Phil Galfond Poker Strategy

Phil Galfond is universally regarded as one of the greatest players in the history of the game. 'OMGClayAiken' is both an amazing live and online player, he's a great teacher and poker theorist. Phil is pretty much the 'whole package'.

Unlike some other notable pros, who almost never share their strategic approach with the rest of the poker world Phil made a thriving business out of teaching other poker enthusiasts how to become good at playing cards.

The Champion of Balance

Before there was GTO there was the balance. Phil Galfond was one of the pioneers of range vs. range hand analysis. Instead of asking questions like "should I cbet KTo on a Q75 board" he was one of the first players to think about his entire range for cbetting on a certain board.

'OMGClayAiken' made his game as hard to read and as close to the game theory optimal approach in times long before the first line of PokerSnowie code was ever written. Proper range balance was an important part of almost every coaching video produced by Galfond from the good old days of BlueFirePoker to the modern times of RunItOnce.

Aggression and Discipline

In this iconic hand against Eli Elezra, Phil Galfond displayed a tremendous level of skill and discipline. The hand started with a healthy raise from David Benyamine and a solid, aggressive 3bet from Phil with a hand that has solid blockers but it's also somewhat close to the bottom of his range (always paying attention to the balance) - K5o. Galfond is also one of the few players in this lineup capable of realizing the fact that passive defend against a 4bet with a wide range is not an outrageous proposition if we really take a closer look at the poker math and how the ranges work.

If we add some recent history to the mix (Eli got outplayed in a previous hand by Lex Veldhuis) we get enough reasons to make a call against the 4bet. The flop is a very trivial call with a top pair. Even though K5o is near the bottom of Phil's preflop range, flopping a Kings is just about the best thing he can hope for when playing this sort of a hand and therefore fold would've been too weak even against a relatively strong range.

Turn is a disciplined check, not much point in betting against a polarized range of the opponent (it's hard to have a lot of medium strength hands on the 99K9 board). Once the river hits and Elezra elects to make a bet Galfond realizes that even though he's most likely capable of bluffing some percentage of time he's not that likely to do that with a bet/check/bet line.

Phil has enough discipline to disregard the absolute strength of his hand and fold a full house that can't really compete with the top of his opponent's range. Lastly, "I would've called a small bet" remark shows the deep understanding of how huge of an impact betsizing has in spots like that. An amazing example of aggression, discipline and deep understanding of the game.

Another similar though arguably less spectacular example of the same principle showing the consistency of Galfond's game.

Great Game Sense

Another iconic example of the master at work. The hand starts with a very standard 3bet from Galfond with AK against Tom Dwan's preflop open, followed by a standard cbet with a backdoor flush draw and two overcards on a fairly dry 9h2s3s board.

Dwan correctly realizes that given the context of a somewhat shallow sit and go he can put a lot of pressure on his opponent with marginal equity and Phil realizes that given the context Dwan is extremely unlikely to have a strong hand on this particular board texture (hands like 22 or 33 are most likely out of Dwan's range by now and Galfond is blocking some of the combo draw combinations).

Adjusting to the Opponents

In this interesting hand from the last season of High Stakes Poker, Phil Galfond shows that he's capable of extreme adjustments based on the opponents he's playing against. While there's nothing exceptional in iso-raising the straddle of a recreational opponent, most players would just muck their open-ended straight draw on the flop when faced with a large raise and poor immediate odds.

Galfond correctly realizes that with deep stacks, position and two recreational players in the pot his implied odds are so huge that he can overall the raise and still show a profit in the long run. Galfond proceeds to choose a solid betsizing once he hits his draw on the turn to manage the pot correctly and hopefully get as much value as possible by the river. Again, some players would've just called the turn in position with the intention of inducing some bluffs from the opponent but Phil knows that raise is absolutely necessary to maximize his EV.

The river brings one of the worst cards in the deck for hero's range and an unorthodox bluff from an otherwise loose and passive player ("I only did that because there was a nine on the board") causes Galfond to lose this expertly played hand. A casual sip of water followed by an honest "very nice hand" shows that Phil is a professional able to back his tremendous poker skill with an air-tight poker mindset.

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