Calling Pre-flop? Strongly Consider 3-Betting Instead (NLTRN Theory)

[creedofhubris]

[ QUOTE ]

I think the problem with this is that most players who are raising a wide range will also call you with a wide range, and the ones who are tight are going to have strong hands that you REALLY don't want to play against in a huge pot OOP.


[/ QUOTE ]

vs. the tight raisers, in a cash game, the strategy is simple: fold almost every hand when they raise, and then steal mercilessly from the SB.

[TNixon]

[ QUOTE ]
For sure, against very loose players willing to call your 3-bet wide, then you'd only want to 3-bet for value. Not having some chance of winning immediately obviously makes the 3-bet much less desirable.

[/ QUOTE ]
What I'm saying though is that this type of player seems to be the norm, rather than the exception.

In my experience, the average opponent doesn't raise a huge range (generally quite a bit less than you really should), limps a LOT, calls almost every raise OOP, even with trash like 72 or 63, and calls most 3-bets. This type of player seems to be *extremely* common, at least in the games I'm playing. I gave up on turbos a while back, so I only play regulars on FT, if that makes a difference. (and there's a very good chance that it does make a huge difference)

Maybe I'm just seeing a lot more of these lately because I had to step back down to $30s, though. (I had to cash out to cover losing a bunch of money in Vegas, so that my wife will continue to be at least somewhat accepting of my obsessive poker playing) [img]/images/graemlins/smile.gif[/img]

[daveT]

That makes me uncomfortable that you are losing money out of the BB, but I will take the sample size argument into consideration. There are players who actually earn more money out of the BB than the SB.

The turbos vs regular games is a strong consideration here. The turbo players tend to raise every hand, but still play too tight, thus negating any advantage that I feel I have by 3-betting lightly.

I play 70/70, what would you do versus me?

If you 3-bet me too often, you are going to face a few tough decisions. HUSNGs seems to feature only one or two hands that really matter. I am willing to take risks with a deep stack. If you 3-bet me with AT and the board comes down 258, what are you going to do when I call you?

What are you going to when the average opponent calls you. At this point you are playing a bloated pot OOP, not knowing why I am calling.

This is for one of three reasons:
I think you are FOS and I hit that 2.
I am on a draw and sense weakness and will float you or expect to get a free card.
I am calling with complete trash to see if I can't steal this pot on the turn.

The decisions are all on you. If you are able to manipulate your opponent into playing poorly, and love to make hero calls, then three-betting too often has advantages.

A feature of No Limit is just that: you can get your chips in the middle at any time you please.