Originally posted by YohanN7
Thats a rule of thumb too. Just ignore protection. I don't have a very big problem with that conclusion, but others might. At least you will see and hear the term "protection" used in murky or blatantly incorrect contexts.
But why exactly is it pointless to try to achieve even a definition of the term? You seem to include fold equity only, and others include the value of incorrect calls.
Should we use the term "protection" when we raise knowing that one player in the will call with a 3-outer or should we not? I'm not asking wether to raise, but wether we should call that hypothetical raise "protection".
You say, in effect, that really taking protection into account is very marginal and way too difficult to attempt even in an analysis. Now I'll be a little bit mean and unfair here and quote you out of context. You have labelled it a huge gain if we can "make" one player fold a six-outer on the flop by being tricky preflop. [The question in that context was capping pre-flop in BB with TT vs 2.].
I'am asking equally much for rules of thumb when NOT to apply the protection reasoning (whatever that might include). Example: Flopped low end of a low straight vs 4 players. There is a 3-flush on the board. Do we go bonkers on the flop and value cap? Or do we take it cool on the flop to be able to set up "protection bets" vs low flush draws on the turn if it looks good? Just in the same way some would not cap monsters preflop mostly to be able to generate folding equity on the flop.
I don't think such questions are not worth asking.
/Johan =
And the quote you quoted was wrong, as it turned out later in the thread.

However, you have to see that on this occasion, that was a flop question, where we could have huge reverse implied odds. But yeah, after the discussion in that topic, it turned out I was overvaluing the protection aspect for sure.
Also, the meaning of the term protection was clearly told in the blogpost that 'didn't answer your question fully'.
Protection means that you can make your opponent fold a certain amount of equity.. Make someone fold
And also if you could see the whole point of the post, it was about people misusing it very often, especially in LHE, given that it's kind of a fancy NLHE-term that is used (correctly) a lot there. So to answer your question: making a hand with equity fold is protection, making a 3-outer call you is value. (Given the definition of a valuebet: worse hands call you. - a 3 outer is a worse hand, and it is calling.)
In your example IF you believe a low FD might fold to 2 bets on the flop, or to a turn bet, protection plays a role there for sure, and not even a small one - but obviously you cherry-picked the best example for that. But even if half of his range is low FDs, they have 18% equity (and some IO for sure) you make him fold 9% equity, that is still not a whole lot
Maybe I'm a bit overreacting this whole protection stuff, maybe I'm just angry, because in my early carrier I got this "protection" shit a lot without seeing the actual purpose of it (that turned out to be irrelevant bullshit covering up that they don't get certain concepts, just like a lot of other fancy terms being used), and therefore I just hate protection from the guts, that's absolutely possible.
So in conclusion what I definitely can say is that protection is an over and misused term and concept, that usually just covers up something that an individual can't or doesn't want to solve or understand. You'll hear that term misused more than 80% of the times.
For the actual math I've never used more than the formula I mentioned before, we make him fold x of the time, y percent equity from a z BB pot: x*y*z. (And also you can estimate the IO/RIO you make him fold, but more in depth would be a waste of time IMO, but I'd be happy if you prove me wrong, like in the last thread. Honestly, I learnt an awful lot from that.)