Lesson
Range-Narrowing Street by Street
River Defense & Bluff Catching · advanced · 13 min
Tyler Forrester reviews hands with Eric by calculating minimum defense frequencies and then translating those numbers into actual range cutoffs. The lesson shows how flop min-bets, half-pot turn bets, turn check-backs, blockers, and low-board river bluff-catching affect which hands should continue.
Key takeaways
- Versus a min-bet, defend roughly 80-83% of your range; fold only the bottom portion, such as hands with no draw or backdoor equity.
- Versus a half-pot bet, plan to continue about two-thirds of your range before adjusting for hands you would have bet earlier.
- Do not leave too many weak showdown hands in your checking range; bet more zero-EV or vulnerable hands on the turn so you are not forced to call too wide later.
- On low, connected river runouts, avoid big bluffs when opponents retain many two-pair-plus hands and are unlikely to overfold.
- When bluff-catching rivers, compare your hand to your actual remaining range; a hand like pocket fives on 8-2-4-7-3 can be high enough in range to call even if it looks weak.