[Jeff_B]

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Jeff_B - this is a fine place for this type of post.

I would think you are stealing a bit less than is optimal and you are actually playing from the blinds a bit more than is optimal. One good excercise would be to filter pokertracker for all of your steal hands and see how well they perform, I would guess they do very well, which suggests you can add some hands.

Certainly part of the value from stealing comes when you win the blinds or win on the flop, but a large part also comes from playing pots in postion. The way you are playing now it seems you are not taking full advantage of position and are probably getting into a few marginal spots OOP from the blinds.

Using folded blinds to steal stats to adjust your steal ranges is definitely a good idea. Taken to an extreme, you can steal with anytwo on the button against blinds who fold 90% or so.

As far as feeling like you are inviting bullies - often when you miss and cbet or have a bad session, you just cringe and think you are going to get c/r again or played back at, and there will be times when this happens, but you want to simply find the right ranges to do this so you can be correct for the long run.

You characterized a lot of opponents at your limits as passive calling stations - this means they most likely WON'T be bullying you too much. However, cutting off the marginal end of your ranges against extreme calling stations is fine because you get paid so often when you do hit there is less of a need for balancing or marginal spots.

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Thanks for the indepth reply..
Yeah I defiently have been opening with a much wider range frm the CO / BUT (read suited gappers, connecters) etc as a steal... Seems to be going good and keeps me playing big pots in position as you said

As far as the bullying...
Im still really hating my line in general on hands that I miss / barely hit the flop

preflop raise, cbet, 2nd barrel and he calls pretty much has me commited a fair amount of chips with little or no chance of winning at showdown...