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
When You are Re-raised
When You are Re-raised People will re-raise you fairly often when you play a loose-aggressive game. While it is rarely good to be re-raised, it isn’t the end of the world. First you have to figure out what the re-raiser thinks is your range. If you have been tight, he will think your range is tight. Because of this, he will usually only re-raise you with strong hands. If you have been loose, which is probably the case if you have been reading this book, he will think your range is loose. Also, your range varies according to the situation. For example, if you raise from first position, players will think you have a tight range and if you raise from the button, they will think you have a loose range. This will directly affect their re-raising range.
Next, you have to figure out what type of player your opponent is.
Next, you have to figure out what type of player your opponent is. Most players realize you are playing loose but will never do anything about it. They will keep folding, waiting for a big hand to bust you. Against this type of opponent, you should fold all your hands except the premium hands and those with high implied odds, assuming the stacks are deep. Suppose you raise 9-8s or 4-4 to 3BBs out of your 150BB stack and the button, one of these passive players, re-raises you to 8BBs. You should tend to call, hoping to get a good flop. Fold to these re-raises with hands like A-J, 10-7, or J-9, because it is just too hard to hit a flop where you would be happy to get your entire stack in. You should usually four-bet with A-A or K-K, as your opponent has announced that he has a good hand and is happy to get a lot of money in with it. If you run into A-A when you have K-K, move on to the next tournament. I tend to call with all my pairs Q-Q and lower against these passive opponents, hoping to make a set with the small ones and flop an overpair with the large ones. Be careful even if you do flop an overpair because your opponent could have a bigger pair. Make sure you aren’t check-raising with Q-Q on J-7-3, because that can only lead to trouble.