When to bluff multiway
Barry Carter gets schooled by Dara O'Kearney and David Lappin on when to bluff each street in three way pots.
This is a deep dive into a hand from a new video from our friends at the Unibet sponsored Chip Race Podcast, Dara O'Kearney and David Lappin. They coach our editor BarryCarter on multi-way pots. You can see the whole video below.
We are in the money five handed and UTG limps, the Button calls, Small Blind folds and I check back 3 9. The flop is 5 2 6 and checks around, the turn is T giving me a flush draw and a gutshot - my big question here is this a spot to bluff? Was the flop a good spot too with my backdoor equity?
David Lappin: I could almost make a case for a donk lead flop here.
Dara O'Kearney: Donk lead flop is reasonable because we have straights they don't have with 43. I would check in practice but can see a case for donk lead the flop, I would definitely donk lead this turn.
This has been a trouble spot for me multi-way. I often donk lead the flop if this was heads-up because I only have to make one player fold but multi way I expect at least one player to have something they can call with.
Dara O'Kearney: No matter what happens if we bluff the flop we have a lot of turn cards that improve us and if you think about their ranges they have lots of hands that can call one bet but not two bets. People also fold more multi way because they have to worry about the other guy. If you donk heads-up no pair/draw/ace high is never folding, but if you donk three way the guy with A9o has to worry about you and the other guy behind.
I have the opposite read for the stakes I play, I don't see much folding here.
Dara O'Kearney: It cuts both ways, we are back to the fact that a lot of the range that can call one bet can't call a second bet. Even if they call we can hit a four or running spades to win a very big pot by the river. While it's true we run into more hands, both players will fold more hands than they would heads-up.
David Lappin: If we are going to tell the story we have to be willing to go twice. If we are going to construct a range, if we are going to lead out with sets and straights, this seems like the perfect bluff to balance the range because we can hit running straights and flushes. This seems like the category of hand that is perfect.
Dara O'Kearney: When you think about balancing your range you want to balance your range across multiple streets. This can turn into a strong value hand but it also makes a good bluff on every street. If we miss the turn we still have a gutshot and we have nine high so it's a natural bluff that always folds out better. If we get called again and miss the river it's a good bluff again, we still only have nine high and we block straights.
So in the end I did put a small bluff out there, UTG folded and the Button called. The river was 8 which seems like a good bluffing card because I block 79 for the nuts.
David Lappin: If they have a ten they are probably going to get sticky here, if we are going to bluff we probably have to choose an overbet size. We have the backdoor flush draw which tends to be a bad bluff candidate because it is what we want them to have.
Dara O'Kearney: I think we can go small here too, literally just to fold out hands like K Q or we can go big to try and fold out a pair. We are not blocking the high spades either. I think I would bet 2/3rds pot to fold out the high cards.
I wimped out and checked and it turned out he had A 7 - one of the few hands that would have folded.
How do you play this hand? Let us know in the comments:
