positional advantage vs. stack leverage.

[DaycareInferno]

this is something i've been thinking about this morning, and i was wondering if any of you guys have any general rules of thumb or ideas on the subject.

lets say i'm in a 6max game, and the guy in front of me is kind of weak post-flop. effective stacks 100bb

hero has 9 [img]/images/graemlins/diamond.gif[/img] 7 [img]/images/graemlins/diamond.gif[/img] otb

mp limps, CO raises to 5, Hero calls, all others fold. 11.5 in the pot.

flop: K [img]/images/graemlins/spade.gif[/img]8 [img]/images/graemlins/heart.gif[/img]2 [img]/images/graemlins/club.gif[/img]

villain bets 8. he opens with a wide range from the CO, and this flop obviously isn't much help to most of it.

option 1 - fold: we're not going to do this, because the reason we cold-called him preflop is that we think we can push him off hands when he misses, so this would be pointless.

option 2 - call: calling is cheap, and since we are in position, its the most efficient way to gain information. our villain will usually shut down on the turn, and we can steal the pot A-Team style

optioni 3 - raise: if we raise to about 30, villain folds most of his range, beacuse most of it is air. this is more expensive, however it has another advantage. if villain has something like KQ, he is now in much more of a bind than in the previous scenario, where he would just bet again, and we fold. if villain calls, the pot will now become larger than his stack, and he won't be able to get away from his marginal hand. from our point of view, we are risking 30, and we know exactly where we are. from his point of view, he is risking his entire stack, and he's not sure whether or not he is ahead.

i know most people understand stack bind, but it comes up surprisingly little in hh analysis here. i use it a lot more than most do i think. i like it, because it has the added benefit of creating more action in situations where you actually do have a good hand and would prefer to get it in on the flop.

obviously a balanced player should probably use both approaches, at least some of the time. i'm mainly wondering if anyone could share some ideas on what factors should lean a person towards one or the other. for instance, lets say that in the example hand, the board was TT4 instead. should that lean me closer to stack bind or floating compared to the given board?

[SnglMaltScotch]

I often 3-bet pf and c-bet flop if called. As played, I would fold. A K is a large part of his range. Since you don't seem to go that route, floating is bad imo. There are no draws to rep on the turn so what would you be repping. If you want to play non-standard, raise now and bluff. If he has a K you will hear about it. If he doesn't he will fold.

SMS

[DaycareInferno]

[ QUOTE ]
I often 3-bet pf and c-bet flop if called. As played, I would fold. A K is a large part of his range. Since you don't seem to go that route, floating is bad imo. There are no draws to rep on the turn so what would you be repping. If you want to play non-standard, raise now and bluff. If he has a K you will hear about it. If he doesn't he will fold.

SMS

[/ QUOTE ]

yeah, i could 3bet preflop, but that's kind of beside the point. the reason that i'm calling pf in the example is because i think that i can steal pots from my opponent postflop a high percentage of the time. with that being my reasoning, it would be dumb to fold on a Khigh rainbow spread to this opponent. AK isn't a big part of his range, because no single hand is a big part of his range. he opens a wide range from the CO, so he could have any broadways, suited aces, suited connectors, whatever.

in the example hand, i'm repping one of 3 things. air, a set, or AK, which i will also sometimes call with preflop versus this type of opponent. i don't want to rep a draw in a stack-bind scenario, because a draw would be behind, and often also be forced to call a shove. that's why screwball straight draws are so much better than flush draws.

[XHitman014]

The villian raised from the CO and c-bet...how does AK make up a large part of his range? His CO range is wide and he's c-betting the entire range on a flop that dry.

[loosbastard]

[ QUOTE ]
The villian raised from the CO and c-bet...how does AK make up a large part of his range? His CO range is wide and he's c-betting the entire range on a flop that dry.

[/ QUOTE ]

Seriously.

But yeah...nice post op. I also think you should post a couple more board textures to generate a little more discussion. Obviously this is a great one to float/makes moves on/etc...but what about something like 4[img]/images/graemlins/heart.gif[/img]5[img]/images/graemlins/heart.gif[/img]9[img]/images/graemlins/spade.gif[/img]? Not sure if it's optimal...but I seem to float the one you posted and bluff-raise the second a lot. Although, I'd love to here some better players comment on this.

[DaycareInferno]

yeah, that's kind of what i'm getting at, lb. i'd like to know what factors people think favor one approach over the other.

for example, in the hand that i made up, the K on the board is a really good card in a lot of stack-bind scenarios, because villain can have a lot of different hands that may or may not be ahead, like KQ/KJ/KT/Kxs. i know that i'm behind, and if i had a set, i'd pretty much know that i was ahead. since my risk is 30, and my opponents risk is 85+, he's going to have to be right about whether or not he's ahead a really high percentage of the time. if the board is more drawy, then not only is there a higher chance that he knows or thinks he knows where he stands, but there's also a higher chance that he puts me on a hand that he beats. its no longer a cut and dry scenario where i either have a monster or a turd.

[DaycareInferno]

also on a more drawy board, floating gains a lot of ground in that i can hit imaginary draws on the turn.

[DaycareInferno]

quick summary of where i'm at so far:

coordination = favors floating over stack binding, because of larger number of hands in your range that 1 pair hands are ahead of, and also because of added bluffing potential on later streets.

lone As and Ks = favors stack binding over floating due to the large number of hands in villain's range (when wide) that will be faced with a problematic decision.

low boards = favors stack binding over floating vs. wide ranges that consist of a much higher than normal ratio of unpaired to paired hands due to the increase in the ammount of times villain will bet again on the turn when anovercard to the board falls, whether or not it actually hits villain's hand.

paired board = favors floating over stack binding due to the further decreased ammount of monsters in play and the decreased ammount of hands that will be faced with problematic decisions.

none of that would mean that one is actually better than the other in the given situation, just that they lean the decision in that direction. does that make sense so far?

edit: i guess i should also go ahead and add that none of this means [censored] if you don't habitually raise flops with monster hands, even in situations where it may sacrifice some value.

[orange]

what hands can you really rep with a float here? seems like an awful board to do so with. you are like repping a narrow hand range (sets/sometimes Ks but there arent a tremendous amt of Ks in that range), and i would suspect you check behind with a decent number of made hands on the turn. (ie. weaker Ks, stuff like TT, etc).

raising too is an option, but this board is really [censored] to do so on. again, what real hands are you repping? sets and maybe AK. other than thatt, lol...not much. you have to think about the types of boards you want to make plays on and what type of opponent you are playing against.

if villan is nonthinking, then aggression for the hell of it is an okay plan sometimes. if he can't read hands for [censored] then sure, go ahead, float him. most players aren't really observing at the table much anyway and won't think to themselves 'oh, he's floating me, c/r his ass or double it'. instead, they just go through the same notion of c/f c/f c/f on the turn.

so, remember who you are playing and look for boards that are nice to bluff. generally against a cold call range, that means stuff like 783 with 2 hearts. or something like that.

[DaycareInferno]

it was probably bad to make the example hand THAT dry. i think the ideas are pretty well outlined though.