Excellent advice on MTT but do you agree?

Hi all.

I posted a thread a few days ago. I recieved contradictory answers. Which side of the fence do you stand on???

This is the details I posted

I`ve just started playing on Pokerstars (nice site) and I would like to share with you all my stats from my first $20 buy in MTT. I would appreciate it if you guys could comment on the information provided. I think this is the way I always play.

During current Hold'em session you were dealt 175 hands and saw flop:
- 7 out of 18 times while in big blind (38%)
- 8 out of 20 times while in small blind (40%)
- 12 out of 137 times in other positions (8%)
- a total of 27 out of 175 (15%)
Pots won at showdown - 9 of 10 (90%)
Pots won without showdown - 12

This was after 226 entries were down to 17, I was in forth at time. Still playing it.

Two completly different replies being
1)
I also think that you are playing just a little too tight with only 15% of your hands played. I feel that at a begginer to novice player will play verly little percentage of thier hands( not saying you are a begginer)because they only play premium card unless just no cards are coming, but with 175 hands there will be some. Now with taking a look you played most of your hands out of the blinds, which tells me that you are not trying to steal the blinds enough. For a tournament it is essential to steal blinds to keep up with the rapid blind increase. Fourth position is awesome with little hands played which means you were able to get your good hands payed off by weaker players, but with a 90% win rate at the showdown it shows me that you are a quite passive player who only will go to the end with the nuts or very lose to it. When you run into the more advanced players they will be able to eat you up easily because you are too predictable. You should open up more and play more positional with moderate standings like suited connectors or small pairs to conceal your play a little. I find though if you play tight/conservative like most people will tell you and you take advantage of stealing during opportune moments(like when it comes close to the bubble) you should be up at around 25-35% of hands played. Also noticing that you are letting your blinds go undefended most of the time. I am not saying that you should defend every bling, but you folded over 50% of your blinds away. You should look back and try to recall how many times you thought your blinds were taken by a steal. Do you think you could have made some reraises to foil stealing attempts?
2) A top pro says the best poker players only play 10% of their hands.

What do you all think?

Ronaldadion

I replied with # 2,, thats what i said, 10%, good players only play 10% of the time>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>. buck

I see youre having a poll. Me vs. what the pros say. lol. Hope I do ok. I am no pro, but a striving amateur. Vote for me! lol.

It looks to me you are falling into that little trap " aww its only a little bit more to see the flop" trap. If you look at your percentages you are being suckered in to pay the extra at the SB when you are folding more at the BB. Why is that? Are you getting better hands at the SB?
Everrything else looks good. You are in an excellent position and seem to be on track to the final table. Once you are there you can open up a bit.

Nope, sorry. One of the guys said one of the pros say that, not one of the pros!!!

I liked what you said, but I`m trying to get my head round the fact that if you play tight/ conservative early in a tourny you won`t lose as much cash, but you might catch. One pro says "money saved is as good as money won" The dilema I have is simple, Mathematically I know I am good, so working out pot odds, etc I`m good at. Therefore, my style of play lends itself to a more tight game. I do feel, however, that I am probably not `passive` - I just try to pick the time to bluff. What I normally do if I bluff is if the other person shows strength I`ll fold quicker than a worker in a laundrette!!! I tend to bluff the same as I raise with a good hand, the idea being that they don`t pick up if its a bluff or a genuine raise. So to get me out of a pot they need to make a strong raise and then chance it is a bluff!!!

But, no, I`m not doing down what you say m8, just it was good to have 2 different perspectives!!!

Ronaldadio

So are you suggesting I fold more of the poor hands in the small blind and save a few more chip with poor hands on sb?

That's what I've heard recommended. It depends on how many others are already in the pot, though -- if you've got several limpers in front of you, the potential equity might be enough to merit completing the bet with many starting hands.

I can't vote because, like most things in poker, "it depends". If you play as tight as your stats show, you could either A) Beat a very loose table because they call anything and you'll always get them with the nuts. or B) Lose to a very skilled table who will pick up on your passiveness, raise you often, and blind you out.

I too have a problem with passiveness. I'm working on knowing when to bluff, when to show a bluff or the nuts, how to "continuation bet" (a form of bluffing), and how to adjust my hand selection to the read I get from the table. I think the Harrington books are helping me perfect my tight/aggressive style to a happy medium between too tight & too loose. If you haven't read "Harrington On HoldEm: Vol. 1", you should get it. It will definitely help in this area. (Vol. 2, also)

It Depends on your table.
It could Theoretically be correct to play anywhere between 5%-100% of your starting hands depending on the table.

That's exactly it. From your statistics it looks like you are folding the same crap hands in the BB but you are keeping them and paying in the SB. Why? They are both the same crap hands.

What you might want to do is keep a record of how many times when you play the SB you actually hit something and win with it. That is going to tell you if you are getting your value out of paying the extra in the SB.