Bluff raising the river in limit Texas hold’em
I have often heard it said that bluffing in limit Texas Holdem is very difficult. While it is certainly more difficult to execute than in no-limit then bluffing is still possible in limit hold’em as well. In this form of poker then you are always getting good odds to launch bluffs in certain situations and you do not need to risk your whole stack in order to do it. Let us look at an example from six handed $10-$20 limit Hold’em poker to show you what I mean. Here is has been folded around to the small blind who has been very aggressive and they raise to $20.
You could three bet with a K-J but choose to call instead making the pot $40. The flop comes 5d-5h-3c and your opponent bets $10 and with five to one pot odds you decide to call as you feel that raising now would be too soon. The turn card is the 8c and your opponent bets again for $20 and with $80 in the pot you call again which is a risky play and raising to $40 only has to work one hand in three for the play to break even. But you call again making the pot $100 and the river card is the 2s and your aggressive opponent bets again.
This puts $120 into the pot and you are a little unsure of what to do with your king high hand. In this situation then your opponent is either value betting or bluffing. If they had an ace then they would have check-called and so your opponent is either betting a made hand or fresh air. This is what is known as a polarised range and here is where you are getting excellent pot odds to raise here. Calling is fine too as if your opponent doesn’t have ace high then your king high hand will beat many bluffs.
However your opponent could have a very weak hand that beats yours like a pair of deuces for example but once again your opponent would check call the hand rather than bet and risk a raise. So calling and raising may be good plays here but notice that raising the river only risks $40 to win $120. If this were a no limit game with a pot of $120 then the risk would have to be almost pot sized to get your opponent from the hand or something that was at least of a substantial nature.
In this example then your king high hand could have won without bluff raising but let us alter your hand from K-J to a hand that certainly wouldn’t win a showdown and was J-9. Here then it would certainly be a good play to bluff raise the river. You will lose a lot of $40 bets here but the play only has to work one time in four for the play to show a profit.