Elite Poker Coach Uses “Anti-GTO” Strategy

Let’s face it. Improving at poker in 2024 can be tough.

A lot of modern poker study methods come down to little more than memorizing solver-generated strategies and charts. This has proven effective for many, but it’s undeniably boring for most players.

But poker coach Uri Peleg* has come up with a different approach that emphasizes creativity and flexibility.

*Uri has coached numerous players who went on to win millions on the felt, including current top pro Barak Wisbrod.

This new approach is meant for players who want to win, but don’t want to spend countless hours studying solvers.

For today’s article, I have pulled 3 unique insights from Uri’s latest strategy video. He plays a short session of online poker, demonstrating the Poker Blueprint approach.

Each takeaway will be centered around a hand history from his session.

Note: Want to master winning poker strategies without confusing solvers or complex math? Check out Uri Peleg’s new course “The Poker Blueprint” here. Get access now.

Important Background

Before getting into the hands and takeaways, you should understand the main principle of Uri’s Poker Blueprint strategy.

Always start by considering what pot size your hand wants. Then, try to navigate to that pot size as the hand progresses.

Uri will refer to “the pot size your hand wants” throughout these hands and the Poker Blueprint course. 

Takeaway #1: Take people out of their comfort zone with creative lines

Your opponents might be well-studied in the most common situations in poker. So a key way to beat them can be to take them out of their comfort zone with creative lines and bet sizings. Take a look at this hand that Uri played at 200NL:

Preflop: Uri is dealt Ac 7c in the Cutoff
Uri raises 2bb. Big Blind calls.

Flop (4.5bb): Kh Jc 8d
Big Blind checks. Uri checks.

Turn (4.5bb): 9s
Big Blind checks. Uri bets 3.4bb. Big Blind calls.

River (11.3bb): Jh
Big Blind checks. Uri bets 16.9bb. Big Blind folds.

Uri checks the flop because his hand is pretty weak and doesn’t want to play a large pot.

He then turns his hand into a bluff on the turn since the opponent showed weakness by checking. Now check out Uri’s thoughts on his decision to bet the river with a 150% pot sizing:

The Jh river is not the most intuitive card to keep blasting on. And this is a spot where his ability to read the story is very, very important.

So generally speaking, when the pot is too big for your hand, it’s a potential bluff candidate. And you can choose to bluff in all sorts of routes. If I start by going bet-bet-bet, the pressure on him is just to not overfold to direct aggression. And that’s one of the things that people are most practiced at, even if they probably still do overfold.

By going check-bet-bet, I’m putting pressure on him to defend correctly with a range that he’s much less practiced in playing. And when people are in these spots where they’re winging it, a lot of the time, they kind of give their hand away. So by checking twice, a lot of people will not have enough strong hands in their range.

He had a chance to be aggressive once I checked back and he didn’t go for it. So I can attack. That’s like waving a red flag in front of a bull. This is a spot that many, many people are messing up consistently.

But given that I bet big on the turn, how can I still bet big on the Jh river? Would I bet a Jx on the turn this big? Am I saying that I have a straight or Pocket Nines? Would I still bet Pocket Aces on the river or a good Kx? All these questions should have been in your head. Also how often does he donk bet his Jx on the river? Because if he donk bets all his Jx, I can keep betting my Kx.

The truth is, to me, until someone proves themselves at these lower limits, I’m like: You look weak. I’m putting on pressure.

Takeaway #2: When you bet the river, know what you are representing

Learning to tell a consistent story is extremely important, especially when bluffing. Take a look at this hand and accompanying analysis from Uri at 200NL:

Preflop: Uri is dealt 8s 7d in the Big Blind
Lojack raises 2bb. Uri calls.

Flop (4.5bb): Js 9d 2h
Uri checks. Lojack bets 1.8bb. Uri calls.

Turn (8.1bb): Ad
Uri checks. Lojack checks.

River (8.1bb): 4d
Uri bets 22bb. Lojack folds.

It’s worth noting that Uri’s call preflop is probably a bit too loose depending on the rake (though he’s probably playing a bit looser to generate examples for the video).

He check-calls the flop with his gutshot straight draw and then faces a check-back on the turn. Here is how Uri decides to approach this river:

So like we said, we want to attack these discontinued aggression spots. You could go for all sorts of sizes here, but we want to tell a coherent story. And the story I’m going to tell is I have something really, really strong.

The thing with this spot is that there are a lot of hands that missed. It’s not easy for me to have an Ax. I can’t bet big with a Jx. So if I make a normal-sized bet, it’s very easy to call.

The thing you want to be thinking about here is the narrative of the hand. When you bet the river, which hand are you telling the other guy you have? You could tell him you have a Jx. But then the bet would need to be very small. And you could tell him you have an Ax and then the bet would be medium. But there are not many Ax hands you can have. And then the last option is you could tell him you have a flush or two pair.

In theory, your opponent should check-back some draws and strong Ax to make your life kind of tough. But unless they show you they can do that, this is a very tough bet to call. It puts a lot more pressure on people to know what’s going on. So just a way of attacking this discontinued aggression combined with thinking about the narrative and what hand I’m repping.

Takeaway #3: There are multiple ways to keep the pot size small with a mediocre hand

Just check-calling is not the only way to get to a cheap showdown with a marginal hand.

Preflop: Uri is dealt Ah Jd on the Button
Hijack raises 2bb. Uri calls.

Flop (5.5bb): Kh Jc 8d
Hijack bets 1.4bb. Uri raises 3.9bb. Hijack folds.

Take a look at Uri’s thoughts on his decision to check-raise small as a method to keep the pot size small:

How big a pot does Ace-Jack offsuit want? When my opponent bets 1.4bb, the answer is that I want a little bit more in the pot, but not very much. There are all sorts of ways you can accomplish that. One would be to call and one would actually be to raise small.

3.9bb is roughly the pot size my Ace-Jack is aiming at. So let’s see if they are capable of reacting to this ridiculously small raise. It doesn’t make sense. Why would I raise a flopped set so small? It’s a very weird size. But it’s very tough to react to this. Imagine you’re him. You have Pocket Tens, Pocket Nines, Pocket Queens, or Ace-Five suited. It’s very, very hard.

Did you catch part 1 of this series about the $74K+ Doug vs Mariano hand?

Check it out here if you haven’t.

Don’t Do This in Poker! Doug Polk vs Mariano High Stakes Analysis

 

Note: Want to discover how to make the right play no matter the hand? Uri Peleg’s brand-new course “The Poker Blueprint” allows you to do just that. Get access now.