I’m writing this because I hear this question asked so often, “What should I ideally do against really loose aggressive opponents?“.

bullying

It’s a good question of course, and I often see lots of regulars at tables not responding well to loose aggressive play. When facing an overly aggressive opponent, I tend to see most people do one of the following things (read mistakes) – 1) Most people tend to tighten up, thinking they can just sit back and wait for the overly aggressive opponent to make some big mistake. 2) They just keep playing their same game.

With mass multi-tablers, you can’t always find and adjust to your opponents, but if you’re playing too many tables to not be able to notice the golden goose in front of you, then it’s time to cut back on the tables. You could make way more money just paying attention and adjusting properly.

So I say to you, this is what you do to adjust properly against bad loose aggressive opponents:

1) Most loose aggressive opponents are not very good. So what do you want to do against bad opponents? You want to get into heads up pots against them. So if you have someone opening and playing a lot of hands, then you start 3-betting a lot of your non-polarized raising range (the hands you might call with like KQo,KJs, A9s, etc…). And you can open it up as much as you think you can handle, but the key point is that you don’t get tighter, and you don’t just call. You don’t need to 3-bet large either. If you’re planning on really opening up your 3-betting range versus them (which is what I do), then if they open to 3 BB’s for example, you can 3-bet to 7.5 BBs. This will dissuade other regulars to get involved, and get you into a re-raised pot against someone who will make big mistakes with hands, and usually out level themselves. You also want to make sure you’re doing this in position. If you’re out of position against your opponent, then use more discretion in opening your range.

2)If they bet into you, raise or fold. Don’t sit there and call unless you have a monster and you’re just looking to trap. If they bet into you on the flop, and you have to pair, raise for value. If you’re re-popped, you can usually let it go because most bad loose aggressive’s won’t get too crazy in re-raised pots (and that’s why you re-raise pre-flop). 🙂

3) Most bad loose aggressive’s will be aggressive in small pots post flop, but they will almost always slow down in bigger pots. So don’t out level yourself, but stay aggressive against them, and if the pot gets big and you don’t have a big hand, then let it go. I don’t like absolutes of course, so there will be good times to call them down slim like when there’s lots of missed draws, and there hand doesn’t make much sense. But in general I’ve found it to be true that if you just take the initiative pre-flop and 3-bet, they will play more cautiously post flop against you.

4) Most importantly, if there’s been money going in, and you don’t have a hand, don’t bluff them. Because they bluff a lot, they expect others to bluff a lot as well, so you’re going to get a lot of hero calls made against you. You want to make small bluffs when you have equity, and in general use their image against them, and bet really big when you do have a hand.

5) Which brings me to my last point. If you do make a big hand, over bet, over shove, etc… especially if your hand looks at all like it may have missed. You can get them to call down with a surprising range of hands because most loose aggressive’s like the idea of being the “bully” at the table, and they don’t like to be bullied themselves. Remember, they are playing mostly based on psychological motivations, and you’re playing for money. So use that understanding against them.

 

So Bully the bully at your table… and do it wisely, and you’ll find a TON more profit! I love playing against bad loose aggressive’s personally. They are some of the easiest players and most profitable to play against if you have a game plan and execute. I hope the above helps you!