12 Aug 2024 bluff discipline moving up stakes red line value bet These days, it seems like everyone wants to know how to improve their red line — their non-showdown winnings. It's probably the number one question I get from prospective students: "Can you help me with my red line? It’s going straight down, and I don’t know what’s wrong with it". This issue is quite common, where you have a really losing red line and recognize that something’s off in your game, but you’re not sure how to fix it. That’s exactly what this article is about. Today, I’m going to share three unorthodox ways to improve your red line. This isn’t just about bluffing more or folding less on the river, although those are important. We’re going to go deeper because there’s a lot more to the red line that the poker community doesn’t fully understand, and I’m going to explore that with you today. Now, let’s dive into transforming your red line. Student Redline Transformation On the screen right now, I have an example of a student I coached who initially had a very losing red line. However, after applying some of my advice, his red line shifted in the complete opposite direction, turning into a winning one. If you're not familiar with how these graphs work, let me explain. When you play online poker using poker tracking software, the software keeps track of your winnings, which is what this graph represents. The green line shows your total winnings, but it’s also broken down into two additional lines. The blue line represents your showdown winnings — the amount you won when you had to reveal your hand at the end of the hand. The red line represents your non-showdown winnings — the amount you won without showing down your hand. There's also a fourth line on this graph, the orange or yellow line, which represents the all-in adjusted winnings. It's important to note that this graph spans over 1 million hands, so this is not just a fluke. The student genuinely transformed his game, and as a result, he added several big blinds per hundred hands to his win rate in the second half of the graph. If you’re looking for a poker coach, check out our section with the limits, prices and other options. The Green Line is What Really Matters Before I dive into how this student achieved their results, I want to emphasize that the green line — your win rate, your bottom line — is what really counts. The goal isn’t to boost your red line just to have a cool-looking graph. The ultimate objective is to win money, period. Now, if you were a solver playing against other solvers in six-max cash games, your red line would likely be negative, perhaps even very negative. In a balanced poker environment where everyone is playing optimally, you can expect a positive blue line (showdown winnings) and a negative red line (non-showdown winnings). But here’s the key: you’re not playing against solvers — you’re playing against humans. And humans, in general, tend to play too passively. They fold too much and don’t raise enough. The most common mistakes human players make are those of passivity, not over-aggression. So, if you’re in real games and have a very negative red line, it probably means you’re leaving money on the table. Alright, I won't keep you in suspense any longer. Here’s how you fix your red line: you have to stop being a nit. Just kidding — but seriously, you do need to play more aggressively. All the tips I’m about to give you will guide you toward playing more aggressively and less passively. If you have a really bad red line, you might not be a full-on nit, but you probably have tendencies that are too tight and too passive. You’ll need to fix those. Bluff More and Fold Less on the River The first real tip, which I’ll call tip number zero, is that you need to bluff more on the river and fold less in those situations. If you do that, your red line will leak less when you’re in bluff-catching spots, and you’ll win more when you’re the one bluffing. But I don’t want to focus too much on these two tips because everyone kind of knows that playing more aggressively on the river improves your red line. That's not particularly groundbreaking, and I don’t want to make articles about just basic stuff. So, here are three more tips. Be More Aggressive Preflop Let’s improve tip number one, which is probably the most common issue: you need to play more aggressively preflop. This is a problem many professional poker players face — they assume they’re playing preflop correctly but haven’t actually checked or studied their preflop game in a long time. Since preflop play is basic, they think they’ve mastered it and are too good to need further study. Don’t be that person. You really need to at least conduct a basic database review of your preflop play, especially if you’ve never done that before, because you’re probably playing too passively preflop without realizing it. The most common leaks include overfolding your big blind to steals, not three-betting enough, and also not four-betting enough. If you’re not three-betting enough, it’s going to really tank your red line. Just turning up the aggression preflop will likely change the shape of your graph significantly and help you stop leaking money preflop, improving your win rate as well. Call and Raise More on the Flop Tip number two: you’re probably overfolding on the flop and not raising enough. This follows the same concept as tip number one, but now we’re focusing on the flop. If you’re playing too passively, giving up too many pots on the flop, or simply not raising enough, it’s going to hurt your red line. This is particularly common when facing small continuation bet (C-bet) sizes, though players also overfold to larger C-bet sizes. As you likely know, the larger the bet size, the less you need to raise in theory, and the smaller your opponent’s bet size, the more you should raise. However, many players fail to raise as much as they should when facing small C-bets, flop stabs, or donk bets, which leads to missing opportunities to take pots down on the flop, ultimately damaging their red line. The takeaway here is not to underestimate the value of taking down pots early in the hand — whether preflop or on the flop. These pots may be smaller, but they’re far more frequent than big river spots, and collectively, they have a significant impact on your overall results. Bet and Raise More for Value If your red line is struggling, you're likely missing out on value on the river — both when betting and raising for value. So, what does missing value have to do with the red line? Let’s break it down: imagine your opponent checks you on the river, you’re in position, and you have a hand that’s a borderline value bet but should be bet in theory. If you decide to check it down instead of making that value bet, you’ll almost always win the hand unless your opponent is slow-playing a monster. These winnings will go to your blue line (showdown winnings) because you showed the hand down. Now, if you were to bet, say, three-quarters of the pot on the river, your opponent would fold about half the time, and those winnings would go to your red line (non-showdown winnings). The same logic applies when you have a hand that could raise for thin value but instead, you just call. This is a significant leak in many players’ games. Not raising enough for thin value on the river is something that isn’t on most players’ radar, but it should be. Poker solvers tend to raise extremely aggressively for value, yet this is rarely seen in live games. A good rule of thumb I give my students is that if you check back the river in position, you should be winning the hand between 45% and 50% of the time. If you’re checking back and winning much more than 50% of the time, it’s likely you’re missing value by checking down hands that should have been value bet. If I missed anything, feel free to add additional ways to improve your red line in the comments below. Thanks for reading, and good luck at the tables!
