Pre-flop is often decisive in Texas Holdem. If we know how to throw in a deadly feeler bet pre-flop Holdem will be our cup of tea.
Even with weak hands we may pull off a nice win if we know how and when to place a feeler bet. Feeler bets allow us to see plainly how to win while the rest at the table grope for what right pre-flop move to do because they haven't a clue of what we hold. Hence, we become a pre-flop Holdem champion.
Like for instance, we hold a 9-9. Not much, but it has a potential to win depending on the flop result. We choose to play it, although precariously, because we play middle position (we're the fifth player among 10 at the table) and we don't have a hint of what the others have. The pre-flop Holdem position here is to never let anyone at the table peek at our hand, no matter what.
So just to impress the players of our "strength" and also as a feeler bet we make a pre-flop raise. Two players after call but the rest players after us fold. Then one player to our right also calls. Caution here - we made too much excitement with a pre-flop Holdem raise and we only hold a pair of 9s. But, to be sure, we built a nice pot - and a good table image.
Then comes the flop: K74. The 7-4 may be good for us, but someone might draw from the K. So the question is, is there someone who benefits from the K? The player to our right checks. Bad image. And we don't want to follow that example. So we put in another feeler bet. Don't commit the error of checking, to the detriment of our pre-flop Holdem raise.
Checking would nullify the image of strength we portrayed with our pre-flop Holdem raise. So we must follow that up with another raise, a little bigger than our pre-flop Holdem raise. This will reveal who really is benefitted by the flopped cards and reinforce our image of strength. Make sure that this raise is not too high or too low.
In the end, we may have the rest of the players folding, all because of the pre-flop Holdem image of strength we displayed right in the beginning. Our 9-9 would make it through by the application of feeler bets that would make opponents think we have a strong hand and also expose their true hand strength till the very end.
