To see when you made a Call River by pot odds, open Holdem Manager and sort your played hands by flat river. You will immediately see when you called your opponents on the last street. If the chart rises up at a distance, then you can skip reading our review. But as practice shows, many poker players lose money by calling River.
Reasons for losing on the River
In most cases, an annoying loss comes from the fact that players bet not on the pot odds - Pot odds. Regs often play too aggressively on the first two streets so they don't hit the River with the top of their hand range. They sluggishly equalize the rates on the River, not assessing the chances of winning at all.
Also, the reasons for losing in the last round of the game include:
- Inability to bluff;
- Bets excluding mat. expectations;
- Too loose play.
Let's say that on the River you have a Pair of Aces, but are playing at the table out of position. At the same time, there is a large number of draw hands in the opponent's range that have missed. In such a situation, 2/3 of the poker players bet for value, get a pass and do not even think that they have made a mistake. If your opponent has too much air, you must create conditions that provoke him to bluff.
An example on Pot odds
For clarity, consider one hand played:
- The game takes place at a table with NL25;
- The poker player is in the position of the Dealer;
- AsJh - his pocket cards;
- The poker player bets 60 cents, and the BB delivers;
- The effective stack in the game is 30$ (120 BB);
- Js9s7s - cards that came out on the Flop;
- The poker player has a nut flush draw and a pair of jacks;
- The player continues the bet by throwing 1$ into the total pot;
- Opponent calls and 3c comes out on the Turn;
- The player sets the 2nd barrel - 3.3$;
- The opponent calls again, so the pot increases to 8.3$;
- In the last round, Th appears on the board;
- The poker player's nut combination is not closed;
- The player declares Check to compare his hand with the opponent's combination for free;
- The opponent delivers $ 6;
- For a pot of 20.3$, the player pays an additional 6$ for showdown;
- As a result, the player loses with his Pair to the younger Flash.
The example shows that the last Call on the River was a puncture. The player did not bet on the pot odds.
When should you call river bets?
There are only a few situations in which it is advisable to call high stakes opponents in the last round of the game. You can call River if:
- You have good pot odds;
- You are ahead of your opponent's Beta spectrum;
- You have a bluff catcher.
In the example above, the player paid 6$ for the pot 20.3$, even though the pot odds were 29%. For a Call to be justified, the poker player must beat the opponent at least 29 times out of 100. But does the player have such chances? Your opponent's value will almost entirely consist of:
- Street;
- Flushes;
- Two Pairs;
- Setov.
It is impractical to bet with Jacks, which means that no matter how strong the player's Pair is, he will not be able to beat any of his opponent's value.
Yes, the opponent can simulate drawing hands. But this is where the poker player's Ace of spades transforms into a nut flush draw blocker. This means that the opponent cannot have a nut combination. Its range will include:
- KsQ;
- KQs;
- Ks8;
- Qs8.
The situation is similar with Straight Draws, because the combination is relatively rare. In the last round, QT and 8T could have strengthened to a Pair, but would have been played by Check, but 68 closed altogether. Yes, the probability of getting a completely empty hand remains, but remember that the regular bluffs only 10% times. So, without preliminary calculations, we can conclude that the player does not have 29%, so he should have played the pass.
To prevent automatic river equalization, ask yourself a few questions:
- Is your opponent capable of betting with value hands that are worse than ours?
- What combinations can the opponent imitate?
- How often do you need to win for a Call to be justified?
If you call Rivera on the odds of the pot, then the game will certainly start generating income!