Never coldcall (theorish)

[Hattifnatt]

Posted in SSMTT, and are very intresting what you high stakes player thinks.

I am not mainly of a tournament player but I think I have a pretty good understanding of the concepts and poker in general. I have tried a little rule for myself the recent tournaments I have played that feels pretty good for many reasons.

That is to never under any circumstances coldcall a raise, not in position and not from the blinds, period.

What do you think about this rule, is it a good one or do you lose much by doing this? Of course its style depending but I think it might be a good rule for many players.

The main reason I try it is because many of the tournament I have played lately I had bust out by getting into awkward spots after calling a raise with a hand like 66 or QJs.

I can see that whatever your playing style is coldcalling the very first levels with small PPs is a good thing, maybe a rule like this can be limited for when stacks are becoming ~50bb or less.

Someone else that have tried something like this or have extremely little coldcalling in your tournament game and if you do whats the exceptions in general?

This applies to Texas NL MTTs.

[djk123]

Meh. Often it is optimal to cold call a raise late in a tourney. For example, say a tight player opens in EP, and you hold QQ. If you reraise, he's probably going to play perfectly, meaning he'll fold every worst hand but never any better hands.

[Ansky]

It's obviously a terrible rule. I don't know why you should need an explanation, especially given that you are a long time cash game player, who obviously understands why you should sometimes just call and not raise.

[eBo]

Early in a tournament, 200BB, UTG raises, you're on the button w/55.

[Pudge714]

[ QUOTE ]
The main reason I try it is because many of the tournament I have played lately I had bust out by getting into awkward spots after calling a raise with a hand like 66 or QJs.


[/ QUOTE ]
This is more likely due to mediocre postflop play than making a preflop mistake.

[registrar]

I think this advice would have been somewhat more pertinent two years ago.

Now that c-betting is less effective, three-bets get called lighter and blind-stealing more difficult, you have to run really hot to profit by only raising or folding pre-flop.

On the whole, the level of pre-flop play has improved a lot in the fish tank over the last year or so. But they still suck post-flop, so play post-flop more.

[Francis_MH]

[ QUOTE ]
say a tight player opens in EP, and you hold QQ. If you reraise, he's probably going to play perfectly, meaning he'll fold every worst hand but never any better hands.

[/ QUOTE ]

This seems so simple when I read it as typed, but it is a difficult concept to understand. This flies right over the heads of many, many people. Its often hard to be rational and think like this, especially late in a tournament, when you see QQ with an early position raiser. Its kind of like "ZOMG, a raise in front of me I have Queens and 20 BBs ALLLLL IINNN time final table yes!" When doing this you forget about the reads you have on him and things like you mention about making him play perfectly. In other words, well done sir.

[MaverickUSC]

Somebody said here that they'd rather re-raise out of the blinds than in position. Why? Then you get to play an inflated pot out of position. This sucks above all.

Think about what you hate more: getting re-raised by a thinking player or called by a thinking player pre-flop. I love to just call in position, because your opponents know that you can have anything and have a really tough time playing against your hand that they know nothing about while you know much about their hand (why you should be cold calling in the first place).

I [img]/images/graemlins/heart.gif[/img] the cold call.

Devo

[aislephive]

Not coldcalling with 30-50bb stacks is usually fine, but making a rule against it is silly. There are some times when reraising sucks and folding sucks more given various situations so calling is the only logical play.

I think though that making rules against making certain plays for the sake of obeying the rule that you have set is stupid. If you think that cold calling QJs or 66 to a raise with 30bbs is -EV then you should fold, otherwise call.

Maverick, the reason why people prefer 3betting OOP than IP is because we want to negate our positional disadvantage by reraising and trying to end the hand there, and it is the assumption before you do this that reraising is +EV in a vaccum.

In 6max cash games I will do a good amount of reraising and cold-calling, but it's very situational. I'm less likely to reraise various hands if there are weak players left to act after an opening raise. 3betting shuts them out of the pot, so calling is best typically there.

[apestyles]

The reason I like to 3 bet out of the blinds with stronger hands is I'd rather put more in the pot when my hand is strong. When I have position I have the advantage of position that is harder to exploit in an already inflated pot. Decisions are much easier in larger pots therefore position is less important.