How to play out of the Small Blind - Small Blind vs Big Blind Ranges

Fedor Holz hosts monthly training sessions for Pokercode Members, diving into some exciting and important topics!

Recently we shared a snippet of one of these sessions on Youtube where Fedor talks about a specific 25BB Blind vs Blindspot where he is playing out of position from the Small Blind.

There are some critical takeaways for when we find ourselves in this spot. There is also a great learning opportunity to understand blind vs blind ranges in general.

Small Blind Range 25BB BvB

The below outlines the outputs from Odin for BvB ranges. At a glance, it is easy to see limping is the most common decision here. Being acquainted with our opening ranges is key, and this graphic highlights the importance of knowing ranges and why this is also a perfect spot to study.

Logic 1 - Play "Defence"

So when we limp in the small blind and big blind checks, we need to play defensively out of position. The equity distribution is roughly 50/50 based on our preflop range when we see a flop in this scenario. We rarely have a nut advantage, and when we do, it is marginal.

This means we will check 50% or more on basically all boards, Fedor estimated that we likely have around a 78% check frequency in this specific spot.

There are a few key takeaways on actions taken on certain types of boards:

• Low Card, Connected, and Monotone boards will tend to have a higher check frequency.
• High Card boards, specifically those more disconnected, will tend to have a lower check frequency.
• Paired Boards 99x and up should be bet more often.
• Paired Boards 88x and below should be checked more often, except when there is an A as the third card, which shifts back to being bet more often.

Fedor gives a great example of how slight changes in the board texture change the bet/check frequency.

• KJ4 is bet at a close to 50% frequency
• KJ7, this bet frequency shifts to somewhere around the 30% mark
• KJ9 should rarely be bet

This highlights that there are times when the connectedness of the board is a stronger driver of decision making than the fact it is a High Card Board.

Logic 2 - Identify Betting Drivers

Fedor has categorised betting into three buckets, small bet, big bet and over bet. Whilst outlining that a two bet size approach could be taken, Fedor highlights some nuances that make a three-bet size approach more Logical.

3 Betting Buckets:

33% - This sizing is excellent on boards with high cards but low connectivity, so boards like AK5 rainbow or AJ6. We do this because

• We have a slight range advantage
• We are protected in the Higher Equity Spectrum, meaning we will face fewer raises from the BB.
• There are fewer equity shifts over time
• There's an incentive for air to fold out air so that we can force folds for the air part of our opponent's range.

We would look to bet at a frequency of 20-45% of the time for the boards in this category.

66% Merged Big Bets - This sizing is primarily for A-high boards, like A74 or A93. We do this because:

• We have an equity advantage in the higher EQ spectrum
• We hold onto this advantage most of the time, as there will be almost no significant EQ shifts.

We would look to bet 10-15% of the time for the boards that fall into this category.

150% Polarised Big Bets - This is the sizing we would go to on many medium (J-8) boards like 964. We do this because:

• We have part of our range that wants to draw to all-in quickly
• No nut disadvantage, sometimes nut advantage
• There are high EQ shifts possible

We want to be checking in these spots most of the time, but when we want to bet, around 10% of the time, we are betting big!

One key point on this spot is that we don't want to be utilising over bets on High Card + FD boards or boards with 2 High Cards.

Head over to Youtube

We've only touched on the key points Fedor highlights in the below video in this article. To dive deeper and better get to grips, we'd advise checking out the video below and clicking this link or the banner at the bottom of the page to signup for a Free Pokercode Account!

This will give you access to some of Fedor and Steffens's best training videos and our free public coaching sessions with Fedor and our other coaches!