All in or not?

Hello,

I am wondering... In MTT's when is it appropriate to go all in and when should I just take the loss. Should I make it a goal to never get all in until I have made the money. Should I make it a goal to never be all in? I have been knocked out so many times with the best hand after the flop by a card on the turn or river. I mean what should be my all in strategy. Am I a fool for getting all in after the flop. Even when I'm confident I have the best hand and I'm say a 2 to 1 favorite? How many times do you think Phil Ivey put all his chips at risk on his way to the 09 final table? On average, how many times does the average tournament winner place all his chips at risk throughout the tournament? Any response will be greatly appreciated! Thanks so much

No risk, No gain.

My experience in the matter is that when playing MTTs you need to decide if you want to get paid or win the tourney and really get paid.

Any MTT that I've approached being very tight and conservative my best position ends up being on the brinks of getting paid and if i'm lucky get my buy-in back usually getting blinded out. I can tell you thats that worth it or a viable situation.

In every single one of the MTT that I've placed either 1st or top ten in i approached with the same aggressive attitude. If you think you have the best hand, play the best hand. Win some and lose some but play it right and you'll end up winning more than you lose.

So in otherwords, no you're not wrong to go all-in when you feel you have the best hand... thats not to say be a donk but it'll also give you a chance to go into the final table with a decent chip stack instead of being short stacked and your payout will be better.

Hope I could help.
Good luck

Hi JJ - you sound pretty frustrated at getting knocked out, out of the money. A fact of tournament play is that you can only get knocked out by putting all your chips in - be that voluntarily or by being forced to by the blinds. It is also true that there are situations where going all in are riskier than others - for example, going all in on the flop when you are holding the nut flush will more often than not pay off - you can still get beaten here though.

Can you give some examples of when you get stung going all in? There are so many 'it depends' angles here it would help to narrow it down a bit.

In the meantime here's some food for thought. When you bet all in you either want your opponent to call or fold - if you call all in you need to be pretty sure you've got the best hand, and depending on the situation, best by some way. For instance, generally I'm not calling all in holding AK to a K88 flop - I might bet all in here if I reckon I can get a fold and the pot is worth winning.

Also, take a look at the tourney as a whole. Say you go all in with AsKc on a Ks8h7h flop against KhQh with your life on the line three times in a tourney. You are very very likely to get knocked out because you are not much better than a coin flip each time. I make that about five tourneys in six you die holding the best hand. Even at an 80/20 favourite it only takes three hands before you are only about evens to stay in the tourney (assuming you are against a bigger stack each time).

As I say, give us a few examples of the situations you are having trouble with and we'll take a look.

Avoid all in situations with marginal hands... most players in tournaments are really overly aggressive these days, its a good approach, but you need a good defense to win tournaments. having said that, i think its better to be aggressive and trying to accumulate a big stack then wait for premium hands and be knocked out.. jsut get more exp and read up here and in books and online about tournament play..

Take a loook at the WA/WB concept, or "small Ball" should help you out/

Hi jj,


Here is a thread where we discuss this and other situations.

Give it a read and join the discussions.

My MTT Strategies




Snow

yeah.. you need to determine whether u wanna win big or you wanna juz get back ur buy in n abit more... it's both different approach. maybe u can do the all in without much risk after u itm????

You cannot get busted if you are not all-in. So, in a tourney where you cannot rebuy, you want to avoid allin situations as much as possible. That said, you will have to go all-in on occasion. You cannot keep folding to pressure. Just pick your spots -- preferably against a player looser than you, preferably with a premium hand. Then cross your fingers and hope you are lucky, because all-in means you have cast your fate to luck.
Some tourneys, luck will be with you and it feels smooth -- you get a lot of premium hands and you win those showdowns -- until the last one. Others, your hole cards are abysmal for ages and you try to make do with positional play and raising the mice. Those tourneys are rocky horror shows.

You may not want to listen to me. I often enough cash, but seldom place high. Depends on what you want. (Personally, I want both, but don't seem to get there.)

The best players do not win every tourney they are in. They do not cash every tourney. There are few people who cash in 20%+. 15% cashes is pretty good. That means 85% of tourneys played are dead losses. Accept that fact. A lot of tourney poker will have you on the rails a lot of the time. It just is.

The difference, though, between the best players and, say, me (my current OPR stat for 2009 on NLHE tourneys is 19% -- not accurate but ok -- looks good but in actuality does not put much cash in pocket) is that, when they cash, they place a lot higher. And, overall, they make more money, more ROI, on the tourneys they cash in.

The trick is to place high regularly and cash in 15% or more. I have not figured out how to do that yet. But it clearly involves a combination of aggressive play and safer play. Some people can fold that AJ easily under pressure, some cannot.

Are you a calling station? Some people would bet their lives on AK! I use that analogy specifically because that's what they do. They can't wait to call with a drawing hand hoping to knock the guy out. Sometimes it's just the feeling we get knocking another out. Sounds foolish, but a lot of guys realize it's a huge leak.

Just a suggestion.