Protection - Defend your Hand
by PokerStrategy.com
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Introduction
In this Article- Protecting made hands from draws
- Protection in heads-up and multiway pots
- Protecting against implied odds
Only seldom will you hold the absolute nuts. Most of the time, you'll have a made hand, which no matter how strong, can still be beat if an opponent manages to hit one of his outs. So while at the moment you are still holding the best hand, your hand can be beat by the river.
Your goal must therefore be to protect your hand. This principle is called protection and is quite simple: you bet so large an amount, that your opponent doesn't receive the correct odds for his outs.
A further goal of a so-called protection bet is to secure those parts of the pot which do not belong to you, from an equity point of view. This means you get your opponent to fold, and therefore give up whatever equity he might have had.
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