Stop Worrying About Getting Outdrawn

Nearly all small stakes no-limit hold’em players live in fear of one thing. Getting outdrawn. It’s the boogeyman.

You are ahead on the turn. You bet. He calls. Here comes the river — not the prettiest card.

You bet. He raises.

You’ve seen this movie before. You know how it ends.

You call anyway. Sure enough, the river card beat you.

It’s time to get really frustrated. Get up. Take a walk. Sit back down. You’re still not over it.

You call a friend. Tell your bad beat story. Rack up. Go home. Think to yourself, “I would have had a winning session today if it weren’t for that one river card. The only reason I ever lose is I keep getting beat on the river.”

Does this sound familiar? If it does, I have some good news and some bad news. The bad news is that your approach to the game is all wrong. The good news is that once you fix your thought process, you’ll never have to worry about getting outdrawn again.

Are You Being Bluffed?

Let’s look back at the example. You bet the scary card on the river, and you got raised.
You called. But why? Why call that last bet?

Let’s make the example concrete. You’re playing $1-$3. You have J-10 and the final board is 10 7 6 J A. You bet the river with what used to be top two, and your opponent raises you.

Can he have a hand that he thinks is good, but is actually worse than yours? The hand just weaker than yours is J-7. If someone bet this river against you and you had J-7, would your first instinct be to raise? I doubt it. I’m not suggesting that everyone plays like you do, but very few players would try to raise J-7 on this board. The same goes for hands like 7-6 and A-K — hands that you beat, and that look like possible winners.

The bottom line is that it’s extremely unlikely your opponent has a hand you beat that he also thinks is worth raising for value.

If that’s true, then when he raises, you’re beat.

Unless he’s bluffing. Are you being bluffed?

In a $1-$3 game, nine times out of ten, the answer is no. Your opponent isn’t trying to bluff you. He just isn’t.

He should be bluffing here. Let’s say you bet $30 into a $50 pot on the river. Your opponent makes it $140 to go. It’s $110 to call, and if you win, you’ll win a $220 pot. He’s offering you 2-to-1, so you need to win one time in three to justify the call. If he’s playing well, he’ll be bluffing here about one out of three, and you can flip a coin to decide whether to call or not.

But that’s not how small stakes players play. They either bluff way, way too often, or they don’t bluff enough. The vast majority don’t bluff. You won’t win anywhere near one out of three to justify the call.

Even if his raise is smaller, you still don’t have odds to call. Say it’s a min-raise. Then it’s $30 to call, and you’ll win a $140 pot. Now it’s nearly 5-to-1 to call, which means you have to win one in six. That’s 17 percent, and he’s not even bluffing that often (particularly when he’s “begging” for a call by min-raising).

Fold. He’s not accidentally raising a worse hand. He’s not bluffing. You’re beat. Fold.
I know you’re frustrated. Get yourself a stress ball. It will set you back about $5 which is a whole lot cheaper than calling these raises.

Now Stop Worrying

You now have license not to pay off when you get beat.

Who cares if you get drawn out on in a $30 pot? In a $50 pot? So you had two pair or top pair — big deal. Those hands get beaten all the time, and the pot is small.

If you live in Alaska, you don’t get mad when it snows in January. And if you play hold’em, you don’t get mad when two pair gets beaten on the river. The key is that you not pay off.

When you pay off the $100 raise, then it’s a big deal. But if you don’t pay off, you got beat in a small pot and lost the minimum. It’s just not something to worry about.
Some Perspective

If you don’t get to showdown, hand values are meaningless. When you bet the flop or turn and everyone folds, you might as well have had 7-2. It doesn’t matter.

So when you actually have something, you want to get to showdown. Again, if the hand ends before showdown, you might as well have had 7-2.

The goal is to get to showdown. Along the way, you want to get some money in the pot. But even more important than that, you want to keep your opponent in the pot with hands you beat.

What do I mean? Say you have 10-7 on a Q-10-7 flop with two hearts. You bet and get called. The turn is a 5 and puts another flush draw out there. With so many ways to get beaten on the river, some players would make a huge turn bet. They want to “win it now.” They’re worried about getting outdrawn.

This is the wrong thought process. If everyone folds, you might as well have had 7-2. You have a hand with showdown value. It needs to see a showdown!

Your goal should be to get money in the pot while also keeping in hands you beat. That means you want to bet an amount that you think hands like Q-9 and Q-J and 9-8 and K 2 will call. They can beat you on the river. So what? They’re big underdogs to do so, and you have a hand that demands to see a showdown.

On the river, if you get beat, so be it. More often than not you won’t get beat. You will win a glorious showdown. You may even get someone to call a river bet.

It you do get outdrawn, you won’t be paying off.

Final Thoughts

Small stakes players make some serious strategic errors that allow you to play a very simple, profitable strategy. When you have value hands, you bet your hand in a way that both gets money in the pot and keeps in worse hands. The goal is to get to showdown, victorious, in a nice-sized pot.

Sometimes you get outdrawn. It’s no big deal, however, since you will refuse to pay off.
Don’t try to blow everyone out of the pot. Don’t pay off if you get outdrawn. Bet your hands for value. Collect the winnings. ♠

Ed’s newest book, Playing The Player: Moving Beyond ABC Poker To Dominate Your Opponents, is on sale at notedpokerauthority.com. Find Ed on Facebook at facebook.com/edmillerauthor and on Twitter @EdMillerPoker.