I steal, I hit the flop - kinda - now WHAT?

[curtains]

I don't think this is a good time to steal preflop. I do steal often, but I think you are just being overly ambitious here, with the two giant stacks in the big blind. I believe that it's -EV to steal here, especially to make it 3.5x the BB.

On the flop I would move allin. The pot has more than half of what I have in my stack, and my opponent has made a weak bet. I'm going to take my chances here and put him to the test.

[McMelchior]

I find you point of view somewhat surprising, Curtains.

You actually think it’s –EV to steal from bigger stacks? I wonder if you misread my post?

I said the average stack is around t9k, and SB and BB is sitting on t14k and t11.5k respectively – not exactly “giant stacks” in my opinion: BB (who’s the one that actually calls) would find himself crippled at less than 8BBs if he loses an all-in to me, and even the SB would risk being reduced to around half the average stack if I have what I represent and it holds up.

Maybe it’s a matter of style, but if I (being a somewhat conservative player) abstained from stealing blinds from players just because their stacks were 30% - 60% bigger than mine I’d find myself blinded out of 90% of the tournaments I enter.

I can see the merit of your view if one of the blinds is a real giant – in the order of magnitude being able to double me up and still retain twice the average stack or more – and has shown a willingness to gamble with marginal holdings. In the described situation I’m looking at players who have not made one single move for more than one orbit (and we’re talking about a WILD $10 buy-in).

Regarding the flop call (which was my reason for posting in the first place) as stated above I agree with the posters (and that's basically all of you, thank you) that advocades pushing – I can’t afford to give up what most of the time will be a decent edge; and offering the BB 5:1 pot odds on a draw to 22 possible scare-cards (for me) by flat calling was a clear mistake. Fold or push with a strong bias towards pushing.

Best,

McMelchior (Johan)