Different strokes

Have you ever played in a home game against one of your mates who’s so easy to put on a hand that they may as well just give you the money at the start of the night? Yep, me too.

Now think about why it’s so easy to put them on a hand. Do they always bet with top pair whether they’ve got position or not? Do they always check-call with flush draws and check-raise with two-pair or better? In other words, do they play their hands in such a standard fashion that they may as well turn their cards face up and allow you to decide on the correct course of action?

Now ask yourself, ‘Do players find it easy to avoid paying me off on big hands and do they always seem to snap off my bluffs? If the answer’s ‘yes’, then it’s time to introduce a greater level of variance into how you play your hands. This may mean you occasionally give free cards, or miss the chance to win quite as many chips as you could, but that’s on individual hands. The long-term benefits are that you’ll keep your opponents guessing and force them into more mistakes. And mistakes mean one thing – more chips for you!

MAKING MOVES

In order to deviate from standard play you need to understand what it means to play hands in an ABC-type way! It’s impossible to teach all that in this article of course, but if you imagine what a tight-aggressive player might do in any given situation then you won’t be too far off.

And there’s nothing wrong with that style of course, but in order to keep opponents on the back foot you need to do things differently sometimes; for example, checking when you’d usually bet, raising when you should fold and flatting when you could shove.

Let’s say you have top pair, top kicker with A-Q offsuit on a Q-8-5 rainbow flop. You raised pre-flop and were called by a tricky player on the button. You both had around 30 big blinds at the start of the hand. You make a standard- sized continuation bet of two-thirds of the pot and your opponent calls. What kind of hand could he have on such a dry board? It’s unlikely that he’d call with a gutshot, and, while 7-6 is within his range, it’s a very small part of it.

Heading to the turn, the standard play would be to bet, providing it’s a safe-looking card, in order to get value from someone calling you down with a pair of Tens, K-Q or Q-J. Most of the time that would be the right thing to do, but against a player that you’ve already categorised as tricky and aggressive there are different lines of attack open.

Your opponent must have some kind of hand as he’s called your pre-flop raise and your continuation bet, but he could easily be floating you on the flop in an attempt to steal the pot on the turn. If you feign weakness now, your opponent may decide to take a shot at the pot. Checking the turn will look like you’ve given up on the pot having taking an obligatory stab at it on the flop. Your opponent knows he has some fold equity, and could be willing to make a move on you simply to make you pass.

Think about it – your raise and their call would make the pot 7.5 big blinds. The bet and call on the flop would make the pile in the middle 17.5 big blinds so any attempt to nick that pot away would involve a shove, or a pot-committing bet which you can then pick off. Should your opponent not take the bait and check behind then another table tap on the river could see them try to win the pot with a medium-sized value bet of around eight big blinds.

Unless your hand has improved here there’s no reason to go mad – simply pick off the bluff and move on. Yes, they may have you beat with something like a flopped set, but you won’t be out, and more often than not that final bet will be a bluff giving that final check some good expectation in certain situations. You will sometimes leave chips on the table, but varying the way that you play hands such as this will also scare more observant players who will realise that just because you check out of position it does not automatically mean that you have a weak hand.

FAST ON THE DRAW

Fold equity is a marvellous thing. It can make players drop hands that were likely to tear yours apart, but shoving without back-up is incredibly dangerous. That’s where drawing hands come in. Nut flush draws, straight draws and combo draws (i.e. you have middle pair and a gutshot straight draw) can be problematic when played out of position. If you bet and are raised what do you do? If you check and then call a bet, but miss the turn, what do you do? In both situations you tend to stumble backwards, fall over and give up on the pot, which is why solid players are increasingly check-raising with these draws. In the early stages of a tournament they may be more likely to check-call, but as the blinds increase a check-raise all-in with a nut flush draw can be devastatingly effective.

Because continuation betting is so popular in tournaments, often the pre-flop raiser will simply be betting the flop with Ace- or King-high, or perhaps second pair. If you check-raise it’s very difficult for an opponent to call off a huge chunk, or even all, of their chips, even if they think there’s a chance that you’re at it. Should they actually turn over a genuine hand most of the time you’re going to be a coin-flip anyway with overcards and a flush draw. Just be careful you don’t do it on paired boards where you could already be drawing dead!

VALUE SHOVE!

If you’re playing your draws fast then you need to do the same with genuine hands, particularly early on in tournaments when there are still plenty of fish in. This is where the value shove comes in. You’ve flopped a set and the board contains a flush draw and an Ace. MrFiSh to your left raised pre-flop and has made a continuation bet. Has he got an Ace? Quite possibly, and there are a load of turn cards that can pop up to kill your action – any flush card for one! So why not get all your chips in now? In the earlier stages, particularly at lower levels, you’ll find a lot of players that will call all-in with top pair. Often slow-playing a set can leave you winning less chips than fast-playing it. Sounds basic, but getting easy chips in the early stages can set you up for another final table.

CAUTIONARY WORDS

A word of warning, though. Don’t go showboating purely for the sake of it. It’s all too easy to get caught up in the moment and find yourself trying to pull off moves for the sake of it, or just so you can ‘school’ other players. Resist letting this temptation get the better of you. Just remember that at the most basic level, your edge will be derived from the fact that bad players call too often with the worst hand and fail to bet for value often enough with the best hand. The majority of the time playing your hands in a straightforward way will see you consistently make the money. Don’t fall into the habit of checking top pair as your standard play because you’ll invite bad beats, and will leave so many chips on the table that you’ll be labelled weak-passive in everyone’s notes.

Whether you choose the standard play or the road less travelled, you must think before you act every single time. If you’re prone to rash decisions, ask yourself one final question before you check or bet: ‘What am I hoping to achieve with my course of action and how likely is it going to happen?’ Simply rapping your knuckles on the table and hoping someone will bet for you just isn’t good enough. Constantly evaluate every situation and try to make the right play at the right time, whether it’s conventional or not.