When to fire a second barrel
For the record I had another good session last night which has carried on my recent good run at NL100 and am ahead by just over 30 buy-ins this month and so have had my first $3000/month since returning to the game after a lay off. Anyway I want to discuss one of the ways that I improved my game over the past few years and that was to base firing extra barrels in heads up spots based on my equity.
Equity comes at you in many different shapes and sizes in a poker game but it is usually the combination of hand equity and fold equity that dictate whether or not you keep betting on a bluff. Like for example you raise from the button and the big blind calls you. Your hand is the As-3s and the flop comes 9c-8c-5d and the big blind checks. You make a c-bet and get called and the turn card is the 3c. On the flop you had more fold equity with only one opponent and you having the initiative.
However after you were called and the turn card didn’t bring a high card then your fold equity dropped alarmingly as the turn card didn’t affect your opponent’s check-call and the ability that they had the best hand. Your pot equity also dropped as you now only have one card to hit your ace and the backdoor straight door is no longer possible. Here then the combination of poor pot equity and poor fold equity leads me to check it back. There is no shame in giving up and only fools lose their stacks to donks needlessly.
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August 1, 2012 at 6:51 amOne point to note about this kind of play, is that when the other player called your c-bet, and didn’t re raise it.
They could have either been slow playing the hand (knowing you were trying to get them to fold) and waiting for the turn to expect a third bet. At which point they could push all in and cause you to fold (having lost your fold equity when the turn didnt give a high card).
Calling the c-bet meant that he either had a lot of outs, or had already build a hand. I would have been more inclined to lean towards the first option, otherwise I would have expected a re raise.
How did the rest of the hand play out?
P.s. nice to hear you had a good session 😉