Please forgive the long/rambling nature of this post; I'm pretty new to posting about strategy, and I guess I'm just longwinded by nature. I hope you get something out of this.

It seems I've picked a less than fortuitous time to start a blog. I'm taking the LSAT in a week, so I have to devote some time every day to preparations. The whole LSAT studying process has actually stirred some thoughts about how studying (and other "academic" endeavors) relate to poker; hell, I may use that as fodder for a future blog entry. I also have some other writing to do, and I have to prepare for Vegas and WSOP. Oh, and I have to satisfy that several-hour-a-day goofing off addiction; perhaps spending dozens of hours playing live over the next couple months will help cure me of this. Or at least make me goof off more efficiently. Either way, it doesn't leave a lot of time for blog writing. Anyway, enough with the digressions, on with the poker.

I took a break from LSAT prep and writing yesterday to play a little poker, especially the Sunday tournaments. A couple marginally interesting hands came up during the 'stars Sunday Million and the 'stars 2nd chance that illustrate something that many new-to-moderately-experienced MTT players miss out on. That is, what to do preflop when you have a big hand in early position and there's a raise in front of you. It's a situation that happens pretty rarely, but it can gain you a lot of expectation if you play it properly. To wit, I almost never put in a third bet in this situation, and if you're playing against a table full of perceptive players, I don't think it's ever correct to reraise in this spot.

I had never thought much about this until few months ago. At that point, I would almost automatically three-bet big hands preflop, no matter the position. One night, I was playing a 'stars MTT and happened to be at the same table as a very good player with whom I occasionally discuss MTT strategy. It was fairly early so the stacks were deep by tournament standards. Someone opened UTG, and I made a moderately-sized three-bet with KK UTG+1. Everyone folded, including both the good player (who was in late position or one of the blinds, I forget) and the UTG raiser. I won a smallish pot, and didn't think much of it at the time.

After I busted out of the tournament, the aforementioned good player sent me a hand history over AIM. I skimmed it, and noticed that he folded QQ preflop. Strange. I looked closer, saw a UTG raise, and saw my screen name 3-betting UTG+1. He didn't just ask if his laydown was good. He knew it was good, he just wanted to know whether I had aces or kings. He also implied that, had I just called, he would have 3-bet himself. Not only did my raise prevent me from getting UTG's chips, it prevented me from getting a boatload of chips in as a 4:1 favorite against the good player behind me! I thought about this for a while, and decided that very little good can come from raising big hands in that spot.

The big problem, as you might have figured out, is that a raise there really telegraphs my hand as big. Nobody is restealing against a UTG raiser (whose hand is presumably much stronger than average) when there are 7 people left to act. So, that makes the range super-narrow. Even if you do get a call behind you, you're probably not going to get a ton of chips in as a favorite postflop, as it is so easy for people to put you on a huge hand. And, you can't really "mix it up" to disguise this; 3-betting speculative hands in early position is just asking for trouble; when someone wakes up with a real hand behind you, or the UTG raiser has a real hand, you'll simply be forced to throw your hand away too much to make it profitable.

So, the simple solution is never three-betting in this spot. This has a couple advantages:
1) You can play other hands here. This is really two advantages rolled into one. You allow yourself to play some speculative hands (lower pocket pairs, for instance), and you disguise your monsters, so that even if it ends up being you vs. UTG, you still likely have a large equity edge (and position) going into the flop. You mix up your play cheaply, instead of either mixing it up expensively or playing your hand face-up.
2) OK, this is really another consequence of advantage number 1, but you might induce a squeeze, or someone behind you might 3-bet a "real" hand that's slightly worse than your hand. Then you can play your hand accordingly; against some opponents call, see a flop, and hope to stack off. Against others, you can 4-bet and hope to get a lot of money in the pot when you know you're likely to have an edge. Oh, and when you call with those speculative hands (or hands like AK, QQ-JJ, and sometimes even KK if there is heavy action behind), you can fold without having sacrificed a large number of chips.

Sure, there are disadvantages to this, and perhaps some exceptions to this "rule" as well (a lot of which obviously depend on stack sizes; e.g. when somewhat shallower or waaaaay deeper, 3-betting is ok). The most notable disadvantage is that you may get an "avalanche" of callers behind you, and you'll have to play your AA against 5 people. A lot of times you'll have to give up on the flop or turn in this situation, at least if you don't want to have a dangerous "stack off with AA all the time no matter what" mentality. But it still beats playing your hand face-up, IMO.

Anyway, here are a couple hands where I used this "rule" in this week's Sunday Million.

In this first hand, it's early on in the tournament. I recognize UTG's name from twoplustwo as someone who doesn't seem to play a lot of higher buyin tournaments. So, he's not a donk, but he's probably not an insanely tricky player who will make my decisions tough when I have position on him.

PokerStars No-Limit Hold'em Tourney, Big Blind is t50 (9 handed) pokerhand.org hand converter

UTG (t10075)
UTG+1 (t10050)
Hero (t9925)
MP2 (t10400)
MP3 (t9875)
CO (t9525)
Button (t9925)
SB (t10000)
BB (t10275)

Preflop: Hero is MP1 with K, A.
1 fold, UTG+1 raises to t150, Hero calls t150, 5 folds, BB calls t100.

Flop: (t475) A, 4, 5 (3 players)
BB checks, UTG+1 bets t300, Hero calls t300, BB calls t300.

Turn: (t1375) 8 (3 players)
BB checks, UTG+1 bets t1111, Hero calls t1111, BB folds.

River: (t3597) 6 (2 players)
UTG+1 checks, Hero bets t2500, UTG+1 calls t2500.

Final Pot: t8597

Here, I get a bit lucky in that I flop TPTK (or, as Jamie Gold put it, OMG TOP-TOP OMG), the pot is only 3-handed, and I have position. Had I 3-bet preflop, I probably would have won the pot right there (or gotten 4-bet and have to fold). On the flop, I feel like I'm way ahead or way behind, and I don't want to blast my opponent off worse aces or pocket pairs; in fact, I'd rather just let him keep betting into me with 2-3 outs. Even though it's the Sunday Million, I think this particular opponent is knowledgeable enough to avoid stacking off for 200 BBs with AQ-AT on a dryish flop. Given his UTG raise, I think it's fair to assume his range is tight, and that I'm likely way ahead of those hands, or at worst letting two big spades bet into me. But, I'm obviously not going to lose a big pot if a third spade hits.

The turn changes nothing, so I continue to let him bet into me.

On the river, he checks. There aren't really any diamond draws he could have, and I really put him on a worse ace or maybe something like KK. So, I think it's a good spot for a value bet, as he might look me up with those hands. I get lucky and he calls with AJ. Some people said they'd check behind here, but I really think I have too much value to do so given his range.


In this next hand, I'm not exactly in early position, so I don't hate 3-betting here as much. I still think calling is better, due to many of the reasons I stated above. Especially the "inducing a squeeze" and "getting a ton of chips in preflop with for-sure the best of it" reasons. I was told this is standard, but, hell, I used to think reraising here was standard. I guess there' always more to learn, which is part of why I enjoy poker so much.

PokerStars No-Limit Hold'em Tourney, Big Blind is t50 (9 handed) pokerhand.org hand converter

MP1 (t10325)
MP2 (t5989)
Hero (t14461)
CO (t10325)
Button (t9800)
SB (t8975)
BB (t9925)
UTG (t10450)
UTG+1 (t9800)

Preflop: Hero is MP3 with A, A.
2 folds, MP1 raises to t150, 1 fold, Hero calls t150, 1 fold, Button raises to t550, 2 folds, MP1 calls t400, Hero raises to t2700, Button calls t2150, MP1 calls t2150.

Flop: (t8175) 3, 8, 2 (3 players)
MP1 bets t7625 (All-In), Hero raises to t11761, Button folds.

Turn: (t27561) 5 (2 players, 1 all-in)

River: (t27561) 7 (2 players, 1 all-in)

Final Pot: t27561

(the BB had QQ and I won a huge pot for this stage of the tournament; not like I really did anything with those chips later, but them's the breaks)


Here's a hand where someone doesn't follow my advice, and profits anyway. Unfortunately, at my expense. He not only reraises a UTG opener, he jams for 50 BBs. Had he merely raised to 13500, I'm confident I could have folded QQ in this spot, as that is almost always AA-KK in my experience. His push really made me discount AA-KK from his range, and made me put him on JJ, TT, or AK, with an outside possibility of KK. Unfortunately for me, he had KK. I still think my call was a good one given my read (he seemed pretty loose, and very aggro). But, sometimes even good spots to gamble have negative results, and you don't win tournaments by folding :P.

PokerStars No-Limit Hold'em Tourney, Big Blind is t1500 (8 handed) pokerhand.org hand converter

MP1 (t27275)
MP2 (t59512)
CO (t81673)
Button (t19544)
Hero (t59282)
BB (t32020)
UTG (t35707)
UTG+1 (t75044)

Preflop: Hero is SB with Q, Q.
UTG raises to t4500, UTG+1 raises to t74969, 4 folds, Hero calls t58457 (All-In), 1 fold, UTG folds.

Flop: (t138376) J, T, 3 (2 players, 1 all-in)

Turn: (t138376) 5 (2 players, 1 all-in)

River: (t138376) A (2 players, 1 all-in)

Final Pot: t138376





Wheeeew, that was quite a long post. I guess I'll go back to LSAT practice, but not before I finish watching the season premiere of Hell's Kitchen. Damn, I love that show. Hope you enjoyed this post, and I hope to hear some arguments and thoughts in the comments. Also, I'd love to hear suggestions on what everyone would like to hear me write about in future blog posts, because I'm not all too good at coming up with writing ideas on my own.