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Defending The Bb With A 13 To 18 Bb Stack


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Last night a good reg, who happens to be in my same staking group, did this. I opened from MP and he flatted in the bb with about 14 or 15bb, I had about 24bb. This is just something I generally don't do but it's gotten me thinking about the benefits of doing this so I'd like to discuss it.

 

What hands are best to do this with?

 

Against what type of opponent is it best to do this with?

 

What are the pros?

 

What are the cons?

 

In the hand mentioned I was pretty confused by his flat and didn't even bother to c-bet. :icon_redface:

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Not uncommon to see someone defend the BB. In terms of this hand, we don't know what the size of your raise was, the stage of the tournament, how many players are at the table, or if there are antes. We also are given no history on your play with this player. The less information you give, the less likely it is someone can give you an accurate analysis of the dynamics at play and how they should be contemplated or managed.

Perhaps, in a general sense, the forethought that player has put in, or is/isn't capable of will decide the quality of the play your opponent made. If his goal was to flat, let you c-bet (if it's your habit), and reshove to create a situation you very likely fold in, he would have chose an isolated spot to do so, and gained great value if he saw that as your play. It really depends how deep the tournament has went and how deep the players are thinking. Here you didn't bet, so if he has a marginal hand you're giving him a free card. Does the board read matter if he is playing a passive game? Perhaps not, he's out of position and if he isn't known to be too trappy then giving him the free card is most likely wrong. It may be an old school thought process, but to me if you aren't giving them a chance to fold you are losing value on a board they may have no connection to.

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I'm going to assume since they are both relatively shallow they're in the later stages of the tournament with antes. I'm also going to assume since Dixie is a good reg she's minraising.

 

I mean, she gave us plenty of information.

 

If it's something you have never seen this opponent do against you or anyone, I'm probably more inclined to shut down here. I mean, a reg isn't all of the sudden going to say, **** it, lets defend this hand. You have to assume he's getting tricky in this spot? I really don'tk now.

 

One thing you could do for balance is to bet really really small on the flop with your entire range.

 

Then again, I don't play poker anymore so this could be all gibberish.

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We were deep, I min raised, he does this some, more than some other good regs but I didn't know this at the time. We probably have a couple of thousands of hands together and we do HH reviews together so lots of knowledge of each others game. Because I hadn't seen him do this, or at least not much, it threw me off somewhat at the time.

 

I'm mostly interested in the concept of what and when and against who we can do this profitably.

 

I also meant defending when shallow stacked. I defend a reasonable amount with 25bb+ but as we get shallower it becomes much trickier.

 

Donk4 you're not playing at all?

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flatting is often optimal with big pairs in his situation particularly vs an open from reg who will interpret your jamming ranges well and call accordingly and who is also capable of opening and folding with a wide variety of stack sizes, but i would only snap heavily weight that range vs the better regulars as a standard. i would consider flatting a wider range with this stack very situationally...

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This type of play seems to be catching on more so lately. Gus Hansen sort of kicked it off with his style of play in the HU tounament at the 2010 WSOP by limping a high percentage of the time from the button. Not that this is the exact same play ... it certainly spawned a 'low risk' type of playing style thought process.

 

I agree that a reg will know that you also are somewhat short stacked and would have a good feel for your shove/call range so with any Ax, Kx, small pair, suited (or not) semi-connectors you can call a min-raise with minimal risk and without giving anything away about your hand. You actually did what the part of the play is designed to do, which is to check back the Flop (freeze you) or set you up for a check raise if you had bet out smallish on the Flop. You would still have fold equity with 20BB and BB picks up an extra 2BB if you do fold. Otherwise its on a showdown which might have happened anyway pre-Flop but now we know we at least hit the Flop for less than 20% of our stack instead of all of our stack.

 

The profit comes from leading out/shoving the Flop or check/shoving a weak Flop bet ... and to give you some props, as it should be done to a opponent who is thought to be a thinker and is willing to fold 'smartly'. You also could get to a check down-show down without risking your stack now knowing you have show down value. It doesn't really matter if you are in position here either when your opponent has fold equity .. 20BB or more.

 

In short stack cash play, the min-raise/call from a short stack is much more likely to have a table slow down than a shove.

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i would really doubt that this is profitable with that wide of a range as a standard against competent opponents in these stages of a tournament... OR's cbet and opening frequencies might dictate a defend w a decent range possibly but i will need more convincing...

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Now I understand more clearly what I'm looking at and what you're looking for I'll try again.

 

First I'd say you're not often going to find a "c-bet" from a guy who flatted that stack. What value would he gain? If you took aggression, technically, you are the one in position to c-bet, so if he does have a hand he's looking to showdown it's best to pass the action to you. He would probably shove if it's a draw heavy board and needs to protect a hand, but most likely if he's looking for value he would check, and shove to a c-bet. If you check behind, it will most likely induce a shove, or depending on the avg stack, perhaps make a feeler bet on an incomplete hand when the turn comes, folding to an all in bet. It depends how valuable those chips are in the bigger scope of the tournament. That said, these are base thoughts and depending on the level of play you are at the inverse could very easily be true. What I find in most lower buy in tournaments is that good players respect each other, or avoid each other, until later stages, playing fairly straight forward ABC with their hands. Most likely if it's a shove and showdown it will be with 2 legitimate hands that could have gotten it in preflop. Some players can check down some strong over pairs trying to get value, and this is where the BB finds value in his hands... It's tough to judge the play of the BB because of the stack size. In the end you will have to look at your hand, and the tournament, and say "Is this the spot in this tournament, with these players, against this player with this percent of my stack at risk that I want to be in?" and realize it will rarely play out without an all in.

 

What do we learn from this if we choose to flat from the big blind? It really depends on our capability to make plays and appropriately assume our opponents judgement and lines of thought. The tournament dynamics play in as well, how are things running? For this to be a profitable situation you have to be on a completely different level from your opponent. Your play has to be so dynamic that you can literally have anything. How many hands do you really see from the big blind? Probably not enough to show quality hands played from the position with enough regularity to get any type of respect, which could enable moving like you have AA-QQ when you flat. Situationally, what do you gain from taking the lead, either a minimal reraise preflop, or betting out on the flop? Well a reraise preflop more accuratley may gauge the opponents range, while aggression of the flop, I feel, is less likely to produce a thought process in your opponent, as opposed to a mechanical and premeditated play no matter what happens or what comes. The later in the tournament and more passive the tournament is playing the more valuable a min raise becomes preflop for the MP player and the more likely it is to be a worthwhile play to pick up the blinds. Thinking players will begin to test the MP if this becomes a consistant effort on their part, and the predicatability of the game and hands held fall apart at that point.

 

If any of that makes sense, awesome!

 

Good Luck

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  • 4 months later...

completely changed my mind on this spot, definitely flatting a pretty wide range here a fair amount... some suited connectors and broadway cards and some of the less scraggly Ax's... as well as some big pairs sometimes... this range dictated alot by the raisers opening range, vs tight opponents who are going to be heavily weighted in broadway cards you can flat a pretty wide range here profitably with a little creativity post flop... vs looser opponents you could consider flatting here with some slightly more raggedy broadway hands as well as some Ax situational obv...

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