Stealing the blinds/Defending the blinds

[Santocubs]

I've been playing about 2 months on Paradise Poker in NL Ring Games, and small entry tournaments. I've been winning consistently at the Ring Games, but I tend to finish just outside the money in the tournaments. One of the areas of my game that needs improving is in dealing with the blinds.

First, stealing the blinds. It seems like when I do this I get caught (only short term speaking) and whenever most do it they get away with it. So...when do you recommend trying a blind steal. How much X BB should the steal be for?

Second, defending the blind steal...when should you try to defend a blind steal...especially when you think that is what it is. What kind of cards do you need to have...or does it matter?

These are truly newbie questions....I think I have a strong preflop game, and a decent post flop game (though I need to get more aggressive at times), but the blind play is giving me some difficulty. Any help would be appreciated

[chardrian]

To steal a blind you should make your standard raise.

To defend a blind you really need to look at things like blind levels, chip stacks and reads. If your read is the guy is stealing and will actually fold to a reraise then you can pop it with any two. If, the guy refuses to fold, however, then you actually need to look at your cards and chip stacks before deciding what to do.

[DickieBets]

Hi,

It may not be an optimal strategy but at low buyin SitnGos ($5 and $10) - I don't worry about blinds too much - I rarely do anything different from the blinds - I find that whenever I try something - I usually regret it. One good hand in the BB can make up for several prior steals from a blind stealer ! Also I find some players are more apt to play back from the BB when it's raised - so it's easy to trap them when you get a good hand but can be expensive if a steal backfires.

Now I don't completely role over and let players walk all over me - so I will make an exception if I think I'm being bullied, but in general things work out well.

Martin

[andy-akb]

It may not be an optimal strategy but at low buyin SitnGos ($5 and $10) - I don't worry about blinds too much - I rarely do anything different from the blinds - I find that whenever I try something - I usually regret it. One good hand in the BB can make up for several prior steals from a blind stealer ! Also I find some players are more apt to play back from the BB when it's raised - so it's easy to trap them when you get a good hand but can be expensive if a steal backfires.

In tournaments I think that your attitude is good for the first few levels, but when the blinds become a significant part of your stack, stealing blinds is something you almost need to do to stay afloat; however, you also know when you are beat and learn to fold.


In ring games blind stealing is profitable and people often steal too often or too little. The one problem I have is when to defend against a blind steal, does anybody have any good advice or articles that talk about this more in depth?

[Thee One]

In ring games blind stealing is profitable and people often steal too often or too little. The one problem I have is when to defend against a blind steal, does anybody have any good advice or articles that talk about this more in depth?

Stealing/defending blinds in a ring game is a leak. Plug it.

The blind is such a small portion of a stack in a ring game that it's too much risk for too little reward. You can easily lose a good portion of your stack trying to protect or gain a tiny percentage. Risk/reward is out of sync. The only exception is if you are trying to set the blinds up for a move later in the session or are trying to build that LAG image. But if that's the case you're doing more than stealing blinds anyway.

Blind stealing done correctly in a SnG is the difference between cashing and bubbling out. The basics are steal when the table is tight. Don't pick on the big stack unless it's the bubble. He has the chips to defend and put your stack/life at risk. No need to court danger. UNLESS you've seen evidence of him not defending, then go for it but be careful.

If you get caught and have nothing, get out. Try again later. Careful of picking on a tiny stack, they're as likley to raise AI on you with any A/K or broadway card as they are to fold. Medium stacks are the most suceptible, they are trying to limp into the money. They tighten up and figure to outplay you when they are guarenteed something back.

Blind stealing is an art. You have to feel it. know the table, know the opps, know your image.

As far as defending...Can't help. I rarely defend my blinds unless I'm getting picked on repeatedly, then I call the bet and lead the flop. It's dicey though, I prefer just to steal other's blinds to compensate for the blinds I give up. I typically play pretty aggressively which also serves to limit the number of times I get picked on.

Oh and the two main things about blind stealing.. YOU DON'T HAVE TO GO AI TO STEAL THE BLINDS. Why risk your stack when the threat of your stack is enough? Live to fight again another hand. AND:
Don't steal the blinds when they are 10/20. Who gives a damn if you just added 30 chips to your 1500 chip stack? It makes no difference in the scheme of things and your stack is in jeopordy for very little return.

Damn, I'm gonna lose so much money now.

[zook]

The one problem I have is when to defend against a blind steal, does anybody have any good advice or articles that talk about this more in depth?

Ditto. I would love to see a blind defending post or article.

[andy-akb]

In ring games blind stealing is profitable and people often steal too often or too little. The one problem I have is when to defend against a blind steal, does anybody have any good advice or articles that talk about this more in depth?

Stealing/defending blinds in a ring game is a leak. Plug it.

Wrong.

I attempt to steal the blinds from the button 29.7% of the time by making a standard 4xBB raise, I win without a showdown 76% of the time and win at show down 4% of the time and so doing some quick math I lose 20% of the time. When I WwoSD that includes times where it is folded preflop and when it is called and folded before a river showdown. If its called preflop and then folded to a cbet on the flop, I win 4.5big blinds, if its folded preflop I win 1.5, if I win on the turn I win more than that. When I win at showdown I win a bare minimum of 4.5big blinds if its called preflop and then checked down, that small percentage of the time though is typically when I actually have a hand so Im more likely making much more than that. If Im reraised preflop Ill ditch it there without losing more than 4big blinds, and if Im called and villain shows some aggression I will ditch it without a hand. When I lose it is way less than when I win, without a doubt this play has positive expectation and is not a leak. Id actually argue the opposite, not stealing blinds is a leak and should add atleast 1ptbb/100 to your winrate if you are doing it about once every 3 orbits. Including the times you steal from LP when there is a limper or when folded to in the SB Id say it is closer to 2ptbb/100, an edge you simply shouldnt be giving up.

[zook]

Stealing/defending blinds in a ring game is a leak. Plug it.

The blind is such a small portion of a stack in a ring game that it's too much risk for too little reward.

I used to think like this. After reading some of andy-akb's posts and finding some of the rare posts/articles about blind stealing in NL ring games, I think like this:

Wrong.

I just looked up my stats at 50NL (alert: sample size only ~5000 hands) and I steal 22% of the time and win without showing down 89% of the time. I win at showdown 67% of the time, so I only lose 4% of the time I attempt to steal. I will steal from the CO or button with Axs, Kxs, suited connectors, suited gappers, unsuited connectors, and even trash if the blinds are weak tighties. With a limper or two in front I'll still steal, but tighten up a little and make a bigger raise. I think stealing adds around 1BB/100 to my winrate, which is significant.

Overall I actually think I may not be stealing enough, but stealing is definitely not a leak in my game. If you don't take advantage of position pre-flop in ring games you're losing a lot of money.

[jyms]

I will always attempt a steal if folded around to me in the cut off or the button(5NL and 10NL mind you) with a 4bb or 5bb raise. I never give the blinds a free pass. If they re-raise I fold like a cheap tent. If they call I wait to see what happens post flop.And If some player tries that on me from the same positions more than once then I call his raise/c-bet big enough to keep them honest. He'll either have a hand and play into me or fold. You'll find out if it's a steal or not. Either way he'll think about the fact that you'll play aggro from the blinds and he better have a real hand.

[Thee One]

In ring games blind stealing is profitable and people often steal too often or too little. The one problem I have is when to defend against a blind steal, does anybody have any good advice or articles that talk about this more in depth?

Stealing/defending blinds in a ring game is a leak. Plug it.

Wrong.

I attempt to steal the blinds from the button 29.7% of the time by making a standard 4xBB raise, I win without a showdown 76% of the time and win at show down 4% of the time and so doing some quick math I lose 20% of the time. When I WwoSD that includes times where it is folded preflop and when it is called and folded before a river showdown. If its called preflop and then folded to a cbet on the flop, I win 4.5big blinds, if its folded preflop I win 1.5, if I win on the turn I win more than that. When I win at showdown I win a bare minimum of 4.5big blinds if its called preflop and then checked down, that small percentage of the time though is typically when I actually have a hand so Im more likely making much more than that. If Im reraised preflop Ill ditch it there without losing more than 4big blinds, and if Im called and villain shows some aggression I will ditch it without a hand. When I lose it is way less than when I win, without a doubt this play has positive expectation and is not a leak. Id actually argue the opposite, not stealing blinds is a leak and should add atleast 1ptbb/100 to your winrate if you are doing it about once every 3 orbits. Including the times you steal from LP when there is a limper or when folded to in the SB Id say it is closer to 2ptbb/100, an edge you simply shouldnt be giving up.

I'm not saying you shouldn't play your position. I button raise often, and almost all the time if it's folded to me. But that's not a blind steal in my book, that's good positional poker. So maybe the disagreement is semantics. But raising $1 to pick up .35c in blinds is hardly worth the time or the effort without a SOLID read. You have to win 1/4 to break even. I don't like those odds myself. Now if we start talking about working that into a more advanced strategy like setting up the blinds to fight back with a BS hand against your monster then that's different. But that goes to table image and is more complicated and outside the scope of this discussion.

[zook]

I'm not saying you shouldn't play your position. I button raise often, and almost all the time if it's folded to me. But that's not a blind steal in my book, that's good positional poker. So maybe the disagreement is semantics.

Open-raising from the cutoff or button with anything is the definition of blind stealing. So it is semantics, but yours are wrong Of course blind stealing is also a part of good, positional poker.

But raising $1 to pick up .35c in blinds is hardly worth the time or the effort without a SOLID read.

I think it's definitely worth it, even without a read. I only think it isn't worth it if you have a SOLID read that one of the blinds will defend.

I'm going to try a little math, using a very simplified scenario... let's say the SB and BB are average, tight, NL25 players. I think this type of player will re-raise you with a very small range of hands, let's say 2% (QQ+, AK), and call your raise OOP with maybe the next 6% of hands. (The numbers could be higher than this, but I think you'll see that it makes little difference, even if we raise these to 4% and the next 10%, which is very unlikely IMO, stealing is still +EV.) Let's only think about the times when it's a true blind steal, and you don't have very good cards. So you can assume that you're always getting the worst of it when the SB or BB raises or calls. If you fold to every blind re-raise, your expected value in those hands is -$1 x 0.04 (chance one of the blinds will re-raise) or -$0.04.

For times that one of the blinds just calls your raise, I think it's reasonable to assume you can win at least 20% of the hands post-flop, given that you've shown pre-flop aggression and have position. This is a simplistic analysis, because sometimes you'll c-bet and lose more than your original $1 steal, but I also think that between hitting the flop and successful c-bets you'll win more than 20% of the hands post-flop, so those cancel out somewhat. In any case, in this simplistic analysis, your EV for hands when one of the blinds calls your raise is -$1 x 0.12 (chance one of the blinds calls) x 0.80 (chance you fold post-flop) + $1 x 0.12 x 0.20 (chance you win post-flop) = -$0.072.

Finally, the rest of the hands, you'll win the blinds outright. So EV for these hands is $0.35 x 0.84 (chance both blinds fold) = +$0.294.

Adding these together ($0.294 - $0.04 - $0.072) give us a +EV of about $0.18 per blind steal attempt. I know it's only eighteen cents, but that's almost the BB and over a long time, that will add up! Let's say you steal blinds once in three opportunities from the button, that means you're stealing 3.33 times per 100 hands, for a +EV of $0.60 per 100 hands. That's over 1BB/100hands!

I know my math is quite simplistic... I'm ignoring times when both blinds act after the steal attempt, I'm disregarding steal attempts from the cutoff, and I'm not analyzing post-flop play and the effect of c-bets. I also probably made some mistakes But I think it's pretty obvious from this very simple analysis that stealing is +EV. The blinds have to be defending a HUGE amount of the time for it not to be. Please feel free to challenge my math or assumptions.

[Thee One]

I'm not saying you shouldn't play your position. I button raise often, and almost all the time if it's folded to me. But that's not a blind steal in my book, that's good positional poker. So maybe the disagreement is semantics.

Open-raising from the cutoff or button with anything is the definition of blind stealing. So it is semantics, but yours are wrong Of course blind stealing is also a part of good, positional poker.

But raising $1 to pick up .35c in blinds is hardly worth the time or the effort without a SOLID read.

I think it's definitely worth it, even without a read. I only think it isn't worth it if you have a SOLID read that one of the blinds will defend.

I'm going to try a little math, using a very simplified scenario... let's say the SB and BB are average, tight, NL25 players. I think this type of player will re-raise you with a very small range of hands, let's say 2% (QQ+, AK), and call your raise OOP with maybe the next 6% of hands. (The numbers could be higher than this, but I think you'll see that it makes little difference, even if we raise these to 4% and the next 10%, which is very unlikely IMO, stealing is still +EV.) Let's only think about the times when it's a true blind steal, and you don't have very good cards. So you can assume that you're always getting the worst of it when the SB or BB raises or calls. If you fold to every blind re-raise, your expected value in those hands is -$1 x 0.04 (chance one of the blinds will re-raise) or -$0.04.

For times that one of the blinds just calls your raise, I think it's reasonable to assume you can win at least 20% of the hands post-flop, given that you've shown pre-flop aggression and have position. This is a simplistic analysis, because sometimes you'll c-bet and lose more than your original $1 steal, but I also think that between hitting the flop and successful c-bets you'll win more than 20% of the hands post-flop, so those cancel out somewhat. In any case, in this simplistic analysis, your EV for hands when one of the blinds calls your raise is -$1 x 0.12 (chance one of the blinds calls) x 0.80 (chance you fold post-flop) + $1 x 0.12 x 0.20 (chance you win post-flop) = -$0.072.

Finally, the rest of the hands, you'll win the blinds outright. So EV for these hands is $0.35 x 0.84 (chance both blinds fold) = +$0.294.

Adding these together ($0.294 - $0.04 - $0.072) give us a +EV of about $0.18 per blind steal attempt. I know it's only eighteen cents, but that's almost the BB and over a long time, that will add up! Let's say you steal blinds once in three opportunities from the button, that means you're stealing 3.33 times per 100 hands, for a +EV of $0.60 per 100 hands. That's over 1BB/100hands!

I know my math is quite simplistic... I'm ignoring times when both blinds act after the steal attempt, I'm disregarding steal attempts from the cutoff, and I'm not analyzing post-flop play and the effect of c-bets. I also probably made some mistakes But I think it's pretty obvious from this very simple analysis that stealing is +EV. The blinds have to be defending a HUGE amount of the time for it not to be. Please feel free to challenge my math or assumptions.

I can't say I agree. Given that the typical 25NL player that I play against seems to have lower calling requirements in the BB as they feel they are already priced in. Calling and raising with a wider range of hands, especially after they read you for a steal. Your math works insofar as the table is how you describe it. However, I find that the makeup of any typical table I sit at is not as you describe it.

Yes, it can be profitable at a table where you have two TAGGs to your left and are reasonably sure they aren't going to play back. However; the odds of that happening are pretty slim I think, otherwise you may want an entirely different table anyway.

Blind Stealing can be +EV in certain situations, but I don't think those positions present themselves enough to make it a worthwhile activity to engage in without a solid read. Not at 25NL or 10NL either.

FWIW, your math seems pretty close to real world, I just don't agree with the classifications of the players.

[Rondavu]

Stealing blinds in ring play (Yes Constantly) is not a leak. Period. Multiply .35¢ x 100 in 25NL and you see why. Add to that a long term increase in implied odds from image playback, and you get a shark.

[zook]

I can't say I agree. Given that the typical 25NL player that I play against seems to have lower calling requirements in the BB as they feel they are already priced in.

I haven't played 25NL in about two months, but I think the numbers I used are reasonable for average 50NL players. I think most players think the way you do (that the blinds aren't worth much) so they aren't willing to defend them. But I do think you're right that there are more BB calling stations in 25NL.

So let's say the SB calls with 10% of hands and the BB with 20% of hands. Is that reasonable? I think those numbers are too high, but my original math still makes it marginally +EV (about +$0.01). That's not even considering that 25NL calling stations are usually terrible post-flop players, so you're probably winning WAY more than 20% of the hands when they call, as my analysis assumes. My stats are that I win 89% of hands when the SB or BB calls my steal attempt. Of course that's high because it doesn't differentiate when I am raising for value from when I stealing with trash.

I think we have to agree to disagree here.

[Thee One]

I can't say I agree. Given that the typical 25NL player that I play against seems to have lower calling requirements in the BB as they feel they are already priced in.

I haven't played 25NL in about two months, but I think the numbers I used are reasonable for average 50NL players. I think most players think the way you do (that the blinds aren't worth much) so they aren't willing to defend them. But I do think you're right that there are more BB calling stations in 25NL.

So let's say the SB calls with 10% of hands and the BB with 20% of hands. Is that reasonable? I think those numbers are too high, but my original math still makes it marginally +EV (about +$0.01). That's not even considering that 25NL calling stations are usually terrible post-flop players, so you're probably winning WAY more than 20% of the hands when they call, as my analysis assumes. My stats are that I win 89% of hands when the SB or BB calls my steal attempt. Of course that's high because it doesn't differentiate when I am raising for value from when I stealing with trash.

I think we have to agree to disagree here.

Actually you're starting to convince me. (More later)

[andy-akb]

Hopefully this puts an end to all of this:
http://forumserver.twoplustwo.com/sh...Number=5348855

[Thee One]

Hopefully this puts an end to all of this:
http://forumserver.twoplustwo.com/sh...Number=5348855

Very nice and convincing. Consider me a convert.