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
Re-raising with Weak Hands
Re-raising with Weak Hands As stacks get shorter, there is more value in picking up small pots. One of the best ways to do this while keeping variance down is to re-raise weak players before the flop while you are in position. You may think re-raising should increase variance but actually it is the opposite because you are playing larger pots in position and smaller pots out of position. If you win 60 percent of the pots you play in position but only 40 percent of the pots you play out of position, you can see how your profit will begin to pile up. Do not get too attached to any hand, and be careful not to constantly re-raise thinking opponents because they will start to play back at you, which will cause a lot of variance and usually bust one of you.
Suppose a loose but weak player raises from the cutoff
Suppose a loose but weak player raises from the cutoff and you are on the button with 100BBs. If he has been raising often and you have not been too wild, you can re-raise him with any two cards. This may seem crazy, but purely bluffing in this spot will usually be +EV. To give myself even more equity, I actually have some sort of hand just in case he calls. I also like to re-raise with hands I could normally not call a raise with, such as J-8. So, I tend to re-raise junky connectors or suited cards. I will also re-raise with all my strong hands. Fold if your opponent four-bets unless you have a hand like J-J+ or A-K. Do not let your opponents know this, or they will attack your re-raises constantly.