Squeezing is the Devil, or at least the spawn of the Devil

Posted by Verstehen

March 20, 2008

I say this with all due respect to Azn_cutie’s recent post on squeezing. In fact, I’m really intrigued by his idea of trying to squeeze blind just by recognizing favorable situations.

BUT as someone who only plays online 6-max no-limit, my firm opinion is that excessive squeezing kills games. Once a small-stakes no-limit game has settled into the pattern of raise-call-squeeze or raise-reraise-fold, it becomes very very tedious. I won’t say that the good players don’t still have an advantage. Knowing how to get value out of big hands, and when to four-bet a squeezer are skills that good players possess. But as someone who really enjoys play on the flop and later streets, I find this style of play crippling. It makes small pairs (my favorite hands) much less viable, and it just becomes a tit-for-tat exercise where you squeezes me last time, so I’ll squeeze you this time.

Dan Harrington was on the Pokercast yesterday, and even he admitted that squeezing has become too common in no-limit games. Of course, he and Phil Gordon and every other poker writer are somewhat responsible for this situation, but I was glad that he could recognize that his trademark play is overdone.

Some people will say, correctly, that we should just adjust. Limp more. Tighten up. Don’t open-raise 33 in early position. Don’t flat call on the button with a speculative hand, since you know that someone in the blinds will squeeze behind you. All reasonable suggestions. But I still say it ruins the game.

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