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RAISING TO DRIVE OUT OPPONENTS
When you raise to get people out, what you are really doing is raising to cut down their poker odds. In fact, you may sometimes cut their odds so severely that you hope they will call rather than fold after you raise.
By cutting down a person’s odds, we mean reducing the amount of money he may win per dollar invested. For example, if there is a $100 pot, someone bets $10, and you call the $10, the player behind you gets 12-to-1 odds on a call.
That is, that player hopes to win $120 from his $10 call, or $12 per $1 invested. But suppose you raise the initial bettor, making it $20 for the player behind you to call.
Now there’s $130 in the pot instead of $120, but the player behind you must invest twice as much - $20 – for a chance to win it.
You have thus cut his odds almost in half from $120-to-$10 to $130-to-$20, or from 12-to-1 to 6½-to-1.
In so doing, you have created a situation where the player may make a mistake, according to the Fundamental Theorem of Poker, by either calling or folding.
Even when he folds correctly after you raise because he is getting insufficient pot odds to call a double bet, you certainly prefer that to his calling an unraised bet correctly and proceeding to out draw you and win the pot.
RAISING AS A MEANS OF CUTTING DOWN OPPONENTS’ ODDS
To illustrate this important point, we’ll examine a hand from five card draw poker. You have a pat flush; the player to your right has nothing at all, and the player toe your left has two pair.
For the purposes of this illustration, we’ll assume you know exactly what both opponent have. We’ll also assume the betting limit is a flat $10 but that somehow a $100 the pot has been created before betting gets under way.
With the cards out, we’ll say the chances of the two pair improving to a full house are 9-to-1 against. In other words, the player behind you will improve to the best poker hand one out of ten times on average.
With absolutely nothing, the player to your right best $10 in an attempt to seal that big pot. You know this player will fold instantly if you raise, and you are fairly sure the player behind you will fold too.
However, if you just call the $10, the player behind you will also call. Consequently, you may win $120 plus perhaps another bet at the end if you call, whereas if you raise you’ll most likely have to make do with the $110 already in the pot. Should you call or raise?
The answer, of course, is you should raise, but it’s look at the problem logically. The opponent with two pair is a 9-to-1 underdog.
If you call, there is $120 in the pot. He would be getting 12-to-1 from the pot for his call when the odds against his making the best hand are only 9-to-1.
Therefore, if you call and he calls behind you, he is making the correct play, the play with positive expectation.
He will lose $10 in nine hands out of ten on average, for a total loss of $90, but he will win $120 in one hand out of ten for a net profit of $30.
He gains on the play, and according to the Fundamental Theorem of Poker, any time your opponent gains, you are costing yourself money.
On the other hand, when you raise, making it $20 for the two pair to call, you are cutting that player’s pot odds from $120-to-$10, or 12-t0-1, $130-to-$20, or 6½-to-1.
Since the two pair is a 9-to-1 underdog and is now getting only 6½- to-1 from the pot, you have made it correct for the two pair to fold.
If he plays correctly and does fold, you do better, as we shall see presently, than if you had played incorrectly and allowed him sufficient odds for a call.