You play too many hands

Consider this an intervention. You play too many hands. You must control yourself.

Of course I've never seen you play No-Limit Hold'em. I've never sat behind you and watched you play while limping into pots with :Qd :Jh or :9s :6s . I've never witnessed you cold call with a simple :8h :8d .

However, I've seen a lot of people play No-Limit Hold'em at stakes of $1/$2, $2/$5, and $5/$10, and almost 100% of them play too many hands. Big players, good players, regulars, amateurs, tight players, and tourists. One and all: these players play too many hands.

I'll give the big players a break, since they have reasons to play too many hands. But to everyone else, I repeat, you play too many hands! You need to cut back.

More hands preflop means more folds postflop

The excuse I hear most for playing a lot of hands is: “Oh, I play her because I know how to run away if I miss the flop.”

Most people seem to think that the main problem with playing very weak hands is that you might only have the second-best hand and lose all your chips. As long as you avoid that situation, they think, calling to see the flop with hands like :Jc :8c or :8c :7s can be advantageous. But they are wrong.

There is a gigantic problem with this line of thinking, and it comes in two parts.

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First, I can’t see where the profit is. The whole idea is, “I know how to lose just a little bit on this hand, instead of losing a lot.” Folding doesn’t make money – it makes you lose. You won’t fold until you get rich.

There is an implicit assumption. When you hit a strong flop, you will win so much money that you will win back what you lost and more.

In today's games, I think that assumption is generally wrong. It's not easy to get called these days. Most of your opponents are just trying to make a good hand and take everything from the guy who can't fold. If you have a really good hand against this type of player (the good ones), you can't expect to take their entire stack with a flush. They just won't call.

If this assumption is a key part of your poker mindset, you need to get rid of it immediately. You can't just assume that all of these folds are correct because your big pot is coming, it isn't. Chances are you're throwing money away.

Second, all the extra hands you play make it harder to play on the turn and river. Do you often have trouble playing on the later streets? Do you feel like you’re often stuck with a hand that isn’t good enough? Do you feel like you won’t have a response if your opponent decides to throw a big bet at you?

There is no way to eliminate these problems completely. However, if you play too many hands preflop, you are guaranteeing problems on the turn and river.

Here's why: on the final streets, your hand falls into one of these four categories.

1. The nuts or a high value hand that you are happy to bet with;
2. A good hand for bluffing;
3. A hand with showdown value but that you would throw away if your opponent bet big;
4. Total garbage.

The size of the first category is relatively fixed. On any given board, there are only a few hands that are really strong and worth betting with. As you add more hands preflop, this category grows, but only slightly. For example, let's say the board is :Kh :9h :4d :Th :4s . If you were very loose preflop, you could have played :9c :4c , which is obviously a very strong hand on that board, worth betting with.

However, even if you play conservatively, you will still have strong hands. Hands like AX, both hearts, pocket kings, pocket tens, pocket nines, pocket aces, AK, :Qh :Jh and even :5h :4h .

So for any given board, as you open up your preflop range more, the number of hands in that category increases, but not by much.

Category two, good bluffing hands, is directly dependent on the number of hands in category one. You can only bluff with a certain number of hands. You need to have a “threat” to make the bluff real. You can only add bluffs as you add value hands. So this category doesn’t grow as fast either.

When you add hands preflop, you're really just increasing the size of categories three and four. You're mostly adding marginal, trash hands that are worthless. These are the hands you don't want to be stuck with on the river. And yet, as you add more hands preflop, you're dooming yourself to showing a lot of bad hands on the river.

Most people just fold these bad hands on the flop and turn. The problem with this is that, again, folding a hand on the flop or turn is not free. Every time you see a turn and fold the hand, you are losing some money.

And what do I mean by all this? That when you play too many hands before the flop you will be causing losses for yourself post-flop. It's not worth it.

Which hands not to play

I'm going to focus on the first five seats of a nine-handed table. That is, everyone except the cutoff, the button, and the blinds. If you have any doubt whatsoever about your hand and you're in these first five seats, you should fold. Got dealt :9h :7h ? Fold. Got dealt :Ac :10s ? Fold. Got dealt :4h :4s ? Fold. :Kh :8h ? Fold. :Kd :Js ? Throw it away!

Give up, give up, and give up. In these five places, you give up.

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In a normal live game with blinds $5/$10, when I'm UTG, the worst hands I play are 77, T9s, and AQo. Four seats ahead, from MP, I increase my range to 44, 54s, T8s, K9s, and KQo.

I open all these hands with raises and I also raise against limpers.

These two ranges make me generally the tightest player preflop at the tables I play. So when I fold so many hands preflop, I don't have to fold as much after the flop. I have the opportunity to value bet and bluff a higher percentage of my range. This makes it hard to play pots with me, because when I do play a hand, I rarely fold easily.

Since I know I'll be playing against players who will have a lot of bad hands on the river, I like to wait for good opportunities. I'll call lightly on the flop and turn, knowing that my opponents will be forced to fold. Their overly wide preflop ranges doom them when it matters most.

I recommend trying these ranges the next time you play. It may seem boring at first, with so many folds, but you'll get used to it. Plus, it makes post-flop a lot more fun, since you'll be able to put pressure on your opponent much more often and successfully.

Author: Ed Miller

Translated and adapted from the original: Poker Strategy With Ed Miller: You Play Too Many Hands