If you are a cash game player looking to cash in big in tournaments then you must forget about winning hands and focus on winning the tournament. Because most big hand confrontations result in a big pot, whilst you are focused on your amount of big blinds held in your stack your decisions must be about chipping up rather than winning chips. The fundamental difference to cash games is that the chips are not real money so the maximum amount you can lose is your tournament buy-in, and you must accumulate all of the chips to win the tournament rather than just ending play with more than you started with as you do in a cash game. The hands you are dealt will be the same in as in a Texas Hold’em poker cash game, but you will play them very differently.

Both the lack of time and limited losses regardless of your stack size means you can be slightly more speculative and willing to flip to win the tournament in 50/50 spots. This is where luck decides whether you get a big win or not. It is not wrong to take a 60/40 flip for a big finish in a poker tournament. That is how bracelets are won in WSOP events.

In a cash game, for example, you would never fold AA. In a tournament, however, you would have to consider folding if, with three players remaining in a large tournament, a player had a very small stack went all-in and was called with the blinds high. Your Aces are devalued against two players with the possibility of more action in later streets between you and the larger stack. You can move up a spot and go heads up if the larger stacked player wins the hand and retain all of your chips for the heads up battle. The extra chips he wins in this hand will not matter that much because you would still be behind in chips regardless. Many players would consider a fold here, but only if the prize they can win is extremely large for them in terms of their bankroll or personal net worth.

I play my tournaments on bwin.com and it is easy to get into a pattern of going all-in with decent hands in a desperate attempt to get lucky and earn some chips. Your tournament thinking must be extremely focused on learning about your opponents who you are sitting with. It is highly unlikely you will meet regular players in these massive fields enough that you will sit at a table and know most of them immediately. There is no shortcut for watching and observing closely. As I have said before if you reach a point where you have a decision to make and you are not sure about an opponent then you have not been watching closely enough.

Consider your tournament status each round when you get on the button. Do you need to chip up quickly? If you are short enough you may be looking for the right hand with which to shove, or the right person to re-raise off a hand. Look for spots where you can use your position to bully a player that is capable of folding from a hand. Sometimes they will shove and you will have to let go, but many times they will fold. Tournament poker is about learning about your opponents and squeezing chips from them. Your actual hand is not critical, because you must play weaker hands due to the time constraints a tournament puts on you. Waiting for premium hands only is not an option, unfortunately.

Think about what it is you need to achieve in the short term to remain above chip average. If you have a large stack you want to pick up blinds and only engage when you need to. Remember many players shove against a big stack hoping to flip for a double-up. If you are forced to flip for a proportion of your stack then do it with a very strong hand so you have an edge. I prefer slowing down with a big stack but always assess its size against other big stacks, blinds and tournament average.

Hopefully we will get to compete against each other on the bwin.com poker tables and I will rue the day I ever gave you this advice!

By Malcolm Clarke

Well, just several weeks ago, I tried a $1-$2 no limit cash game. It was actually my first time back then. Unfortunately, I messed up at some rounds because of some hands, but the whole time just about $100. At a certain point, I held J-Q offsuit in the big blind and there were 3-4 callers, so I checked. A number of players then limped in, followed by a $10-$15 raise.

Finally, the flop came 2-J-J. I thought it was a good thing therefore placed $15 as a bet. Some folded but one has called my bet. Then the following card was a 10 with no flush draw and so I checked. Then, he placed $25 as his bet and I called as a reaction to his action.

The river came and it was a 7. By the way, there were no straight flush or straight probabilities back then.

Then because of position, I checked once again. At that time, the player has enough bets to put me all in, by which I called actually. I thought I had him trapped, he turned over 7-7 then. Well, I realized I just allowed him to have a full house on the river. Too bad it was already late.

Do you think if I have check-raised all in on the turn, results may have sided to me? And till the river, have I made the right plays up? How about if he continued to bet the river, do you think I would eventually realize that he had a hand that could knock me down?

Thanks again! Keep up the good work!

Bruce

Bruce,

You checked in the wrong spot. When you flopped your set of jacks, this was the point to slow play your hand and hope to induce a bet. You then call him and lead out on the turn. Betting out was not a bad play but checking the turn and just calling his bet was. If you checked there, you needed to check raise. If he calls your bet there and catches, then you are just unlucky. The way things turned out, you let him get there.

I’m sure on what I’ve laid down. But I have some doubts. At some point I thought whenever someone who’s extremely short stacked moves all in, and you hold a low pair, I’d say call. But how about whenever the short stacked gets called before me? Well, maybe the odds will increase. But I’m not sure.

Similarly, say you will have two people with two over cards against you, which would imply 4×6=24 outs preflop. For an instance the caller was also short stacked, what do you think they will be looking for?

How about sharing of an ace by all in player and the caller, what’s your say about this? And if in case this happens, will the odds be much better compared to the potential winning?

By the way, I’m curious if how you’ll gonna play low pair against two short stacked all ins. Can you give me an idea? And what do you think, are the pot odds better than against just one, or was it a no-brainer lay down?

Just an information, these stuff were in a ring game. Do you think things have been different if they were in a cash game?

Thank you.

Mark

Mark,

I’m assuming that you are telling me that this was a tournament as opposed to a cash game. A ring game is typically another term for a cash game. In your scenario, your opponent went all-in and was called before you even acted. This is a no-brainer fold in my opinion too. If he was short stacked, and the call would not have been for much, you may want to take a card off and see if you hit your set. However, if you don’t hit your set then you are likely behind to the other player.

If you were the only person to act and they were short stacked, then you could call unless you were running low yourself.

Cash games don’t really make much difference with this scenario. He was all-in and called. You can’t believe sixes are good in any case.

While a six did hit the flop, when you play a pocket pair, you only flop a set 11% of the time. Do you really want to put a big portion of your stack up for 11%?