Driving the big car in NLHE
When I'm behind the wheel of Susanne's 6,000-pound Mercedes ML550 sport utility vehicle, I notice something that I don't when I'm driving my unarmored Mazda 6: people are less willing to take chances and we never end up with some kind of crazy last-second collision that is a possibiliity when I'm driving the '6.
I think it's a good analogy with NLHE. When you are in the small car (weak hand like offsuit face cards and weak suited aces) and especially when you are in the small car out of position, you don't want to risk running headlong into a train. That means not calling raises with marginal starting hands that are likely to be dominated when you're in early position. Sometimes when you try to "trap," you get trapped!
When you're in the big car (decent hands in position), you still want to make sure the small hands don't run into you, and you mainly do this by using their weakness and weakness of position against them.
That is, especially in 6-max games, preflop raising your big cards on the button or in the cutoff after a limper or two and keeping the pressure on out of position players on the flop.
The preflop raising punishes weaker cards that can't (and shouldn't) stand a raise from seeing the flop. And you might even nix some better cards, such as KJo or KQo, which are hard to play out of position to a raise.
In Ed Miller's recent post that Gnome pointed out, Miller talks about how good limit players have a "raising reflex" which should be unlearned and reconsidered in NLHE.
He also advocates controlling the pot size, particularly by calling on the flop.
I'm a big advocate of keeping the pot manageable in situations in which you don't know where you are, but I feel like flop calling in NLHE flys in the face of the CR offense. If you feel like you have the best hand, you need to bet/raise accordingly. And punish limp/callers by continuation betting, when you have it and especially when you don't. If guessers are losers according to Amarillo Slim, you're forcing them to make bad choices out of position. And that's how you make money, by picking up their sacrificed chips from trash cards or stacking them when you do have it.
Or get rid of it, say if an early player bets out the flop. Depending on the situation, your TP may not be good at all. The more pressure you put on the table, the better you'll be able to assess the field -- which players will always scurry from your bets and raises and which players are apt to play back at you. And it'll help you know when to get rid of a hand when one of these players strangely is keeping up with your aggression for no reason at all.
Gnome actually explains these concepts a lot better in this March 13 post when Ed Miller's NLHE book came out.
Taylor Caby's CR offense is actually more tempered -- consider your image while you're being LAGgy. If you haven't been doing anything for a while, it's likely time to jack it up instead of when you've been raising it up three or four times in a row. Pressure -- but not too much!
So if you have the big car in NLHE, drive it accordingly and use its advantages to your advantage -- and profit.
I think it's a good analogy with NLHE. When you are in the small car (weak hand like offsuit face cards and weak suited aces) and especially when you are in the small car out of position, you don't want to risk running headlong into a train. That means not calling raises with marginal starting hands that are likely to be dominated when you're in early position. Sometimes when you try to "trap," you get trapped!
When you're in the big car (decent hands in position), you still want to make sure the small hands don't run into you, and you mainly do this by using their weakness and weakness of position against them.
That is, especially in 6-max games, preflop raising your big cards on the button or in the cutoff after a limper or two and keeping the pressure on out of position players on the flop.
The preflop raising punishes weaker cards that can't (and shouldn't) stand a raise from seeing the flop. And you might even nix some better cards, such as KJo or KQo, which are hard to play out of position to a raise.
In Ed Miller's recent post that Gnome pointed out, Miller talks about how good limit players have a "raising reflex" which should be unlearned and reconsidered in NLHE.
He also advocates controlling the pot size, particularly by calling on the flop.
I'm a big advocate of keeping the pot manageable in situations in which you don't know where you are, but I feel like flop calling in NLHE flys in the face of the CR offense. If you feel like you have the best hand, you need to bet/raise accordingly. And punish limp/callers by continuation betting, when you have it and especially when you don't. If guessers are losers according to Amarillo Slim, you're forcing them to make bad choices out of position. And that's how you make money, by picking up their sacrificed chips from trash cards or stacking them when you do have it.
Or get rid of it, say if an early player bets out the flop. Depending on the situation, your TP may not be good at all. The more pressure you put on the table, the better you'll be able to assess the field -- which players will always scurry from your bets and raises and which players are apt to play back at you. And it'll help you know when to get rid of a hand when one of these players strangely is keeping up with your aggression for no reason at all.
Gnome actually explains these concepts a lot better in this March 13 post when Ed Miller's NLHE book came out.
Taylor Caby's CR offense is actually more tempered -- consider your image while you're being LAGgy. If you haven't been doing anything for a while, it's likely time to jack it up instead of when you've been raising it up three or four times in a row. Pressure -- but not too much!
So if you have the big car in NLHE, drive it accordingly and use its advantages to your advantage -- and profit.
posted by kurokitty at
2:43 PM
1 Comments:
Good post.
Certainly there's a place for cold calling flop bets with top pair, but raising is frequently the better option. I think Miller got sick of hearing "raise or fold!" and decided to write a post about it, which is fine, but there's no reason to go overboard.
In our conversation that led to this topic, I was actually referring to Miller's previous post titled, "Building a No-Limit Hold’em Starting Hand Chart – Playing in Early Position." In that post, (http://www.notedpokerauthority.com/articles/
building-a-no-limit-holdem-starting-
hand-chart-playing-in-early-position.html#more-322) he suggests throwing in more open limps and minraises. Maybe it works for him, but that's not my style -- nor is it the style of many cash game experts.
By
Gnome, at 9:57 PM
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