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Stealing and re stealing the blinds

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FOUR ACES
Sunday November, 15th 2009 by fullhouse

Winning many small pots over long periods of time can be just as effective as winning a handful of huge hands over shorter periods of time. It is much more profitable to win 100 $4 pots than it is to win 5 $65 pots. The pots that players tend to remember are the big ones, win or lose, but the pots that really help to define the bottom line are the small ones. Stealing the blinds is one of the easiest ways to accumulate small amounts of chips consistently. The reason that stealing the blinds is so great is largely due to the great risk to reward ratio. You will be successful in stealing the blinds a very large portion of the time, but even if you run into a wall it will be easy to escape with minimal losses. Stealing the blinds becomes infinitely riskier when you begin attempting what are called re steals. For low or mid stakes players it is usually optimal to stick to just stealing the blinds, but more experienced players will find re stealing to be profitable as well.

Stealing the blinds

There are usually only a few spots (in regards to table position), where stealing the blinds is ideal. As a general rule of thumb blinds should not be stolen from early position. The farther away you are from the blinds, the harder it is to take them away. Stealing the blinds is one of the few occasions where your hand will become largely irrelevant. While it would be better if you had a decent hand when stealing the blinds, it certainly is not a requirement. The “stealing” aspect is based on the understanding that you are taking away the pot without a hand. Now that you know the basics of stealing the blinds it is time to learn how to do it.

You should either be in the CO, BTN, SB, or BB when stealing the blinds. There are basic guidelines that make stealing the blinds quite easy. If in the CO you should simply raise to 3x BB, that is to say three times the big blind. If you are the BTN a raise to 2.5x BB would be perfect. 2.5x BB in the SB and BB work as well. You may have noticed that the raise size was trimmed down at the BTN, SB, and BB. When you are this close to the blinds it becomes much easier to push the remaining players out. A 4x BB raise will not be much more effective than a 3x or 2.5x BB raise when your only intention is to steal the blinds. Plus, if they call or re raise you it is important to minimize your losses.

Re stealing the blinds

Re stealing the blinds is exactly as it sounds, once you suspect a player has attempted to steal the blinds you re raise them to try and take the pot down. This play will carry some high variance. It can be hard to tell when a re steal would possibly work, so a re steal is more of a guessing play that will pay off in time. Re stealing relies on a player simply making more winning re steals than losing ones. Obviously every move in poker assumes more wins than losses (otherwise you wouldn’t make it), but re stealing the blinds will create a much smaller winning edge than most plays.