Poker mistakes we used to make - backdoors
The solvers have taught us that 'double backdoor' hands are profitable to play with aggression, says Dara O'Kearney.
I have been discussing some of the wisdom we all thought was rock solid in the early days of online poker that has been disproven in the era of solver technology. Previously I have spoken about how we overvalued set mining and worried too much about domination.
Today I want to discuss something we did not take seriously enough, and that is how valuable 'backdoor' hands are.
Things elite poker players used to believe (pre solvers)
1. Worried far more about domination than they should have
2. Overrated set mining
3. Blockers weren’t a thing in NLH (only PLO)
4. Backdoors didn’t matter much
5. Limping always terrible (especially from small blind) pic.twitter.com/KqYh8pBtva— Dara O'Kearney (@daraokearney) September 28, 2022
Double backdoor power
A backdoor draw is one where you need two consecutive cards on the turn and river to make a very strong hand like a straight or flush. For example the flop is 287 and you have JQ, needing running hearts or running 9/T to make a big hand.
It was considered very fishy to overplay backdoor hands, because you needed a tremendous amount of luck to make your hand.
However, in recent years the solvers have shown that 'double backdoor' hands (where you need running cards to make a straight and/or a flush) can be profitable if you play them aggressively.
Let's say, for example, the flop is 744. It is Big Blind vs Button with 40 big blinds effective in a single raised pot. The typical hand that the Big Blind might check/raise for value would be all the 4x hands like K4s and 54s. This is the full range below:
To be balanced they also need some check/raise bluffs. In this spot, the solver often plays hands like JTs, J9s, T9s, T8s, T6s, 98s and 95s aggressively when they are of the same suit as one of the three flop cards.
Easy to play and well disguised
These are all hands that look like they have no equity on this flop, but all of them can hit runner runner to make a straight, and runner to make a flush. A hand like 95can also hit a gin card like a 6 on the turn, meaning they can hit a flush or a straight on the river with any 3, 8 or club.
With a hand like 95 you have a reasonably profitable bluff on the flop. If you hit a big drawing card on the turn you have a very profitable bluff on the next street. If you get called twice you potentially hit a very well disguised monster hand to value bet on the river. They are also easy to throw away when you completely miss the next street.
When you understand this, it makes every street easy to play.
Finally, when you take this solver strategy to real life games, your opponents will struggle to put you on the big hands you sometimes make by the river. They are unlikely to put you on a hand like 95 as a check/raise, for example, and will more often pay you off when you hit. An added bonus is they will remember the times you got there with the double backdoors and assume you are a maniac.
Dara O'Kearney's latest book Endgame Poker Strategy is out now.
