Poker Reflection: It's Expected That You'll Fall for Bluffs

Most poker players hate the idea of folding and then finding out that their opponents’ bets were bluffs. Not only do you lose the pot, but you also lose the satisfaction of seeing your opponent’s cards. It leaves you with a nagging feeling that “maybe I could have won that hand.” Then you start thinking that your play is weak and that “those braggarts are stealing my pots!”

Or worse, maybe your opponent calls your bluff, and then you really feel like a fool. Not only did you get robbed of the pot, but you were tricked into letting the braggart get the better of you. Now he’s across the table rubbing YOUR money in your face. He laughs as he shuffles his chips, and in that moment, you realize that you’ve been exposed to everyone at the table as a weak player, and they’re all just waiting to make a fool of you and steal your pots.

Enough is enough. Ninety percent of this is just in your head. The braggart may be bragging about his masterful bluff, but letting that get to you would be giving him exactly what he wants.

What about the rest of the table? Half of them probably had their faces buried in their phones and didn't even notice the action. Plus, they can't see your cards (unless you made the mistake of dealing them). face up fold – don’t do that!), so they have no idea if you gave a fold bad or not. It's unlikely that they'll think this or that about you, and it's even less likely that they'll play differently against you just because of that hand.

Understand – falling for bluffs is normal

There are dozens of metaphors we use when we are bluffed, but the truth is that this is expected to happen. Somewhere out there there is a Poker player who has never given fold faced with a bluff, and he is probably among the biggest losers in the game. If you never give fold when bluffed, You will end up paying a lot of value bets in situations that will make you lose more money than if you had swallowed your pride and given up on the hand.

The truth is that most of your opponents don't bluff as much as you think they do, and most players – probably including you – call more bluffs than they should. There may be some situations where you do fold more often than you should, but in general calling big bets is probably the leak of your game that needs more attention.

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There is something else you should notice, although it is difficult to understand at first glance. Just because players call your bluffs doesn't mean your fold it was a mistake!

When you make the decision to call a big bet you need to think about all the hands your opponent would bet with. Unless you catch a tell or something like that, you can't know for sure what hand he has this time. What you can do is take into account the action that has already occurred in the hand so far and what you know about the opposing player. Putting this information together, do your best and put together a range of hands, a rough list of all the possibilities that would make him bet.

Of course, this is easier said than done. It can take years to master this data-based analysis. range (Yet another reason to start as early as possible!). The point is that you're not just playing against the two cards your opponent is holding at the moment, you're playing against all the cards he could have been holding when he made the bet. So seeing the two cards after the fact doesn't necessarily tell you anything about your decision.

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If you really understand this idea, you won't be affected when the braggarts show bluffs. What he's really showing is, "I could have been bluffing in this hand, and this time I actually was."

Worrying too much about it is as silly as thinking you made a mistake by going all-in with the second nuts against the nuts. You probably made the right decision, you just happened to come across the specific hand in your opponent's range that made him win that pot. This is often what happens when you give fold and the opponent shows the bluff.

Translated and adapted from: Thinking poker: You're supposed to get bluffed