Stealing/defending

[daviddem]

I have recently started playing 5NL and I have adjusted my game quite a bit compared to 2NL, so I only post my 5NL stats below. I know it's a lol sample size, but bear in mind that I have a regular job, a family and other hobbies that take up a lot of my time, and that doesn't leave me much to play.

Note that the win rate would be higher had I not f*cked up loosing 75bb by misreading the board with the sucker's end of a straight.

As you can see the stats are nitty, but as long as it works, I have no real reason to change this, uh? However, I am thinking about progressively opening up in LP, once I get up a few more buy ins and I can stomach a bit more variance.

My first question is about possibly adjusting my preflop raise sizes according to position/type of players to my left/presence of a limper, etc. For now, I raise 4bb+1bb/limper in all cases, except for the SB where I raise 3bb if alone vs the BB. The reasons I do this are:
- I don't steal that much, so when I do I quite often actually have a decent and sometimes premium hand and I want value for it.
- seems to me people probably fold a little more to a 4x than a 3x, so it helps the fold equity when I don't have a good hand. I guess on the downside it also hurts a bit when they fold when I have a good hand and they might have called a 3x.

So basically what do you guys do? How do you adjust your preflop sizing and for what reasons?

Next question is whether I should defend more. What are decent stats for defending in the SB or BB? How often do you call/reraise and under what circumstances?

[spoonitnow]

Just what are you defending?

[daviddem]

Just what are you defending?

Guess it means my fold to steal is ridiculously high?

Mind that for now I voluntarily play tighter than my guts tell me to because I try to get well in the green with minimal variance before I start opening up. I am only 4 BI above the cutoff I have set myself before I go back to 2NL and I REALLY don't want to get back there...

What are decent target % for defending blinds by calling? 3 betting? In the SB? In the BB? Do you tend to 3bet a polarized range and just call with the middle of your range?

edit: my low defending % may also have something to do with the fact that I play a lot of short sessions when I have like an hour ahead of me, and I tend to take it cautiously against unknowns

[JKDS]

Spoon is saying this: http://www.flopturnriver.com/pokerfo...se-173291.html

"You're not being attacked, there is no fort, and there is no defense. Your opponents have a weak range, and you're responding to it. Don't let the terms like "stealing" and "defending the blinds" get too stuck in your head to the point that they generate an emotional response."

[daviddem]

"You're not being attacked, there is no fort, and there is no defense. Your opponents have a weak range, and you're responding to it. Don't let the terms like "stealing" and "defending the blinds" get too stuck in your head to the point that they generate an emotional response."

Yes OK, I get the point. I am well aware that the blinds are simply the price we pay to be dealt 9 or 10 hands, that they are not "ours" and that they belong to the pot. We are free to pick which hands we play among all the hands we are dealt to overcome this cost and the blinds are at a positional disadvantage post flop so they are often not the best hands to do that. The proper way to see blind "defense" is simply that we are trying to play profitably facing a raise from a weak range (at least generally weaker than the usual raising range of this opp).

This being said, I am still interested in the stats and comments of people playing (or having played) at my stakes, if anything, just to have some reference points.

By the way, find attached the HEM file I used to generate the "steal" report above. Just remove the .txt extension from the file and copy it in your HEM \reports folder and restart HEM. The "steal" report will show up in the reports drop down menu. It is also interesting to look at the "preflop activity" report and filter it using by "position", "facing preflop" and "actions" to see if your overall steal attempts/blind defenses were profitable even if opp didn't fold preflop. For example I find that I have 63% immediate steal success from the button (opp folded) and times when opp called a cbet did the job 65% of the time. But then again, I am very selective (probably too tight) with my steal spots.

[NightGizmo]

Stealing from the button/SB:
Once I have a decent sample against the two players to my left, I decide how wide my stealing range will be and use that to decide my standard raise size from those positions. If there are two nits to my left, my raising range will be super wide, so I only raise 3bb (even with AA). If the players are loose, my stealing range narrows and my standard raise size becomes 4bb.

If there are limpers, then I'm no longer trying to steal -- I'm deciding whether I want to (a) play my hand for value or (b) isolate a weak-tight player and then steal the flop. Either way, I'm now raising my usual 4bb +1 per limper. With limpers, you can't really steal preflop anymore -- there's too high a chance that one of the limpers will call your raise.

[daviddem]

OK thanks. Do you steal from the CO? Raise size in the SB? How do you "defend"?

[NightGizmo]

OK thanks. Do you steal from the CO? Raise size in the SB? How do you "defend"?

I do steal from the CO, using the same logic as from the button. But I tend to keep my range tighter, because now I have to get 3 people to fold instead of 2. I generally keep my standard size at 4bb in the CO, unless the 3 players to my right are all very very tight.

In the SB: 3bb if I'm stealing a wide range, 4bb if not.

Spoon's article sums up my blind defense strategy (in fact, that's where I learned my strategy).

[spoonitnow]

My comment was more about the mentality than the language. People are stealing with very wide ranges, so all else being equal, there are a lot of hands you can play against that which will still give you an advantage in the cards you hold. However, not all else is equal, mainly because of position. If you're out of position, you have to tighten up some, and if you're in position, you can often play even more hands and have an advantage.

It's also worth mentioning that if you look at the attempt to steal percentage, that stat's determined by how often you open-raise from the CO/BU/SB.

Best of luck.