Most lower limit Pot Limit Omaha players really like to light their money on fire when they are in the blinds. In this article I’ll provide you with a couple tips about how to keep your money safe.

HEADS UP POTS

If you are facing a competent opponent, it is extraordinarily difficult to make money against them by just calling their raises from the blinds. You will get punished when you make second best hands and will quite regularly be folding the best hand if you flop something like top pair but can’t stand much pressure.

I recently played a hand (and very often play hands just like it) that illustrates the problems with flatting out of position. Sitting 130 blinds deep, I open the button with the Kx J T 9 and the big blind flats with the Q Q 9 7. We see a flop of 8 3 4, which obviously whiffs my hand completely. I make a standard continuation bet of 60% pot when checked to and the big blind elects to call. The turn comes T and the action goes check check. The river is the 7, giving me the nuts, and my opponent check/calls a 75% pot bet.

Let’s put ourselves in our opponent's head for a moment and try to figure out where he goes wrong. I will open most buttons when folded to, so he’s thinking that his hand is ahead of my opening range. However, he doesn’t want to three-bet since we’re relatively deepstacked and he’s not going to be in love with most flops, so he decides to call.

He gets what appears to be a good flop for his hand – an overpair plus a queen-high flush draw. I’m going to be c-betting most flops, but he’s probably thinking that he can’t check-raise me because he will be completely lost if I flat him. If I three-bet, he could be in a world of hurt if I have a hand like AA or KK with the nut flush draw. Also it’s important to note that just about any hand I have in this spot with the nut flush draw is a favorite over his hand. So he comes to the conclusion that there’s a good enough chance he’s ahead but he doesn’t want to play a huge pot, so he elects to call.

Now the turn gives him an open-ender in addition to his overpair and flush draw, but again he doesn’t really want to play for stacks here since he could be crushed, so he checks. I turn top pair and a straight draw and think I have some showdown value at this point so I check behind. Also important to note here that he has done nothing to figure out what I’m holding; I could have literally anything in this spot. The river comes 7 and he is left with a naked overpair. But he is (correctly) thinking that I will bluff at this card if I have air since his hand looks so much like a busted flush draw, so he elects to call again. This is a totally reasonable thought process for him to go through, and extremely common to otherwise decent PLO players.

This highlights just how difficult playing deepstacked and out of position is, and why it’s so often a better idea to just fold your hand when facing a button raise and don’t have a hand that you’d like to three bet. I actively seek out players who will frequently call my raise in a heads-up pot and then try to play from this position of weakness Don’t be one of them.

MULTI-WAY POTS

On the other side of that coin is calling raises from the blinds when there is a raise and call; or a raise and multiple calls in front of you. The problem that most players have in this situation is going broke with strong second-best hands and draws. A hand like QJ97 one suit or TT87 looks good enough for a call if there is a raise and call in front of you, but it's very easy to make naked two pair, second-nut straights, or non-nut flushes with hands like these.

Additionally, because the pot is already decent-sized preflop, it can be difficult to control the size of the pot and you’ll most often end up playing for stacks if you check-raise a flop where you have a strong but non-nut hand and then be put in the horrible situation of calling off your whole stack when you might be totally crushed.

The way to adjust properly is to call only with hands that are likely to make nut combinations or draws to the nuts, most importantly making sure that your flush draws are nut flush draws. I think flat-calling preflop from the blinds is much more justifiable in multiway pots as long as you have the proper type of hand because the pot will be fairly inflated preflop and you can negate your positional disadvantage by check-raising your strong hands on the flop and getting most of your stack in (assuming you are playing 100bb deep or close to it). That said, it’s a good idea to play very tight preflop in these situations.

THREE-BETTING

Another major problem that a lot of newer PLO players have is only three betting AAxx hands from the blinds. This tends to be coupled with overplaying them post flop and is ultimately a recipe for disaster. Three betting from the blinds takes experience to do profitably, but a major key is to disguise your hand. A general rule of thumb that I like to use is to make sure that, if I’m playing against someone with whom I have no history, I make sure to three-bet them without aces before I three-bet them with aces. This impression will tend to stick with them and they may not bluff raise you as frequently on flops that are oriented toward the middle of the deck.

Three-betting without aces is also a good way to get even competent players to make big mistakes post flop. If you balance your range with your premium rundowns (basically any four card straight with no gaps where the lowest card is higher than a 4) and some other hands like QQJT double suited or AT98 with a suited ace then you will be putting your opponent in some really bad spots postflop when they call your three-bet with hands like J986, as most opponents will. Another way to disguise your three betting hands from the blinds is to three-bet more aggressively from the button and cutoff. Most players will not distinguish the difference and will allow you to only three bet premium hands from the blinds while having your opponent give you credit for a wider range and stack off lighter.

All in all, blind play in PLO can be extremely tough to do well. Hopefully these suggestions will help. Perhaps the best single piece of advice I can give is, “When in doubt, just fold.” This will definitely lead to greater profit.

nsinger

Nathan Singer a Pot Limit Omaha MTT/SNG specialist instructor for PokerPwnage, a site that features training videos and coaching from fellow PocketFivers Russel rdcrsn Carson, Alex assassinato Fitzgerald, Jon sketchy1 Eaton, Tom titantom32 Braband, and others. Eaton, Tom

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