Open up his range
by PokerAnon ~ March 17th, 2010This blog started out as an anonymous means of tracking things that I was learning in poker. From my university studies I knew that writing about things works a as a means of trying to cement them in my head, and then the writings expanded to include various meanderings around in my brain on topics like emotional reactions and attempts to analyse myself as well as my connection to my poker game.
“Open up his range” is a phrase that I’ve heard often lately, and though I think I understand what it means I haven’t looked at it in here so it’s worth spending some time with it to work it into my thinking properly. Essentially it’s a shortened form of “not showing strength in order to encourage weaker hands and air to feel more confident and be more willing to bet and/or to call a later bet by us.” In other words letting our opponent make plays than to just fold to our bet.
We raise preflop and get called, flop top pair on a non-dangerous flop, and our opponent checks to us. If we bet he may or may not call with bottom pair or an underpair. If we check behind, he starts to feel more confident with his weaker hand, thereby “opening up his range”, encouraging him to take a stab on the turn and maybe encouraging him to stab again on the river or to check/call our river bet. We can possibly get one or two streets of value where we might otherwise have got one or maybe no more. Similarly if we did c-bet the flop and were called, we can also check the turn hoping to induce a bet or check/call on the river from perhaps a medium pocket pair.
Sound good? There are a lot of caveats in this however. The first is that we can’t do this at the lowest levels, like 0.05/0.10 or lower. It can possibly work there but the opponent has to be willing to play his part. Most, but not all, opponents at these levels will happily call flop and turn bets chasing with bottom pair and an Ace, gutshot draws, weak flush draws, or other weak hands, so against this type of opponent we leave more money on the table by not simply betting for value. The opponent has to be a little smarter, smart enough to not call three streets with middle pair just hoping that his hand might win, so we can’t win more money by just betting. They also need to be slightly more aggressive so that if we give them opportunity to bet a later street they might do so.
There’s also the danger of letting our opponent outdraw us. A drawy flop is not a good time to check to induce bets as we let our opponent draw for free. And this is another reason not to do this with beginner opponents as they may be calling with a wide range of hands and virtually any card on the turn could give him two pair.
Scare cards could also shut down our action and kill our plan. An Ace on the turn or a card that might complete a 3 flush or 3 straight might scare off our opponent even though we’re sitting there with just a big pocket pair or top pair with a good kicker.
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When we make this play we accomplish something else as well. Normally this play is made with a medium to medium-strong strength hand. Often in these cases we’re looking to win a medium sized pot, and by checking an early street, either the flop or the turn, we keep the pot from getting too big.
