The Gap Concept towards Small MTT Buyins

How strongly do you guys apply the Gap Concept towards buy in tournaments of $20, $10, $5, $3?

I go far in these fields and end up getting into coinflips when my chips become stagnant near the money.

I've been folding holds like AJ and KQ to early raises. I rarely see what these guys hold, but then I watched people calling out of position with 86 clubs and hitting flops of 66A and taking people out with AK.

I'm not busting out early but should I loosen up and get more involved pre-flop to people's raises if I want to start winning these tournaments?

[AWLurch]

I share this exact problem. Gap concept forcing tough folds preflop in late position. Then running into flips on bubble.

[Xhad]

Do you play live at all?

You notice the bad calls more when they work than when they don't. Most of the time some doofus calls when he's not supposed to he either misses and quietly folds, or breaks out. Not being results-oriented includes not considering it good strategy when someone gets lucky right before your eyes.

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Do you play live at all?

You notice the bad calls more when they work than when they don't. Most of the time some doofus calls when he's not supposed to he either misses and quietly folds, or breaks out. Not being results-oriented includes not considering it good strategy when someone gets lucky right before your eyes.

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Yeah, I play live. My friends and I get together for sit N go type tournaments, as I'm 20 and don't turn 21 for a few months...so casino tournaments are out.

We play WSOP Main Event style, so for $10,000 chips and small blinds early on I'm not pressured to accumulate chips like I am playing online.

It seems before I blink, there is somebody with 6,000 chips.

[woodguy]

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should I loosen up and get more involved pre-flop to people's raises

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If you have position, and your stack is deep enough to blow off some chips without causing a change in your strategy and you are comfortable playing postflop, then, yes you can call in LP with speculative hands, but don't waste chips when you need them.

Its best to do this when someone else has already called the raise in front of you as having 2 players behind the PF raiser may freeze him on a missed flop and keep him from making a cont=bet so you can see the turn for cheap too.

If you are the only PF caller expect a cont-bet, and you only have the implied odds of 1 stack so its not as appatizing.

A good strategy in low buy in's is the typical tight, aggro with your big hands, don't get fancy, just bet, these are full of calling stations waiting to pay you off with 2nd pair. They also love to draw so charge the max.

Early in tourney you can call with a very wide range of hands in LP if the price is right, with all of the implied odds being dished out by the size of the stacks in relation to the cost of getting involved.

edit: Just read Betgo's post, and agree 100%, calling raises in LP w/ stuff like AJ and KQ is a big no-no,you are just asking to be dominated. Do it with hands that if you hit, you have a higher percentage change of your hand being good (spiking sets with small pairs, flopping OESD+Flush Draw w/ stuff like 76s etc)

Regards,
Woodguy

[betgo]

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I've been folding holds like AJ and KQ to early raises. I rarely see what these guys hold, but then I watched people calling out of position with 86 clubs and hitting flops of 66A and taking people out with AK.

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86s is as good a hand to call a raise with if the money is fairly deep than KQ or AJ. It certainly plays better against AA-JJ or AK-AQ.

If the money is deep, people are overplaying top pairs and overpairs, and you can bluff if you miss, it is OK to call a raise with a suited connector/gapper.

If people are putting in loose raises, you can call with KQ or AJ, if you think that is likely to be the best hand. However, it is easy to lose a lot of money with top pair with a trouble hand like that.

I don't know if calling more raises will keep you from becoming short stacked. There could be other weaknesses in your play that lead to your not accumulating chips. You may just be playing solid while other people may be playing wild and busting each other out. I don't mind being a small stack later on and trying to take chips from bad loose players with big stacks.

[Degen]

lol

the gap concept is all you need man

[Degen]

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I share this exact problem. Gap concept forcing tough folds preflop in late position. Then running into flips on bubble.

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such is tournament poker

you play tight early so you can be around later and see if you can get lucky and win a couple key flips

[woodguy]

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you play tight early so you can be around later and see if you can get lucky and win a couple key flips




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I play loose earlier in order to gain a bigger stack, so that later if I take some flips I'm not spending all my chips to do so.

Taking the worst of it or slight edges early helps lessen the variance later in a tourney.

Regards,
Woodguy

[nightlyraver]

I love it when people call my early raises w/ KQ or AJ. Why? Because they ALWAYS are taking the worst of it. Sometimes they are only small dogs to my pair of tens, but mostly they are huge dogs to the reasonable range of raising hands from EP. As was said earlier, call with speculative hands that may make you lots of cash. I would call an early raise with 66 for example if the stacks are deep - but definately not with KQ ESPECIALLY if they are offsuit and it's heads up.

Remember, you lose nothing by folding on the button no matter what you hold. Also, pay close attention to pot odds and the range of hands you could be facing. Example: UTG opens for a 3x raise; MP2 flat calls; If you hold AJ it's probably a clear fold even with the good odds since your A is usually not good and your J will probably not make the best hand BUT calling with 98s is a pretty easy call and calling with 55 is almost automatic (provided that the stacks are fairly deep).

As an aside, you are probably not playing for maximum value if you constantly find yourself short stacked around the bubble. Yes, you will sometimes be in that position, but you should also get to the bubble a fair amount of time in a comfortable spot (by "fair" I don't mean usually).

Read Harrington on Hold'em vols. 1 and 2 as well as Tournament Poker and the Art of War. Those should help.