6 Handed SNGs

I have been playing any poker for about a month or so and about 5 days ago I got back into it playing $10 +$1 6 handed SNGs. I have banked around $300, only playing a handful of games a day. So here's the question...I've found myself min-raising a lot, especially in the later stages when the blinds are getting larger. I felt that in the past, my standard 3x bb raise was constantly getting called and I was getting outplayed on the flop, or I was getting popped preflop and felt that I was getting the right price to call, sometimes with the best of it, sometimes dominated. The min-raises seem to be working for me, but I've read many hand histories of players asking where their mistake was in the hand and seeing replys of getting put down because of such a small raise. Do I continue to use this strategy if it seems to be working or change my preflop style to something more stable?

The problem with min raising is it gives your opponent such good pot odds to call especially the small blind or big blind. You're almost forcing the big blind to call with almost any two cards. The min raise probably works better when the blinds are big because the big blind, although he is getting great odds, to call he's putting in a large chunk of his stack so he's more likely to fold. That's why the 3x bb raise is usually better. At least your giving your opponents a tough decision whether to call or not, 2x bb is so small the other players are much more likely to call you with marginal hands.

Minimum raising is generally a bad idea for the reasons that Ben states above. I would suggest reading this archived thread. It may shed some light for you as to why it (in most situations), is bad.

after i read your post I was going to scour the archives for the link that JQ already gave you, but alas there it was. Read that thoroughly, it is genius.

However, I would not go as far to say never min-raise. I would suggest min raising about 3% to 5% of your raises to just to mix up your raising amounts.

Once in a great while, if the stars align just right, and the angle of reflection from the moon to the sun is 103.2 degrees, I'll min. raise to feign weakness. Usually the situation is against an aggressive, weak villain, to which I am playing the nuts against on the river. I'll min. bet, and the villain will go all in, and viola, I stack. But otherwise, I agree with the rest of the field.

SubT33 said:

Once in a great while, if the stars align just right, and the angle of reflection from the moon to the sun is 103.2 degrees, I'll min. raise to feign weakness. Usually the situation is against an aggressive, weak villain, to which I am playing the nuts against on the river. I'll min. bet, and the villain will go all in, and viola, I stack. But otherwise, I agree with the rest of the field.

Click to expand...

This pretty much sums up how I feel about it too. It's good for maybe setting a trap against an over-aggro player. But you need to make sure you have the absolute nuts.

I would raise 3x the BB!

I've noticed lately that a min raise from early position seems to get a ton of respect (much more than it deserves) because people think you'll only min raise early with AA or KK. I'll use it occasionally in tourney's as a cheap steal technique.