Miller, Ed. Smallll Stakes No-Limit Holdem

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The Fold To Steal (FTS) stat gives you a rough idea of how often your opponents fold from the blinds when someone opens from the cutoff or button. For typical players in $1–$2 6-max games, this stat ranges from about 50 percent up to about 90 percent. Most players fall between 65 percent and 85 percent.

For example, if a player has a FTS percentage of 80 percent, it means that you can expect them to fold to your button open roughly 80 percent of the time. It’s only a rough estimate because the stat includes open raises from positions other than the button and because your opponents will adapt their strategies for different situations and opponents. Always remember that tracker stats measure your opponents’ average tendencies over a wide range of situations and opponents, and they may not accurately reflect how your opponents will play against you in this particular situation. Having said all that, if your opponent has a FTS stat of 80 percent, you can expect them to play fairly tightly against your button opens.

The Range War

We refer to “ranges” over and over again in this book. If you need a brush-up on the general concept of a hand range, review “The REM Process” we presented in Professional No-Limit Hold’em: Volume 1. The general premise of REM is that in any given hand, you should formulate a hand range for each opponent, calculate your equity against their ranges, and then maximize your expectation. Range, Equity, Maximize.

In this book we delve deeper into not only your opponents’ ranges, but also your own range. By that we mean the range of hands you take certain actions with, as well as the range of hands your opponents perceive you to have when you take certain actions. You can think of no-limit hold’em as being a big range war. It’s always your range versus their ranges.

Assume the players in the small and big blinds both have FTS stats of 80 percent. They might play AA-22, AK-AT, KQ-KJ, some suited connectors, and the occasional suited ace, suited one-gapper, and unsuited connector. That’s a 20 percent range, which corresponds to an 80 percent Fold To Steal.

As a rough estimate, if you raise from the button you can expect to win the blinds about 64 percent of the time (0.8×0.8=0.64). In practice you’ll probably succeed somewhat less often than that, so let’s round that number down to 60 percent.

Say you open raise to $6 (three times the big blind). You’re risking $6 to win $3, so if you were to succeed more than 67 percent of the time, your steal would show an immediate profit. By “immediate profit” we mean that even if you turbo-mucked your hand (without seeing the flop) as soon as an opponent called your steal, you’d still make money over time on the steal attempt.

We estimated that a steal will succeed about 60 percent of the time, so you fall short of an immediate profit. Fortunately, however, you won’t be turbo-mucking your hands when called. You’ll see a flop, and, even if your hand is trashy, you’ll have the advantage of position. In practice it’s not difficult to steal a few pots after the flop, and that’s all you need to do to make the entire hand profitable.

So if both blind players fold to a steal about 80 percent of the time or more, you can reasonably open any hand on the button and expect to make a profit.

If both blind players fold to a steal about 80 percent of the time or more, you can reasonably open any hand on the button and expect to make a profit.

You can steal profitably with any hand. But that doesn’t mean that you should necessarily try to steal at every opportunity. If you pound on tight players too relentlessly, some of them will start to play back at you. You don’t want otherwise tight players to adjust to your stealing by starting to 3-bet (reraise) with weak hands. So mix it up a

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little bit. Show your opponents that you can fold your button every once in a while, preferably when you have an offsuit trash hand.

But don’t fold too often. Steal most of the time. And if the blind players are even tighter, folding to a steal up to 90 percent of the time, then don’t give them any room to breathe. When players are ultra tight from the blinds, it generally indicates that they’re playing a limited, nut-peddling strategy, and they aren’t likely to adjust to your steals. So rob them blind.

In a typical $1–$2 6-max game, you’ll frequently find two tight players in the blinds, and therefore you’ll often be in a situation where you can profitably open any two from the button.

Raise Size

All else equal, you’d like to raise as little an amount as you can get away with when you are stealing. After all, a smaller raise means that you’re risking less for the same reward. But all else isn’t equal. Different raise sizes will change the dynamics in two areas:

1.Folding frequency

2.Postflop expectation

Theoretically speaking, your opponents should fold more often against big opening raises and less often against small ones. If you raise to $4, the big blind has to call $2 to have a chance to win $7 (your $4 raise and the $3 from the blinds). If you raise to $8, the big blind has to call $6 to have a chance to win $11 (your $8 raise and the $3 from the blinds). Clearly the odds offered in the first scenario are more generous, and therefore the big blind should play with a wider range of hands.

In practice, however, typical players don’t adjust their playing ranges the way they should. Many players, especially tight players, will fold a good portion of their hands from the blinds regardless of game conditions. For example, a lot of players will virtually never

play a hand like Q♠7♠ from the big blind against a raise, no matter who raised, how much the raise was, or from what position.

Small steal raises pay off against the many players who don’t adjust their blind ranges for the size of the bet.

Against players who play roughly the same strategy against a small or a large steal raise, raise small.

The story doesn’t end there, however. Postflop expectation is also important for determining the size of your steal raises. What do we mean by postflop expectation?

Let’s say you have a very tight player in the big blind. If you openraise on the button, he’ll fold 90 percent of his hands whether you raise to $5 or $10. But the 10 percent of the time he plays, he 3-bets to $24.

Against this player you should steal 100 percent of your hands from the button. Because he folds so often, your raise will show an automatic profit. But when he does pick up a hand, you’ll usually be facing a large 3-bet with a hand that’s not strong enough to continue. So you have virtually no postflop expectation against this player: Either you steal the blinds, or he 3-bets you and you have to fold. You’ll rarely see a flop.

When you have a low postflop expectation, you should choose a small raise size. Why risk $10 when $5 will do the job just as well?

With little postflop expectation, choose a small steal raise size.

Now let’s say the big blind plays very differently. He folds 80 percent of the time and calls 17 percent. With the best 3 percent of his hands, he 3-bets to $24. Against this player your steals won’t win immediately as often, but you’ll usually see a flop when your steal fails. You have some postflop expectation. Even with a stinker of a hand like 9♣4♠, you will sometimes win with a continuation bet or another well-timed bluff.

Note that the player who employs this strategy does little to no hand reading. He is concerned only with his own hand strength, not with yours or anyone else’s.

The fit or fold strategy is extremely and easily exploitable. It loses to a strategy of raw aggression. Just keep betting and, the vast majority of the time, a fit or fold opponent will end up folding. The small number of times the fit or folder makes a hand, you’ll tend to lose a bigger pot than those you steal. However, choosing moderate bet sizes and practicing basic hand reading will give you a big postflop edge over a fit or folder.

Here’s the bottom line. If a player tends to defend his blinds by 3- betting rather than calling, you should choose a small bet size. If a player tends to defend his blinds by calling rather than 3-betting, and then uses a fit or fold strategy after the flop, you should choose a large bet size. Since you’ll steal so many pots postflop, you benefit from starting with a larger pot.

Choose small steal-raise sizes against players who like to 3-bet. Choose large steal-raise sizes against players who like to call and then play fit or fold.

When in doubt about your opponent’s tendencies, default to a small raise size. It’s less exploitable.

Return To Stealing Range

We have already argued that you should steal with 100 percent of your hands against sufficiently tight players in the blinds. But we didn’t talk about how to adjust your stealing range when your opponents aren’t sufficiently tight. We’ll talk about that now.

Say the two players in the blinds will defend often enough that you won’t show an automatic profit by stealing even if you raise to just $5 or $4.50. Furthermore, assume that they will never flat call your steal raise. If they defend, they will 3-bet to about $24.

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Few blind players in real games will follow this strategy. If they did, each of these players would be 3-betting with nearly 25 percent of their total hands. But, for the sake of argument, let’s assume you have two very loose and 3-bet happy opponents in the blinds. How should you adjust?

Clearly you shouldn’t steal with 100 percent of your hands any longer. Too often you’ll raise your trash, face a 3-bet, and have to fold. So fold your offsuit trash.

Against a frequent 3-bettor, instead of folding to the 3-bet, you can sometimes play back by calling and making a play postflop or by 4- betting as a bluff.

We’ll discuss these options in depth in the “3-Betting Light and the 3-Bet, 4-Bet, 5-Bet Game” chapter. For now, just know that when your opponents defend against steals by 3-betting with a wide range of hands, you’ll react by tightening up and 4-bet bluffing sometimes.

In practice, you won’t usually come up against players who 3-bet as often as 25 percent of the time. Even players who like to 3-bet to defend will usually fold frequently enough to make stealing profitable.

When stealing against players who often 3- bet when they defend, choose a small bet size and trim the worst offsuit hands from your range.

If your opponents defend often, but they usually call rather than 3- bet, then your stealing range depends on how your opponents play postflop. If they play a fit or fold strategy, then you can steal aggressively—with potentially up to 100 percent of your hands against sufficiently compliant opponents. Fit or fold players don’t take your hand strength into account, and they usually end up folding by the river. So it doesn’t really matter much what hand you have since you’ll win so many pots against them without a showdown.

Against players who defend often, but who usually defend by calling and who play fit or fold postflop, choose a large bet size and open with most of your hands.

Now let’s talk about the real calling stations. They call preflop with a wide range of hands, and they don’t like to fold postflop either. As you might imagine, stealing becomes a relatively weak strategy against a calling station. These players force you to tighten up a bit.

Say the big blind player will call roughly 70 percent of the time you open from the button. You should stick to opening a range of hands that you can often play for value postflop, something like:

22+,A2s+,K2s+,Q7s+ JTs-54s,J9s-75s,J8s-96s A2o+,K9o+,Q9o+,J9o+,T9o*

This range comprises about 40 percent of your total possible hands. It’s a flexible range—whether a particular hand is profitable or not will depend on the specifics of how your opponent tends to play. Calling stations force you to pass on steals with weak hands, but they more than compensate you by paying off your good hands after the flop.

* Large hand ranges can be difficult to conceptualize, and it's a challenge to write them out in an intuitive way. We've settled on a three-line format. Line one lists pocket pairs and suited hands with a specific high card. Line two lists suited connectors. Line three lists offsuit hands. A plus sign indicates all better hands of the same type. So 55+ indicates all pocket pairs 55 and better, and Q7s+ indicates all suited hands containing a queen that are Q7s and stronger. Thus, one could read this range as, "Any pocket pair, any suited ace, any suited king, any suited queen Q7s or better, no-gap suited connectors down to 54s, one-gap suited connectors down to 75s, two-gap suited connectors down to 96s, any offsuit ace, and offsuit kings, queens, jacks, and ten with at least a nine kicker."

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Calling stations force you to tighten up your stealing range. But against them you can choose larger raise sizes and value bet more aggressively after the flop.

When you have two very different opponent types in the blinds, you’ll usually be forced to play the more conservative of the two associated strategies. For instance, if you have a fit or folder with an 80 percent Fold To Steal (your associated strategy: 100 percent open, big raise size) and a frequent 3-bettor (your associated strategy: tighter open, small raise size), you should protect yourself against the 3-bettor by tightening up a bit and using a small raise size.

Button Stealing Summary

When you’re opening from the button, you want to steal with as many hands as you can get away with. When both of the blinds are quite tight, you can steal with up to 100 percent of your hands. You should perhaps fold a hand here and there to avoid making your strategy too obvious, but you can open nearly every time.

When your opponents tend to defend by calling and then playing a fit or fold strategy postflop, you can also open nearly all of your hands. This is true even if they defend fairly frequently. You’ll win often enough by stealing pots postflop that the overall play will be profitable. When your opponents are playing fit or fold, you should make large raises so the pots you steal are worth more.

When your opponents defend fairly tightly, but they respond aggressively to your steals by 3-betting or by calling and playing back postflop, you can still steal with a fairly wide range. You might want to dump your worst offsuit trash, but you can steal with most other hands profitably. Choose a small raise size to minimize your exposure to your opponents’ aggression. If your opponents 3-bet too often, you will have to incorporate some 4-bet bluffing into your strategy to keep your button steals profitable.