Loose Player

1. Loose Layer Of Dead Plant Material
2. Loose Player Poker
3. Hell Let Loose Player Counts
4. How To Play Pocket Aces Against Loose Players

The most common opponent you are likely to face at an online poker table is the loose opponent. Most complaints you will hear from most experienced players involve loose players. They are the source of most “bad beats” and can cause frustration for even the most talented of sharks.

The only way to beat these loose players is to made adjustments to your game. Here are a few things you can do to adjust your game for a loose opponent.

Hell Let Loose is a multiplayer first-person shooter video game developed by Australian studio Black Matter and published by Team17 and released for Microsoft Windows. The game was announced via a successful Kickstarter campaign in 2017, where it raised US$220,000. It was released on Steam as an early access title on 6 June, 2019. To let loose; free from bonds or restraint. To release, as from constraint, obligation, or penalty. Chiefly Nautical. To set free from fastening or attachment: to loose a boat from its moorings. To unfasten, undo, or untie, as a bond, fetter, or knot. To shoot; discharge; let fly: to loose. A loose player is generally defined as a player that plays a lot of hands, no matter the quality. You can spot the loose player by watching what cards he plays to showdown. Pay particular attention to hands that are raised before the flop.

A loose player is generally defined as a player that plays a lot of hands, no matter the quality. You can spot the loose player by watching what cards he plays to showdown. Pay particular attention to hands that are raised before the flop. Keep notes on what cards he will call with to a substantial pre-flop raise. Be careful not to over-estimate calls made on the blinds or in position. Look for weak hands that call one or more raises in poor position.

While loose play is generally a losing strategy because it costs money to see so many flops and cards post flop, it has the advantage of masking the strength of the loose player’s hand. If he will play any two cards, you never know if he is playing good cards or bad cards. Either he is just an action junkie that likes to play every hand, or his plan is to spend a little money on every hand with hopes to win enough big hands to make up the difference.

There are, of course, a few different types of loose players. There are three categories of looseness. There are loose passive players, who are called Blackjack Players. Blackjack players approach the poker table just like they approach the blackjack table. They get two cards, they make their bet and they are going to see what they get. They hope for a 21, if not, they hope the dealer busts. They call every hand pre-flop no matter how much is raised, and call every street down to the river hoping to make their hand. If they lose, they don’t care, there’s another hand of blackjack being dealt in a couple of moments. Another chance to win their money back.

The second category is the Calling Station. Calling stations don’t play quite as many hands as the Blackjack player. They might exercise a little bit of pre-flop selection, but if they see a flop and hit any part of it, they are going to call down to the river.

The third and most dangerous of the loose players are loose aggressive players, or LAGs (Loose Aggressive Guys). The LAG will bet and raise with a large range of hands. Just because a LAG raises, doesn’t mean he has a good hand. It doesn’t really mean anything. Just because a LAG doesn’t raise doesn’t mean anything either. LAGs often raise with weak hands and call with super-strong hands, trying to be “crafty.”

Once you have identified the particular type of loose player you are up against, you can use a strategy against him to increase your chances of winning against him. For all these players, the first and most important thing you must do is play tighter than normal.

If you are facing the Blackjack Player, You must play tight. When you actually enter a pot it is important to raise as often as possible. If he wants to see more cards, you have to make him pay as much as you can to see those cards. You can assume that you are entering the hand with superior cards, but you will often get out-drawn by these players. It is important to calculate pot odds very carefully with drawing hands. Math is on your side against these players. As long as they don’t get extraordinarily lucky, you will win against these players in the long run. You will take bad beats from these players, and it is very important to control yourself to keep off tilt. Do not try to bluff these players, but you may be able to call them down with ace high if you don’t think they have caught anything.

If you are facing the calling station, don’t bet as often as you would against a Blackjack Player. Never slow play a big hand against them, as they are going to call your bets anyway. Any pair larger than bottom pair can worth betting against these players. Top pair is almost a lock and should be played to the river unless overcards come. Do NOT bluff these players. They simply will not fold. Count on them always having at least one face card or ace in their hand. If a calling station should raise, consider folding immediately. You can assume he has the nuts or something close.

When facing a LAG, the most important thing to accomplish is to isolate. You can beat the LAG with marginal hands, but your other opponents should have tightened up as well, and you don’t want to take a marginal hand too far against more than your LAG. Don’t raise this player unless you are sure you are ahead, which is difficult to tell against this player. Let him do the betting until you are sure you have him beat. Since you are only playing premium hands against this player, usually any high pair is good enough to call down to the river. This player loves to play fancy and make “moves” so don’t be surprised by any bets, and don’t be fooled into thinking those bets mean anything. There will be swings as the pot sizes can be quite large, but if you play the right hands against this player, you can make a substantial profit.

The most important thing to remember when playing loose opponents is that they will catch cards. It is going to happen. They will hit goofy straights and catch runner-runner flushes against you. Bad beats are inevitable. DO NOT TILT. Keep playing solid tight poker against them, and your solid wins will out number and out stretch the bad beats.

Loose Layer Of Dead Plant Material

I help you categorize your opponents into their respective player types based on stats and tendencies. I also give some easy-to-use exploits against each.

Listen to this podcast episode #289:

You MUST Understand Player Types

“The money available to a player winning long term comes from other players’ willingness to put money into the pot with bad hands that a perfect player would not play.”

– Ed Miller in his incredible book, The Course

This is exactly why we must understand player types and assign each of our opponents to one of them.

When you’re profiling your opponents, you’re looking for weaknesses. When you see those weaknesses, you know exactly how to play against them to earn their chips. You can also selectively target the weakest players who are most likely to give you their chips.

“Attack weakness, avoid strength.”

– Ed Miller in his incredible book, The Course

You’re looking to play more hands versus weak players and avoid hands versus strong players. Battling good players can kill your profits. We’re all playing this game, at least in part, to make money. Since it’s easier to make money versus the weak, that is who you MUST go after. The key to going after them is to understand and spot each of the weak players around the table.

You must become an active observer when you’re not involved in the hand:

• If a player just open-raised from the Hijack, and it’s the first hand he’s played in 3 orbits, he’s likely a tight player who only plays the best hands.
• Maybe another player makes her 4^th limp in a row… she’s likely a Fish.
• Now a different player 3bets then triple-barrels down the streets with J8s after flopping TP. Wow! You found a loose and aggressive player.

Because you’re paying attention, you’re able to categorize each of these players and now you can use some basic exploits against each.

The 4 Common Poker Player Types

We use two different tendencies to put players into one of the 4 player types.

Tight versus Loose

A tight player plays few hands (VPIP < 20%), and a loose player plays a lot of hands (VPIP > 20%). 20% VPIP is just the cutoff percentage. Of course, players can be ultra-tight at 5% or ultra-loose at 95%.

Passive versus Aggressive

A passive player doesn’t raise preflop that often (PFR < 15%) and an aggressive player raises a lot (PFR > 15%). Again, 15% is just the cutoff with the ultra-passive player having a PFR of 1% and the mega-aggressive player at 45%.

Loose-Passive

LOOSE = Plays lots of hands; PASSIVE = prefer making checks and call; they love to see flops; they stay in way too long with weak hands and draws; #1 targets at the table; if they raise post-flop, WATCH OUT!

AKA: Fish or Calling Stations

Common VPIP/PFR Stats: 22/6, 28/5, 45/9 (Mention video in show notes detailing VPIP & PFR)

Color Coding: Green

Characteristic #1: Passively plays very wide & weak ranges. Not positionally aware.

Exploit: Play ranges that dominate theirs and isolate them (as limpers or in the blinds) whenever +EV.

Characteristics #2: Generally losing players.

Exploit: Target them and play as many hands as possible in +EV spots!

Loose Player Poker

Loose-Aggressive

LOOSE = Plays lots of hands, AGGRESSIVE = prefers bets and raises; can be a high variance loser; they use the power of position yet they might not be that positionally aware when it comes to starting hands; capable of spewing chips in bad bluffing spots.

AKA: LAG, Donk or Maniac

Common VPIP/PFR Stats: 24/18, 36/24, 55/35

Hell Let Loose Player Counts

Color Coding: Orange

Characteristic #1: Too much aggression with weak ranges. Open-raises, iso-raises and calls too much preflop.

Exploit: Play with hands at the top of their range, and strive for IP play.

Characteristic #2: Constantly applies pressure.

Exploit: ALWAYS gauge how well the board interacts with their range. Be willing to call wider with 2nd and 3rd pair when they can be bluffing worse.

How To Play Pocket Aces Against Loose Players

Tight-Passive

TIGHT = Plays mostly strong hands, PASSIVE = prefer checks and calls (but sometimes they’re aggressive with few calling hands); quick to fold post-flop; beware their bets and raises.

AKA: TP, Rock or Nit

Common VPIP/PFR Stats: 11/9, 11/2, 7/3

Color Coding: Red

Characteristic #1: Strong hand selection & positionally aware. Folds too often preflop and raises only strong hands.

Exploit: Play a wider but still strong range when IP. Call their raises with hands that play well post-flop and can crack big hands (good playability).

Characteristic #2: Doesn’t often fold to 3bets and 3bet = the nuts.

Exploit: 3bet and 4bet with the best hands to get value from his tight range.

Tight-Aggressive

TIGHT = Plays mostly strong hands, AGGRESSIVE = prefers bets and raises; can be winning regs; multi-tabler; quick to fold most marginal spots post-flop and when OOP.

AKA: TAG, ABC or Reg

Common VPIP/PFR Stats: 12/10, 18/13

Color Coding: Yellow

Characteristic #1: Plays multiple-tables, so they’re selective, patient and they choose the best starting hands (small & value intensive range).

Exploit: Play strong hands against them, but speculative hands can crack their strong ranges.

Characteristic #2: Quick to fold weaker pairs and draws because they see little value in these hands.

Exploit: Bet and raise to earn post-flop pots, make sure your size hits their “pain threshold” so often at 2/3 pot or more.

Here’s my challenge to you for this episode: While you’re playing your next session, set a timer to go off every 10 minutes. When it does, pick a table and think about each player there and describe all you know about them – player types, weaknesses, how to exploit, etc. This will train you to profile your opponents and it’s a great way to test that you’re paying attention.

Now it’s your turn to take action and Scooby-dooby-doo something positive for your poker game.

Support the Show

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