Last month I wrote an article describing how poker leaks develop, but I never gave any specific examples of what kind of play could be a leak and that’s why I wanted to write this article.
About a week or so ago, I was looking at my poker graph and thinking, “Holy shit! This thing’s got more peaks than the Rockies!” My overall win rate was positive, but there were some brutal swings in my chart. I knew I had a leak somewhere. I just needed to find it.
The leak wasn’t hard to find. It was HUGE, but it still surprised me. My leak was accepting coin flips during the early blind stage of Sit N Goes.
After I became aware of my leak I started paying more attention to my opponents and realized that I wasn’t alone. The coin flip leak is common. Here’s what happens.
The blinds are 30/60 and you’re in the cutoff with AKo. You have 1760 chips. UTG limps and UTG+1 raises to 240 and everyone else folds to you. UTG+1 has 1575 left.
You re-raise to 600 and it folds back to UTG+1 who thinks for a couple of seconds, then shoves all-in. You call and UTG+1 shows 99. It’s a classic race situation.
Hands like this happen all the time in low-to-mid limit Sit N Goes and I’d argue it’s a major leak in most players’ games.
There was no reason for this stack-off. The blinds were low and both players were in fairly good shape before the hand yet each one was willing to risk their entire tournament on a coin flip.
This kind of play is fine when the blinds are high or a player is short-stacked because your opponent’s range is much wider in these situations and AK or a pocket pair may be big favorites. However, when the blinds are low your aggression should be low.
In my opinion, the player with AKo should have called or put in a smaller raise. The player with Ace-King had a strong hand and position and could have outplayed his opponent or gotten away easy if his opponent showed a lot of strength. This player’s raise and the subsequent re-raise all-in took away the positional advantage he would have had if he just called.
Since I started declining coin flips, I’ve noticed two things. The first is that I money more frequently and my graph is more stable. But I’ve also noticed that I finish 3rd or 2nd more often because I’m usually playing a smallish stack after the bubble. However, I think the latter is more due to less-than-optimal bubble play than failing to build a big stack early.
If you think you’re a better player than most of the field, there’s no reason to grab a small edge when the blinds are low. Play solid poker early on and save the gambling for when the blinds justify the risk.
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