Welcome to a brand new, one hundred percent free episode of the Low Limit
Cash Games Podcast. This is a podcast I created exclusively for you, the
lowest stakes poker player at your local card room or at your home poker games
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help you become a winning player. Let's jump right into it, shall We
welcome into another episode real quick before we be today's content about player reads,
especially as it is in respect to flush draws. I want to quickly let
you know, because I mentioned this in a while, but you can follow
me on social media. We are on Instagram and Facebook, and if you'd
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Just DM me on the platform of your choice, Low Limit Cash Games Podcast,
either on Instagram or on Facebook. I will say this, usually see
the Facebook ones first. I do eventually see the Instagram ones, but Instagram
hides them sometimes, So if that matters to you, we're going to be
talking about player reads. So one of the most asked questions I get from
you guys is you know how do I read players? What am I looking
for when I'm reading players, what how do I label players? How do
I use that? I'm not sure I understand that, and so I think
we may do a series. Now. I'm not going to say every episode
for the next few episodes will be a part of the series, but definitely
it's my goal throughout this year to continue this series intermittently. So we're definitely
going to continue to probably hit this subject a couple more times. But today
I'm going to give you one of the easiest ones to look for, explain
how you can use it in your game to help you improve, and also
explain to you how you need to be playing hands in this type situation as
well. We're going to talk about flush draws today. So one of the
easiest pieces of information you can pick up when you're playing at the poker table
is to term how players at your table play flush straws. Knowing this piece
of information is invaluable when you have strong hands and you're concerned that you may
have got coolered. You're concerned that maybe you need to slow down with your
pocket aises or pocket kings. You have concerns about pot control, maybe you
think you can't get full three streets of value when there are flush draws on
board and really obvious flush straws. So when you're paying attention to players at
the table, it's very important that you watch showdowns. You need to see
how hands are shown down. You need to see pre flop action. You
need to pay attention to flop action, you need to pay attention to turn
action, and you need to pay attention to what happens on the river,
and you need to be constantly banking the stuff, saving it for later.
And one of the most important things you can see is when a hand is
shown down and one of the people in the hand and it may be again,
but you don't have to be in the hand. You can be watching
other people in the hand. When a hand is shown down on the river
and you see that one of the players has hit a flush straw, either
on the turn or on the river, and they wind up winning the hand,
you should have been paying attention to the whole hand, and you need
to go back to the flop and you need to see what happened on the
flop. You need to know if this player who turned or rivered a flush
with a flush draw raised on the flop or not. Now, just because
they did raise on the flop doesn't mean they'll always raise flop because all not
all flops are the same. For instance, a lot of times on ace
high flops you might see people who would normally raise their flush straw not raise
their flush straw because they know their opponent has a sex and range a ton
of the time and they're not going to fold. And if you're never getting
folds, then probably raising with flush draws isn't the best idea. But if
one of the players raised pre flop billing called pre flop and you had say
ten high flop like let's say ten six' three with two diamonds and original
pre flop raiser bets pre flop caller three bets, then it's call turn river
action. You see showdown, and the person who three bet that ten high
flop turned or river tod a flush. That makes a lot of sense because
you can get a lot of ace king to fold, ace queen to fold,
Queen King to fold. They can get a lot of overcards that raise
pre flop to just fold on a ten high board. So when you have
a flush straw, it's really in your interest a lot of times to be
raising here. So it's really important to those kind of boards. And as
with everything, you can't make a definitive judgment about how a player will play
all the time. But for sure, the first time you ever see that
a player raised and won and showed down that a flush draw that hit,
you know that they will raise flush straws. You know they're very capable of
raising flush draws. Now the opposite of that is something that's a little bit
harder determine, because, like I said, not all flops are good raising
candidates when you have a flush draw. So just because you see a player
show down a flush that they hit, they hit a draw on the turner
of the river, but they did not raise the flop, that doesn't necessarily
mean they never raised flush straws. So you need to pay attention to the
flop. Was it a flop that maybe a player could think they could take
down a lot of the time to a pre flop raiser, And if it
was and they didn't raise, maybe that tells you something. But if it
comes like ace King seven with two diamonds and they didn't raise, maybe they
just didn't raise because ace King just hits their opponents so hard. Who raise
pre flop the stupid for him to raise much here, because they just run
into monsters so often. It's may be better to just try to peel one
hand, see what develops, some turns, things of that nature. But
this is one of the easiest things to look for. You don't have to
be a rocket scientist, you don't have to be a poker read scientist to
get these reads on people. You just need to pay attention. That's why
I say the game of poker is going all the time, whether you're in
the hand or not. If you're not actively involved in the game, when
you don't have a hand, then you aren't playing poker. I don't know
what you're doing. You're waiting on hands to play, but you're definitely not
playing the game of poker. Because people who are genuinely playing the game of
poker are playing it all the time, whether they have a hand or whether
they don't. Now, look, sometimes you're talking to the waitress. Sometimes
you're checking an email on your phone. Sometimes you're replying to your wife for
girlfriend's text. I mean that happens sometimes, but other than times like that,
or you know, maybe you're being really friendly and you've wound up involved
in a conversation with the guy next to you. I mean that happens,
and poker's a social game, but most of the time you should always be
playing the game. And playing the game means you are always paying attention to
what's going on in the hand, whether you have a hand or not,
because that is playing the game of poker. So how we use this is,
well, we used our advantage when we have say pocket aces, we've
raised pre and got called you know, I one or more players and the
thought comes, you know, ten high, ten, seven to four,
and we bet, and a player raises us there raise three four x or
something, you know, healthy raise and there's really no straight draw's really no
flush straws. I mean, what are they raising here? So now you
know there's some other things you need to know about this player. Hopefully you've
been paying attention. You know, if they had ace ten here, or
if they had king ten here, would they just raise their top pair when
you're the pregressor and it's a ten higher board and you bet? I mean,
if they are a player that you can do something like that, of
course you can consider boldly. Otherwise you need to strongly consider the possibility that
maybe some sets exist. Now we're not folding our aces, right, but
we may switch to now two streets of value because just because of this player
type, and just because of this board texture, and just because of what
we've seen from this player in the past, their hand is skewed so much
farther to like pick value. Like we could say, let me give you
a better example of flop, like say it's ten nine to five, ten
nine to five, and it's two diamonds, ten nine to five minutes two
diamonds, and you got your pocket aces and you get raised. Now,
if you know from playing with this player for whether it's been four hours tonight
or maybe you played with them eight hours last night and you're four hours in
tonight, so you have twelve hours with this player, you've seen them show
down several flush draws that got there, et cetera, et cetera, and
you've never seen them raise a draw on the flop. You've just never seen
it straight draw, flush draw. Any university don't raised any kind of a
draw on ten nine to five with two diamonds when they raise here, they
have a very strong hand. Now is it two pair? You know they
have ten to nine for two pair. They have pocket tens, they have
pocket nine, they have pocket five's. I mean, most likely, if
your table image is what it should be. As a person who is a
very strong player, you're mostly tagged. Sure you can get out of line
a little bit, you show up some hands sometimes, but you mostly have
a strong range. I mean, they really shouldn't be raising you with like
Queen Tin here, that's just a call, right top pair with Queen ge
that's just a call. You really shouldn't be getting crazy with pocket jacks here.
They're just passive in calling with it pre flopped. They're probably just gonna
be passive in call with on the flop. Sure, maybe sometimes they raise
it, but more than likely they have a really strong hand. And these
are the type players who raise because they're scared of the draws, and that's
the only time they raise. Have a big hand and they're scared of the
draws. They're scared of the straight draw, scared of the diamond draw.
It's important you understand that type of player verse a type of player who will
raise with a draw. So these are two very different player types, and
you need to be looking out for them and paying attention. You will spot
them players who will raise their draws on the flop, be aggressive with them.
You can play very differently and know a lot of things about their hand
versus players who never raise with draws on a flop. So, if you
have pocket aces and it's ten nine to five with two diamonds and you're versusn
aggressive player who will raise their draws, and you bet your aces and three
bat you, I mean, this player just has so many draws in their
range, right. They have straight draws, they have flush draws, they
have straight in flush draws. They just got all kinds of draws on this
board. And so you can just continue this hand on out in a much
different fashion versus that player than you do. When it's a player who never
raises their draws who's now raising you on this exact same flop, you need
to probably shift into a two straight plan versus player, and maybe even a
turn crazy action fold plan sometimes just because they're so skewed towards strong hands.
Now I know somebody's listening to this podcast right now, but well that's crazy.
You got pocket aces and you've got one of these players and they raised
you on the flop and then they bet big on the turn and you just
let your aces go because you just assume they have a set or two pairs
or something. Well, I mean, you know, unless it's a player,
and again it's all about paying attention. Maybe it is a player who
doesn't raise draws and stuff, they will r they will raise pocket jacks on
ten ninety five. You know, then for sure you continue right onto the
river call call. You still can't be in there betting and getting crazy because
you don't know, because they also have tons of sets and two payers and
range along with their pocket jack. But now if it's a player that generally
passive player types are just not gonna go hand with pocket jacks on ten nine
to five, they're just not especially when your pre flop aggressor and then you
bet flop, they're just probably gonna call a lot. Again, it depends
on the player, and this is why we pay attention. So now that
we've seen how you can exploit those two different players types, and you can
exploit them pretty massively and play them both very differently with the exact same hand
on the exact same boy, you would take two very different lines with those
two very different players and understand how important it is that you now address your
play and how you play draws. You do not need to be the player
that never raises with their flush draws or straight draws on the flop. You
just don't need to be that player. You need to be the player who
mixes, a player capable of doing both, so your opponents never know what
you have. So if you look at the other two opponents and you have
the one that will raise flush draws, they would also raise their sets.
I mean, you still't know what they got, and you're just probably gonna
wind up putting way more money in behind a lot of time versus that player.
Then you will verse the player who never raises draws. You're not gonna
put in mountains of money against that player because they are strong when they are
raising you, check, raising you, barreling off. I mean, they're
very strong, and so you're never gonna lose much money to that player as
you are going to lose to the player who both raises their value and their
draws, because you just can't simply shut down as much against them. You
can't go into a much conservative mode as much against them. They're just going
to extract more money from you. You're never going to be able to hero
fold them. You know, you can't do any of these exploits and you
can do massive X ones against the other player type, and so you don't
need to be exploitable. Learn from this and understand, I don't want to
be that guy. I don't want to be that guy that's massively exploitable because
I never raised draws. So I don't want to get too deep into how
you execute this in game, because we could go on forever on that.
But just to understand that you don't have to raise all your draws. You
do need to raise a percentage of them, and I would say pray.
The easiest way to start out is raise your best ones. Obvious you will
you will want to raise your straight and flush draws. Those are very strong.
And I don't mean just straight flush draws. I mean straight and flush
draws. Have both, and it not be a straight flush draw. You
want to raise your gut shot straight and flush straws. That's a bit of
a stronger draw. You want to raise your flush draws when you have overcards,
so you know you're ace king suited on the you know ten whatever I
said earlier ten eight five or ten eight four with two of your suit or
something that's pretty good. I had to raise. You got the overs,
you got the flush draw. Likewise, your straight draws where you have the
overs. So you know, on the ten nine, five or whatever,
when you have jack queen, not only do you have the open ended,
you also have two overs to the ten jacks. That's a pretty strong draw.
So you don't have to raise all of them, right, I have
to raise all of your draws, but you need to be raising at least
some portion of them, some decent portion of them, so that when you
raise on these flops, you don't only have one through, so you're raising
both. And you flop the set of fives, you're raising that. When
you flop the set of nine, you're raising that. When you flop the
set of tens, you're raising that. When you flop the ten nine,
you're raising that. And you're also raising your queen jack, and you're also
raising the overs with diamonds, and you're also raising the flush draws with straight
draws and the gut shot straight draws with the flush straw, and you're just
see, you just got quite a good mix of draws in there to throw
along in with your big value hands, and so you're raising all of them,
and it will make you very difficult to play against, and you won't
be maximumly exploitable like the player who you've been playing with that you know never
raises flush draws, and when they raise on a flush draw board, they
are raising to protect against the flush straw, and that tells you something very
significant about the strength of their hand. I hope today's episode has helped you
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