In no-limit and pot-limit Texas Hold’em getting the best value on your hands is the name of the game. When you have what you think is the lead in hand, it’s important to bet the proper amount for the situation. The situation can take many forms, more than I could go into in a short article. There is some basic strategy that you can follow to make proper value bets when you have a caller on the line, and you need to bet as much as possible without losing the fish you’ve hooked.
Making the right value bet means that you need to have an idea of what your opponent is holding. The bigger the hand you think they have, the bigger the bet they will call. Depending on how the board cards are laid out, you should be able to put them on a range of possible hands. Once you decide what they likely have, you bet an amount that would warrant a call from that type of hand.
If the situation looks like your opponent could be on a draw that would beat your hand, you have to make your value bets bigger than an amount that would still give them favorable pot odds. If the board has two cards of the same suit or two big running cards, you should bet close to the size of the pot. This size bets makes a call from a drawing hand a mistake by your opponent if they make it. It doesn’t mean that they won’t hit their draw and beat you, it just means that you forced them to call too much for the odds that their draw had.
If you have a nut hand and think that your opponent is holding a big hand, the biggest bet you can make would be the right play. If a player looked like they were on a flush draw and the third suited card comes, but at the same time makes you a full house, you can get a lot of value on the situation with a larger than normal bet.