Playing out of position

A lot is said about the importance of position in poker. Ever yone knows that having position in a hand gives you a great advantage over your opponents. You won’t always have position though, and playing well out of position should increase your win-rate by a significant amount. A lot of your choices and decisions should be made depending on your opponents so it’s extremely important that you are aware of players’ playing styles and keep notes as up to date as possible.

CONTINUATION BETTING

You are often going to find yourself wondering whether to place a continuation bet out of position. Too many people fire a standard c-bet without thinking. Aggression is good but it must be controlled. As soon as your opponents figure out you are c-betting every time they will exploit you. If the button called your pre-flop raise you should consider the following (among other things) before automatically firing:

1 Your current, and potential hand strength

2 Your opponent’s pre-flop calling range

3 The likelihood of your opponent calling (or raising)

You have to weigh up each flop and then decide the best action. C-betting with air is advisable on an untextured flop like K-3-8, but as soon as you start c-betting out of position on flops such as 8?-7?-6? with air or a marginal holding, you are going to get yourself into trouble. There is no fixed rule for when you should c-bet, that will vary depending on your own style of play, but if you c-bet more than three quarters of the time when out of position you are probably c-betting too often.

CHECK-RAISING

This is a very important tool to have in your arsenal and can be more profitable than c-betting. This move is often made from the blinds after your opponent was the aggressor pre-flop. You just have to have the bravery to check-raise with nothing, with the knowledge that your opponent is probably c-betting the checked flop.

This move works best on untextured boards such as K-3-8 rainbow. Any check-raise here is putting a lot of pressure on your opponent and he will be laying his hand down most of the time. Basically, you are scared of A-K, Q-K, K-J, A-A, K-K, 8-8, 3-3 in this scenario and he may even fold a King depending on how strong your raise is perceived. There are far more other hands that he will have to fold.

Of course, if you meet resistance here you should nearly always be giving up on the hand.

KEY POINT

Keep solid notes and look for opponents that continuation bet often (over 80%) and who you think may give in easily.

CHECK-CALLING

Sometimes check-calling is best post-flop. There are many reasons to check-call as long as you mix up your play and use it for different scenarios each time. You should consider check-calling when:

1 You have hit a flop fairly well but want to control the pot size

2 You have hit the flop hard and want to set a trap

3 You have completely missed the flop but want to float

Suppose the cut-off raises and you call from the big blind with J?-10?. Now the flop comes down K?-J?-5?. This is a perfect opportunity to apply pot control. Your opponent should c-bet with a range you are easily ahead of, but check-raising simply turns your hand into a bluff. He would never call the check-raise with a worse hand, and would rarely fold a better hand.

The pot is $30 on the flop, and your opponent c-bets $20. You check-raise to $65 and he shoves. That’s $65 you’ve lost. Now consider check-calling. You check-call a $20 bet on the flop, and a $45 bet on the turn. You’ve spent the same amount of money, but you have given yourself a chance to draw out on a stronger hand. You’ve also gained more money from bluff hands.

There aren’t too many players willing to bet all three streets on a bluff, so you should win the pot against a weaker hand a decent amount of the time. You might also get a free card on the turn, in which case you can then either value bet or check-call the river and get to showdown for the same cost as the flop check-raise.

KEY POINT

Check-calling is a good option against an aggressive opponent where you want to exercise some pot control and avoid turning your hand into a bluff

FOLDING OR SLOWING DOWN

Sometimes you just have to wait for a better spot, even with a strong hand. Having control of the hand is so important when playing no-limit hold’em – if you lose control when out of position it could cost you your entire stack. You need to know when to apply the brakes and when to give up completely. This is a typical scenario faced by thousands of players every hour of every day.

You raise under-the-gun+1 with A?-Q?, and the button calls. The flop comes A-9-6 rainbow, you bet, the button raises, you shove and the button calls with two pair or better. There is an argument for flat-calling the flop raise here but shoving is inexcusable.

Without reads you are playing for stacks and are only really beating a bluff. In situations such as this, it’s much better to fold and wait for a better spot. Make sure you note the hand though and keep an eye on future plays by this player.

A similar stance can be made when playing A-A/K-K. Play them hard. Don’t mini-raise pre-flop and don’t limp – bet most flops hard. But, if you meet strong resistance at any time post-flop you must slow down and re-evaluate. A-A/K-K is far from the nuts post-flop and you have to ask yourself if your opponent would really raise you with worse. Quite often the answer is no and you are drawing thin.

KEY POINT

Don’t give up every time you are raised post-flop but you have to know when to apply the brakes and when to bail out completely.

VALUE TOWN

So how do we go about extracting value when we hit a big hand out of position? The answer will again differ depending on your opponents’ playing styles, pre-flop action and the board texture. Let’s play the same hand against 2 different opponents:

You are in the big blind in a six-handed cash game with 6?-6? and call a $14 pre-flop raise from middle position. The flop comes down 2?-6?-K?.

SCENARIO 1

Your opponent is very tight and has only been raising with premium hands. You give him a range of K-Q+ and 9-9+. He only c-bets 40% of hands and you have been playing fairly loosely up to now. You decide to lead out hoping your opponent has caught something and to disguise your set.

You bet $20 and your opponent calls. You can narrow his range fairly accurately to A-K, K-Q, 9-9, T-T, J-J, Q-Q, K-K, A-A. All of which, barring K-K, you are crushing. The turn brings a 9 and you value bet $45. Your opponent calls. The river brings a 10 and you can confidently bet for value knowing that you should be called most of the time and are rarely beaten by an overset. You bet $110 and are called by Q-Q to take down a nice $370 pot.

Had you chosen to check-raise the flop (or any street) the alarm bells may have started ringing for this tight player and you could have easily lost your customer.

SCENARIO 2

Your opponent is very loose. He is raising 25% pre-flop from any position and is c-betting almost 100% of the time. He is very aggressive and enjoys testing people by c-betting and firing on every street. You check the flop and as expected your opponent bets $23. You elect to flat-call and hopefully allow him to continue his aggression.

The turn once again brings a 9, you check, and your opponent fires again, this time $55 into a $76 pot. You decide to call, as you are sure he will see this as weak and will fire again on the river. He quickly fires a bet of $120 after the river 10. You pause for a second, move all-in and he folds.

Letting aggressive players who try and win every raised pot be aggressive when you have them crushed is often the way to go. Here we took a more passive line and allowed our opponent to bluff off a large amount of money. Had we fired from the start we may not have got past the flop.

CONCLUSION

Being out of position is not ideal, but there are ways to counteract this disadvantage. Try and keep your opponents guessing as much as possible and learn to bluff at more pots post-flop, especially by using check-raises. The main thing is not to just give up on hands every time because you missed the flop and are out of position.

The player in position will often feel obliged to take the lead just because he has position, but he will have missed the flop just as many times as you. Make sure you use detailed player notes and statistics to help you carefully consider every hand you play and begin taking advantage of other people’s habits.