Follow on from other Article- Mid Section

#1 9th January 2008, 3:04 PM

Hey guys, this is the follow up to my previous Article, again comments please

Hand Selection and Strategy – Hold’em MTTs
The Middle Period

This is the second article in my “hand selection in Hold’em mtt’s “series”. I hope that everyone enjoyed my early on article and will enjoy and use this one just as much.
We have now reached the 2nd hour of play, and this article covers how to play the next couple of hours of the tournament. This of course is based on what stack you have, and also the table image that you either decided to create or not in the first hour of the tournament, based on using either the survival theory or the all or nothing theory (see Early On article for details).
If you used the Survival Theory
As I mentioned in my other article, my strategy early on in mtts is to stay out the action and when you enter it make sure you are aggressive and take down pots relatively easy and with no comeback. Create the table image that you are a tight aggressive player (which makes sense, because this is the way you would have been playing.)
The way you play, will of course depend on the chip stack you have built to by this stage. Let’s suppose after the first break we won a few small pots, and a couple of donks helped us to double up a couple of times when we had big pairs and we are sitting on between 5-10k in chips. The blinds are somewhere around 100-200 and so IMO we are sitting nicely, and have a good chance of possibly progressing to ITM and beyond. It also means that we have over 25BB and so we can be fairly selective if we wish with our hands.
Because we used the survival theory for the first hour, depending on the players that were at your table, and how long you have been at the table at which you are currently sitting hopefully (at least) the players at the table have figure out that you are a solid player, and don’t enter pots except when you have a decent hand. This is brilliant to use to our advantage, if need be.
There are as always in poker, more than one way to therefore play the next 1-2 hours in the tournament. You can either decide to stay tight and aggressive (seeing as it had worked for the first hour) or you can decide we want to turn out better than average stack, into a FT or even tournament winning stack. To do this, you will need to most likely play more hands. If you decide to stay the same as you have done for the first hour, then do so. (See Early On and Survival Theory for details). However if you decide to loosen up then we can change our play in many ways.
For at least the first half hour or so, because the players all think you’re so tight they will respect your raises until they realize that you have changed gear and by then hopefully you will have lots of different players at the table and it will be too late for them. In this period of play, you can introduce blind stealing and reraising on the steal into your game plan. You need to pick your spots, and watch the players whose blinds it is and who you are reraising, especially if you are on a total bluff but it is time to start taking down pots with lesser hands. If you think a player is weak when he raises then go ahead and reraise him. The same with the BB, if you have seen him fold lots of BB’s to raises, and you assume he won’t call unless he’s got something then go ahead and steal his blinds. You cannot however, do it too often because then your game becomes too predictable and people will start to call you down and even reraise you.
As well as stealing pots and blinds with nothing hands, you can also start to see flops with hands that you otherwise weren’t even thinking about playing in the first hour. Hands such as ATs, QJs, and medium suited connectors such as 8-9s or 9-10s can all become playable if you wish. Once again, the more hands you play the more risk you put yourself at, so you must be careful if you want to apply this strategy. Because of this, I recommend that you try and get into flops with these sorts of hands as cheaply as you can, and preferably in late position, so that, if you flop a half decent hand such as top pair weak kicker, or middle pair then you can see what the rest of the table does before you have to determine what to do with your hand.
I am not implying by saying this that it means you should play 89s every time you get it, and sometimes even for a raise. I am just saying, if you haven’t had a hand in a while, the table still thinks you’re relatively and you’re in late position, limp and take a cheap flop, or if it comes unraised to you feel free to open the pot up with a standard raise and take the blinds down. The main issue with playing weaker hands, and especially playing suited connectors, is the fact that you can hit what appears to be a good flop and then lose all your chips to a better hand. This is why I recommend that you only start to play these sorts of hands if you feel confident in your post flop play and ability to analyze how weak or strong an opponent is based on their betting patterns and any reads you may have picked up.
The aim of this next period is to stay in the tournament, continue to build your chip stack so that you give yourself the best chance to get ITM, and eventually with a bit of luck and good judgment, the FT where the big paydays are.
If you have started the 2nd hour with a smaller chip stack than I mentioned above, let’s say 1-4k then of course with the blinds this high you cannot afford to play so many of the weak hands, but having said that you cannot fold forever or you will be blinded out. If this is the case you may need to start shoving allin with the “premium hands” I.e. pairs 99 and above, AK, AQ and if you like AJ. Also, staying away from suited connectors would be a good idea, play the smaller pairs if you can get a cheap flop to set up but other than that stay away from the action in general.

If you used the All or Nothing Theory
Because you used the more risky theory of the two, although the more beneficial theory stack-wise of the two, it is more likely that having stayed in the mtt for an hour, you will have a bigger stack than if you had used the survival theory. If you have a smaller stack, 1-4k use the same strategy above, look to shove allin and double up if you get a premium hand, whereas if you have a small pair try and limp and see a cheap flop, or stay away from the action. Having said that, if you are nearer to the top of that scale, and have say 3800 chips, then maybe you can play slightly looser, but this is personal preference. Generally at this stage you only want to put money in when you have a very good chance of winning some back.
If you have a bigger stack, which could be anything from 5k-30k depending on how the first hour went, you have a couple of options again. You can either decide to slow down, tighten up and play much like the survival theory says for the first hour, for the next couple of hours, so as to not throw away chips and only play hands where you are in front. Or you can continue to play the same way you have been playing for the first hour; after all it worked then so why will it not continue to work? Personally, I think the bigger your chip stack is the more likely you should be to slow down and protect it, but if you like seeing lots of flops, and your reads have been good then keep playing the way that is working for you.

I will at some stage (although it may be after the competition) be writing an article for how to play when you get ITM, just before you get ITM and before and on the FT. I hope you all enjoyed this article, more to come from me soon.

No1yidmax

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