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December 29 — Tweet Reversal — In drop games like in California you should chop

One of the first articles that I ever wrote for Card Player told people that they should not chop in big bet games. My argument was basically that players would get so rattled if you “played” that they would make very poor decisions after the flop. I gave an example of a player that stacked off to me with Q-5 offsuit for three big streets on a queen-high board against my overpair.

Although my argument did have merit at the time, I am here to say that I have changed my mind on the topic, especially in drop games like we have in Southern California. Now, if you are in a time game, then I really see no reason to chop. The rake is not costing you any money, so my original argument about heads-up confrontation is very valid.

However, it is the rake, and especially games that take a full drop after the flop, not a percentage, which has made me change my mind. In Los Angeles, in the $5-$10 games that I play in, the drop is $5+$1 on the river plus $1 for the bad beat jackpot—no matter how small the pot is. A lot of people are unfamiliar with this structure, coming from places like Las Vegas where the money is collected as a “rake,” say five percent up to a $5 cap.

In a raked game, depending on the structure, the decision to chop could go either way. The deeper the stacks, the more unlikely it is that I will chop. But in a drop games, you just cannot beat the casino. I mean, would you play someone heads up for $7 per hand? I would think absolutely not. You probably would not be able to beat one of the biggest fish in the world with that type of money coming out of the pot, especially in a capped game.

The other quirky thing about games in Los Angeles, however, is that even when you do chop, they still take a modified drop. I remember 10 years ago when I first started playing, it was 50 cents. Now it is two dollars. But after losing even two dollars to the drop after chopping, it still makes sense to chop when, if you just limp, as much as 20 percent of the pot will be taken by the house.

You can imagine that if I am advocating chopping the blinds in $5-$10 games what I think about $5 blind games. A lot of the games here in Los Angeles are now $5-$5, so it doesn’t require you to complete any amount of money in the small blind if it gets folded to you. If both blinds were heads-up and checked their options, $6 of the $10 pot would be dropped! And if it got checked down to the river, an additional $1 – totaling 70 percent of the pot. That really is an incredible amount. Remember when you are dealing with flat drop games or heavily-percentaged rake games, the best idea is to chop.

January 2 — The pace of your opponent’s turn call will oftentimes give away the strength and value of his hand

One of the most common situations that occurs in no-limit hold’em is after you take the lead betting, an opponent check-calls your flop bet and then checks to you on the turn when a front door draw completes. A lot of people get lost in this situation and they check behind by default because they are scared of the draw or for pot control. But, like another article that I wrote last year explained, your opponent has a lot more top pair-types of hands combination-wise in their range than draws, especially when the top card is high and you hold an overpair.

Let us take a look at an example of a hand that I played a few weeks ago at $5-$10 no-limit in Los Angeles. The pot folded around to me preflop and I looked down at A A in the cutoff. I opened to $35 and only the big blind called. The flop came out K 5 4 and the big blind checked. I made a continuation bet for value of $55 and the big blind quickly called. The turn brought the 8, one of the most draw completing cards in the deck. The big blind checked again and I pondered my options. Should I check behind here, scared of a flush or a straight? Well, this idea is pretty illogical unless I was going to fold to a bet on the river, no matter what came, or value bet when checked to at the end. However, I still thought that I could get two streets of value from a king, especially with a diamond kicker, so I decided to bet again and carefully study my opponent. A lot of times, a player will look back and check his cards when the third of a suit comes out to check to see if he has a flush draw. Other times, you may not see a player check at all which, to me, is indicative of him having an actual made hand that he does not need to check, like in this case a straight or a flush. Other times, of course, people feign like they are checking their cards when they have the nuts, so you have to pay close attention to this. In this case, the player did check his cards and called again. The river brought a blank and he check-called about a two-thirds pot size bet and I won a nice pot with my A-A.

Now anybody can win a decent size pot with an overpair versus a top pair-type hand, but what about when you are bluffing? Should we be paying attention to the same type of things in the way that our opponent calls the turn? Absolutely! In another hand I played from that session, I opened the pot on the button to $30 with A Q and the big blind called. The flop came out K 9 2 and the big blind checked. I thought that this was a pretty good board to make a continuation bet bluff of $45 and I was prepared to fire again on the turn due to the dynamics of the hand (button vs blind) heads up. In other situations, I might only plan on firing one time on this board, but I thought my opponent’s range could be rather wide in this situation. The turn is the 3 and my opponent checked once again. Now, some people might think that I should shut down at this point. I cannot beat a king and now the flush draw came in. However, I thought this player might fold a nine if I bet again and I did not want to give him a free card with a gutshot Broadway draw and a random club, so I fired $115.

This is a great example of watching the way in which my opponent calls the turn. If he paused, looked at his cards and thought for a while, I would have thought that his “ranged was capped” at a king, with or without a flush draw. And if the river rolled off a disconnected non-club and I fired huge, I thought it would really be difficult for him to call with a hand like K-10. However, in this situation, the player never looked back at his hand. He actually did not take too much time with it and called again. This should have really set warning bells off in my head. The river rolled off the 6 and, once again, the big blind checked. Stupidly, not taking my own advice about accurately noticing turn calling tells, I thought that if I overbet bombed the river, he would not call with a king. So I fired out $575, a more than pot-sized triple barrel bluff, something I rarely ever do at this level. My opponent paused for a moment and said, “how much?” and quickly called. I knew before he even turned over his hand that he had a flush.

I really blew it in this spot, even if my assumption was correct that he would have folded a single-paired king. I should have paid closer attention to the fact that he did not check back at his hand after the turn, usually indicating a hand like two pair or better, not needing to check to see if he had a flush draw kicker with top pair. ♠

Follow Bart for daily strategy tips on Twitter @CrushLivePoker and @BartHanson. Check out his poker training site exclusively made for live cash game play at CrushLivePoker.com where he produces weekly podcasts and live training videos.