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
Fold any hand not listed above if someone raises in front of you.
Fold any hand not listed above if someone raises in front of you. Even in position, you should rarely play hands like K-2 unless your opponent will check-fold every time he misses the flop, which you will not encounter too often in today’s games. If you are lucky enough to run into one of these super-straightforward players, you can call in late position with a wide range of hands with the intention of picking the pot up post-flop. But don’t get carried away with this play. Even the most standard opponents will adjust over time.
A few books suggest never re-raising pre-flop.
A few books suggest never re-raising pre-flop. You can win this way if you play very well post-flop, but I don’t think it is optimal, especially against competition at a skill level similar to yours. In the high-stakes tournaments I play, I do not believe anyone has a big enough edge over anyone else to never re-raise pre-flop. If you are a world-class player with terrible opponents, you can get away with never re-raising pre-flop because you will be able to outplay every player in the tournament after the flop. I am not nearly so egotistical as to think I can outplay everyone in the world.