How to Defend Against a ‘Small Ball’ Poker Strategy

Small ball poker is often employed by experienced and skilled poker players. It gives them an advantage at the tables by ensuring that hands are played over several betting rounds – allowing superior hand reading skills time to take effect. For the less experienced tournament player, defending against the small-ball poker strategy is important. This will prevent the more experienced players gradually ‘grinding away’ at your stack and potentially give you a higher chance of reaching that profitable final table.

This article looks at several ways of defending against the small-ball poker strategy. First we define the characteristics of small-ball and signs to look out for that show that this strategy is being used against you. Next we look at the simple – but dangerous – solution of pushing all-in to negate this advantage. Finally some strategies and ideas for effectively defending against this strategy in a number of situations are looked at.
Small-ball poker reduces the variance of playing big pots in poker tournaments. A professional or experienced player will use this strategy often in the early stages of tournaments in order to minimize the effects of ‘chance’ on their game. The reasoning is that their skills should allow them to accumulate chips without having to put their entire stack on the line – thus risking busting on a bad beat or an error.

Small bets, calls – especially in position, and often checking behind on later streets to control the size of the pot are all characteristics of small-ball poker. Players who employ this strategy will generally see many flops, taking them away with bets when opponents show weakness and folding when the action ahead of them gets heavy.

This is generally a difficult strategy to play against. Skilled players will be very good at reading your hands and assessing what your bets mean – giving them a huge advantage.

One thing that small-ball poker players dislike more than anything else is to be asked to commit all of their chips in a single hand. One strategy in defending against small-ball is thus to push all-in when you feel that your opponent will fold. This can be effective and will get experienced players to fold many hands that are the best hand at the time. However it is also very dangerous and likely to lead to you being ‘trapped’ for all of your chips sooner rather than later.

If you constantly push all-in over an opponent’s raises the statistical chances are than someone at your table will wake up behind you with a premium hand – costing you your seat in the tournament. A little more caution is thus advised.
Small-ball poker players love to have position – that is to act last after the flop, turn and river betting rounds. This gives them a huge advantage of seeing what you do before they make a decision in the hand. One way to defend against this style is to make sure that, when playing pots with the small-ball specialist, you have position on them. Denying them information about your intentions before they act will negate much of their advantage.
Raises on early betting rounds are dangerous to small-ball poker players – as there is the potential for the pot to become large by the river. Raising more when in a pot with such a player is another way of defending against this strategy. Here you are signaling that you wish to play a big pot – yet not risking all of your chips in case there is a large re-raise behind you.
To summarize, small-ball poker is a strategy employed by experienced poker players to reduce variance and allow their skill advantage to show. It is important for less experienced opponents to identify and defend against the small-ball player by adjusting their strategy. Playing pots in last position, and raising more than your ‘standard’ raise are just two ways of defending against small-ball strategy.