Call or raise? (general thoughts)

[Aisthesis]

This last month I've been playing draws much more aggressively, with good initial results at the $100 and $200 tables, then a bit of a downswing.

Anyhow, the basic idea has been to do very little flat calling but a lot of raising and betting out with draws, and I'd have to say at this point the results are pretty mixed (I'm struggling now for a break-even month at the $200).

I hope you guys will bear with me here, as my ideas on calling vs. raising are still a bit vague. Anyhow, I also see some calling advantages (had a few nice plays last night with this), which can even include a check-call sometimes. So, anyhow, here's what I consider the beginning of an idea anyway:

The advantage to betting out a draw is that you can often take down the hand mainly if the board pairs on the turn. I'm quite sure that this move (betting a good draw, then half-potting a paired turn) has been profitable for me. But it clearly presupposes that you very rarely trap when you really do make your full. Anyhow, betting out seems to me often to give you more options for taking down the hand.

Also, raising strong draws (I still like 13-outers or better as an almost auto-raise) puts at least good players in a bit of a quandary with middle set and certainly with top 2: They're often drawing near dead if that's all they have because you make this same raise also on top set.

Where flat calls or check-calls seem to work pretty well is against good players on very drawy boards. Here's roughly one I had last night (doing it from memory, so not entirely accurate): I have JJ76 in EP with 2 diamonds. Flop comes Q54 with two diamonds. Well, a couple of weeks ago, I would definitely have bet-pushed this board. But I decided to play it with a check-call this time if someone bet, as LP did (good player but was buying some pots in LP for sure, so I'm not assuming QQ here).

The thing about this board is that there are a lot more scare cards in the deck than just the ones that make my hand. And in fact, the turn came an offsuit 7, and I bet and took it down.

Anyhow, I think there were a lot of advantages here to check-calling rather than betting. First, there's control of pot-size where my primary draw is really to a non-nut flush. If it hits, I can bet it, but if I get raised, I can get away without losing my stack. Second, I don't have much of a made hand at all, since I can't even beat a Q or any overpair without improvement. Third, (and this is clearly the main argument) I gain a lot of pseudo-outs, particularly against a straightforward player (as this guy was). In addition to my diamonds (which may or may not be good) and the 3 and 8, I pick up the 2, 6 and 7.

I'm not sure whether or not playing it the same way would have been desirable if I had had, for example, AA76 with diamonds--giving me 8 outs to the nut flush plus my 6 to the straight plus 2 to top set for a total of 16. I'd at least be very tempted to bet-push on that hand.

But on very draw-heavy boards, I think calling often does have a lot of value, since you can rep a lot of cards that you don't have. The main thing you lose with this play is not being able to rep the full when you don't have it.

I'd be most interested in hearing what others think about when it's better to call (or check-call) and when it's better to raise (or bet-push--I'll exclude check-raises for the moment).