Value Betting a Key Skill

One of the most important skills to learn, especially in today’s game, is how to properly bet for value. Betting for value means exactly what it sound like, getting the most out of your hands. This means that value betting applies purely to made hands, as there is no value in betting a weak hand if a player calls. Value betting involves two basic concepts, stack size in relation to pot size and the size of bets in relation to hand strength. These two concepts may seem foreign at first, but you will see that they are easy to understand and apply with just a little bit of practice.

Lets take two examples and see which would be the easier situation to get your opponent all in.

Example One

Your opponent has $20 left and the pot is $100

Example two

Your opponent has $100 left and the pot is $20

The first example presents an infinitely easier situation for us to get the other player all in. They have little left relative to what is already in the pot. The second example, however, is the exact opposite scenario. It is much tougher to convince a player to put all of his money in the pot when there is so little to be won. The money in the first pot indicates that the player likely has a strong hand and that he is unlikely to give up. The money in the second pot tells us that we do not know if the player has a strong hand or if he is at all willing to put much more into the pot. In hand one we have little work to do, in hand two we have a lot of work to do. I will play this hand out after we discuss the second major concept involved in value betting.

You are probably thinking something along the lines of “The stronger my hand the more I bet.” You need to be thinking the exact opposite. You should be considering your opponents hand strength when making value bets. This is not to say that you should pay no attention to your own cards, not at all, but value betting assumes that you have a strong hand. Value betting with weak hands is virtually impossible. You can do it, but if you are getting called with a weak hand the odds are that you are beat. So, if you can put your opponent on a strong range of hands you can make larger value bets, where if you put him on a weaker range you can make smaller bets. It really is that simple. Adjust to what you think your opponent has.

You are dealt Ac Kc UTG and raise to $4 at .50/1.

One player in LP calls.

The flop is As 7c Ks, the pot is $9.50.

You check raise his flop bet of $7 to $18. He calls.

The pot is now $45.50 as the turn is dealt, 6d.

He called your flop check raise so you can put him on either spades, a strong ace or two pair.

A solid value bet would be $31. It is enough that he will call this street and it leaves him with a pot sized bet on the river. You are setting up the last value bet.

By check raising to $18 you can assess his range, and by betting $31 into $45.50 you leave him with just $50 left on the river (assuming he had a 100 BB stack at the start of the hand). He will feel committed to call. This is how you properly get three streets of value from the villain, keep them in the hand until all their money is gone. Value bets take bits of a stack at a time, bits that eventually make up the entire stack.