Moving from Online to Live Play

Jordan ‘iMsoLucky0′ Morgan

After honing their games online for awhile, many players decide to take the next step and test their skills in a live poker room. For some, the transition comes easily but, for others, the differences between playing at a computer and at a live table can be difficult to overcome.

For many online players, one of the hardest adjustments to make is to the speed – or slowness – of live play. Where you may easily see 50, 60 or more hands an hour if you multi-table at home, you’ll be lucky to see 20 or more hands during an hour of live play. The game just doesn’t move as fast. Some players adjust to the “boredom” of live play by listening to music and zoning out while they’re not involved in a hand.

While I don’t personally object to listening to music at the table, I prefer to chat with some of the players seated near me during the game. First of all, there’s a nice social aspect to playing live – if you have a good table – that you just don’t get online. Secondly, chatting with your fellow tablemates may help you to determine what kind of players they are. Is the guy next to you just killing time at a $5/$10 table while he’s waiting for a bigger game? Is he in town on vacation and just playing a little poker for the fun of it? Is he a regular?

These little bits of information can help you categorize your opponents and determine what kinds of players they might be; serious, casual, aggressive, etc. Remember, the more information you can gather, the better decisions you’ll be able to make when you’re involved in a big hand. This brings me to another important distinction between online and live play – focusing on your opponent.

When you’re playing online, you’re working with a much more limited amount of information than you are live. Sure, you may be able to calculate how often a player raises or re-raises from the button and keep track of their statistics, but when you get right down to it, you’re playing your game based on your two hole cards and the patterns you can establish about your opponents. When you’re playing live poker, on the other hand, you have a lot more information that you can factor into your decisions.

How is your opponent betting or sitting at the table? Are they confident? Do they look scared? Does your opponent’s demeanor change when they’re involved in a hand? Do they talk more? Less? Are they tilting? Drunk? Loose? Because of all of the extra information available to you at a live game, I believe it’s much easier to make reads on your opponents and, in turn, to put them on a very specific range of hands – or hand – if you’re really paying attention to what’s going on at the table. One of the biggest mistakes I see many online players make when they first start playing live is that they overlook this extra information and play a very “general” game rather than focusing in on a specific opponent.

My advice for these players is simple; slow down, focus, think. While you don’t want to take two minutes to contemplate every single play, there’s nothing wrong with going into the tank every once in awhile during a live game or tournament. If you’re paying attention to the action and your opponents, there’s a lot more information that you have to process and this sometimes takes some time. Think about how the hand has played out – and about how your opponent has played the hand – and you’ll find that your game will improve.

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Control Your Environment

Scott Fischman

We’ve all had moments in good old fashioned brick and mortar casinos where our senses become overwhelmed by an environment that we have no control over. From uncomfortable chairs to overflowing A/C to the guy sitting next to you who obviously hasn’t bathed since the last time the Cleveland Indians won the Series, playing live poker can be a less than pleasant experience at times. That’s why one of the biggest advantages of playing online poker versus live poker is the ability to control your environment. By standardizing all the variables of game play and setting your poker playing environment to your liking, you can maximize your focus and take that next step toward becoming a winning player.

So how do you control your environment? Well, let’s start at the beginning. If you’re anything like me, you’re going to be very anal about your poker playing environment. That means you turn off your phone and shut down whatever program you use for instant messaging. Even if you’re just playing for fun, you should still be taking poker seriously (unless you’re just looking to flip away your roll). Along those same lines, make sure to turn off the TV, stop surfing the web and answering emails. This is about minimizing distraction in an effort to maximize focus, and one of the pitfalls of online poker is all the readily available procrastination devices at your fingertips.

Now that you’re distraction free, tune the other variables in the house to your liking. Is the temperature in the house comfortable? Check. Do you have water and soda within reach and a tasty meal ready to go in the fridge? Check. What about music? I always like to have some music going in the background, but nothing too loud or distracting (if you’re singing along with the lyrics, it means you’re not focusing on poker).

So you’ve got all the peripherals taken care of, now comes the game play itself. Go through the options in the game lobby and set everything to your liking. Most of it is up to you, but personally, I like to roll with the animation off (so the game runs smoother) and “highlight bet amount” turned on. For those of you who don’t know, when you turn on “highlight bet amount” it makes it so the bet amount is always highlighted when it’s your turn to act. That means all you have to do is type in the amount you’d like to bet when it’s your turn ? no having to manually highlight the number yourself or fumble around with the bet slider. I also like to set the game background to plain brown, especially when you’ve played down to the final table. That bright blue “hockey rink” final table background can be distracting, so I always switch it off.

Once again, you’re doing all of this because it’s to your advantage, not just because you’re a control freak. By controlling your environment, you give yourself the best chance to maximize your focus on the game and be a winning player. This is far and away one of the biggest assets available to all online poker players.

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Playing Over-Cards

Andy Bloch

For many players, there’s nothing prettier than peeking at their hole cards and seeing paint. A-K. K-Q. Q-J. They’re all big hands and, often times, very playable ones, especially in position. Sometimes though, your masterpiece of a starting hand can lead to a very ugly result.

The fact is over-cards can be some of the trickiest hands to play well if they don’t connect with the board. So how do you avoid going broke when you whiff with your overs? In the words of Kenny Rogers, “you gotta know when to hold ‘em and you gotta know when to fold ‘em.”

Let’s say you’re in late position or in the blinds with over-cards and are facing an all-in bet after seeing a ragged flop like 8-5-3 rainbow. What do you do? The answer is an unequivocal “It depends”. First of all, what could your opponent possibly be betting here? Top pair? An over-pair? A set? Your read of your opponent’s hand should greatly influence your decision because if he’s holding anything but a set, you may have odds to call.

That brings me to the next question: how much is he betting? If your opponent’s all-in bet is worth half the pot or less, I think you have to call with any two over-cards so long as you think they’re still live. Over-cards give you six potential outs to the board, meaning that you’re only about a 3-1 dog against top pair if you have no straight or flush draw possibilities. Your over-cards may even be ahead if you think your opponent is pushing all-in on his own draw or is bluffing at the pot.

In situations where you’re not facing an all-in bet, the decision becomes a little harder because you must not only consider the size of your opponent’s current bet, but also the size of his next potential bet. If you’re both deep stacked and you call on the flop, you could find yourself facing a sizable bet on the turn. In this situation, I believe mucking your hand and looking for a better spot is the preferred option.

Another thing to consider in this type of situation is your position relative to your opponent. If you’re playing from position, you may want to consider staying in the hand even if you miss the flop – especially if you can do so cheaply. For one thing, calling a cheap bet on the flop might let you hit one of your overs, giving you what may likely be the best hand. For another thing, being in position can let you try and steal the pot away on the turn or river if your opponent shows further weakness on those streets.

Facing this same situation out of position is much riskier as your opponent has control of the hand and gets to act behind you on every street. I’m much more likely to throw my over-cards away here and look to play a better hand later on.

While position can be a key factor in determining if you carry on with your over-cards, the texture of the board is also something to be considered. On a flop like the one earlier – 8-5-3 rainbow – I’m much more likely to at least see the turn with my two over-cards than I am if the flop is more coordinated, like 9-8-7 or something that brings flush or straight draw possibilities. Why? Because unless my opponent is holding a pocket pair, it’s just as likely that he missed the flop the same way I did. On a more coordinated flop, there are more ways for my opponent to connect and, even if I hit one of my cards, I could be drawing dead against a flush or straight.

If I’m in a pot with multiple opponents, I’m even more likely to play my over-cards conservatively because there are that many more hands that can easily beat me. Where I might try to continuation bet the flop against a single player, I’ll almost certainly check against multiple players because I don’t want to give someone the chance to raise behind me and force me to give up chips I don’t need to waste.

If someone does bet and another player calls, I can very easily give up my hand without having lost too much. If, on the other hand, someone else bets and the action folds back to me, I can determine whether I want to fold, call or possibly even raise in an attempt to steal the pot myself.

When all is said and done, the key to playing over-cards successfully is not to fall in love with your starting hand no matter how pretty it may first appear. Play your hand smart after the flop and you can avoid an ugly result.

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The Dreaded Min-Check-Raise

Aaron Bartley

There are a lot of potentially horrendous moves to be made in No-Limit Hold ‘em: playing out of position with a marginal hand, chasing down a draw without the correct odds, overplaying (or underplaying) the nuts. All of these are horrible, horrible plays. But in my opinion, the worst play that you can make (and I see made far too often) is the min-check-raise.

I’ve never seen this play used correctly. In fact, I don’t think it’s even possible to use it correctly. If you min-check-raise a hand it means one of two things: either you have an incredibly strong hand and don’t want to scare off your opponents, or you have a draw but absolutely no idea of how to play it.

The first instance I can almost live with ? you have the absolute nuts and are just trying to milk the minimum amount of money out of your opponents with a bet so small that they’re forced to call. The flipside to that thought process is that if one of your opponents actually has a hand that he thinks is good, wouldn’t he possibly call a bigger bet? You might think that you’re slow playing, but you’re going about it the wrong way. While you might win an extra bet with the min-check-raise here, most of the time you’re just costing yourself more chips later in the hand by not getting a little more creative with your play.

The second instance of the min-check-raise is what really gets to me. You’re on a draw and hope that min-check-raising is going to accomplish something. I guess these players think that they are semi-bluffing, but they’re a little mixed up. The point of the semi-bluff is to take the pot down right then and there (with the potential to make the best hand later on if your opponent calls), but if you min-check-raise in that position, your opponent is priced in to the pot and there’s no way he’s folding anything better than 8 high.

This exact situation occurred recently while I was playing in a tournament. I was in middle position with K-6 of spades and one limper in the pot. I put in a pot-sized raise with the intention of stealing the pot. If worse came to worst and someone called me, I knew they’d probably be out of position during the hand. As expected, everyone folded – except, of course, the limper.

The flop came A-8-8 with two diamonds. A complete whiff for me – I had King high. There’s no reason to believe I had anything but the worst hand, so I had to proceed with caution. The limper checked to me and since there was no way I’d win this hand if it went to a showdown, I bet just over half the pot in an attempt to pick it up. The limper responded by min-check-raising me. Hmm? At this point I have two options: get away from the hand unscathed or make the call to see what he would do on the turn. He could have a monster hand here or he could simply be on the flush draw – the turn would give me the information I needed. Since it wouldn’t hurt my stack to find out, I decided to call.

The turn brought a blank. If he came out betting he obviously has a strong hand because there was no reason for him to bluff after I called his raise on the flop. He checked. There was a slight chance he was trying to play his hand super tricky, but it was unlikely.

People who min-check-raise either want to protect or get value from their hand, and will usually come out betting the next street. His check told me that he was most likely on the draw, so I decided to bet about half of my entire stack. This showed him I wasn’t folding to anything and the only way he could raise was if he was extremely confident he had the best hand. I had raised pre-flop, called his raise on the flop, and bet out on the turn – signifying to him that I had a very strong hand. His min-check-raise had worked against him and he was forced to fold his hand because he wasn’t getting priced in.

This player lost a lot of chips because he tried to get cute and put in a min-check-raise. Learn from his mistake and avoid falling into the trap of the dreaded min-check-raise.

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The Real Value of Tournament Chips

Bill Edler

Whenever you’re talking about poker strategies, you’ll find people who make no distinction between tournament play and ring game play. In fact, I know some top players who believe that both should be played exactly the same. Even though some of them have been extremely successful with this approach, I couldn’t disagree with them more.

The basic problem is that in a tournament setting, all chips are not of equal value. In most cases, the chips you lose are going to be worth a lot more than the ones you win. While losing a hand to a marginal call in a ring game might cost you, the same marginal call in a tournament can send you to the rail. Given the nature of tournaments, it’s extremely difficult to rebound from a loss that could have been avoided in the first place. Because of this, what might be an acceptable call in a ring game should probably be a fold in a tournament.

Think about this in terms of playing the first hand in a tournament: you wouldn’t take a coin-flip for your whole stack and risk busting for what is likely a 50% chance of doubling up. Why? Because doubling your stack – especially early on in a tournament – doesn’t double your equity. If you think of yourself as a winning player, your goal should be to win the entire tournament – not just the first hand. Looking at it like this, the limited potential for this short-term gain doesn’t justify the risk of getting knocked out immediately.

The same concept also holds true later on in a tournament. Let’s say I have 50K in chips in the middle stages and I find myself in a potential coin-flip situation for 20K. Obviously, if I win, I go up to 70K and if, I lose, I go down to 30K. I’m risking 40% of my stack for a potential gain of 20% and the advantage gained by winning those extra chips isn’t nearly enough to justify the risk of dropping to 30K. If that happens, I’ve put myself at a serious disadvantage that would be extremely difficult to recover from. There are plenty of players who would probably just go for it and take the flip, but there’s rarely ever going to be a situation where I would. This reward just isn’t worth the risk.

Given what I’ve just said, I’m not telling you that you should lay down your hand every time someone shoves their entire stack into the pot. There are going to be plenty of times when the EV is there and you’re justified in calling someone’s all-in bet. Let’s say you’re holding A-K and you’ve already put your opponent on a weak Ace. In that situation, you might have induced a bluff and calling is justified. But when we’re talking about situations where you’re likely to be flipping, you don’t want to be that caller. While it’s true that you can’t always escape flip situations, I think it’s best to do everything that you can to avoid ending up in that spot.

I think that these examples clearly illustrate the huge difference between how winning or losing the same amount of chips affects you. Some people might disagree with me in specific situations, but I’ve never heard a single good player disagree with that basic idea. To me, the concept that the chips you stand to lose are a lot more valuable than those you stand to win in marginal situations is fundamental to tournament play. If you avoid these situations, it will put you that much closer to victory.

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Stealing the Blinds

Allen Cunningham

The middle stages of a poker tournament can be a tortuous and tedious experience for even the most seasoned pro. The long trek toward the money, combined with a variety of potentially tricky scenarios you may face along the way, make it difficult to come up with one sure-fire strategy to help you through. That said, one aspect of mid-tourney play that’s extremely important is picking up pots pre-flop.

If you’ve been card dead in the first few levels you may only have as many chips as what you started with, or you may have been lucky enough to double or triple up early on. You may be minutes or hours away from making the money, depending on the number of entrants, and the average chip stack may be 20, 30 or even 40BB, based on the structure.

No matter what the situation is, however, it’s important to remember that once the blinds start to represent a decent percentage of your stack, you want to steal as much as possible. Raising the blinds a fair amount also balances your play and gets your big hands paid off more often. You’ll lose a few of your raises with speculative hands when people come over the top of you or call, but you’ll win a few as well, and raising will convince people to play back at you on those times when you happen to have big hands.

Bear in mind it’s still important to pick your spots. Continue to play tight from early position – stick to big pairs and AK – but from late position, start to attack the blinds with a variety of playable hands. At this stage of the tournament, if you’re going to play a hand, you should be coming into the pot with a raise every single time.

From the cutoff or hijack, for example, I’m going to open with hands like 9Ts, any Ax suited, all pairs, two picture cards, and even looser hands than that from the button. If I’m in late position and facing a raise, I’m either going to want to smooth-call with a really good hand or re-raise bluff them to pick up the pot pre-flop.

If somebody makes a pre-flop raise that’s more than 10% of my stack and I have a hand I want to play, I’ll consider moving all-in over the top of them. Any smaller re-raise commits me to the hand and flat-calling gives me no idea of where I’m at. If I smooth-call, my opponent is likely to bet first after the flop and without top pair or an over-pair, I’m going to be forced to either fold the best hand or, possibly, move all-in with the worst hand.

For example, let’s say somebody opens in mid-to-late position for 300 and you’re on the button with T-T and 2,000 in chips. In this situation, I would assume the raiser is opening with any two picture cards, any pair or suited Aces, so a hand like T-T is definitely strong enough to play against their range.

I think the best play here is to move all-in. This will put some pressure on your opponent if they don’t have a very good hand and they’ll be likely to fold. This move also helps you avoid the trouble you might face if you just smooth-call the raise and over-cards come on the flop. If you’re holding T-T and the flop comes Jack or King high, you really have no idea what your opponent has if they lead out, which means you will probably have to fold.

I’d recommend moving all-in with 8-8 or 9-9 in this situation too because you’ll get more action pre-flop and maximize the value from your coin flips. If someone raises pre-flop with A-Q and you elect to just call with a mid-pocket pair, they’re likely to miss the flop and check-fold. However, if you go all-in over the top and they call, you have a good chance to take their whole stack and set yourself up for the rest of the tournament.

By moving all-in with hands like A-K, A-Q, 9-9 and T-T in these situations, you’re giving yourself more opportunities to win pots by either getting your opponents to lay down marginal hands, or to make calls that put them in coin-flip situations. By mixing up your game a little and making these moves with monsters every once in awhile, you can also get your opponents to make some calls where they’re huge dogs.

Remember, the first goal of tournament poker is to make it into the money. By aggressively attacking blinds and antes when you think you’re likely to be a favorite in the hand, you can build a stack that will help carry you through the tough patches you may face in the middle stages, and put you in position to play for the win once the bubble bursts.

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Big-Stack Play

Jordan ‘iMsoLucky0′ Morgan

There are few better situations in poker than to enter final table play as the big stack. However, there’s a big difference in coming to the final table with the chip lead and in knowing how to use your stack to take control of the final stages of a tournament.

There are many players who don’t slow down once they reach the final table with a big stack. I’m not one of them. By the time I reach the final table, I’ll have already played a number of hands against about half of the other remaining players. I’ll have developed reads on their games, and they will have done the same with me, which makes this a good time to switch gears. If I’ve been hammering away aggressively before the final table, I’ll often slow things down and go back to playing a more tight-aggressive style than I had been just a short time earlier.

Even more important to my success here, however, is that I begin paying very close attention to the size of my opponents’ stacks. I want to know who’s likely to be playing conservatively in order to try and move up a few spots, and who is short-stacked and looking to get their chips in the middle with any two cards. I’m more likely to play pots against the conservative players and avoid the gamblers.

Let’s says the majority of the players are sitting on somewhere between 40 and 50 big blinds each, but the short stack only has about 15 blinds in front of him. He’s going to be looking for any chance he can to double up, which means I’m not going to raise his blinds unless I’m holding a hand where I can comfortably call his all-in re-raise. While doubling the short stack up probably doesn’t hurt me in the long run, the reward I get for knocking him out of the tournament may not justify risking chips that I can put to better use against other opponents.

When there’s a log-jam of players who all have about equal size stacks, I’m willing to play a fairly wide range of hands against them, so long as I’m in position. For example, say I’m chip leader with about 100 blinds and a smaller stack with about 40 blinds open raises for 3x the big blind. I’ll call this raise from the button or from late position with hands like 4-5 suited, 7-9 suited, or J-10 suited if I think I can pick up the pot after the flop.

I know that I’m not often going to flop anything better than a single pair – if I connect at all – when I call with these kinds of hands, but I’m still comfortable making this play because I know my opponent will miss often enough that I can steal the pot with a post-flop bet. This is especially true against players who completely shut down their games if they miss the flop, because you can use your big stack to force them to commit a sizeable portion of their stack if they want to contest the pot.

When I do decide to play against the short stacks on the final table, I’m looking to do so from position and with hands that aren’t going to be easily dominated. If I don’t have to worry about someone entering the pot behind me, I’ll play coin-flips against the short stack all day long because I know I’ll win enough of these hands over the long run to be profitable.

The times I won’t make this play with my big stack are when I think someone else may try to squeeze me out of the pot by raising all-in behind me, or when doubling up the short stack could drop me from being the chip leader back down to an average size chip stack. In these cases, I’ll look for better spots and let the shorter stacks fight amongst themselves.

While having a large chip stack is a weapon in itself, you’ll get better results if you know how and when to use your stack to your best advantage. Apply pressure to the conservative players while avoiding unnecessary confrontations with the short stacks, and you’ll turn your chips into something much valuable when the tournament is over.

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A Monster at the Aussie Millions

Gus Hansen

Hand 133 – Crucial hand 7 – Biggest Hand So Far – Busting the Defending Champ

Blinds: 4000/8000/1000, My position: SB, My hand: Ac Qs, My Chip Stack: 389,000

Defending champ Lee Nelson has been moved to the table. He opens in middle position for 24,000 and I decide to just call with my Ac Qs in the SB. The BB folds. The flop comes:

Qh Qc 4c

I think it is fair to call it an above average flop!

I check and as expected Lee bets 44,000 into a 64,000 pot. Having flopped three Queens with top kicker, or as some would say “a Monster”, I have a couple of different options:

1. Calling, trying to trap Mr. Nelson would be more tempting with no flush draw on the board. Another draw-back is that calling simply fails to put more money in the pot. For it to be a real trap, I would have to check the turn as well and could thereby easily give Mr. Nelson two free cards. I don’t like it!
2. The mini-raise – doubling his 44,000 bet to about 100,000. Trying to keep Lee in the loop but forcing him to put a little more money in the pot. It might also be interpreted as a cheap steal-attempt thereby inducing Mr. Nelson to make a move. I like it!
3. Standard raise – to about 150,000. Put even more money in the pot but might force Lee out of some marginal hands. Has some merit!

As you can see I prefer the mini-raise.

After some deliberation I make it 100k. Now it is Lee’s turn to think. Surprisingly fast he goes all-in putting a total of 326,000 towards the middle. Pretty happy about the development I don’t hesitate to call. After all – I am holding the third nuts – or more likely “the nuts” since Lee would have played it a little slower if he was holding either Q4 or 44.

There is now 716,000 in the pot, so the next two cards are very crucial for the outcome of this tournament. The defending champ is all-in and I am left with less than 50,000 in front of me. Whoever wins this pot will be well on the way to the final table and the other guy headed – or more or less headed – to the sideline.

Showtime:
Lee: Kc 9c
Me: Ac Qs

Winning percentage before the turn:
Lee: 23.1 %
Me: 76.9 %

Turn: Jh

No club but now he has a gut-shot as well. His winning percentage stays the same.

River: 3h

Nice – I win the 700,000+ pot.

So what really happened here? How did we get 700k in the middle at this stage at the tournament?
Let us take it from the top:
Lee’s opening raise from middle position with Kc 9c – a play that has my utmost sympathy.
My call in the blind with AQo is definitely not mandatory and I would generally lean towards the re-raise. Being out of position, facing a tough opponent with a big chip-stack, I opted for the more conservative call.
Checking the flop – Very straight forward as Lee will most likely take a stab with any two cards.
Flop bet by Lee – Good solid play! Continuation bets is a big part of winning tournament strategy and should be performed a very high percentage of the time – especially this time where he actually has a flush draw to back it up!
My mini-raise – described earlier in the hand.
Lee’s all-in move – OOPS. I do not agree with this play.

A much better option would be to just call and see what develops. Lee is in position and has the luxury of awaiting my next move. If I had an air ball there is a very good chance that I would give up and he would be able to take it away with a medium-sized bet on the turn. On the other hand if I had a Queen I would probably move all in on the turn and Lee would be able to get away from the hand without losing all his money. Not to forget, if a club comes on the turn we would get all the money in with me having the drawing hand.

As you can see Lee would have gained a lot of information by flat-calling. Not only would he have a better idea about the strength of my hand but he would also get to see whether a club showed up or not!

Furthermore, contrary to what people think I am actually a very tight player . At least in some situations… Very rarely do I check-raise a big stack on the flop with absolutely nothing. I was in a comfortable position and not especially looking for a spot to pull off a big bluff. Analyzing the hand again and again I have come to the conclusion that my most likely holding is a random Queen, with the Ace high flush draw next in line. None of which the Kc 9c fare well against.

I am not quite sure why Lee opted to move all-in but I have a strong feeling that my reputation played a big part in his decision-making.

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Loosening Up Before the Flop – Part 2

Andy Bloch

In my last tip, I talked about the necessity of loosening up your pre-flop game, especially in the late stages of a tournament. This week, I’m going to provide you with some more specific examples of the kinds of hands you may want to play when you’re under the gun or on the button, and the ways you may want to play them as you get closer to the money.

For each example, I want you to assume that antes have come into play, which makes stealing the blinds not only more profitable, but also more of a necessity if you want to maintain a playable stack. If you’re not willing to raise with anything but “premium” hands at this point in a tournament, you’ll find your stack becoming noticeably shorter with each hand and orbit of the table.

With that in mind, let’s say I’m under the gun; I’m going to be raising pre-flop with almost every pair, depending on how aggressive I think my opponents are. I’ll also play suited Aces all the way down to A-8 and unsuited Aces all the way down to A-10. I’m also likely to play any two suited cards that are 8-9 or better. As far as off-suit hands go, K-Q or K-J are probably the worst hands I’ll consider; I’ll play both of these hands from under the gun when there are antes, but I won’t play K-J from this position when there are no antes.

By the same token, I’ll play a lot looser when I’m on the button and it’s folded to me: any Ace, any King, any suited Queen, basically any two suited cards 4 or higher, and usually any two unsuited cards that are 8 or higher. This puts 59% of the hands into play, which are just about how many you should play in that spot.

Of course, you’ll need to adjust your starting hands based on the make-up of the table. If you’re seated with a loose-aggressive player, you’re going to play fewer hands because they’ll call or re-raise you a lot more often than more passive opponents. On the other hand, if the table’s playing tight, the player in the Big Blind is playing tight, or you’re on the bubble, it’s a great opportunity to open up your game and steal more often. This is especially true if you’ve got a huge stack and everyone else is just looking to survive.

Remember, this is a baseline strategy – deviate from it based on your opponents, the stage of the tournament, who is in each blind, and your position. What do you do when you’re facing a pre-flop raise? Think about how you would play in your opponent’s spot and that should give you an idea of what cards they might be holding. If you don’t know anything about your opponent, assume that he’s varying his strategy based on his position; playing tight under the gun and raising with less than 10 percent of his hands (tighter than I recommend) and looser on the button, raising with about half of his hands.

For example, say your opponent raises under the gun and you’re next to act, holding A-10o. You’ve got to respect the raise from under the gun because your opponent is probably only playing about a third of the hands he’d play from the button. Not only that, but the rest of the table is still left to act and any one of these players could easily have a big hand with which they’ll call or re-raise. Since you’re clearly out of position here, you need to lay your hand down and look for a better spot.

If you do call with A-10o in this situation and everyone else folds, you’re probably going to be a 45 percent underdog to any of the hands that your opponent should have been raising with from under the gun. Even in this “ideal” situation, you’re still risking chips when you don’t have to.

If you’re holding A-10o in the Big Blind when someone raises from under the gun, that’s a different story altogether. You’ve already got money in the pot and you’ve seen who’s still in the hand. Similarly, if your opponent raises on the button and you’re in one of the blinds with A-10o, your hand is actually the favorite because he’s likely raising with any Ace in that spot.

There are also some players who don’t take their position into account before they decide to play a hand – they just play with Aces through Jacks and AK no matter where they are at the table. You need to tighten up against these players as you know they’re only putting their chips in the pot with big hands.

All of this is just a framework for playing on the button and from under the gun. Use it to help figure out which hands you should play in these spots and which hands you should be playing when your opponents are in these spots.

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