The preflop strategy in Texas Hold’em cash games is a crucial aspect, as it is in any other variety of poker and in all its forms. But there are some peculiarities that only a professional knows, and we tell you about them so that you can face your Texas Hold’em cash games with more guarantees.
But first, let’s take a look at preflop and everything it entails. Be warned: if you think preflop is just a preamble to warm up, you’re wrong. What you do preflop will have repercussions later on, so be careful not to underestimate its importance. Watch out.
Definition of preflop in poker
The preflop is the round of poker that happens before the flop and is where the action begins. It is an important and very stimulating part, as each player can start to manage his game in a different way and the wealth of options is very high.
One of the most important questions is how much to bet. As with everything in poker, a mathematical formula can provide the answer to this problem.
The general rule of thumb is four times the Big Blind plus one times the value of the Big Blind for each limper.
If we go to betting more than four times the big blind we are going too far. Too much risk for a potential reward of 1.5 times the big blind. To put it bluntly: betting more will earn you very little, and exposes you to much greater losses. In short: be very careful and don’t get smart. If you overdo it, you’ll feel it.
So is it advisable to reduce the stake to minimize the risk? Absolutely not. In fact, it will hurt your game because betting 2BB or 3BB will hardly put enough pressure to try to isolate your opponents and leave only the highest cards on the table, so it will be a somewhat useless or unprofitable bet.
Also, keep in mind that if you bet below your odds, you will be giving your opponents very important implicit odds: the villains will end up seeing our bet with speculative plays and we could end up creating a multiplayer pot that does not suit us at all.
About calling and raising preflop
One thing is very clear, and that is that if we decide to play the hand and we are the first to open the pot, we have to raise. What this does is to sift through the opponents you’ll be facing, causing some of them to fold and no longer be a problem. So much the better for you: the fewer players who require your attention, the more effort you can devote to analyzing other opponents. And if you manage to reduce your opponents to one with your raise, you’ve got yourself a winner.
Raising as soon as the pot opens also gives you a strong image to the rest of the table. This gives the impression that you are in a good game and encourages what is known as the “check to the raiser” attitude.
The check to the raiser or check-raise is nothing more than the fact of checking to let the player who has raised speak. If they do this to you, be careful: it’s fine for you to speak to take the initiative, but if they are deliberately giving you a free hand to play, watch what you do: your play must be very subtle, not erratic and opaque, free of clear interpretations. Don’t give anything away (or, if you do, take advantage of it to confuse others), and bear in mind that you will be under the gaze of everyone present, so speak carefully.
This strategy has another advantage, and that is that we can make our game more difficult to read. If we up the ante, even if we don’t have the best cards, we will avoid telegraphing letter by letter everything we are doing to the others. That’s why we said before that you should be careful with the check to the raiser, although you can use this to your advantage.
Limping, as a general rule, is not recommended. Calling means calling the big blind preflop, and it is a synonym that our cards are not too good. However, there are a few situations where it can be a good option:
- If we have a good hand and we think the guy talking after us is going to raise, folding is a good move.
- If the blinds are bad postflop players, we should also consider it.
- If the pot ends up being multiplayer and we’re holding suited cards, too.
What to do if you get re-raised?
In low limit games, a re-raise will almost always mean you’re facing KK, QQ, AA or AK. But if the 3bet comes from one of the blinds when we are in position to steal, the range of options opens up because the blind will be thinking that we are stealing and that our hand is not legitimate. But knowing the approximate range in which we are moving is good, as it reduces the options we have and can help us to minimize damage depending on how the blinds are developing the game.
And what happens if we see that a player is constantly abusing re-raise? It could be that it is a mistake and we are not interpreting the game correctly, or that we need to extend our push range. On very specific occasions the solution would be to go for a 4bet, which is rare because 3bet ranges are usually closed at small limits.
But what if we re-raise? That should only happen when we have a premium hand, a really good one. In that case, we would have to triple the bet. If the original raiser bluffs below the standard bet, the best thing to do is to ignore him, as his play will no longer make sense. It’s a strategy for the unwary that if you don’t identify it, it can make you dizzy and you’ll end up missing your game.
The best preflop poker hands are achieved by keeping all of this in mind, managing re-raises well and listening to your calculations. It is important that you don’t let yourself get tricked and, if the occasion calls for it, that you use the limpers to your advantage.
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