Shoving For Value And As a Bluff

There’s an interesting situation that can emerge when you have a reasonably strong made hand with little or no chance of improving on a board where a lot of draws are possible. Though there may be a chance of putting in all your chips drawing dead, the pot can easily be large enough compared to your stack that you can’t get away from your hand. At this point, your chips are committed to the pot, and the only question is how do you want to put them in?

Generally, when you have a draw that’s good, your objective is to maximize your fold equity by making the last bet yourself, whereas when you have a strong made hand you want to give your opponent the opportunity to make the last bet. He probably won’t fold made hands stronger than yours, but you may induce him to bluff with weaker hands by giving him the illusion of fold equity.

The situation I’m going to discuss here differs in that you may not want to induce bluffs from hands that will turn out to have very good equity against you. It’s an odd case where making the last bet with a strong made hand has the potential both to fold out hands that have good equity against you and also potentially induce hero calls from hands with poor equity.

Black Chip Bounty

This first example occurred during a $250 six-handed tournament that featured an additional $100 bounty awarded any time you eliminate a player. Blinds were 1,000-2,000 with a 300 ante, and I opened to 4,400 in first position with A A. The player on the button called, and everyone else folded.

The Q J 10 flop was not exactly ideal for me, but it was too soon to panic. I bet 7,500 planning to fold to a raise but expecting to be ahead — at least for the moment — if called. My opponent called.

The turn was the 6. There was now 28,600 in the pot and 57,400 in my stack. My opponent had something like 80,000 behind. Very little good can happen for me on the river. The three non-heart kings would give me the nuts, but even cards that improve my hand such as the K or a third ace are still not that great for me. If I bet something “normal” like 15,000-to-20,000 on the turn, it might be difficult to get a value bet paid off on a blank river. Basically, I thought I probably had the best hand now, but I really wanted to end the hand one way or the other on the turn.

There are a few ways we could end up getting all-in. I could bet a “normal” amount and then call a shove. Although I’d be priced in, I don’t think I’d be in especially good shape against the range that will jam on me here. Plus this gives my opponent the option just to call and then play the river with money behind, which is what I hoped to avoid.
I could try to check-raise all-in, but this too gives my opponent the option to play the river, in this case for free. I also feared that a lot of the hands against which I have the best equity, such as A-J, wouldn’t bet.

Instead, I decided to do something unconventional and just moved all-in for about twice the pot. This isn’t something I’d often do, but in this exact spot it avoids the problem of having to play the river without turning my hand into a bluff. In other words, there are enough ways that he could look at a hand that I’m crushing and mistakenly decide that he has enough equity to call. K-Q, for example, seems awfully strong, with top pair plus an open-ended straight draw, but actually has just 18 percent equity. Even K 10 has only 34 percent equity, a bit shy of the roughly 40 percent he’d need to call if he knew my hand.

The number of draws on the board also plays to my advantage in that my big shove could easily be perceived as a semibluff with a big draw, leading my opponent to look me up light. Because he covers me, the $100 bounty provides a little extra incentive as well.
He ended up folding, which though not ideal, was still a better outcome for me than having to play the river.

Toppest Pair!

This hand occurred shortly after the dinner break on the first day of an $1,100, ten-handed tournament. Blinds were 500-1,000 with a 100 ante, and a player in middle position opened for 2,300. Based on how he’d been playing and who was in the blinds, I thought he’d have a pretty wide range for opening here, so when I looked down at A-9 in the cutoff, I wasn’t inclined to fold it. If I were suited, I might have just called, but as it was I three-bet to 6,000. The action folded back to him, and he called.
The flop came 9 8 6, and sadly I did not have a diamond. There was 14,500 in the pot, and I had about 48,000, a little over three times the pot, in my stack. My opponent covered me, with about 70,000 in his stack.

Top pair with top kicker isn’t exactly a monster here, but I was pretty sure this player would have four-bet most if not all hands that could have flopped an overpair here, so I felt pretty good about it. I couldn’t see betting and then folding to a raise.

My options, then, were either to check behind, to bet with the intention of getting all-in to a raise, or to move all-in myself. Checking behind was the first thing I ruled out. My hand was too vulnerable, and there were too many turn cards that my opponent could bluff even if they didn’t improve his hand.

When comparing the choice of either moving in myself or betting and getting all-in to a raise, the main question to ask is what are the hands that will fold to a shove but raise a bet? Probably no hand better than mine is folding, but would worse hands check-raise? Yes and no. In some sense, a hand like 7-6 or K-Q with a diamond is worse than mine. But 7 6 has 46 percent equity, and K Q is actually a slight favorite with 53 percent equity. If a shove could get these hands to fold, that would be great for me.

If I thought my opponent would check-raise as a pure bluff, with some sort of airball hand that would fold to a shove, there would be a lot of value in giving him room to do that. On this board texture, though, I don’t expect that to happen.

Although there was no bounty in this event, the presence of draws that I could be bluffing still gives my opponent some incentive to look me up with hands that I crush. In fact, if he misreads my hand as something like A K, it may cause him both to fold hands I want him to fold, such as K Q, and call with hands I want him to call, such as 10 9.

I shoved and he folded, which was again a fine outcome. ♠

Andrew Brokos is a professional poker player, writer and coach. He blogs about poker strategy on ThinkingPoker.net and is co-host of the Thinking Poker Podcast. Andrew is also interested in education reform and founded an after-school debate program for urban youth.