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
You have reverse implied odds with some hands.
You have reverse implied odds with some hands. This means you can hit a hand that you think is best and still lose a lot of chips. Hands with huge reverse implied odds are those that can make top pair with a decent, but not great kicker, such as A-J and K-10. Suppose someone raises from early position and you call with A-10. You should be careful if the flop comes A-x-x, as you are only going to put a lot of money in the pot when your opponent has an ace with a better kicker.
So, while you are only putting in a few chips early in the hand,
So, while you are only putting in a few chips early in the hand, if you and your opponent both flop top pair, you stand to lose a lot of money. Notice that if your opponent has a hand like K-K and it comes A-x-x, you will usually only win one bet, as most players will bet once and then get away from that hand. Because of this, you will either lose a big pot or win a small one. As the stacks get deeper, hands that are normally strong, like A-A, become harder to play because if you have 300BBs, you will have a hard time getting that many chips in ahead of your opponent’s hand range. Make a point to play small pots with hands like top pair or an overpair when deep-stacked because if a lot of money goes into the pot, you are usually beat. Note that as stacks get shorter, reverse implied odds matter less because you don’t stand to lose as much. So, if you have A-A with 40BBs, it is usually fine to get all-in on most flops as long as they are not super-connected.