Postflop Play in No-Limit Limpfests

If you’re lucky, you live near a card room with a lot of loose-passive players (LPPs). When you see a lot of preflop calling and hardly any check-raising, you know you’ve found a great game. Given the high overhead of brick-and-mortar play, “no-limit limpfests” like those are among the few games in which you can play for relatively low stakes and still make a decent long-term profit.

Last month, we talked about the best way to take advantage of LPPs preflop. Specifically, you have to attack them when they limp by experimenting with larger-than-standard raises, preferably while in position. The idea is to learn how willing they are to call those raises with speculative hands. Usually the answer is, “Much more often than they should.”

Let’s continue with the example we looked at last month. In a deep-stacked no-limit hold’em game with $1-$2 blinds, two LPPs limp for $2, you raise to $20 in position, and they both call. Just from the preflop action, you’ve already made a profitable play. Now let’s examine the best way to proceed postflop.

You will have your fair share of instances in which you either start with a big pocket pair and/or flop a big hand. As a whole, I’m confident you will make money on those hands no matter how you play them, so for now let’s not focus on those situations. Instead, let’s assume that you started with a marginal hand and the flop did not hit you hard. In short, even though you might have the best hand, you would be happy to win the pot uncontested.

If one of the LPPs bets into you, the chances that it’s an outright bluff are practically zero. LPPs simply don’t bluff into preflop raisers. The only question you have to ask yourself is whether he could be betting a draw or a weak one-pair hand. If so, then you might either have the best hand, or floating him with air might have some value.

However, the only reason to draw that conclusion is that you’ve previously seen the same player bet out sometimes with marginal hands. If that’s the case, then there is probably value in calling the flop. Unless he improves on the turn, an LPP will usually either shut down at that point, or else make a weak second lead-bet, often similar to the size of his flop bet. As a strong, aggressive player, you should be able to sense his weakness and take the pot away from him on the turn or river. You won’t succeed every time, but your aggressiveness should work often enough for the flop call to have been a profitable play.

On the other hand, if the LPP’s flop bets usually are legitimate, then it’s better to simply fold and move on. Too often, trying to force him off his hand will be throwing good money after bad. Some players think it shows too much weakness to raise to $20 preflop and then fold to a flop bet, but that’s just ego talking. Just be thankful that, as an LPP, he tipped the strength of his hand before you had to invest yourself any further. A trickier player would have allowed you to continuation bet and then check-raised.

You shouldn’t be facing a flop bet from an LPP too often. LPPs usually will check to you on the flop, at which point you definitely should come out betting, but don’t allow yourself to get carried away. You want to avoid the common mistake of over-betting the flop against LPPs.

Preflop, our goal was to test the upper limits of the LPP limpers. How big of a raise would they be willing to call? Postflop, we want to test their lower limits. If they missed the flop, which will happen most of the time, how small of a bet can we make and still have them be likely to fold? LPPs are usually not paying attention to pot odds, bet sizing, or putting their opponents on a range of hands. Instead, their primary focus is whether or not they connected with the flop.

Let’s say they have a hand such as Q 9 and the flop comes 7 4 2. If you bet $20 into a pot of roughly $60, their initial instinct usually is not to think, “I’m getting 4-1 on a call, I’ve got two overcards that might be live, and my opponent might be betting with nothing. I can call because a queen or a 9 might give me the best hand. Plus, even if I miss, my opponent might check the turn, and then maybe I can bluff him out on the river.” Trust me, none of that is going through a typical LPP’s mind. Instead, he is simply thinking, “Damn, that flop completely missed me. There’s no reason for me to spend another $20 on this hand.”

On the flip side, if an LPP catches a strong enough piece of the flop, he will call — plain and simple. In most cases, the size of your bet won’t affect his decision. Also, since LPPs are passive, they rarely will check-raise. With all that in mind, why make a pot-sized bet when a bet of one-third the pot can accomplish the same thing?

Last month, when we discussed the size of our preflop raise, we said that sometimes you have to make a counter-intuitive play. No book will tell you to raise to 10 times the big blind behind two limpers, because too often you’ll get action from only the hands that have you beaten badly. That logic does not apply to many no-limit limpfests, since some players regularly will call large raises with very speculative hands.

However, many of those same players will take a “fit or fold” attitude on the flop, so it doesn’t take a bulldozer to get them out. Betting $20 into a roughly $60 pot, with the hope of getting your opponents to fold, can seem even more counter-intuitive than the preflop raise, but against the right opponents, it’s clearly the correct play.

Whether you bet $20 or $60, they will fold the hands that missed and call with the ones that connected, so there’s no sense in betting more than is necessary. The idea is to find the minimum bet size that will give you the information you need about their hands.
Not every LPP is identical, though. Many of them have different calling patterns and will respond in different ways to your bets and raises. We’ll take a closer look at that next month, and discuss what to do when the hand reaches the turn and/or river. See you then. ♠

Matt Lessinger is the author of The Book of Bluffs: How to Bluff and Win at Poker, available everywhere. You can find Matt’s other articles at www.CardPlayer.com.