How to Get Full Value After Flopping a Set
This week’s hand is one I played during last summer’s World Series of Poker and comes from Event #25: $5,000 No-Limit Hold’em Eight Handed, a tournament in which I made the final table. In fact, the next few hands I will be sharing and analyzing all come from that event.
The hand comes from relatively early in the tournament and involves me calling a raise from position with a small pocket pair and managing to flop a set.
Whenever you flop a set, your primary concern should usually be to maximize value. However, that does not mean you should blindly make large bets, hoping your opponent will mindlessly pay you off.
Always think about your opponent’s range and adjust your bet size so that she can realistically call your bets. You also want to set up the stack sizes so that you can invest a significant amount on the river.
Take a look and see how the postflop betting went in this hand:
Would you have played this hand in the same way? Let me know in a comment below.
Jonathan Little is a professional poker player and author with over $6,200,000 in live tournament earnings. He writes a weekly educational blog and hosts a podcast at JonathanLittlePoker.com. You can follow him on Twitter @JonathanLittle.
Want to stay atop all the latest in the poker world? If so, make sure to get PokerNews updates on your social media outlets. Follow us on Twitter and find us on both Facebook and Google+!
