When The Big Blind Is Too Tight

[David Sklansky]

Someone posted that Chris Bell said I was playing way too tight in the Borgata 10K tournament where I took third. He supposedly went on to say that because of that he was doing a lot more blind stealing when I was in the Big Blind and he was in the cutoff.

Forgetting about the fact that he didn't see my folded hands and his sample size was too small to be sure I was prepared to fold as many hands as he thought I would, the question arises as to his supposed counter strategy. To wit:

If all have a deepish stack, you are in the cutoff seat, the big blind calls your raises once in four, and you thus raise first in with x per cent of your hands, how does x change if a new player, at least as tough as the previous one postflop, takes over in the big blind calling your preflop raises one in six?

[yellowsub]

is this a trick question? x increases because we're winning more uncontested pots.

theoretically x should increase by 33%, i think

[diebitter]

The answer would appear initially to be to widen your hand range by 50% of what it is, but that doesn't take into account the likelihood of the SB/button jumping in now and again (either just because they get cards, or because the notice the BB's habits and your habits and decide to take advantage of this knowledge). So I'd suggest you widen your range a little (say 20% of what it is). Say you are pretty aggressive, and raising with 30% of hands here, this could go up to 34-38% of hands. This would be take longer for players to spot as a tactic than a 50% increase.

I personally would just reduce the raise amount some to get it back to a once in four thing, but would pay attention to see if this gives the button or SB an invite to jump in significantly more.

[FortunaMaximus]

Less than 33% to account for the fact that the BB is presumably calling with a narrower range. Merely countering on a frequency basis, your x as % of hands, if you adjust by 33%, you will be losing a greater number of pots in post-flop play simply because the BB will have a greater starting postflop advantage than you do.

[gobboboy]

If he really is that tight I would raise his blind 100% of the time. In a tournament if he only defends his blinds 1/6 times his ass is mine.

[FortunaMaximus]

Run into Button/SB opposition much? [img]/images/graemlins/tongue.gif[/img]

[Supwithbates]

1/6? As in, he only plays top 15% vs steals? That's like AJ+ 77+ from a cutoff raise...
I'm probably more a 1/4-1/5 unless the same guy starts raising my blind more than 25% (though this is hard to determine in donklimits as it will be folded to cutoff only 1/4 of the time anyways)

I'm with the other posters, how often are the SB/Button playing back? My cutoff raises are often smoothcalled light by the button if he's aggressive (maybe top 40-50%) (or repopped if he's SB), so in those cases it really doesn't matter what the BB or SB are going to do, stealing with trash just isn't profitable.

Another consideration: if you've ever played a Hubble's Hold'em (Sklansky probably hasn't), you'll notice that a good number of players are sitting out in the early levels. Even if you are guaranteed a fold by the BB, the other players react accordingly and call with top 60% or so quite often. My point is that the BB is only 1/3 of the players you have to deal with, and especially if he's a rock, you're going to have to deal with other players reacting to the fact just as you are.

[Foucault]

[ QUOTE ]
If he really is that tight I would raise his blind 100% of the time. In a tournament if he only defends his blinds 1/6 times his ass is mine.

[/ QUOTE ]

Agree. Obviously button and SB will change the dynamic, and presumably BB would wise up as well if I employed this as a consistent strategy, but on any given hand, if I knew he was only 1/6 to call me and would not re-raise, then I would certainly raise any two.

[SilverLining1]

I'm not sure about the math problem, but if I have a tight player off the BB with deepish stacks and I'm like down 6:1 against the chip leader, I'm having a [censored] field day against the BB. Period.

[Jeff76]

Tangental question here, but somewhat related. I don't understand the benifit of defending from the button by calling. If I am playing from the big blind, I'm generally raising to try and re-steal from the initial stealer, or at the lest set up a reasonable c-bet on the flop. But there are very few hands I'll just flat call with from the big blind. The money isn't "mine", so what do I care if someone "steals" it? I really don't like playing a marginal hand OOP, so anything I'm willing to play from the BB is going to be strong enough that I'm going to be re-raising.

Maybe I'm just weak/tight, but I admit that people steal a lot from me and this doesn't bother me much. I'd rather be the one putting the pressure than the one "defending".