If you play poker online, you find many different games and tables, each of which emphasizes different skill sets. Cash games are different than tournaments, and nine-player tables generally call for strategies that might not work as well in heads-up matches.

Heads-up play has grown in popularity, starting with NBC’s annual National Heads-Up Championship and extending to a bracelet event in the World Series of Poker. One of the keys to successful heads-up play is an acute awareness of where you stand in a hand, particularly with meager holdings.

The ability to extract value when playing something less than the nuts transfers nicely to bigger no-limit hold ’em tables because you frequently find yourself facing only one opponent and are looking for small edges to build your stack.

At the World Poker Tour’s Doyle Brunson Five Diamond World Poker Classic at Las Vegas’ Bellagio in 2008, young pro Ryan Hughes put those skills to work. With blinds at $100 to $200 plus a $25 ante, Hughes raised to $600 from the cutoff position with the questionable holding of 7-4 offsuit.

“I hadn’t been raising much,” said Hughes, a two-time WSOP bracelet winner, “so I thought I could steal the blinds.”

Perhaps sensing a steal, young, aggressive pro Kevin Saul called from the big blind. The flop came K-6-4, rainbow, giving Hughes bottom pair and position on his opponent.

“He checked to me,” Hughes said. “I checked because I wanted to keep the pot small. I could’ve bet and maybe won the pot, but I wanted to see the turn.”

The turn came the 2 of spades. Saul bet $1,300, almost the size of the pot. Still holding just a pair of 4s, Hughes called.

“I was pretty sure I had the best hand,” he said. “There were no flush draws.”

The river came the 8 of clubs. Saul bet $1,700.

“It looks like a value bet,” Hughes said, “but I know Kevin is prone to bluffing now and then, and I was getting a little over 3-1 on the call, so I figured I might as well call.”

It turned out Saul was bluffing with J-9 offsuit.

“I’d say that call-down comes a little bit more with experience,” Hughes said. “I play a lot of heads-up, so I’m used to making a lot of marginal calls. That’s kind of my specialty in the game. You get better at playing marginal hands—third or fourth pair. You get better at reading when you’re good and when you’re not, and when it’s worth it to call.”

Table talk

Value bet: A bet usually of half the pot or smaller intended to induce a call from an opponent with the second-best hand.