Playing
Drawing Hands Aggressively
One of the great things about having a
drawing hand is that there are many different
ways that you can
play the hand.
You often
see people check-call so that they can play to
their draw while minimizing the
amount of chips
that they
risk. This
can
certainly
be
a profitable way to
play the hand.
However,
if you
increase your level of aggression you can often
build the pot as well as your stack much more
than you would have by just calling.
When you're playing
draws aggressively are going to find yourself
putting up bets, or making re-raises of your
opponents when you're in later position in the
hand. A lot of players want to make their hands
with as little cost to them as possible. Playing
aggressively when on a draw is going to build
much bigger pots at showdown, and also to find
yourself picking up a lot of small pots without
ever having to showdown your cards. If you want
to play this way, you're going to
need
to have a great read on your opponents at the
table, as well as a lot of experience playing in
these drawing type of situations. When you first
start playing your drawing hands aggressively,
only do so when you're drawing to the best hand,
or the nuts. You don't want to put yourself in a
situation where you're playing a hand in an
aggressive manner, only to find out that you're
playing against the bigger draw. This will only
lead to frustration and disappointment in
yourself, can be avoided by paying careful
attention at the table.
When you're in a poker
hand you are going to win one of two ways. Your
either going to win by having the best hand at
showdown, or by making your
opponent fold
his
hand before the hand is all played out. When you
play in this aggressive style you will often
find that you don't have to go to showdown to
win it, especially playing against passive
opponents who are not calling you with anything
less than top pair with a strong kicker. You can
also work a semi-bluff play by leading out when
you are on a draw, this is a situation though,
where you really want to have a good read on
your opponent.
Another great advantage to
playing your draws aggressively is that you're
going to be able to disguise your hand, because
this play shows that you're strong as opposed to
if you are just check-calling. Leading out with
a bet should communicate to your opponent that
you have a made hand, and your opponents will
often have a hard time being able to put you on
a draw. The big advantage to playing like this
is when you do hit your flush, or where you make
your straight on the turn, and they continue to
play the hand by betting or calling, when all
they're really doing is paying you off.
You will often hear
players say they like to play in big pot's. That
is something that playing your draws
aggressively will do for you, as you are going
to be forcing your opponent to commit more money
to the pot. Playing aggressively makes it so
that if you do get raised by your opponent,
chances are you're going to be getting good odds
to call. The more you can build the pot the
better your odds are going to be when
your opponent
raises you and you want to call, and many times
your opponent will be doing the raising with hands
like
top pair-top kicker, which your hand has the
ability to dominate.
If I am in a pre-flop
situation holding a hand like Ace-six suited,
and
I am
heads up with my opponent holding a hand like
Queen-nine off-suit, and the flop falls
Qs-Js-8s, which gives me a draw to the nut flush
and also gives my opponent top pair with a fair
kicker. I am first
to
act, and lead out
with a bet
of
$30 into a pot of $60, and I get raised to the
minimum of $60. Here my opponent is trying to
protect his top pair, however has made a poor
effort to do so by raising so small. The pot
is
at $150, and it's only going to cost me $30 to
stay in the hand, so in this situation my pot
odds are 5 to 1. The odds that I could make my
hand at just about 4 to 1 making this an easy
decision and easy call to make. When the state
hits the turn, and I make my flush, I get to
drag in a much larger pot all because I played
my draw aggressively.
So in this situation, I could
not use the semi-bluff to get my opponent off of
his hand, but I had a great price to call and
keep playing and was able to hit my hand. So
here if I play it passive, and just check on the
flop and my opponent bets into me with that same
$30 bet, I am only getting 3 to 1, and making
the call is not nearly as easy of a decision. It
is easy to manipulate the pot odds to be in your
favor when you play aggressive, and your
opponent decides it is a good time to raise you.
The
way
to make money
playing
poker is by forcing your opponents to make
mistakes, and the bigger they make the pot, the
bigger the mistake your opponents
are
going to make. Play
aggressive and force your opponent's into making
bad choices.
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