Capture the Flag -- Bertrand Grospellier

Bertrand “ElkY” Grospellier has been a dominant force on the tournament circuit in recent years, but he started his career by playing cash games online. Once a professional gamer, Grospellier transferred his mouse-clicking skills from StarCraft to online poker, and eventually took on live poker, as well. He also will appear on the new season of GSN’s High Stakes Poker, which premieres in February 2010.

Kristy Arnett: How did you get your start playing cash games?

Bertrand Grospellier: I first started playing poker by playing cash games, and I really had no idea what I was doing. I was playing $1-$2 no-limit [hold’em] six years ago, because my friend told me to go on PokerStars. I put $200 on there, played $1-$2, and went broke pretty quickly. For the first couple of months after that, I played 50¢-$1 and started taking it much more seriously. I moved up to $2-$4 and $3-$6, and the highest game at the time was $5-$10.

When I started doing better, I’d just play a few tournaments on the side, and I won some seats for a couple big tournaments. Then, PokerStars offered to buy me into a few events, like the EPTs [European Poker Tour]. So, I played a lot of tournaments and was traveling a lot, so I didn’t have much time to focus on cash games. My focus basically moved from cash games to tournaments, but I still love to play cash games when I get the chance, especially live cash games. It’s very different, because there’s no limited buy-in. You can buy in very deep, as much as you want, so it’s much different than online, because most of the tables are limited to 100 big blinds. When you have 100 big blinds, there are some moves that you can’t make. Also, you can stack off with some hands that you wouldn’t if you were deeper. You can play more aggressively with 100 big blinds. It’s harder to be aggressive when you are so much deeper, because you risk a lot if you run into a big hand.

KA: Because you learned the game by playing cash games rather than tournaments, do you think it has affected your overall game positively?

BG: I think it’s important to learn both for your overall game. Cash games teach you a lot about implied odds. You usually have a lot more situations when you are deeper-stacked in cash games, so it helps you play in tournaments when the structure is very deep. Some people might stack off too light because they are used to playing tournaments with 30 big blinds, when it’s really not OK to do so when you are deep. When you are in cash games with 150 big blinds or more, you really have to pick your spots better. You also can play more hands, because you can call reraises with a wider range, especially if you have position. If you know what a player has, you can call the reraise and play the hand accordingly. In tournaments, even if you know what he has, sometimes you don’t have the odds to call and play post-flop.

KA: What advice would you give to a beginning cash-game player?

BG: Think about all the hands you played, and really try to improve yourself. Always be honest with yourself, and know when you make a mistake. It’s easy to just say, “Oh, I got unlucky.” Discuss the important hands with your friends or with other good cash-game players. That’s very important, I think, because everyone has a different style. Even if you don’t agree with what the other guys are saying, it’s still good to listen to different opinions to have an idea of how other players are playing the game.

KA: When you play higher stakes and against tough competition, what are some mistakes that you find even good players making?

BG: I think even good players sometimes don’t adapt very well. They have pretty good basics, usually, especially these days online, but they don’t adapt enough to the flow of the game. They have just a basic strategy, and they aren’t very flexible. It’s very important to be flexible with your strategy in poker. If something you are doing is not working well at one table, there’s a reason. You have to think about it, and adapt. The games are definitely much tougher these days — so much tougher than three or four years ago.

KA: How have you adapted to the growing preflop aggression?

BG: You definitely have to be defending much more carefully against some players. You have to learn to four-bet or five-bet even lighter. Against players who will raise and reraise you, you have to be ready to make a move on them if you think the situation is right. Definitely, I think the variance in cash games is bigger lately because the preflop action is so much crazier than it used to be. Before, people would just flat-call you with hands, so you need to be ready to go to war much more lightly preflop.

KA: If you think you are better than the other players, why put so much money in preflop, instead of trying to play with a bigger stack-to-pot ratio post-flop?

BG: Well, it depends on how much better than the other player you think you are, and it depends on where your edge comes from. Some players make big mistakes post-flop, but online, it seems like players play much better post-flop, so I don’t think it’s bad to push your edges preflop. It’s much different than tournaments, because players are not as good post-flop; also, you can just rebuy in cash games. In tournaments, it’s very important to protect your stack and not play with too high a variance. If you’re betting against a guy in a tournament, you don’t want to take a coin flip, because you can find lower-variance situations, but in cash games, it doesn’t really matter, because if you go broke, you can just rebuy. Another thing is that in cash games, you should have a big enough bankroll that it won’t affect your decision to make a high-variance play.

KA: What are a couple of examples of how you can exploit players preflop or post-flop?

BG: If they’re aggressive preflop, sometimes you also have to be super aggressive preflop, but it really depends on what you think their biggest weakness is. If you think they call too light post-flop, you don’t have to be so aggressive preflop. So, if you are up against a guy who stacks off too light post-flop, you can play tighter preflop and hit your hand, because you know that he is going to call big bets with marginal holdings. If you think he’s opening too many hands and folding preflop, you can reraise a lot in position, because he gives up too much and never four-bets without premium hands, like jacks or better. Then, obviously, it’d be profitable to play aggressively preflop against him. You really have to recognize players’ weaknesses and adapt your play accordingly.