Your first assignment in any pot is to put your opponent on a hand. You're trying to figure out where you are.
Your next assignment is to determine the best way to get the most money out of your opponent. However, before you put in that big raise on the river, you need to ask yourself what your opponent could hold that would allow him or her to call that raise with the second-best hand.
Frequently, the answer is that your opponent could call that raise only with a hand that would beat you. In today's hand, which was played at the $2,000-buy-in no-limit hold 'em event at the 2007 World Series of Poker, Blair Rodman and Amato Galasso were engaged in a three-hour, heads-up battle.
With a chip lead of about $5.3 million to $2.8 million, Rodman was looking for the one big hand that could end it. With blinds at $80,000-$160,000, plus a $20,000 ante, Rodman limped on the button with 10-6 offsuit. Galasso checked his option from the big blind.
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