Going to War

“Force, and fraud, are in war the two cardinal virtues.”
- Thomas Hobbes

FORCE

There were numerous reasons to enter World War II, including but not limited to the fact that someone got a little bit uppity and dropped bombs on our heads. Far down the list of good reasons to enter World War II was the reasonable expectation that entering the war would end the continuing desperate slowness of our economic recovery from the depression. It may have been far down the list, but historically it was significant.

In his little green book, Phil Gordon has a chapter on hands to go to war with. Hands like open ended straight flush draws. Hands like two over cards with a flush draw. Hands that are drawing hands but that are likely to actually be favored. Most of us know what these hands are. But are we willing to go to war with them.

I say, not only do we need to be ready to go to war with these hands as Phil suggests, but that in a NL cash game it is essential that we do go to war with them. On the flop we must push these hands as far as we can. We need to be ready to raise, re-raise and go all in with them.

Not only are these hands favored and are slightly more likely to win money than lose it but they are exactly the kinds of hands that everyone at the table must know that we are willing to play and play strongly. By going to war with drawing hands we are letting everyone know that we are willing to gamble, or so it would seem. In the long run, by raising the crap out of these things, we will make a small profit, but there is a fallout that, like the economic recovery spawned by World War II, is a reasonable expectation but not really thought of as a good reason to go to war in the first place.

The side benefit of going to war with these hands is that our future actions are now framed by the fact that we are gamblers and willing to risk our whole stacks. The next time we raise with a set to our opponents over pair, they will remember that we pushed our whole stack on a draw and will be much more willing to hang with us. By pushing our weaker holdings we greatly increase the profitability of our stronger ones. “You have to give action to get action” as Doyle likes to say.

Go to war. If you drop your whole stack on a 50/50 shot, don’t sweat it. Rebuy and play on. Your willingness to push the slight edges will benefit you later when you have the big ones. The hit you may take initially will likely be followed by a strong economic recovery.