In any form of poker, there are always many tactical options available for the knowledgeable player. One of the most effective (and the most fun) tactics is the good old-fashioned raise. However, just because raising is fun and easy doesn't mean you should just throw chips around with abandon. According to Hold 'Em for Advanced Players, by David Sklansky, there are five basic reasons to raise (he put forth seven in "The Theory of Poker" but I see the last two as subcategories of the second and I'll include them there.) Let's revisit these five reasons.

1. Raising To Get More Money in the Pot with the Best Hand

This one's easy to understand. If you have the best hand, you usually want to get more money in the pot. The larger the pot gets, the less correct it becomes to slowplay your hand and the more straightforward you should play. An often overlooked corollary of this concept, however, is that sometimes you can get more money in the pot by not raising. For example, let's say you have

For example, at a full table, you might prefer a hand like:

with a board of:

and two opponents remaining. The first player bets, and the action is to you next, before the last player can act. By the way the hand has played out, you're pretty sure the bettor has something like:

and the player behind you has top pair, something like:

If you call the bet, you know that the player behind you with top pair will call as well, but if you raise, he will definitely fold. Furthermore, we'll assume you know that if you raise, the original bettor will fold as well. In this case, just calling would actually make you more money than raising would.

2. Raising to Drive Players Out

There are a few reasons you might want to drive opponents out. Let's explore each of them in turn.

Driving players out when you have the best hand. When you raise to knock out other players, what you are actually doing is cutting their odds. Sometimes an opponent can call a single bet correctly, but would be incorrect to call two. In such a situation, you root for him to call the raise (since that would be a mistake), but you ensure he can't profitably draw out on your hand for one bet. For instance, assume you have:

On a board of:

Let's say the pot is 4.5 (big) bets, and there are three players still in. The first player bets out (making the pot 5.5 bets), and you are second to act. If you call, the player behind you will be asked to call one bet to win 6.5 bets. This would still give him odds (6.5 - 1) to call with several draws, such as:

However, if you raise, the player behind you will be required to call two bets in order to win 7.5 bets, cutting his odds almost in half (3.75 - 1) and making it incorrect for him to call with such a hand. (To keep this exercise simple, we are ignoring implied odds.)

Driving Players out with a Second Best Hand. Depending on the size of the pot and your opponents, it can sometimes be correct to raise when you have the second best hand, if you think it will drive out the third, fourth or fifth best hands. For instance, in a four player situation, if there's a bettor who has a 50% chance of winning while you have only a 30% of winning, you would increase your winning chances (to 40%) by knocking out the two other players who comprise the remaining 20% chance of winning.

This situation might arise when you have one big pair against a player with two smaller pairs, and two other players with straight draws. Even though you're beat now, if the pot is large enough to continue, you should raise so that if you hit your two pair, it will be safe from the potential straight redraws.

Isolating the Draw. Similar to the previous example, if you have a hand that is not the winner at the moment, the timely betting of a draw to your right often offers an opportunity to buy the pot for yourself. For instance, imagine you had:

in the big blind. The third player to act raised before the flop, and both you and the small blind called. The flop came:

and you're now facing a bet from the small blind, who - based on the way he plays his made hands in such situations - is most certainly betting with a flush draw, something like:

Although the original, pre-flop raiser may have an ace behind you, there are several bigger pairs he could have that you would like to see him fold. For instance, if you put him on a range of 99-KK or AK/AQ, he is more likely to have a pair than a big ace - this would be a good opportunity to use the draw bettor as a springboard and force the pre-flop raiser to call two bets. Even a hand like:

would be hard pressed to call two bets with the ace on board, and if he folds, you'll have bought yourself a larger share of the pot. You will be the favorite against the lone flush draw, and in fact have turned his bet into a bad play by denying him the implied odds he had expected.

3. Raising to Bluff (or semi-bluff)

Raising as a pure bluff can be a risky and often ill-advised move. This usually occurs when all the cards have come, and the raiser is trying to convince his opponent that he has hit a hand when in truth he has come up short. It is often more prudent to raise as a semi-bluff, which is a bluff at heart, but one that has an added chance to win when considering possible cards to come.

A good time to raise as a complete bluff would be against a timid or good opponent (capable of making good laydowns), when the river has completed a draw other than the one you were drawing for - but it looks like it could have completed your hand based on your play thus far. For instance, if you have been calling bets with an open-ended straight draw, but then a third of a suit falls on the river - completing a possible flush but not completing your hand - you might still be able to take the pot with a proper raise, since it will essentially look like you were on the flush draw the whole time, anyway.

4. Raising to Get a Free Card

This essentially involves showing strength on an early betting round in order to induce checking on the later betting rounds. It's important to note that there is no such thing as raising to get a free card; the term "free card" is just jargon - you are actually raising to get a cheaper card. In order for this play to be effective on its own then, the raise must be of a smaller size than the next betting round would have been. This is usually the case between the flop bet and the turn bet; for instance, in a $5 -$10 limit game, you might raise an extra $5 on the flop to stop someone else from betting $10 on the turn. But since the raise cost an extra $5 on the flop, you've really only saved half of the $10 turn bet.

Because of people's inclination to check to the raiser, position is a key consideration when looking for free cards. While it is possible to use the check-raise for a free card, it is quite difficult and won't often work since you'll have to show weakness by checking first on the following betting round, Out of position one can only offer their opponent a free card (by checking); the choice of taking it always falls to the person in last position.

5. Raising to Gain Information

This is generally not something one should do very often as a play. While you can use a raise to further define your opponents' hands, it can be a costly sonar to use when it has no other benefits attached. Information should usually be viewed as a bonus deal when raising for another, more solid reason.

For an information raise to work, the circumstances would be similar to that of a free card play - one would use an earlier, cheaper betting round to save money on later, more expensive rounds.

For instance, let's say you're playing an opponent that you know very well. He bets into you on a particular flop, and based on how he plays, you know he has either a small set or a small flush draw. Furthermore, you know that if you raise him, he will just call with a flush draw but he will reraise with a set. If you have a hand like one or two pair, then a raise on the flop could save you some money if you're opponent comes over the top - you just fold to his set. Obviously, you have to be very confident of your reads to be able to use this play..

Deciding How Much to Raise in No-Limit

Unfortunately, there is no magic formula for deciding how much to raise. There are just too many variables that need to factor into such a decision that it would be impossible to discuss them all here.

Style-wise, some players prefer the large, risky moves that work a high-percentage of the time and yet cost dearly when they fail. Others (like myself) prefer finesse to brute force; we pester our opponents with low-risk, constant bets that help to confuse them into spewing lots of chips at the perfect moments.

Dan Harrington pointed out once that in theory, betting half the pot when you're bluffing and the whole pot when you're not would be a successful strategy, if no one was paying attention. However, people do pay attention, and furthermore, every opponent views different bets in different ways. Some players will view an extremely large bet as an obvious bluff; others will recognize the same bet as a tricky move designed for a call. Because of this, no set amount is right for every situation.

For a more thorough discussion on sizing your bets and raises in no-limit, refer to the "Bet Sizing" article.

Sam @ Power Poker Course.




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