Poker Strategy With Jonathan Little: Don't Make That Costly Mistake Pre-flop!

Recently, I was looking through the hands of one of my new students who mainly plays 1$-2$ and 1$-3$ no-limit cash games at live casinos when this interesting spot appeared. On 1-$3 they all folded to take over, a decent loose, aggressive player who raised to $10 from his effective $207 stack. Button folded and my apprentice called from the small blind with A 8.

While this check may seem standard to most players, it is actually a serious mistake. Especially when you are out of position, you have to watch out for big raises with each hand due to your poor position.

When you find a premium hand on the flop you will have a hard time extracting value, and when you flop a marginal hand your opponent decides how much money will go into the pot. My student should have folded which is a pretty good option. Or he can 3-bet to take control of the pot.

To clarify this point, imagine the flop came K-7-4. If you 3-bet pre-flop with A 8 and you make a continuation bet on this flop, your opponent will almost certainly fold unless he recovers to at least a pair, which is only 30%

By playing aggressively, you will win many pots where you have the worst hand. Compare this to what happens when you call your opponent's pre-flop raise. You check the K-7-4 flop, your opponent raises and then folds. This will cause your opponent to steal your pot.

I understand that playing aggressively can be uncomfortable at first, but you just have to learn to be aggressive if you want to be successful in poker. Be sure to check out the bluffing courses on my PokerCoaching.com/cardplayer training page.

This time the flop came to A K. J.by giving my student top pair with a weak kicker. My apprentice called, takeover staked $30 on the pot $39, and my apprentice called.

This is exactly the type of flop my student doesn't want to see. He often has the best hand, but when a lot of money is put in the pot, he is usually crushed. While I don't mind check / calling on the flop, this situation usually gets quite unpleasant on the river.

The turn came 7. My apprentice called, takeover staked $39 on the $50 pot, and my apprentice called.

At this point, I think it is fair to play tight. Note that there are very few value hands that a competent player would bet in the place of a hijack that my apprentice will beat. The best my apprentice can count on is that he is betting on this take with a slightly worse hand such as A-5 or KQ, or that he is completely bluffing with a 000-9.

Instead of focusing only on the hands you are winning, you should also look for hands that bet the way you lost. There are many hands A-8 is losing to.

River is 5. My student called, seizure bet $99 on a pot $179 and my student called.

Despite the great pot odds, I'm not a big calling fan again. The only hands my apprentice wins at this point are overvalued marginal made hands (which many competent players would not bet) and total bluffs. Nor do I think a lot of players will raise this bet on the river as a bluff, although maybe some will.

This time, the hijack showed AQ which gave him a nice pot. In most low and medium stakes games, when someone bets the flop, turn and river, you should assume they have a reasonable hand value, unless you have good reason to believe otherwise.

Jonathan Little is two-time WPT champion with over $ 7 million in live tournaments, author of the best-selling 15 educational poker books and 511 GPI Poker Personality of the Year. If you want to improve your poker skills and learn to win at games, check out his training page at PokerCoaching.com/cardplayer.

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