Pot control is the art of maintaining the size of the pot close to the relative size of your hand. There are various ways to achieve this. Part of pokers skill is pot control and making a check in the right place instead of betting and spotting these critical moments of the hand where you think ahead and make the right decision. Professionals utilise pot control extremely well, so if we want to get up to that level of skill then we better take a look at just how to control pots. If you want to win playing Hold’em online this will be time well spent!

Pot control is achieved by taking into account some significant factors in the hand and then implementing the right moves to achieve your desired goal. Let us look at each in turn.

Considerations

Stack Size – If you are very deep in terms of your stack in a cash game then pot control is of paramount importance as a big pot could mean a lot of chips. You only want to build a pot with a very strong hand. Remember the key concept, small hand small pot, large hand large pot.

Opponent Range – Knowing how your opponent plays their hands and their betting patterns helps you work out their potential range. This pulls you as close as possible to the fundamental part of winning poker which is….fold when you are beat. In a specific situation you can assess what hands your opponent may have and whether your hand ranks well against them. If it does not, get out of the hand quickly!

Opponent Style – Getting into a hand that you would prefer to keep the pot small knowing he is aggressive and bets every street is unwise because you know what will happen. Other players are more passive and you can engage with them knowing showdown is possible. Against this opponent you could play a wider range of hands and expect to reach the river for fewer chips than playing an aggressive opponent.

Implementation

Pot control must be implemented, which means the decision to bet, call, check, raise or fold must be correct no matter how well you consider the above factors whilst deciding what to do.

Increasing the pot size when you believe your opponent is on a draw is a good idea. This aggressive “anti-draw” strategy can be seen in many high stakes cash games on the videos you can view online.

I have received responses to these types of article in the past saying that playing aggressive opponents does not give you the opportunity to execute pot control. This is untrue. Aggressive players will rarely show up on the river with less than top pair. Ultra aggressive players are rare. To an intermediate player it can look like a tight aggressive player just bets all of the time but they usually have something and will fold many hands. You can play small hands against this type of player. Remember to have a hand when you play these players!

All of the techniques used in pot control must coincide with you understanding your own hands value and strength relative to the action. If you simply make plays to make your opponent fold you will not succeed because your opponents will force to you go to showdown. This keeps you honest as a poker player! Think about the pot size in relation to your own hand strength as this is a good way to step away from the hand and realise you are in too deep when the action says fold. Sometimes you just have to give up a hand and not think of creative ways to win.

By Malcolm Clarke

Related posts:

1. Why Poker Reads are the Real Tells Sit still because everyone is watching. Say nothing, do not...
2. Starting Hands in 7 Card Stud With two hole cards facing down and one face up...
3. Are Poker Rooms Doing Enough To Stop Bots? Poker Bots are a constant problem for poker rooms who...
4. Instincts Shouldn’t Be Ignored in Poker Sure, poker is primarily a game of skill, odds, math,...
5. Poker Fundamentals – Slow Playing Many have never heard of slow playing.  It is a...

Related posts brought to you by Yet Another Related Posts Plugin.