There Are Other Ways to Set Traps Besides Slow Play

When some no-limit hold'em players think of "traps", they immediately think of "slow play". In fact, some will equate the two, mistakenly believing that this is the only way to set a trap for an opponent after the flop.

Setting a trap actually refers to a broader post-flop strategy that can, but doesn't necessarily, involve slow play. You can "trap" and still play the hand "forward" by betting and raising for value.

Setting a trap with Slow Play

We are all familiar with the Slow play, a strategy that can work especially well in certain situations, particularly against aggressive opponents. It's like the opposite of bluffing. Instead of betting with a weak hand, you check or call with a strong hand, giving the impression through your action that you have a weak hand.

Matthew Pitt described a hand that provides an example of someone slow playing a strong hand with the aim of winning as much money as possible.

With eight players left in the €5,300 High Roller, Enzo Del Piero raised with :8h :7h and was paid off by Pierre Neuville who was in the blinds with :Jh :9h . The flop came :9s :9d :Kd and Neuville made trips. Instead of giving a donk bet, he chose to check and allow the player who raised pre-flop to give a continuation bet, and that's what Del Piero did.

Neuville just called the c-bet and checked again after the turn card was too safe for his hand, a :4c, making it virtually certain that his trips of nines remained the best hand. Del Piero checked behind this time and the river brought an Ac.

With other cards on the river Neuville could have chosen that as the time to make a bet. However, he knew that the As was likely to have improved Del Piero's hand to a good hand, but in this case, it would have been the second best hand. If this card hadn't improved his hand, it might have encouraged him to bluff and represent having the As in his hand. Neuville therefore checked again and Del Piero was trapped into going all-in.

Neuville paid up, won the pot and eliminated Del Piero.

PartyPoker is back in Brazil! Find out about the bonus and the advantages of creating your PokerDicas affiliate account.

Setting a trap through a bet

While this was certainly an example of slow play, Neuville's call on the raise with Jh9h illustrates the key principle of "trapping" - playing a speculative hand and then finding a way to extract maximum value when the hand hits the board well.

Such examples of traps can start in various ways. A player may choose to open a hand with :Jh :9h - the "suited one-gapper" with the potential to flop a flush or straight ask. Suited connectors (e.g. :Qd :Jd , :9s :8s and so on) and low pairs also qualify as speculative hands that need to improve post-flop to overcome stronger starting hands.

When such hands improve, the probability of your winning value increases, as your opponents often think first of the strongest starting hands when others raise pre-flop. Especially if you've cultivated some kind of tight image, your raise with :Jh :9h and the flop comes :Th :8d :4h , your opponent won't necessarily realize how well that edge hit your hand (giving you both a straight and a flush call). Or if you raise with :6d :5d and the flop comes :9c :5s :5h - an edge that looks discouraging to a pre-flop raiser holding broadway cards.

Take advantage of your study time and create your 888 Poker account by clicking on this link! You get $88 free* and you can also play our weekly freeroll of $100 every Tuesday! (*$8 cash and $80 bonus).

In such cases, continuation bets are more likely to pay out, as are your turn/river bets with you being able to extract even more value. The "trap" here is achieved not by slow-playing the hand, but by betting and/or raising with it.

A hand like that is beneficial in other ways, as it also affects your image. Did you raise with 65 and, on top of that, bet post-flop? Some opponents won't realize how much those bets were for value, instead remembering what looked like a very loose pre-flop play. In fact, you may be tight, but now you look loose and, what's more, you're setting yourself up well to win action when you raise with a really strong starting hand.

Going ahead and betting after you've hit a set with a small pair is another way of setting a trap for your opponent to pay you off. You have :4d :4c and the flop comes :Qc :9d :4s . In some cases using slow play may be the right alternative, but in others going ahead and betting will be even more deceptive and thus a more effective "trap" to catch an opponent.

However achieved, setting a trap means under-representing the strength of your hand so that you encourage opponents to invest their chips when you have them beat. However, Slow play - that is, checking and calling - isn't the only way to under-represent the hand. Betting can also show weakness, in certain situations, and thus send out a message that you're not as strong as you really are.

Giving continuation bets on "dry" flops that seem unlikely to have hit the hand you raised with pre-flop is an example. Then, too, you can "donk bet" - leading with a bet out of position after calling a pre-flop raise - on a flop with draws that may have hit your hand well. Even a post-flop check-raise, commonly a very aggressive move that signals strength, can sometimes be seen as suggesting weakness, interpreted as a bluff rather than a genuine attempt to build a pot.

Conclusion

Slow play can be an effective way to trap big pots, especially against aggressive players. However, remember that there are other ways to set a trap, too, which includes betting with strong hands in situations where your bets might look more like bluffs than value.

Article translated & adapted from the original: There Are Other Ways to Trap Than by Slow Playing