When I Was A Donk – Tom Cannulli

In this series, Card Player asks top pros to rewind back to their humble beginnings and provide insights regarding the mistakes, leaks, and deficiencies that they had to overcome in order to improve their games.

Tom Cannuli made a name for himself in the summer of 2015 when he final tabled the World Series of Poker main event. The New Jersey-native earned $1,426,283 for his sixth-place finish.

Although he started out as a cash-game grinder, the 24-year-old pro now plays more live tournaments than ever as an ambassador for 888Poker.

Here, Cannuli talks about how his three-betting frequency would get him into trouble.

I’d say that even as recently as two years ago, my three-betting frequency was way too high. There was a point in time where, if I felt it, I was going to pull the trigger. If I felt there was even the slightest hint of weakness or if I felt they couldn’t have the top of their range, then it didn’t matter what my cards were, I was going to three-bet.

You can get away with that for a while, and it becomes a nice, easy way to accumulate chips without having to win a showdown. But once you start doing it too often, your opponents will adjust and start either four-betting you or calling to put you in a tough spot on the flop. My problem is that I would compound my mistakes by three-betting, and then barreling on the flop. If you do that a couple of times unsuccessfully, it can get very expensive for your stack.

These days, I’ve tightened up my three-betting frequency a bit and it’s helped. Not only do the three-bets get through more often, but it’s also allowed me to be more selective when I get played back at. If I three-bet in position, and my opponent four-bets, now it’s a little easier to see when someone has a real hand or if they are just tired of me raising and want to make a stand. A lot of the time you can just let it go, but every once in a while you can see the wheels turning and you know that they are making a move, and that’s when I come in with the five-bet.

But you obviously don’t want to three-bet, fold too often. When I three-bet, I’m doing it with the confidence that my opponent will fold, that he will just call or that I will five–bet. If someone does something to show significant strength, then I will reevaluate, but for the most part, I think I’m picking my spots a lot better these days. ♠