Sit and Go Strategy Part II: Other concepts

by Guy Downs

Here we'll look at a few other winning concepts that are often overlooked by even advanced Sit and Go players.

Mistake #1) Re-raising all-in before the flop when you're short stacked.

You see this mistake made time and time again-both by novices in the small online games, and even by tournament pros on T.V. who ought to know better. Now there are times when you would reraise all in pre-flop with a good hand; for instance, if you thought your raise would get the pot heads-up with the original raiser, you'd probably want to do it. But in a typical hand the original raise is substantial enough to get virtually everyone to fold, and since your short stacked it's unlikely that the little extra your adding to the price to see the flop will be enough to persuade someone to fold who was originally thinking of calling.

The problem with re-raising all-in pre flop is this: By doing so, you're not giving yourself a chance to fold out a hand which a) missed the flop, but b) still has outs to your hand. Let's look at an example.

Say you have 1000 in chips in front of you, and the blinds are 50-100. Your playing five handed, and except for one very small stack everyone else has about $2000 in front of them. You're in the big blind with As Jd. Everyone folds to the button, who has about $2000 in front of him. The small blind folds, and the action is on you. What should you do?

First, notice that by re-raising all in, your opponent is getting proper odds to call with any hand that doesn't contain an ace with a lower kicker. Every other hand he could have is worth a call in this spot, since he's never worse than a 2-1 dog to your hand. Further, note that your opponent could have just about anything here. Hands like T8s, J9o, even 65s-none of these hands can be eliminated from contention. Now if you re-raise all in, you'll be getting the best of it. However, by doing so you'll be unable to to anything to keep your opponent from seeing the turn and the river; thus, if he does have a hand like T9s, and the flop comes K75, you'll have to sit back helplessly and pray that a nine or a ten doesn't drop-something that's going to happen about 25% of the time.

But what if you just call pre-flop? Now, with that same flop, you can bet your remaining $500. This amounts to the same thing as going all-in pre-flop, only now you can get your opponent to fold some of those hands that he would call with if he could see your hand. In other words, you're now playing your hand in a way that allows your opponent to make a mistake. When you go all-in pre-flop, he's correct to call. So what good does that do you? But if you wait to the flop, you can often make him play his hand incorrectly.

Obviously if you flop a pair you check, since your opponent will bet your hand for you 95% of the time. But if you miss you can get your money in on the flop, and hopefully persuade your opponent to fold a hand that he should call with.

If you need to re-raise to get the pot heads-up, then do so. Also, if you think your re-raise will be big enough to get your opponent to fold, then you should do so. Otherwise, however, you're betting off waiting for the flop to push all-in.

Mistake #2-Trying to sell a big hand.

What we mean here is betting a very small amount with a monster hand in hopes of enticing an opponent to call. Let's say your opponent raises to $40 in the early stages of the tournament, and you call with pocket 6's. Now the flop comes T64. Assuming neither of your are short stacked, you should not play your hand slow. Check the flop, and then check-raise when your opponent bets. How much to check raise is up to you, although you should at least double the bet. If your opponent calls, he probably has an overpair. In this case, you should push all in on the turn. You will probably get called, and be able to bust him right there.

Bad players will often just bet a small amount on the turn, hoping to 'suck in' their opponent. They figure that there's close to a 100% chance that he'll call a smaller bet, say $200, then there needs to be a 25% chance that he'd call a bet of $800 for the bigger bet to be worth as much as the small bet. That may be true in a cash game, but it's sure as hell not true in a tourney. Why? Because in a tourney, you also gain extra by virtue of the fact that you now have one less player in between you and the money. Getting your opponent's first $200 is not worth as much as getting his last $200, since getting his last $200 means that there is one less player who could break you. Thus, you should look to bust a player whenever possible-and this means often over-betting a big hand. If he folds, but would have called a small bet, it's a bummer but not a disaster. If, however, he would have called the big bet, but you only forced him to call a small one, you've lost a golden opportunity to send another player to the rail.