Poker strategy with Jonathan Little: calling with marginal hands

If you happen to have an over-aggressive image, caused by a lot of bluffs or just getting a lot of the best hands, you can look across the table and see one of your opponents staring at you furiously. When you spot someone giving you a "look" you can be fairly sure they will play with you sometime in the near future, either because they assume you are playing in ranges that are way too wide, or perhaps they are trying to "level" against you. you.

Knowing that they are going to attack you ahead of time can turn a normal easy pass into an easy check. But you also need to give this opponent a chance to bluff. If you raise money against them, they will be forced to fold their marginal hands and bluff, so if you make any made hand you should be sure to go check-calling.

In the last 1 $,000 buy-in tournament, I played my standard loose, aggressive strategy, although I was never too far off the line. A young player on the other side of the table was giving me a "look" even though we didn't play the hand together. I raised with a random hand, made a continuation bet and took down a small pot.

Already on the next hand, when the blinds were high -600 from 34,000 effective stacks, I raised to 1,400 with J 9 with the button. A kid who was in the small blind three-bet to 3,400. Seeing me get decent odds to call and thought my opponent could easily play, I called with the intention of calling if I hit a decent flop. It's worth noting that if I thought my opponent was playing normally, I would have folded easily.

The flop came down to J 6 2 which gives me top pair. My opponent bet 4,600 and I called.

At this point I can be either far forward or far back, but I will never fold top pair when I feel like my opponent's range is very open. A raise doesn't make much sense as he will fold most of his trash (which should be a large part of his range) and call against all the better hands that beat me.

Turn to 6 , pairing the board. He bet 7,000 and I called.

The same logic on the flop is true on the turn. If he has a better hand, he always calls a raise. If I raise, I'll have him fold any bluffs I keep within his reach by calling. Whenever you have a strong but not a note hand, your main concern is to keep your opponent's range as wide as possible.

It was 8 on the river and quickly bet 7,600 out of his 18,000 remaining stack.

When players make a really quick bet on the river, it usually means they planned to bet no matter what card came out. Since his range should be mostly bluffs and a few nut hands, I called and beat his A 3 .

Note that if I had raised on the flop or the turn, he would most likely fold (unless he was an absolute geek). The optimal line in such situations is simply a call. If I had a stronger hand like pocket aces, I would still call. I wouldn't raise on the river because again, he usually only calls when I'm beaten.

By playing your marginal hands passively, you keep all bluffs within reach of your opponent while preventing them from bluffing. You also make it difficult for your opponent to get a lot of value when he actually has the best cards because you have never raised.

The next time you face someone who probably has too many bluffs within their reach, take that line and let them bluff their stack.

Jonathan Little is a two-time WPT champion with over $ 7 million in live tournament earnings, best-selling author of 15 educational poker books, and 2019 GPI Personality of the year in poker. If you want to improve your poker skills and learn how to beat the games, visit his training page at PokerCoaching.com/cardplayer.