Playing in Loose-Passive Games

Once a year, I pack up the family and head down Interstate 15 to California. We always stay at Commerce Casino. My wife and daughter head off to do their shopping thing, leaving me in the cardroom to see if I can win what they spend in the shopping mall!

The limit hold'em games play much differently in L.A. than they do in Las Vegas. Generally, L.A. games are more passive, and more pots are played multiway. The knowledge and skill sets required to get the best of these games require adjustment to the style of the game. The differences are so great that many winning players in one city cannot adjust and be winning players in the other. That said, a knowledgeable, good player adjusts to the situation he is facing and beats all types of games.

So, how do you adjust to multiway pots? The weak calls that players make create additional value for the weak calls that other players make - including your own weak calls! The price received from the pot makes drawing to gutshots, backdoor flushes, small pairs, and a-pair-and-a-piece hands better propositions. In Vegas, much of your value comes from bluffing plays in small pots and trapping to extract extra value from your opponents. In L.A. the value comes from trying to either eliminate opponents or negatively adjust their price to draw to beat you.

Trapping and bluffing plays still have value in loose-passive games, but there are much fewer opportunities to utilize them correctly. Players who are very good at trapping and bluffing plays (which is often players who have focused on higher-limit play) find that some of their strategic value is lost when they play in loose-passive games. Conversely, some players who are very good at loose-passive game strategies find themselves being the live one when playing against tight-aggressive-deceptive opponents.

It is not uncommon in multiway pots to hit your hand but be extremely vulnerable to being outdrawn. In these spots, you need to attempt to reduce the field or charge them the maximum to draw, making their calls incorrect, or at least of lesser value. To actualize this, knowing your opponents' tendencies is crucial. Are players with a high propensity to bet in a position such that if you check-raise, you can make it two bets cold to most of the field? If you lead, is there a player to your left with a high propensity to raise, which will make it two bets cold to the field? If you think you have the best hand and an aggressive player is to your left, you still can check-raise and charge your opponents two bets, possibly get reraised, and "protect" your hand. Decisions, decisions, decisions.

It is, alas, an imperfect world, and the above scenarios are not always present or will not always work. Sometimes you play for a check-raise and wind up giving your opponents a free card, which is a bad proposition in a volume pot in which many cards will likely cripple your hand, and some of which may be completely unsuspecting to you. While leading and getting only one bet out of your drawing opponents is not ideal, by any means, it is much better than giving them a free card. Accurately assessing the risk/reward ratio when faced with the option of betting or check-raising requires knowing your opponents, and accurately assessing the vulnerability of your hand and how it will likely play against them. The less vulnerable your hand is, the more risk you can take, but always keep the texture of the board and your opponents in mind.

The flip side of the risk of giving a free card is the value in getting one. Because the pots tend to get much bigger, increasing your percentage chance to win has more value than increasing your percentage chance to win a smaller pot. Therefore, I tend to raise more in position in loose-passive games, where players tend to "check to the raiser" or check in an attempt to check-raise you. I sometimes do this with wired pairs and suited hands. In a loose-passive game in which you pick up a draw on the turn, you have an overlay to draw, and the extra 4 percent chance to make a set against weak-loose-passive opponents can equate to huge value. Of course, making this play at the correct times assumes that you can assess the likelihood that your opponents will both check to you and provide appropriate value for the cost of the raise. The greater the likelihood that you will get checked to, and the greater the likelihood that they will give you action, the greater your propensity should be to make this play.

Another play that I like to make in loose-passive games is to flat-call a preflop raise from an aggressive player who is to my immediate right when the value of my hand warrants a reraise. I do this to position myself for a post-flop raise. This play is most often correct when there are limpers before the raiser who won't fold to an extra raise, or the styles of the players behind you is such that the extra raise will not eliminate them. This play, and subsequent raise on the flop when you connect with your hand, gives you the best chance to protect a very vulnerable holding (like one pair).

There are, of course, no absolute rules about any of this. These plays for loose-passive games rely on "feel" to correctly gauge which have value, and when. Watch the game, think how your opponents think and play, and utilize the plays when they are conceptually correct, and you'll find your win rate in loose-passive games improving.

Roy Cooke and his collaborator John Bond have written for Card Player since 1992. Their new book How to Play Like a Poker Pro will be released by www.conjelco.com this fall. Roy played poker professionally for 16 years and is currently a real estate broker/salesperson. Please see his real estate ad on this page.