on the World Wide Web, you will often come upon the advice that whenever possible you should raise and re raise pre flop to take the pot down. Now if you do that you will often end up with a smaller pot, because you did not get to see the flop. In effect you are playing for a smaller pot.
Yet that is precisely what you should do. Why? Because the longer you are in the hand, the greater the chance of your opponents catching a bigger draw. Thus, playing the AK for all its worth preflop is crucial. If you try to take the hand too far, you could just end up blowing your chances of winning the money; you could miss the flop, and if someone makes a high pair or set, your hand is as good as dead.
The desire for a lot of Poker players, especially online, to go after the big pots often leads to trouble. Instead of taking it down with a big raise after getting the AA before the flop, they slow play the hand, hoping to get other players to put more money in. While this can happen, it will also leave the door open for a lot of players to get better hands, those capable of beating an AA.
What you need to know is that all Poker strategies and tactics, be it for any variant, must focus on the accumulation of the money. Winning several small pots is very much preferable than to taking big risks trying to win the big one. Of course, if the right opportunity presents itself, you should go after a big pot.
For example, if you flop top set, and the board is uncoordinated, you should look to slow play the hand and try to squeeze as much money as you can from the other players on the Poker table.
However, for the most part, you need not force it. Let the other players blow their stacks fighting for the big pots. Winning the small pots in Poker entails less risks and in the long term, is more profitable.
