Best Poker Tips

In the early stages of a tournament you should be keeping it tight. You know that by now.

In this tip I would like to go a little deeper into why it is so important to start loosening up after players get eliminated. There are several reasons, some mathmatic and other more player orientated:

- First of all the most obvious reason is because the blinds come round faster so you have to play more hands as it get more expensive to fold. For instance, if the blinds are 15 and 30 in chips at a full table (nine man) it will cost you 45 to see nine hands, which is an average of 5 per hand (45 divided by 9). At a five man table it will cost you 45 to see 5 hands, which averages at 9 chips per hand (45 divided by 5).

- Second; as players get eliminated the first positions disappear because the positions are judged not by how soon you have to act - chronologically, but by how many players are left to act behind you. So first position at a nine man table means eight players have yet to act, but first position at a six man table means only five players still to act behind you, similar to being on the first middle position (seat four) at a nine man table.

Since all good players are aware of those two factors - hence start playing more loosely - the value of marginal hands goes up because other players are less apt to be holding killer hands.

- Third; as the other players are loosening up, they will notice you are playing too tight - assuming you are playing too tight and they are any competition at all. Because you are playing too tight they will easily give you credit for a big hand, which is fine if you want to be bluffing, but since you’re playing so tight you’re not very likely to. So when you finally do get a hand, you’re not going to win any big money with it because other players will avoid you.

If you’re indeed playing too tight your stack is probably plummeting after a few rounds. Sometimes you may win some chips back and get even for a while, but you shouldn’t forget that if you show a hand down - even as a huge favorite like holding aces vs. your opponent’s kings - there is always a chance that you’ll get suckered. Let me illustrate:

Suppose you’re playing heads up. Both of you start with 5000 in chips and you are folding and folding until you’re down to 2500 vs your opponent’s 7500. Say you move all in with aces and your opponent is unlucky enough to call with kings, which makes you about 4:1 favorite. Even though you’ll win this hand four times out of five, the fifth time, mathematically, you will go broke. In essence he is freeroling with your money. You are giving him the chance to take those bad odds because it is for free.

So you see, nothing good can come from folding too many hands. Sure, you may get lucky every once in a while, but in the long run it’s not going to pay you any dividend.

So whenever players start falling off, loosen up!