Why the Stop + Go Works (long and poorly written)

[NoahSD]

A series of posts in MTTF and STTF have made it pretty clear that a lot of people don't understand the stop and go. So, I thought I'd try my best to clarify.

(Note: In this post, I'm only discussing situations in which your opponent would be getting 2:1 or better to call your push. The assumption is that villain won't ever fold preflop. Because of this, I completely ignore the case in which we stop + go and our opponent calls because in those cases, we were getting our chips in no matter what happened.)

An absolutely pure stop + go--an unexploitable stop + go--is easily the most insulting move in short-stacked poker. Here, you make a bet that every single hand should call, and you do it with the hope that your opponent will be stupid enough to fold. Here's an example:

PokerStars No-Limit Hold'em Tourney, Big Blind is t400 (6 handed) internettexasholdem.com

CO (t8415)
Button (t12053)
SB (t9037)
Hero (t1230)
UTG (t3180)
MP (t12085)

Preflop: Hero is BB with A[img]/images/graemlins/diamond.gif[/img], A[img]/images/graemlins/heart.gif[/img].
3 folds</font>, Button raises to t1200</font>, SB folds. Hero calls.

Pot: t2600
Flop: Q[img]/images/graemlins/spade.gif[/img]J[img]/images/graemlins/club.gif[/img]7[img]/images/graemlins/heart.gif[/img]

Hero bets t30

To simplify things, let's say you turn over your cards when you make this bet, and your opponent has the worst hand possible: 2[img]/images/graemlins/diamond.gif[/img]3[img]/images/graemlins/heart.gif[/img]. He's a 65:1 dog to win the hand, but he's getting 88:1 odds to call, so he should obviously call... folding would be awful. When he does fold, you gain equity just because he made a silly mistake. So, this play is unexploitably correct.

Of course, most stop + gos are not so simple. It's very rare that you'll be left with so few chips relative to the size of the pot. In fact, when making most stop + gos, your opponent won't always be making a mistake by folding. But, the play is still correct because he's much more likely to make a bad fold than a good one. Here's an example:

PokerStars No-Limit Hold'em Tourney, Big Blind is t400 (6 handed) internettexasholdem.com

CO (t8415)
Button (t12053)
SB (t9037)
Hero (t3300)
UTG (t3180)
MP (t12085)

Preflop: Hero is BB with A[img]/images/graemlins/diamond.gif[/img], K[img]/images/graemlins/heart.gif[/img].
3 folds</font>, Button raises to t1200</font>, SB folds. Hero calls.

Pot: t2600
Flop: Q[img]/images/graemlins/spade.gif[/img]8[img]/images/graemlins/spade.gif[/img]7[img]/images/graemlins/heart.gif[/img]

Hero bets t1100

Here, villain would absolutely be correct to fold 2[img]/images/graemlins/heart.gif[/img]3[img]/images/graemlins/diamond.gif[/img]. He's not getting the odds. But, he'd be making a big mistake to fold any hand with a [img]/images/graemlins/spade.gif[/img], a T, a 9, a 6, or a 5. And, of course, folding a pair would be a horrible mistake.

But, let's say you have A[img]/images/graemlins/heart.gif[/img]A[img]/images/graemlins/diamond.gif[/img] in the previous example. Then, your opponent would be correct to fold hands
as strong as 9[img]/images/graemlins/club.gif[/img]9[img]/images/graemlins/spade.gif[/img]. So, stop + going AA here would be incorrect.


Up until now, I've been talking about stop + going in the hopes that your opponent will make a stupid mistake. But, what happens when your opponent is a perfect player? This is an area in which I think a ton of 2+2ers make a huge mistake.

If our opponent had been a good player in my first example, he would've known that folding 2[img]/images/graemlins/diamond.gif[/img]3[img]/images/graemlins/heart.gif[/img] is a mistake, so a pure stop + go is pointless against a good player. An impure stop + go against a good player is an extremely costly mistake. In this case, we're letting a good player who will make correct decisions have more information to work with. This is exactly equivalent to pushing preflop and then letting our opponent peak at the flop before he chooses whether or not to call. Therefore, you should never stop + go a good player when they'll be getting 2:1 or better.


In summary, here are the things to consider when stop + going:

1) You must have little to no fold equity preflop to consider a stop and go. Usually, this means that your opponent must be getting better than 2:1 to call a push. If this is not the case, pushing is almost always better. (I may write up a similar post about why this is true later.)
2) Stop + go much more when your stack is shorter. The better odds your opponent will be getting, the more likely he is to make a mistake by folding. Note that in the first example, the pot odds are so good that folding 23o would be incorrect even if you showed your AA.
3) Stop + go more with your weaker hands. You never want your stop and go to make your opponent play better than he would have if you just pushed. So, don't stop and go with hands that don't want villain to fold (after pot odds are considered).
4) Don't stop and go good players. The reason that stop and gos work is because you're giving players a chance to make a dumb mistake. Good players don't make dumb mistakes, so stop + going them can't be profitable.

[MLG]

Today has been a very good day in the MTT.

1 extra point. There are times in a tournament (specifically at the FT, or approaching it) when it is ok to give away a tiny bit of equity to reduce varience. In those spots there are other arguments for a stop n go...for example with a small pair to shut out overs from seeing the turn and river.

[NoahSD]

Yeah.. I avoid the lowering variance issue because I think that with a standard MTT payout it's a lot easier for me to find a dumb spot to make a low variance play than it is to find a good one.

Stop + going with a small pair to shut out overs is exactly the same as stop + going with AK to shut out JT or whatever, except that the odds are different... It's a good play when the overs would be making a mistake to fold most flops and it's a bad play when they'd be correct to fold any whiffed flop.

[Beachman42]

The stop -n- go is essentially about creating the illusion of FE where in reality there isn't any (the bad fold on vilian's part). One issue I'd like to see discussed is the frequency of using the stop-n-go. I have found it best used sparingly, much like the re-steal when you have the chips to re-steal. Thoughts?

[bza12]

How about a non-FT or buble situation, where you call with a small pocket pair OOP and the flop is non-treatening and also doesn't connect with your holdings. Does it make more sense to attempt a stop n go here to win the pot right away, or check/call all-in, check/re-raise all in a continuation bet the better play? I guess assume that the pot is the size of your stack. I wouldn't think this would be a situation to use when you both are deep, but I am not good, so I am probably wrong.

[pineapple888]

[ QUOTE ]

4) Don't stop and go good players. The reason that stop and gos work is because you're giving players a chance to make a dumb mistake. Good players don't make dumb mistakes, so stop + going them can't be profitable.

[/ QUOTE ]

Note that the whole point of a stop-and-go is that it CANNOT reduce your equity. If Clueful Shark calls you every time post-flop, you are in exactly the same situation as if you had pushed preflop. So while it may not ever win against a top-notch player, it will never lose either, so you might as well try it with your marginal hands.

[jcm4ccc]

[ QUOTE ]
[ QUOTE ]

4) Don't stop and go good players. The reason that stop and gos work is because you're giving players a chance to make a dumb mistake. Good players don't make dumb mistakes, so stop + going them can't be profitable.

[/ QUOTE ]

Note that the whole point of a stop-and-go is that it CANNOT reduce your equity. If Clueful Shark calls you every time post-flop, you are in exactly the same situation as if you had pushed preflop. So while it may not ever win against a top-notch player, it will never lose either, so you might as well try it with your marginal hands.

[/ QUOTE ] I was going to say the same thing, but I think it's a bit more complex. There are times when a person might fold rather than push preflop, but then they decide that doing a stop-and-go gives them that extra edge to make call/push flop more profitable than folding. Generally, this is a bad idea. If you would rather fold than push, then you should also rather fold than stop-and-go.

[pineapple888]

[ QUOTE ]
[ QUOTE ]
[ QUOTE ]

4) Don't stop and go good players. The reason that stop and gos work is because you're giving players a chance to make a dumb mistake. Good players don't make dumb mistakes, so stop + going them can't be profitable.

[/ QUOTE ]

Note that the whole point of a stop-and-go is that it CANNOT reduce your equity. If Clueful Shark calls you every time post-flop, you are in exactly the same situation as if you had pushed preflop. So while it may not ever win against a top-notch player, it will never lose either, so you might as well try it with your marginal hands.

[/ QUOTE ] I was going to say the same thing, but I think it's a bit more complex. There are times when a person might fold rather than push preflop, but then they decide that doing a stop-and-go gives them that extra edge to make call/push flop more profitable than folding. Generally, this is a bad idea. If you would rather fold than push, then you should also rather fold than stop-and-go.

[/ QUOTE ]

Agree completely, and I think this play is way overused.

The decision process should be: "I'm not folding my hand. I'm short, so I should push. No, wait, no FE. OK, stop-and-go."

Counting on the "extra" equity from it is usually a very bad idea.

By "marginal" I meant "the bottom portion of what would normally be my repushing range".

[adanthar]

[ QUOTE ]
There are times when a person might fold rather than push preflop, but then they decide that doing a stop-and-go gives them that extra edge to make call/push flop more profitable than folding. Generally, this is a bad idea. If you would rather fold than push, then you should also rather fold than stop-and-go.

[/ QUOTE ]

Poker Stars
No Limit Holdem Tournament
Blinds: t750/t1500
(Ante: t75)
9 players
Converter

Stack sizes:
UTG: t34048
UTG+1: t53088
MP1: t20694
MP2: t27058
MP3: t23747
CO: t36758
Button: t60156
SB: t28067
Hero: t12953

Pre-flop: (9 players) Hero is BB with Q[img]/images/graemlins/spade.gif[/img] T[img]/images/graemlins/spade.gif[/img]
6 folds, <font color="#cc0000">Button raises to t6000</font>, SB folds, Hero calls t4500 <font color="#aaaaaa">(pot was t8250)</font>.

Flop: A[img]/images/graemlins/club.gif[/img] J[img]/images/graemlins/diamond.gif[/img] 3[img]/images/graemlins/spade.gif[/img] (t13425, 2 players)
<font color="#cc0000">Hero is all-in t6878</font>, Button folds.
Uncalled bets: t6878 returned to Hero.

Results:
Final pot: t13425

[woodguy]

Adanthar,

If the Q[img]/images/graemlins/spade.gif[/img] is K[img]/images/graemlins/spade.gif[/img] do you jam PF?

Regards,
Woodguy