"Paul" and I were in the same shorthanded $15-$30 hold'em game for two days straight. The first day, he downright brutalized me. He caught a great run of cards, but he also took full advantage of his winning image by skillfully mixing in some well-timed bluffs. Meanwhile, I couldn't make a hand. Anytime I raised preflop, the flop would miss me completely. My continuation bets would occasionally win me the pot, but typically I would get check-raised at some point and be forced to fold. The few times that I made it to showdown, an opponent (usually Paul) would produce some random pair to beat me. My table image was poor, and my ability to make plays was limited. After eight hours of torture, I had to simply admit defeat.
On the second day, I decided that I would have to give him some different looks. I couldn't just raise preflop, bet post-flop, and hope to win. I needed to do some different things, such as occasionally limping in preflop, and sometimes checking post-flop. My hope was that mixing up my style would throw him off his game.
Early on, it was working. He made some overly loose calls, and I was finally able to show down some legitimate hands. After a couple of hours, I was up about $400. Then, this most interesting hand came up.
The Preplanned Bluff
Sixhanded, I open-raised from the cutoff with the 9
8
. Everyone folded to Paul in the big blind, and he called. Surprisingly, the flop came 10
10
10
. Before this hand was dealt, I already had made up my mind about how I would play the next flop that missed me, and was likely to have missed Paul, as well. Rather than simply bet the entire way, in which case I might get called down or check-raised as a bluff, I decided to check if he checked. But if he bet at any point, I would raise. If it got checked to the river, I would bet the river. I wasn't exactly following conventional wisdom, but my goal was to give him a different look.
On the flop, he checked, and I checked behind him. The turn was the 5
. Again, we both checked. The river was the A
, a card that fit in nicely with my predetermined strategy. It would be easier to represent an ace than some other random card. But, to my surprise, he bet into me.
If I thought that he had an ace, I would have abandoned my predetermined strategy and simply folded. But my immediate gut reaction was that he didn't have it. I figured that he would've bet somewhere along the way with ace high. And then, on the river, if he made tens full of aces, it seemed more likely that he would check and try to snap off a bluff, rather than bet out. With all of those things in mind, I raised. I figured that if my read was correct, and he didn't have an ace, it would be extremely tough for him to call.
Once in a while, I'll mix in some chatter with my bluffs. Sometimes it works, sometimes it doesn't. I'm still experimenting with it. I had been quiet most of the previous day, mostly because I was taking a beating and really wasn't in the mood to talk. So this time I decided to talk it up a little.
"OK, just in case," I said, as I put out the raise. The implication was that I had an ace, and "just in case" he didn't have one, I was popping it. He seemed remarkably taken aback by my comment. He grabbed the $30 to call, but then hesitated while he shuffled his chips.
"You have the damn 10, don't you?" he asked. He kept shaking his head and looking at me, while I looked at the board. A few seconds passed. He acted like he was going to throw his chips in, but then grabbed them back. "Damn it, I'm 99 percent sure you have the 10," he grumbled. Now this was getting interesting. My best-case scenario was for him to think I had slow-played a 10, but I figured I'd have much more success representing an ace. Instead, he seemed fixated on the idea that I had quads. That could only help my cause.
I decided to give him the full treatment. I chuckled softly, grabbed $30, and said, "If you raise me, I'm only going to call," trying to make it sound like I wanted a raise. In reality, he had made it abundantly clear that he didn't have the 10, so I couldn't imagine that he would raise. But, really, it was a moot point. I needed him to lay down.
He looked at me and said, "Matt, I've been playing for twenty years. I know that when someone is talking like that, he's got it." He then showed me A-J and, unbelievably, threw it away! Proudly, he declared, "All you had to do was keep quiet, and you would've gotten paid off." I guess it's a good thing I started yapping! As I raked the pot, I probably should have congratulated him on such a "good laydown," but truthfully, I was too busy being mad at myself. I had made a terrible read. He had the ace, after all. I was throwing away $60 on the river, yet somehow I got away with it. It would be nice if all of my mistakes worked out so favorably.
With so little action in that hand, it wasn't even a substantial pot, but it did lead to a complete shift in the game. Suddenly, I was able to win pots uncontested. People were laying down to me, sometimes correctly and sometimes not, but the important thing was that I no longer needed to make a hand to win. I rode my image for all it was worth, and went on a nice rush that ended more than $1,000 later.
Is there something to be learned from this episode? I think so. When your current style isn't working, sometimes you have to shift gears and play a little differently, especially if a particular opponent seems to have your number. That doesn't mean that you should abandon solid starting-hand values and begin playing inferior cards. It simply means that you should change up your patterns. If you usually raise preflop, maybe limp in on occasion, or limp and then three-bet. If you normally bet in position, check it once or twice and watch the action as it transpires in front of you. It might give you some new perspective on your opponents, and maybe you can throw them off just enough to reverse your fortunes.
The bottom line is, if you're already getting beaten badly enough, it really can't hurt to try.
Matt Lessinger is the author of The Book of Bluffs: How to Bluff and Win at Poker, available everywhere. You can find other articles of his at www.CardPlayer.com.
