Cool to play in the dark?
Pre-checking the flop – that is, before the cards are revealed – looks smart but is it clever? Barry Carter has his doubts..
Something I have noticed cropping up in card rooms recently is the “check in the dark” move. Televised poker has, to some extent, bought this move to the public consciousness, and I think a lot of players wouldn’t really be able to tell you why the chose to play it – though the more honest ones might admit that its just because they’ve seen Daniel Negreanu do it.
For those unfamiliar with the phrase, checking in the dark (or just “checking dark”) is announcing that you want to check on the next street of betting – usually the flop – before the cards have been revealed. To avoid looking like a buffoon you need to make sure that; the last round of betting is over; and you will be the first player to act in the next round.
Not only can checking dark be a tricky play to pull off, it is doubtful whether it is a valuable tool in your poker arsenal at all. It can certainly prove very costly if you don’t have any idea why you are doing it.
Dark Check Pros: To resign position. When you are the first to act in the hand, you are ‘out of position’. You have no information about whether the board has helped your opponent, which means you cant control the pot size, you leave yourself open to being re-raised or slow-played, or you may just scare away someone who would have paid you off at a later stage in the hand. When you check, as first to act, you leave the onus on another person to act – but they may well interpret your action as weakness or trapping, and act accordingly. When you check dark, though, you hand over the responsibility to act without having seen the board yourself; so your opponent cannot possibly tell if it has helped or hindered you. This means that he is, in effect, now the first to act, and has to do so with no information about your cards. So you can garner info about his hand based on his actions and how he has acted in the past, while he is still clueless about what you are holding, other than what he may have gathered from how you acted in the previous round(s).To appear weak. Checking is, in general, regarded as a sign of weakness, and you will be thought weal a lot of the time when you check dark, which means it is a perfect strategy for when you have a big hand against an aggressive opponent.
This is particularly true if there was a bit of a raising before the flop, because your opponent is almost obliged to take a stab at the pot with a continuation bet if he gets a free shot at it.
In normal circumstances, a check may be perceived as a trap, but a check in the dark will often be interpreted as an imperfect hand, such as a weak Ace or a small pair, and when the right flop comes your opponents may think they can take the pot from you. When this works, you have guaranteed at least one extra bet into the pot when a value bet from you might have stopped the action there and then. You can now decide whether your hand is worth slow-playing or re-raising to seal the deal.
To mix things up against a tough cookie. Generally I would stay away from checking dark against a tricky, skilful player who has seen and done it all, because he’s likely to be a couple steps ahead of you in the hand. There are, however, times where you are totally outplayed by a particular opponent, who can tell when you are strong and when to re-raise you off the hand.
Against this sort of player, you have to do something different if all else is failing, and maybe checking dark will throw him off course a little. It also is useful against players who are good at picking up tells, because looking at your non-verbal reaction to the flop is one of the biggest giveaways to these guys.
Dark Check Cons, you don’t know what the flop is.
Poker is all about making informed decisions, and you cannot make the best decisions if you don’t use all of the information available. When you check dark, you are acting without information that your opponent does have – the composition of the board. You wouldn’t lead troops into battle blindfolded, you wouldn’t bet dark and you certainly wouldn’t go all-in in the dark.
It allows pots to taken from you. When you check blind on the flop, you give up one of the most powerful tools in poker manual – the continuation bet. Most hands miss the flop two out of three times, and the continuation bet (a follow-up bet after a pre-flop raise) is a long term profitable strategy. Checking dark gives your opponent the opportunity take the pot from you bet when he would have laid his cards down only you had beaten him to the punch. Being the first person to act in the hands is often a powerful move, and one of the few where being out of position is an advantage.
You may be giving free cards or missing bets. If you check dark when you have a strong hand, you are likely to give you opponent a free shot at outdrawing you. If you check the flop blind and all of a sudden are staring at a flash – and straight-hevy board, you have just outplayed yourself and put yourself in a position where you probably have to fold to any bet.
The ploy is wasted on some people. Maybe because they are listening to their iPod or engrossed in conversation, some people are simply not going to notice that you have checked dark. When the dealer tells them it is their turn to act, they will just assume you have checked after the flop was revealed, and act accordingly. There are other players for whom this move is wasted, not because they haven’t been paying attention, but because they simply have no understanding of what you have done. Some players have no concept of position at all, and putting the onus on them at act first in the hand ill not change anything, because they had no idea what they were going to do on the previous street anyway.
Cool or fool? Checking in the dark certainly looks cool. It implies that you know your way around a card table, and you know your opponents so well that you can play them with your eyes closed. But checking blind is often a needlessly complicated strategy that gives too much of an advantage to your opponent, when much more straightforward approach will almost certainly bring in more profit.
You need a very good reason to check in the dark, and a certain amount of ability to pull the move off. If you’re sure you can make it work for you and against your opponents, then don’t fool yourself into thinking that you need to include it in your repertoire.
Posted by: admin
Category: News 2008
