Hey guys..
I"ve only been playing HUSNG's since I joined this site in January... so excuse my ignorance. Say we call a raise from the button with AQ vs. an aggressive player; flop Q72 rainbow. My normal line is to c/c for value because an aggressive player will recongnize a dry board and
1) villain will likely to bet his entire range (small pair, weak made hand or total air).
2) checking calling allows me to rep a "float" or a weak hand allowing me to bluff catch his barrel on the turn or his big bet on river...
3) check raising is bad because it "narrows" all the hands that can reasonalbly call and folds out most weaker hands that would continue bluffing or betting (like pocket 9's).
But lately I've been challenging this train of thought. If you read the forums here and on 2p2, you can see how most people struggle with habitual 3 bettors. 3 bet pots seem to put people back on their heels.
So I see a reraised pot as an opportunity for my opponent to make a greater mistake. Why not create this dynamic more often... especially when I believe I have the best hand?
My thought is if I check raised more flops...I could then balance my semibluffs by checkraising TPTK, 2 Pair, Trips for value... because I could expect villians to float more often... and stack off weaker made hands.
I decided to experiment and play a normal speed game as I thought about this post. I fired up FTP. What do you know? My first hand was JJ in the BB. Villiain minraised, I reraised to 120, call. Flop JT4 rainbow. Villain potted it for 240, I re-raised to 540. Villian ships, call. Villian shows A4. Whoops! He drawing dead by the Turn. Not sure why he did that. Maybe he thought he had the best hand. Maybe he was bluffing. Or maybe he was high on cocaine. All I know is: 1 hand. I have the best hand. Game Over. Easy game. And the best part about it... it happened so fast... Villain insta-hits re-match.
Perhaps this is a bad example... , this was a bad $5 player, but my point is... isn't this what I should be doing to bad $5 players? Shouldn't I be bloating the pot when I have the best hand and not c/calling my trip Jacks, because I think he has a weak hand?
I used to think that keeping pots small was better because I made better poker decisions more often. I would grind my opponents down until they start shoving their stack out of frustration. I still believe that is the way to defeat some villians (tight players, passive players). But against bad AGGRESSIVE players, I'm now more likely to bloat the pot.... choosing to check raise all my strong hands vs. bluff catching... for value. Thoughts?
yes this works. in very, very specific cases. the conditions are facing a full blown maniac (this has nothing to do with villain beein agressive +bad, and or a sick setup in your favor. i highly feel like the nature of this beeing the first hand helped aswell, cuz in some heads the first hand is all about feeling the other guy out and villain propably just feels like a victim of circumstances haha).
there's nothin wrong with you reasoning per se, but i feel like there's danger in overvalueing such strategies.
(un)fortunately poker is never easy, and there is much danger in thinkin one has figured something out that makes life easier.
dunno... i hope you know what i mean anyway :)
I also started doing this and just started putting as much money in as possible on every single street and the first two matches I ran into two terrible players who just gave me their money in terrible spots. I thought "I am fcking amazing at poker, how did I not know this before." But then I ran into a couple tight and passive players who I owned myself against and when I went back to look at the matches I lost them because I got zero value out of my big hands and it felt like I wasn't getting any hands because I wasn't getting value out of my big hands. It's all player dependent make the right adjustments early in the game and you will most likely be making the correct plays.
Thanks for responding...
However... I'm not arguing for jamming every street... on any board texture..... vs. any opponent. I'm not "going maniac". And I'm certainly not advocating not getting reads.
I'm just want to focus on those somewhat CLEAR moments when we likely have the best hand... preflop & postflop.... and we can assume that our villain is loose and aggressive. These moments occur frequently IMHO. Hit TPGK, hit a draw, put a guy on a float.... I used to think extract value... now I'm thinking... end the game. And the easiest way to play for stacks... isn't to value bet him... it's to let my aggressive opponent put money in the pot and check raise him.
Of course, there are moments when you are behind or get outflopped. We are constantly evaluating. My JJ would have shrunk against an AKx flop. If Villian is clever enough... they could bet to induce. Everything is exploitable/player dependent.
My point is... against random aggressive players... check raising MORE OFTEN seems more profitable. I feel it could be superior to bluff catching.
Does my thought process seem sound?
Absolutely.
Fighting aggression with... aggression, is almost always the key.
Many players just want to wait until they have hands, or think "this is so easy if I have a hand." Yea, it is easy when you flop 3-4 good pairs vs a maniac in a row. But that's not what happens most of the time, and you can very well have solid leads in matches where you do not hit a single flop.
Think about what your opponent is doing and why, and don't curl up into a ball. This also applies to preflop poker. If a guy is aggressive, don't just auto limp every hand, or polarize your ranges. Start minraising, mess with your ranges to best exploit him.
And don't be afraid to fire two or three barrels with air. If it's a spot that makes sense to do so in... do it.