Secrets of Professional Tournament Poker, Volume 1 (16 page)

Thinking ahead will save you many headaches that most players bring on themselves constantly throughout their careers. They make marginal bets without considering what might happen on future betting rounds. I always wonder what most players think about when it is their turn to act. If they were thinking ahead, they would usually know what to do as soon as the action was on them.

Thinking ahead also comes in handy when you have been super-aggressive and think someone is about to make a play on you. If you can anticipate this, you will make a killing off these players.

In a WPT event, a player at my table constantly raised in late position, stealing my blinds as well as my opportunity to steal blinds. I finally decided I had to do something about it. He raised from the cutoff and I re-raised with Q-7 from the small blind. We were both around 80BBs deep. The flop came Q-x-x, I made a continuation bet and he called.

The turn was an ace and we both checked. The river was blank, we checked and my middle pair won.

After this hand, the loose player started raising around 75 percent of hands before the flop. He somehow won every showdown and built his stack to around 200BBs. I was pretty confident that if I re-raised him again, he would probably not fold. About 90 minutes later, he raised to 2.5BBs and I re-raised with A
-J
to 8BBs out of my 70BB stack from the small blind. He instantly went all-in. I called fairly quickly and won a 140BB pot against his A-6. Even though I had not played a hand with him in 90 minutes, I could feel he was going to go after me whenever he had a chance. As long as you are one step ahead of your opponent, poker will be a profitable game for you.

How Much to Bet

I always size my bets and raises the same so my opponents cannot get a read on the strength of my hand from them. The following set of numbers is going to be rather boring, but necessary to remember, as you will need to know how much to raise to for each stack size. Obviously all the numbers listed apply to when you plan to play your hand. If you are going to fold, simply fold. If any bet will risk more than 30 percent of your chips, you should usually go-all in unless you have a good reason not to. There will be more on this throughout the book.

When you are first to enter the pot, I suggest you raise to 3BBs if you have more than 125BBs, around 2.75BBs with 70 to 125BBs, 2.5BBs with 40 to 70BBs, 2.25BBs with 12 to 40BBs, and all-in with fewer than 12BBs.

If you are folded to in the small blind, tend to raise 0.5BB more than usual. You want to discourage your opponent from playing his hand, as you will be out of position. To avoid giving off tells or causing my opponent to think he has a tell on me, I raise to the same amount at each blind level regardless of my stack size, unless it drastically changes. For example, at 100/200 with a 100BB stack, I will raise to 275 every time. At 1,000/2,000 with 50BBs, I will raise to 2,500 every time. If I were to lose a big hand and get down to 18BBs, I would adjust and raise to only 2.25BBs pre-flop.

If someone limps in front of you, raise to 4.5BBs pre-flop as long as you have more than 60BBs. Raise to 4BBs with 27 to 60BBs, to 3.5BBs with 15 to 27BBs and all-in with fewer than 15BBs. Add 1BB for each additional limper. For example, if there are five limpers and you have 100BBs, you should raise to 8.5BBs, assuming you plan to raise with your hand. Again, if you are out of position, either in the small or big blind, raise an additional 0.5BB. If raising over a limp will put in more than 30 percent of your chips, you should just go all-in. If you have A-J with 2,000 chips, you’re playing 50/100 and four people limp, a normal raise would be to around 7.5BBs. Because this is more than 30 percent of your stack, simply go all-in.

If you plan to re-raise, take it to around 2.75 times the original raise. So, if someone raises to 300 at 50/100, re-raise to around 825. Add the amount of the initial raise for each player who called. So, if there is a raise to 275 and two callers, re-raise to 825 + 275 + 275 = 1,375. Add half the original raise if you are out of position, i.e., re-raise to around 3.25 times the initial raise instead of 2.75 times. If a re-raise will risk more than 30 percent of your chips, you should usually just push. Suppose you have A-K on the button with 2,700 chips, playing 50/100. If a player raises to 275 and someone calls, a normal re-raise would be to around 925. Because this is more than 30 percent of your stack, you would be better off going all-in.

The three situations above are the most standard that will come up before the flop. If you can remember a few simple formulas, you will have no problem sizing your bets optimally while providing no information on the strength of your hand.

After the flop when you are deep-stacked, your bets should be somewhere between 1/2 and 3/4 of the pot. For simplicity, throughout this book, I will express bet amounts in terms of big blinds, although most poker players will express the amounts of their bets as a percentage of the pot. This will enable you to keep track of everyone’s stack size. If someone bets and you want to raise, you should usually raise to 2.5 to 3.5 times the bet.

Say everyone has 200BBs, someone raises to 3BBs from middle position and you call with 2
-2
on the button. The flop comes K
-J
-2
. Your opponent makes a standard bet of around 4BBs, which is 2/3 pot. If you raise, you should make it about 12BBs here, which is three times your opponent’s bet. If there is a bet and a call, you should raise to 3 times the bet plus the amount of the calls, so if a player bets 200 and someone calls, you should raise to around 800. As stacks get shorter, your raises can be a little smaller, although they should rarely be near the minimum, as you will be giving your opponent odds too good to fold.

As you can see, I use a few fairly simply formulas to determine how much to bet in any given situation. While you can vary your bet sizes from time to time against the weakest players, most competent players will discern a pattern if the sizes of your bets vary by situation. Because of this, I suggest you bet the same amount every time in a particular situation.

  Chapter 4

Before the Flop