Great Article on When Playing By the Book Isn't Correct

Was perusing through All-In Magazine, where I found this article by Rick Fuller: I highlighted the major point in bold type.

One of the most common mistakes that can cost you a lot of money over the long haul is calling a bet on the river when you know you’re beat. It’s a huge leak for a lot of players—one I’m familiar with because I’m actively trying to remove it from my own game.

“Well, I’ve got pot odds,” you say to justify your call. But it doesn’t matter. In these situations, pot odds mean less than a marriage proposal from Britney Spears. Yet so many of us make the call anyway, thinking we have no choice. Earlier this year, I was playing in a $20/40 limit Texas Hold’em game. I was in early position and raised with pocket queens. A loose player behind me called, and another loose player re-raised all-in, making it $50 to go. A very tight, predictable player—I’ll call him Rocky—capped the action at $70. The big blind called, putting it back on me. I had $40 invested and wasn’t going to fold pocket queens. For only $30 more I was going to see a flop. I called and the player behind me called—making us five-handed with one dude all-in. The flop: K-7-4, all spades.

The big blind and I both checked as I looked back at my cards to confirm that one of my cards was indeed the queen of spades. The loose player also checked, and Rocky bet out $20. The big blind folded—putting the decision on me. I was pretty sure Rocky had pocket kings. That’s what I put him on before the flop, and I was sure that all he would bet in this situation were a set of kings or possibly pocket aces with the ace of spades. (The way he played, there were no other hands with which he would’ve capped the action pre-flop.)

I was pretty sure he didn’t have aces because he didn’t check his cards after the flop. Although it’s possible that he would have remembered which aces he held, most players at this level will at least take a peek to double-check. Yep, I was almost certain that Rocky had flopped a set of kings.

Now I had to decide what to do. It was possible that one of the two players behind me had the ace of spades, but they both played a ridiculous amount of hands, so it was just as likely that they held any two random cards. I also knew that the player who was not all-in would be likely to draw to a lot of spades, including the jack or the ten. With the pot size at $360, I decided that making the $20 call was the right thing to do here. I threw in my chips casually and the player behind me folded—leaving just Rocky, All-In and me. Burn and turn … six of spades.

I was watching Rocky’s face as the card came. He got a disgusted look that seemed genuine enough. I fired $40 toward the pot; Rocky thought about it for just a minute and reluctantly called, still looking perturbed. The river … six of hearts—pairing the board. Rocky’s eyes lit up, and at that moment I knew I was beat.

I checked to him and he bet $40. It was at this point that I made the mistake that can cost a player a lot of money over the course of time. There was $500 in the pot and it was just $40 to give myself a chance to take it down. I figured that I had the pot odds to call—because if Rocky was bluffing and I was right about that only one time in 12, it was a profitable play. But there was a major problem with this line of thinking.

Rocky was a very tight, passive player who would have been more than happy to check and show down just about any hand except for the nuts. I knew this, but for some reason still decided to call. I did not have the pot odds because I knew that I was beat. Sure enough, Rocky rolled over the K-K for a full house, the exact hand that I knew he had.

Leak.

There are times when you simply have to ignore pot odds and lay down your hand. This applies to pot-limit and no-limit Hold’em games as well. A favorite ploy of many no-limit tournament pros is to make such a small bet on the river that their opponent feels they simply have to call. If there’s $4,000 in the pot and I bet $400, and you know that I will bluff at least one time in ten in this situation, then you have to make the call…right? No! If you know, either through a read or betting patterns in play that you are beat then you do not have to call. Save the chips for use in a better spot.

In limit Hold’em, one of the keys to success is the ability to “save bets.” I used to believe that earning an average profit of one big bet per hour made me a good player. But if that’s my goal as a professional, then in the hand described above, I had just blown my expected earnings for the hour. Errors like this one tend to really add up over the course of a single session, not to mention an entire year. Folding on the river when you know you’re beat—just a slight tweak to your game—can significantly increase your expected winnings—from 1 big bet per hour to 1 or even 2 big bets per hour.

That’s not to say that you should always lay down a hand to a river bet when you suspect you’re beat. If Rocky were the type of player capable of making a bluff in that situation, then I wouldn’t have been so confident about his pocket kings, and my decision to call would’ve been easy and correct. But, after playing together all night, I knew Rocky better than that—and thus I should’ve known better than to throw “just another $40” into the pot, no matter how sumptuous it looked.

It's the anti-ToP argument. At a certain level of poker (which I can say that I may or may not be at currently), you need to trust your reads and toss pot odds out the window. Just because there's 12 BB in the pot, and there's a 4-flush on the board that beats your 2 pair, do you call because he might be bluffing? Pot odds theory says yes. Rick Fuller and I say no. Trust your reads, kids.