A Pro's Journey: Common Mistakes

Whenever we grind we come across endless mistakes made by beginners/recreational players, they are quite common and can be avoided with a little study of the game. In this article I will mention some of them and try to explain why the play can be considered bad.

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-Limp: Going around “cleaning” hands and hands during the tournament can cost you dearly. First, by limping, you are giving space for other players to enter the hand, and by multiway, the chance of us taking down the pot decreases considerably. Second, by limping you also give space for a player in position to raise and isolate the game against just you in a larger pot, in which he will C-BET and draw most of the time.

-Call, call, call: Also known as a “calling station,” this is the guy who can’t let go of ANYTHING, and calls any bet on draws and with any pair. Before calling a bet, we should always define a range for our opponent, so we can get an idea of the strength of our hand in relation to his range. This will allow us to lose less and win more. When we have a draw (flush draw, straight draw), we should think about the most profitable play at the time according to our opponent. We can check-raise, make a lead, call, and even fold. It’s important to ask yourself before making the play: If I hit my draw, will I be able to extract a lot from my opponent? If I DON’T hit my draw, will I be able to steal the pot before the showdown?

-Defend the big and always fold: Many players are always defending the BB and folding to a C-BET, and this can cost them dearly in the long run. Before defending the BB you should have a plan for your hand, and the plan cannot be to just continue if you hit something and fold if you don't. You need to know who you are playing against, knowing how you can exploit certain opponents will make you gain a lot of chips.

-Do not 3-bet light: If you're just calling or folding weak or semi-value hands, you're leaking a lot. By 3-betting average hands, you can actually help your hand develop, such as AJo and ATo. When you 3-bet, you're stealing the aggressiveness of the hand for yourself, and you'll be able to decide what to do post-flop better than if you just called. Find out which players at the table raise a lot pre-flop and/or fold a lot to 3-bets, and 3-bet them.

-Raise preflop with low pairs: Depending on our stack (and the overall stack at the table), we can open-raise with any pair. When we are deep stacked, this play is very profitable, because when we find a set on the flop we can win a lot of chips. However, when our stack is medium (less than 30BBs), opening a raise with small pairs in EP and MP is a serious mistake. First, because when we hit our set, we won't extract enough for the play to become +EV. Second, small pairs are hands that don't develop well post-flop, and we'll hardly hit a board where we can make 2 or 3 shots. And third, we don't have blockers who can prevent a resteal.

-Slowplay: Hitting a set on the flop and checking the flop and turn, hitting a straight and not C-betting. Every day I see players hitting a monster on the flop and slowplaying non-stop. What happens is that these players hit excellent hands to capitalize, but end up extracting as little as possible. Of course, there are situations in which slow play will be very good, but study the hand in question and see how you can extract the most chips, don't keep slow playing every time you hit a monster. Remember: Strong hand = big pot, weak hand = small pot.

This was the last article in the “A Pro’s Journey” collection. Well, I think I managed to convey a little of what I see on a daily basis, and I hope it helps those who are studying to become a better player. Hugs!

Questions, concerns and suggestions?