Mad Man Poker

In No Limit Texas Hold’Em, or basicly every variety of poker, there are 5 different things you can do.

You never have all 5 opportunities at the same time, but at any given time you always have 3 options.

Today we try to analyse when to use these options.

FOLD

A few weeks back I suggested you might make a list of hands you are willing to play in certain situations before the flop. I take it you made that list or at least drew it up in some way in your head.

All the hands that didn’t fall within your grace are off course going pre-flop. For me that includes about the bottom 100 to 150 hands (out of 169) in a standard situation. Meaning, I get no odds, am faced with a decision (limping late on a weak table where people only raise when they hold aces is not a decision) or have no stack to fool around with. Specifically I am talking about hands like J3 off suit, 54 or even A4 in a non-profit situation. I am not making another article on this, I already did.

That was the easy part. Now let’s look at folding when there are cards on the board.

You missed it, hold no overcards, sense no weakness in your tablemates, basically have no way of winning besides the bluff.
Bluffing is a play that should be handled with care. Nobody’s saying you shouldn’t “test” how the other holdings around the table may be, but get out when you see no way of still winning this pot. Bluffing is to be reserved for key situations where you think you can actually scare the other guy. All the rest goes into the muck.

You hit the flop lightly (second or even bottom pair, overcards to the pair in your hand, one pair on a highly connected board, …) and get a lot of pressure from one of your opponents. Assess your hand and even more important, assess what you’re up against. If the outcome is poor for you, remember that it is always better to be bluffed out of a small pot than to loose a big one.

You hit a draw, but get no correct odds. Learn the odds for draws! They’re not that hard, especially when you take into account that every out should be multiplied by 4 on the flop and by 2 on the turn to have your percentage of still winning the hand.

Always take into account that pot odds are one thing, but “stackodds” are another. If 20% of the pot is almost your entire stack in a tournament or of your bankroll, think again before you call the 30% shot that you still hit your draw. Also, always downtune your calculations, just in case you misinterpreted your read.

Should you still be in the hand after the flop, you should have already made up your mind what to do when your hand doesn’t improve or when a scare card comes off.

CHECK

Checking is almost never a good option. If your hand is not worth raising with, it’s probably not worth playing with.

Still, checking can have some advertisement purposes. When you didn’t hit the flop and are able to check it down, your opponent will pick up a lot of measly pots, but at the price of laying down hands you do bet, thinking you hit them.

Gradually you can condition other players to leave more and more uncontested pots to you.

Sometimes, leave a pot checked when possible to show a monster at the smallest amount of interest the other guy shows in the pot. Can you check it down to the river? Good, from time to time (not too much, of course) do so. People will be less likely to attack pots, afraid you’d shove another top set or flopped straight into their face. This will make for some nice moments where you can wait and see what turn and river bring or even start stealing yourself.

Slowplaying, just like bluffing, should be handled with caution and only executed rarely. Slowplaying is a risk on itself, since a lot of people try it on highly textured boards and then see the straight or flush get there to watch their set or two pair go down.

One pair is not a reason to go slowplaying. At least not as a rule.

CALL

Calling can be used in 3 situations, and 3 situations only.

1) You know you have the best hand, raising here would push other players out of the pot. Actually this is a sort of slowplaying and should be conducted with as such.

2) You would like to see a next card without risking being reraised by your opponent.

3) You plan on making a play later on.

Calling gives control of the action to your opponent and leaves you following his lead. Sometimes that’s not such a bad thing, but you need to be aware of the fact that he is deciding the pot here.

The further you go into the pot, the harder it will be to get away from your “calling” image, since the pot will get higher and higher and therefore will also be the bets of your opponent. Did you decide to call the 150 on a pot of 220? OK, do you now realise the pot is now 520 and that when your opponent bets, it won’t be 150 anymore? Raising a pot bet here (the 500) would throw you into the 4-number range, where click raising 1 street earlier would “only have cost” you 300.

Mind you, this sounds very specific as an example, but the whole strategy of downbetting on the flop and pot betting on the turn is getting played more and more these days and you will need to be aware of it.

The practice is as logic as it gets. On the flop you don’t even try to push out the draw. Nowadays many players draw anyway as long as their stack is not in danger. By keeping the flop bet smaller, you loose less when the draw does hit. If it doesn’t now all of a sudden you have a bigger pot you can bet the draw out of and drag it in.

Here’s a thing about calling: These days it happens too much on draws! Something where standard strategy is still the best idea: Raise it up and see what gives.

BET

Betting is what it’s all about! It’s your most powerful tool, the salt and pepper to a poker game.

When in doubt, don’t check! Bet! A hand that is beat can only drag down pots when cards are being put to a decision.

When you’re a tight player, a bet from you will always get respect from the table. When being called, at least now you know something is out there.

When you’re an aggressive player, don’t be afraid. People will not be so eager to get into every pot with you once their money is on the line. In free games, sure! Be careful with calling stations, but a few steps up the food chain will usually get you into a zone where most calls have nothing to do with making a play or delaying a decision. Usually here, a player who sees no more chance of comfortably playing the hand will throw it away, regardless of where he or she stands. Since playing against your aggressive style costs money, a lot of people will easily remember the huge pot they lost to your monster a few hands back and have no interest in a rerun. Also, their ability to doubt your bets makes them an easier target when you do have the best hand. As a general rule: don’t get committed before the turn, but when you are on the turn, get crazy or get out!

Betting is a tender matter. Bet too little and you don’t loose people to your bluff or gain too little from your monster. Bet too much and you lose potential callers on your monsters and see no more chance to get away from a bluff.

Therefore, I usually stick within the 60% to 75% range. That’s my standard “I’m comfortable and I’m playing” zone.

Make sure you have tricks up your sleeve with smaller bets (with me usually testing a hand I expect to be beat in or on the contrary inducing the raise to come over the top) and of course also some stories involving higher bets (again, pumping a pot into infinity when I have it or trying to push every weak caller out).

RAISE

Raising is the poker way of “laying down the law”. You basically are claiming a pot to be yours. This is a strong signal and you have to be prepared to follow up on it.

Just like with betting raising gives you 2 options to win a hand, where calling and checking only give you 1. You can either have the best hand or take it down here.

When to raise?

Is “when you have the best hand” a trivial answer? You should always try to gain control over the betting when you have the best hand. The best way to do that is coming over the top of a made bet. The signal you send out is in most cases strong enough to set some people to serious thinking over their hand. All feeler bets and all marginal bets will now be out of the hand. Off course, click raising is still quite different from raising, for example, 4 times the initial bet. The first is putting your opponent on a decision, the second is forcing him to decide the hand right here. The latter is usually a pretty weak play. If you have the hand you now forced stronger players out of the pot in about 99% of the cases. If you misread and the other guy has you down hard you just lost a chunk of your stack that could have been avoided.

When sensing weakness in your opponent, raising can be a valid option. Once again, realise that when money is involved people won’t be so likely to play with a “we’ll see” attitude. Sure “it’s only money”, but that’s a style you won’t come across too often when the price of poker is going up. Therefore playing into the things I told you here earlier could be the perfect play. If you feel that your opponent has already decided that his hand is not too strong and that is better to be bluffed out of a small pot than to lose a big one, this is exactly what you will do.

People don’t generally like big decisions on hands that are not the nuts or close to it. When this is your assessment, time is your enemy.

First of all, if you can pull this on the flop, good! There are still two streets to come and people will be reluctant to call you, knowing they could be confronted with yet another bet on the turn and yet another on the river.

Well there you have it.

If confused, come to us, we’ll put you to the choice hard!

The Mad Man