Nits can be frustrating opponents that require a specific set of skills to beat. See if you have the knowledge with the latest PokerPlayer quiz
Q1. Jack-A-Rama
Players 6 Blinds $0.50/$1 Your stack $100 Your hand J♣-J♥
Action
You raise to $3 in the cut-off with pocket Jacks, the button calls and then a notoriously tight nit squeezes to $15 from the big blind. What should you do?
Decision
a) Fold
b) Call and see a flop
c) Four-bet to $32 and fold to a shove
d) Four-bet to $32 and call a shove
Q2. Three-bet fun and games
Players 6 Blinds $0.50/$1 Your stack $100 Your hand 8♥-7♥
Action
It’s folded to you in the cut-off and you raise to $3. Everyone folds except the nit in the big blind who makes it $11. You call. The flop is T♥-5♣-3♠. The big blind bets
$13 into the $22.50 pot. What should you do?
Decision
a) Fold
b) Call and re-evaluate on the turn
c) Raise to $30 and call a shove
d) Raise to $30 and fold to a shove
Q3. Trippy
Players 9 Blinds $1/$2 Your stack $200 Your hand A♣-Q♠
Action
It’s folded to you in the small blind. You make it $6 with A♣-Q♠ and a decent nit in the big blind calls. The flop is A♥-2♣-5♠. You c-bet $8 and are called. The turn is another Ace giving you trips. You bet $22 and are called. The river is an offsuit 7. The pot is now $72. What should you do?
Decisions
a) Check-fold to a bet
b) Check-raise all-in
c) Bet $58
d) Move all-in
Q4. A lovely pair
Players 6 Blinds $1/$2 Your stack $266 Your hand J♠-T♠
Action
A nit raises to $6 in the cut-off. You call on the button with J♠-T♠ and a weaker player in the big blind also calls. The flop is J♥-2♣-4♦. The big blind checks, the nit
bets $14 and both you and the big blind call. The turn is 4♠. Now the nit bets $44. What should you do?
Decision
a) Fold
b) Call
c) Raise to $100
d) Move all-in
Q5. Tournament trials
Players 9 Blinds 5,000/10,000 Your stack 180,000 Your hand A♥-2♥
Action
It’s the final table of a major online tournament where most of the money is in the top three spots. It’s folded to a nitty player on the button who has a 350,000 stack. He raises to 25,000. You have A♥-2♥ in the small blind. The big blind has you both covered. What should you do?
Decision
a) Fold
b) Call
c) Three-bet to 75,000
d) Move all-in
Answers
- Call and see a flop. Ordinarily, you’d be ecstatic to get Jacks in preflop against an aggressive opponent. But versus a nit you need to show more caution. Nits are very rarely going to five-bet jam as a bluff or with any hands that you dominate. It’s best to take a flop and see what happens.
- Call and re-evaluate on the turn. Nits invariably three-bet a tight, strong range but they will also give up easily postflop if they have missed. This makes them great targets to float flops against with the intention of stealing the pot on the turn.
- Check-raise all-in. This is a close one. It’s very likely that the nit has an Ace. It’s also likely that if you bet you have an Ace too as he knows this would be a terrible spot to bluff. As he didn’t three-bet most of his Ace-x hands are going to have a low kicker and he may be able to fold to a bet. When you check though all of these hands are very likely to bet for value, allowing you to check-raise shove with what is usually the best hand. Even if the nit feels beat he will be getting great odds to make the call.
- Fold. Nits don’t usually double barrel with air, especially when there are more than two players in the pot and the turn doesn’t bring any scare cards.
- Move all-in. Nits will have a very tight calling range late in tournaments, making it very profitable to shove on them frequently if you are short-stacked. In this case the nit really cannot afford to call light as he would lose around half his stack if he calls and loses the hand.
Your score
0-2 Riddled with nits
Oh dear back to the drawing board
3 Nitty gritty
You’re making progress but the nits can still do their damage
4-5 Nit rider
Congratulations. Nits cower in fear whenever you are near
