How To Modernize Your Non-Showdown Winnings

Sexy poker play is all about increased non-showdown winnings. Even the cliché poker tournament all-in confrontation of aces versus kings gets old. True poker fans (and players) love when past history between players allows exploitation, and counter-exploitation. Learning how to get inside your opponent’s mind to increase those non-showdown winnings is exactly what we are about to do.

Non-showdown winnings are essentially chips won from bluffing. Even though we can gain non-showdown winnings by value betting and having an opponent fold, we can only value bet so many hands. On the other hand, bluffing frequencies rarely have limitations. So once you find a weakness in your opponent’s game plan, you can attack it like crazy until she adjusts.

Maximize Exploitive Bluffing Frequency

By utilizing a maximal bluffing frequency against players who allow it, you increase your non-showdown winnings to their limit. As a poker player, you don’t want to leave any potential winnings on the table. When you find a weakness in your opponent’s game, you might feel guilty to exploit it to the fullest extent. Don’t let those thoughts control your play. You’re at the table to win. But, as we all know, solid competition sits at the table to win, too! In recent years, players have improved their game plans and that is why you need to modernize your strategy and increase your non-showdown winnings in those spots that aren’t so obvious. These are spots beyond the understanding of your competition.

Modern Non-Showdown Winnings

A modernized approach to increasing non-showdown value is therefore shrouded in more nuanced spots, those spots where players rarely showdown against the general player pool. In other words, you need to discover those lesser known weaknesses by detecting betting patterns within the game that appear to have a generally high rate of success for the bluffing player. Once you detect plays other people in a game make that seem to work a bit too often, you can attack. When you have located all the weaknesses in your opponents’ game plans, you will have maximized your non-showdown winnings.

Maximizing Non-Showdown Winnings

Maximizing non-showdown winnings is more of an ideal to strive for, rather than a realistic goal. First of all, perfect understanding of every spot in no-limit hold’em is currently impossible for most games. Next, poker is a game of imperfect information. Many observations are simply frequency based, from which you can gather inklings of inconsistencies with solid strategy. Just because your opponent open-folds the button four times in a row does not necessarily mean she is extremely tight. It is certainly more likely that player has an overly tight button open-raising game plan, but you cannot say for sure. On the other hand, if you are deep stacked and your opponent flashes an ace as she folds on the button, then you can be absolutely sure that she plays too tightly.

Identifying Weakness

Your issue now is how to properly locate attackable weaknesses in your opponents’ game plans that increase your non-showdown winnings. We touched on the classic juxtaposition between frequency based information versus heuristic, or observable, information. Observable information is typically more valuable since it allows a direct line into the thought process of our opponent. However, a lot of what is observed is known by your opponent as well, which may allow her to adjust to you. In other words, she knows you know what she did that time she was caught with her hands in the cookie jar. Given that information, how do we know how to act? Maybe a frequency based strategy is the way to go after all!

Introduction To Population Reads

The best marriage of the two approaches to sniffing out great bluffing spots is creating and acting on population reads. Population reads are tendencies of the general poker player in a particular game to act certain ways in similar spots. Those tendencies comprise a player profile, and within those player profiles are several actionable weaknesses that allow you to bluff profitably and increase your non-showdown winnings. Let’s assume that you have open-raised preflop with 8 7 and that you have been called by two snug players in later positions. The board falls 10 9 4 and you have continuation bet (c-bet). The first of the two players calls and the second player folds. Now, the turn is the 2. What’s the best way to play your hand?

Using Your Population Reads

Let’s pretend that you have a population read that players call preflop with a bit too many broadway hands like K-Q, K-J, Q-J. On top of that, you believe that the first player to act after your c-bet is cautious about playing marginal hands like 6 6 on the flop after you bet. You know that he folds them. Lastly, consider that you know that players in this game bet far too often as a bluff with their missed draws; but also, that those bluffs work extremely often. Generally, population reads take the form of “it doesn’t make sense why it works, but it works” because great players would not let habitual bluffers get away with these bets. So with all the information you have about general players in this game, you decide to check-raise all-in on the turn. Your opponent folds and you win the pot. Great news right! Well, almost great news.

Exploring All Your Options

Remember, you are looking to maximize your non-showdown winnings, not simply increase them. You have already decided that our opponent’s turn betting range is vastly dominated by drawing hands that are desperate to win the hand immediately or to make the nuts on the river. You also have decided that your turn check-raise all-in is a profitable bluff, especially since you have a chance to suck out the times we are called. But you have even more options that can gain you even more profit against these types of players. So let’s use those population reads to the best of our ability and check-raise the turn to a very small size. Check-raising so small ensures that your passive and careful opponents will call with their semi-bluffing hands on the turn, and maybe some of their good hands as well. Because those semi-bluffing hands put even more money into the pot, you can move all-in on any river and increase your non-showdown winnings, since the draws are unlikely to hit. You did it! Well, almost you did it.

Cater Your Strategy To Board Developments

Since you want to maximize your non-showdown winnings, you can actually take your river bluffing strategy a step further and cater your bluffing frequency to your opponent’s most likely bet/calling range on the turn. In other words, you have already weighted her turn betting range toward hands like K-Q, K-J and Q-J. Of course, she occasionally has a good hand or a flush draw as well. But, in general, unless the river is a king, queen or eight, you are going to have a very profitable all-in bluff (a jack makes you a straight, and allows you a clear value bet).

Cultivating Fearlessness

You might be on board with a game plan like this specific one now that it has been broken down. Beginning and intermediate players are often fearful of these types of stack-risking bluffs because of the huge downside, losing your stack. Keep in mind that losing your stack is by far less likely than is winning your opponent’s bets and the pot in the middle, not to mention the possibility of improving to a straight on the river and being able to get value from your opponent. Fearlessness can be a powerful byproduct of a complete game plan. Once you totally understand the risks and rewards of situations, the sexiness melts away, and you are left with a profitable and powerful poker strategy that has modernized your non-showdown winnings. ♠

Reid Young is a successful cash game player and poker coach. He is the founder of TransformPoker.com.