bonycamel's poker diary

Here we'll look at some of the basic concepts involved in proper Sit and Go tournament play.

In the next installment of this two-part series we'll explore some additional ideas that

should help to improve your results.

One nice thing about Sit and Go's-and, for that matter, all tournament play-is the fact that

a player can usually expect strong results after only having mastered a couple critical

ideas. Here we'll look at three of those concepts, and explore how they should inform your

play.

Concept 1-Don't 'gamble' early on the tourney.

What we mean by this is that you shouldn't go all in, or commit the majority of your chips,

on those hands where you believe you only enjoy a marginal edge. This is because the best

thing that can happen if you win is that you double up, while the worst thing that can

happen is that you bust out. If you bust out, you've lost your buy-in. But if you double up,

you haven't guaranteed yourself of doubling your money (i.e., coming in third).

Consider this- we each put twenty bucks in the pot, and we agree to flip a coin for the full

forty bucks. In a case like this we'll both expect to break even over time, since half the

time I'll lose, and half the time I'll double my money. Make sense? Of course it does. But

now let's extend this logic to a Sit and Go. For example, let's say it's the second hand of

the tournament and you have 7c 7d. It's folded to you, you raise to $50, and now the next

guy goes all in. All fold to you. Now, because of some quirk in the software, your

opponent's cards are exposed and you see he has the As Ks. Even though you're a mathematical

favorite to win the hand, you're only favored by a few percentage points. Thus, you're

basically in a 'coin flip' situation. Which means you should fold, even though you know

you're a favorite. Why? Because if you lose you're guaranteed of losing your buy in, but if

you win and double up you're not guaranteed of doubling your money since you could still

bust out before you finish third. Thus, even though you'll win about half the time, you're

not getting 'even money' or better on your bet, which makes calling here a -EV play.

Situations like this come up all the time in these tourneys, and you'll be doing yourself a

huge favor if you learn to spot them. Another example would be flopping top pair with a

good-but-not-great kicker (e.g., holding AJ on an A96 flop, or JT on a T75 flop) when an

opponent who has at least almost as many chips as you moves all in. As long as you still

have most of your original chips left in front of you it's usually a good idea to get away

from these hands and look for a better spot for your money.

Concept 2-So long as you have a decent sized stack, and the blinds haven't yet escalated,

don't be afraid to take flops with some marginal hands-especially in late position.

One problem that winning limit players have in the tourneys is that they don't take enough

flops when the pot hasn't been raised. In a normal ring game you wouldn't limp in on the

button with a hand like A7o, or Q6s or 74s, even if only a couple players have yet entered

the pot. But in a no limit Sit and Go's these types of hands are usually worth taking a

flyer on if you're in the cut off or on the button. The reason for this can be seen in the

fact that you're getting huge implied odds before the flop-which means you can get away from

your hand if you miss the flop, but can often double through if you hit the flop hard. With

a hand like 6h 3h, you're only paying ten or fifteen bucks to see the flop. But if you get

all the flop (by flopping two pair, a straight, or trips) you can frequently bust one of

your opponents. Another bonus is that if everyone misses the flop you can often steal it

with a small bet (by which we mean a bet that's sized at about ? to ? of the pot). To borrow

from Vince Lombardi-'in limit poker the button is everything; in no-limit it's the only

thing'. Position is so important in no limit that you can take flops with all kinds of wacky

hands on the button provided that it doesn't cost you much (relative to your stack size) to

call.

Concept 3- Get aggressive in the middle stages of the tournament.

As the tournament progresses the size of the blinds begins to become significant. This means

that it becomes essential to take some risks, since you simply can't wait around for the

nuts. So long as your stack is at least moderately sized, you should be making more than

your share of blind-steal attempts, even with hands that wouldn't appear to warrant it. Of

course you can't try this if someone else has already limped in, but so long as everyone has

already folded you shouldn't be afraid to take a shot at the blinds with some fairly weak

hands (for example, hands like J8s, or 97s, or K9o). When the tournament gets into the

middle and late stages, most players make the mistake of folding too much in the blinds.

When the tournament gets into the late stages this phenomenon no longer exists, since you're

usually down to four handed (or less) and everyone is 'on the lookout' for blind steals. But

in the middle stages most players are still entertaining dreams of sneaking into the money,

which means they don't want to lock horns with crappy hands. Obviously you'll have to

pattern you blind-steal play after your opponents-if they're loose cannons, for example, you

can often just wait around and break them once you catch a real hand. But the typical Sit

and Go player starts getting real risk averse after about five orbits or so, which allows

you to help yourself to their blinds.

Sit and Go Strategy Part II: Other concepts
By Guy Downs

Here we'll look at a few other winning concepts that are often overlooked by even advanced

Sit and Go players.

Mistake #1) Re-raising all-in before the flop when you're short stacked.

You see this mistake made time and time again-both by novices in the small online games, and

even by tournament pros on T.V. who ought to know better. Now there are times when you would

reraise all in pre-flop with a good hand; for instance, if you thought your raise would get

the pot heads-up with the original raiser, you'd probably want to do it. But in a typical

hand the original raise is substantial enough to get virtually everyone to fold, and since

your short stacked it's unlikely that the little extra your adding to the price to see the

flop will be enough to persuade someone to fold who was originally thinking of calling.

The problem with re-raising all-in pre flop is this: By doing so, you're not giving yourself

a chance to fold out a hand which a) missed the flop, but b) still has outs to your hand.

Let's look at an example.

Say you have 1000 in chips in front of you, and the blinds are 50-100. Your playing five

handed, and except for one very small stack everyone else has about $2000 in front of them.

You're in the big blind with As Jd. Everyone folds to the button, who has about $2000 in

front of him. The small blind folds, and the action is on you. What should you do?

First, notice that by re-raising all in, your opponent is getting proper odds to call with

any hand that doesn't contain an ace with a lower kicker. Every other hand he could have is

worth a call in this spot, since he's never worse than a 2-1 dog to your hand. Further, note

that your opponent could have just about anything here. Hands like T8s, J9o, even 65s-none

of these hands can be eliminated from contention. Now if you re-raise all in, you'll be

getting the best of it. However, by doing so you'll be unable to to anything to keep your

opponent from seeing the turn and the river; thus, if he does have a hand like T9s, and the

flop comes K75, you'll have to sit back helplessly and pray that a nine or a ten doesn't

drop-something that's going to happen about 25% of the time.

But what if you just call pre-flop? Now, with that same flop, you can bet your remaining

$500. This amounts to the same thing as going all-in pre-flop, only now you can get your

opponent to fold some of those hands that he would call with if he could see your hand. In

other words, you're now playing your hand in a way that allows your opponent to make a

mistake. When you go all-in pre-flop, he's correct to call. So what good does that do you?

But if you wait to the flop, you can often make him play his hand incorrectly.

Obviously if you flop a pair you check, since your opponent will bet your hand for you 95%

of the time. But if you miss you can get your money in on the flop, and hopefully persuade

your opponent to fold a hand that he should call with.

If you need to re-raise to get the pot heads-up, then do so. Also, if you think your re-

raise will be big enough to get your opponent to fold, then you should do so. Otherwise,

however, you're betting off waiting for the flop to push all-in.

Mistake #2-Trying to sell a big hand.

What we mean here is betting a very small amount with a monster hand in hopes of enticing an

opponent to call. Let's say your opponent raises to $40 in the early stages of the

tournament, and you call with pocket 6's. Now the flop comes T64. Assuming neither of your

are short stacked, you should not play your hand slow. Check the flop, and then check-raise

when your opponent bets. How much to check raise is up to you, although you should at least

double the bet. If your opponent calls, he probably has an overpair. In this case, you

should push all in on the turn. You will probably get called, and be able to bust him right

there.

Bad players will often just bet a small amount on the turn, hoping to 'suck in' their

opponent. They figure that there's close to a 100% chance that he'll call a smaller bet, say

$200, then there needs to be a 25% chance that he'd call a bet of $800 for the bigger bet to

be worth as much as the small bet. That may be true in a cash game, but it's sure as hell

not true in a tourney. Why? Because in a tourney, you also gain extra by virtue of the fact

that you now have one less player in between you and the money. Getting your opponent's

first $200 is not worth as much as getting his last $200, since getting his last $200 means

that there is one less player who could break you. Thus, you should look to bust a player

whenever possible-and this means often over-betting a big hand. If he folds, but would have

called a small bet, it's a bummer but not a disaster. If, however, he would have called the

big bet, but you only forced him to call a small one, you've lost a golden opportunity to

send another player to the rail.