Secrets of Professional Tournament Poker, Volume 1 (56 page)

This is a pretty good spot to re-raise, as your hand is too weak to call. You re-raise to 8BBs, which is about normal. Your opponent calls and the flop comes A
-J
-4
. When he checks, you should bet around 12BBs every time. In fact, with hands like 7-6, you should bet every board unless your opponent gives off a crazy tell, letting you know he doesn’t plan to fold. Only check behind with hands that have good showdown value but will be in bad shape if a lot of money goes into the pot.

Some players make these loose re-raises from the blinds but I usually shy away from that because I will be first to act after the flop. Notice that you can re-raise with hands like J
-9
and A
-9
from the blinds because they are too weak to call but still have value and bluffing potential if your opponent calls. Suppose you re-raise from the small blind with A-9 and your opponent calls. Bet most boards except A-x-x because on this board, you just want to get to the showdown. Go ahead and bet on 9-x-x because your hand is susceptible to a lot of bad turn cards. If you play a lot with a specific opponent, even though you would normally want to pot-control with top pair, bad kicker in these spots, go ahead and bet in order to stay balanced.

Make sure to re-raise with these hands when you have position on a weak opponent who folds too often. Keep these concepts in mind and you will find yourself winning tournaments 10BBs at a time.

  Chapter 11

When You have Between 60 and 40BBs

With between 60 and 40 big blinds, take care not to get your stack all-in with a weak holding. Do not fall prey to fancy play syndrome, as one wrong move will often cost your tournament life. In general, tighten up just a bit more when calling before the flop but still be very willing to attack the blinds and pre-flop raises of weak players. If you keep your cool, you will find a way to survive.

Do Not Fear Going Broke

Once you get down to 60BBs, you can’t really fear going broke with strong hands like A-K or 10-10 before the flop or A-Q on a Q-7-3 board post-flop. While still pot-controlling with weak top-pair hands, be happy to get all the money in with anything better.

If you raise before the flop with hands like A-Q+ or 10-10+ and are re-raised, go all-in unless your opponent is extraordinarily passive. For example, you raise with A-Q to 2.5BBs out of your 50BB stack and an aggressive player re-raises on the button to 7BBs. Push basically every time here, unless you raised from early position, in which case you should probably fold A-Q but still push with A-K+ and 10-10+. Your early-position range should be tight, so most players who are willing to re-raise here are probably willing to get all-in. Generally though, never fold a monster hand before the flop once you start to get short.

Be willing to push with an even wider range against the most aggressive players. Suppose your opponent is fairly loose and aggressive and knows that you are as well. You raise to 2.5BBs out of your 40BB stack from middle position into a tight player’s blinds and your opponent in the cutoff re-raises to 7BBs. You can go all-in with a wide range because most of your equity is going to come from your opponent’s folds. You must know your opponent is fairly wild; otherwise an easy push can turn into an easy fold.

Suppose you raise 9
-8
to 2.5BBs out of your 45BB stack from middle position and your loose-aggressive opponent re-raises to 7BBs. This is another great spot to push. You will usually have at least 30-percent equity if called, and most likely around 40 percent. When you have that much equity in a hand, pushing is usually a great play if you have any fold equity at all, and you’ll have plenty here.