Blind Defence: Three-betting

Poker Strategy / Matthew Pitt / 26 July 2011 / Leave a Comment

Almost every poker player worth his or her salt knows that stealing their opponent's blinds and antes can be very profitable strategy, but one area where a lot of players struggle is when they are having to defend their blinds from being attacked.

As much as blind stealing is a profitable business, so is blind defence. In fact a quick check of my last 12,000 hands in my Holdem Manager database show my winrate from defending my own blinds is around a third higher than when I am helping myself to the blinds of my opponents and it would be even higher had I not lost some real cooler hands after defending my small or big blind.

Often the best forms of defence is to attack the stealer and come over the top with a three-bet, though you need to ensure you have plenty of information on the stealer before you consider taking them on. The main reason for this is that if your three-bet is called you are going to be forced to play a bloated pot out of position, which is a far from ideal scenario.

The first piece of information I look at, on my Heads Up Display, is how often villain has been stealing from the cutoff and the button, which may seem obvious but you will be surprised at how many people treat any raise from late position as a steal, remember that people do get legitimate hands in these seats too. If it is on the high side, say 30% or greater, I see them as a prime player to re-steal from with a three-bet. Next I look at their VP$IP and PFR (Voluntarily Put Money Into the Pot and Preflop Raise) to see if they are generally tight or loose and from here you get a good foundation to base your decisions on. Obviously, you would prefer a habitual raiser to be loose-aggressive as they are more likely to be raising a wide range of hands compared to the tight player but this is only half of the story.

As mentioned two paragraphs up, if your three-bet is called you are not in a great spot, that is unless you have a premium hand yourself, so the next statistic to look at is how often villain folds to three-bets. If it is very high, coupled with a high steal percentage, then three-bet them until your heart's content and expect to take the pot down preflop but if it is low to average then you need to start to tighten up your three-betting range otherwise you are going to find yourself in plenty of tricky spots. That said, many players will attempt to steal then call a three-bet only to completely give up when they face a continuation bet, so keep a close eye on this statistic also because it will help you to plan ahead if you are called.

For what hands to three-bet, it is completely down to how comfortable you feel playing out of position and the opponent you are going to three-bet. If they fold most of the time they are three-bet from the blinds then your cards simply do not matter because they will rarely be needed. Three-betting premium hands is a no-brainer but as a general rule I personally like to use suited connectors and suited one-gap connectors for three-betting the typical villain, mainly because they can flop so well and you are often left with an easy decision post flop.

As with most situations in poker it is important to keep your opponents guessing to your holding. If you only three-bet aces and kings then you will become easy to read, your opponents need to know that a three-bet from you could indeed mean aces or kings but you could also have 7s5s. Build a profile of the players around you and adjust your range based on that player. Happy re-stealing!

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