In today’s exercise we are going to pull out Flopzilla and start exploring ranges in 3bet pots. This is primer work that is extremely helpful when trying to wrap our heads around how ranges in 3bet pots specifically hit various textures. For this lesson you’ll need the following:
- Flopzilla
- Pen/Paper or Spreadsheet
- 1 hour to focus on this exercise
The situation we are going to analyze is this:
$100NL with $100 effective stacks
MP opens to $3, we 3bet next to act to $10, it folds to MP who calls.
Flop ($21.5): XYZ (with $90 behind)
MP checks to you.
What we are going to do is simple. We are going to start by drawing up a couple different ranges that we think our opponent called our 3bet with. Take a moment and write down 3 different ranges that you think players tend to call your 3bet with OOP.
After you’ve done that, it’s time to run our first range in Flopzilla. Open up the software, and plug in Range 1 into the left. For the time being we are going to ignore our cards, so leave the dead cards empty on the right. And in the middle section, put a checkmark next to decent pairs, big draws, and other realistic hands that you think will never fold if you bet the flop.
Now it’s time to go to work. First, let’s analyze a flop of 8♠ 6♠ 2♥. Plug that into the middle section and see how often his range will have a pair/draw on this board:
Write this down. He hits about 1/3 of the time and misses about 2/3 (you can write down the exact percentages if you’d like…I just prefer to round when I’m doing estimated analysis). Now the question you must ask yourself is “If I bet for $14, will he fold when he ‘misses’ with hands like AJ, KQ, etc.?” So essentially you are looking to find easy areas of exploitation. Ones where your opponent is simply folding too often. If he’s really folding every time he doesn’t catch a pair/draw+, then he’s folding almost 2/3 of the time and even a bet of $21 is outright profitable.
Just because someone doesn’t fold often enough to the first bet does NOT mean that we want to check. Consider the effects of betting multiple streets!
Since this is primer work, and we aren’t going to go waaaaaaay down the rabbit hole, we’ll stop here with Range 1 + Flop 1. But before we jump to Flop 2, plug in the other 2 ranges on the left and see how they hit on this 862 flop. Again, write down all of your findings so you can review them later (and also, writing helps our brains remember things).
Congrats! You just explored how 3 different ranges hit on the same flop. You now have a good idea on how often common ranges hit/miss on a common texture. Great job!
Now that you know what we are doing, we’re going to continue this for different flop textures. Remember, plug in the board, then explore how each range you picked hits that board. The textures I want you to explore are:
T♣ 5♥ 5♦
A♣ T♦ 6♦
K♠ 9♠ 7♥
9♦ 8♦ 5♠
K♣ Q♠ 8♥
J♣ T♦ 7♦
Q♥ 7♣ 2♠
Doing this work may seem tedious since you are exploring 3 ranges on 8 different flops giving you 24 different answers. But this is work that VERY few players ever even consider doing, yet alone actually sinking the time into it. Your goal is to start seeing how common ranges hit common flops, so that you can gauge in real time if this is a texture that villain is likely hitting a ton (or missing a ton). This can help you decide if a CB is worthwhile and give you great confidence when comes to double/triple barreling. But we’ll handle those in another lesson.
Once you’ve completed this work, give yourself a high-five and grab a beverage of choice. You deserve it!
