The first question I want to put out there is about population tendencies in Spins at say $15s and $30s. My perception is that both the rec population and reg population call widely v button raises 3 way, albeit with different ranges and sounder logic in the case of the latter.So if we sit down at a table with 2 unknowns (or say Sharkscope tells us villain is a reg but we have no prior playing stats) would you proceed on that assumption ?

Now if that is agreed, I want to think about our preflop button range and sizing. Is there a case for a somewhat tight RFI range along the lines of 55+ A2s+ A5o+ K5s+ K9o+ Q7s+ QTo+ J7s+ JTo+ T7s+ T9o+ 97s+ 87s 76s. So just about 30%. I have seen a lot of charts from various sources and most are at least somewhat looser than this.While any comments about specific hands to exclude or include are welcome the specifics are not the important point. It is more the broad shape/width of what our range should look like in response to how the population plays.Of course, we can make a case for playing wider v recs to exploit skill and positional edge but equally sticky rec preflop tendencies may be replicated postflop: are we better playing a tighter range preflop and betting aggressively for value as our primary source of profit v recs with bluffing being a less frequent, secondary, approach ? If so, then a tighter range would seem implicit ?


The other question is this .If the population assumption is correct and we are playing a tight preflop range along the lines suggested, is there a case a for a larger open raise size ? Of course, we lose more when we are 3bet but with a tighter range it is harder to exploit us. We are also denying equity and building pots with a stronger range as per basic principles. While there are of course antes in MTTs which do make a significant difference , conventional button min raising wisdom has been challenged and I would be interested to hear arguments as to why/why not a similar rethink would not be appropriate to the almost universal min raise approach we see in Spins.

getting called more /= having to raise less