I guess my problem is this:

Sometimes I have a read. But more often I have TPTK or some other medium strength hand, and my read is more like "my hand is best until proven otherwise." I bet the pot until someone plays back, then I make my read based on their raise. But until then I had no read.

Smoothcalling in position is easily the best way to extract money from me. Check-calling works almost as well, although I tend to check behind in NL with TPTK (which the past couple nights has cost me a bit) or two-pair on a scary board.