PokerWorks

There are many different ways to play poker. One concept that has gotten significant attention and is becoming the way many players play is small ball. The success of players like Daniel Negreanu and Gus Hansen, notorious small ball players, has poker players from all over questioning their own playing style and scurrying to books and internet poker learning sites in an attempt to learn how to play this style. Why has this approach been so successful though and is it for every one?

It works because it does two things really well. First, it gives players more opportunity to accumulate chips because they are seeing more flops. A typical small baller will see many more flops than your average tight, aggressive player. The second thing it does is it minimizes losses. While most players are firing out ¾ to pot sized bets and playing large pots, the small baller is making smallish ¼ to ½ pot bets and checking behind. By doing this, their losses are often much less than a typical player. Here's an example:

Our hero, the small baller, has raised to 2.5 times the big blind pre-flop with K-Q suited and gets two callers. Three players see the flop and there is 1500 in the pot. The flop comes Q-10-5. Our hero makes a bet of 500 into the 1,500 pot. It is called and re-raised by another player; deciding to get out of the way, our hero folds, having lost a total of 1,000 in the hand. Now let's look at how this hand would play out with a conventional tight aggressive player (TAG). The TAG opens the action for 3.5 times the big blind pre-flop. The pot is 2,250. They make a bet of 1,500 and fold to the re-raise. Their loss on the hand was a total of 2,250. The small ball player saved 1,250 in chips in comparison to the TAG and the result was the same – both players folded. This is why small ball poker can be a very effective method of playing.

The one problem, however, with small ball poker is that it is an extremely volatile style of poker. It requires the player to see a lot of flops and be faced with a lot of tough decisions. While you might save money in a particular hand in comparison to a TAG, you'll also be playing many more hands than the TAG and risking chips more often. If your post-flop skills are average or sub-par, you should work on those skill sets before moving into small ball poker.

Here are two key tips to playing small ball:

#1 – Pre-flop either limp or raise small. You'll notice players like Hansen and Negreanu limp into hands first to act much more than the average player. If they do raise, it's usually a very small raise like a minimum raise or 2.5 times the big blind raise.

They do it with a wide variety of hands and from all positions. The reason they do this is it lets them see more flops, generates action on their bigger hands, and provides deceptive nature to the types of hands they play. It is not uncommon to see a small ball player limp in early position, face a raise from a later position player, and then put in a re-raise. If you were the player facing the small ball players limp re-raise, what would you put them on? Probably a big hand right? Most often it will be, but this play allows a small baller to make this move with a wide range of hands because they are playing so many hands unpredictably.

The other thing limping or raising small does is encourages action. Poker players often can't resist themselves, if they see three people already in the hand, they are going to join the party. The most important thing, however, that limping or raising small does is it keeps the pot size small and helps them to control it post-flop.

#2 – Play more hands in position. While it might seem that small ball players ignore position because of how often they will play from earlier positions, their bread and butter comes from playing hands in position and taking advantage of weak post-flop play. For a small ball player, it is very profitable to make a bet of 300 into a 1,000 pot when it has been checked to them on the flop. Over 10 hands, the small ball player would only need this bet to be successful 3 times to make a profit. However, a traditional ¾ pot bet would need to be successful 5 times to not lose money. By playing hands in position, you give yourself the opportunity to pick up these easy pots more often because of the information you have available to you.

The last thing that is important for a small ball player is controlling the size of the pot. There are two main ways to control the pot size. The first is one that we've already talked about, making smallish bets. Small bets, both pre-flop and on the flop, are the key to controlling the size of the pot. Just because you are a small ball player does it mean that you always make small bets? Once you get to the turn and river, is when you can start to make larger bets, either because you have the best hand and want to get value for it, or because you are bluffing and want your opponent to fold.
Another excellent way of controlling the pot size is to check. This might seem like passive play, but if you are unsure if your hand is the best but think it has show down value, this can be the best approach to reaching that show down without risking a significant portion of your stack. The additional benefit of utilizing this approach is that it will often get you value for some of your hands as your opponent continues to bluff into you. Here's an example:

Our hero, the TAG, has A-Q and raises pre-flop to three times the blind. He gets two callers and the pot size is 1,800. The flop comes A-9-2 and our hero bets 1,200 and is check raised by a player to 3,000. Our hero calls. The turn is another 9 and our hero checks. The flop check raiser bets 5,000 and is called. The river is a 4 and our hero check calls a 10,000 bet. The check raiser shows A-9 and collects 18,000 post-flop chips from our hero.

The small baller, however, decides to take a different approach. He understands that his A-Q is probably good on the A-9-2 flop but because he has position, he sees that everyone has checked to him. If his hand is the best, it's likely his opponents will fold. He thinks to himself then that there is no harm in checking here because if he does have the best hand, he won't get any value by betting, but by checking he will minimize his losses for the times he is behind and maximize his profits for the time he is ahead. On the turn, a player bets 1,200 into the pot and the small baller decides to just call since the board paired and it's possible his opponent might have a 9. On the river, the same player bets 3,000 and our small baller calls and loses the hand. His loss, however, was only 4,200 as compared to the 18,000 from the TAG. That's a significant difference.