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Pre-Flop Open Raise SizingDoug Fieselman posted on November 11, 2009 00:00I had originally intended to talk about pre-flop raise sizing for all situations (i.e. open raising, isolating, and 3+ betting) but after I got into it I realized that it would be far too long so I'm only going to discuss some basic strategies for sizing pre-flop open raises.
Since this is my first “strategy” article, I want to provide a few caveats (which will apply to future strategy articles as well):1. I am not a professional poker player so any strategy article I write should be taken for what it’s worth.
2. I expect and encourage different viewpoints to any of my strategy articles (or any of my articles, for that matter).
3. As with anything in poker, every move is situation and opponent dependent and so there will be times and places where doing the exact opposite of any strategy (be it from me, or a pro) would be a better play.
4. I am a fullring online hold ‘em cash game donk so that is where my perspective is coming from. Your mileage may vary depending on the game you are playing.
To understand bet sizing, be it pre-flop or post-flop, we need to start at the beginning and talk about why we bet in the first place. While there are a number of reasons why we bet in poker, it basically all boils down to two basic reasons:1. For value (getting worse hands to call)
2. As a bluff (getting better hands to fold)
When we are betting for value, we believe our hand is the best (or has the most equity) and we want worse hands to call. When we are betting as a bluff we believe we are behind and want to get better hands to fold. You will notice that I did not include “betting for information”. This is because betting expressly for information is not a valid reason for betting and is just plain spew, imho. So just don’t do it. (Note: I recognize that there are some subtle nuances that don’t easily fit into one of the 2 categories, such as semi-bluffing, but generally a bet can be put in one of the two aforementioned categories).
Now let's talk about sizing our pre-flop open raises. Just to make sure we are all on the same page of what a pre-flop open raise is: raising when nobody has limped or raised in front of you (being the good players that we are, we don't open limp, so if we have some cards we want to play, we're raising). Below are some of the typical strategies for open raising bet sizes, the rationale for each, and some pros and cons of each (in no particular order).
Always Raise a Set Amount With this strategy you open raise the same amount from any position on the table, regardless of your card strength. The obvious advantage is that your opponents cannot get a bet sizing tell off of you because you bet the same amount when you have AA as you do when you have J10s. Online, the typical size is usually 3 or 4 times the big blind (often described as “3x” or “4x”). Live, it can be quite different (often 5x or more).
The argument for using the larger raise sizing is that it makes it easier to get stacks in the middle by the river. This is called pot geometry - by betting bigger pre-flop, your flop bet size can be bigger, making your turn bet size bigger which makes it possible to get it all-in on the river with a pot-sized bet on the river (with a smaller bet size you'll have to over-bet on a street or two to get stacks in). Using the bigger bet size is good when you play fairly tight and/or the table is loose passive with a number of calling stations because you'll get the most value from your tight opening range. Opening for the smaller amount is good when you like to play loose or when you have some "tricky" players to your left (i.e., when you raise crappy hands and get 3-bet and are forced to fold, you lose less). Opening for a smaller amount also benefits players who are skilled at playing post-flop because it usually results in a higher Stack-to-Pot Ratio (SPR) which provides more room to outplay opponents post-flop.
Vary the Size of the Raise Based on Hand StrengthThis is pretty self explanatory, but basically you raise more with your premium hands (like AA, KK, QQ, AKs), raise less with your medium strength hands (like JJ, 1010, 99, AKo, etc), and even less for your more speculative hands (like small pocket pairs, suited connectors, AXs, etc). An example bet sizing would look like this: 4x for premium hands, 3x for medium strength hands, and 2x for the speculative hands. The rationale for this strategy is simple: By raising more with your premium hands you are getting more value from them and you lose less when you get played back at with your speculative hands. This strategy works best at the lowest stakes where most players are not observant enough to catch on to your sizing and you are focused on playing strong hands and getting maximum value from them.
The biggest flaw to this strategy would be that it would be fairly obvious to an observant opponent on how strong your hand was based on the size of your raise. However, you can throw off your observant opponents by reversing that strategy every once in awhile (i.e. raise small with your premiums occasionally).
Vary the Size of the Raise by PositionUsing this strategy you vary your pre-flop raise sizes by position - the earlier your position, the lower your raise size and the later your position, the bigger your raise size. Usually it is something like: raise 4x from the early positions, 3.5x from the middle positions, and 3x from the late positions. I’ve also seen players break out the late position even further and use 3x in the hijack and cutoff seats and use 2x for the button only (works great when you have short stacks in the blinds). The rationale behind this strategy is two-fold. When you are in early position, your hand range is stronger (or should be, anyway) so you want to start building a pot right away. Building a bigger pot early also helps reduce some of the disadvantage of playing out of position because there will be a lower SPR on the flop (which makes for easier post-flop decisions). Conversely, when we are in later position, our opening range will be wider and we’ll be playing more speculative hands. Therefore it is to our advantage to keep the pot smaller because it minimizes our loss when someone behind us raises and we have to fold and it keeps the SPR higher (which is good for speculative hands).
Completely Random AmountThis is a strategy where your open raise size is completely random. To make sure it is truly random you'd have find a way to "randomize" your play. In Harrington on Cash, he suggested using the second hand of your watch to randomize your play -- so you could do something like raise 4x when the second hand is between 1-15, 3.5x when its between 16-30, 2.5x when its between 31 and 45, and 2x when its between 46 and 60. The obvious advantage to this is that it is completely unreadable. The disadvantage would be always have to look at whatever it is you use as your "random generator" which could be a pain in the ass, especially if you are playing multiple tables online.
Situational (or Flex) Based SizingThis strategy is where you open raise to an amount that is appropriate given the table dynamics, opponents, your image, etc. The rationale is that you always have the flexibility of being able to use the optimal bet sizing given the specific situation which you aren't doing when you strictly follow a set strategy. To take advantage of this strategy you have to be really focused on each hand and each situation and have a very solid understanding of optimal bet sizing theory to get the most out of this strategy. For this reason it isn't ideal for a multi-tabling online player or newer player.
I don't think you can go too terribly wrong using any of these strategies. Ideally, you want to choose the one that best fits your style, skill level, and situation. Even more ideally, you would use a combination of these depending on the table dynamics. For what it is worth, my "default" strategy is raising a set amount by position because I find that it fits really well with my playing style (really tight in early position, and really loose in late position). I will also incorporate the "Situational Based Sizing" when I notice a good opportunity to vary from my standard open raise sizing. Do you use any of these styles or do you do something entirely different? I'd like to hear your thoughts.
Until next time, good luck at the tables!
Courtesy of: insidestl.com
UK Best Bet Betting and Poker Forum
....And now, a pro's take on:
The Optimal Opening RaiseJanuary 2007 | Brandon AdamsWhat’s the proper opening raise in a tournament? Most people just make it three big blinds without giving it much thought. That’s probably close to optimal, but my view is that many players can benefit by opening for less than this amount. Dare we say min-raise?
Let’s start with a stylized example. If your opponents will respond to your opening raise by either folding or going all in, then it makes sense to raise the minimum. I think many tournament situations are approximated by this simple case. This argues for raising to two big blinds rather than three or more big blinds, and yet we rarely see top players do this. The standard opening raise among good players seems to be three big blinds. Two notable exceptions are Alan Goerhing (who frequently raises to 2BB) and Daniel Negreanu (who frequently raises to 2.5BB). Interestingly, most players raise the same amount whether there are antes or not, meaning that they offer their opponents drastically different pot odds once antes kick in.
I’m convinced that Daniel has it about right. Note the key tradeoff that Daniel is facing when he chooses to open to 2.5BB. The first consideration is the one noted above — you shouldn’t put in more money than is necessary to achieve your objective (namely, stealing blinds and antes). Daniel has probably observed that people play against him in very similar ways regardless of whether he raises to 2.5BB or 3BB — that is, his opponents don’t properly adjust to the better pot odds offered by the 2.5BB raise.
To see the disadvantage of a small opening raise for Daniel, note that he is often going to have position against players who choose to play against him. This is true because he will be opening the pot much more liberally from late position and because the big blind will be forced to defend frequently against him, especially in the presence of antes.
Daniel is likely to be more skilled than his opponents. If you couple this with the fact that he has position on them in contested pots, you get the argument for big pre-flop raises. It’s the same argument that drives skilled cash game players to play extremely aggressively with position in early streets: “Let me put in more money now, so I can steal it back later.”
There also seems to be a strong psychological element to the use of small pre-flop raises by Negreanu and Goerhing. I think there’s a sense in which they view these small raises as “sucker bets” for players who do think about pot odds. They are essentially saying, “Come on. You know you are getting the right price. I dare you to tangle with me.”
I took up this “sucker bet” against Daniel in Tunica. I doubled him up and he won the tournament. With ten players left and blinds of $4,000-$8,000 ($1,000 antes), he did his standard opening raise to $20,000. I was in the big blind and couldn’t resist the 42:12 pot odds that I was being offered with Q?7?. At the time, I was thinking, stupidly, that I wanted to get in pots with Daniel because I figured he would be fearful of busting 10th and not making the TV table. My plan was to bet out the flop if I missed, check-call if I hit a piece of it, and check-raise all in if I hit hard (queen-high flop, flush draw, two pair). Well, the flop came Q?4?8?. I check-raised him all in and he made a great call with Q-10. The interesting thing is that I never would have played with Q?7? if he had offered me pot odds that were just a bit worse.
When thinking about optimal opening raises, one thing you must ask yourself: “Am I willing to make tough calls pre-flop?” If you’re not, tend towards smaller opening raises (such as 2.5BB). This is another reason why Daniel likes the small raises — why force yourself into situations where you have to make tough calls with small edges? If Daniel open-raised to 4BB instead of 2.5BB, then he’d frequently find himself in a scenario where he, say, opens with K-J suited and then has a player move all in on him for 8BB more. If he had raised 2.5BB, and then had someone come over him for 9.5BB more, he could easily lay his hand down with confidence. By openraising to 4BB, he is offering himself good odds when re-raised all in, and he will be forced into situations where he has to gamble as a dog.
The player who makes big open raises often has to contest big all-in pre-flop hands as a dog, because calling the raise and playing as a dog is often preferable to leaving a lot of money dead in the middle. Towards the end of a tournament, I like to craft my preflop strategy in such a way that I’m rarely leaving money dead in the middle. Too many times I’ve lost a stack late in a tournament by opening pots and then repeatedly being forced to lay down hands as opponents reraised me.
There are some players who believe that one should alter one’s standard opening raise with position. Specifically, they believe that you should raise relatively more in late position, especially late in a tournament. At this stage, antes are present and all-in preflop moves are common, so making larger raises with position is essentially a commitment device. You are saying, “Look, I know you might have a better hand than me, but I’m pricing myself into a call.” It can be an effective strategy, so long as you’re willing to call as a big dog. You also have to be willing to put in big pre-flop raises with some really bad hands.
To simplify, assume everyone at the table has 12BB. The pot contains 1.5BB in blinds, and 1BB in antes. Assume you’re on the button and the action folds around to you. If you open for 4BB, you are offering yourself 18:8 pot odds if the small blind moves in on you and 17.5:8 pot odds if the big blind moves in. There are a lot of mediocre-to-bad hands like A-4o that you will have to call with when offered these odds. You wouldn’t have had to call if you had opened to 2.5BB. Your opponent, knowing this, will move in on you with fewer hands when facing a 4BB raise. For you to take advantage of this, you’ll often have to make this 4BB as a steal with complete rags (5-6o, say) that you can comfortably lay down when re-raised. By raising to 4BB instead of 2.5BB, you will be offered worse odds on the steal (2.5:4 vs. 1:1), but you will be able to steal much more often.
To conclude, I believe that, in general, aggressive players are better off with relatively small opening raises, such 2.5BB. I recommend maintaining this standard even when antes are introduced. That said, it serves a player well to think carefully about his situation. You should make relatively large opening raises if your skill level is below that of your opponents. At the extreme (say you’re beginner at a table of world champions), you should craft a strategy that involves simply raising all-in or folding. Generally speaking, I recommend raising the same amount regardless of position; but, as noted above, there are certain situations where it might make sense to craft a strategy involving large late-position raises.
Courtesy of: bluffmagazine.com
