Top 5 Hacks For Missing The Flop in Poker

02 Dec 2024

Intermediate

This material is for medium-skilled players

Knowing how to proceed when you miss the flop is extremely important - playing perfect GTO ranges preflop will do nothing for you if you don't understand how to execute sound strategies postflop! This article will teach you all the tricks you need to crush your opponents when you miss the flop as the preflop aggressor!

Introduction

Remember that your strategy needs to change depending on if you are In Position (act AFTER your opponents) or Out Of Position (act BEFORE your opponents), as different ranges will be at play & will connect with different boards, even when your exact hole cards miss the flop.

It’s also important to consider the effective stack depth, and your opponent's tendencies, to ensure you are maximally exploiting your opponents. Many players will consider themselves "pot committed" when the effective stack is short in relation to the pot, many other players will consider their implied odds "too good" when extremely deep-stacked. Understanding these tendencies will help you find the right option when you miss the flop and need to decide whether to bluff, and what size to bluff!

You're going to miss far more flops than you hit. You're going to raise preflop. Someone's going to call. You're going to flop nothing. Get used to it. Assuming you don't have a pair in your hand, go into the flop. You're only going to flop a pair about 29% of the time. Now sometimes you're going to flop some sort of a draw, or overcards, or a backdoor flush draw, but you're only going to get a pair or better about 29% of the time. It's not all that often. 

Knowing how to proceed when you miss the flop is very important because sometimes you should still play quite aggressively, and other times you should not. Today we are going to discuss what you do when you miss the flop in No Limit Texas Hold'em. What you do should depend on five main ideas that we are going to go through.

Hack For Missing The Flop #1: Who Has the Range & Nut Advantage?

First, who has the advantage? Who generally has more good hands in their range? Not necessarily right now, but in their range in general. Next, your position, and next - the effective stack depth. Then, your opponent's tendencies. And finally, the number of players in the pot. These five things are going to heavily impact how you play when you flop nothing. So let’s finally get right into it!

You always want to ask yourself, who has the range and or nut advantage? These are two different things. One means your entire range in general is ahead of your opponent's range on a particular board. The nut advantage is when you have more super-duper strong hands than your opponent on a particular board. For example, say you raise from first position with just the best broadway hands and pairs and whatnot. And your opponent calls in the big blind. When it comes, ace, king, queen, and they check you, you have a really big range advantage because you have all the big cards in your range and they do not. Well, they may have the big cards in their range, but they also have a whole lot of stuff like nine, five suited and seven, six offsuit that are absolutely nothing on ace, king, queen. 

And in that scenario, you also have the nut advantage because you have hands like sets. Pocket aces, pocket kings, pocket queens, jack, ten suited for the straight. It's very different, though, if you raise from first position and the big blind calls and the flop comes nine, six, six, because then you have almost no sixes in your range, but they do. So in that scenario, you have the range advantage because you still have all the good strong high cards and pocket pairs, but you lack the nut advantage and that will impact your overall strategy. 

So if the flop is just good for your range and therefore not good for theirs, you very often bet quite frequently even when you have nothing. When you don't have the range advantage, when you usually have 55% equity or less, you're going to check with your medium strength made hands like middle pair, under pairs, ace highs, and you're going to check with hands that are just really, really bad. So say you have nine, eight suited and the flop comes jack, six, four. That's a spot where you may end up not continuation betting it because they could easily connect with the six and the four if you raise and they call on the big blind and they could easily have a jack and you don't have a whole lot of backdoor equity. 

Imagine you don't have a backdoor flush draw. That's a spot where maybe you just want to check and give up and that's okay. It is okay to check and give up some portion of the time when you have little or no equity. Also when you have a lot of nutted hands in your range, you typically bet more often just because if you bet, you should not get raised all that often because your opponent has to worry about you having one of those very strong hands. And when the flop does not give you very many potential nutted hands, you should generally check more often because if you bet, you should expect to get raised more often because they will have more nut hands.

So essentially, whenever you are favored in the pot, on average, you typically bet more often and that does include even when you miss. And as you're disadvantaged, you do way less betting, which means you're not gonna bet with a lot of the absolute worst hands in your range. 

Hack For Missing The Flop #2: Are You In Position or Out Of Position?

You should generally check way more often from out of position. It is a commonly used strategy to bet frequently from in position using a small size. If you study game theory optimal strategy with the GTO solver, you will find that you bet very frequently and small from in position. And this small bet allows you to bet more often with a wider range of hands. 

That said, you can also bet small from out of position using a small size frequently if your opponent is straightforward and will generally play in a face up manner. If you raise with whatever and your opponent calls on the button, if they will always fold and unless they have a pair or a good draw to a small bet, you should be betting small very often. 

But if they're good and they're gonna float on the flop, they're gonna call with all sorts of over cards, backward straight draws, backdoor flush draws, etc. and make your life miserable on the turn. Well, then you have to do a whole lot of checking. In general, when you're in position, you get to bet more often. When you're out of position, you have to do a whole lot more checking. 

Hack For Missing The Flop #3: What is the Effective Stack Depth?

Next, the stack depth, the effective stack depth is very important, not just your stack, but also the stack of everyone involved in the pot. As the stacks get shallower and shallower, it becomes more costly to lose a continuation bet because it will become a larger percentage of your stack. For example, if you're 100 big blinds deep and you raise to two and a half big blinds if somebody calls and they check the flop and you bet two and a half big blinds, if they raise you, you lose five big blinds total out of your 100 big blind stack, 5%. 

That is a big, big difference. So you have to be way more cautious in general when you're playing with a shallow stack. And that's especially true in a tournament where you're usually incentivized to not go broke anytime soon, especially once the stacks start to get shallow and you're deep in the tournament. Also, realize that when you are playing very shallow stacked, your junky draws will not be getting very good implied odds, which means they lose a lot of their value. And this is why you see when you are playing with shallow stacks, you often don't even play with small pairs or suited connected type hands because you just can't win all that much if you do make a really good hand. 

So for that reason, when you are playing shallower stacked, you have to check more often in general. And that's especially true if you're against someone who just does not like to fold all that often. If your opponent will easily let the pot go for a 1.5 big blind continuation bet, then sure you can still continuation bet a lot. But if they're going to call that bet or raise that bet very, very often, you have to be far more cautious when you are playing shallower and shallower. 

Hack For Missing The Flop #4: What are your Opponent's Tendencies?

Next, your opponent's tendencies are very important. We've touched on this already a little bit, but in general, when you are facing maniacs or calling stations, essentially people that don't like to fold, you should bluff way less often. It is fine to play ABC, straightforward poker against these players. When you have a good hand, bet for value because they don't like to fold. And when you miss, when you have nothing, just check and give up and lose a tiny pot.

I actually play a decent amount of charity tournaments locally, and a lot of these players really hate to fold. So what do I do? I literally just sit there, play good cards, make top pair better, and load my money in. It may sound overly simplistic, but it works if your opponents simply do not fold and they don't care what you are doing. That said, against overly tight opponents, players who want to have the nuts before they put their money in, you can increase your bluffing frequency because they will be overfolding and not defending enough even against small bet sizes. 

In my first book, a long time ago, I wrote very clearly, when you raise before the flop and somebody calls, when they check the flop, you should probably continuation bet every single time. I knew that was not the game theory optimal strategy, but it was a strategy that worked really well a long time ago when people were playing weak, tight, straightforward poker. Now some people still play that strategy. A lot of people don't, but some people do, and if you are lucky enough to find yourself against weak, tight, straightforward players, just raise and continuation bet frequently because they are going to be drastically overfolding and you're going to win all the small pots. Just make sure, though, whenever they do raise you or stick around, you get a little bit more cautious because their range to get to the turn is going to be way stronger than most people. 

Bet frequently for small amounts and win way more than your fair share of the pots. But as you see, these two strategies are very different, right? Against calling stations and maniacs, you only bet when you have a good hand, and against other players, the tight players, you bet all the time. Very different strategy, but if you implement it correctly against your particular opponents, that's going to result in them playing right into what you want them to be doing. 

Hack For Missing The Flop #5: How Many Players are in the Pot?

Finally, the number of players in the pot is very important. When you're playing multiway, you simply must bluff less often because you're facing a whole bunch of hands and someone's going to flop something. And if it's not you, it's probably someone else. And so when you're facing a lot of players, you have to bet very polarized, typically with just your best made hands and your draws. And even then, sometimes you should check with your entire range, usually when you are first to act or early to act and there's a bunch of people yet to act behind you. 

For example, say you raise from an early position and five people call you in position and the flop comes 10-7-3, that's the spot where you should actually check with your entire range. You should not continuation bet even with pocket aces on the 10-7-3, assuming you're trying to play well, because your opponents are all going to have sets some portion of the time. And if you bet, they should presume that you must have a really good hand to bet into all those people and they should make pretty tight folds. 

Now, in the real world, a lot of people will not make those really tight folds and because of that, maybe you should bet the pocket aces. But if your opponents actually play well and cautiously multiway, you also in turn have to play pretty cautious yourself. So when you raise and there's a bunch of people yet to act behind you, you need to be checking a ton. 

And in general, when you're betting in multiway pots, it needs to be with your very well made hands that are happy to play for a lot of money and your draws that can hopefully stick around against a raise or improve to the effective nuts. Generally, it is a good option to give up on the flop when you miss against multiple people. Simple as that. When you raise Ace-King and four people call and you flop nothing, check and fold. It's annoying. I know Ace-King was good before the flop. I know it's two over cards. It's the best two over cards. But when it comes 9-7-4 and somebody bets, just get out of the way. So that's it. That is how to play when you miss the flop. 

Final Words

So, let’s sum up all of the above. What to do when you miss the flop? First, ask yourself, who has the range and the nut advantage? If you are heavily favored, you probably want to bet when you miss. If you're not, you probably want to check. Your position is very important too. If you raise with junk and you're out of position, say you raise the hijack seat and the button calls and the flop comes and you have nothing, it's probably okay to check a large chunk of the time. 

The effective stack depth is also very important. When you're deeper stacked, you can typically bet more often. When you're shallower stacked, not so much. Your opponent's tendencies are vitally important. If your opponents make any sort of error you can predict, such as when they're way too loose and crazy or in their way too tight and passive. And then finally, the number of players in the pot will highly impact the strategy you should use because as a whole bunch of people see the flop, someone's going to have something really good. And if it's not you, it's probably one of them. That's it for today!