Hi guys,
this time I'm gonna post myself a typical spot which I believe is a pretty good example of a situation where most regulars till 50NL will simply not have enough bluffs, so we can fold all of our bluffcatchers:
Hero raises 3bbs CO with Q♥:J♥:
Regular BB calls (22/18, 6% 3bet)
Flop K♣:9♥:3♦:
BB checks, Hero bets 50-66% pot
Turn J♠:
BB checks, Hero checks
River 5♥:
BB bets 75% pot
This is a typical spot where we have a bluffcatch situation and some of you might consider calling here. That would be a mistake in my opinion.
>90% of regulars 10NL to 50NL (maybe even higher) will simply not find enough bluffs to be doing here. Reason being that BB calling range on the flop is something like Kx, 9x, JT, QT, QJ, maybe AJ, maybe AQ. And that range has very few "air type hands", which means villain will have to be turning weak made hands into bluffs, like A9, Q9s, JT. And this will not happen often enough.
So, when deciding whether to call in river situations here are a few things to keep in mind:
1- Is your hand a bluffcatcher? If it never wins against any hand villain might be value betting, then yes.
2- If it is a bluffcatcher then we have a lot of considerantions to make.
3- If villain is somewhat balanced in his betting range (a little less than 1 bluff combo to 2 value combos for a 75% potsize bet) then our bluffcatchers are close to indifferent and it doesn't really matter too much what we do with them.
4- If we think villain is overbluffing then we should be inclined to call most if not all of our bluffcatchers
5- If we think villain is underbluffing then we should be inclined to fold all of our bluffcatchers
In this particular example it seems clear to me that point number 5 applies very well and we are correct in exploitatively fold all of our bluffcatchers.
If you go through these points everytime a situation like this arises you will be better prepared to make good decisions. Considerations about "blocker effect" is out of the scope of this highlight and they are not essential to understand this simple concepts.
I hope this all made sense to you. Please feel free to give your input and maybe post some examples where we can apply this thought exercise.
