Card Player short handed play

An interesting Jim Brier article on short-handed play.


http://www.cardplayer.com/?sec=afeature&art_id=12285

"One of the biggest edges that the good player has is his preflop play."


I disagreed with this to at least a small extent. While preflop play is very important and, depending on where you live and the limits you play, its often a large hole in your opponents game the magnitude of overlay you get postflop can be a lot larger.

JB writes,"This means you have to start playing weaker cards. When you have to play more marginal holdings, two things happen, both of which are bad. First, as stated previously, your preflop play starts to look like everyone else’s. Second, once the flop comes, you will find yourself thrown into more marginal situations. You may have to play middle pair or bottom pair with or without a good kicker because of the pot size and the fact that you cannot be as confident that you don’t have the best hand. It may be harder to tell whether you are leading or chasing. There is a big difference between dealing in 10 players to start with and having three of them take a flop vs. dealing in only five players and having three of them play. The three who took a flop from a population of 10 will, on average, have better starting hands than from a starting population of only five players. Furthermore, many players will start raising with hands they only limp with in a full game. A-10 offsuit is usually a limping hand. It becomes a raising hand in a shorthanded game. This means that more pots are getting raised. So, in a shorthanded game, you have the double-barreled impact of having to play more hands in raised pots. Having to put up more blind money, playing weaker cards, and paying multiple bets to take a flop all mean that you are gambling more and incurring higher fluctuations. This is why most experienced players at the middle and lower limits simply avoid shorthanded play."


I would argue for the reasons he mentions short handed requires considerably more skill as you are now forced to play more marginal situations, and your judgement is called into question. As opposed to in a full game where your judgement is called into question considerably less frequently and can play on autopilot quite often. It seems one can get an edge in a full game by ,"sitting on one's leather ass and waiting."


Granted different skills are accented in a short game, but I don't think JB's argument holds in saying that a good player's edge is often erased in a short game. Maybe play on later streets take on much more importance.


I contend when you are making more decisions in a short game where you would often be waiting or watching in a full game, and your decisions are consistently better you are in more profitable situation than if you were sitting in a full game...

Although JB says "good player," I think that he really means "typical solid 10-handed player."


The article is generally meant to compare and contrast full-table play v. short-handed play and that there are subtle differences that the "typically good full player" can become a "good shorthanded" player.


He just says that it negates one of the many advantages of a solid full player.


Just my 2 cents.