Overcalling on the Turn

When it comes to overcalling on the river, most poker players have the drill down pat. If you're involved in a hand of hold'em, and three or more players reach the river, you generally know what to do if there's a bet and a call before the action reaches you. On the river, your hand has no more potential. It's either been realized or it hasn't, and once the river is reached, either all of your draws have flown away or your prayers were answered. You made the hand you were hoping for or you didn't. In any event, potential plays no further part in a hand once the river card has been dealt.

When one opponent bets the river and is called by another, you need a very good hand to overcall. Yes, the original bettor might have been bluffing, but a caller has to have a legitimate holding. And you need enough strength to beat both the bettor's and the caller's hand before an overcall makes any sense at all.

Most players understand this, and hands like top pair with a marginal kicker are routinely thrown away when there is a bet and a call before it's their turn to act on the river. Stronger hands get souped, too. You'll often see a set tossed out like yesterday's trash if there's a suited board and significant action by two or more players.

While most players are pretty careful about overcalling with losing hands on the river, that trait doesn't always play down to the turn. When there is still a card to come, many players are still prone to call – and even overcall – with lots of weak holdings in hope of catching a miracle card on the river. Players who routinely do this cost themselves plenty of money, and they wouldn't have to burn off so many chips if they'd just learn to scrutinize their chances a bit more carefully.

Although there are many more playable hands on the turn than the river, due to the potential some of these hands have, there are many others that are doomed on both of the last two betting rounds. When you get down to cases, many of them were probably doomed on the flop, too, and were played only out of the kind of rationalization that many players employ to boost the implied odds they think they're getting far beyond all reasonable expectation.

These players are quick to assume that they're getting the right price to draw to their long shot because they believe none of their opponents will fold, and everyone will pay them off until the bitter end. When these same players lose to a drawout, they just can't fathom why their opponents stayed in the pot, since " … they should have known that everyone else would have folded long before they made their hand," thus depressing the implied odds (how the prospects of future action affect the value of a hand) to a level that precludes an opponent's call.

But let's not dally with something as subject to guesswork as the implied odds likely to pan out during the play of a hand. Instead, we'll look at a few of the simpler things in life. If you have two overcards and the board is composed of small or midrange cards, why would you stick around if there was a bet and a call before it's your turn to act? You have only six outs going into the river, and even if you get lucky, your hand may not be any good. One of your opponents may already have two pair or a set, or perhaps flopped top pair and top kicker with a hand like A-9. Now, if an ace jumps up on the river and appears to help your hand, you'll be in a world of hurt if you bet, because you'll surely be raised and cost yourself even more money. You see plays like this every day, in games at all betting limits, made by players with enough experience to know better, yet they persist in chasing unwarranted long shots.

Another situation in which overcalling on the turn is a weak play occurs when you've checked from the blind with a hand like J-9 and there's a board like A-J-5-3 of mixed suits, yet you overcall with it. This kind of play is fraught with danger anytime, but especially when there's an ace on board. The entire world must realize by now that many players are fond of playing ace-anything, especially if the ace is suited, so when there's a bet and a call before it's your turn to act, it's a reasonable assumption that at least one of your opponents is holding an ace in his hand. If you've got second pair, you're hoping to hit one of your two remaining jacks, or one of the three remaining nines – a long shot, at best – and on top of that, you've got to hope that the guy with the ace hasn't made two pair, also. There's no guarantee your hand will be the best one even if you get lucky, and whenever you make the hand you are looking for and it's no good, it's almost always going to cost you some chips. As a general rule, if your hand is neither a straight draw nor a flush draw, and not strong enough to bet, it's probably not strong enough to overcall when the action gets back to you.

Sometimes you'll have what appears to be a very good hand and you will come out betting the turn, only to be check-raised. Suppose you have A-K, and bet into a rainbow turn like A-7-3-2 and are check-raised. What does that mean? Well, despite the fact that your opponent can't have a flush or straight, the news is not very good. You're beaten most of the time you are check-raised on the turn; that's just the nature of poker.

Your opponent could have anything from a set of sevens to hands like A-7 or even A-3. The question is this: What should you do about it? Many players routinely call the check-raise as though they've punched some autocall button in their brain, and then pay off the hand on the river, costing themselves an additional two bets they could have avoided by folding. Check-raise bluffs are fairly uncommon in most hold'em games, and they're even less likely when you eliminate the few players tricky enough to use them. There are many players who have never check-raise-bluffed in their lives, so when these guys check-raise the turn, their message ought to be crystal clear: You're doomed! In fact, if you had to make one choice or the other – and we'll assume no one would ever realize what decision you actually made – you'd be far better off folding each time you are check-raised on the turn than calling and paying off a river bet whenever that situation pops up.

These are just a few examples of how people cost themselves a significant number of bets by poor play on the turn. There are more, too – lots of them. And when you digest the food for thought in this column, you ought to be able to come up with a suitcase full of examples. If you're able to do that, you will have gone a long way toward understanding the dangers of overcalling on the turn.

Visit my web site at www.loukrieger.com. My newest book, Internet Poker: How to Play and Beat Online Poker Games, is available at www.ConJelCo.com, and all of my books can be found at major bookstores and online at www.Amazon.com.