[Buzz]

Fish - It's hard to specifically answer your questions about big blind defense.

You may be defending your big blind too much. But then again, maybe not. If you're only getting raised 20%, maybe it's because you tend to defend.

I think there's a side benefit to defending your big blind. I think you are less likely to face aggression in other situations if you seem to not easily give way to aggression when you have posted your blind.

Face it. It's harder to play against aggressive play than passive play. You can probably turn over-agressive play by
your opponents to your advantage. But it's not exactly always easy to do that. For example, when someone makes it two bets to you, expecting you to get out of the way, you might make a big mistake and fold what would have been the winning hand. You should rather prefer to make it two bets when you want it to be two bets.

But having written the above, you don't want to over-defend your big blind. Usually when you get to see the flop for the blind post, a hand that wouldn't have been worth voluntarily playing isn't worth continuing beyond the flop anyhow. In other words, what is trash before the flop is usually still trash after the flop.

In a game with not too much pre-flop raising, I generally defend my big blind the first three times it's raised at a table with unknowns (depending). Thereafter, big blind defense adds about 25% value to a marginal or sub-standard hand.

I think that's working for me. I don't feel like my big blind is singled out for attacks. Some opponents seem to get raised almost every time they post by other opponents who seem to be trying to intimidate them into giving up their big blind.

In a game where pre-flop raising is the order of the day, and where people generally do not seem to defend their big blinds, I add about 25% value to a marginal or sub-standard hand for big blind defense.

A hand like 8-9-T-J pr 8-9-T-Q is not worth playing, in my humble opinion, even if double suited, and even increasing it's value by 25% for big blind defense.... though it's close for 8-9-T-J if double suited.... maybe sometimes....

The small blind is generally trivial in the scheme of things, not worth defending.

Buzz