Sometimes, poker is a game of opportunity. Most of the time, in order to be a consistent winner at the game, you must outplay your opposition. On some rare occasions however, good fortune just comes to you. It doesn’t happen very often, but when it does, it is very important to maximize your financial expectation for it. For this reason alone, I think it is very important to never be short stacked at the table. After all, isn’t doubling up when you have $400 in front of you, better than doubling up with $75 in chips? Of course it is.

Keeping this in mind, let’s go to our hand of the week. In a recent $1-$2 no limit game, I was starting to dwindle down in chips. I wasn’t playing particularly badly but I wasn’t making money either, so slowly but surely, I was getting blinded down. I had about $80 left in front of me and got to do some thinking. If I were to have a big hand, one which could double or in a best case scenario, triple me up, I wouldn’t really stand to make too much money from it. Plus, with such a small stack, any significant action would likely put me all in, so I decided to re-buy for the maximum of $300.

So, now I sat there, fully armed and ready to do battle when the following hand happened. I was on the button when I looked down to see 4d-4c, a nice little starting hand. An early position player made a $10 preflop raise and got 4 callers including myself. I thought it was a curiously small raise on his part and given his early position, I put him on a big pair and not wanting to scare off the competition.

The Flop came as 5h, 4h, 8c. Nice flop for me as I hit bottom set. This is one of my favorite types of flops because no one will put me on a low set. The initial raiser bets $40, and a middle position player and I call. There is now $160 in the pot.

The turn is the Js which doesn’t figure to help any player. The raiser bets $80 and the middle position players folds and its up to me. With only myself and one other player involved, I don’t want to scare him away by raising here. I want him completely pot committed. I know I have the best hand and I know I’m simply going to call but I don’t do it right away. I pretend to count my chips and I pretend to look at the pot. I sigh. Why the theatrics? Well, I want my opponent to think that I am considering drawing to my flush and that I’m doing pot odds calculations. I just had to sell it. So after a minute, I call.

The River falls and guess what it is? Yes, it’s the 4s giving me quad 4’s. I can barely contain myself but I don’t even flinch. The raiser immediately goes all in for $200 and my call would put over $500 in the pot. I just look at him and say sheepishly, “I think I have to call you here,” and turn over my quads as the table erupts. No one expected it, especially not my now broke opponent.

Give yourself every opportunity to maximize your wins and start making the most of your monsters.

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