If you have the biggest stack and are in command of a table, it’s very easy to be aggressive with big bets and raises. After all, you’re in no real danger of being pushed out of the tournament, and you have the chips to bully other people on the table.
However, things are quite different when you are the short stack and have to fight for your tournament life. In fact, you’ll have to go all-in at some point (or multiple points) just to get back to a decent chip stack. Here are a couple things you should look at before deciding whether or not to go all-in with the short stack.
Hand Quality
This is one of the most obvious things you should think about before going all-in. If you’ve got Q-Q or better pre-flop then you absolutely have to start thinking about shoving. Even a hand like 9-9 or a drawing hand like Q-J might warrant going all-in if you’re really short stacked. Of course, good hands don’t always fall to us when we’re short stacked so there is another thing you should definitely look at.
Required Odds
One more thing you need to be aware of before making the decision to go all-in is what your required odds are. Basically required odds are really good odds that require you to go all-in when sitting on the short stack. If you believe that you’re getting 2-to-1 odds on any hand then you should be shoving.
For instance, even if you think your opponent has A-K and you only have 10-9 then you should still be shoving since this hand will beat A-K almost 40% of the time. When you put your opponents on this kind of range and get 2-to-1 odds or better then you need to be going all-in.
GSN created waves in the poker world when they decided to do away with one half of the High Stakes Poker broadcasting duo after firing A.J. Benza. The move was not only a shock to Benza who publicly complained on his blog about it, but it was also a shock to fans of the show since Benza and fellow co-host Gabe Kaplan played quite well off each other.
There aren’t too many poker autobiographies that I would be excited about. Doyle Brunson’s upcoming book, however, is one I’ll be buying. Godfather of Poker is slated for a November 11, 2009 release and is building a healthy buzz.
With the November Nine FINALLY coming up soon, we’re ready to go with more coverage, news and whatnot. It seemed like it was so far away, and now it’s almost here. It’s like Christmas… gambling Christmas.
Reality TV Update!
No poker game involves reading opponents as much as No-Limit Hold’em does. In fact, pretty much every successful No-Limit player is excellent at being able to read their opponents and make the necessary adjustments to keep pace with the table. And keeping pace with everyone else is imperative if you are going to be unpredictable on the felt. Here are some tips for how you can switch up your playing style in order to keep the other players guessing.
While the Browns are at the depths of NFL suck-i-tude and the Cavs dropped the home opener against the Celtics, you’d figure that the city deserved a bit of a break. Maybe the Poker Players would be winners? Not so!
