PRIMARY POKER SKILLS

But yet one of the primary skills in any form of hold’em poker is in how you handle post flop play. In no-limit hold’em, most of the time you will not go beyond the flop so post flop skills are not required as often. But in games where big bets cannot win the pot immediately like with pot limit and especially limit play then you have to be able to play very well after the flop.

While you cannot lose your buy-in in one foul swoop in limit play, your level of skill will be under constant bombardment by having to see flop after flop after flop. This will be even more pronounced in six handed play. Let us look at an example to show what I mean here.

It has been folded around to the button who raises, the small blind folds and you are in the big blind with the hand Qh-5c. Now if this was a no-limit situation then you can clearly fold and wait for a better opportunity as Qh-5c isn’t exactly one of the better poker hands. In fact even if your opponent on the button is a very loose and aggressive player then folding would still be correct here. Even though you would be looking to open your range, it wouldn’t be opened wide enough to incorporate a hand like Q-5.

LIMIT PLAY IS DIFFERENT

But in limit play then you really must play this hand. Your pot odds and implied odds coupled with your opponents likely range gives you a straight forward call here. In fact to balance your play somewhat then you can even consider throwing in a small percentage of re-raises although that percentage cannot be very high with a hand like Q-5.

Your opponent could have something like K-9 but yet pot odds of 3.5/1 dictate that you simply cannot fold this hand. Then you can decide how to proceed on certain types of flop. For example if the flop came J-7-2 rainbow then you may get the opportunity to take the lead here on a ragged rainbow board that has likely missed your opponent.

You could try leading out or maybe check-raising for balance. You have reached this situation purely because you were playing a form of poker where you were receiving good pot odds to get involved before the flop.

Poor post flop play at limit hold’em is like a slow bleeding of money and this is why having a rakeback deal is critical these days to your hourly rate. The overall level of skill in limit play has led to variance becoming more and more of an issue.

This is precisely why I stopped playing the game and switched to no-limit play via a brief fling with SNG’s. But do not let anyone tell you that limit hold’em is a far less skilful game than no-limit because anyone who says that simply does not understand limit hold’em.

This article was written by Carl “The Dean” Sampson

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In this hand our hero had the 10c-9c and it was limped by three players in a full-ring $5-$10 texas hold’em game. In this instance then the call is pretty automatic given the hand type and the pot odds which are very good. Then when you consider the implied odds as well then we have a profitable situation. The big blind raps the table and there is $25 in the pot.

The flop comes Qc-4c-2d giving our hero a flush draw. He is now the first to speak and rightly checks. There is little point in semi-bluffing here into four opponents or pumping the pot. If one of his opponents has flopped top pair and they raise then he could find himself heads up with the worst hand trying to outdraw the only player left in the hand with reduced implied odds.

If you bet and it gets raised then that raise can prevent other players from calling. Here is a situation where you really don’t mind other players staying in the hand if you check and someone else bets. Everyone checks to the final limper who bets and now it is back on our hero.

Once again the correct play here is to call, folding is not an option simply because of the pot odds so the choice is between calling and raising. But raising presents our hero with a similar problem as before. If his opponent is betting a hand like top pair with something like Q-J then a raise will simply thin the field against the one hand that they have to outdraw to win the pot.

It is simply better to call and let other players come along for the ride so to speak. Our hero calls as does one other limper and there is now $40 in the pot and three players left in the hand. The turn card is the 8h which misses our hero so he checks and so does the first limper. The final limper bets $10 making a $50 pot and our hero rightly calls getting 5/1 immediate odds and some implied odds as well so he cannot fold even though the limit has doubled.

The other player folds so the hand is now heads up with $60 in the pot. The river card misses our heroes flush draw but pairs his ten. He checks and the final limper bets again.

This now puts $70 into the pot. Despite the fact that he is almost certainly beaten here, pot odds of 7/1 coupled with a hand that does have some potential to be the best hand then a fold is simply out of the question here.

Raising is a poor play as if our hero has the best hand then he will win the pot by calling as any weaker hand wouldn’t call the raise anyway. Our hero called and lost the pot to a K-Q but he can be commended for playing the hand well.

This article was written by Carl “The Dean” Sampson

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I hope you don’t mind if I ask something about betting.

Let’s say for an instance, in a no limit game, the blinds are 50/100. Then there is player 1 who is the first one to act after the big blinds and a raise to 300, players 2 and 3 fold to player 4 who eventually places a 500 chip.

Player 1, being dissatisfied discoursed that a re-raise less than double the original bet is not possible. Any idea?

Somehow, I thought that a re-raise was only bound to the minimum of the big blind, therefore if someone places a bet of 300, I could make it 350 or so. Do you think, the minimum raise should be twice larger than the bet placed earlier? And one more thing, is this the same thing at all betting rounds?

Thanks!
Jacob
Jacob,

Once a pot has been raised, the re-raise must be in the amount of the previous raise. In your example above, since your opponent raised by 200, the reraise must be at least 200. Player four’s bet off 500 was a call of 300 and a 200 raise.

This applies to all streets of betting.

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Well, three players were left in the pot and at the turn the 1st player to act bet. Eventually, the 2nd player to act called and then the 3rd player raised. After which, the 1st player called and the 2nd player re-raised. Someone at the table who was not in the hand called a foul for he thought a re-raise after a call was not supposedly possible.

Personally, I thought it was a check raise so I haven’t reacted.

What do you think?

Regards,
Jayden
Jayden,

A check-raise is when a player checks the betting to another opponent, that opponent bet and then you raise. What your opponent did was known as a limp-raise. This is perfectly acceptable. When a player raises as opposed to calling a bet, they are reopening the action to other players. The players have the same options to call, raise, or fold. Would your opponent objected to your other opponent calling and then folding to a raise? Not likely.

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