Every month I do hot seat coaching inside MTT Poker Academy.
Hot seat coaching is an opportunity for a member of The Academy to receive 1:1 coaching from me while everyone else in the group can watch, give feedback and ask questions in real-time.
It's proved to be the most popular live session that we do.
Recently, one of the members, Rod, wanted to improve his approach to turn play after c-betting the flop.
Now while he's gone through my Train & Play Like The Pros group coaching program and watched the content on turn strategy, he was still struggling to apply the framework in real time.
In my 12+ years as a poker coach, and my 16+ years as a teacher, I've found that students are good at coming up with the answers, they just don't know what the questions are.
So today I want to share with you the 4 questions we came up with on the call to help Rod apply the framework, and hopefully it can help you too.
And the great thing?
It works on the flop and river too!
Let's dive in...
It's all in the questions
Here are the 4 questions to ask yourself at each decision point postflop:
How would you describe this texture (if on flop) or card (if on turn or river)?
Who is this texture or card better for?
What does your overarching strategy look like on this texture or card?
What does your exact hand want to do?
Let's walk through the process with an example hand...
72bb CO vs BB on 752fd
You raise to 2.3x off 77bb and just the Big Blind, who has 73bb, calls. The Big Blind checks on the 752fd board.
How would you describe this texture? This is a low unconnected flop.
Who is this texture better for? You have slightly more equity, but the Big Blind has a slight nut advantage (2pair+).
What does your overarching strategy look like on this texture or card? Normally on low boards where the equities run closer together and you don't have a nut advantage, you want to use a big bet or check strategy. Bet your strong, but vulnerable sets, overpairs and top pair hands, check hands in the middle and bluff with draws and nothing-type hands.
What does your exact hand want to do? Definitely value bet - JJ is a strong, but somewhat vulnerable hand and you can get a lot of value from worse hands.
You c-bet 6.04bb into 6.22bb and the Big Blind calls.
Approaching the turn
The turn is the 3h and the Big Blind checks.
How would you describe this turn card? This is a straight completer (A4 and 64 get there).
Who is this turn card better for? Definitely way better for the Big Blind, they have more equity since you bet big on the flop and they continued. They folded their garbage on the flop so their range gets stronger. The Big Blind also now has a much higher proportion of nutted hands and good hands while you have a huge chunk of trash hands.
What does your overarching strategy look like on this turn card? Again, it's big bet and check. Two pair and better hands want to bet big for value, while most overpairs and top pairs want to do the same. But because the card is better for the Big Blind, there will be more checking than betting with our range.
What does your exact hand want to do? JJ mainly wants to bet to get value from 7x, 5x of hearts, 2x/3x of clubs, all pair+draw type hands and then all flush draws. Having the Jc might mean that we check sometimes, but in practice I think I'm betting here all the time.
In-game I miscalculated the geometric (2e) sizing, which is understandable given it's almost impossible to calculate on-the-fly and I bet 19.86bb into 18.3bb. Having said that, the SPR is less than 4, which means the geometric sizing is never going to be more than pot. D'oh!
The Big Blind calls again.
Approaching the river
The river is the 3s, the Big Blind checks and you have your final decision point.
How would you describe this river card? The 3s pairs the board.
Who is this river card better for? The Big Blind has more equity on this runout, but their range is made up of mainly good and weak hands.
What does your overarching strategy look like on this river card? Your range is very polarised on this runout to strong hands and trash hands and not a lot in the middle. Most of your value hands from the flop and turn are still strong enough to value bet and your bluffs didn't get there. This means your decision is between jamming or checking.
What does your exact hand want to do? JJ is plenty good enough to jam for value.
You jam and the Big Blind calls with TT.
Summary
If you're struggling with postflop strategy, use these questions to develop your own framework:
How would you describe this texture (if on flop) or card (if on turn or river)?
Who is this texture or card better for?
What does your overarching strategy look like on this texture or card?
What does your exact hand want to do?
That's it for this week.
See you next time!
Whenever you're ready, here's how I can help you:
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