- Mar 07, 2011 That obviously isn’t ideal, and many people would probably accept a much lower salary to get a steady biweekly paycheck instead. But, I imagine that this would be tolerable for most people in the poker world. While a 50k hand sample ain’t too bad for making money, it’s absolutely terrible for estimating your winrate. A break-even player.
- A good sample size is usually 500+, and a great one is 1,000+but there can still be good information over just a 60 hand sample. As you can see, every stat, other than the number of hands, is simply a percentage.
How to Compute Poker Probabilities. In a previous lesson, we explained how to compute probability for any type of poker hand.For convenience, here is a brief review: Count the number of possible five-card hands that can be dealt from a standard deck of 52 cards.
One of the best ways to increase your win rate in lower stakes cash games is to get good at reading opponents’ hands in various situations. This allows you to make tailor-made value bets that are based on what they are able to call. It also allows you to find that perfect bet size for your bluff.
Hand reading in small stakes cash games is never an exact science and I am no Daniel Negreanu. However, there are several specific clues that players frequently give off regarding the strength of their hand at the lower stakes. Let’s look at a few of these.
Preflop Action
At the lowest stakes online or live, when players just flat call your preflop raise this typically means they have some sort of non-premium though decent hand they don’t think is good enough to three-bet. Either that or they have a speculative hand or small pair, so we’re talking about hands like:
- , ,
- , ,
- -suited, -suited
- ,
Most players at these stakes will three-bet with their big premium hands (, , , , ) a lot of the time. Based on opponents’ preflop responses to our opening raises, then, we can already begin to narrow down their ranges considerably.
Postflop Action
The hand reading process continues after the flop based on the actions that our opponent takes. Timing tells in the online game and physical tells when playing live can also come into play.
When somebody just flats your flop continuation bet at these stakes, it is usually some sort of weak made hand or a draw. They will be slow playing something big from time to time, but this is not the norm. And if they are, they will typically let you know later on in the hand with a raise on the turn or river.
If they call your c-bet quickly, then this is usually a dead tell that they are on this weak pair/draw range as well. The reason why is that if they were slow playing something big (or even calling with nothing to set up some sort of bluff later on), then they would often want to think about it for a moment. When they snap-call us, though, it typically means that they didn’t even consider their other options. This is what somebody with a mediocre hand would likely do.
If we assume that our opponent has something like middle pair or a flush draw a lot when just calling us postflop, we should continue to bet for value with all of our decent-to-good made hands. We should also continue to fire as a bluff on all boards that get progressively scarier for them and do not complete the obvious draws — e.g., a board like .
Custom Bet Sizing
Now that we can narrow down our opponents’ possible hands based on preflop and postflop actions, we can consider what the appropriate bet size will be to get the maximum value out of them or make them fold if we are bluffing. I am primarily speaking about the river here.
On the flop and turn, you should often just go ahead and bet the “standard” 60%-70% of the pot that is typical for these low stakes cash games whether you are betting for value or bluffing. However, once we get to the river we have the maximum amount of information about the strength of our opponent’s hand.
It would be a mistake at that point always to continue to bet these same amounts. Sometimes we should bet less, and sometimes we should even bet more.
Under-Betting the River to Get Value
If we get to the river and our opponent has been calling the whole way, as I mentioned before this is typically the sign of a weakish pair that is hanging on or a draw. If they have a missed draw, then obviously it doesn’t matter what amount we bet on the river, they are folding. However, if they have some sort of made hand it is very important that we get value here by making it an amount that they can’t say no to calling.
This is when you really need to use your hand reading skills. What sort of pair do you think your opponent is likely to have considering the preflop and flop action? Did the turn and river bring overcards to that pair? If so, then perhaps something like 40% of the pot or even less is the right amount to get a call.
This is especially the case if you think that they might be capable of hero calling you with bottom pair or even ace-high. Bombing the pot here against those hands would be a serious mistake.
The bottom line is that you want to put yourself in your opponents’ shoes here and ask yourself how much can they call considering the strength of their hand. Pot sizes are the biggest on the river and it is critical for your win rate that you consider what the optimal bet size is instead of just auto-firing like you might have done on earlier streets.
Over-Betting the River as a Bluff
This play is a little bit more complicated and not something I do nearly as often at the lower stakes versus the large amount of calling stations and bad players. However, there are a few situations where a bigger bet size might get them to fold a bit more readily when we are bluffing.
Again, the key here is to put yourself in your opponents’ position and try to narrow down what hand they are likely to have based on their preflop and postflop actions as well as the board. What do you think they called you with on the flop? Did the board get scarier for them? Were there any draws? Could you perhaps rep a draw that came in yourself?
If you think they might have something fairly decent, a bigger bet size of 80% of the pot or even more might just be the magic number to make them lay it down. You want them really to think about whether they want to make that call with their middle pair or weak top pair. You don’t want to give them an easy decision by betting too small.
It would be wise not to attempt this sort of thing very often against the recreational players who will call you down with anything. Also, you should be careful about tapping the well like this too many times against any regulars with whom you have an aggressive history or who are calling stations themselves (which is often the case at these stakes).
Conclusion
Learning how to read your opponent’s hand in small stakes cash games can really help you make the right play on the later streets and perhaps more importantly make the right bet size.
Handing reading is all about putting the pieces of the puzzle together based on your opponent’s actions throughout the hand. Despite what you might see on televised poker shows or in Hollywood depictions of the game, this isn’t about calling your opponent’s exact hand. This is about narrowing down their range to a specific type of hand such as flush draw, middle pair, top pair/weak kicker, and the like.
Once you get better at doing this, then you should pay close attention to your bet sizing — especially on the river — in order to make sure you get the most value when you have it and get the fold when you don’t.
Nathan “BlackRain79” Williams is the author of the popular micro stakes strategy books, Crushing the Microstakes and Modern Small Stakes. He also blogs regularly about all things related to the micros over at www.blackrain79.com.
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Why can’t I win money at online poker? Where am I going wrong? What do I need to do to improve my poker game?
I don’t know. Those are some pretty vague questions right there. Maybe if you sent me some stats, graphs and a few hand histories then I might be able to do something. Then again, this isn’t really much of a dialogue, so that’s not going to work either.
However, what I can do is give you a bunch of reasons as to why you can’t win money from online poker and ideas for what you could do to improve. How does, say, a nice, round 26 reasons sound?
Poker Hand Sample Size
Reasons why you lose money playing online poker.
- You’ve played 1,000 hands. Ever heard of variance? Don’t draw any conclusions until you hit at least 10,000 hands, and even then you can’t really rely on the results from that sample size. Just play lots of hands before you resign yourself to the losers’ corner.
- You don’t use bankroll management. If you don’t use BR management, you’re never going to be able to consistently win money from poker. And no, I’m not just saying that to scare you.
- You play too many hands. Sure, all hands in poker have a chance of winning, but then I also have a chance of having a threesome. Just because an event can happen it doesn’t mean that you should put your money behind it. The odds aren’t always going to be in your favour.
- You undervalue position. How many articles and tips is it going to take before you start to understand that position is actually way more important than you think it is? Have you not noticed how much easier it is to play from the button than it is UTG?
- You make minraises before and after the flop. Why? Raise 3BB + 1BB for each limper preflop and bet at least 2/3rds of the pot postflop and you’ll do much better for yourself. See bet sizing for more details.
- You multi-table too many tables. Yeah sure, all the cool kids are multi-tabling but that doesn’t mean you have to too. Take you time and play within your comfort zone. I’m sure that if I had a Ferrari as my first car I would have crashed it. Thank God that I was broke and had to settle for a washing machine with wheels.
- You chase draws too much. Blindly chasing after any and every flush and straight draw isn’t going to pay off. Pot odds will sort you out.
- You make crying calls. It’s nice to be able to see your opponent’s hand at the end, but if it’s costing you money then it’s not really all that nice at all. Learn to be content with your decision and fold if you think you’re behind.
- You blame the poker room and not yourself. PokerStars is rigged!!11!! - of course. It couldn’t possibly that you have leaks in your game could it. Winning players look inward not outward when they are losing.
- You haven’t read any poker books. Even in this high-tech world of training videos, interactive seminars and snowboarding, there is still room for the good old-fashioned poker books. The better ones are still incredibly helpful, so don't overlook them.
- You chase after stats. You are 28/16/2 and apparently you need to play 22/18/3 to be a winning poker player at 6max NLHE, so you force yourself to play less hands and raise more. Unfortunately, that’s not how it works. Focus on playing good poker and the stats will take care of themselves.
- You play whilst on tilt. Yes, that’s right. Shoving all-in with 63 offsuit UTG is by far the most effective way to get your money back after that bad beat.
- You make fancy plays against micro stakes players.Floating the flop and check raising the turn isn’t going to go down too well if the guy on the other side of the screen is dribbling, scratching his balls and randomly clicking buttons. Keep it simple. Bet your good hands and check/fold your bad hands.
- You don’t value bet big enough. Seriously, crank your value bets up and your winrate will skyrocket. Why bet $20 in to a $100 pot when you can get called by a $100 bet? Bigger value bets = bigger wins.
- You don’t value bet at all. Even worse! If you have a good hand, get some money for it. Don’t be afraid to lose 1 time out of 10 or whatever. Not value betting is like never crossing the road because you’re always afraid of getting run over.
- You call raises with weak hands and then fold to further action. If you don’t have a plan for later on in the hand you’re no better than a monkey clicking buttons. You should always have a plan of action for later streets. Fold on that turn if you don’t know what you’re going to do on the river.
- You don’t continuation bet.Continuation bets can pick up loads o’ little pots. Adding the cbet to your game is an instant winrate booster.
- You continuation bet too much. Easy now tiger, cbets are good and all but not necessarily 100% of the time. On some flops you’re much better off checking. See this video on continuation betting for a quick quite on when and when not to cbet.
- You don’t double barrel. This is often because you just cbet too much. If you’re not prepared to double barrel then hold back on those cbets.
- You double barrel too much. Just because your continuation bet got called it doesn’t mean you need to go ahead and throw the kitchen sink at your opponent to get them off the hand. Pick your spots.
- You triple barrel too much. I think this is going to be the biggest bankroll rapist. Poor triple barrels are going to ravage your bankroll until it’s a quivering mess.
- You don’t 3bet enough. If you’re not 3betting your AKs and AQs against loose raises you are missing out on easy money. Put money in the middle with strong hands.
- You call too many 3bets. If you raise and get 3bet by a tight player, what sort of hands do you think your AJo is beating?
- You don’t get rakeback. This isn’t going to fix the root of the problem, but if you’re a break even or marginal losing player then rakeback can turn you in to a winning player overnight.
- You play when you’re tired or drunk. As a rule of thumb, if it's not legal for you to drive, then you shouldn’t play poker either. As sad as it is to say this, think of poker as a sport. You need to be in good condition, otherwise your results will suffer.
- You have a “lucky” hand. No, J3o isn’t lucky and it’s not going to win you any money.
Any of those help you out?
Good Poker Hand Crossword
Oh, and for what it's worth, you definitely can win money from poker. Have a look at how much money you can win playing online poker.
Go back to the interesting Texas Hold'em articles.
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