The Art of Value Bluffing From the Button

Laying the Foundations

On most sites that offer Spins, there are no antes. The consequence is that the Button’s Alpha is significantly worse, which results in the BTN opening a tighter, linear range as seen below.

The BB only needs to invest 1bb to see a flop in a 4.5bb pot; this incentivizes the BB to continue with a very wide range preflop.

The narrow linear range vs. wide range dynamic results in the narrow range—in this case, the BTN—having the range advantage on almost every flop.

They leverage this by c-betting their entire range on most flops:

Ranking Flop Types

Consider the following flop types and try to order them from 1–4 (with 1 being the best for the BTN and 4 the worst).

Three cards with rank 9 or higher:
One Broadway, Two non-Broadway:
8-high and lower flops:                             
Two Broadway, 1 non-Broadway:

A♣K♦Q♣ / J♣T♥9♠ / K♣Q♦Q♥
K♥8♦7♠ / Q♠5♥4♣ / J♠7♦5♣
8♥5♦4♣ /  7♥7♦6♣ / 6♣5♥4♥
K♥T♦6♣ / A♠J♣7♣ / J♥T♥5♦

Three Cards With Rank 9 or Higher

Take the following scenario at the start of a 25bb Spin and Go. We’re on the Button, and we open to the standard 2bb sizing, SB folds, and the BB calls. We get to a flop of A♠K♠Q♥.

When instructing GTO Wizard AI to choose one sizing, it prefers the 3bb (67% pot) c-bet sizing with effectively the entire range, demonstrating just how advantageous this flop is.

Below we can see how the BB has to take into consideration how strongly the BTN connects with this flop. A 67% pot c-bet sizing is used, making MDF here 60%. However, since the range advantage is so strong the BB doesn’t come close to meeting this:

We can see the BB continues ~12% of the time with a raise and ~25% with a call, totalling ~37%. A long way from the 60% MDF. We will often encounter this when one player has a significant range advantage over the other.

On the A♠K♠Q♥ flop, our 67% pot c-bet is check-called by the BB. The turn reveals the 5♦, on which the preferred barrel sizing here is 7bb into the 10.5bb pot. How would you play the following hands as the BTN with the chance to barrel or check?

How many did you get correct? The answers are not easy and require a deep understanding of the ranges at play.

To understand why a more natural-looking barrel hand like J♠7♠ checks, yet a counterintuitive hand like Q♦9♥ barrels, we need to dive deeper into the ranges and BB’s response to the barrel.

Notice how BB’s range is almost exclusively pairs of Aces, Kings, and Queens. When holding an unpaired hand, it’s almost always one that has a flush draw. The BTN maintains a very large nut advantage here.

Let’s work through the surprising results of the quiz and try to understand the “why” behind what the solver identified as optimal for each hand.

When we hold the J♠, the auto-fold combinations with that same card can no longer be in our opponent’s (BB) range. As for folding out dominated flush draws, we’re preventing scenarios where we can cooler worse flushes on the river.

The argument in favor of betting is that we expect to fold out a large portion of Villain’s pairs of Queens and Kings, but that also applies to other hands in our range. It just happens that there are better ones to select for bluffing because they have properties that benefit more from these folds.

When adding in the fact that we, quite often, can get a better pair of Queens and Kings to fold, whilst still retaining some showdown value when called without having to improve, it starts to become clear why 6♠5♠ makes for an amazing value-bluff barrel.

What if Somebody Misses Unnatural Bluffs?

The betting frequency has remained similar, going from ~62% to ~60%. However, the range composition changed a lot; removing barrels with Queen-x and worse pairs and replacing them with unpaired hands such as flush draws and gutshots.

Barreling AA and all Ace-x, combined with using higher-equity bluffs like flush draws, is enough to cause a drastic shift in the BB’s defending range. The BB’s marginal holdings (e.g., King-x without a redraw) are no longer incentivized to defend against an overly strong range.

Other Flops

Take the following scenario at the start of a 25bb Spin and Go. We’re again min-opening the BTN, SB folds, and the BB calls. We see a flop of K♥8♦7♦.

The preferred sizing is still 67% pot; however, the betting frequency is almost half of what it was on A♠K♠Q♥. This is a result of the BTN’s range advantage not being as big as it was before. We now have more unpaired holdings in our range (especially Ace-x), so we start to check back the majority of our made hands that are second pair or worse to support the non-made hands we check back.

Flops that only have one card higher than a 9—like the board that’s being considered—generally require an extensive checking and betting range due to the high percentage of unpaired holdings in the overall range.

One noticeable exception is when the one card ranked 9 or higher is an Ace, since Ace-x is the BTN’s most common unpaired holding preflop. The best card on the flop for the BTN is always the Ace.

Three Cards With Rank 9 or Higher on the Turn

We covered earlier how, when there are three cards with rank 9 or higher on the flop, the BTN needs to get very creative with their bluffs on the flop and the turn.

This holds true when the turn brings the third card with rank 9 or higher. Let’s look at an example of two different turns for the same flop (J♥T♥5♦) to illustrate this.

A smaller size of 1.8bb is used here almost with the entire range. This is common to see on structures where there are two cards with rank 9+or higher.

In general, non-flush completing high turns are best for the BTN. This is logical, as it will reduce the number of non-paired holdings within their range.

First, let’s look at one of BTN’s worst turns, the 8♣.

The turn-barrel range here looks fairly natural. The hand class that starts to get bet for value is top pair. For balance, mainly unpaired bluffs are selected. There are still some unnatural bluffs making the cut, though! In particular, some low pocket pairs, but this is not a significant part of the strategy, unlike the AKQtt example from earlier.

Let’s compare this with the BTN’s best turn, an A♦

It’s clear to see that the difference is drastic; the best turn is so beneficial for them that the entire range now wants to bet, instead of the roughly 50/50 check-or-bet strategy on one of the worst turns.

The key learning point to take away from this is that:

The larger the BTN’s range advantage on the turn, the more unnatural hands should be barreled.

It may not be a huge mistake to not barrel low pairs on the turned 8♣, where our range is much weaker. However, when the turn brings us a larger range advantage, not barreling such hands would become a big mistake (as we can see below).

Conclusion

The more cards on the board that favor the BTN’s range (cards with rank 9 or higher), the more often the BTN should not just treat its low-pair holdings as showdown value. A quick trick to apply in-game is to ask yourself, “Does the turn have three cards ranked 9 or higher?” If true, consider pocket pairs and third/fourth pairs as potential “value-bluff” combinations.

Failure to use low pairs as bluffs on the BTN will make it correct for the BB to make considerable hero folds on the turn whenever the board contains three cards rank 9 or above. You can use this information to adapt to your Villains accordingly and keep you one step ahead.