3-Betting With A Polarized Range: Specific Hands
In yesterday’s blog, “Beyond Tight Aggressive: An Introduction To Exploitative Poker”, I gave you three strategies for stealing pots that don’t belong to you: raise more hands and continuation bet, 3-bet with a polarized range and continuation bet when called and float the flop. In today’s blog, I want to go into more detail about raising with a polarized range because I had a lot of difficulty understanding this concept and having the courage to implement it so I imagine others are struggling with it as well.
In the past, I felt scared and guilty to 3-bet something like A3 off. It’s a garbage hand and doesn’t play that well after the flop because your opponent could easily have an Ace with a better kicker. But that’s exactly the point. From a purely value perspective, A3 off is a fold to any raise. 3-betting with it is a semi-bluff. It’s a bluff for the reason articulated above about running into a better Ace. But it’s only a semi-bluff because your opponent doesn’t always have an Ace so that when you flop one your hand is sometimes good. For example, your opponent may call your 3-bet with KQ suited or pocket 9s. So the hand does have some value.
That’s why raising with A3 off is much different than raising with 92 off because the latter is complete trash from a value standpoint. For example, the flop may come Q 9 6 and your opponent may have KQ or 1010 so that your 9 is no good even though you hit your hands high card. That’s why 92 off is always a fold.
In yesterday’s Flight A and B of Graton’s $800 $500K Guarantee Main Event, I recall making two light 3-bets. In the first level (100/200/200), a tight player opened to 500 from early position and one that was splashing around called. I got a little out of line and 3-bet to 2,000 from mid-position with Q3 of diamonds. Now, Q3 suited is a fold according to the table on page 40 reproduced above from Jonathan Little and Albert Hart’s book Bluffs: How To Intelligently Apply Aggression To Increase Your Profits From Poker (2016). But I had little concern about playing it against the two players who were already in the hand for a couple of reasons. First, I knew the first player would play extremely straightforwardly after the flop so that I’d be able to figure out what to do if he called both my 3-bet and flop continuation bet. Second, the caller had been splashing around and just called so I knew he didn’t have a premium hand. In this case, both players folded and I scooped the pot.
The next light 3-bet I made was more standard. I had just been moved to a new table at 1000/2000/2000 and Travis Fujisaka, an excellent local pro, raised to 5,000 from UTG+2. I was on his direct left with KJoff and 3-bet to 15,000. I’ve played a decent amount with Travis and I know he regards me as a solid tight aggressive player and would give me credit for a premium hand. And indeed he folded saying that it was a “nit fold”. It can be scary raising strong players with moderate holdings like KJ off but not if you understand what you’re doing and have a plan. If Travis 4-bet, I’m out. If he called, I’m continuation betting the flop no matter what. If he calls my 3-bet and flop continuation bet, that’s when things get harder and you have to make reads and play poker.
Now I could have folded KJ off to Travis. But what I won’t do with it is just call. Why? Because I’m behind Travis’s raising range and KJ off doesn’t play that well after the flop. Even if a K comes, AK and KQ are part of his range so I may not be good. If a J is the top card, he will show up with AJ sometimes. Here’s the key point: raising with a polarized range means raising your premium hands and some other hands that are decent but not good enough to call a raise with like KJ off.
The other thing you don’t want to do is 3-bet strong hands that flop well but are not all in hands like AJ suited. Why? Because if you get 4-bet you have to fold a hand that you’d really like to see a flop with. With KJ off, on the other hand, when you get 4-bet it’s an easy fold. Little and Hart do an excellent job of explaining the concept of a polarized range on pages 39-42 of their book. In fact, I have highlighted and bracketed almost everything and refer back to it regularly.
Do yourself a favor and start getting out of line preflop every once in a while. It’s actually a lot of fun once you get the hang of it and you’ll be surprised how much this one move adds to your game.
Also be sure to get your copy of Little and Hart’s book because they detail 16 other moves for getting out of line and stealing pots.
