Raising For Information

[BobboFitos]

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Mike, I thought over your article in the shower.

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Hate to tell you what I think about in the shower...jk. Nice post.

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unfortunatly poker has taken over my brain, so i spend my shower time thinking over it. i used to think about more fun stuff.
;/

thanks tho

[ML4L]

Hey Bobbo,

Thanks for the response. At least one person cares... [img]/images/graemlins/grin.gif[/img]

Everything that you said is correct (at least, I think everything; that was a long post...). I think that it is a perfect addendum to my article.

Unfortunately, there are word count limitations on the magazine articles, so I wasn't able to go into depth about the things that you talked about in your post. Although, hopefully everyone saw that I did briefly address every point that you mentioned.

The real purpose of writing the article was to address the countless posts on this forum that advocate doing something to "find out where you're at" when it is not the optimal play. Many players use small raises, ill-timed blocking bets, and other feeble attempts at manipulation as crutches so that they never have to learn how to read hands or have to make difficult decisions. Most of these players also loathe the thought of ever folding the best hand, so they take actions that minimize that probability, rather than actions that maximize EV. So, I presented a reasonable scenario where the play of "raising for information" would actually cost a player money.

But, as you illustrated, there are scenarios where a "raise for information" is a good play. In fact, when I was discussing my draft with Matt Flynn, his first response was, "I raise for information all the time." But, I think that there are a number of factors that generally need to be present to make this sort of raise correct, including:

- deep stacks
- a non-straightforward (but not overly tough) opponent
- position
- other benefits to the raise aside from information
- a willingness to selectively apply more pressure when called

Another important consideration that you touched on is that, any time that this sort of raise is profitable with a marginal made hand, it would likely be at least as profitable (sometimes more profitable) with a weak draw or nothing. There is also the consideration that, with a weak draw or nothing, you have no showdown value to factor in, so you don't have to worry about a situation where raising is +EV, but not as +EV as calling down, as might be the case with a marginal made hand.

Thanks for the response.

Mike

[greg nice]

good post bobo

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Rather, a raise for information is useful when an opponent will NOT REVEAL THIS INFORMATION. This is someone capable of firing a 2nd barrell, or possibly 3rd, with an unimproved AK.

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this ist he key. as you mentioned, the deeper the stacks are, the more willing a guy will be to just keep firing. with online 100bb stacks, most players will define their hand on the turn, because another pot bet will put in substantial portion of their stack. as stacks get increasingly deeper, each bet could be somewhat thought of as a bet in a fixed limit game, where they have so much money behind that commmittment is the last thing on their mind.

the interesting thing is even though this seems like a case where you are raising for information because he will not reveal that info, in reality, YOU ALREADY HAVE YOUR INFORMATION. that is, you have the info that he is aggro with a deep stack, will raise loosely preflop, and will fire 2nd and 3rd barrels with no pair. i would say you are raising for VALUE vs a likely hand you beat!

[aflaba]

Is there anyway to read the article now?

[Nirfur]

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Is there anyway to read the article now?

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[Ansky]

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I'm an idiot, where do I find it? maybe helpful to put on link since I'm retarded right now.

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Link

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Hmmm link doesn't work, and I can't find the page. Anyone have it?

Also, good freaking post bobbo.

[captZEEbo]

Post deleted by Mat Sklansky

[hectorjelly]

Is it possible to get a copy of this article?

[Nate.]

Bobbo --

Nice post.

I'm also glad to see that you have been to the Original Super/System School of Manic Typesetting.

--Nate

[kitaristi0]

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Is it possible to get a copy of this article?

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