Getting Out Of The Way

When facing a raise and a three-bet, it is important that you understand how tightly you should play based on your opponents’ ranges. In the most extreme situation, when a tight player raises from first position and another tight player three-bets from second position, you should fold every hand besides A-A and K-K. This may seem exorbitantly tight, but take a look at how J-J fares versus even two reasonably tight ranges:

J-J 33.15%
6-6+,A-10s, K-Js, Q-Js, J-10s, 10-9s, 9-8s, 8-7s, A-Jo, K-Qo 24.56%
10-10+, A-Qs+, A-Ko 42.29%

The second line in the image is the preflop raiser’s range and the third line is the tight three-bettors range. If you four-bet with J-J and all the money goes in, you will be against only premium hands:

J-J 36.56%
J-J+, A-Ks, A-Ko 63.44%

Playing for all the money with 36 percent equity is not where you want to be. Sure, you will make your opponents fold some small portion of the time, but most of the time, you will be crushed. Do not fall into the awful habit of thinking that you “must” go broke every time you have a traditionally strong hand. The factor that determines your hand’s value is the ranges you are up against. If you are against only premium hands, you need an incredibly strong hand to enter the pot.

In the real world versus normal players, with 75-big blind effective stacks, when faced with an early position raise to three big blinds and a three-bet from another early position player to nine big blinds, I suggest you four-bet to 23 big blinds with A-A, K-K, Q-Q, and A-K and be willing to get all-in with all of them. You should fold everything else, including J-J and A-Q. Calling is not a great option because you will have a difficult time playing your hand after the flop.

Imagine you called instead of folded from middle position with A-Q. The flop comes Q-7-5. If the three-bettor bets and you call, if you face any additional aggression on the turn or river, it is safe to assume you are against top pair, top kicker or a better made hand. This should lead you to fold, but if you are folding this hand, you are folding almost every hand in your range, making you easy to run over. The same holds true for when you call with J-J and the flop comes with three under cards. Instead of getting involved in this situation that has huge reverse implied odds (meaning you will either win a small pot or lose a large pot), simply fold.

You may be thinking that if we are only four-betting with the nuts that our opponents can exploit us by folding every time. While that is true, remember we are laying them excellent pot odds to call before the flop by four-betting to 23 big blinds. If our opponents fold hands like 10-10 and J-10 suited, they are folding hands that are getting roughly the right price to call.

You may be wondering why I advocate four-betting A-K and getting all-in with it because A-K actually doesn’t fare so well versus a premium all-in range:

A-Ks 45.68%
10-10+, A-Qs+, A-Ko 54.32%

The problem with folding once you put in 23 out of your 75-big blind stack is that you only need to win 34 percent of the time to break even. Against an extremely strong range of only J-J+ and A-K, your A-K offsuit will win 40 percent of the time. When you only need to win 34 percent of the time and you will win 40 percent of the time, you cannot justify folding unless you are on the bubble of a tournament. The only other time you should consider folding A-K offsuit is when you are against the super-nit range of Q-Q+ and A-K suited.

This same logic of playing tightly versus a raise and a three-bettor also applies when the action is coming from players in later positions. Even when facing a cutoff raise and a button three-bet, you should play somewhat snuggly from the blinds. In general, when you have to risk a ton of chips before the flop, you should only play your best hands because you do not need to stick around often at all to take advantage of your opponents’ large bets. This also holds true when playing in cash games where a player normally plays tightly but when he raises, he makes it 15 big blinds. Just sit back and wait for the nuts.

While it is exciting to ram and jam all-in with a wide range, unless you are against two overly loose, aggressive opponents, you should bide your time and wait until your opponents have weaker ranges. ♠

Jonathan Little is a two-time WPT champion with more than $6 million in tournament winnings. Each week, he posts an educational blog and podcast at JonathanLittlePoker.com, where you can get a FREE poker training video that details five things you must master if you want to win at tournament poker. You can also sign up for his FREE Excelling at No Limit Hold’em webinars at HoldemBook.com/signup.