More Pre-Flop All-In Frustration

Recently, I wrote about my frustration with Pre-Flop All-Ins. This sparked quite the heated debate between one of my friends and I. As a result, I figured I’d dive into the topic yet again; this time, offering a little clarification.

First of all, I’m not saying that I have never gone all-in before the Flop: I have. My frustration comes when people play online, and automatically, without reason, and go all-in on every hand. Not once, not twice, but EVERY hand. A bulk of the time, they’re just picking up the blinds, but it gets incredibly frustrating.

I realize the strategy behind this is for people to add some pretty hefty padding to their bank. And I’ve got to admit, it works. But there’s got to be a limit, or a cut off, at some point. I was watching an online tournament the other day when 9 hands in a row a man went all-in before the Flop without being challenged. Again, he just picked up the blinds, but at this point in the tournament, he racked up several hundred in chips.

Granted, there was nothing keeping people from challenging him and calling, but at that point in the tournament, I don’t know that it would be worth it. You would have to have an incredible pot to go forward with something like that.

The flip side to this is while you are padding your bank, you run the risk of somebody not only calling you, but beating you. You’ll lose more money than you would have gained. However, if you go all-in when you actually have a decent hand, then maybe it is worth it. That way, you can still pad your bank, but aren’t at as high of a risk for getting beat if somebody calls you.

While padding your bank by going all-in is a decent strategy, it still reeks of unprofessionalism, poor sportsmanship, and immaturity to me.