The power of changing gears

Watching other players being effective at what they do is a good way to learn extra techniques and patterns that can be applied to your own game.

I watched one player last night give an extreme example of what "changing gears" means, and how to use it to your advantage.

At the start of the tournament, he appeared to be perhaps the ultimate aggressive fish. On every hand that at least had one re-raiser and one caller, he would go all in. Basically, whenever the pot grew to a size over 10x the bb, he would go all in.

You might assume some card selection went into his all ins, but the hand history would indicate otherwise. His lowest hand that he went all in was Q 4 off!

At first he scooped a couple of big pots until people got a better idea of his range, over the next half hour he busted out and rebought (at 10 bucks ago) SEVEN TIMES.

Eventually he did get lucky, and with a few all in moves and a good catch or two, he became the big stack at the table.

Long story short, over the first hour this player was a maniac, going all in on any big pots, willing to rebuy as many times as necessary until he got a big hit.

In that hour all players remaining at the table got a very good idea of his wild play, and you started to see a lot more reraise aggression on second pair, as his range was so low.

So, my calling range on this guy, IF I was able to isolate him in the pot, was any A 9 or higher, any pair 77s or higher, any two face cards with the possible exception of QJ off.

And I doubled up through him once in that first hour with that strategy. All good right?

Well, unknown to the rest of the table, this player who I am sure all of us put somewhere in the "super lucky donk streak" category, suddenly tightened up. Suddenly his calling and re-raising range made a lot more sense.

In the next hour he succeeded in devestating the table. People went all in on second pairs when he had top pair, he started folding to agression. He continued getting lots of action due to his first hour of highly notable maniac play, and continued getting paid off on his premium hands.

I did notice that he was playing less hands, and that his all in calls were starting to have meat behind them, but like the other unfortunate players who lost their stacks to this guy in the second hour of play, I called an all in when my ace hit on the flop (my cards A 9), and he had A Q.

I started seeing evidence of him changing gears, but for whatever reason (also due to my small stack, less than 10x bb) I disregarded that information.

I don't regret my action, at such a small stack against an aggressive player A 9 on is not a bad all in move, but I am much more interested in what made this guy effective. Two things:

1. He played initially a memorable playing style that was sure to be noted by the table. Within that first hour all but the most innattentive players would know his range.

2. He completely changed 180 degrees his calling range after that first hour, and one by one picked of the rest of the table on his now premium hands.

The big flaw of this strategy of course is that you risk too much to start with (in my opinion), and then you really have to count on a good amount of premium hands or at least strong flops after the first hour of wildness to pull it off.

Both of which are not risks I am willing to take.

However, it does illustrate in the extreme the power of switching gears, in this case from maniac to tight conservative.

The adjustment period that other players go through is the ultimate point of exploitation.

So, two keys here to switching gears:

1. Your playing style or hands you have hit recently are notable, either through their size or strength. The other players at the table MUST have you on a certain range of hands.

2. Your change should be sudden and fairly drastic. If you have been playing tight conservative, your sudden large raises and aggression will initially be folded to, as players give you credit for a tight range. And, as in the extreme example above, if you are in lots of pots, raise on anything, and get caught on a few bluffs, then playing a premium hand in the same way as you played the loose hands can net some big results.

Generally, the safest way to play a big tournament at the lower blind levels is play aggressive conservative for the first hour or so, and then suddenly switch to aggressive lose and continue until players start to lower their calling range, then switch back.

The transition between your playing styles will end up being luctrative.