What does the minimum raise mean?

Lately I play more tournaments than cash games, I love the action, the rush that you get once you make the final table. Although if you're an okay player, playing cash games usually won't usually take you up to a year to make some money as when you play MTTs. You can go a year without making any real money in MTTs but if you do win a big one, that will more than make up for all your losses.

But in both cash games and MTTs, many people like to min raise, either to open the pot or to reraise after someone has opened preflop. And based on experience, it often means a big hand like aces or kings. While it could be anything really, it does seems like it's more than likely to mean a big hand than a marginal hand.

It happens in cash games as well as in tournaments, or I'd say even more so in multi table tournaments. Let's say I'll raise in middle position and get one late position caller. I'll continuation bet the flop and they'll almost instantly minimum raise my bet. What the hell does that mean? ometimes I just get frustrated and shove on them, depending on how many chips I have and sometimes I just call.

This play just confuses me. If you flopped a set and you min raise, you're not going to make them much more money off me because you've given away the strength of your hand.

These min raises often confuse me, but from positive side, I've started doing them myself as well, and it seems to confuse the heck out of everyone else too. But be sure not to make mistakes in poker as this might make you a losing player. Min raises and aggressive play both have their time and place.