Any of them could wake up with a strong hand and cold four-bet. They think he is representing a strong range and flat-call because they do not want to face a four-bet.Īnother concern preventing players from three-betting from early position is the large number of players left to act. They project the opening ranges they learned from charts onto their opponent. A typical player next to act in these games may get squeamish and just flat-call with hands as strong as Q-Q and A-K. This is almost three times the amount he should be able to open profitably. I mentioned that my coach opens over 40% of hands from UTG in soft games. Here are four of the most common spots where players do not three-bet enough in small stakes tournaments. Even those of us who have decent three-betting ranges overall don't do it enough in certain spots. As crazy as that sounds, it works for him because the players simply do not three-bet often enough. In fact, my coach opens over 40% of hands from under the gun when deep in super soft games. This is something I observe every time I play live tournaments with players who I know to be good, but who make clear 'mistakes' with their early position opening ranges. The better players in these games have developed a loose-aggressive style designed to take advantage of this passivity.

This is because a less than optimal amount of three-betting allows for a more than optimal amount of open-raising. If you stick to standard opening poker ranges charts in these games, you can do well, but you will be leaving some money on the table. This results in much less three-betting than is optimal. The number one hallmark of these games is that they generally play too passively. I primarily play in soft small stakes tournaments both live and online.

Poker 3-bet chart