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The Blocking Bet

If you’ve read through all of the Pokkercards strategy articles, you realize what an important role position plays in poker strategy. Playing in late position is awesome, while playing in early position, quite frankly, SUCKS! Although having a crappy hand in early position is bad, it gets worse- having a marginal hand in early position. What the heck do you do with one of those?

With a marginal hand in early position, you face a unique challenge. Your hand could very well be good down to the river, but you can never really be sure. After all, gathering information when you’re first to act is tough.  In these situations, you’ve got to somehow strike a balance between extracting maximum potential value from hands that you beat, and protecting your chips against an opponent that might be ahead. Sound hard?

Enter: The blocking bet

A blocking bet is one made by a player in early position, usually on the river. The blocking bet acts as a combination of a value bet, and a defensive bet. Firing one prevents hands that have you beat from making a raise that forces you to call, while simultaneously encouraging a call from a losing hand. Using this type of bet is the best way to deal with marginal situations in early position.

Let’s check out an example of a blocking bet situation.

Imagine you’re playing a game of $1/2 NL Holdem. You’re in middle position holding QdJc, and you raise to $6. An opponent on the button calls, while everyone else folds. The pot is $15 when the flop comes out.

The board is dealt Ah-Qh-9d, giving you middle pair. Since you’re first to act, you fire a bet of $12 into the pot. Your opponent calls, which gives you very little information about his holdings. The pot grows to $39.

The turn comes 5h, putting a potential flush on board. You decide to check, and see how your opponent reacts. He checks as well, potentially showing a bit of weakness.

The river card is Ts- a scare card. It’s entirely possible that your opponent has missed this board entirely. After all, he is on the button- he’s got a wide preflop range. Your table image up to this point has been tight-aggressive, and he’s got to know that you’ve caught at least a bit of this flop. How do you deal with the situation?

It’s a perfect time to fire a blocking bet. By betting around $20 into the pot, you accomplish two things:

1.    You prevent being bluffed out of the pot by a weaker hand. If you were to check in this situation, you would essentially be handing the pot to your opponent. Again, it’s entirely possible that he’s got nothing here, so you don’t want to let him bluff you out of the pot. Your marginal pair could very well be good, and you want to position yourself to extract whatever value you can from your opponent. If you check to him and let him bet, your hand’s value diminishes completely- you don’t even give yourself a chance to take down the pot. You can’t call a bet on this board. Firing a blocking bet on this river maximizes your hand’s potential value, and gives up none.

2.    You size your bet so that you aren’t mathematically obligated to call a raise. If your opponent raises over your blocking bet, you can be pretty darn sure that his hand is stronger than yours. Since a blocking bet is sized to look like a normal value bet, your opponent can’t reasonably discount the possibility that you’re holding a pretty good hand. Therefore, any aggressive action on his part indicates real strength. If you were to bet something like $40 rather than $20 here, a raise from your opponent would effectively force you into calling, given the size of your stacks. A $20 dollar bet however, doesn’t oblige you at all- you can fold in comfort, knowing that you’re surely beat, and that you tried your best to maximize your value.

The blocking bet is an extremely useful tool, and it becomes especially important when you start running into skillful players. Dealing with marginal early position situations is never fun, but against thinking opponents, it can be downright nasty! Knowing how to effectively use the blocking bet helps to reduce the nastiness, and makes your life a little bit easier. Use it wisely!

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