playing short stack in cash game

So, what would be a good strategy to play short stack in cash games? I've tried playing with 20bb in a cash game wich I played very tight and ended up losing some stupid hands because I was getting called light, since I had no more chips to play post flop. Hands such AKs vs Q5 off etc.

I ended up deciding that playing short in cash games is BS and should play deep stacks, but eventually I'll find myself in a short stack and dont really know if I just go allin preflop with a decent hand or try to see a good flop and go from there. I've been losing a lot of money in this type of situation.

I'd encourage you to set up an auto top-up once your stack reaches a certain threshold (like 80% of buy-in) so that you still have a stack to play with when you get to a good hand. I don't think that playing short-stacked is a good idea as you are really limiting your options on your play and you are effectively playing a push-fold type of strategy (and being short-stacked, you lose a lot of fold-equity).

nameless1537 said:

I'd encourage you to set up an auto top-up once your stack reaches a certain threshold (like 80% of buy-in) so that you still have a stack to play with when you get to a good hand. I don't think that playing short-stacked is a good idea as you are really limiting your options on your play and you are effectively playing a push-fold type of strategy (and being short-stacked, you lose a lot of fold-equity).

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I agree. I probably wont try playing shortstacked anytime soon
thnks

Playing SS in cash is difficult, takes extreme luck and is extremely hard to be profitable. Like you said, you'll be getting called light all day long and sometimes in multiway pots. Never good. I get not wanting to top off all the time but stay close to max buy in as much as you can to help protect your hand.

If you are playing online and dont want to play short stacked, then just enable auto top-up. Most sites offer it including pokerstars and 888 Poker.

vini127 said:

I agree. I probably wont try playing shortstacked anytime soon
thnks

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I do encourage you to also keep track of how many times you get topped up and by how much. More importantly, set a stop-loss limit for yourself ahead of time.

Personally, I have a stop-loss limit of 2 full buy-ins... but I think others have it set at 3 or more. Whatever your stop-loss is set up at, stick to it. This will help you limit damage from tilt or series of bad beats.

Playing a short stack is much easier than playing deep.

You have less decisions and can exploit the fact that many loose player play a lot of hands with implied odds against other deep stacks.

Barry Greenstein used to buy in short when he didn't feel he had an edge in High Stakes Poker.

Just google "short stack play cash games" for a lot of strategy. It becomes more like shorter stacks in a tournament. Also a lot of advice for that on Google/YouTube.

Play more hands that can flop good Top Pairs and Over Pairs mainly - plus all pocket pairs depending on the price pre-flop. High cards and pp go up in value and sc down.

Pokerstars used to have a minimum buy-in of 20bb and a lot of short stack pros. Now I think the lowest buy-in is 40bb in a lot of cash games (more of a middle stack strategy applies when).

If you are a good player relative your opponents (and are bank-rolled for the game) it is of course better to buy in full since you can earn more.

I like games there the by-in is about 200bb. Deep but not mega deep.

I hate playing short stack. It tilts me even harder as I am trying to catch to the bigger stacks who always tax you. Off course it depends on how deep you are willing to go

pentazepam said:

Pokerstars used to have a minimum buy-in of 20bb and a lot of short stack pros. Now I think the lowest buy-in is 40bb in a lot of cash games (more of a middle stack strategy applies when).

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40BB is often called a cap stack, and while you do see some regulars use that strategy today, its kind of rare. At least 90% of the time, when someone dont buy in full, its not a very good player. Maybe not the worst player in the world, but not like a solid winning regular.

The difference between 20 and 40BB is, that with 20BB you can often jam over a standard open and make it solely a preflop game. With 40BB you have to go postflop quite a bit more, but you can typically just go with a hand like a strong top pair even in a single raised pot.

I totally understand you but when this inconvenient situation arise the only thing you can do is to control your tilt as much as you can and also raise the value of your hands,instead of raising three times before the flop with AK raise at least five and if you hit the K or A on a flop raise all pot size not just the part of it cause every player with huge stack will try to draw against you.

If buying in small in a cash game, you want to pick a spot to shove and either collect blinds or double quick. Obviously play big hands strong, but you also want to play hands that have a lot of equity preflop like 10 9 suited. If you're not active, you will only lose a slow and painful death.

vini127 said:

So, what would be a good strategy to play short stack in cash games? I've tried playing with 20bb in a cash game wich I played very tight and ended up losing some stupid hands because I was getting called light, since I had no more chips to play post flop. Hands such AKs vs Q5 off etc.

I ended up deciding that playing short in cash games is BS and should play deep stacks, but eventually I'll find myself in a short stack and dont really know if I just go allin preflop with a decent hand or try to see a good flop and go from there. I've been losing a lot of money in this type of situation.

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So your're saying that the other players tend to call you lightly when playing a short stack. Like with Q5 against your AK. And that bothers you. Why? I would love to have my raises with AK called by Q5 every single time. Of course, AK will lose sometimes against Q5, but the poker player's goal should not be to win every hand, just the majority of them.

zinzir said:

So your're saying that the other players tend to call you lightly when playing a short stack. Like with Q5 against your AK. And that bothers you. Why? I would love to have my raises with AK called by Q5 every single time. Of course, AK will lose sometimes against Q5, but the poker player's goal should not be to win every hand, just the majority of them.

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I 100% agree. You want to get it in with the best and try to isolate to be against only 1 or 2 people. If they hit their random hand then so be it. You gotta play your hand to its max potential.

nameless1537 said:

I'd encourage you to set up an auto top-up once your stack reaches a certain threshold (like 80% of buy-in) so that you still have a stack to play with when you get to a good hand. I don't think that playing short-stacked is a good idea as you are really limiting your options on your play and you are effectively playing a push-fold type of strategy (and being short-stacked, you lose a lot of fold-equity).

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In my opinion your advice is excellent for advanced players, and not that great for the less advanced. I think the beginner players should be concerned about minimizing losses before maximizing gains. Playing against more skilled opponents with a large stack in front of you is counterproductive because the same mistakes lead to increased losses. As far as the fold-equity, I think it's actually the other way around: when you are short stacked and make the same raises you force your opponents into making mistakes by calling with speculative hands, because in case their hand improves after the flop there is not enough money to be made from your short stack to justify the investment. Good players who understand and rely on odds while playing are aware of the implied odds which are never great against short stacks.

nameless1537 said:

I'd encourage you to set up an auto top-up once your stack reaches a certain threshold (like 80% of buy-in) so that you still have a stack to play with when you get to a good hand. I don't think that playing short-stacked is a good idea as you are really limiting your options on your play and you are effectively playing a push-fold type of strategy (and being short-stacked, you lose a lot of fold-equity).

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Very good answer

I used to buy in deep but now I find that I just save my cash and just go short stack when I enter a table of unknowns. It makes me play tighter observe the play of other players post flop play. Get to know when opens wide range who c-bets who gives up easy post flop. Who calls most of the time. When I came in short it makes me observe the table habits for a few orbits. If you get premium cards you can also force the play preflop Deep stack players hate a short stacker 4betting. Then when I feel comfortable I know the players tendency I buy in for more and play the deep stack ( or sometimes a double up) and go to with my post flop strategy and play a more conventional game just as the player adapt to my allin short game I switch gears

zinzir said:

In my opinion your advice is excellent for advanced players, and not that great for the less advanced. I think the beginner players should be concerned about minimizing losses before maximizing gains. Playing against more skilled opponents with a large stack in front of you is counterproductive because the same mistakes lead to increased losses.

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I agree, that beginners are likely to lose at a higher rate, if they play with a deep stack, because deep stacked poker is more complicated. For instance there are more spots, where you need to be able to get away from strong but not nutted hands like top pair or an overpair.

However it depends also, what are your goals in poker? If you want to learn and improve, there is no other way to learn a 100BB strategy than to actually play 100BB deep. And if you just started out playing 2NL, its cheaper to make a mistake for stacks now, than to make the same mistake later at 10NL or 25NL.