table bully

[fortunesknave]

I was watching 2005 US Poker Championship--a recorded episode, so probably aired last week--and one of the players was bullying the table. It got me wondering.

If someone has a massive chips stack, is raising every pot, calling to the river because s/he can afford it, what kind of starting hands do you want to play? I mean against a serious bully, who is raising preflop every hand over 4x the bb, and will bet/call to the river.

What kind of hands can you absolutely not play? Do you bother raising with big pairs? Do you play middle pairs like small pairs?

[Cry Me A River]

This can be very situation dependent, you particularly need to consider your chip stack versus the size of the other chip stacks as well as the big stack.

If you're the #2 stack, the big stack has 20X your stack, you're 5X the the size of the #3 stack and there are several small stacks that are about to go out then you'd play this pretty conservatively. You're going to have a hard time catching the big stack, regardless, and you're somewhat safely in second place. So you don't have a lot to gain by going to war here. OTOH, you have an awful lot to loose if you do go up against him and you get knocked out in 8th or 9th or whatever.

However, if you're the smallest stack then you need to look at this as an opportunity to double up and maybe move up in the chip standings so you're going to play back with a much wider range of hands.

"It depends" is often the answer to poker question and this is a very broad question. That's why posting hand histories is encouraged.

[kimchi]

If you're short stacked, then I think you can assume his raising standards are low, so he'll provide you with good opportunities to double up.

If you have a large stack, then you need to tighten up a little because you have more to lose. If you have a big hand, then you could isolate him if he's to your right, or try limp-raising or check/raising if he's to your left