Playing In Late Poker Position Part2
3. A play that wins you the blinds, when successful, adds significantly to your hourly rate, which is what all of this is really about. If you can successfully steal the blinds only twice an hour, you will be winning almost three small bets per hour, which is almost 1.5 big bets per hour. Remember how I said that the average professional hold 'em player considers himself successful if he can earn 1-2 big bets per hour? I know a few players whose overall skill at the game I would consider to be mediocre-to-average, but they're professional late position players and blind stealers. There's no reason you can't be, too.
4. When you raise in late position, your opponents won't know for sure which one of the five reasons to raise it is that you have in mind, although they will often correctly suspect that it's primarily a move based on position and very small pot odds. In other words, they will believe that most of the time you raise in late position, you're raising mainly to eliminate players. They won't be certain, though, and it's always good to keep your opponents guessing.
5. By making this type of play regularly (don't overdo it, or your opponents will just start calling you all the time), you're setting your opponents up for a future play. You won't always have a second-rate hand when you raise in late position. Sometimes you'll have that AA, KK or AKs when you raise, and you'll make a lot of money from the players who call you all the way down, just because they think you have K9 or QIO, which they can beat.
6. If you buy the button and one (or both) of the blinds calls your preflop raise, you'll have position on him (them) throughout the hand.
7. If you have an ace, and you raise in late position as the first one in, you may find yourself against just one opponent on the river. In that case, your ace is a big card. You might win with just ace-high against that one player, where king-high and queen-high won t win. With an ace, your raise was a fairly safe play.
You have an entirely different situation if you're in late position and a lot of players have entered the pot ahead of you. Now you have to consider a few things:
1. The players in early position probably have very good cards.
2. The players in middle position have good drawing hands, otherwise one of them would have raised before the flop.
3. Because of their position and the pot odds they were getting when they called, other players (besides you) in late position might have longshot draws, such as small pairs and medium suited connectors (7^64, 6V5V, or even 5*4*).
4. One of the players in early position might have limped in with a Group 1 hand (AA, KK, QQ, JJ, AKs) and is waiting to reraise if you raise.
5. If such a reraise happens, one of the other players might want to make it three or four bets to go just for the sake of building the pot.
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Tags: blinds, online casino, poker, stealers