Quote:
Originally Posted by itsatarp
But from theory, it's quite clear that even a Mississippi straddle from the BTN is a bad idea for a winning player.
In poker, you can prove almost any theory by making the “right” assumptions.
You’re making one here: BTN is a winning player. The majority of players aren’t winning though. So the average player on the button might actually benefit from shallower stacks. If straddling gets your expectation from -10BB to -8BB, that move is +EV for you.
Now let’s assume BTN is a winning player in that game. That doesn’t mean he’s the best player at the table. Maybe he’s a 5BB winner in that game with two 15BB winners to his left and everyone else is a losing player. Putting those two players on his left in an even tougher spot by having to act first preflop might be worth the investment.
But the main assumptions we make when analyzing spots like this in theory is that we say other players know how to adapt to the straddle. And real life proves that false over and over again.
A couple times a year I travel through Tunica and play at the Horseshoe. That game allows players to straddle the BTN. Over the course of the evening, there’s always at least one player who asks “what’s that?” when they see the button straddle. That means information is distributed asymmetrically with some players having zero knowledge about how to play in that spot.
Anecdotal evidence proves over and over again that the vast majority of small stakes players have little idea what they do in general and zero idea when it comes to straddles.