Shoving is Fun!

It's a recent phenomenon. In just about every no-limit hold'em poker tournament, you will see people making huge overbets or all-in raises or reraises -- often with hands that are mediocre, at best. Despite the fact that they risk so many chips with cards that don't seem to warrant it, oftentimes these people who love to "shove" are not stupid, by any means -- and they are not gambling, either. More often than not, they have a clear strategic reason for doing what they do, and I know that for a fact -- for the simple reason that I am a prime example of such a regular "shover."

To some people, this is a practice that looks rather silly. For instance, when my big blind is raised and I choose to reraise all in with a hand like the 8 6, and I get called and have to show my paltry holding, there's always people laughing or giggling at this so-called "expert" who has risked his entire tournament life with a mere 8 high. Yet, I use this strategy as an integral part of my poker weapons arsenal. So, what are the reasons behind it?

Well, quite simply, the following factors need to exist to make shoving or "effective" shoving (sticking in just 55 percent to 70 percent or so preflop -- meaning that you are committed, and that the rest of your money will always get into the pot after the flop) a viable strategy:

• You are playing in the late phase of a tournament, and the blinds and antes have become sizable.
• The money has become rather shallow, meaning that the usual strategy of a standard preflop raise and then a fold (usually) against a reraise has become too expensive; losing just one or two pots this way would account for too high a percentage of your stack.
• Yet, the money is not so shallow that your bet or raise will almost always get called (for instance, by one of the bigger stacks).
• You have fold equity. There's a lot of money in the pot because of the blinds, the antes, and any calls or open-raises that your opponents may have made, making winning just this money in the pot a viable goal. If you choose to shove in your stack here and decide that there's a good chance that you will not get called -- that's fold equity, a situation in which the quality of your cards is not the most important reason to make the move that you are making. (Had you made a small opening-raise that would not have committed you to the pot yet, one of your opponents could have taken the opportunity to go all in, putting you to the test and thinking that he could have fold equity. To prevent this from happening, a big, pot-committing open-raise on your part could very well be better at this stage of the tournament than a smaller, standard raise.)
• You are up against just a few players who have either invested money in the hand or who are still to act. The fewer opponents you have to bully your way through, the better -- as the likelihood that any of them will wake up with a big enough hand to call you decreases.
• Your opponents are tight, respect your game, are not the type to make big calls, or are more focused on moving up the prize ladder than on trying to win the event.

When I started playing for a living in 1998, a common tournament strategy for the good players was to open-raise liberally to steal the blinds and antes, as most of their opponents were not sophisticated enough to play back with nothing; they would almost always wait for a big hand to play back. The result: The aggressive players could pick up many pots uncontested, and could safely lay down hands like A-10 or A-J if they got reraised, because at best they would be even money and usually would be a big dog. But in recent years, especially the young players have learned the value of relentless aggression. By putting their opponents to the test for all of their chips, these young guns win lots of (fairly big) pots uncontested when they make the initial raiser fold, and their opponents fear tangling with them, knowing that every pot could cost their entire stack. This enables them to win even more pots uncontested - and in tournament poker, with high blinds and antes, this is obviously an excellent situation to be in.

So, quite clearly, the shove-it-in approach has a lot of merit in the late stage of a tournament. Yes, it is extremely risky and will lead to disaster more often than not, but when executed at the right time and against the right players (and, of course, if we simply get lucky once or twice when called), we could very well bully our way to the title with relatively few showdowns needed.

When I started out playing tournaments and still had an extremely tight image from my cash-game years, I actually used the "any-two-will-do" approach if I thought the situation was right for an overbet-raise or even all-in shove. Especially if I was up against an open-raiser who was tight enough to lay down an A-Q if I moved in on him, I would not need a hand to come over the top if I thought that he didn't have a truly big hand this time. I would do this just as easily with an almost-no-showdown-power hand like the 5 4 or the 8 7 as I would with any other hand.

Of course, once you start using this overbet/shove tactic on a more and more structural basis, your opponents will start to notice. After all, they have read Kill Phil, and if they suspect that you are using the tactic of this book, they will choose to call even your huge raises or reraises with fairly marginal hands. If I notice that a player who has this line of thinking is in the big blind, I will change my shoving approach in the following manner:

• I will start overbetting my big hands. Rather than making a standard three-times-the-big-blind raise with A-K, I will open-raise for 10 or even 12 times the big blind. (This assumes that my stack is less than 20 big blinds in a situation where there are antes. With 25 big blinds or more and/or there are no antes, there's no need to push the panic button too soon. You can still occasionally shove when someone else has open-raised, but if no one has opened in front of you, a raise this huge would be risking too much in order to win too little.) If the big blind happens to wake up with a weaker ace than I have or even a hand as weak as K-Q, he is likely to go for his entire stack, thinking that I may be trying to push him off his hand with nothing.
• I will not be playing any of my marginal hands aggressively anymore. I will just fold them, or -- when in position -- I might call or minimum-raise, but not overbet-raise. After all, there's no use in trying to represent strength through big raises when your opponent actually reads these big raises for weakness, rather than for strength.

If you take into account all of these factors, and use the shove (a) sparingly, (b) when your image is tight, (c) when the open-raiser doesn't necessarily have a big hand, and (d) he is not the type of player to make a stand with potential problem hands like A-10, A-J, and even A-Q, just "shoving it in" may be a remarkably good strategy.

Of course, if you get caught and are eliminated from a major tournament, getting it all in preflop with a mere 7 high or 8 high, you will definitely look silly and feel silly. But, that doesn't necessarily mean that you played silly -- because your approach may very well have been the correct one, given the game circumstances, the prize structure, and the tendencies of your opponents.

Rolf has been a professional cash-game player since 1998. He is the author of the successful Secrets of Professional Pot-Limit Omaha, and the co-author of Hold'em on the Come. He is the creator and presenter of the hold'em four-DVD set Rolf Slotboom's Winning Plays. He is the first-ever Dutch Champion, and maintains his own site at www.rolfslotboom.com.