SB blinds steal

[johnny_fish]

Hypothetical situation. You're in SB and it gets folded to you. What conditions do you need to push any 2? (M's, read on BB, ITM/bubble, etc.)

[Sprayed]

For a push it's deffinately a small M. With a big to huge stack I'm going with a read and bubble and throwing a 2.5 to 3x raise/no push.

[drmcboy]

off top of my head, M<5. I want BB to be standard or tighter, no calling pushes with A7 or55. I don't want to have been caught pushing a weak hand before. I don't want to have pushed more than once per orbit (unless I have shown down reasonable hands). Bubble is certainly better than not bubble but not that much of a factor. I want my stack to be at least 1/3 of his, 1/2 + much better.

[chardrian]

To push - I need a small M.

In other situations... Being super weak on the SB early gives you a very goot image as a weak player and sets up a nice over the top re-raise steal for later when blinds are bigger and the CO or Button makes an obvious steal.

[CDN Panther]

In small blind, folded to me, I will raise 3x bb everytime if I have a mid-large stack M>9. This way, I will take the pot down a lot of the time without a fight. The real advantage is, you do this 3-4 times in a row they will make a stand against you. When they do, hopefully you have a big hand and when they re-raise you, you push. They will call more often then not, and you can win a very large pot. If you hand is weak, you can fold right there. They key is not to let up just cause they fight back, but keep attacking them. You will wear them down into a situation where you have them dominated.

[chardrian]

Counterpoint:

The real disadvantage to this is that usually you will just have to fold your raise because you are once again raising with crap and the BB has now effectively taken back more than what was taken from him when you stole the smaller blinds.

Even worse, often times the SB will call the reraise "because of pot odds" and get destacked when their 8T os hits the T high flop but your opp has QQ.

Save your blind steals for later when they are more valuable.

Even as the bully chip leader, I'll fold my SB to a mediocre stack.

[CDN Panther]

Good counterpoint. The reason I do it, is that although it may turn out to be a loosing situation in terms of blind steals, I feel it is offset by the chance to get his entire stack.

I think of it in terms of this:

100 hands played with 3xbb raise in sb with no callers

30% of the time I will take the hand down without a fight.
30% of the time I will get a call and take it down with a continuation bet on the flop (first to act)
15% of the time I will get a call on my continuation bet, and can dump it if I'm holding nothing, or play back at him if I hit something like 2 pair or trips. (60% of the time he'll win, 40% of the time I'll win)
15% of the time he will re-raise my continuation bet, and might push. (10% of the time I will have a premium hand, 20% of the time I will have a debateable hand 44 or 55 for example, and 70% of the time, I just fold and get away from it)

If you add up all the percentages times the value of the bet, long term I find this to be very profitable. My percentages are based only on my perception, but I feel they are if anything light in the opponent fold pre-flop %, I find it to be closer to 40-50%.

The added bonus too, is that no one will be able to put you on a hand. I love nothing more then have JJ-AA in SB and putting out a bet that looks like a steal, getting a raise, and pushing all-in. In the tourney I was in yesterday for example, I was stealing from the 2nd leader in chips. I had 700,000 and they had 450,000 chips. I was being aggressive and kept pushing him around at the final table. He finaly made a stand, but I had QQ and took him for all his money against his KJs.

I like to play aggresive this way, but then again there is no one right way. It's a matter of preference.

[drmcboy]

you left out % of time he pushes over pre flop.

[CDN Panther]

Your absolutely right, I did. It should have been the last one. It should be 15% fo the time he will re-raise/push my raise pre-flop. Not my continuation bet. Sorry about that. If he pushese your continuation bet, you are playing post flop (not really the topic here), and then it's a judgement call. Did you hit the flop, how many outs to you have, what cards do you have villain on.