The term “3 bet” in poker refers to any time a player re-raises another player’s preflop raise. This re-raising can happen on any street in the hand and is often done with a strong value hand, such as a pair of aces or suited connectors. The aim of the 3 bet is to make it more expensive for your opponent to call your raise with weak hands, and to prevent them from bluffing with their own strong ones.
The 3 bet strategy can be used in a variety of ways depending on the opponent and the table conditions. For example, a fish will likely call a lot of 3-bets out of position so it makes sense to play value hands against them. In contrast, a skilled player will be more inclined to 3 bet bluffing and you should try to exploit this by limiting the size of your bluffs to strong ones that have a chance of winning on the flop.
You should also consider playing polarized 3 bets when facing good opponents. This involves raising a range of hands that your opponent might not expect you to raise with, such as suited connectors and lower suited aces. This will cause them to think twice about calling your 3-bet and can be very effective in removing their range of possible hands they could call with on the flop, turn and river.
When deciding on a bet size for a 3 bet it’s important to look at your opponent’s preflop raise range using a hand range program such as Equilab. This will give you an idea of what range of hands you should re-raise with.
It’s also important to consider the position of the original preflop raiser when making a decision about whether or not to 3 bet. If you 3-bet against a weak player from a late position, you can force players to fold who would have called your open-raise without one. This is much more beneficial than simply calling the open-raise from the same position.
A good 3-bet size is usually around four times the original preflop raise, especially when playing out of position. This will negate the positional disadvantage of your opponent and allow you to extract value from a wide range of strong hands.
The best way to increase your profits when playing 3-bets is by building up pots on the flop, turn and river. This is easier to do when you are in position and can prevent players from slow-playing their monsters with bad odds to call.
