Feel your way

	The flop gives you the biggest hit of information in the hand and is the point where you have the most freedom to make plays

So far in this series on tournament play, we’ve covered pre-flop plays and value plays. This month, it’s time to take a look at playing the flop. The flop is often said to be the defining moment in any given poker game and this is certainly true in that it’s the moment that 60% of the community cards are revealed. The flop is the point where you can get a good idea of where you stand for the rest of the hand. However, as ever, you won’t be surprised to learn that there are no hard-and-fast rules for post-flop play: like everything else in poker, it depends entirely on the situation at the time.

So the flop is important, but how many chips you have is equally important. To some degree, the size of your stack guides your play during tournaments as much as the cards you have. In my first article on pre-flop play (see IE 28, p40), I discussed how stack size determined starting hand and pre-flop betting strategy – and this is just as true after the flop. The more chips you have, the more room you have to manoeuvre and the more imaginative you can be with your play. When you have a big stack, you’re much freer to play the board on the flop. Post-flop play is for the big stacks, and this is where the real poker is played in a tournament.

BIG PAIR WLTM HARMLESS FLOP

Big pairs look great before the flop, but can become a real problem on a tough flop with multiple players. The more players who see a flop, the scarier it is when you’re holding a big pair, and the ability to read the ‘texture’ of the flop – and so how likely it is that your big pair is beaten – is vital to successful tournament play.

As a general rule, if there are three or more players in the pot with you, at least two will have draws to a board showing a potential flush and/or straight. This is where you need to define your hand and see how strong your pair is. Reading the texture of a flop is an important skill and comes with experience, but you should always judge a big pair by the flop, rather than look at your hand in isolation. For example, a common fault with beginners is that they find themselves unable to put down a pair of Kings on an Ace-high flop when they have multiple opponents, but it only takes a couple of early exits for most people to realise this is a losing situation in a freezeout tournament.

Holding big pairs with a dangerous flop is what I’d call a pretty marginal situation. As a general rule, I like to keep these kinds of marginal pots low – I’m only interested in building pots with big hands or when I’m sure my opponent is bluffing.

TO BE CONTINUED?

Continuation bets are a common feature in all types of poker and simply refer to when a pre-flop raiser makes a bet on the flop – ‘continuing’ the action and showing the rest of the players that his hand is still good. A lot of players like to make continuation bets, me included, because it’s generally a consistently profitable play. Again, though, reading the texture of the flop is important if you’re making the continuation bet (or looking to steal the pot from someone you think is making a continuation bet with nothing). For example, if I had As-Ks in middle to late position and raised pre-flop to find four callers seeing a flop of 10h-9h-5c, I would be very hesitant to make a continuation bet as somebody is likely to be drawing to a straight or flush – or both. It’s a combination of the number of callers and the potential risk of the flop that must guide your decisions here. Another example would be the same situation with a flop of 4h-2c-8d, which is virtually impossible to hit. A continuation bet here would probably win the pot without much resistance.

Also worth considering is that because lots of players often make routine continuation bets, there’s plenty of scope when you have the chips to put a bettor to the test. If you observe that a player on your table almost always follows a pre-flop raise with a continuation bet, pick a good spot when the board looks dangerous and force him to make a decision. Your cards aren’t important, just your judgement of the situation and whether he’d lay down two overcards or an overpair to a dangerous flop.

GENERATING ACTION

On the rare occasions you’re lucky enough to flop a monster, you need to generate action to maximise your winnings, but if your hand is that big, how can you get people to bet at the pot? For example, if you have A-Q and the flop is A-A-Q, there’s only one Ace and two Queens that can give anyone a hand to play into you. The answer is to bet out. A small bet could represent a steal or a smaller pocket pair and may get action from people holding the Ace or a Queen, who will raise you. A common beginner’s mistake would be to check in this situation and hope someone else bluffs at this pot, but by checking then reraising a bettor, you’re letting your opponents know you have a monster hand. It’s much better to play out and hope someone comes back at you. And if they really think you’re trying to steal, you may end up busting them out.

So I like to bet out a strong hand to generate action. However, as I keep saying, judge each hand on its own merits and assess the possibilities of the flop when making your decision: it may be that a flop is dangerous enough to generate action for you, even when you have a great hand. I can remember the following example from the WSOP in 2004 when I checked a monster to induce a bet on a dangerous flop.

I had K-K and raised two to three times the big blind (about $12k) with two callers seeing a flop of A-K-x (two hearts). I had flopped a great hand (trip Kings), but because the flop offered so many possibilities to players who may have thought they were ahead (pair of Aces, flush draw, two pair, A-K and so on), rather than bet out, I checked. Sure enough, one player bet two-thirds the pot (around $40k), and then the second pushed all-in for $260k, overbetting the pot. It was a good bet, but a big overbet, which suggested the player was semi-bluffing, thinking my failure to bet showed weakness. This player knew me well and that I usually bet when I have a piece of the flop. Having this player just about covered, I called and he showed A-x of hearts for top pair and a flush draw. This was a good bet by him, but because I had checked my trip Kings, he wrongly figured I had nothing when I was, in fact, 70% favourite and duly took a big pot down when he missed his flush. In this example, I won a big pot by letting the flop do the work for me.

OVERBETS AND CALLING ON THE FLOP

The flop gives you the single biggest hit of information in the hand and is the point where you have the most freedom to make plays at your opponents. Overbets are a great way to give misinformation about the strength of your hand. An overbet usually indicates a semi-bluff such as a flush draw or perhaps even a weak holding, so this can be a good play when you flop trips or two pair, and will often induce a call from an overpair. Overbets can work on so many levels: they can look strong or weak, dangerous or scared, but it’s by varying your play that you can profit from overbets. With all post-flop strategies, you have to make sure you don’t slip into betting patterns that give away the strength of your hand.

Calling on the flop can also be a good play, despite the received wisdom that it’s better to bet or fold. You might call with a big hand hoping to let people catch something and play into you, or simply to keep the pot small when you have a marginal holding. A call can even indicate strength on a dangerous flop. I’m always suspicious when a tight player calls, as it often means they’re holding a cinch hand and looking to build a big pot.

FLOPPING ’EM AND DROPPING ’EM

Once again, I’m pleased to disappoint any readers looking for hard-and-fast guidelines on how to play the flop. It’s a poker truism that you’ve got to ‘know when to hold ’em and know when fold ’em’, and it’s the flop that gives you the biggest guide on what to do in any given hand. On many flops, top pair-top kicker will take down the pot, on others it will get you slaughtered. Developing the knack of assessing the dangers and opportunities the flop presents is one of the most important skills in poker, but also one of the hardest.