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As for his "blanket advice", I don't recall a scenario where his advice didn't make sense if the pot was too small or reversed. As I said in the prior thread, show examples - so far you have not. People love to take pot shots at 2+2's work because its an easy way to make themselves look better in their own eyes or in the eyes of others. But to say that the book doesn't apply to todays games is ridiculous.

TT[img]/images/graemlins/club.gif[/img]

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I didn't post this comment as a personal insult or as an ego trip, just as a word of advice to players looking to play Razz today, not in the 1970's. There are many concepts in Sklansky on Razz that apply to today's games, but the book is far from infallible. Let's take a look at some examples from the first few pages:

<u>Structure</u>
On p. 105 (in the third edition of "Sklansky on Poker" which is the copy I have) the author discusses the two extremes of Razz structure playing in Vegas in the 1970's. The 15/30 game is described as having a $1 ante/$5 bring-in/$15 SB/$30 BB and the 30/60 game as having a 5/10/30/60 structure. He even warns us right up front that "the ante and betting structure is extremely important in determining the correct strategy in the game of razz." I wholeheartedly agree. So for an 8-handed game (which is assumed in all his examples) the ratio of the "juice" (antes + bring-in) to the small bet in the low ante 15/30 game is about 0.9 but is about 1.7 in the high ante 30/60 game.

<u>Ante Stealing</u>
In this section, the difference between the 15/30 and 30/60 games is usually considered, but with some notable exceptions. On p. 108 the author states "When I am reraised on third street and have been trying to steal the ante, I will generally fold. In order to call in this particular spot, you usually need about a three-card nine." He then lists several factors that could cause him to adjust this strategy, but the size of the antes is NOT one of them. In a HU 15/30 game, your odds to call the reraise are 3.5:1, but in a full ring 30/60 games you're getting 4.7:1. Couldn't the difference affect how bad a hand you call with?

On p. 109, item 5 of his summary advises players to steal with a three-card nine even with 3 or 4 low cards behind you. In order to consider this play a "steal" there has to be a reasonable chance that all the low cards behind you will fold, but when was the last time you played at a razz table with that many low cards out and not ONE player willing to call you? In fact, most razz games today are so loose that if you raise with a smooth three-card 9, it's more of a value bet than a steal! He's obviously assuming a very rocky game which I've heard used to be the norm.

In fact, there are several other examples of advice that disregards how the pot odds created by high antes should change your starting requirements. Like on p. 116 when the author categorizes a 752 starting hand as "weak" if three other babies are gone. On p. 117, when talking about the hands you need to call a single raise, he says that you can loosen up a little in the 30/60 game and MOST three-card sevens can be played unless a lot of your outs are dead. How often would you fold a live three-card seven to a single raise? Clearly he hadn't seen a lot of the hole cards turned over at online razz tables when he wrote this (or even at the 2006 WSOP).

Maybe we can understand his tight play a little better by considering that he's figuring his odds to call a single raise in the 15/30 game as 28:15 and in the 30/60 games as 70:30. This is only a 25% increase, but it's also mathematically wrong since he completely neglects the bring-in in the 30/60 game! The actual pot odds are 80:30 in the 30/60 game for a 43% increase over the 15/30 game. It's a natural mistake though since he makes the same error on p. 107 in claiming that an ante steal at 30/60 is risking $30 to win $40 (should be $50), and again on p. 112 when calculating the odds to defend your bring-in. Here he states that when you're only getting 2.8:1 in the 15/30 game, you'd be correct to fold 100% of the time against a probable steal but the 7:2 odds you get in the 30/60 game could swing it to a call if you hold the best possible hole cards. Except that your pot odds in this spot are actually 4:1 in the 30/60 game. Might this change the correct strategy a little?

I'm tired. I'll post some more later when I go over it in more depth. [img]/images/graemlins/spade.gif[/img]