Default Positioning: Folding, Calling, Raising

by: Lou Krieger©

In poker, as in life, we have default positions that help us put a lot of our decision making on autopilot so that we con concentrate on the really tough choices. We’re not unlike our computers. Every time I open Microsoft Internet Explorer, Hotsheet comes up. It’s my homepage and I don’t have to make any decisions or go through any gyrations to put it right up there on the screen in front of me. It’s my default choice, and I like it that way.

Poker players have default positions too. Most of us — when confronted with folding, calling, or raising — choose to call. It’s our default position and represents what we do almost instinctively. We don’t think too much about calling, but we ponder long and hard about either folding or raising.

When we default to calling — rather than saving our money for another hand and a better opportunity by folding, or trying to seize control of the situation by raising with a good hand — we’re wrong more often than not.

Calling runs on the wrong side of one of poker’s prime strategic tracks: Be aggressive, but be selective. A call is not aggressive, and when you call too often, it’s not selective either.

Aggressive play builds pots when you have a big hand, and more importantly, it provides two ways to win. An aggressive player can win by causing his opponent to fold a hand that might have beaten his, and he can win by showing down the best hand. The passive player can only win in a showdown.

The need to be selective is obvious. If you’ve ever had a maniac at your table who raises almost every pot, you’ll see him experience huge swings but almost always lose money in the process.

There are times to call. But a decision to call should be made only after analyzing the cards you hold, the community cards on the board, and other players’ playing styles. Here are four situations when calling pays.

1. You have a drawing hand that you’re trying to complete as inexpensively as possible.
2. To sucker your opponent into betting with what he mistakenly believes is a bigger hand; then you can checkraise him.
3. To disguise the strength of your hand or take a free or inexpensive card when you’re in the small or big blind.
4. A guy to your right bets when you have a huge hand. Calling will probably attract additional calls from players acting behind you. It may also help you get in a checkraise on a subsequent betting round.

Most of the time, however, raising or folding is preferable to calling. Too many poker players call when they should fold. It’s the single biggest mistake you’ll see at the poker table. Here’s why. Players come to a casino to play, not to throw away hands. Like traffic entering the freeway, they merge with the rhythm of the table. Soon they are playing just like their opponents — and calling too much as a result.

If you need a default program to guide you at the poker table, try this: Fold more than you raise and raise more than you call.

While this aphorism is true for cash games, it is even more important in tournaments, where you seldom want to call. Many top tournament pros almost never call. If they can’t raise before the flop, they fold.

This allows aggressive players to pressure their opponents. Because bluffing is generally more effective in tournaments than it is in cash games, a selectively aggressive player can drive his good hands and his bluffs too. When a player has a good number of chips to work with and can afford to lose a hand without becoming so short stacked that he has no latitude left for creative play, taking command of the table by raising the hands he plays is the fast lane to the final table.