Carpal Tunnel post: common leaks in the 2+2 game (long)

[mike l.]

"MP limps, SB limps, you check. Flop: Q83."

awful example. this flop is likely to touch a lot of hands mp would limp with. wait for K32 flops, etc.

"Donk bet more."

okay enough of you. now youre starting to give away some of my best plays.

[elindauer]

I guess I'm not surprised that there's some disagreement with the examples. After all, the whole point of this post is that most 2+2ers are missing out on these plays, so obviously lots of players, many of them solid winning players, don't play these hands this way.

Additionally, I wouldn't defend these plays as being always correct. I'm making some assumptions about how your opponents play here to suggest these plays are simply often correct. If these plays were correct against everyone, you'd have all found them by now.


I'll definitely have more to say on the ideas behind these hands, but for now I'm content to just hear what you all think. I just want you to remain open-minded, and think about a) what kinds of opponents would make this play correct, and b) how common those opponents are in your games.

-Eric

[w_alloy]

Regarding the examples: I think the last one is wrong 90%+, the Q2 one is wrong 60-80%, and the 72 one is wrong 20-40%.

I think the last example might be different if most tags arent c-betting 99.9% of their hands here anyways. Checking behind here sets off big warning bells for villian, enough to lower their turn bluff frequency to around correct levels against our hand.

[jgorham]

The first example I like, with the caveat that I won't make that play if MP is either really tight or really lose. As a bluff it only needs to work better than 1 in 3 to be profitable, and sb almost always has given up on this pot and offers a sort of protection in so far as MP will be less suspicious of a bluff.

Example 2 I really like. The pot is small and only 2 overcards to your hand can come. Most aggressive players will bet regardless of their cards into 2 blind players who have both checked, and then you have the option to checkraise the flop or turn. If you are pretty confident MP will bet the turn as well, I call the flop and checkraise the turn. If not just checkraise the flop. If you check, it gets checked around, and an A hits the turn the hand is still pretty easy to play IMO.

Example 3 I don't like. The pot is small, there is an ace on the board and 3 spades. A bluff will work here sometimes, but I dont think it will work enough to be profitable, as it fits your opponents range pretty well. I think there are better times to bluff in this manner.

Example 4 is only a solid play against opponents who I consider very good players. You want to check the flop sometimes against those players, and picking a time when you know you will at least see a river is the best time to do it, as it puts them in the position of needing to bluff at both expensive streets to pick up the pot. And even sometimes when they do that you will hit your hand and pop em. Against most opponents though I would just bet.

[TravestyFund]

nice post

[tpir]

there have been many 5 star posts recently. who said 2+2 was dead?

[Bill King]

i'm glad to hear you get to spend more time with your family eric, thats great.. good for you!

i like your observations, and your thought processes. If everybody played the same way this game would never evolve and grow into what it is today.

I find myself doing just what you do very often, reading literature about poker, on here and in books, and wondering the different ways are to play it while still playing correctly. though, most of it is truely read/opponent dependant and your table. Now adays games are getting wayy looser, and on a typical friday or saturday night they get even crazier. This is one thing i am trying to work on very dilligently, beating the crazy games with 6-7 per flop for multiple bets while still making a profit.

[elindauer]

all right, time for some follow up. Let's start with 72 on the Q83 board. Is it worth betting this into 2 players?

With all of these examples, I don't think my suggestion is right or wrong. I'm only claiming that it can be right against the right players, and more importantly, claiming that these players are pretty common.

ok, so how about this example? When would you want to bet? Well, it would help if you felt confident that the SB would bet his decent made hands. So far so good. Lots of people make mistake #2 so it's quite common that the SB checking indicates he's pretty weak and will fold to a bet.

What about that limper? It's hard to say. Mike correctly points out that the Q8 part of the flop isn't absolutely perfect, in that JT, T9 and J9 have gutshots. He suggests that K32 would be a better steal board. I agree, but that doesn't mean it's wrong to bet the Q83 board.

Remember, we're getting better than 3:1 to bet, and there's still the possibility of the occassional profitable follow through bluff on the turn as well. Hell, once in a while we'll turn a pair and have it hold up!

If the SB is tricky and aggressive, betting might not be great. If the limper is very loose, not just a little loose, it's possible the odds on a pure bluff won't be there. If your image is very loose and aggressive, maybe you want to check this flop and wait for the K62 board. Like all plays, you have to think about your opponents to decide on the situation, but the point is, this bluff can show a profit even on this less-than-perfect board, and most players would never make this bet.

good luck.
Eric

PS. I think that 2 opponents is the max you want to make this play against. Once it gets to 3, the parlay of all of them folding is no longer, generally, made up by the extra small bet in the pot. I'm making a lot of assumptions about the chances of players folding, making moves, etc, but my small sample size attempts to track these ideas have confirmed this.

[elindauer]

Although several people said they thought the examples were poor, only Justin A had the courage to say why he felt betting Q2 on a Q83 board was better than checking, arguing that you get too much value from callers to check here. Kudos to justin for defending his argument (eventually). [img]/images/graemlins/smile.gif[/img]

This may be true against an exceptionally loose and passive opponent(s), but these players are not the norm. If they are common in your game, then ok, bet, but if you're like most people, your opponents are very aggressive.

Put it this way... imagine you have T9 for the flopped gutshot and you check... how often do you expect to get the free card you want?

If you answered "almost never" you are in the kind of game where you should check Q2 here. ggbman sums it up perfectly... any hand that might call you will surely bet if you check. More importantly, there are tons of hands that will bet if you check but fold if you bet.

Also important in this case is the size of the pot... it's only 3 small bets! Pots hardly get any smaller than this. Sure, you don't want to give this away for free, but you should certainly be willing to take some chances with a pretty strong hand. Even if the flop gets checked through, it's not the end of the world. The SB may bluff at the turn, a huge win for you! And while someone might catch a lucky card and draw out on you, they can just as easily, probably more easily, make a pair that ends up costing them 2 BB. Note that you would gladly allow someone to turn an open-ended straight draw in a pot this size, as they will make a mistake on the turn for sure!

In other words, checking on a slowplay in this tiny pot is not an outrageous idea. In light of that, you should not be at all concerned that the limper might check through the flop every once in a while. Checking and picking up that almost sure bluff from the 3rd player is very profitable.

good luck.
Eric

[elindauer]

This one is more complicated and you kind of have to talk about your entire game to understand this one. In fact, there's so much going on here that I'm inclined to kind of gloss over a lot of ideas to keep this manageable. Here goes though:

First, I think we all know that the raiser is going to bet the flop. More importantly, I think that even fairly poor players have figured out that a guy betting the flop after raising preflop doesn't mean anything.

Second, I think that most players are too loose. They play too many hands after the flop. As you move up, these hands get played more aggressively.

Third, most players try to take advantage of the pfr's continuation bet by checking all hands to him intending to check-raise.


ok, given all these adjustments that players have made to pfr continuation bets, is it still correct to bet everything you raise? This question is especially aimed at the standard 2+2er that is raising 10,12,15% of his hands before the flop. Can it really be right to always bet everything under these circumstances?

The only conclussion I could come to was no. I decided that it must be better to take a lot of free cards when people check to you, a lot more than I saw most people taking.


By playing this way, lots of good things happen. I get more free cards when I need them. My losers cost less. I tend to have stronger hands when people play back at me.

There are other things. Most people don't know how to adjust to this. They don't understand that they can't continue to check everything to me if I'm going to check behind a lot.

The downside is that every once in a while, I check a flop I could have won by betting. I make up for this and then some though by sometimes winning pots I would have lost had I bet. Further, my bets can carry a little more weight than normal, so I might pick up a pot with a bluff that another player wouldn't have. Also, my checks can actually represent weakness, which is an interesting side effect. It allows me to sometimes check behind when I flop a strong hand and induce bluffs.

Which leads me to the A7s hand. If you always bet everything, then yes, suddenly checking behind might not be such a good idea. It probably look strong, and certainly looks suspicious. Since you are strong, that's bad. You should just bet and pray that he plays back at you, since you know it's pretty unlikely he has a real hand.

If you check behind more though, then you can check behind a hand like this and give your opponent a chance to bluff on the next street. He'll have to see you check and give up every once in a while first of course, but... ok. You already should be doing that.

The ideal opponent here is a fairly aggressive opponent, and teh ideal timing is right after you happen to have checked behind a couple of hands and folded the turn. If your opponent is incredibly loose, or a maniac, etc, then yes, you should bet the flop. Like all the examples, checking is not correct 100% of the time. But betting isn't correct 100% either, and I bet there are many on this forum who have never checked this flop.

good luck.
Eric