my End Game is terrible just now! advice?

helloo everyone. okay, so for this month my Poker results have been up and down the whole time. i started down, then got level then down, then got level and i am now currently down. haven't had a losing month in a couple of months (it is still not ever of course) but what is really getting to me other than some mtt variance is my end game. i usually play $8 180 man sng's if i mix them in, but i just decided there to play strictly $2.50 and play a ton of them. keep regging every time i get ko'd. this was because i wouldn't feel tilted if i got a bad beat and i thought i could play my best game throughout by simply going for the win.

i played around 30 in total in the space of a couple of hours. final tabled two, came 10th in two (got DC'd for 5 mins so this cost me at least one of these 10ths and some chips the other times i just scraped itm or went in to FT ss or whatever.) highest i came was 7th. which is pretty bad tbh. overall i was down for that session, not too worried about that but more about my game.

when i was playing the early and middle stages i felt so confident and as if i was playing near as good as i can- hand ranges were perfectly mapped out in my head for any situation, be that a certain stack size, position, calling/ shoving, in 3 way pots etc. as well as having good reads when playing the odds post flop pot. in both of these stages i feel like i have a pretty big edge. this usually allows me to get to the last 2 tables with a decent amount of chips. i never went in with monster stacks, usually around average. however, when it got to the last 2 tables i didn't feel as confident for some reason. whether that was stack sizes, stage of tournament or whatever i am not sure. but i felt a little bit lost at points. usually my end game is pretty good, but the past few days it has been poor- yesterday ko'd in 16th from $13.50 KO from big field after 2 pretty bad mistakes. and then today i went in to final 2 table of $11 $3k gtd tourny with a av stack, got blinded away lost a pot or two then lost with 3's v 8's on FT bubble. again in 10th. in some ways i don't think this is a terrible thing as it shows that i am not bothered simply to make FT, but overall i feel i am losing a ton of money playing my current end game. does anyone have any advice on what to do to get me back playing well in this aspect? cheers!

playing 30 and fting 2 doesn't seem that bad for me those things get so short around 14-15 people from what i remember of playing them your going to go into spans of not cashing in these, failure rate of mtts is high and itm in these things from what i remember would be around 18-20% for the top players so even then with that average in your sample it easily could be nothing of your own doing ( and one of your data points is skewed bc of the DC) just keep working hard you will be fine

rumsey182 said:

playing 30 and fting 2 doesn't seem that bad for me those things get so short around 14-15 people from what i remember of playing them your going to go into spans of not cashing in these, failure rate of mtts is high and itm in these things from what i remember would be around 18-20% for the top players so even then with that average in your sample it easily could be nothing of your own doing ( and one of your data points is skewed bc of the DC) just keep working hard you will be fine

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thanks man this month has been far my biggest losing one ever, but seeing as i only started playing a year ago that's not really saying a lot tbh as 6 months ago a big losing month for me would be one or two hundred $ took the past 2 days off and gone out to the cinema/ drinking with friends just to take my mind off things and be able to re focus for the next month and beyond.


working out my plan of action today and will continue to do so tomorrow, been looking up variance/ bank roll guidelines, as i think 100 bi's is too low for me as i can play 20+ tables at once and play 1000+ mtt's a month so 200 at least, and also been thinking about a certain % a day, say 4-5% of my br. going to try get my HUD sorted again but have gotten all my best results in past 4-5 months when it hasn't worked so won't be end of the world if it doesn't. also been watching wsop, EPT and some coaching vid's today to refresh my poker game. managed to help a friend, who is rec player, win a $2.50 180 man sng. i railed his FT as i was just studying then he phones me with 3 left and i help him out and he ships it, so that was nice kind of helped me gain back some of my confidence in the original post, even though i wasn't playing i felt my help was vital to him winning.


sucks having a bad month, tbh i felt i played pretty well this month just ran horribly, no big scores really and would always bust with a couple of tables left and didn't really make one big FT in terms of big $ up top (in relation to my stakes ofc.) as you said i will keep working hard and hopefully November is a ++ month just found out today that Micro Millions will be running in November too so this is further motivation for me to keep working hard in preparation for this. said after the previous MM that i will try to win the next Leader Board and i will attemt to, i think this is realistic as i fell i will be better than 99% of the players in these fields, as they attract so many rec's, will be able to put in a lot of volume, and feel confident playing the series as i managed to do well in the last series, coming 119 or so on the leader board, without making a FT too. i had a ridiculous % of cashes, maybe like 30% or more, and had a few top 100's out of massive fields but couldn't run well enough to make a FT. also aiming for at least one FT. i am planning on playing maybe 75% ish of the events, so will most likely make a thread on this nearer to when the series starts in a few weeks

Gl in the mm even though im us lol

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newbie in training said:

Gl in the mm even though im us lol

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thanks man

I dont understand people firstly grinding 180 turbo's at 2.50 at stars..

you have the top 9 which in effect gives you about a 1 in 16 chance chance of winning $5 dollers or more in a 180 turbo.... even with an edge over the field this would still be 1 in 10

if you min cash its like 2.66? or something.

asides from first or second place (a 1 in 90 chance) - you might aswel be playing 18 man tournaments with a very strong chance of cashing 45 dollers in 7.00 buy in if you have an edge.

Your losing money if you are a good player. its sooooo easy to cash in 18 man sit n gos and 27 at pokerstars (non turbo)
If you work hard and Im guessing you have a solid game as you are studying poker, online im sure you can build your bankroll alot better in the 18/27's

Post some hands in this thread, I'll take a look for you and see if I can give some advice or point out some errors you might have in your late game.

The main thing is that that you say it's "now" bad. How can it become bad? You must be either tilting or your end game wasn't as good as you think and your run good might be coming to an end. If your early/middle game is good then I wouldn't recommend you playing 180's turbos and stick to normal speed tournaments and try learn your end game because the end game of MTT's is where the most profits come from, not the early/middle stages. You can simply just play like a nit in most parts and when you approach the 30bb or less stage, this is where most of the mistakes come from in my experience, especially as stacks get even more shallow like 15bb and less.

I agree the odds are far better in the 18/27 sng's less variance than the 180's

ramdeebam said:

Post some hands in this thread, I'll take a look for you and see if I can give some advice or point out some errors you might have in your late game.

The main thing is that that you say it's "now" bad. How can it become bad? You must be either tilting or your end game wasn't as good as you think and your run good might be coming to an end. If your early/middle game is good then I wouldn't recommend you playing 180's turbos and stick to normal speed tournaments and try learn your end game because the end game of MTT's is where the most profits come from, not the early/middle stages. You can simply just play like a nit in most parts and when you approach the 30bb or less stage, this is where most of the mistakes come from in my experience, especially as stacks get even more shallow like 15bb and less.

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cheers, nah i don't think my run good ever started lol. i think i was slightly tilted that night when i posted, however for the past week or so i keep coming in to the final 2/3/4 tables and not final tabling. i think mostly this is down to a lack of confidence as i just had my worst month. i feel i am playing pretty well, for example in the middle stages i can be in total control of a table when the stacks are deeper, but when it gets to the final 2 or 3 tables, as you said, when the stacks are shallower i am not doing so well. not winning flips etc that is needed to win. i don't think it is entirely just a case of winning flips though, i am obviously doing one or two things wrong. like perhaps being too cautios nearing a final table when earlier on i would have no fear of getting ko'd or whatever.


today i was in the $2.20R 500 cap. (i have dropped down in stakes due to bad month.) at the bubble i was raising like every hand and was around 3rd in chips when it burst. after that i kept a good stack, and at final 2 tables was average. however, at this point eveyone has 20 bb's. before i would probably be confident in being able to come out on top of this, as i have previously felt this sort of stack size i was able to play very well, however i was just thinking that there is soooooo much luck at this stage. picking up a pair higher than other player, better A etc. and sure enough, out with A Q v A K haha. kind of frustrating as i feel i have a pretty good edge throughout but when the stacks are all pretty short and everyones playing pretty tightish ( i can't really raise a ton of hands with 20 bb's when everyone has shoving stacks) i feel i don't really have a huge edge here.


i will post some hands i tried to do one earlier but it didn't let me upload it on boom for some reason.

this isn't an amazing hand or whatever, just what has been happening a lot recently when i am deep. (again smaller buy in but almost $1k for 1st so still pretty decent.) think around 30 left here. http://www.boomplayer.com/poker-hands/Boom/5652086_AF3AEF974E
then same tourny again not many left a couple of nights before. http://www.boomplayer.com/poker-hands/Boom/5603745_C5D839A96F
A J< 7's in $10k gtd $11 last night with 20 odd left.
and 2 or 3 times i have come inside top 50 of $5.40 ko 1st prize $2k or more then ran QQ in to AA and something similar again. with QQ i felt deja vu from previous times even flatted 3x open from mp. flop comes paired with f/d he shoves slightly over pot so obviously snap calling as doubt he'd do this with KK or AA (although was obvi never folding anyway) and yeah he has AA lol.


was thinking about getting some old hand histories from previous final tables of mine and watching them to see if i done anything different then. think this a good idea?

cotta777 said:

I dont understand people firstly grinding 180 turbo's at 2.50 at stars..

you have the top 9 which in effect gives you about a 1 in 16 chance chance of winning $5 dollers or more in a 180 turbo.... even with an edge over the field this would still be 1 in 10

if you min cash its like 2.66? or something.

asides from first or second place (a 1 in 90 chance) - you might aswel be playing 18 man tournaments with a very strong chance of cashing 45 dollers in 7.00 buy in if you have an edge.

Your losing money if you are a good player. its sooooo easy to cash in 18 man sit n gos and 27 at pokerstars (non turbo)
If you work hard and Im guessing you have a solid game as you are studying poker, online im sure you can build your bankroll alot better in the 18/27's

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thanks for your insight and the detail you went in to yeah i agree tbh, overall i think i am down from 180 mans, but up from the 45's etc. however i only really use these if i don't have a lot of tournaments running, and as 180's have greater 1st prizes as an mtt player i just select them. but yeah i am definitely an mtt player as opposed to sng. this month i am trying to play less tables to focus more and player better so doubt i will be playing sng's. totally agree wwith everything you said though about 6 months ago i built up $40 from $0.25/ $0.50 sng's- $1.50 to $400. but never really done anything with the 180's bar a 1st and a couple of 2nd's which isn't great considering i have probably played a few hundred if them (really don't have a clue how many tbh but not that much in relation to mtt's and not enough to be +ve.)

steveiam said:

I agree the odds are far better in the 18/27 sng's less variance than the 180's

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yep deffoo much less variance. going as low as the 9 mans these are so soft, although i only play these on Full Tilt which is kind of a side project of playing the odd cas/ sng/ tourny for 1 hour or so a day every so often as my main focus is on Stars mtt's. not long ago played 4 $5 sng's. 2 9 man and 2 6. won 3 and lost heads up in the other ( and in the one i lost think i lost a 60/40 with A J v K Q for the win haha.) 9 mans are pretty good but couldn't imagine grinding them for 12 hours would get pretty boring imo 1 hour is fine haha. perhaps similar to 18/ 27's.

indahood193 said:

thanks for your insight and the detail you went in to yeah i agree tbh, overall i think i am down from 180 mans, but up from the 45's etc. however i only really use these if i don't have a lot of tournaments running, and as 180's have greater 1st prizes as an mtt player i just select them. but yeah i am definitely an mtt player as opposed to sng. this month i am trying to play less tables to focus more and player better so doubt i will be playing sng's. totally agree wwith everything you said though about 6 months ago i built up $40 from $0.25/ $0.50 sng's- $1.50 to $400. but never really done anything with the 180's bar a 1st and a couple of 2nd's which isn't great considering i have probably played a few hundred if them (really don't have a clue how many tbh but not that much in relation to mtt's and not enough to be +ve.)

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No Prob : )

You might find playing less tables will bring you improved success - personally I think I profit as much 2 tabling as I do 4 tabling because I observe players better. I dont use tracker/HUD. though I will have to If I want to make serious money,
at the end of the day players do and have made bankrolls from live games 1 tabling.

the 180' turbos honestly are a gamble you end up tossing 95% the time in late play.
Im also an mtt player by preference I chase the big cashes.

If I was you I would grind the non turbo 9/18/27 mans and play the 'big' and the 'hot' series tournaments with a proportion of your profits as a bonus 'on pokerstars' You get a better return when you cash and if you run well you can be taking down 4 figure bankrolls.

But thats just me.
lol

cotta777 said:

No Prob : )

You might find playing less tables will bring you improved success - personally I think I profit as much 2 tabling as I do 4 tabling because I observe players better. I dont use tracker/HUD. though I will have to If I want to make serious money,
at the end of the day players do and have made bankrolls from live games 1 tabling.

the 180' turbos honestly are a gamble you end up tossing 95% the time in late play.
Im also an mtt player by preference I chase the big cashes.

If I was you I would grind the non turbo 9/18/27 mans and play the 'big' and the 'hot' series tournaments with a proportion of your profits as a bonus 'on pokerstars' You get a better return when you cash and if you run well you can be taking down 4 figure bankrolls.

But thats just me.
lol

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yeah that is true, when i play too many tables i can sometimes feel tilted, but i feel i play much better when i play less, but sometimes there are just too many tempting tournaments to play in haha. i appreciate your advice but don't think i will be playing those sng's tbh, if anything i am thinking about playing more cash as the variance is soooooooooo much lower haha. yeah i like the Big's and Hot's, the Big's especially they are my fav tournaments i have final tabled the Big $5.50 and Big $16.50. this hand cost me great chance of winning http://www.boomplayer.com/poker-hands/Boom/4877356_A19B404CAD


just going to be really selective of the tournaments i play, avoid playing 2 separate tourny sessions in a day as i don't seem to do well when doing so, and not play more than 8 tournaments at the one time until i start making money again. today was the 1st day in donkeys i managed to not play over 8 and was level so went okay i guess.

randomly signed up for an $11 mtt at 2am, was studying and felt the urge to play. liked the blind structure and field size so just 1 tabled. came 4th/ 500ish for like $300 so not bad. feeling good again just didn't get cards to win but ah well

That bad beat with queens hurt but honestly with a huge stack size I would have definitly folded and tried to build it back up because 9th is like nothing compared to top 3 js got to be cautious of the pay jumps

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newbie in training said:

That bad beat with queens hurt but honestly with a huge stack size I would have definitly folded and tried to build it back up because 9th is like nothing compared to top 3 js got to be cautious of the pay jumps

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yeah that's true i know i could easily have folded but i knew he would never do that with Aces or Kings and it would have left me with a brilliant chance of winning. me and that guy were having a constant battle so imo folding Queens would be a mistake but deffoo agree that it would be totally fine to slowly chip up and move up spots instead.

cotta777 said:

I dont understand people firstly grinding 180 turbo's at 2.50 at stars..

you have the top 9 which in effect gives you about a 1 in 16 chance chance of winning $5 dollers or more in a 180 turbo.... even with an edge over the field this would still be 1 in 10

if you min cash its like 2.66? or something.

asides from first or second place (a 1 in 90 chance) - you might aswel be playing 18 man tournaments with a very strong chance of cashing 45 dollers in 7.00 buy in if you have an edge.

Your losing money if you are a good player. its sooooo easy to cash in 18 man sit n gos and 27 at pokerstars (non turbo)
If you work hard and Im guessing you have a solid game as you are studying poker, online im sure you can build your bankroll alot better in the 18/27's

Click to expand...

I disagree - one of my former backers has a stable (with a couple business partners) with over 70 horses and at least a handful grind the 180s profitably. Most prefer turbo formats for these, though, as you can grind more and force errors from players who play improper push/fold poker.

Personally I preferred grinding 18 mans (turbo) but have seen several do well consistently with 180s.

my only advice for turbos is "unlike standard 8-10 minute blinds you can afford to go down to 10BB, but in a turbo the blinds increase so rapidly, in my oppinion i would start playing push fold a lot earlier, saying 15-20,

it causes a bit more varience because your getting involved in alot more all in situations, but so many people tighten up that when you do double up, you will have a much better stack to play with

If it's just flips you're not winning, then this is quite normal MTT variance. The example with where you said you busted with AQ vs AK for 20bb; could actually be avoided in most cases. I mean it's hard to say as there's no information about the hand, action in front, positions and of course the villain in question.

When people are 3B shoving 10bb stacks then you should be assigning a range of hands you will open/call a shove vs before you raise. If someone has a 3B shove of like 20%; you should definitely start calling lighter of course. Also to note; in general when a 10bb stack 3B shoves after you open, you likely have to call of most hands anyway given the price you will be getting. Again though; if you are up against aggro 3b shoving stacks you shouldn't be opening hands you aren't willing to call of.


As for the two hands you showed;tThe first AK hand is just standard; nothing you can do there.

However; as for AQo; When someone min raises UTG with a 16bb stack; I'd really be tempted to fold here his range looks super strong. Like best case scenario is he has AJo and even then, will likely fold to your 3b shove. I know when you look down at AQo vs a 16bb stack raise you feel it's good to go with but his min opening range in that spot usually is only going to be hands he's will to call of a 3B shove with; like 99+/AK+ all of which of course do very well vs AQo. Of course had this been later position raise then it would be a standard 3B but maybe it's spot like this you might be getting yourself into trouble. Like when we really look at what he is doing, his position at the table and the range of hands; it can only really ever be a super strong range. I very much doubt he is min raising hands like 22-77 in this spot.


I'd really love to see how the AJ<77 hand played out if you have the hand history. I'd recommend for sure looking through your tournament hand histories - it's only a good thing!

ramdeebam said:

If it's just flips you're not winning, then this is quite normal MTT variance. The example with where you said you busted with AQ vs AK for 20bb; could actually be avoided in most cases. I mean it's hard to say as there's no information about the hand, action in front, positions and of course the villain in question.

When people are 3B shoving 10bb stacks then you should be assigning a range of hands you will open/call a shove vs before you raise. If someone has a 3B shove of like 20%; you should definitely start calling lighter of course. Also to note; in general when a 10bb stack 3B shoves after you open, you likely have to call of most hands anyway given the price you will be getting. Again though; if you are up against aggro 3b shoving stacks you shouldn't be opening hands you aren't willing to call of.


As for the two hands you showed;tThe first AK hand is just standard; nothing you can do there.

However; as for AQo; When someone min raises UTG with a 16bb stack; I'd really be tempted to fold here his range looks super strong. Like best case scenario is he has AJo and even then, will likely fold to your 3b shove. I know when you look down at AQo vs a 16bb stack raise you feel it's good to go with but his min opening range in that spot usually is only going to be hands he's will to call of a 3B shove with; like 99+/AK+ all of which of course do very well vs AQo. Of course had this been later position raise then it would be a standard 3B but maybe it's spot like this you might be getting yourself into trouble. Like when we really look at what he is doing, his position at the table and the range of hands; it can only really ever be a super strong range. I very much doubt he is min raising hands like 22-77 in this spot.


I'd really love to see how the AJ<77 hand played out if you have the hand history. I'd recommend for sure looking through your tournament hand histories - it's only a good thing!

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thanks for your reply! some good advice in here yeah i find that A Q has been a really poor and losing hand for me recently, a lot of tournaments i have been ko'd recently has been with this hand. it is kind of right in between very strong hands and good hands. for example as you said when the guy raise utg and i have A Q it could deffoo be a fold, but i had been playing so tight, so thought he might fold the same hand and even pairs such as 7's which is obviously great for me. plus it was only a $2.20 so he could be randomly raising any hand. but yeah A Q is pretty hard to play in mtt's imo when it gets to push fold as if someone raises and you have A Q with a fairly ss it is always tempting to push, but you have to think about their ranges and how loose/ tight they have been. think i could have folded it tbh.


as for the A J v 7's hand i don't have the hh or have it boomed but i remember it pretty well. this guy had a huge stack and raised from middle/ late position. was either from the high jack or the seat prior, i was in the bb with A Jo around 8 bb's. thought i was pretty far ahead of his range as i would imagine him raising any 2 half decent cards. wasn't great when he turned over 7's but obviously was flipping so not a disaster but i missed and was out.

When I'm 3Bet shoving/ Restealing the ONLY ace I will do this with is AK (ok...lie....if they are a very active player opening light a lot I will also do it with AQ and occasionally AJs)

I prefer to 3Bet shove/resteal with hands that are less likely to be dominated...the main goal is a fold from my opponent anyways....so it doesn't really matter what I have....but in the off chance they do have a calling hand, I want a hand that is as live as possible. Obviously they will call with QQ+ and AK so I prefer to 3Bet ship with medium to big pairs, AK and hands like T9o, T8s, 87s. Yes I know the medium pairs can be up against a bigger pair, but usually they are up against 2 overs that will most likely fold.

that's just me.