This will be my first in a series of posts about various moves and strategies I keep in my arsenal in no-limit holdem tournaments. The first move I want to cover is what I call the delayed steal. The basic premise behind the delayed steal is that, rather than a typical steal which I might execute preflop or with a bet of around 2/3 of the pot on the flop, I can instead just smooth call (or check-call) my opponent's continuation bet on the flop, with an eye towards stealing the pot on the turn or river if I continue to believe my opponent is weak.

The delayed steal can be preferable to the normal flop steal-bet for a number of reasons. First, it allows me to check some hands on the flop, or to call some small bets, and thus provides me with the opportunity to see some free cards in other situations later in the same game, because my observant opponents will remember me as someone who is fully willing to check the flop but then bet on the turn or river to take down a pot. Second, just looking at the number of chips involved, the delayed steal will usually net me more money than a steal on the flop because, if executed correctly, I will convince my opponent to make a bet of between 2/3 and the full size of the pot, which I will call and then have more chips to steal in the pot on later rounds. One other nice side effect of executing a nice delayed steal once in a while is that it will act to prevent my opponents from making standard continuation bets on the flop, because they know I might call them and make them lay down to me on later streets. Anytime I can make my opponents play more timidly against me, that plays right into my hands as an aggressive player myself.

So how does the delayed steal look in practice? I'm in the Mookie this week, and I limp preflop from middle position with AK, with one player already limped in from first position. Four players see a flop of Q92, and the first three of us check it around on the flop. Last position then bets 100 chips into a 135-chip pot, and the first two players fold. With the action back to me, I have no reason to believe that my opponent actually hit this flop. He only limped in preflop with 4 other players already in, so his range of starting hands is very wide, and now he only bet about 2/3 the pot, and only when it had been checked around to him by 4 players on the flop. So I figure my AK could likely be good here. But rather than raise, I just smooth call his flop bet. Often times, to an observant player the smooth call is more scary than a raise, because many players might raise with a decent-but-not-great hand to find out where they're at. The smooth call can indicate a draw, but it can also indicate a big hand like flopped trips, two pairs and similar holdings. So here I just smooth call what I perceive to be a position-based bet on the flop and with just two overcards, with the clear plan to take this pot away from my opponent on a later street. Plus, with two overcards like my AK, letting another card fall before I execute my steal can help me in that I have six outs that can fall to give me top pair on the turn.

The on the turn, an offsuit 6, I check it again, waiting to see if my opponent is willing to fire another bullet at the pot with what I still figure to be an inferior hand. He checks behind, all but saying out loud that he does not have a hand he is willing to play here, and basically begging me to take the pot on the river. Which is exactly what I do when the river card pairs the 9, also dropping a third heart and creating more scare cards than my opponent wants to consider. And providing me the perfect opportunity to spring the trap:

My opponent folds, and I pile 335 chips into my stack early on in a multi-table tournament. Interestingly, this move is often best executed with a hand like this, where I might not actually have been stealing after all since my AK was likely the best hand on every street. But the important point is that a delayed steal can bring several benefits (in addition to winning the actual hand in question) when combined in an apparently random fashion with other continuation bets and steal-moves on the flop in no-limit holdem tournament (and cash game) play.

My next post will show the reverse of this, how I can also maneuver my opponent to believe that he is doing the delayed steal move on me, and use that to chip up nicely early in tournaments as well.