When is it ever correct to minraise? (discussion)

[Allinlife]

I know minraise often tells the others that you have a hand that is desperate for a call, but you don't want to scare them away, so it is kind of what I think could be called "Contridicting" bet.

Whenever someone posts a hand where hero minraises, they often get berated for that bet. I know it often gives away your strength when you use a minraise, but it proves to be effective vs guys that could fold their TPTK to minraises on turn. another ideal situation to use minraise is when a minraise will commit your opponent, which could frequently be the case when in a shallow game (usually PP 50 bb stacks), where pot is raised with multiple callers, and often the raiser will make a crying call that will commit them when minraised.

So how did I do? are these the correct situations to use the minraise?

comments appreciated /images/graemlins/crazy.gif

[fimbulwinter]

minraises postflop certainly have their place. they are often overused, but still should not be considered intrinsically bad.

minraises preflop are like cold-calling raises in EP. there are very very few situations in which they are the correct action and very many situations in which weak players use them as a crutch, thus the stigma.

fim

[soah]

If someone makes a pot-sized all-in bet and there are people to act behind me, I will frequently minraise. Say the pot size is 10. Someone bets 10 all-in. If I raise to 20 then the people behind me are getting 40:20, or 2:1 to call. So my minraise serves the exact same function as simply making a pot-sized bet.

If someone makes a big bet into a big pot I will sometimes minraise them if the stacks are just deep enough that pushing will let them get away easily, but calling the minraise leaves them fairly committed. That is, if they bet 10 into a pot of 10 and they have another 40 left, then a minraise will leave them 30 more on the next street with 50 in the pot.

Sometimes I use a minraise as a free showdown ploy... minraise the turn, check behind on the river. Notice how this concept can work well with what I wrote in the previous paragraph... as the minraise lets me threaten my opponent's entire stack without actually risking all of my own. If I've got the nuts I can push on the river, and if I have a marginal hand (top pair) I pay the least to see the showdown. Sometimes the stack sizes are at the exact size where only a minraise can serve this purpose, as any decent raise is essentially all-in.