Calling Raises

When you have a tough decision to make regarding whether or not to call a raise or reraise, a crucial part of that decision is whether or not you are going to be all in if you decide to play. Naturally, if you are not going to be all in, there is the option of reraising. But for the purpose of argument, I want to discuss the situation under the (incorrect) assumption that it is a call or fold decision. What I want to explain is that you need to have a much better hand to call if the wager you face does not close the betting. Let’s look at some of the reasons why this is so.

If there is anything in poker that I hate, it is being right about what an opponent probably has, correctly deciding to call, but losing the pot anyway. This happens when you have the best hand and the opponent draws out — which can occur whether or not you are all in. But it also can happen when you have the best hand but fold in subsequent betting. Obviously, if there is no more betting, you cannot fold the best hand. Your chance of making a good decision to play is increased if the possibility of making an incorrect fold in subsequent betting rounds is removed. So, if other factors are not present, you should be calling an all-in raise more often than you call a raise that leaves additional money to be wagered.

Even when you have a weaker hand than your opponent has, the advantage of being able to see the hand through at no additional charge applies. If you get to see only the boardcard that is dealt on the next betting round, your chance of drawing out is much slimmer. You will reach another tollbooth on the highway to the river. If you don’t pay the toll, you won’t get to your destination. If you do pay, the cost of the trip is substantially increased.

The advantage of being all in also applies to your opponent, the raiser or reraiser. If he runs into a big hand, he still has hope of drawing out, and will have a chance to win. Here is an example:

Let’s suppose that you are in a $2-$5 blinds no-limit hold’em cash game. The button opens for $15 and you are in the big blind with a good hand. The small blind folds, and you decide to reraise to a total of $60. He now reraises $200 more. With what hands is he liable to do this? A total bluff is unlikely, as this type of wager is often called.

If the wager is all in, how weak could he be? He “says” that he has a big pair, but he easily could have some hand like A-K, pocket queens, and possibly two jacks or A-Q, depending on who he is and what he thinks of you. In other words, you have a decent chance of catching your opponent with a hand worse than kings. This applies particularly to tournament play, where many competitors feel they must run risks to avoid bleeding to death from the antes and blinds.

But suppose that there is another half a grand left in both of your stacks. Do you really think the prospect of catching your opponent with a lesser hand than two kings is all that bright? Your opponent is acting as if he is willing to commit all of his money — $760 rather than $260. True, he could dog it if you call, but that is not likely. The usual scenario is for him to move all in on the flop. I think the danger of running into aces or kings is too great for you to gamble a call with hands like A-K or Q-Q, let alone A-Q or J-J. These are not hands with which you go all in when you have 140 big blinds in your stack, nor are they hands with which you put a quarter of your stack into the pot, hoping to hit the flop. In fact, there is no such hand, as far as I am concerned. I would either move in or fold at that ratio of committed chips to remaining chips.

Suppose that you are facing an opponent who has the same preflop philosophy as mine: not calling to hit the flop when a quarter or more of one’s chips would be invested with a call. The effect of this philosophy is to make that person reraise in situations that superficially might look like he has a bigger hand than he really does. For example, in a $5-$10 blinds game, he opens for $40; you are in the big blind and reraise to $140, and he moves all in for half a grand. An important element in this confrontation is that you placed your opponent in a spot where he couldn’t call! He might not be too eager to play this big a pot with his hand, but he figured that he had better equity here with a raise than a fold. And part of that figuring might have been the possibility that you’d surrender instead of choose to fight.

Compare this situation with one in which the betting is the same but you each have a starting stack of $2,000. Your opponent is not under any pressure to either raise or fold. If he has a pocket pair such as jacks or queens, he is investing only 7 percent of his stack to see the flop. This is a price that makes trying to flop a set worthwhile. Furthermore, if he fails to flop a set, he still has the option of continuing if he manages to flop an overpair. The same type of reasoning might apply when holding a hand like A-K. This hand flops a pair about a third of the time. Most players would prefer to call the reraise and hope to make a pair (or better) on the flop. In all of these cases, we have been looking at a player who has position on all of the last three betting rounds, which adds to the incentive to just call with good hands that one would usually be unwilling to farmer out a couple of grand into the pot. (Please do not write a letter to the editor about my using that term. I have nothing against farmers. I am just using a common poker expression.)

I believe that most poker players instinctively feel more inclined to call a wager when it is all in than when there is more betting left to be done. The purpose of this column was to intensify a feeling that you already have, and make you give sufficient weight to this concept. I am at least twice as likely to call an all-in reraise, as opposed to a situation in which we both have a fairly large amount of money left to wager. This also shows the leverage effect of more money left to wager magnifying the pressure, even when it has not actually been committed to the pot.

Bob Ciaffone has authored four poker books, Middle Limit Holdem Poker, Pot-limit and No-limit Poker, Improve Your Poker, and Omaha Poker. All can be ordered (autographed to you) from Bob by e-mail: [email protected]. Free U.S. shipping to Card Player readers. Ciaffone is available for poker lessons at a reasonable rate. His website is www.pokercoach.us, where you can get his rulebook, Robert’s Rules of Poker, for free. Bob also has a website called www.fairlawsonpoker.org.