Work Em
 

Single table LL SnG. You jump to a decent first place lead (3300/8000). Five total players left. Second place has 2200 chips. The others have from 200-1000. Blinds are at 50/100 level.

Do you use your stack to throw your weight around (with marginal hands) or do you let them bust each other out?

I prefer to let them fight amongst themselves and "earn" a spot in the money. Not to mention if you let one of the larger stacks double up on you, they're now well within reach. My 1st and 2nd place finishes outweigh my 3rds by over 5:1, so I'm fairly decent when we get down to 3 at my SnG level.

Once we do get down to 3 I hit the "Aggressive" button on the front of my computer and work the smaller stacks heavily.

Thoughts?

Re: Work Em
 

Sometimes your way is good, sitting back will get your raises more respect when the blinds do climb higher, it always depends on the players though, if they aren't the type to go over the top of steals (ie not good players) I like to nick, nick, nick. Bully, bully, bully. Coasting into the heads up match with a commanding chip lead.
Hey, if they're inviting me to do so it's rude not to accept.

Re: Work Em
 

I think you can bully smallish-medium stacks who limp in front of you. You figure they don't have premium starting hands, and so even though you don't either, you raise because you can afford the higher stakes and they can not.

You avoid the other big stacks so that no one hand can cripple your stack, and you don't bully the very short stacks unless you'd rather be called.

Sounds easy, but I find it hard to put into practice consistently.

Re: Work Em
 

Bullying with the larger stack gets easier as you move up the limits because the players "respect" your stack a bit more.

Thats not to say that it can't be done at the lower buyins but you have to watch a bit more carefully and look at who can be bullied and who cannot.

This is where you have to think about where players are sat relative to you. If you have players who don't respect your ability to bubble them behind you or on the big blind then you are going to have to be more careful about bullying than if they were in other positions.

Tim