In this the second part of us looking into the world of Over-Betting the pot, we look at an example where Doug Polk over-bets for maximum value.
Pre-Flop Action
We pick up the action from Live at the Bike with blinds at $50/$100 with a $100 ante.
Max opens for $400 from the Hi-Jack with K♠ T♥
Doug Defends his Big Blind with A♣ 4♥ calling $300
The flop
Q♠ A♠ A♥
Doug starts off with a check, although he flops a huge hand in the way of having three of a kind Ace’s, if he leads out at this board he will only really get action when he is in bad shape and he is going to want to keep worse hands in the pot.
Max flops a gutshot straight draw and a backdoor nut flush draw with the King of Spades in his hand, he elects to check this back and I like this line from him, he has little need to bet, he can look to get to showdown with this holding and play some turns that Doug picks up the lead on.
The Turn Card
T♣
Improving Max’s hand giving him two pair and a gutshot straight draw…
Action is on Doug to act first from the Big Blind and he elects to check again, I like this line from Doug, combinations of KJ just got there versus him and it’s going to be hard for him to get two streets of value here without being beat, so playing a little bit of pot control and a little bit deceptively allowing some bluffs from Max a check here is really good.
This also balances Doug’s range in the long run, but what does this mean?
Well if Doug even checks his three of a kind holdings on this flop and turn, he is protected for when he has weaker hands like JT, T9, Q9 just as some examples, checking twice here allows him to have strong holdings in his check twice range, meaning his opponents can’t just exploit him any time he checks twice because he never has a good hand when he does this.
This is an important thing to work into your game, being balanced in spots so you cannot be run over in the long run by always playing too predictably.
So the action is to Max and he decides to check back too.
This is good from Max also, he has little reason to bet, he will pretty much only get called if Doug has an Ace or a Queen in this spot, so his hand is much better used as a bluff catcher for the River.
The River Action
So with little action on all previous streets, things are about to heat up, with just $850 in the pot so far Doug is going to fire up the Over-bet on the end, betting $2,250.
Let’s look at why this is good, his opponent would have been betting all better hands than his either on the flop or at least on the turn, so Doug is good here nearly 100% of the time, with rare exceptions of hands like 22 in Max’s hand.
So Doug can bet for Value here for a large sizing and this way he could be bluffing too as he might take this line with a no showdown value hand like 56s for example.
Max’s range is capped so this would be a good time to reach out and try and steal it from him.
This is what makes Max’s decision a tough one here…
So if we are getting to this River decision with all our hands we check back the turn with like KQ, KT, QJ, QT, Q9, 33-99 we are going to have to bluff catch with some of these holdings…
Whilst it’s easy to just sit here and say I like folding any of our hands with a Ten in them, that is the most logical choice as for the times our opponent is value betting with hands like KQ, QJ themselves, at least chopping this pot would be betting than losing when we call with Aces and Tens on this run out.
So we need to look at our whole range and decide which hands we will call with given this terrible price on the pot we aren’t going to want to call too often, so I would choose hands like KQ and QJ as these are our strongest holdings which also block the straight.
I think we can let the KT go here most of the time but sometimes use it as a call, as at least it is the nut pair of Tens.
Play at Full Tilt Poker!
Use lines like Doug Polk’s at the tables today…
Get £20 FREEPLAY with your first deposit, T&Cs apply
FTP has joined forces with PokerStars now sharing player pools on the biggest network in the world for online poker.
Play the same huge selection of games on the Pokerstars network but with the amazing old school avatars of the golden era of online poker.
Sign up today to get this amazing offer for new players!