If position is power, then the blinds are a tax. You’re forced to put chips in the pot with random cards, and you’ll have to play the rest of the hand out of position. That makes the Small Blind (SB) and Big Blind (BB) the trickiest seats at the table.
But don’t worry—there are smart ways to protect yourself, save chips, and even turn the blinds into weapons when the situation is right. This time, we’ll discuss playing from the big blind before the flop; next time, we will talk about how to play after the flop as the big blind. Then, in future tips, we will focus on small blind play.
🎲 Did You Know? Why the Blinds Exist
Blinds were invented to give players an incentive to play hands. Without them, players could sit around waiting for premium hands forever. By forcing two players to put chips in before the cards are dealt, there’s always a pot to fight for—and those players have a reason to defend.
The Big Blind: Use Your Discount, but Don’t Donate Your Stack
The Big Blind is a weird seat: you’ve already put chips in, so you get a discount to see flops … but you’ll be out of position after the flop. Those two factors tend to push your strategy in opposite directions.
Think of it like a coupon—great when used wisely, expensive when used on junk. You’ve already put 1 BB in the pot—that’s a real discount on the “price” of seeing a flop. You also get to see the true price before you decide (you are usually the last player to act before the flop, so you don’t have to worry about someone raising the price after you call). That means you can use your coupon on things that hold value—pocket pairs, broadways (both cards Ten or higher), Ace-high hands, and most suited hands (you can fold the worst ones that don’t have a high card and are not connected enough to make a straight)—and skip the junk that rarely pays you back (most offsuit hands with one or both low cards).
The catch: after the flop you’re out of position (you act first), which makes winning the hand—and maximizing your wins—a lot harder. So even with a coupon, you don’t want to “buy” bad items. (We will cover what to do after the flop in our next tip.)
Don’t Forget To Re-Raise Your Best Hands
Although your main strategy in the Big Blind is to call, you still want to 3-bet (re-raise) your best hands to get even more chips in the pot. Think big pocket pairs (Tens or higher) and your best Ace-highs (perhaps A-J and better).1 These hands are strong enough to try to get more money in the pot, even though you will be out of position. Re-raise to about 3 or 4 times the size of the opponent’s raise (this will usually be about 6 or 7 big blinds in our games where min-raising is the norm).2
What If No One Raises Pre-Flop?
Interestingly, your strategy is relatively similar whether the players before you limp or raise. When the action limps to you, you still want to raise those strong pairs and Ace-highs (4 BBs is a good raise size, but you can raise bigger if there is more than one player in the pot with you). And you still want to consider moving all-in with those medium/small pairs and offsuit Ace-highs.
The main difference is that instead of having to decide where to draw the line on junk hands to fold, you get to just check everything but your strongest hands and see what develops on the flop.
Some Quick Examples
CO raises 2 BB → you (BB) A♦9♦: Call.
BTN raises 2 BB → you (BB) Q♣5♦: Fold.
HJ raises 2 BB → you (BB) QQ: 3-bet (re-raise).
SB raises 3 BB → you (BB) K♠J♠: Call.
Five limpers → you (BB) A♣K♣: Raise to about 6–8 big blinds (because of so many limpers).
Notice how we’re folding weak offsuit hands, calling suited/connected hands, and raising our premiums.
“But…” Common Objections
“I already put in 1 BB—I should see a flop.”
That’s the sunk cost trap. Calling another 1–2 BB with a hand that rarely wins is how stacks disappear slowly (or quickly if you are unlucky enough to flop a second-best hand). Use your coupon only on hands that play well.
“It’s only a min-raise.”
Cheap preflop doesn’t mean cheap postflop—especially out of position. Fold the ugly offsuit stuff; invest in hands that can make top pair, straights, and flushes.
“If I fold I’ll look weak.”
Good poker folds a lot. Save your chips for spots where you can 3-bet for value or flop strong and apply pressure after the flop.
Takeaway Challenge (for Our Next Game)
The good news: from the big blind, you mostly want to just call pre-flop, which is something that our players do naturally. So your challenges for next game relate to the other two options:
- Raise (or 3-bet) a premium hand from the BB. Pick a big pair or strong Ace-high hand to raise. If everyone has limped to you, raise to at least 4 big blinds to get the chips into the pot early; if there was a raise before, you raise to about 3 or 4 times the size of their raise.
- Fold the junk. The next time you are in the big blind with a bad offsuit hand like K♠️2❤️, Q♦️6♣️, J❤️7♣️, or 9♦️6♠️, just fold and save your chips for the next hand.
Next game, try to notice how much you save by folding junk vs. how much you win when you 3-bet premium hands.
What’s Next?
Now that we know what to do before the flop, what do we do with all those marginal, speculative hands after the flop? That’s what we will discuss next time.
- You may be thinking “if I only re-raise these hands, won’t my opponents know that I have a good hand when I re-raise?” That’s the right way to think! And there are two answers.
First, since you are raising with both good paired hands (e.g. AA and KK) and good unpaired hands (e.g. AQ and AJ), your opponents still won’t know how strong your hand is, either before or after the flop. For example, if a player holds KQ, they might happily call if you have JJ, but not so much if you have AQ. Or if they have 99, they might be happy to call against AJ, but not against TT.
Similarly, on a flop with low cards, you could have a strong overpair or a marginal Ace-high hand that missed the flop. Likewise, on an Ace-high flop, you could now have top pair (a great hand) or an underpair (like JJ) that just got weaker. So your opponents still don’t have enough information to play perfectly against you.
The second, and more advanced, answer is that if you want to really play optimally, you can “balance” these strong 3-betting hands with some weaker bluffs. The best hands to bluff with vary depending on the exact situation, but it will usually include some suited connectors (like T-9 suited, 9-8 suited, and 8-7 suited) or weaker Ace-high and King-high hands (like A-8 offsuit or K-6 offsuit).
Picking the right 3-bet bluffs is a more advanced topic that we won’t address too much in these PPC tips. But feel free to let me know if you have questions on this and I’d be happy to help.
↩︎ - Pro Tip (with about 30 big blinds or less): If you really want to take your game up a notch, consider jamming (re-raising all-in) with the medium and low pairs as well as the offsuit versions of your good Ace-highs. Why? These hands are very strong, but are not as easy to play after the flop. (Want to know just how strong different hands are? Stay tuned for our next Poker Math Made Easy tip where we will discuss the odds of different hand types winning against other hand types.) So theoretically your best play is to move all-in and either pick up what’s already in the pot or get to see all five cards with a strong hand. (Note that even many experienced players are not doing this properly, so no worries if you can’t quite get up the nerve to try it.) ↩︎