Weekly Poker essay #1: Hand Reading

[TheGrifter]

This is the first in a series of weekly posts I will make in an effort to jump start the discussion of NL hold'em strategy in small stakes games. What I have written is only my view on each area and I hope that others will disagree wiht and/or expand on my ideas. I will continue to post my thoughts if people find this type of strategy discussion interesting.

One of the most valuable skills in low stakes NL hold’em is the ability to analyze your opponents play in order to assign to them a range of possible holdings. In doing so, you can extract maximum value when you are ahead and determine if it is worthwhile to draw when you are behind.

Reading hands online is unique in that you do not have access to information that your opponent may give away with his/her bodily and facial motions. You have to rely upon the actual actions taken at the table in the form of checking calling or raising on every street. You must also adjust your reads as your opponents make actions on the later streets and relate them to the action taken earlier in the hand. In doing so you can generally narrow the range of your opponent’s possible holdings down much more easily than if you examined only the current action facing you. Lastly, online play does offer the possibility of timing reads based on the amount of time each opponent takes to make a decision, it is important not to take this concept too far but it can be very valuable in applied correctly.

First, let us examine how each action your opponent takes reveals information about his down cards. In low limit ring NL games opponents generally make plays based directly on the cards they hold, within the framework of their own personality and playing style.
The first opportunity to glean information about your opponent’s holdings is in the preflop action. Did your opponent raise or simply call the big blind? Was that raise unusually large or small? Take the following action (assume all have 100BB stacks):

- Player A raises to 4x BB from MP
- The cutoff and button call
- You hold QQ in the SB and must act next

At this point you have three pieces of information to base your action upon, the standard opening raise of the BB and the call of the CO and button. It is appropriate to assume that all have slightly above average (but not necessarily premium) hands. In fact, it may be quite possible that the MP player has only a marginal hand (such as KT) and was hoping to maximize his chances of winning with top pair. At this point it is likely that one if not all players have broadway cards, big aces, suited cards or pocket pairs. A reasonable range of hands for Player A would be AK-A9, any pocket pair, any suited broadway cards (possibly also offsuit broadways) or even a weak suited ace.

The CO and Button are letting you know that while they want to play their hands, they do not feel strongly enough to re-raise with them. In this situation, in low stakes NLHE QQ is going to be far ahead of all three players so often that it would be wrong not to re-raise. Your hand, although strong, is vulnerable to the overcards that your opponents are likely to have, therefore you want to give them the opportunity to fold by raising a significant amount (a pot sized re-raise of 20xBB would be appropriate). Now, let us assume the following action takes place:
- You raise to 20xBB
- MP folds
- CO Re-raises all-in (100xBB)
- Button Folds
- Action to you
The cut off has come to life and pushed in all his money following your re-raise. He has pushed 96BB into a 40BB pot. At this point, you know two things, the cut off likes his hand a lot and you’re getting nearly 2:1 on a call. This means that even if you are behind some of the time you can still profit from a call. It is important not to ignore the strength of the CO’s actions however. Remember, he didn’t only re-raise you, he felt strongly enough about his hand to not want to get other players out until the pot grew to a size that he felt comfortable winning, this almost ALWAYS means a big hand and if you call here you are likely up against AA or KK. Another possibility is a medium pocket pair 99-JJ that is being overplayed or AK, but given that your opponent has position on you and could utilize that advantage it is much more likely that you are beat and even given the price, should fold. You come to this decision despite the strength of your hand, by reading your opponents actions.

As important as it is to take your opponents actions into consideration the real value in playing observant poker is in how those actions reveal a picture of your opponents hand as the play progresses to the flop and beyond. On the flop you should always keep in mind whether your opponent limped/raised, called or checked preflop and what this means as the hand is played. For example, your opponent raises 4xBB from late position after a couple limpers, and you call in the BB with a medium pocket pair (66), the limpers call. The flop comes AK6 and you must act first. In this situation you should often lead out with a small bet (1/3 pot) for several reasons:

- You know your opponent raised in LP and is more likely to have broadway cards than if he had not raised.
- If he has an Ace he will almost surely raise you, if he has other broadway cards he will have at minimum a gutshot straight draw and will often call.
- This will then trap the limpers who also likely have a bit of this board when they call your small bet and you call LP’s raise
- Don’t worry about slowplaying this board because your opponents aren’t paying attention to you, you need to make the action that maximizes profit given the range of hands you read your opponents for and a small bet does so here. Also, it creates a bigger pot and more opportunity for profit on later streets.
Therefore, you lead for 5xBB and are called by both limpers and the BB raises to 15xBB. The action is back to you, in this situation a case could be made for both calling and re-raising. However, re-raising will likely shut out the limpers and their marginal holdings and you therefore give up value on the turn and river. At this point you can tuck away in your mind that it is unlikely that the preflop raiser has AA or KK as he would almost certainly slowplay these holdings. So you call:
- The turn is the Jh, completing the rainbow.
- You check and it is checked to LP who bets 40xBB

At this point you can be almost certain that LP does not have the straight, and QT is a very unlikely holding for the limpers as well. However, there are now many more two pair possibilities with the jack hitting the board. This is the most likely hand for LP given his preflop and flop actions. It is also possible that one of the limpers has improved with the jack to a pair plus straight draw or 2-pair as well. At this point, given the strength of your hand and the fact that your opponents will not be able to get away from hands that you beat you should raise all in. You will often find opponents calling and flipping over KJ or AJ here and often hands as weak as Ax you will see AA, KK, JJ and QT VERY rarely given the action that has come previously. By reading the situation carefully you are able to act strongly even without the nuts because you know that hands that beat you are unlikely.

Another tool that can be very effective is the observance of the time your opponent takes to make a decision. I recall once hand in which this was very effective for me:
- This was 5 handed 2/4 blinds and I had red sevens in the BB (all have approx 450-600)
- UTG (good aggressive player) limps, CO (Loose, bad player) limps I raise to 20, limpers call
- Flop is Ts 5h 2s, I bet 50 UTG insta-calls, CO thinks and calls
This call was very fast but not quite so fast that the auto-call button was checked, this led me to believe that UTG was on a flush draw as he would have had to consider his action with any other hand on this board. I had less of a read on the CO but he is the type of player that would flat call here with a ten, a five, or possibly even just overcards
- The turn is the 4d, checked around
- The river is the 2d.

At this point I feel strongly that my hand is good, I doubt very much that the CO would check through with a ten or 5 on the turn and I still feel that UTG was on a flush draw. I also feel that the UTG will fold if I bet and the CO . However, I think that this is a situation in which my reads lead to the decision to check for several reasons:

- It is possible that the CO called the flop with a 2 and now has trips, in which case he will raise
- Given the fact that the turn was checked through this is a good opportunity for UTG to bluff at the pot with a busted draw
- If UTG does bluff at the pot then I can see the CO’s action first before deciding my move

I did check and UTG bet 150, the CO folded quickly and I called. His A high flush draw was revealed and my hand was good.

This is a situation in which a bet would never have generated as much profit as a check and an example of how using timing reads can improve your bottom line.


My question is, what methods do you use when attempting to read hands online and how do you apply those methods?

[AZK]

Small stakes needs more of these from the experienced posters. Nice post.

[Relentless]

Good post.

[BobboFitos]

Good post! (Chiming in with everyone else)
Since everyone has said good post, I'll try to expand on something:

[ QUOTE ]
- You raise to 20xBB
- MP folds
- CO Re-raises all-in (100xBB)
- Button Folds
- Action to you

The cut off has come to life and pushed in all his money following your re-raise. He has pushed 96BB into a 40BB pot. At this point, you know two things, the cut off likes his hand a lot and you’re getting nearly 2:1 on a call. This means that even if you are behind some of the time you can still profit from a call. It is important not to ignore the strength of the CO’s actions however. Remember, he didn’t only re-raise you, he felt strongly enough about his hand to not want to get other players out until the pot grew to a size that he felt comfortable winning, this almost ALWAYS means a big hand and if you call here you are likely up against AA or KK. Another possibility is a medium pocket pair 99-JJ that is being overplayed or AK, but given that your opponent has position on you and could utilize that advantage it is much more likely that you are beat and even given the price, should fold. You come to this decision despite the strength of your hand, by reading your opponents actions.

[/ QUOTE ]

Although this is true more often then not on numerous sites / what have you, on Party Poker this DOES mean a small PP a large % of the time. (Enough, I dare say, to make calling better then folding) For some reason whenever someone raises preflop, they ("they" loosely meaning the monkeys on Party) figure the raiser for AK, and think, "Hey, 44 is a slightly favorite over AK, this is a great spot for me!" and will push all in. 4s, in addition, is a hand typically limped from LP, so it fits with the hand-reading patterns so far developed.

Because the player with QQ IS getting roughly 96:44 (24:11) on a call, the opposition only needs to show 44 or the like ~32% ish of the time to show profit.

I truly like your point about wanting to build the pot up to a point where the opposition felt comfortable winning it, but I disagree that this means a big hand; small stakes NL players sometimes will limp from EP with a big pair or what have you, (the tricky ones) a limp/raise from LP does NOT have to mean a big pair.

To sum this up, although you are facing a limp/raise, you ARE getting a good price, and they only need to show an underpair to yours 32% or so of the time for this to be a profitable call. (And I think this number is higher on a site such as Party) In addition, if you do call and it turns out the player does have AA or KK, it's a great time to note them and see that they will limp/raise from LP with a big pair. (haha)

[gergery]

Great post, keep them coming.

Timing tells:
Reraising very quickly is almost never a huge bluff, esp. if he has little time to think. ie. I raise preflop w QQ he calls, flop hits T93, he raises, i reraise, he very quickly reraises all in. he's got a set, not almost never bluffing or semibluffing. And by contrast, with longer pauses, he could have 88,QJ etc.

[phil_ivey_fan]

[ QUOTE ]

[ QUOTE ]
- You raise to 20xBB
- MP folds
- CO Re-raises all-in (100xBB)
- Button Folds
- Action to you

The cut off has come to life and pushed in all his money following your re-raise. He has pushed 96BB into a 40BB pot. At this point, you know two things, the cut off likes his hand a lot and you’re getting nearly 2:1 on a call. This means that even if you are behind some of the time you can still profit from a call. It is important not to ignore the strength of the CO’s actions however. Remember, he didn’t only re-raise you, he felt strongly enough about his hand to not want to get other players out until the pot grew to a size that he felt comfortable winning, this almost ALWAYS means a big hand and if you call here you are likely up against AA or KK. Another possibility is a medium pocket pair 99-JJ that is being overplayed or AK, but given that your opponent has position on you and could utilize that advantage it is much more likely that you are beat and even given the price, should fold. You come to this decision despite the strength of your hand, by reading your opponents actions.

[/ QUOTE ]

Although this is true more often then not on numerous sites / what have you, on Party Poker this DOES mean a small PP a large % of the time. (Enough, I dare say, to make calling better then folding) For some reason whenever someone raises preflop, they ("they" loosely meaning the monkeys on Party) figure the raiser for AK, and think, "Hey, 44 is a slightly favorite over AK, this is a great spot for me!" and will push all in. 4s, in addition, is a hand typically limped from LP, so it fits with the hand-reading patterns so far developed.

Because the player with QQ IS getting roughly 96:44 (24:11) on a call, the opposition only needs to show 44 or the like ~32% ish of the time to show profit.

I truly like your point about wanting to build the pot up to a point where the opposition felt comfortable winning it, but I disagree that this means a big hand; small stakes NL players sometimes will limp from EP with a big pair or what have you, (the tricky ones) a limp/raise from LP does NOT have to mean a big pair.

To sum this up, although you are facing a limp/raise, you ARE getting a good price, and they only need to show an underpair to yours 32% or so of the time for this to be a profitable call. (And I think this number is higher on a site such as Party) In addition, if you do call and it turns out the player does have AA or KK, it's a great time to note them and see that they will limp/raise from LP with a big pair. (haha)

[/ QUOTE ]

Actually, I do think this reads as AA,KK. Four people going in at 4BB is nice w/ AA. You can slip in w/ a monster and someone is likely to hit a top pair and not be able to lay it down.

Now once the pot is reraised by QQ. The AA/KK must push in.
a) if he has KK, he wants to get his money in before the flop incase an Ace falls.
b) if he has AA, he knows he's ahead and figures that the QQ (if a bad player like the majority of PP) will call.

In the 25 $ 50NL tables, you will be behind w/ QQ more than half the time.

[TheGrifter]

ivey,

The point that he was making is that it's okay if you're behind 50% of the time as long as you're ahead at least 65% of the time. In my experience (not on party) with that action you are up against AA/KK ovr 75% of the time, this may not be true on party, and if it isn't you should call.

[TheGrifter]

[ QUOTE ]
Great post, keep them coming.

Timing tells:
Reraising very quickly is almost never a huge bluff, esp. if he has little time to think. ie. I raise preflop w QQ he calls, flop hits T93, he raises, i reraise, he very quickly reraises all in. he's got a set, not almost never bluffing or semibluffing. And by contrast, with longer pauses, he could have 88,QJ etc.

[/ QUOTE ]

I agree, I intentionally wait 2-3 seconds before making any calling/raising decision in order to make sure I'm not giving away this type of information...even bad players may notice if you act very quickly and can glean information from this.

[BobboFitos]

[ QUOTE ]
In the 25 $ 50NL tables, you will be behind w/ QQ more than half the time.

[/ QUOTE ]

Ahah! My friend, that is the beauty of the situation. You only need to be ahead ~32% to make it a good call.

[asofel]

first, thank you to the intelligent players out there taking the time to help those of us who're still learning the same skills and strategies you have down cold...

now, there's obviously plenty of math involved with poker and gambling in general...the numbers don't scare me, being a math major, but i don't have the techniques quite yet for how many of you are arriving at these percentages...i don't expect a full blown explanation, but if anyone has links to some reading online for various calculations etc, that'd be great.
Thanks!