i am a very agressive player, pre flop and the turn, however very few times do i raise pre flop and go all in even less before the river. my question is where do you win the most chips play the sleeper game and bust their chops on the river or shove large bets early and take the smaller pots
A win is a win is a win no matter the size of the pot. Every chip gained no matter how, is one less chip for your opponents to bet against you.
You win the biggest pots when someone makes a monster hand, and you make an even better hand, and you get them all in. Some opponents are more reckless than others. For example some people will call an all-in with the thinnest of draws. You want to get heads up with those opponents.
Some examples:
A couple of days ago I was playing a ring game and I flopped a flush in hearts with a draw to the straight flush. One of the opponents was someone who I know to be a loose caller, so I shoved on the flop and he called with a set of nines. The turn and the river were both Aces, so he won with the boat and I lost 15 million chips!
(However, if you think about it, even if I had not shoved my full stack on the flop, I was still going to lose a lot of chips on this hand, though perhaps I would have folded on the river when the board paired.)
The next night against the same opponent I shoved on the flop with a straight, and he called with another set and he lost.
It is almost never profitable in the long term to call overbets with draws, no matter how good the draw.
The biggest pot I ever lost was 70 million chips. Opponent went all in on the turn with a straight. I called. I had:
2 pairs
A gutshot straight flush draw
A draw to the full House
An open-ended straight draw (that might have split the pot)
A flush draw
However I still missed! I fully knew the risks, but I never like to turn down the chance to make a straight flush.
Even if you have a flush and straight draw with two overcards, which hardly ever happens, the odds are only slightly in your favor.
So you will win your biggest pots when you find opponents who will overpay for draws. Another very profitable type of opponent is the opponent who will shove their whole stack with AA or KK on the flop or turn when you have two pairs or better. Another kind of opponent to look for is somebody who will call off their whole stack when they hit a flush on the river even though the board is paired.
So my tip for winning the biggest big pots in ring games is to look for opponents who have vulnerabilities in their games and try to get heads up with them when you have a very powerful hand.
Another way to win large pots is to look for betting size patterns in opponents who bluff a lot. For example you may notice that when they have top pair they bet a pot size bet, and that when they have a draw, they bet a half pot size bet. Making large check raises against them on the flop can pay off big time, especially if they call and miss their draw and try to bluff on the river.
Additional note: hands where you flop a straight can sometimes pay off big time. The problem with flopping a straight is that it is very difficult to improve your hand on later streets, so you are very vulnerable to boats and flushes. This means that you usually need to take the pot down at the flop. In many cases you might as well shove your whole stack as a deterrent to callers. If they call anyway, the odds will still be in your favor, but whichever way you look at it, if you flop a straight you are either going to win a lot of chips, or lose a lot of chips, so I think it makes sense to go for the big win.
You do what you think is best to build your bankroll. I’d rather collect chips little by little in a consistent manner.
This is so true. No matter how much I tell myself that betting further will only cost me chips. I have to see if I can get that illusive straight flush. To date, I never have benefited by doing this. But it feels so good at the time. Well, until I lose a lot of chips…hehe