I'm all confused all of a sudden

[Blarg]

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Jeez this seems so foreign from the world of the 11's, where people will call with any face card, 98 suited, and the like.

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Not my experience. Is this because you tend to play at peak hours and I tend to play at non-peak hours, since I'm in Sweden?

I'd love to see figures on stuff like average VPIP/tourney level, buy-in level and hour of the day over a large sample of tourneys. Anyone has anything like that?

Does it differ as much as people often suggest here?

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I tend to play evening hours, till midnight or so, PST. I regularly see the calls I'm talking about. I was just pissing myself the other day at getting sucked out on and booted from the tourney 3 times out of 5 or 6 by guys calling with 75 offsuit (two in a row!) and 54 offsuit.

Seriously, these guys have "blinds disease." Kind of like beginning ring players, who feel that their blind is still "their money," and that once they've "invested" it by putting up that blind, they can't throw away their money by folding. They just don't know any better.

Which is great when you don't get sucked out on of course, because you make a lot of easy money. But, when it comes to stealing, it means you can expect to get an incredible percentage of calls on your pushes, and they will often be with astoundingly random hands. Which, though potentially profitable, changes your situation from "trying to steal the blinds" to "showing down the cards I'm trying to steal with very frequently so I have to win almost every push" and "showing down the cards I'm trying to steal with very frequently so people quickly notice if my cards are less than stellar, and then are even more encouraged to call almost every push."

I say this as someone who doesn't push like crazy, either, and am almost always playing people I've never played before, so they have no particular reason to be calling with garbage except for a love of their blind money or a desire to make sure nobody bullies them, or a simple misunderstanding that calling an all-in for your entire stack with 7-5 offsuit when your stack size doesn't force you to do it isn't really a good idea.

I think the times of day may very well matter a lot here. I notice the games get much looser when I play in the evenings. That's why I play those times, and why most people do.

[Blarg]

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If the BB knows that button is pushing with a certain range, he should know better than to call just because his hand is an odds favorite over that range.

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I'm trying to focus the discussion on the question of how much of a favorite you need to be to call a push of any two.

First you said I don't really know it is any two. Fair enough, but plenty of contributors here do advocate pushing any 2 in the kinds of bubble situations we are discussing.

Now you say it is a matter of math, not style. I think we can reconcile somewhat. My style is to take a 60-70% edge in calling a bubble push. You can beat me by being more selective about what you push, or by catching lucky.

Although I play incredibly tight, I have virtually never actually been blinded out. Have you?

Sabre170

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If you've virtually never been blinded out, you haven't played many games.

And I'd happily say that even if you were the best SNG player in the history of the world.

[sabre170]

By the standards of many here, I don't play much.
I think I have been genuinely blinded out exactly once in about 1000 SnGs, on 3 sites.

Since keeping better records, I haven't been blinded out in about 200 SnGs on Empire. That's about 10 weeks of play for me.

By "blinded out," I mean forced to go all in to post a blind, and losing.

There have been lots of times I made a desperation push in early position in order to avoid being blinded out in the next few hands.

Sabre170

[ilya]

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If the BB knows that button is pushing with a certain range, he should know better than to call just because his hand is an odds favorite over that range.

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I'm trying to focus the discussion on the question of how much of a favorite you need to be to call a push of any two.

First you said I don't really know it is any two. Fair enough, but plenty of contributors here do advocate pushing any 2 in the kinds of bubble situations we are discussing.

Now you say it is a matter of math, not style. I think we can reconcile somewhat. My style is to take a 60-70% edge in calling a bubble push. You can beat me by being more selective about what you push, or by catching lucky.

Although I play incredibly tight, I have virtually never actually been blinded out. Have you?

Sabre170

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Well, the edge you need depends on the situation. In the example I gave, a 56% edge would be sufficient to call. In some situations, a 60% edge might not be enough. I definitely see where you are coming from...adjusting to opponents is essential, and people who advocate pushing any 2 regardless of context are often not giving very useful advice.

I can't resist pointing out that A3o is only 55% against a random hand.

[ilya]

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Pushing is probably not correct and you gave the main reason why in your correction post.

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Fair enough. It's quite close, however.

[lorinda]

Although I play incredibly tight, I have virtually never actually been blinded out. Have you?

Remember that with four people dealt into the next pot, you are still going to have the best hand at the river at least once in four.

I don't get blinded out often, but to rule it out of your calculations would seem short sighted.

Lori

[curtains]

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Although I play incredibly tight, I have virtually never actually been blinded out. Have you?

Remember that with four people dealt into the next pot, you are still going to have the best hand at the river at least once in four.

I don't get blinded out often, but to rule it out of your calculations would seem short sighted.

Lori

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You will have the best hand by the river far more often than 1/4.

[lorinda]

You will have the best hand by the river far more often than 1/4.

It took me five minutes to try and cover all angles with that wording.

You are correct of course [img]/images/graemlins/grin.gif[/img]

Lori