Have you ever tried to bluff a guy who’s got a big stack and a ton of profit?

It’s not easy!

In today’s hand, Doug Polk attempts such a bluff against a player named Peter on Hustler Casino Live’s Million Dollar Game.

Peter had been absolutely crushing and was up $2.5 million (over the last 2 sessions) when this hand began.

The blinds are $500/$1,000 with a $2,000 big blind ante. Doug started the hand with around $750,000 and Peter covers.

Let’s jump into the action!

Note: Doug Polk is currently working on a new live poker module for members of the Upswing Lab. He plans to reveal his strategy for notable hands he’s played on stream — like a supercharged version of his Poker Hands series on YouTube. This new module is scheduled for release in August.

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Preflop Action

Tom Dwan raises to $3,000 from the Cutoff with As 3h. Doug calls with Jc Th on the Button. Peter defends the Big Blind with Ac 8d.

Advanced Preflop Analysis

The key factor in this hand is the presence of a large big blind ante, which incentives all players to play loose.

Ace-Three offsuit is a borderline hand for Tom to raise. He should be raising with around the top 35-40% of starting hands. Both raising and folding are reasonable options.

Doug should be playing a wide range here and his call with Jack-Ten offsuit is good. His range should be roughly the top 25-30% of hands, mixing evenly between 3-betting and cold-calling (except for premiums like Pocket Jacks or better, Ace-King, and Ace-Queen suited, with which he should always 3-bet).

Peter can continue with an extremely wide range and his call with Ace-Eight offsuit is good. He is closing the action with a lot of dead money in the pot. So his defending range should probably go as wide as offsuit gappers (like 53-offsuit, 64-offsuit, 75-offsuit), any Ax offsuit, all suited hands, and some hands like K8-offsuit, Q9-offsuit, and J9-offsuit.

Flop Action

The flop comes Ad [Qd] [8h] and the pot is $11,500.

Peter checks. Tom checks. Doug bets $5,000. Peter raises to $17,000. Tom folds. Doug calls.

Advanced Flop Analysis

There a lot of decisions in this hand so I’ll break them down one by one.

On this dynamic flop, Peter has two pair, Tom has top pair weak kicker, and Doug has a double gutshot straight draw.

Checking over to Doug is the right strategy for both Peter and Tom. Doug’s range is the tightest and thus has the highest concentration of nutted hands.

Doug should bet with a polarized range because he is faced with 2 opponents who can both hold very strong hands. Therefore, Doug should c-bet for value with a tighter range, and construct an appropriately smaller bluffing range. Jack-Ten offsuit is a double gutter that fits this role perfectly. It has no showdown value and great potential to improve to the nuts.

As far as sizing goes, Doug’s is very good. He is putting just enough pressure on Peter’s Qx and weaker hands, while not risking too much. Betting smaller would give away too much equity to weaker hands by allowing both Peter and Tom to defend more freely. Betting bigger would start to hinder his ability to extract value with his strong hands.

Peter has a monster hand that he should be looking to check-raise for value (at least some of the time). His sizing is good, putting pressure on Doug’s weakest draws.

Tom makes a good laydown here. Peter is representing a two pair or better for value, which puts his hand in a pure bluff-catcher scenario. Plus Doug is still left to act with a ton of good hands in his range.

Doug’s call is very good. He has a lot of equity to improve to the nuts and is in position.

Turn Action

The turn comes the 6s, making the board Ad Qd 8h 6s. The pot is $45,500.

Peter bets $37,000. Doug calls.

Advanced Turn Analysis

Neither player’s ranges improve on the the 6s turn.

Peter’s Ace-Eight is a great candidate for barreling or check-raising for value. It all comes down to a few factors:

1. How often does he think Doug will stab with his draws? (the more often Doug stabs, the more trapping makes sense)
2. How well does he think he can play on the river after Doug calls his bet? (the more accurately he thinks he can play, the better it is to barrel)
3. The deeper the stacks are, the more often he should bet.*

*This happens because there is a larger incentive to build the pot right away to get the stacks in and to thin out Doug’s draws. 

Given the extremely large stack-to-pot ratio (SPR), going for a turn overbet at a high frequency is the better play overall. This line gets him the most amount of value and clarity on the river.

Doug’s Jack-Ten is very close to breaking even as a call against a balanced betting range. It has good properties for calling as it unblocks Peter’s flush draws. This is the type of holding that you should randomize between calling and folding against unknown opponents.

River Action

The river is a flush-completing [7d], making the board Ad Qd 8h 6s 7d. The pot is $120,000.

Peter checks. Doug overbets $185,000.

Advanced River Analysis

The river [7d] changes everything as both players can have flushes.

Peter should make a thin value bet with his two pair (especially because he holds the 8d). In theory, he’ll have very few bluffs here which forces him to use a smaller size. By checking, he allows Doug to create a polarized betting range that would make his two pair indifferent between calling and folding.

Doug makes a great overbet, correctly recognizing that Peter is likely to be capped at two pair. His overbet range consists of sets and flushes for value and missed straight draws for bluffs.

Faced with this overbet, Peter decides that Doug is likely under-bluffing (or simply didn’t feel like risking this much money). He elects to fold his bluff-catcher despite having a good blocker card to Doug’s flushes.

Results

Peter folds and Doug drags the $120,000 pot as he gleefully flips his hand face up.

The smile of a man who just bluffed a rich guy

Final Thoughts

Wow! What a sick hand!

That’s all for this breakdown! I hope you enjoyed it and that you learned something new from it! Do you think Peter made a good fold on the river? Let me know in the comment section down below!

Till’ next time, good luck, grinders!

(Remember, Doug’s new live poker lesson drops next month in the Upswing Lab. Be sure to sign up before then!)

I have a cool hand to share with you today!

The stakes are $200/$400 (with a $100 ante). This one took place on the online felt between one of the world’s greatest cash game players (Linus Loeliger) and one of the world’s greatest tournament players (Michael Addamo).

Let’s dive into the action.

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Preflop

Addamo raises to $880 with Kd 6d from Middle Position. Linus calls with 5s 3s from the Button. BTC200K-FORSURE (an unknown player) calls from the Big Blind with an unknown hand.

The effective stack between the Addamo and Linus is around $35,000 (87.5bb).

Advanced Preflop Analysis

Given the ante in play, Addamo should be open-raising with a wider range than in a regular 6-max game. Normally, you’d want to raise with around the top 20% of hands from this position. With an ante, that increases to around the top 25% of hands with the ante.

King-Six suited is towards the bottom of that 25% range. His raise size is good. Anything between 2bb and 3bb should work well as it gives him good pot odds on his raise.

Linus’s call with a low suited gapper is probably a bit spewy, at least in theory. It will be an uphill battle to make this hand profitable. I think it’s fairly likely he sees the relatively unknown player in the Big Blind as a weak player. So, he called with this hand in order to play a pot in position against that weak player. But that’s just speculation on my part.

The theoretically correct strategy for Linus in this spot would be to mix between cold-calling and 3-betting with the top ~15% or so of hands. With this strategy, the strongest possible hands (like Pocket Queens or better, Ace-Queen suited, and Ace-King) would always 3-bet. The other hands should mix calling and 3-betting at varying frequencies.

BTC200K should play quite loosely from the Big Blind because he is getting such great pot odds. He only needs to win the pot 14% of the time to break even on a call (he must call $480 to play for a pot of $3,440).

Flop

The flop comes Jh 5d 2d. The pot is $3,440.

BTC200K checks. Addamo checks with Kd 6d. Linus bets $800 with 5s 3s. BTC200K folds. Addamo raises to $3,600. Linus 3-bets to $6,898. Addamo calls.

Advanced Flop Analysis

BTC200K has the weakest range by far, so checking is the best option for him with his entire range. 

Despite the fact that he has a flush draw, Addamo should also probably check his entire range here. The rest of the players combined will have more nutted hands than he does.

Linus is incentivized now to bet for a very small size here with a lot of medium-strength hands and semi-bluffs. The idea here is that by risking a little bit of money, he accomplishes a few things:

Addamo should be check-raising here, so his decision is correct. This range should consist of overpairs, strong top pairs, overcards with backdoor draws, and flush draws. This strategy is optimal because he doesn’t want to let Linus realize his equity for so cheap.

Linus makes a rather unconventional play here and 3-bets. We don’t usually see 3-bets as part of an optimal strategy for the in-position player, especially on boards such as this one and at a high stack depth (almost 100bb deep).

But if we want to look at why Linus might have decided that this is the best strategy, we need to understand when such a play would be optimal. This line with 53-suited would be best if Addamo:

• Is too bluff-heavy with high equity hands that will call the raise
• Is too bluff-heavy with weak semi-bluffs that will fold against the 3-bet
• Will fold some strong hands such as overpairs with a diamond that block his bluffs

There may be one more reason why Linus might prefer 3-betting with this hand: Equity realization. If he thinks that he will be able to navigate the future inflection points more accurately, then it can make sense to choose this line.

As far as blocker selection goes, having the 5 is a good choice as it blocks the set of 5’s that Addamo is representing while it unblocks his bluffs. Also, Linus still has outs to make good two pairs and trips in case Addamo has a strong but vulnerable hand.

Addamo’s call is good here. He is getting great pot odds, only needing to win the pot around 19% of the time once he calls. An easy feat with a high flush draw.

Turn

The turn comes the Ad, making the board Jh 5d 2d Ad. The pot is $17,236.

Addamo checks. Linus checks.

Advanced Turn Analysis

A great card for Addamo and a horrible card for Linus. 

Addamo’s range now improves to contain the top set. Plus, his bluffs have improved to a flush.

Linus won’t have many flushes at this point since 3-betting with anything other than the nut flush draw on the flop doesn’t make much sense. And since the Ad came on the turn, there is no way he had the Ace-high flush draw on the flop.

Both players played this street correctly in my opinion.

River

The river comes the Qc, making the final board  Jh 5d 2d Ad Qc. The pot is $17,236.

Addamo checks. Linus shoves all-in for an effective bet of $27,007. Addamo calls and scoops the $71,252 pot.

Advanced River Analysis

The Qc is a total brick. The effective nuts do not change.

Addamo realizes that Linus has a capped range from which it’s going to be very hard to extract value. This happens because Addamo’s range has improved so much on the turn. 

In theory, we would probably expect Addamo to mix between checking and betting with this hand. In practice, if he thinks that Linus might be the type of player to overly attack a capped range, or simply has a weak range, then trapping would be the superior action. 

Linus’ 3-bet on the flop was quite suspicious to begin with, especially against a shorter than 100bb stack. In this case, it makes even more sense for Adammo to give Linus some rope to put some more money into the pot with a high probability of him holding a weak hand.

When Linus faces a check on the river, he is never winning if he checks back. On top of that, he is very likely at the bottom of his range in a spot where it is very hard for him to have bluffs. This makes it a prime situation for turning his hand into a bluff, so his play is good (but he probably never should have been in this spot to begin with).

What do you think of how this hand was played?

In these battles of elite players, there will be a lot of back-and-forth exploitation going on. Sometimes one player gets the upper hand, sometimes the other one.

That’s all for this article! I hope you enjoyed it and that you learned from it! 

What do you think of Linus’ 3-bet on the flop? What do you think of Addamo’s trap on the river? I am curious to hear your opinion!

Till’ next time, good luck, grinders!

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Online poker sites with high stakes have some of the sickest cash games in the world!

We’re going to get a glimpse into that arena with today’s hand analysis. 

This hand was played by Wiktor “Limitless” Malinowski and Oleg Bychkov at $200/$400 blinds with an effective stack just over $40,000.

Let’s dive right into the action!

Preflop Action

Wiktor opens up the action with a raise to $1,200 from the Small Blind with .

Oleg 3-bets with to $3,600 from the Big Blind.

Wiktor calls.

Preflop Analysis

Wiktor can employ a couple of strategies for playing an unopened pot from the Small Blind.

1. He could play a mixed strategy comprised of folding, limping (around 30% of hands), and open-raising (around 30% of hands).
2. Or he could go with a pure strategy, comprised of open-raising the top 40-45% of hands and folding the rest.

Theoretically speaking, the mixed strategy has a tiny bit higher expected value (EV) than the pure strategy. But can be great strategies if executed properly. It just depends on which one you can play better than your opponent.

(If you play low stakes cash games, Upswing Poker recommends going with the pure strategy from the Small Blind. The rake is simply too high in those games for the limp strategy to be worth it.)

Oleg should look to 3-bet with around 15-17% of hands, and his range should be polarized. His 3-betting range will be similar to this:

The numbers below each hand represent the frequency at which that hand 3-bets. For example, Q9o shows 0.333, which means it 3-bets 33% of the time. If a hand shows a 1, it 3-bets 100% of the time.

In summation, the 3-bet range contains the strong hands (99+, ATs+, AQo+) and a smattering of “bluff 3-bets” that have effective blockers and/or good playability when called.

Against the 3-bet, Wiktor should be looking to call with around half of his range. I’d estimate his calling range is something like this:

Now that we have the preflop ranges estimated, let’s see the flop.

Flop Action

The flop comes   and the pot is $7,200.

Wiktor checks with . Oleg c-bets $2,400 with . Wiktor check-raises to $6,480. Oleg calls.

Flop Analysis

The flop gives Oleg top set with Pocket Jacks, but not a whole lot for Wiktor’s .

Despite having a ton of weak hands in his 3-betting range, Oleg still retains a small equity advantage on the flop. That being said, he will retain a much larger percentage of the pot due to having the nut advantage (which at this stack-to-pot ratio (SPR) could be considered overpairs+). He also has position, which makes it easier to realize equity.

A very high-frequency, small c-bet will work perfectly in this kind of scenario. Oleg could even simplify and go for a range bet. This way, he will put a lot of pressure on decent-looking hands such as Ace-Queen, low pocket pairs, and some middling suited Aces that have a backdoor flush draw.

Against this small c-bet, Wiktor should be always folding his Ace-Five suited. It is simply too weak to justify calling or raising with just an overcard, a backdoor flush draw, and a crummy backdoor straight draw.

While Wiktor’s specific hand should be folding, his general approach to the situation should be aggressive in order to deny as much equity as possible from Oleg. Check-raising with some strong top pairs and better, plus some semi-bluffs to balance them, is optimal in this scenario. But is just too weak to continue with.

(Perhaps Wiktor had an exploitative reason in mind when he check-raised.)

Against this raise, Oleg has no reason to fast-play his flopped set since the pot is already getting big, so calling is the best play. There is so little money left to play for in their stacks compared to the pot, thus he can afford to slow-play.

Turn Action

The turn comes the , making the board . The pot is $20,160.

Wiktor checks. Oleg checks.

Turn Analysis

The changes nothing. Wiktor can continue betting with some portion of both his value hands and bluffs.

could be a decent candidate to use as a semi-bluff here given that it blocks Pocket Aces and Ace-Jack. But in any case, Wiktor goes for the check.

Against a check, Oleg should take a stab at the pot frequently. A small size will be most effective since Wiktor will mostly be giving up at this point. Top pairs are, for the most part, strong enough to value-bet. Plus, he has plenty of straight draws that would like to bluff.

With top set specifically, Oleg should check back because:

1. His hand is not vulnerable — there is no downside to letting Wiktor “catch up”
2. He blocks a lot of the hands that would call him (such as )
   
3. The stack-to-pot ratio is very low — getting the full stack in on the river is still possible, even if he checks the turn
   

Let’s see what the river brings.

River Action

The river comes the , making the final board . The pot is $20,160.

Wiktor checks. Oleg bets $6,960 with his full house.

River Analysis

The river is another brick. Wiktor should mostly check with his get-to-river range since none of his weaker hands improve on this river. This includes his .

Oleg should use a bigger bet size here, in theory. One-third pot river bets in position are not usually an optimal way to play because it caps the amount of bluffs/value hands that you can use.

That being said, purely from and expected value point of view, it isn’t a significant mistake at equilibrium (though it can be exploited). This type of play could be optimal if Wiktor is going to be overly loose/aggressive against it.

Back to Wiktor now, who actually has a good bluff-catcher at this point. He unblocks all potential bluffs (such as ) and also wins against all of them.

If Oleg is over-bluffing when using this size (has more than 20% bluffs), has a positive expected value as a call. Whether that is the case or not is up for debate and only by playing many many hands against a player can you make those distinctions.

Results

Wiktor hero calls with Ace-high. Oleg scoops the $34,080 pot. A nifty prize!

What do you think of Wiktor’s call on the river?

Do you reckon Oleg is bluffing more than 20% of the time?

Let me know in the comments below.

That’s all for this article guys! I hope you enjoyed this breakdown and as usual, if you have any questions or feedback please let me know in the comment section down below!

Do you think you have what it takes to get to the nosebleeds? Prove it! Till’ next time, good luck, grinders!