Poker Strategy For The Rest Of Us: Mike McDonald

It’s great to see pros like Daniel Negreanu and Phil Hellmuth battling it out on poker’s biggest stages for millions of dollars, but the truth is that most of us will never get the same opportunity, nor will we really learn anything from their play that directly applies to our own games. The truth is that while we all aspire to be the next Phil Ivey, many of us will do so from the comfort of our friendly neighborhood home game or the low-stakes tables at a nearby cardroom.

In an effort to provide valuable tools and tips that are relevant to even the smallest games, Card Player is pleased to unveil the brand new series Poker Strategy For The Rest Of Us, which will focus on everyday situations that occur against the poker world’s most casual players.

Pro – Mike McDonald

Concept – Turning Pairs Into Bluffs

Mike McDonald is only 23 years old, but he has already established himself as one of the best tournament poker players in the world. The Canadian pro, known as “Timex” online, burst onto the live poker scene at just 18 years old by winning EPT German Open for €933,600 ($1,370,161) in February of 2008.

He hasn’t slowed down since then as he has amassed over $4.5 million in career tournament earnings and has been one of the most dominant online players in world. McDonald was recently invited to MIT as a guest lecturer for the seminar course entitled “How to Win at Texas Hold’em Poker” taught by fellow Canadian poker pro, Will Ma.

The CardRunners instructor sat down with Card Player during his trip to the United States to break down an online tournament hand from the Merge network.

The Hand

As the bubble approaches in an online tournament, our hero is under-the-gun at a five-handed table and is dealt the 6 6 and has 54,594 in chips. With the blinds at 500-1,000 with a 100 ante, our hero raises to 2,000. He is called by the player on the button (48,276 in chips), the small blind (33,748 in chips), and the big blind (35,440 in chips).

The flop is 7 4 3 and both blinds check. Our hero bets 4,250 and is called by the player on the button. The blinds fold. The turn is the K and our hero bets 8,500. The button calls once again and the river is the Q. Our hero moves all-in for his opponent’s remaining 33,526 chips and wins the pot without showdown when the button folds.

The Interview

Steve Schult: Starting with the preflop raise, is there any merit to raising more than just a min raise given the stack sizes behind us?

Mike McDonald: I think it’s fine to raise a little bit more here. If you want to make it like 2,200 that is an option, but I usually min raise. I’m not really in a position to say which one is better though, I just like to min raise.

SS: At what point in the tournament are you cutting down your preflop raise size to 2.5 or less?

MM: Essentially, the shorter the stacks get the smaller I’ll raise and the more prone the big blind is to defending, the larger I’ll raise. And those are the two factors that I look at. In this instance, the stacks are relatively short and presumably the big blind isn’t defending that much, so I would just tend to raise 2 or 2.1 times the blind.

SS: Our hero gets called in multiple spots and they see the flop four-ways. Since there are so many people he needs to get through on this flop, are you usually continuation betting this flop?

MM: Yea, I’m usually betting this flop. Our hand is extremely vulnerable and any card eight or higher could take the lead away from us if we don’t bet the flop. Also, our range appears to be the strongest since we opened under-the-gun and the board is pretty nonthreatening in a sense that it is three low cards. The seven is the only card that is higher than our pair, but it’s much more likely that the other players have a king or a jack in their hand than a seven. So we have the best hand more often than not and if we can fold out hands like pocket twos and king-jack, it’s very good for us.

SS: How often are you going to be betting pocket sixes here against three opponents? Are there going to be many boards that you are going to be betting?

MM: I can’t say whether or not I’m betting the majority or not the majority because I would say it’s very close to half the time. If I had to guess, I would probably be checking slightly over half the boards, but it’s tough to know for sure exactly what percent I’m going to bet.

SS: So our hero bets 4,250, which is exactly half the pot and is only called by the player on the button. Since we got called, do you consider the flop bet a value bet or a bluff?

MM: When we bet the flop, I wouldn’t exactly say that we are value betting or bluffing. I guess if you had to describe it as one thing, I would say that we are betting because we think we have the best hand rather than we are trying to fold out a seven. We certainly aren’t trying to fold out a seven or trying to get him to call with ace-ten. We are largely just betting to try and fold out hands that have a lot of equity against us, which is done primarily as a value bet.

SS: The only information we have on the button is that he is running 17 percent VPIP (Voluntarily Puts Chips Into Pot) and a 10 percent preflop raise. When he flats the flop bet, what range do you put him on here?

MM: I think he has less top pairs than most people. I think most people here have a mixture of top pairs and flush draws and I think a player like that is going to have less hands that contain a seven. I think he is going to have hands like fives and sixes, some small over pairs, and some flush draws that include all of his suited Broadway hands up to A-J suited and all the way down to about 10-9 suited. I doubt this guy is going to have too many 8-6 suited combinations or anything like that.

I would say that we would have to give up on any heart on the turn, and if it is a high card that doesn’t complete a flush, it is kind of a guessing game in terms of what kind of shape we are in.

SS: Well, the turn card is the guessing game card. Are you going to continue to bet and try and fold out some smaller over pairs or are you just going to check and fold?

MM: I would say that the type of player that it’s good to bet against would be the kind of guy that is going to have weak flush draws and top pairs on the flop. This guy, however, with his tight preflop range is going to have more pocket nines and strong flush draws than weak flush draws and 8-7 hands in his range. I don’t hate bet-folding and if I’m bet-folding, I’m betting the majority of rivers as well, but personally, I’d probably just check-fold.

SS: Our hero decided to bet the turn. He bet 8,500 on the turn.

MM: If I were going to bet this turn, I would tend to be betting a little bit bigger here. It’s a good situation that if you are up against a flush draw that you beat to put more money in. Also, if you are betting this turn, you are going to be betting this river. You don’t want to bet here, get called, and just check the river and let him bluff you with worse hands. Additionally, I think if you bet small here, you are betting so large on the river, that you are winning a smaller pot.

Let’s say you bet 8,500 here and then you have 35,000 effective left into a pot of about 35,000. Whereas if you bet 11,500, you would have 32,000 left effectively into a pot of 40,000, so you are just giving yourself a better price on your river bet as well as getting a few more folds on the turn.

SS: What rivers wouldn’t you be betting?

MM: I don’t think I would be betting heart rivers most of the time. His timing on the turn matters a lot too in figuring out whether or not he has heart draws or stronger hands. But we bet so small on the turn that I don’t think we would be gaining that much information on whether or not he has a draw, so I don’t think I would be bluffing heart rivers.

I think I’m betting high card rivers. Any card ten or higher, just because it would make his life more difficult with stuff like nines and also coupled with the small turn bet, he would have more 7-x hands in his range.

I think I check-fold a six though. I still think fives could be one of his likely hands here, so even though we would river a set, I don’t think he would be betting a lot of top pair hands. If he bet small I would call, if it looked like he was betting K Q for value or something. I would also be giving up on some small, board pairing cards as well.

SS: The river is an offsuit queen so the flush draw missed and it’s one of the cards that you said you would be betting. There is a only a pot sized bet left on the river, so would you just be jamming this river?

MM: I would have check-folded the turn, but as played I would just be jamming the river here as well.

SS: What kind of showdown value do we have here if our hero decided to check the river.

MM: Not much. Pretty much just flush draws that don’t contain a king or a queen in them.

SS: How much of a factor does the bubble play into how often he should be barreling here?

MM: It’s a tough question to answer because I don’t know enough about the player. He could be someone who is splashy in small pots, but really tight in big pots, he could be someone who is tight to get into a pot, but is then not really willing to fold. It’s just really tough to say how exactly somebody is going to react on the bubble because there are so many different types of people you could encounter.