Plugging Some Leaks - Part IV

In the third part of this 10-part series, I discussed a few general leaks, in brick-and-mortar play as well as on the Internet. Today, I will discuss two common mistakes in big-bet poker that can and should easily be solved.

Leak No. 7: Making the wrong decisions in pot-limit Omaha when a scare card comes up

A common scenario for players who are relatively inexperienced in pot-limit Omaha (high only) is something like this: They call from early position with Q-Q-8-7 and get a flop of 6-5-4 with two of a suit that they don't have. Then, reasoning that they have the current nuts and thus have to charge their opponents to draw out, they bet the pot, a bet that is about 15 percent or 20 percent of their total stack. They get called in two places, and then on the turn, the board pairs. What should they do?

Well, the problem is that a good player will usually be able to make the correct decision here, but someone who is not that good or who doesn't read people well probably should have tried to avoid this scenario in the first place. For him, it might have been better to simply check on the flop and then go for the check-raise, and if everybody checked and a blank came on the turn, go for the check-raise again. This way, the player minimizes his losses in case he gets outdrawn on the turn, and will avoid tough and tricky decisions later in the hand. After all, with a scare card on the turn, an inexperienced player is likely to make one of the following mistakes:

• Losing more money with a hand that has already been outdrawn and has little chance of winning.

• Getting bluffed out by a good player who knows his opponent has a straight and also knows he can make him lay it down – when, in fact, this good player doesn't have him beat at all. (He might have a flush draw that hasn't gotten there yet, or the same straight.)

To avoid these delicate situations, the player who is not very experienced in this game should often base his decisions more on the size of his stack, and actively look for move-in situations, meaning that he will try to play for either a very small pot or a very large pot, but almost never a medium-sized pot. This is especially true if this player is relatively short-stacked and has just enough money for one raise when someone else has bet the pot. If this is the case, he should almost never make the first bet, but should usually wait for someone else to do the betting for him, and then either release or move in for all of his money. This is especially true when there are still cards to come, meaning he should try to make his move on the flop or turn. He might even try to move in before the flop, in order to (a) maximize his wins, (b) avoid the tricky decisions that come with a scary flop, and © take advantage of the fact that he is all in and thus can reach the river for free while his opponents might bet each other out of the hand.

Leak No. 8: Not adjusting starting-hand selection to stack size in big-bet poker

Lots of people who play in pot-limit and no-limit games base their decision whether or not to play a hand almost exclusively on the quality of their cards. Some people also pay attention to the characteristics of the players who have already entered the pot, but very few also take into account the size of their stack. But the fact is that in big-bet money play (and also in tournaments), there are some hands you can play with deep money that you would not have played with shallow money – and sometimes the other way around, as well. Let's say that you are playing in a big-bet game in which people are playing large stacks, and we'll assume that you are one of the best players in that game. With deep money, you should be able to pick up pots not because of the quality of your cards, but because of position plays and/or your ability to make moves on specific players because you read them well. Because you know you can outplay your opponents almost regardless of the cards you hold, you want to be involved in quite a few pots – especially when the weak players or the players you can read very well are also in.

In aggressive games with shallow money, all of this does not apply. Oftentimes, your best strategy is to wait and wait, to fold all marginal hands, and when you finally get a premium hand, to try to go all in before or on the flop by coming over the top of bets and raises from your aggressive opponents. You are playing showdown poker now, and because this is the case, you'd better have a good hand whenever you decide to get involved – meaning that you will have to be very selective of the hands you play, because playing a marginal hand might be very expensive in this type of game. After all, with your opponents' aggressive play and your shallow money, seeing a flop may well cost you 10 percent or 15 percent of your total stack. Because you cannot afford this, you should be willing to play for your entire stack or not play at all. Because of one single, seemingly trivial, factor like stack size, you should be playing significantly more or fewer hands than you do under normal circumstances, and the players who don't make these adjustments will be losing ground to the players like you who do.

Some Final Words

In my next column, in the fifth part of this series, I will discuss another common leak in pot-limit Omaha: the failure to move in before the flop with aces when playing a short stack. I will also take a look at a common limit hold'em leak: the failure to bluff on the river with a busted draw when the situation seems right.