I think we're getting a little bit too focused on folding.

[Entity]

Yeah, it's happening again. I'm seeing too many suggestions to bet-fold the river. Or bet-fold the turn. Or fold to a checkraise in a HUGE pot against an unknown, or against a slightly aggressive opponent.

Basically, y'all are getting too fancy. And it's costing you bets.

A little story to illustrate.

$3/6, 10-handed at Party Poker.

3 limpers to me and I raise in the CO with AKo. Overaggressive Button coldcalls, SB folds, BB calls, limpers all call. First two limpers are a little too loose and are pretty bad postflop; 3rd limper (MP3) is better, though he makes mistakes preflop and isn't great postflop, he's not passive from what I've seen. I don't have a great read on him though. 6 to the flop for 12.3SB.

Flop comes A[img]/images/graemlins/spade.gif[/img]8[img]/images/graemlins/spade.gif[/img]6[img]/images/graemlins/club.gif[/img]. Checked to me, I bet, Button raises, BB folds, one limper calls, and MP3 calls. I 3-bet, Button calls, everyone calls. 4 to the turn for ~24SB.

Turn is the 8[img]/images/graemlins/club.gif[/img]. Checked to me, I bet, button calls, limper folds, and MP3 checkraises. I pause for a few seconds, think about what being checkraised in a protected pot means, and decide to call. Button calls. River is a blank, MP3 bets, I call, Button calls.

MHIG over MP3's AQo and Button's A5o. Meh.

Obviously I'm a results-oriented prag in this case, but I called down expecting to lose. I was expecting to lose to A8s or 66 a LARGE portion of the time.

This is just meant to be a friendly reminder that when you expect, in all honesty, to lose 80% of the time, that you still win 20% of the time. And when it's costing you 1BB to win a pot 20% of the time that is 20BB's, you're losing 3BB's, on the average, by folding.

So yeah. Stop looking to make great folds. Folding too many winners is a much bigger leak than any of you will realize for a long time. Ed wrote a post on this before my time: it's called "Why you guys aren't crushing the microlimits." Read it. Reread it. Believe it.

Rob

[Chris Daddy Cool]

fold the turn.

just

kidding

[MooFrog]

Thanks a lot for this post, I couldn't agree more. Reread Ed Miller's post yesterday, then came on and was wondering what changed recently. I've been staying in big pots much more often and noticing a very nice effect on my bankroll.

[Entity]

[ QUOTE ]
fold the turn.

just

kidding

[/ QUOTE ]

Don't you mean the flop? It's pretty clear I'm crushed when he calls two cold on that board.

[cmwck]

Good post, will set a lot of people straight.

Now I just have to figure out what a "big" pot means.
It would also be a leak to continually misapply "Well, the pot looks big so I'll just call to the river"

[bottomset]

nice post Entity

[itsmesteve]

From Ed's post that Entity referred to:
[ QUOTE ]
When the pot is big (and big essentially means as little as that there was a preflop raise)

[/ QUOTE ]
From SSHE p145-6
[ QUOTE ]
Unfortunately, there is no bright- line standard that seperates the two (small and large pots). . . In many hands begin to consider the pot to be large if one of the following is true
1. It is 6 hannded or more preflop
2. It is raised preflop and 4 handed or more
3. It is 3 bet or more preflop
4. At least 2 of your opponenets will usually go to the river.

[/ QUOTE ] my italics for clarity/emphasis.

As Ed says, there's no sure fire standard, but you should be able to "feel" it based on the above, imo.

While calling down could be a leak (1-2BB per occurence) folding for one bet when you could win 10+ is certainly larger (10+ BB per occurence)

[TripleH68]

[ QUOTE ]
Folding too many winners is a much bigger leak than any of you realize.

Rob

[/ QUOTE ]

Excellent reminder. In the above hand example your calldown only needs to be good maybe one in seven or eight to show a profit.

[Nfinity]

Wonderful Post Entity, as usual.

Just for my own info you said:

[ QUOTE ]
Turn is the 8. Checked to me, I bet, button calls, limper folds, and MP3 checkraises. I pause for a few seconds, think about what being checkraised in a protected pot means...


[/ QUOTE ]

Sorry if I'm being too much of a noob here, but what exactly is a "protected" pot. I'm probably familiar with the concept, I've just never seen that before.

Thanks.

[McGahee]

Good post
I may be guilty of this leak, but isn't semi-bluff turn check raising like, I dunno, 500 times more common at 3/6 than it is at .5/1? I still wouldn't have mucked in this example though.