Good at cash games awful at tournaments

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arjunkrishnan

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I have been playing poker semi-seriously for about 2 years now, and I am quite profitable at cash games. I generally play loose and aggressive pre-flop and tight aggressive post flop. I rarely loose on showdown.

Not a fan of online play, I play mainly home games or at card rooms and casinos.

I have over the last 3-4 months tried playing sit-n-go poker tourneys extremely unsuccessfully. I've played 15 odd tournaments in the last 4 months and not cashed in any of them.

Maybee this is a sign that I should just stick to cash games because I'm far more profitable there but I want to improve tournament play.

Any advice on how I can improve my tournament play? I don't have a huge bankroll and I have to say that my bankroll management also needs some work and I'm spending too much playing tournaments.

Thanks
 
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hffjd2000

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Maybe you are carrying your cash game strategies to tournaments.

The two are different in many ways.

I consider tourneys as long term thing while cash is short one. For tourneys, have to play many games before cashing a substantial one.
 
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44Blackhawk

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I play mostly online and like you do ok at cash games. I think variance is a killer in tournaments. I think you need a pretty large BR to play them profitably. Many times I have finished just out of the money or in the chump change payout range. Too many coin flips to rely just on your poker prowness, at least at my skill level. Most of the time I don't feel like I've wasted my money as much as my time.
 
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arjunkrishnan

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Maybe you are carrying your cash game strategies to tournaments.

The two are different in many ways.

I try not to carry my cash game strategy into tourney play, what I notice though is that in tourneys I quite often end up folding before I get to showdown. I'm much more nervous playing marginal hands and fold on large turn bets only to later learn I had, or would have had, the best hand. I start going on tilt far more easily in tournament play as compared to cash game.

Any good books you can recommend for learning better tournament play, or is experience the best teacher?
 
joker131

joker131

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quite the opposite for me cant play cash games at all, play loose and always get hit on the turn and river play tight and not play enough hands to keep the other players guessing which is all part off cash play.
 
PapaC

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Yeah you have to make cash and MTT buyins the same. Glad you only played 4. Ok what is your goal. Are you trying to make money from it, or is it just fun and if you win ok, if you lose now and then it won't kill you. Cash is good for you, so play that for the money for a good MTT once in awhile for fun and experience. And bring the questions here.
 
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arjunkrishnan

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I play poker mostly for fun! I play a no money game as seriously as I would a $200 buy in. I just think that other players might not. I went and registered at an MTT tournament yesterday, a small field only 30 players with 7 cashing and ended up 12th , which is an improvement but not great.

I then went and played a cash game and recovered my tournament buy-in and a little more.

I was the short stack(8BB) on a table with 5 others and was at the cut-off and shoved with AKo. The BB called and showed A10o and hit a 10 pair on the turn.

I just feel that I have too many bad beats when I play tourney, in a cash game atleast i can re-load!
 
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theevildub

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those sit and gos and MTTs are beasts !! But a great experience for you to improve your game. There are a LOT of coinflips. Usually, the big stack picks on the smaller stacks until they chip out. So even if they are a 40% to 60% dog, it wont really matter to them because it wont hurt their chipstack that much.

Unlike cash games, you cant just sit around and wait for good hands. And even when you do, those hands arent guaranteed to win. Play good poker. Take some chances. Pretend its a cash game since your so good at those and dont let the "Tournament" part of it scare you.

Good luck !!! Now go get those donkeys !!!!
 
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Ben Byrne

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Get some practice in freerolls, and play sit and gos with an increasing number of players to get the best practice imo
 
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44Blackhawk

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The title of this thread fits me perfectly. A few minutes ago I finally made a final table for the first time ever (since 2010)! I placed 9th and at least tripled my buy in.
 
anonimalit

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sitgo and cash games have to be agressive , mtts have to be tight agressive =)
 
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Tosh_67

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Tourneys are a survival process... You must have the mindset to fold good cards sometimes to survive past the bubble, something that is not as common on a cash table....

You say you play LAG on cash tables... maybe try playing a bit more TAG in tournaments... the less hands you play the less chances of being knocked out to bad beats
 
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44Blackhawk

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I can't believe it twice in one day! I made the final table again and finished 5th of 47! Unfortunately the payoff was only 2 buy ins in a $4. game. But it proves that even I can actually do this.
 
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TryTo

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You can afford to make mistakes in cash and to be in plus anyway, but not in tournaments. Even one may worth no hitting any money.
 
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Lying So Low

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really can't play cash... in tourneys have regular ITMs. Cash game = lost my money. Need another strategy:mad:
 
makisaa

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Tournament needs patient. The more you play you will improove playing in tournaments.
 
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bizbakol

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The key is that you have to raise in the cash games even though if you have nothing, because in the most cases the opponent fold his cards, but if not and reraise, you have to fold. In the long distance this tactic will be profitable.
 
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