It’s a situation you’ll often see in the early stages of a tournament and in some cash games: one player limps, then another, then another and before you know it everyone is getting great odds to call. When the action comes to your door you have three options: fold, limp as well, or raise. But which is the best option? Limping in is always a viable option, especially when the stacks are deep, because the implied odds in an unraised multi-way pot are usually excellent. Alternatively, another common play is to ‘punish the limpers’ by putting in a big raise and taking control of the pot. When deciding which option to take you should consider the following key factors…
1. Who is limping?
This is the most important factor because every player limps in for a different reason. Having an understanding of a particular player’s motive for limping will help you make the correct decision. If the players that have limped are the types of players who are looking to see a cheap flop, then it’s often a good assumption that their hands will not be able to withstand much heat. Therefore raising is an excellent option. However, let’s say the table has been ultra-aggressive with a lot of pre-flop raising, but this time two people, who you know to be smart and savvy players, have limped in. What are the chances that they did this with a big hand in the hope of getting someone to raise over the top of them? In this case, limping (or folding for that matter) is a better option because you can potentially win a big pot if you hit the flop. Know who is in the hand before deciding which option to pursue.
2. What are the blinds?
The earlier in the tournament, the less likely it is that a raise will force all the limpers to fold. The reason is that a call is usually a smaller percentage of their stack. Later in the tournament, the opposite is true. You can still raise to isolate the play when deep-stacked, just don’t expect everyone to fold.
3. What are the stack sizes of the involved parties?
If a player has limped in with only 5-6 big blinds left, there is a good chance they will not fold to any raise. The best time to ‘punish the limpers’ is when you can make a raise that is large enough to put a serious dent in the limpers’ stacks but at the same time small enough that it will not cripple you if you are called.
4. What’s your position?
A lot of players like to punish limpers from the blinds, but there is an inherent problem with this. What do you do if you are called? At least if you are punishing from the cutoff or button and get called pre-flop, you will have the advantage of position after the flop. This is not to be underestimated.
Get your bet sizing right
A common mistake that players make in these instances is to raise too little or too much. There is no need to move all-in for 50 big blinds, while at the other end of the scale a raise of three big blinds will seldom get the job done. A good starting point is to take your standard raise and add one big blind for every limper in the pot. For example, if your standard raise is three times the big blind and there are three limpers, you would want to make your raise six times the big blind. And make sure you play your big hands the same way for the sake of balance.
Proceeding on the flop when called
When you decide to raise a group of limpers preflop, more often than not you are hoping to take the pot down there and then. As with most things in poker, however, no play is guaranteed to work 100% of the time, and you will often find yourself facing a postflop decision. The default tactic that nearly every poker player has been told time and time again is to fire out a continuation bet. However, blindly betting just because you were the preflop aggressor is a huge mistake.
First and foremost you need to know what the tendencies of your opponents are. What kind of hands do they limp in and then call a large reraise with? Did the board help this range of hands? If it did, you might want to err on the side of caution and check and see what they do on the turn. If they check again, you could fire a delayed continuation bet, a play that has a higher probability of success because your opponent has shown weakness by checking twice. If you don’t think the flop helped their range of hands then a continuation bet is likely the correct play.
Pot sizing
Another important factor is the size of the pot. Too often, players will end up over-committing themselves in bad spots because they feel they have to follow through on their bluff. For example, let’s say there are four limpers and you decide to make it eight big blinds to go with 7d-9d. You get two callers. The flop comes Qc-8d-5h, giving you a gutshot and backdoor flush draw. The two callers check to you. There are approximately 25 big blinds in the pot. A standard continuation bet is going to be around 12-20 big blinds. If you’re playing in a typical tournament, this could be 25% or more of your stack. Is this really a place you want to be risking a large chunk of your stack?
On the other hand, just because you were called doesn’t mean you should automatically be scared of firing out a bet. Your opponents are the ones who have shown fear and you should take advantage of that most of the time. If there is a high probability that your opponent will fold if you bet, despite the fact that they might have the best hand, then you should do just that.
Detecting limp-trappers
Poker players love it when they can be tricky and outplay their opponents. One of the most common tricky plays in poker is to limp in with a big hand in the hopes of inducing a raise from a later position player. It doesn’t even have to be a player who was the first limper – it can be the second or third limper. What these players are doing is trying to induce someone to ‘punish the limpers’ and then take advantage of the big raise that is frequently made in these cases.
Just because a player has limp-reraised though, it doesn’t necessarily mean they have a hand like Aces or Kings (although they frequently do). They could merely be making a play back at you, believing you are trying to push out weak hands with your raise. This is why it is important to punish the limpers with good hands as well as bad hands. By good hands, I mean hands that you’re willing to risk a significant portion of your stack with like Queens, Kings, Aces and A-K. You need to be able to show that when you are raising in these situations you ‘usually’ have a hand. That being said, however, it is often best to raise limpers with marginal hands like 9-8 suited or small pairs. The reason is simple. If you are reraised, your hand plays easily as you can fold it.
Hot or hoax?
How do you figure out which players are limp-reraising with monsters then? One good indication is if limp-reraising is something that’s out of character for that player. For example, if a player has always raised first to act and comes in limping in early position and then eagerly puts in a reraise after you have popped it up, you’ve probably run into a limp-trapper. However, if you’ve seen a player limp-reraise on four different occasions, chances are he is simply using this play to represent strength that he doesn’t necessarily have.
Pay attention to what the players at your table are doing when they limp in. Do they only limp in with speculative hands or have they shown that they will do it with big hands too? If a player has shown the ability to do it with big hands, then you always need to account for the possibility that they are limp-trapping.