To Bluff or Not to Bluff?

When I wrote The Book of Bluffs, one of my fears was that some readers would take some of its concepts to the extreme, and start bluffing in situations in which they had little or no chance of success. In fact, that was the main reason I included a healthy dose of failed bluffs interspersed among the successful ones. I wanted readers to see some scenarios in which they should avoid bluffing, along with the many situations in which it's the right play.



With that in mind, I recently received an e-mail from Chris, a reader who asked me about a recent hand he played. In part, he said:



"The game is no-limit hold'em with $5-$10 blinds and a maximum buy-in of $1,000. I have $1,300 in front of me, and pick up the K J in the cutoff (a marginal hand, I know). Four players call in front of me, and I decide to raise to $45.



Everyone folds around to the player on my right, a woman with about $1,800 in front of her, and she calls the extra $35.

"The flop comes A J 4, and she immediately fires $125 into the pot. I sit back to analyze the situation, and decide that there's a chance she has me beat, but I'm not going to just flat-call with such a favorable flop, so I make it $300 to go. She calls immediately. Now there is $735 in the pot.



"The turn is the 10, improving my hand ever so slightly. She immediately checks. Now I'm pretty sure she is also on diamonds, which makes me an overwhelming favorite, so I fire $450 into the pot. She thinks for a long, long time, and flat-calls.



"The river brings the 4, for a final board of A J 4 10 4, so I have jacks up and a missed flush draw. She checks. With a pot of more than $1,500, and thinking of your book, I move in for my last $505. She goes into the tank, and finally calls with the A 3. When she sees that she has the best hand, she says, 'Phew! I called hoping to hit my club redraw on the turn, and then I felt committed. Plus, I thought that 4 on the river might have earned me a split pot.' I say, 'Good call, but I can't believe you made that call with A-3.' She simply replies, 'I don't like to fold aces.'



"Was my play incorrect? Or, did I make the right play, but it was simply against the wrong person? Thanks for your insight."


And now, the gist of my reply



"Being in late position, I have no problem with your raise into a bunch of limpers, even with a marginal hand such as the K J. After the flop, I have no problem with your raise, either. However, she called your raise immediately, and it's from that point on that you went off course.



"When you reached the turn, you said, 'Now I'm pretty sure she is also on diamonds, which makes me an overwhelming favorite.' My guess is that you were trying to put her on a hand you could beat, and that is how you decided she had a flush draw. Realistically, you could not simply eliminate the possibility of an ace. In fact, given her actions of calling a raise preflop, betting the flop, and then calling a raise, I think an ace was clearly her most likely holding.



"But, OK, let's say that you truly believed she had a flush draw. Then, maybe your bet on the turn could be correct, but it makes your bet on the river entirely pointless. The only hand you can beat is a busted flush draw, and if that's what she has, she's not going to call your bet. You simply could show down your hand and win. Otherwise, the chances are overwhelming that she has an ace. And since she called $450 on the turn, there is little reason to believe that she wouldn't call another $505 on the river.



"Whether or not you would lay down the A 3 in her shoes is irrelevant. You have to judge your opponents and their calling patterns and degree of looseness, and unfortunately you did not gauge hers correctly."



Three lessons to be learned

1. Chris' closing question spoke volumes. He asked if he made the right play against the wrong person, but what constitutes the "right play" is entirely dependent on the player against whom you make that play! (That's why, in general, it bothers me when other people ask me about the correct play in a given situation without giving me any information about their opponent. That is the crucial piece of the puzzle that usually determines the right action to take.)



In this case, Chris had the information he needed; he simply did not use it correctly. Bluffs should be directed against tight players who look for reasons to fold. Clearly, his opponent did not fit that description. She called a significant preflop raise from out of position. She bet the flop, called a raise, and then called a very large bet on the turn, even though Chris was giving her every reason to believe that she was beaten. From that information alone, we could assume one of three things:



(1) She has a strong hand (which would give her every reason to call on the river).



(2) She is purely on a draw (which gives Chris no reason to bet the river).



(3) She is a loose player who is calling with a marginal hand (which means that she is not likely to be bluffed out on the river).



Once her hand was shown down, we knew it was (3). But, even before then, by going through her possible hands and what she was likely to do with each of them, it would not have been too hard to come up with the correct play of checking.



2. Chris' opponent had $1,800 at the start of the hand, in a game with a maximum buy-in of $1,000. That meant she was either making good plays or getting lucky. But either way, it meant that she was more likely to call on the end, either because she would correctly read Chris as being weak or because she was feeling lucky and figured that she could win even with a marginal hand.



3. Finally, any player who calls the turn with some type of made hand is probably going to call the river, as well, assuming that:



(a) The river card doesn't appear overly dangerous, and



(b) The size of the river bet is the same as, or similar to, the turn bet.



If a player thought his hand was good enough to call on the turn, then after a seemingly harmless river card (one that is unlikely to have helped his opponent), it stands to reason that he will decide his hand is good enough to call on the river, as well.



In this particular hand, not only was the 4 river card harmless, it actually gave Chris' opponent reason to believe that her hand had improved. Of course, most players in her shoes wouldn't consider it likely that they were up against an A-X, with X being worse than a 10, and that now they might get a split pot. But it is irrelevant to talk about what "most players" would do. Loose players look for reasons to call, and the added possibility of a split pot gave her an additional reason to call. In turn, that meant Chris had an additional reason to check the river and save his remaining $505.



In Conclusion

My passion is bluffing. So, when someone tells me about a bluff, my juices start flowing. And whether the bluff succeeded or failed, my goal is to break it down to its essence, and determine the reasons why it should or should not have worked. Hopefully, I succeeded in that mission, so that both you and Chris can avoid making similar mistakes in a future hand.

Matt Lessinger's The Book of Bluffs is available at CardPlayer.com. While there, you can also find other articles of Matt's in the Online Poker News newsletter. Please visit his new website at http://www.mattlessinger.com/ to learn more about him.