While it's still fresh in my mind, I wanted to type-up some of the middle game play that sheets talked about. Basically, you are looking for steal opportunities regardless of cards and position.
The idea is to find spots where the bb has 15-10 bbs. They can't call. All they can do is shove or fold. The other time to steal is when you yourself is around 15bbs or 10M. This is when the total blinds can add 10% to your stack. The middle game starts when you have 15bbs/10M or the majority of the table is around 15bbs/10M.
Resteals are very important when trying to chip-up. You want to look for players that are around 15bbs making standard raises. If you have 67s in the bb and CO with 15bbs standard raises, you can come over the top for a steal. Ideally, you want to have a bigger stack than the CO. The other thing to look for is when you standard raise in LP and one of the blinds reraises but leaves some chips behind (not pot committed) so that he can get away and fold his hand if you push all in. This is a resteal. Push all in on these guys.
The other thing to remember is that when you are around 10bbs, you need to push any two when folded to on the BU and SB. You need chips and it's a high % that they won't call considering they first have a hand and second you are only going through 1 or 2 people. When you hit 5bbs or the blinds will take you below 5bbs, you must push any two when UTG, because you have no FE when < 5bbs. Just opposite, when folded to you on the BU or SB with a stack > 10bbs, and the players to your left have around 10bbs, push any two. Their range is narrow here and they can't call without a very good hand.
Sit tight in the early round of play and stay out of the way. Play big aces, pps, and scs in position. Stay away from trap hands like KJ and AT unless you have position. Once the middle game starts, this is the time to open up your game. No more limping when the antes kick-in.
Steal blinds when they are worth something. Have a plan if called.
If you are a known player, your opponents may have a read of you from past play and therefore, your current playing style might not matter.
If you know how you are perceived, then you know how players will play at you.
If a player leaves chips behind so that they can fold, then they are probably on a resteal.
Middle game is usually determined by the amount of players left and stack sizes in relation to the blinds. When the majority of your opponents at your table has 10M. You can steal now.
When antes come into play, no more limping.
When you can add 10% to your stack you can steal.
If you are in the blinds with a 10M and a late position raiser has 10M, you can raise with a wide range for a resteal.
Players in the blinds with 15-10bbs are good targets to steal from. Even in any position that you might be in. Ex. bb has an 11bb stack and you are in mp with 53s. Blinds are 200/400 ante. You can raise here safely.
Resteal against stacks that are smaller than yours.
If you flop TPTK and someone leads out and the board is scary, you can call and then lead the turn. If they reraise then you can fold. Check calling isn't that profitable.
With big hands like AQ you don't mind multiway pots when suited, but unsuited you want to be HU.
Play extremely tight early. Conserve your chips for later in the tourney. Play only pairs and nice Aces. Ultimately stay out of the way.
With an over pair to the board just play it safe because you don't know where you are at and you don't want to bust.
SNGs are not a game of post flop play up to the $500 levels. You can play a little stronger when the blinds are 50/100. If opponents have 10bbs push all in on them because you would be calling anyways if you standard raise and they push. The other reason is if you standard raise they can play back at you.
If you have a good stack, you can see flops in position when they limp.
When around 15 bbs in ep or mp, you can limp small pps instead of raise because you can't afford to raise and be reraised.
When you see people around 7-5 bbs, they are pushing with a wide range and you can call with Ax or big broadway because your range is better than theirs normally. You can do this normally when it's around 20% of you stack.
When oop and with a big hand raise fairly big if another deep stack is in the hand as well. You don't want to give them a chance to draw to their hand because of the implied odds.
Hands that are not suited they play better HU not multiway. Like KQo vs. KQs. You can limp KQs after limpers but the offsuit you want to throw away.
With a hand in lp like KQs it is great multi and HU so if there are limpers just sweeten the pot with just a 3x raise instead of a higher because of the limpers. You want them to call so that if you hit you get more chips
Hands like mid pps you want to be in a pot with several players. HU you want to reraise to isolate if you have a read on the player. Other wise just dump it.
When in the bb and you have a terrible hand and the sb limps raise upto 5xbb because you want to take it down preflop. You don't want to play the hand. Also, there is no rake if you win preflop. If they call you have to try and out play them or just give-up.
When in the blinds with a pp and facing a position raiser, you want to reraise to take it down preflop because it's hard to play post flop. If there were other people in then calling would be ok for set value.
Only call raises that are 5% of your stack with scs and pps.
T is the second most dangerous card to an Ace on the flop. It hits a lot of hands.
Your stats should be 25/20.
If a person has a high cold calling range, they are calling with very marginal hands. You can 3 barrel them if need be.
You are responsible for your own results.
Vary reraises based on stack sizes. You don't want to give them the implied odds to call.
When you reraise and you are oop, you must reraise more than the pot. If you are in position you can reraise around pot sized or little below.
If you identify a player that plays his good hands strong and his moderate hands passively then you can play accordingly. If someone will call down with second pair known as playing it safe, then you can value bet your marginal hands because you are usually ahead. Also, if you know he is in safe mode then you can bluff with a shove or reraise.
When there is someone that will get their chips in with the worst of it, you can profitably call with JJ+ AK.
The best flops to c-bet are when there is one high card and the rest all low cards.
It is very important to have a wide reraising range.
Flops that are coordinated are not great to c-bet if you are playing against someone with a wide range. Normally these folks are loose.
These notes come from sheets. If you don't know, sheets is an SNG expert.
It's all about risk vs. reward. What are you risking if you win compared to what you could lose?
The closer you are to bubbling your calling range decreases which means you can call with more hands. The opposite is true if you are farther away from bubbling the tighter your calling range must be. In other words you can't call with that many hands.
Calling ranges of opponents will change due to their stack size. For example, if your stack can't bust your opponent then he has a wider range to call.
If you can not risk all your chips and they could bust if they call then a push is ok. Most of the time this will be when your opponents have less than 10bbs. You can safely push any two cards from the button and small blind.
Here are somethings to remember about pot odds that I learned from chardrian.
2-1 means you need a 33% chance so there are a lot of times when "normally" you shouldn't.
3-1 means you need a 25% chance - there is rarely going to be a
time when you think you have much less than a 25% chance (it could
happen though I guess) so at 3-1 I think it is going to be much more
"normal" to call.
4-1 for me means insta-call almost everytime. KK vs AA is still getting basically the right odds at 4-1.
Here's a quote from one of our resident FTR johnny_fish, that has been fairly successful as of late.
"You have to take all risks with positive expectation. Playing for survival doesn't work with top heavy payout structures. So if you can get a flip with 41% equity and 40% pot odds, be happy to get all your chips in. I'll take any risk as long as equity pot odds."
I'm going to start posting some of the notes that I have taken from various good players. Most of these are from videos that I have watched at PXF and cardrunners. However, some will come from our resident FTR players. Let me know if you agree or disagree with some of these ideas. I will post some other random stuff not necessarily about poker, but I wanted to post some of these notes to either help other aspiring players and to possibly generate a discussion if others feel they're incorrect.
Since I've been reading all this talk about cash is where it's at, I decided to give it a shot. Also, I want to be a true baller. I'm starting pretty low since I'm a noob. I'm playing multiple tables of 10NL. I find that I need to play at least 2 tables or I get antsy and start playing recklessly. I'm trying to play fairly tight but not too tight that I'm a rock. I pretty much raise every time I decide to play.
One leak that I think I have is smooth calling raises too much especially against short stacks. With marginal hands like scs and pps I don't mind smooth calling against big stacks since I have the implied odds. My other leak is not identifying the player and thinking that they're all bad at the table and are trying to be a maniac bully. Usually this is early on when I just sat down. I goes like this, I raise from mp with AKs and big stack to my left 3 bets me. I'm like fuck you bitch and either reraise or push. He calls and shows KK. gg me.
I was going to move up to 25NL and I have a couple times and was successful, but I want to get my game down in 10NL before I move up to bigger stakes and possibly better comp. (but I doubt it).
I can honestly say though that by playing a lot of cash lately has helped my MTT play. I'm playing my position more and stealing a few more pots. Also, I have a little more confidence post flop and I'm able to read other players a little better.
So you will probably see my lurking in the SHNL forum and asking some fairly obvious (code for stupid) questions. I'm trying to ingest all of the stickies and read NLHTP a couple of times. Any help and advise will be much appreciated.
I wanted to write two stupid mistakes that I made the other day. I was playing two separate SNGs on Stars and I violated two basic rules. The first mistake was when we were down to 4 players and I had 2nd place chip stack. The 4th place chip stack was close to busting out and for some reason I went brain dead. The 1st place chip stack was just hammering the table. He was raising every hand and taking advantage of the situation.
I was in the bb with 77 and 1st place guy makes a standard raise. I quickly thought that I was good here because of all the raises that this guy was throwing around. So, I quickly threw in all my chips thinking that he would fold. Wrong, I didn't take into account that my push didn't have any FE because my stack was ~2k and the blinds were 200/400 and with his standard raise he only had to call a little more. He quickly called with QJo and we were off to the races and you know the rest. In addition, I shouldn’t have gotten my chips in because 4th place guy was close to busting out (he only had 670 chips, doh. I think that this was a case of not keeping my finger off the mouse as Chardrian has said countless times.
My other stupid mistake was another 9 seat SNG where we were 6 handed and I was in the bb with AJo. The sb to my right had built a large stack through only playing very big hands and was the chip leader. I did not see him show down anything worse than KQ. He wasn’t involved in a lot of pots and was like 20/10. There were three hands prior to me donking out that he was folded to and just called. I did my standard thing with decent hands and raised. He folded every time.
My donk out occurred when it was folded to him again, but this time he raised standard. As I said earlier, I had AJo. Again, I think that it was a simple case of not taking my time to look at the entire situation because I quickly got my chips in. Mind you that the blinds were 75/150 and I had ~1300. I should have really taken a hard look at this and realized (clue #1) that all other times he just called and this time he raised (clue #2) he's only playing the goods even with a big stack (clue #3) I wasn't desperate enough yet with 6 people remaining and several have stacks similar to mine that I needed to gambool here. I should have said to myself that AJo is no good and thrown it away. But, I was too stupid and pushed and was killed by his QQ.
Moral of the story is that you must pay attention at all times and take your time before making even what you think is the easiest decision to make. I felt that I needed to post these so that it would be ingrained into my mind.
I have always been of the mindset that you raise 3xbb + 1bb for each limper. I have just heard recently from sheets that he suggests that one should raise 3xbb + 2bb for each limper. Some may think that 1 more bb isn't going to make that much of a difference, but I think it would.
Another interesting piece of tidbit that I heard recently is to raise more than 3xbb from the sb when folded to you. Rizen shared this one. He feels that since you are at a positional disadvantage post-flop, you should be encouraged to get the hand over pre-flop as early as possible. He also says that he likes to do this with his reraises out of the blinds because of the positional disadvantage as well.
Most people tend to just click the slide bar and think nothing of it when making their bets and raises. Bet sizes are extremely important and knowing the correct betting amount can go a long way when trying to win a tourney or cash game.
Below is a compilation of my notes throughout my journey thus far. I typed this up for a friend that has been struggling in low buy-in MTTs. I would like to hear form the accomplished players if I have the wrong ideas or if I am missing something.
There are a lot of bad players in these lower buy-in tourneys. If I were you I would see cheap flops with suited connectors, pps, and sometimes Axs when in position. Call 3x to 4x raises when they are not over 10% of your stack with these hands. You are playing for 2 pair or better. If you hit one pair play it small and dump the hand if the pot gets too big or you are playing for your stack. You don’t want to go bust on just one pair weak kicker. In addition, you have to pay attention to the size of your opponents stack. It may not be profitable to call with these hands if he doesn’t have enough behind to pay you off.
With big hands you want to play them strong and hard. If you flop TPTK you can play it strong. Just be careful if someone is playing back at you when you bet big and they come over the top when you have TPTK. In these low buy-in games I will generally reraise with AK and JJ+. I will definitely raise after limpers to 3x bb to 4xbb + one bb for each limper with AQ+ and JJ+. Against good players I may not raise after limpers with AQ and JJ.
It is important to know your opponents when making your bets and raises. A very loose player that raises 2xbb to 3xbb you can figure that you are ahead preflop with the hands that I mentioned. With a tight player that raises 3xbb or 4xbb you are going to need a bigger hand than normal. AQ and JJ might not cut it. Against tight players I will generally fold AQ but call a raise with JJ looking for a set.
When you have any of these hands when in the blinds it is always best to raise or reraise after loose limpers and raisers especially if they are raising in position. If a loose player is raising UTG you can widen his range of hands. If it is a tight aggressive player you will have to honor his raise and maybe limit your hands to just AK and QQ+. With that said, if you are in position with scs and pps and his raise is 10% or less of your stack call his raise.
Put your opponents on hands. What type of hand does he typically raise 2xbb with? Is there a difference in the type of hands that he raises 3xbb or 4xbb? Normally, I have found that 2xbb raises are pps, Ax, and marginal face cards like KJ. I usually see 2xbb raises after several limpers with hands like pps when these folks think that they need to increase the pot preflop incase they hit a set. Remember though that you hit your set 1 out of 8 times. You don’t need to get fancy because fancy plays do not work against bad players. Just sit back and wait for a hand. You don’t need to force anything.
If you find yourself down to 10bb at anytime throughout the tourney, you need to push AI to try and steal the blinds so that you can stay afloat until a real hand comes along. Look to do this when folded to you in the CO, button, and sb. You have to pay attention to who is in the blinds and play accordingly. You can almost do this with any hand against tight players in the blinds. Against loose callers or big stacks you will need to have somewhat of a decent hand but not great. If you get down to 5bb at anytime, look to push when UTG with almost any two. By pushing when down to 10bb and 5bb you still have fold equity (FE). If you go below 5bb, your opponents are getting the right price to call almost with any two. When down to 15bb you have to look for situations where you can push overtop of raises when your opponents raise MP and LP. At 15bb you have reraise FE and a standard reraise will put you down to 10bb or lower. So it makes sense to just get your chips in. This is done normally from the button or the blinds with hands that are not powerhouses or need to see all five cards like 22-JJ and AJ+. A standard reraise or just a call works best with QQ+. You want them to call with these hands. Again however, you need to know the type of player making the raise before you make this play.
I have noticed that my stats show that I place ITM on a fairly regular basis, but I lack deep finishes. My stats on thepokerdb.com show that I can money on average. I feel as if I'm not gambooling enough to put me in a position to win. I think that I'm claming-up when the blinds get high and then I am looking for a hand to push and double-up. It seems as if I'm always at this point when I play unless I achieve a big stack early which is not a common event for me. It could also be that I'm not playing enough tourneys to show some success. I play on average one or two tourneys a night. The weekends I probably play a few more.
I don't think that I'm extremely passive but I do feel that I miss opportunities at times. More aggression during the bubble probably would change things a little. I may see my ITM stats fall a little, but I think that the reward of more FTs would make up for that. Those of you that are successful MTTers, I would love to here some of your views of the end game. What are some of your thoughts and approaches when getting close to the money and then working your way to the FT?
Lately, I have been trying to make well timed positional steals/bluffs and snap off resteals or bluffs. Last night I was playing a $4.40 180 and I was doing well. I was watching Trump_Killa since he was the chip leader at my table and he was on my left. I was the second largest stack to him so I wanted to try and stay away from him if I could. But, I knew that I would have to tangle with him since he was on my left and I needed to steal some blinds when in position. What I was noticing was that he would call a 3xbb raise almost every time from the bb. Then he would either lead out on the flop or check raise. The check raise was usually a min reraise. I took this note and stored it so that when we went to battle I knew what to look for.
The following hand was our showdown. I knew that he would call if I raised preflop and I was ok with that. I was fully expecting him to lead out on this flop, but when he didn't I knew that the check min raise was coming. His odds of having a T here was pretty low. He represented trip T's by check raising. Good play by him. So I reraised to see what he would do. When he came over the top I should have let the hand go and said np u.
I think that the error that I made was not pushing all in to his min reraise. This would have made the decision difficult on him. The hand that I chose to make this play with is suspect, but I truly thought that I could out play him. I believe today that I could have if I would have made the push. The question that I have been asking myself is should I have not tangled with the only stack that could kill me and tried putting pressure on the medium stacks? Especially with this hand and that board? If I didn't stand up to this guy he would have been a thorn the rest of the tourney. I welcome your thoughts and opinions on this hand.
Board: Td 7c Tc
Dead:
equity (%) win (%) tie (%)
Hand 1: 62.7778 % 61.21% 01.57% { QhJc }
Hand 2: 37.2222 % 35.66% 01.57% { 8d6d }
Board: Td 7c Tc Th
Dead:
equity (%) win (%) tie (%)
Hand 1: 73.8636 % 70.45% 03.41% { QhJc }
Hand 2: 26.1364 % 22.73% 03.41% { 8d6d }
PokerStars Game #6533347191: Tournament #33172784, $4.00+$0.40 Hold'em No Limit - Level VIII (200/400) - 2006/10/05 - 21:42:47 (ET)
Table '33172784 1' 9-max Seat #4 is the button
Seat 1: Blue Diesel (5720 in chips)
Seat 2: citril (6592 in chips)
Seat 3: DoomFor21 (3188 in chips)
Seat 4: Sprayed (10951 in chips)
Seat 6: TookieT (5569 in chips)
Seat 7: Trump_Killa (12760 in chips)
Seat 8: Jim78911 (4462 in chips)
Seat 9: Dokath (3475 in chips)
Blue Diesel: posts the ante 25
citril: posts the ante 25
DoomFor21: posts the ante 25
Sprayed: posts the ante 25
TookieT: posts the ante 25
Trump_Killa: posts the ante 25
Jim78911: posts the ante 25
Dokath: posts the ante 25
TookieT: posts small blind 200
Trump_Killa: posts big blind 400
*** HOLE CARDS ***
Dealt to Sprayed [Qh Jc]
Jim78911: folds
Dokath: folds
Blue Diesel: folds
citril: folds
DoomFor21: folds
Sprayed: raises 800 to 1200
TookieT: folds
Trump_Killa: calls 800
*** FLOP *** [Td 7c Tc]
Trump_Killa: checks
Sprayed: bets 2000
Trump_Killa: raises 2000 to 4000
Sprayed: raises 2400 to 6400
Trump_Killa: raises 5135 to 11535 and is all-in
Sprayed: calls 3326 and is all-in
*** TURN *** [Td 7c Tc] [Th]
*** RIVER *** [Td 7c Tc Th] [9s]
*** SHOW DOWN ***
Trump_Killa: shows [8d 6d] (a straight, Six to Ten)
Sprayed: shows [Qh Jc] (three of a kind, Tens)
Trump_Killa collected 22252 from pot
*** SUMMARY ***
Total pot 22252 | Rake 0
Board [Td 7c Tc Th 9s]
Seat 1: Blue Diesel folded before Flop (didn't bet)
Seat 2: citril folded before Flop (didn't bet)
Seat 3: DoomFor21 folded before Flop (didn't bet)
Seat 4: Sprayed (button) showed [Qh Jc] and lost with three of a kind, Tens
Seat 6: TookieT (small blind) folded before Flop
Seat 7: Trump_Killa (big blind) showed [8d 6d] and won (22252) with a straight, Six to Ten
Seat 8: Jim78911 folded before Flop (didn't bet)
Seat 9: Dokath folded before Flop (didn't bet)
I'm sitting here watching my Buckeyes put whoop’n on the Hawkeyes and I’m feeling pretty good. Right at the start of the game, I ended a six hour MTT session. I finished 3rd in a $5.50 MTT on Stars. Made about $450 and I was close to making a win in that one. A couple of days ago I finished 1st in a $4.40 180 MTT on Stars as well for about $210.
I know that this sounds like not that much, but I just recently redeposit $50 into my account. I had to start over because I took all of my br out a couple months ago. I took a new job and wanted to focus all of my attention on the job. Once things got settled at work, I was able to start over.
This was a good thing because before I took the job I had racked-up ~$8k. But I didn't feel like I was playing my best or even knew what I was doing. This time I have taken a more serious approach. I am reading and studying more and I feel like I now have a better understanding as to what it takes to do well.
I have also enrolled as a member at pokerxfactor. This site totally opened my eyes to how to play MTTs and SNGs. Another thing that I have come to realize is that it's not all about playing tight and hoping that the cards hit you in the face. I am now playing a few more hands in position and trying to play the player a little more. I Primarily do this in the first hour and try to build a big stack. I use to be one that could make the money on average but then fizzle out. What I found was that I was always getting to the money with a medium to small stack.
Now I'm trying to have a big stack by the time I hit the money. I'm also trying to put pressure on everyone during the bubble if it appears that they are tight. Another thing that has helped is taking small edges. Getting my chips in with the top hands and doubling up is key in these fast moving blind tourneys. I try to be as active as I can, but get out when I know I'm beat or not going all the way with just one pair or something similar. I'm not saying that you have to force the action, but I don't feel as if you can just sit tight until Aces come.
I'm no expert and I don't protest to be. It's just that you have to be aggressive and take gambools at times to win. Although, you may read my blog in a couple of months and I may have changed my tune because of variance and I lost my roll.
So I bought The Poker Tournament Formula book the other day and it is an interesting book. It's mainly about playing position and gambooling when your stack gets below 30bb. When I say gambooling you are getting your chips in with 77+ and AJ+. When you get lower than 20bb you get your chips in with 77-AA, AK, AQ, AJ, KQ, KJ, K10, QJ. The author says it's all about how fast a tournament plays which dictates how fast you should play.
What I like about it is how it teaches how to play position. When raised to you in three off the sb, co, and button, you raise with any two. In addition, you call limps or 3-4x raises with any two from the button. The idea is that if it gets checked around to you, you bet and steal the pot if nobody raised. If someone throws out a weak bet say less than 1/2 the pot you can reraise to steal or call and take it away on the turn. Of course this depends on your opponent because weak bets may be strong bets.
The downfall with playing this way is that you have to know when to let go of your hand. Also, you can be spewing chips really fast. When you have more than 30bb you can play this way. As you decrease, you have to look to increase your stack and hands is where you get your chips then, not necessarily position.
Some of the author's ideas seems to me to be a little reckless. However, this may be because I am uncomfortable playing this way. He says that it will get you to the FT an average like 1-4 and that's what the strategy is all about. He believes that if you continuously try to build and not play a tight and wait type game, you will have a greater chance to get to the FT and make the big bucks. So far I am running bad with this, but again it's probably because I don't normally play this way.
I would suggest that people read this book for it's ideas and advice on positional play. I would be interested in hearing experienced player's thoughts about the advice in the book if you have read it.
You know what I hate more than anything in the world is the min raise. It might be a useful weapon for some, but for me it is a nuisance. I never understand the guy in late position and it's early in the tourney when the blinds are 10/20 and several people limp and this dumb ass min raises to 40. Everybody goes back around and calls 20. The flop comes, someone besides the min raiser bets and the min raiser folds. What the fuck did that accomplish? I just don't get it. Can someone fill me in?
So I'm sitting here in my office acting like I give a shit. People come in and ask questions and I'm like "yea! sure! I'll get right on that!" When they walk out of my office I mumble under my breath "go fuck yourself". Don't get me wrong, the job pays well, but it's the same old shit day in day out. The same bureaucratic red tape shit. You can't do this unless you do this first kind of crap. There are probably 20 different steps for something that could take one second to complete. But no, follow the pipeline is what I'm told and it ends up taking me all fucking day.
Here's my other gripe, government agencies and their older than dirt civil servants. These fuckers have been working at these agencies for over 30 years or at least sense Christ was a corporal. They insist that nothing change and will fight to the bloody end to keep things the way they are. Even if the new process would make life so much easier. Their supervisors are afraid of them and the federal employee union won't have any of it.
So there you go. That's what all of you college folks have to look forward to. And guess what; over 70% of what you learn in college doesn't apply in the real world. Go chew on that for a while. When you get out, large corporations will try to brainwash you into thinking that their idiot ways of managing a company is correct. They will make you believe that 12 hour work days is the way life is. So you will work your 12 hours and watch your manager leave after 8. You won't ask where the fuck do you think you’re going, because you will be afraid to lose your job.
If you do decide to work in the defense contracting world, do your damnedest to get a government clearance. It will make you very marketable and you can land the big bucks much easier. Here's what it takes to land the big paying jobs:
-Who you know
-Experience
-Education
Yes, in that order. I don't know how many senior execs or VPs that are managing things today without any idea of what they're doing. They got where they are at by experience but most importantly who they knew. They made friends with other big wigs and pushed their way in. Do what I did, find a job that pays well and lets you sit around and type senseless shit and study poker.
Well that's the corporate life lesson for today. Stay tuned for more useless crap from me later.
. I think that this was a case of not keeping my finger off the mouse as Chardrian has said countless times. 