How to Beat Limpers When Playing from the Blinds

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One question that I often get from players is how to play from the blinds when facing multiple limpers. This isn’t an uncommon scenario in low stakes games, so learning how to adjust can help significantly improve your win rate.

In this article, I’ll try to break down some strategies to help you punish the limpers for their mistakes.

There are several ways you can adjust, and the important thing is to stay alert and flexible. Players will likely react to your adjustments, but if you can stay one step ahead of them and change your strategies on the fly, they won’t be able to catch up.

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Knowing Your Limpers

Before anything else, you’ll need to observe the game and figure out the kind of hands these players are limping with. Are they only doing it with weak hands to try and see the flop, or are they also mixing in some very strong hands like pocket aces and kings?

In most cases, the original limper is your biggest concern, as they are the most likely to have a good hand. Other players limping behind will usually have much weaker ranges.

After assessing the situation, you can start tailoring your strategy from the blinds. In general, you’ll want to raise with your big hands and some bluffs, both of which we’ll cover in the following sections.

When it comes to sizing, you can experiment with different sizes and see what works best. You’ll want to raise pretty big to make the pot odds not as appealing (i.e., six or seven big blinds), but you can even try bigger sizes.

If your opponents are only limping with weak hands that can’t stand raises, you can really go for it and make it 15x. It is a huge sizing, but if they are pretty much never calling, you’ll just be printing money.

When there are several limpers in front of you, and you’re in the small blind, you’ll be getting great pot odds to complete and see the flop.

Thus, you should be doing this with all hands that can reasonably flop the virtual nuts – suited connectors, small suited aces, small pairs, etc.

Despite great pot odds, there are still hands you should be folding. These are junky offsuite hands that can get you in trouble, like K5o or Q7o. The problem with these hands is that they have bad reverse implied odds, and the easiest way to avoid the trouble is to not get involved in the first place.

Being out of position and playing hands like these, you’ll usually either win a small pot or lose a big one.

When it comes to raising, you want to do it with two types of hands. You can raise for value with big pocket pairs and hands like ATs+ and AJo+. For bluffs, you can pick hands that contain blockers but don’t play particularly well after the flop, such as Ax, Kx, and Qx off-suite.

Once you get to the flop, your strategy should be very straightforward. While you might get an occasional situation where you can bluff and steal the pot, betting into multiple opponents without a decent hand is ill-advised.

You put almost nothing into the pot, so you don’t need to battle too hard to win these. Don’t put too much money into the middle unless you have a very strong hand or a huge draw.

In the big blind, you can check and see the free flop every time, so you’ll be doing this with the majority of your hands. However, you’ll still have a mix of hands that you’ll want to raise for value and as a bluff.

When it comes to value hands, the range is similar to that from the small blind – big pairs, big aces, and some suited broadways.

You can use some of the off-suite Ax, Kx, Qx, and Jx hands as bluffs. Your sizing will depend on the things I’ve mentioned earlier in this article, i.e., the type of range you expect the limpers to have.

Since you will be forced to see many flops, even with some junky hands, your flop strategy is very important.

When you get a big hand or a big draw, act according to your opponents’ tendencies. If they will check behind a lot, you’ll want to be leading out with these hands to take the initiative and win the pot right there and then.

When you find yourself with a mediocre holding and face a bet and a call or a bet and a raise after you check, the best approach is to fold. You don’t want to be chasing with a hand like the second or third pair here, as even when you do improve, you’ll often end up losing a big pot.

The same applies to draws – continue only with draws that can result in the nuts or very close to it, and get rid of all your junky draws that can get you in trouble.

How to Beat Limpers: Summary

The biggest factor in beating limpers will be your ability to correctly asses their tendencies and act accordingly. Adjust your strategy and your raise sizes based on this knowledge and your win rate will improve significantly.

Of course, you have to stay alert and be aware that other players will try to adjust to your adjustments. For example, if they notice you’re attacking their limps, they might switch around and start limping with good hands to try and trap you.

Things are always very dynamic at the poker table, and you have to keep up. But as long as you stay one step ahead of the competition, you’ll be in a great spot!