How often should a solid player finish in each position?

[Pat Southern]

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I think if you tighten up considerably early on you will see dramatic improvement.
very tight early.

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Is this the consensus? I mainly come from a MTT background, but decided to try sngs for a month. I like to play somewhat loose in the first 2 rounds because of the nice implied odds when I hit. I guess the flatter structure in sngs makes taking these risks less +$EV?

You might get imlied odds in some cases. But the times you don't, (or the times you chase a flush when you flop the draw, or second pair, etc) you considerably damage your stack. One of the most important things in a sng is preserving chips until you can get your money in with the best of it. The more chips the better.

I sued to think along the same lines as you, but after experience I can say that playing alot of hands early is simply not worth it. Majority of the time you fold postflop and slowly chip your stack away.

[Pat Southern]

I'm not talking about drawing with incorrect odds or anything, more along the lines of limping with hands like 75s on the button after 2 limpers...

[AliasMrJones]

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levels 1-3, folding things like KQo preflop in MP, AJo in MP,

[/ QUOTE ] Good.

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folding...AQo to any kind of real raise.

[/ QUOTE ] What is a "real raise"? Change that to "folding AQ to a raise" and I think you've got a winner.

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And after the flop dropping any hand worse than TPTK or a great draw preflop. Folding when it's probably decently +EV to draw.

[/ QUOTE ] I assume you mean postflop, not preflop since you start the sentence with "after the flop..." Basically, the rule is, don't take risks early. It is more important to make it to the bubble than it is to double up early at the risk of busting out. If you're getting a lot of finishes less than 7th, you're taking too many chances early. I have almost as many 4ths as I do 7th-10th put together.

[ZeroPointMachine]

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I'm not talking about drawing with incorrect odds or anything, more along the lines of limping with hands like 75s on the button after 2 limpers...

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This is a MTT habit you have to give up at the SNGs. The blinds increase much faster and the betting tends to be much more aggressive. Playing every cheap flop you can see is a great way to trap people in a MTT environment. You can bleed off 100-150 chips early looking for a great flop and you still have a workable stack and 40 minutes of low blinds. When you lose those chips in a SNG you put yourself in a bad place. Soon your needing to double up 2-3 times to make the money. Those lost chips should be doubling too. Not having them can have a big impact on your FE and limit you options severely. That 150 chips doubled three times is 1200. That makes a HUGE difference in your ITM potential.

I read somewhere a long time ago that hands like 6 [img]/images/graemlins/spade.gif[/img]9 [img]/images/graemlins/spade.gif[/img] are like potato chips. You can't have just one.

[AA suited]

there's also another theory to gamble at lvl1. if you think it's a coin flip situation, go all in to a raise. ie: you have ak, or 88+

it's all about $/hr.

the theory is that you either double up and increase your chances dramatically of ITM, or you just start a new game.

[me1tdown]

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Ah.. okay. Well, I wouldn't say the stats are terrible or something. 6th is still one of my highest finishes for instance.

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Sorry for bringing this up again, but I find a similar thing - 1-3 are the highest % finishes with 6th the next one. I think that this is indicative of tight play which (at least at the $11s ) will find you in 5th or 6th place usually in level 3 or 4 if you haven't had a hand yet. As the 7th and 8th place finishers flame out in the next couple of orbits this will become one of the short stacks and start to feel pressure from the blinds and I start to think about making a move. A 6th place finish is the chalk outline marking where an aggressive play was run down. If I can double up here I make it to top 3 way more then 4th or 5th ( some of my lowest % finishes). I suspect that a high 4th place % is the foot print for a different style of play, or at least a shifting of gears that I haven't found yet. YMMV.