My style at the table, when I'm playing my best game, is definitely tight aggressive. I may occasionally bluff big or semi-bluff small, but most of the time I'm betting top pair or better and trying to get value out of the hand. I make a lot of lay downs that other people might not, just to be safe and to avoid tough decisions on later streets. Of course, other players know this, which frequently makes them think it's a good idea to bluff me, because they know I'll get away from a lot of marginal hands, especially if the pot is small. Lately, this has been a big source of profit for me at the tables. I'll give a recent example.

I was playing in a short handed $2-5 game and I limped in the big blind with A8 off suit. Several other players limp, including Greg, in middle position. Flop comes A64 with 2 hearts, giving me top pair A with an 8 kicker. I bet out $25, about the size of the pot, and Greg instantly calls me (instant call is almost always a sign of a draw). All other players fold. Turn card is an off suit K, which changes absolutely nothing about the hand, so I bet $60 and Greg hesitates for a second and then calls. River is another 6, pairing the board. So, now board reads AK466 with no possible flush. I put Greg on a flush draw or an A, since he never raised. So, I bet out $100 on the river. He takes a while. Then, he pushes his remaining $400 into the pot, a raise of $300.

Now, Greg is the type of player who is frequently trying to out-play people in hands. He will bluff whenever he thinks he can take down the pot. So, I thought he may have missed his flush and was just trying to buy the pot, but before I did anything, I needed to run through the possibilities.

If Greg had a set of 6s or 4s, he surely would have raised on the flop, since there was a possible flush draw on the flop. He'd want to bet me off that flush draw. Same goes for 2 pair like A6 or A4. He would not want to let the flush get there.

If he had AA, he surely would have raised pre-flop, and even if he did limp with the AA, and let's say he slow played it on the flop, having flopped a set of As, he surely would have raised the turn. He did not do any of those things.

Ok, so what does that leave? How about a weak A, like I have. If he has an A, the off suit K that fell on the turn made it so that our kickers would not play, so we'd be chopping the pot, both with AA66K. He could have AK, but again, he would not limp with it pre-flop.

After going through all of this, I just could not put him on anything that beat me, so I called him and he instantly mucked his hand. Apparently, he missed his flush draw and was trying to buy the pot.

My tight table image made him think he could just drop the hammer and bluff me off any medium strength hand on the river by pushing in his whole stack. The mistake he made was that he just did not have a believable story. There were no scare cards and he wasn't really representing anything that made any sense.

This kind of thing happens to me all the time, when aggressive players peg me as a tight player. They think they can bully me off a hand. From my perspective, the important thing is knowing what my opponent is capable of. If he's totally capable of a big bluff and is making a huge raise that is not looking for a call, then that sets off a red flag for me.