Post for david...

[haakee]

I think both responses here have said the same thing cryptically: variance may be the only difference when looking at defending with these marginal hands in a vacuum, but defending your blind frequently in these seemingly 0 EV situations will add EV in a meta-game sense.

[Steve Giufre]

[ QUOTE ]
The tougher calculations occur if we stipulate a bet on the turn is a favorite but not a certainty too represent a better hand.

[/ QUOTE ]

I like this part the best. The turn is by the far the most difficult street to play in these situations from the standpoint of both the raiser and the player in the blinds. It makes sense that way more hands become playable from the blinds if your opponent is going to accurately represent his hand on the turn. A lot of players simply wont put the bet in on the turn with a no pair hand when they miss, heads up or not. A lot of tend to call a river bet after they check behind, and some dont. But players who tend to have betting patterns, and who always tend to play the turn very straightforwardly must be ones we should me mixing it up agaist with those break even sort of hands. Also the players who will simply bet every bet every street when checked having to be equally good candiates to defend agaist, since we will punish them too, but extracting the max when we do flop a pair like David said. I'm glad you brought up the turn, its defintely these kinds of postflop patterns we should be looking for when decided who to defend agaist with marginal holdings. I guess where most of my confusion has been is knowing exactly how far we should push this. I am pretty sure I've been dumping hands I should be defending with.

[rory]

Steve it is interesting that you are thinking about the turn in the blind-defense thread, because I was thinking about it too. Nate's recent thread in HUSH: threadand this thread seem to go together.

[haakee]

Barry Greenstein just did that [img]/images/graemlins/smirk.gif[/img]

[HiatusOver]

Hope there is a lot more to come...just got home from playing some poker and trying out some blind defense strategies. Limit Hold Em is way more fun now that I have identified a definite leak, so much to learn/work on experiment with. Anyways, I am too tired now to post anything substantial...but thanks for the responses so far...David, hopefully you will stick around to help answer questions...and JA, no hard feelings hopefully. Just kinda felt my manhood was questioned when u seemed to imply I couldnt beat a live 100-200 game.

[Tommy Angelo]

"Tommy and you seem to have a never-ending interest in making things easy"

Hi JV,

Did I say "easy?" What I meant was "simple."

For instance, I decided to read this entire thread because of the topic and because of who was in it. I simply wanted to know what ya'll currently think. But I knew there was simply no chance of me changing my simple approach to the blinds preflop. That's because my blind play has little to do with cards and opponents and much to do with firstlessness.

Then came David's post, and I got to thinking (and typing too!). David wrote:

" ... suppose you have Q4 offsuit and are raised by someone with any pair, any ace or any two cards that add up to 15 or more. Next assume that your strategy is to fold on the flop if you don't pair and check and call all the way to the river if you do."

That was when my ears perked WAY up, since that is the plan I would choose in that situation, except that I would always reserve the option to fold on any street if I think I'm beat. And that's where simple-but-not-easy comes in.

Tommy

[MaxPower]

David's post reminds me of something I recall from HPFAP. In discussing semi-bluffing, they say that you should play in such a way that anyone who tries to keep you honest will make only a small profit.

How does this relate to defending the blinds? Since your opponents will often be semi-bluffing you will want to play more hands against those who don't understand the above concept (i.e., those who will bet every street automatically). If you opponent does understand this then you will probably have to value bet your hand more often when you do hit something.

I think the biggest problem people (including myself) have in defending the blinds is not which hands to play but how to play after the flop when you have missed and cannot beat most of the hands you opponent may be semi-bluffing with. My feeling is that is you can break even with your opponent in this situation you are doing very well. Al least you want to make sure that your opponent does not win a large amount. At this point, I just rely on my hand reading and give up most of the time, but play back and try to resteal a certain percentage of the time.

[stoxtrader]

I loved reading this thread. Though I fear it may actually hurt my earn.

I defend pretty loose, but that's mostly cause I like to see flops. Three whole cards for the price of one bet? nice.

Whoever said they want action with J9s I disagree with. Sure you want action if the pot size was zero.

JV is my favorite poster in this thread. I too care less about the difficulty of poker, than the quality of my play.

David Sklansky explained much better my next point - these situations really really really are opponent dependant. As any SH and HU pots are. So you get into if this happens he might do this, so the the probability of this happening is X, vs what the pot is laying me, etc.

If you want to improve in this area, I suggest playing 2,3 and 4 handed. Do you change your opening standards UTG 4 handed vs folded to you in the CO full table?

should you?

How do you play the button 3 handed? is it different from the button at a full table folded to you?

Conversely, do you respect an open button or CO raise more full table than 3 or 4 handed? why or why not?

I think there are a few pertinent points for both my above questions...would love to see if others can hit on them (and in the process I can hope people will point out thoughtful things I do not understand, kind of an underhanded way of getting others to help think through these problems).

[SCfuji]

i was wondering if there is merit to 3-betting a blind thief from your sb or bb with your own garbage? many posts have talked about restealing on a future street, but why not take the lead away preflop? is the main reason because we are oop in the blinds? any thought are much appreciated. if i intruded on your party ill just go back to my $1/$2 cave.

[Bartholow]

Sredni would appreciate your talk of swords.

I know it was mentioned by David, but I think many here are not giving it much discussion time: how loosely you can profitably defend your blinds depends HUGELY on how well YOU play.