Empire $200k, on the bubble, play or not?

[lehighguy]

How you ended up in this situation is a better question. I'm betting your one of those stallers that sits around waiting for aces or something.

Tournament payouts are exponential, you should try to get to the final table where the big money is. Try to steal pots/blinds with marginal hands. Busting out in the low money is all the same for all intents and purposes.

Post some hands when your stack was big enough to actually play.

[lacky]

point takin. I went from 6500 to about 4400 with a pocket pair i had to fold after overs and fairly heavy betting. Then i got really lousy cards for several rounds. I pushed A6s to steal the blinds once, only other marginal hand i had was 87s from early, which I passed on. I definatly wasn't waiting for aces, but was hoping for a pair or high cards at some point.

So, I guess I need input, should I be pushing with Q6, J2, etc. (I also had an active big stack to my left, which made me hesitent to steal too weak)

[CardSharpCook]

[ QUOTE ]
How you ended up in this situation is a better question. I'm betting your one of those stallers that sits around waiting for aces or something.

Tournament payouts are exponential, you should try to get to the final table where the big money is. Try to steal pots/blinds with marginal hands. Busting out in the low money is all the same for all intents and purposes.

Post some hands when your stack was big enough to actually play.

[/ QUOTE ]

OK, this post upsets me. It seems to start from the premise that I, being the expert that I am, will NEVER find myself in this situation. I'm sorry, but play enough poker you WILL find yourself here. Hell, play enough poker and you WILL be the first one to bust out in a 1500 man tourney.

Also, what is this feast or famine mentality? Why do we not trust that this individual arrived in this situation by playing excellent poker? You know, you can play well... and still lose. The post seems to suggest that the player should either have busted out long ago, or be amoung the chip leaders. Again, it doesn't always work like this.

I play a style of poker that will often find me amoung the chip leaders, but more often, I'll find myself being dragged along with the back of the pack going from blind steal to double up as the field dwindles from 1200, to 1000, to 800, to 700, to... well, maybe the point that our young friend finds himself (and I'm aware he's probably older than me).

Now, busting out in low money is earning a do-over plus a little extra for my time. When I'm looking at a chip stack equal to the one I started with, four hours into an online tourney, a do-over sounds pretty nice.

Now, don't get me wrong. I've once come back from 5 chips in an SNG to win it all - I'm not giving up on the top prize, but I'm not forgetting about the money I've already got in the pot. Sure, I'd rather have T4k than T2K, but I'd rather have $800 and T0K than T0k and $0.

Tournies are about aggression, risks, and fearlessness... but they are also about patience, discipline, restraint, sacrifice, and, yes, payouts.

I'd fold AA here.

I'll take $800 and a coin flip a few hands from now.

CSC

[CardSharpCook]

[ QUOTE ]
point takin. I went from 6500 to about 4400 with a pocket pair i had to fold after overs and fairly heavy betting. Then i got really lousy cards for several rounds. I pushed A6s to steal the blinds once, only other marginal hand i had was 87s from early, which I passed on. I definatly wasn't waiting for aces, but was hoping for a pair or high cards at some point.

So, I guess I need input, should I be pushing with Q6, J2, etc. (I also had an active big stack to my left, which made me hesitent to steal too weak)

[/ QUOTE ]

I have a personal tourney rule that says when my stack is btwn 4-6BB, I'm stealing from any position with simple hands like Q9s, 57s, JTo, etc. I try to stick with suiteds, and try to have some connectivity. The idea is that if I am called, I'll probably have two live cards plus a str8 draw and a flush draw possible. But if I'm MP3, Ace anything is good enough, and K8s looks pretty good. However, I'm folding if someone raised ahead of me and only calling their raises with premium hands.

When I get below 4BB, I'm accepting any offer of a coin flip. CO bets me all in on the button, I'm calling with pocket ducks or AT.

This rule is also accompanied by a "tighten up" rule that says btwn 10BB and 6BB, all-in is my only bet and I'm only doing so with premium hands and/or Choice position.

If I have 4BB, I'm hoping to double up with my Q9s and then catch KK the next hand and double up again. If I don't catch KK, I'm waiting another half hour until I have to give Q9s another go.

Just some advice from a rookie, it is well-thought out and often used, but I don't have the experience of others here.

CSC

[Paul2432]

[ QUOTE ]
I think you have to decide whether you're playing for the money or to win.

[/ QUOTE ]

Play to maximize EV. Sometimes that means hanging on for the money. Other times it means going for the win. It all depends on the situation.

I think MicroBob gave a nice analysis of the EV of the situation.

Paul

[Bernas]

It's not about having a hand. It's about having position. If it were folded to you in late position try stealing with any 2. You can't wait for a hand or the Blinds will eat away at your stack.

[lacky]

Well, after a little sleep on this, I can live with the decision I made. It might not be the most +EV, but at the time I still had the goal of winning the thing and it was clearly the right choice for that.

I think what had me so completely on tilt last night was just that I was giving the choice to make in the first place. After waiting for over an hour for any kind of decent hand I got dealt AK in the small blind on the same hand the blinds increased, and 2, 3 hands max before I would be in the money anyway.

But, what can ya do. The goddess of poker loves to play her jokes. Really I've won more than my share this month anyway and I'm sure I made the poor guy with 168 chips' day. I picture him bragging it up at the office and I feel a little better about it all.

Steve

[lacky]

good point. The player to my left had 4 to 6x my stack and was playing lots of hands. I think that intemidated me too much and I played less than i should have

[Bernas]

I would agree with you except the following suggests that he could have played a little better.

[ QUOTE ]
I went 40 or 50 hands with nothing better than Q6, 87, etc, so I had decided to just make the money rather than push crap, then hit the only decent hand I'd seen with horrible timing. Even the blind steal agianst u was with A6, then nothing even that good came. Should I have pushed with trash and hoped? I really didnt know so I was basically on the fence waiting for something decent for the last hour, then finally got it and prob should have mucked it. grrr

[/ QUOTE ]

If he went 40-50 hands without stealing, and waiting on premium hands at this point in the tourney then he let himself get into this position.

There was no need for the person to call him a staller though(unless he watched him play and he actually was stalling).

[Bernas]

[ QUOTE ]
good point. The player to my left had 4 to 6x my stack and was playing lots of hands. I think that intemidated me too much and I played less than i should have

[/ QUOTE ]

Now you know for next time. Still looks like you played well though.