Pot Commitment (long)

Checkraise,


You are correct to point out that pot commitment is fallacious when one considers only the amount of money they have invested in the pot, but I do not think Mike Norton is doing this. Rather, he is making the excellent point that somebody with AQ would be getting better odds to a KTx flop with more money in the pot preflop. (Of course, they are getting the right odds to draw for the gutshot if 2 bets are going in with this many players, but situations surely exist where they will be correct to draw if 3 bets went in but not if 2 bets went in.) I don't think Norton was basing his decision on his money, but on the total money in the pot.


Now, it doesn't matter whether that money comes from your hands or is a free donation from the house, but it still affects your odds, and pot commitment is a very real thing. If enough money goes in the pot preflop, and for whatever reason you are in the hand (this is rare for a solid player without an extremely solid starting hand), you are going to draw to a lot of crazy garbage, like runner-runner double gutshot straights or something. For example, if Mike had 3-bet and it ended up getting capped around, he should probably hold onto his Ks even if an A flops, looking for an elusive K to hit the board. That is what I think is meant by pot commitment.


Good post.


Mike