Set mining is all about playing pocket pairs while knowingly dominated. Doesn’t make sense? Don’t worry; it makes more sense than it sounds.
To set mine well, those over at www.888.com note how you will need a deep stack (200 BB if possible) as you will be dealing with high implied odds. Therefore most of the time, set mining is not a good idea, as most of online poker tournaments don’t give you enough starting chips, and most people play cash poker with less than 200BB.
As set mining is completely dependent on the flop, put as little money in the pot as you can pre-flop. You will hit your set about 1 in 7 times on the flop. This means that you need the corresponding odds from the pot (7/1) to make the correct call and continue your hand onto the flop.
But to have any implied odds at all you must be as sure as you can be that your opponent will pay you off if you hit. These implied odds can obviously not be calculated precisely, but you can take a variety of things into account – the sort of player your opponent is – is he very tight or aggressive? – or is he short-stacked or is he the chip leader?
Because set mining is so popular amongst those looking at free texas holdem poker these days, top players play big hands more warily. This is turn has lead to less profitability from set mining. It is interesting to see how the game is evolving at such a fast pace these days. There will no doubt be a new technique to play pocket pairs in the not too distant future.
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