|
Poker players are not liars. Likewise,
a bluff is not a lie - it
is a test. Thinking of a bluff as a test of your
opponent rather
than a lie can lay the groundwork for a paradigm shift worth
a
whole lot of money.
First of all, know your opponent. Knowing your
opponent is the
most important skill any poker player possesses. While
every
player does it differently, Phil Hellmuth classifies players
by
identifying them as one of five animal counterparts:
1. The Mouse - The Mouse is the most conservative of
players
and almost never raises without an extremely powerful
hand. This is the
player who tends to be the easiest to rob of
blinds, but the hardest to come
over the top of.
2. The Jackal - The Jackal is the
exact opposite of the
Mouse and bets with reckless abandon. This is the
player who
bets with trash and gets himself deep into hands that he has
no
business being in. While generally protective of their blinds,
this is
a player who is extremely susceptible to strong river
bets and coming over
the top of.
3. The Elephant - The Elephant is the most
passive of
players, and seldom does anything but call. They play a lot
of
hands and suffer from that most costly of poker diseases: "my
card is
coming; I just need to hold on until the river."
Generally it is a useless
venture to bluff an elephant because
they don't really care what you have,
they're there to see some
cards and will end up deep into pots with mediocre
draws.
4. The Lion - The Lion is a good poker player.
The Lion
has solid hand requirements but still plays trash from time
to
time to avoid being labeled a mouse. The Lion is difficult to
take
advantage of as he could be holding anything, but tends to
be holding
something strong.
5. The Eagle - God only knows what
the Eagle actually is,
but Hellmuth calls himself one. Presumably, the Eagle
is a
top-tier poker God like Doyle Brunson or Phil Ivey. The Eagle is
the
player who always has position on you, always has better
cards and ends up
with your chips. It is worth noting that some
very successful pros have
failed to reach Eagle status in
Hellmuth's book, most notably Gus Hansen. As
Phil Hellmuth is
the prime example of the Eagle, perhaps it is also the
player
who squawks the most at the table.
The first thing that Phil
Hellmuth does at a poker table is
identify his opponents. He takes it easy,
playing only premium
hands while carefully observing his opponents' betting
patterns.
Remember that knowing your opponent does not mean establishing
a
psychic connection whereby you magically see the cards they are
holding
written across their face. "Knowing your opponent" means
to see the
underlying pattern in their betting. Once in a while,
you might pick up a
"tell", or subconscious physical movement
which signals hand strength.
However in most cases, players do
not twitch their left eye every time they
pick up Aces -- a tell
usually has more to do with a basic attitude change or
shift in
a player's posture. Once Phil has identified everyone's
animal
style, he goes about his Eagle work exploiting each
player's
specific weakness.
Once you have established exactly who it
is that you are playing
against, it's time to go about taking advantage of
them.
Remember that if you know what your opponent has or is likely
to
have, your cards become meaningless. So the presupposition
behind most
of these bets is that you do not have very good
cards.
1. Blind-Stealing. If you plan on succeeding in
tournament
play, you have to be able to steal blinds. It's less
important in cash games
but crucial in tournament play,
especially once those blinds have started to
get big. It is most
easy to steal blinds when you are on the dealer button as
there
is no one left to act after you but the big and small blinds.
Look
for situations where tight players (the Mouse in Hellmuth's
world) with
healthy chip stacks are in the big blind. It is
important to make sure that
they have a lot of chips (at least
15 times the big blind) as they may have
to call a raise with
any two cards if they are too short. Raise enough that
for them
to call they would have to have a good hand. That way, even
if
they call, you will have some idea of what they are holding and
can
make a more informed decision on the flop.
2. Coming Over the
Top. This bet is when your opponent
has made a bet or raise, and
you "come over the top" with an
additional raise of your own. Look for a
situation where an
overly aggressive player (the Jackal in Hellmuth's world)
has
entered a pot looking to steal. A classic example of this would
be a
player trying to take your blind. Here are two ways to come
over the top as a
blind in such a hand:
* Re-Raise pre-Flop - The
aggressive player raises from a
suspicious position like the Button and you
triple or quadruple
his bet before a single community card hits the table.
Make sure
you raise enough to really put pressure on the bettor. This
bet
is doubly effective as it sends a message to the table to stay
away
from your blind because you will re-raise.
* Call then
Check-Raise - This bet is a little trickier
as it requires more
things to go right, but it can also be worth
more. This is where you call the
pre-flop bet then check on the
flop. Presumably, the super-aggressive player
will proceed to
bet with any two cards. Once he has made that bet, you come
over
the top with a big raise. Sometimes players making this play
will
merely call the bet on the flop and spring their trap later
in the hand like
on the turn or even the river. By calling, a
player can put out the signs of
trapping with a monster hand. By
calling with nothing but a plan to come over
the top later in
the hand, a player can be leaving themselves vulnerable to
an
all-in bet.
3. Coming Over the Top of an Over the Top
Bet. This is
where a super-aggressive player makes a bet, someone
comes over
the top of them looking to take advantage, then you come
over
the top of everyone. Dan Harrington successfully made this bet
in the
Final Table of the 2004 WSOP main event. This bet only
works when the table
perceives you as the most conservative of
players and you are sure that the
re-raiser was making a play on
the initial bettor's aggression. This is an
awfully tricky bet
as to pull it off requires a tight table image, position
on two
players, enough chips to scare off the re-raiser and enough
courage
to make the bet in the first place.
4. Continuation
Bet. This is a staple of most pros'
games. It is where you bet
after the flop with any two cards.
Many times players who have raised
pre-flop with a good hand
like AK or AQ and have been called by a player in a
later
position, will bet at any flop -- even ones that look like 8 5
J.
Just like coming over the top pre-flop on the big blind, this
bet sends the
message to the table that if anyone wants to play
with you it will not be
cheap.
5. Semi-Bluff. This is a bet made on the flop
or turn
with a hand that is weak at the time, but with the right
card
would become very strong. This is a hand like four cards of the
same
suit or four sequential cards, where an additional card
could make a flush or
straight. Rather than checking to see
another card without having to put in
chips, the player with the
draw will bet out hoping to take the pot before
their hand is
strong. A semi-bluff is a very effective bet because even
if
called, the drawing hand can still win the pot outright with the
right
turn or river card.
Before you go running into a low-limit online poker
room with
chips blazing, keep in mind that it is actually harder to
bluff
novice players than to bluff more experienced players. This
is
because novice players are not able to follow a hand - they have
no
idea what's going on. Consequently, they are just as unable
to give you
credit for a monster hand as they are to pounce on
your blind. Playing
against novice players can be frustrating,
and even more so than at an
experienced table, you must have
patience when playing against novices. Cash
game superhero and
Bluff Master Sammy Farha put it best when he said simply,
"I'm
no good against no good players."
Don't think of a bluff as a lie
because then you'll be focused
on your cards, rather than your opponent's.
Think of every bet,
bluff or not, as a test of your opponent, identify what
they are
likely to be holding and then take advantage accordingly.
Don't
be afraid to go over the top of a Jackal or to steal from a
Mouse.
Be a hunter at the poker table because from time to time,
even Eagles get
shot down.
About the author: This article was published courtesy of
PocketFives.com. Pocket
Fives (www.pocketfives.com) is a site dedicated
to Online Poker.
Our goal is to expand the online poker community through
our
Poker Discussion Board, Online Tournament Player Rankings,
Site
Reviews, Articles, and Blogs.
|
