Headhunting Celebrities as NL tourney strategy

While I believe it is a common phenomenon that some players will go suicidal in attacking famous players, going all-in happy with just about anything, I do think there might be some strategic value to the concept of targeting the celeb. If you let, say TJ, know that you are going to put him all in if he ever raises you, this may cause a noticable shift in his behavior--i.e., that he may not raise you. Of course he may call your bluff and see whether you'll go through with it, but if you do and get away with it you've gained some valuable psychological leverage. Anyway, a potentially effective gamesmanship move.

The main benefit of hunting down the big name players early in the tournament is that by knocking them out early, you will no longer have to deal with them later on in the tournament, thus making it easier for yourself to win the title later on against the live ones. This is the strategy reigning WSOP champ Robert Varkonyi utilized most expertly in the past week.


On the first and second days, he took out Hellmuth, Brunson, Negreanu, T.J., the fabulous Nguyens, and the others. By doing so, he made winning the championship a piece of cake because now he only had to contend with the dead money live one amateurs like Mr. Shipley, Mr. Gardner, Mr. D, etc. A very smart strategy indeed.