when you\'re cards run really bad
 

What can you do in this situation? When your card are running much worse than average. Should you just sit back and let the blinds eat you up or should you put money into the pot with your marginal to poor hands? Can you just misrepresent yoru hands or can you try to win a pot with a K2 or J5? Can you possibly win in this situation?

Re: when you\'re cards run really bad
 

A lot depends on what stage in the SnG you're at. Early on, just sit it out - the blinds are small enough that you can wait for something decent. I play on Crypto and the SnGs are 10 handed, 1000 starting chips, first 4 rounds' blinds are: 7/15,15/30,25/50,50/100. With this structure you can fold the first 40 hands and only be down 300 chips, less than 1/3 of your starting stack. Other sites might be less generous, but you should definitely be able to wait a long while before you have to try something.

That said, in early rounds I do try to limp on some marginal hands if I'm in LP - mostly suited connectors. For only 15 or 30 chips you can get to see a flop which could pay off well. You can fold if it doesn't without having affected your bottom line too much.

If it's later and you're still getting dross you'll have to make a stand at some point - once the blinds are up to 50/100 or 100/200 I'll try to steal every now and then, usually with an all-in. Sometimes you get called and go out, but by this point you're going to go out soon enough anyway unless you give it a shot.

HTH

Tom

Re: when you\'re cards run really bad
 

Firstly, your cards aren't going worse than average - ever. Your cards at any given point were running below average up to that point. The difference seems slight but is actually huge and thinking this way will help.

Secondly, it depends greatly on the situation. If you are UTG and the big blind coming up will finish you off you should push with any hand that's even slightly better than average. Also, I'm not sure about the others but I push basically every time if the blind is about to take away my steal equity (say I have 3-4 bb and am UTG). If it's early, say level 2 and you get below average hands you obviously should fold them.

If the blinds are escalating and you've been folding nearly every hand that may be a time to try to steal with a weak holding if your opponents are paying attention and notice that you haven't played a hand all tournament. The problem is that that doesn't hold in most low level SNGs. If you raise with let's say 95o you will often be called by some guy with Q9o or some such terrible holding that none the less has you dominated.

Re: when you\'re cards run really bad
 

Ok so I just realised my calculations suck here - and I can't edit my original post (maximum edit time exceeded - what's the point of that?)

Anyway, of course you normally couldn't play 40 hands and still have that many chips - you'll pay blinds more often as people go out. Even without that, if you did fold all the way up to the 100/200 level you'd only have 3.5BB left and be in pretty poor shape..

But the eseence of what I was saying is that you can afford to hold off through at least level 1 and level 2, waiting for a decent hand. By the time your stack is nearing 10BB you'll need to start stealing and risking lower quality hands, else you're going to be in trouble soon.

Re: when you\'re cards run really bad
 

I'm not so sure I understand what you mean in the first part. Care to shed a little light?

Re: when you\'re cards run really bad
 

When i am in that situation i get tigher and try to play perfectly my blinds. It is a must to steal some bets so be prepared to make a move against a player who shows weakness. Good luck

Re: when you\'re cards run really bad
 

Sure. The point is that while there are runs of good luck and bad luck there is no such thing as the cards continuing to run well or poorly. Your odds of getting a premium hand are still the same no matter how your cards had been running up to that point. Let's look at getting aces. The odds against getting aces are 220:1. If you've gotten aces, kings, queens, and big slick in your last four hands the odds are still 220:1, similarly if you've gotten rags.

The thing is everybody knows and agrees with that because it's obviously correct. However, it's easy to let the other side creep in and it happens to everyone. It's especially a problem in tournaments because you can't wait forever for a good hand while in a ring game you can so you feel more desperate as the trash comes in. I felt that's what may have been coming through in your post.