Tournament Strategies
After receiving pocket cards, you are immediately faced with a choice: play your cards and either raise or call the blinds, or fold.
Practice Matters
Obviously, your opponent will not go all-in every time,
Obviously, your opponent will not go all-in every time, as he could have a weak hand or get scared if the flush card comes, so you must learn to discount for that. I would estimate you are actually getting something like 7-to-1 on average, which is still a great price. So, you call. If the turn is a J and your opponent bets 200 into the 300 pot, leaving himself 700 behind, you should still call. Even though you are getting 5-to-2, which means you need to hit your hand 28 percent of the time, which you won’t, it is likely your opponent will put the other 700 in on the river, as he has already committed a huge percentage of his stack. So, your implied odds are 7-to-3 (the 700 chips left in his stack compared to the 300 in the pot) plus the 5-to-2 immediate odds, which comes to 4-to-1 because you have to call 200 to win the 1,200 chips that will most likely go into the pot. This is again a clear call. If you miss the river and he goes all-in, you have an easy fold. If you hit, you have an easy call if he goes all-in or an easy push if he checks.
I discounted for the fact that even if you hit your flush,
I discounted for the fact that even if you hit your flush, you may lose to a larger flush. Also, your opponent may not push the river if a spade comes. On the other hand, if your opponent goes all-in for 500 chips into a 100-chip pot and you have the same 8-4 on the 9-6-2 board as before, this would be a fold, as you would risk 500 chips to win 600 chips, giving you 6-to-5 odds, which is much worse than the 2-to-1 you need to call. So, the deeper your stacks are compared to the current bet, the greater your implied odds.