My Articles - My Blog - Video - Poker Work - Charity - Downloads - Links - Subscribe
Raising on a Draw in No Limit Cash Games
A little while ago I wrote an article called 'Implied Odds and Calling on a draw in no-limit cash games', which explained the situations in which it is profitable to call with just a draw in these types of games. Since then, I've moved up in the world, and I'm now playing in bigger games against better players.
Now, when I flop a flush draw, call a series of big bets, and hit on the river, my opponents check and fold! When they see me calling with two suited cards on the board, then making a big bet when the third card arrives, they read my hand perfectly. This makes the play unprofitable because they don't pay me off and compensate for the majority of times when I miss my draw. So against these new opponents I can't call and have to come up with other ways to make profit.
Raising on a draw is one way to do this. Lets look at an example.
Its a £2/£4 blinds game. I have the A-Q of spades and have called a middle position raise from the button. I am heads up against the middle player, the size of the pot is a convenient £30, and the flop comes 10-7-4 with two spades, so I have a flush draw. For further convenience, lets assume that my overcards aren't enough to win the pot even if I hit them, and that my opponent is unlikely to improve to a hand better than my flush if I do make it - so I have a pure draw. Me and my oppponent both have £400 remaining, and he will make the usual pot sized bets.
Because he is the preflop raiser and a good player, my opponent is going to bet not only when he does have a hand, but when he doesn't. So if I raise even the minimum amount, we can assume that he will fold if he doesn't have a hand, and call or reraise if he does. There are four different scenarios that are likely to occur:
- He bets, I raise, and he folds.
- He bets, I raise, and he calls. He bets again on the turn if nothing scary comes, and I have to fold.
- He bets, I raise, and he calls. He checks to me on the turn and I take the free card.
- He bets, I raise, and he reraises. I have to fold.
Lets say that about 20% of the time, the opponent folds. This is a reasonable estimate, because he won't always have a hand, and because the minimum raise is a technique often used by players holding extremely powerful hands, he might fold some of the times he has something. 60% of the time he calls, but half of those times he will check on the turn, giving me a free chance to hit the flush card. Again this isn't an unreasonable estimate.The remaining 20% of the time he reraises and I have to fold. Because I have raised and not called however, and he hasn't seen me make this move before, my opponent doesn't put me on the flush draw and pays me off for all of his chips when I do hit.
20% of the time, scenario 1 occurs and I win £80.
30% of the time, scenario 2 occurs. About 20% of this time I win £420, and about 80% of the time I lose £40 for an overall profit of £52.
30% of the time, scenario 3 occurs. Now 37% of this time I win £420, because he has given me a free card to hit my flush, and 63% of the time I lose £40 for an overall profit of £130.20.
20% of the time, scenario 4 occurs and I lose £40.
The overall expected value of the play is (0.2 x 80) + (0.3 x 52) + (0.3 x 130.2) + (0.2 x -40) = 16 + 15.6 + 39.06 + -8 or a positive EV of +£62.66.
Now I am back in the realm of profit again, just by making an aggressive move! Notice that the only unfavourable situation is scenario 4, where the opponent reraises. The great thing about the move is that it is only unprofitable if your opponent will reraise you a massive proportion of the time, or if he will be able to put you on a flush draw, and typical opponents will not do so.
Of course, aggressive action to maximise profit in no-limit games has the drawback of having high variance. However, that doesn't make this particular play unsuitable for tournaments where you are trying to avoid high-risk plays, because scenarios 1 and 3 are much more likely to occur in such a situation where the other players are playing tighter than usual.
In my older games, I think this play would still be profitable. However, because the players are less observant and play more loosely they are less likely to fold, making it less worthwhile. Different strokes for different folks!
Alex Scott April 2005
