Jason Pohl Article

[Georgia Peach]

I was wondering what the seasoned vets think about Pohl's article found on Poker Pages:
http://www.pokerpages.com/articles/players/jason-pohl03.htm

Is this good advice for the beginner/novice?

[Mason Malmuth]

Hi Peach:

I skimmed through the article very quickly and didn't see anything out of line. But in our writings we have much more thorough stuff on short handed play. You would probably be better off looking at the short handed section in the 21st Century edition of Hold 'em Poker for Advanced Players, and a couple of additional essays on short handed play appear in my book Poker Essays.

Best wishes,
Mason

[Mason Malmuth]

I just noticed that Part II now appears on Poker Pages. Basically he quotes all the stuff that we have written (and which I referenced in my post above). He does feel that we should be a little more aggressive in our defense on the big blind.

For those of you who are unfamiliar with much of our advice on short handed play, this article, even though it contains a few differences, is a quick overview and probably will be found beneficial by most of you.

Best wishes,
Mason

[tewall]

I liked the article. A couple of comments (nitpicking, I'll be considering heads-up play).

First of all, the article mentions that being suited doesn't add much value to playing hands, but it does mention being able to semi-bluff with drawing hands. Going from memory, HEFAP recommends playing hands as low as 5-3 suited (and that's a one-gapper, I might be one off on this, maybe 6-4 is the cut-off, but I think it's one or the other). This would suggest that being suited does make a substantial difference.

Secondly he gives an example where a couple of high cards "incorrectly plays back" when the flop misses him but both his cards are higher than his oppenents. The opponent hits 3rd pair. He then gives a couple of examples where the high cards hit the flop and totally dominate the low cards hitting 3rd pair. The flops in a couple of the cases are nearly identical.

I don't believe that playing back is a mistake. In fact it seems to me it would be a mistake not to play back (generally -- of course you want to vary your play).

With 6 outs the high card hand is a little over 7 to 1 against helping in the next round. Given implied odds, it's difficult to think of a situation where it would be correct to fold on the flop. Even on the turn the implied odds may be such that you can continue playing, even if you knew your opponent had a small pair (assuming he doesn't know your hand).

[Ian]

Most of my cash game activity is short-handed now and I use suited cards as my RNG (FWIW, I don't bother with a RNG in six-handed or higher, just use intuition). I do believe using suited cards in this context provides a slight, but material edge. But the bigger advantage is that it detracts from your opponents play: e.g., when I am up against players who know me(and therefore admire my play -- lol),it encourages them to overvalue suited cards when they see me play them; when I am up against players who don't know me, or ones who are prejudiced against tournie specialists, it makes me look fishy.

[Ian]

BTW, I am continually amazed by the number of otherwise good top tournament players and short-handed players who either bluff purely intuitively or use an RNG totally uncorrelated to hand EV. This is such a huge advantage for me, I believe, that I hesitate to give examples of such common bad plays or what I do instead. OK, one example. I have seen any number of top players move-in a stack of 10X or more the big blind in an unraised pot with a complete garbage hand (some players seem to take pride in using 27o as their RNG -- 69 is another popular one). This is so wrong for two huge reasons. I have even pointed this out to a few I have seen do this who have become friends and who know I understand what I'm talking about -- yet they still do the same thing again and again! I won't say what I do, but if you understand the two huge reasons such moves are wrong, you will know what conditions precendent I have for making a bluff move.

[tewall]

I take it you're reasoning is along the lines of what follows. If you choose suited cards to bluff with, and in particular suited connectors or suited gappers, a fair amount of the time you will flop a legitamate drawing hand to bluff with. So some percentage of the time you will have some outs, maybe quite a few, to fall back on if your bluff doesn't work. With a purely random hand you're much less likely to have outs to fall back on.

[tewall]

BTW Pohl's article was dealing with limit play.

You bring up some interesting points. Regarding the bluff move with a random bad had, Sklansky discusses this in his tournament book. He suggests trying this move with hands that don't mind being re-raised when the opponents stacks are not too large or too small, in which case they're too likely to call you. 10x is out of line (too big). That is, you're risking too much to gain too little.

[Louie Landale]

I suspect that most of the statistics are off a little, but fundamenally it sounds pretty realistic. Yes, the value of unsuited high cards goes up drastically since the likelyhood of getting dominated is way down and any medium or big pair usually wins.

One problem, however, with the article is that if fails to give the REAL value of suited or connected hands short handed: semi-bluffing is the key to short-handed play, so betting these hands when they flop draws is MORE valuable than waiting until they make the big hand.

- Louie

[Jason Pohl]

The real point is that you shouldn't be playing as many drawing hands short-handed. Clearly, K9s is more valuable than K9o. And I do agree that the ability to profitably semibluff increases with suited hands versus unsuited hands. I did not include extensive discussion on semibluffing for two reasons. First, it is a postflop strategy, but not one easily explained. As you can see in the article, I am pushing the 2000 word mark, which is at the limit of most people's attention span IMO. Second, I believe semibluffing is overrated. And that creates a problem, because it is not the most popular view and is definitely one requiring more explanation.

I admit, the semibluff is an integral weapon in shorthanded play. To say otherwise would be ludicrous. However, the value of the semibluff lies in three areas:
1) The chances of winning the pot immediately.
2) The chances of improving.
3) The increased chances of getting paid off if the draw hits, due to early aggression.

The disadvantages of the semibluff in shorthanded play are twofold. First, players are more aggressive. Second, players are less likely to fold. Malmuth addresses this in Poker Essays. He suggests NOT raising with 87s on the button in a 3-handed game because your opponents are LOOKING for the steal attempt. "...the psychology of the game has changed. Your opponents expect you to raise, and they are psychologically prepared to mix it up." The same concept applies to postflop play. Good players are LOOKING for the semibluff and will play back or string out an aggressive player. And most players will call too much and nullify the chances of winning the pot immediately. Since the odds of immediately winning the pot decline, and there is an increased chance that a semibluff will cost extra bets, the value of a semibluff drops precipitously, and often, becomes a -EV play.

Having said that, a semibluff is VERY profitable in the right circumstances (meaning the right types of games). An interesting result of the current literature pointing out the need to go to the river and be ultra-aggressive is that many if not most of the games I find tend to be filled with loose aggressive players who do not fold enough to make bluffing or semibluff a positive play except in select circumstances. I often want my drawing hands to play cheap in those games until I hit my hand unless I have enough outs to turn my semibluff into a value play.

Finally, I don't believe semi-bluffing is the key to short-handed play. Saying anything is THE key is suspect. But if I had to name two keys, it would be reading your opponents' hands well, combined with the ability to adjust play depending on the number of opponents. Which is probably the two keys I'd name for full ring games BTW.

FWIW,

--Jason

[Jason Pohl]

Thanks for the comments Mason.

It's just one article and cannot possibly cover or compete with 25 pages in a book. But I'll keep trying. /forums/images/icons/grin.gif

There is a reason I reference your books. They are the best I've read and are almost always "correct". In fact, the preflop strategy short-handed is one of the few things that could be improved IMO. But that is a dangerously arrogant thing for me to say, isn't it?

--Jason