Small Ball

LizaBuv

LizaBuv

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I have been recently learning more about Daniel N (Small Ball Strategy). From a past post it appears most people disagreed with my 9Ts open raise from MP.

There is a chance I am overdoing it with the strategy as I am excited about utilizing it in my game. Question is, how should I play my suited connectors with this small ball strategy. Should I be only waiting for LP or is there a time for them to be played from EP and MP as well.

When answering, please consider the fold equity I have. ex: Pot with both blinds and antes is 2650 and I open for around 2 and a half time the big blind 2250. Risking 2250 to win 2650 because of the antes...Liza
 
cjatud2012

cjatud2012

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Small ball only works when the effective stacks are deep and you have a very large edge over your opponent in post-flop play. This isn't the case very often in tournaments (especially online) so it's really not very useful.

imo I would spend more time focusing on good value betting and assigning villain hand ranges before even thinking about small ball.
 
ManicLombax

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I was one of the few people on your other thread who said the raise from MP with T9s was ok. I've been thinking about it a bit, and wanted to talk about that a little more. The play I would make there would be more of a bluff than a value raise, and I wouldn't do it every time. I might take down the blinds and antes and be happy. If I get called, I might throw out a c-bet if I miss my hand and take down the pot with nothing. Or obviously I might hit a nice draw and bet for value.

This differs from small ball play in that I'm not really going to try to win the hand when I hit middle pair. Daniel Negreanu will raise you with 96s, hit a pair of sixes, and either bet you off your hand or make a hero call on the river and take your chips (and of course sometimes he'll make a hero call and give you a bunch of his). I'm not nearly good enough at reading people to figure out how to play middle or bottom pair for value.
 
FreeRollWannabe

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I feel that, that kind of poker playing, should be reserved some of the best poker players.

I have come across about only 3-4 poker players over the years that play the "lesser" hands, and just post-flop out play me - consistantly.

It is extremely annoying, as I can clearly tell they are better than me.

Just recently played against one said player, the man had balls, It was a SnG and I was far ahead with 7k, the SOB clearly had me pegged and whittled me down to nothing. Hell I even called him on it while we were playing.

Just typing here reminds me of my Real life playing, sat down with a Coloradian "Pro." Every single hand, and I mean every hand, every position, he would raise the max (limit poker) 12 bucks. Out played everyone at the table, it was crazy, hella annoying to be put in your place like that.
 
Egon Towst

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I would cheerfully play suited connectors for a raise from MP in a cash game, but that will not often be an appropriate play in a tournament. In order for that tactic to be successful, you need deep stacks and players who are willing to give you action, should you hit a hand. In tournaments, stacks are generally smaller and play is often more cautious, so that suitable conditions are seldom available.
 
ManicLombax

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I would cheerfully play suited connectors for a raise from MP in a cash game, but that will not often be an appropriate play in a tournament. In order for that tactic to be successful, you need deep stacks and players who are willing to give you action, should you hit a hand. In tournaments, stacks are generally smaller and play is often more cautious, so that suitable conditions are seldom available.

True, but I think as a semi-bluff it can work sometimes, particularly if you're at a tight table as you're describing here. You raise and take down the blinds. Or you raise, c-bet, and take down a nice little pot. I just like this play with sc's more than two random cards because you have quite a bit more nut value than if you're doing this with Q5.

Of course if effective stacks are so short that you can't even c-bet anymore, this won't work, but unless you're playing a turbo I think you can still semi-bluff sometimes.
 
Egon Towst

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True, but I think as a semi-bluff it can work sometimes, particularly if you're at a tight table as you're describing here. You raise and take down the blinds.


I had assumed we were talking about playing the hand for value. You are right, of course. Stealing the blinds is a sound (and often necessary) part of the MTT player`s game,
 
c9h13no3

c9h13no3

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I would cheerfully play suited connectors for a raise from MP in a cash game, but that will not often be an appropriate play in a tournament. In order for that tactic to be successful, you need deep stacks and players who are willing to give you action, should you hit a hand. In tournaments, stacks are generally smaller and play is often more cautious, so that suitable conditions are seldom available.
/thread

Small ball strategy is targeted at events like the wsop where your stack stays fairly deep until very late in the tournament. The vast majority of tournaments are played short stacked, and small ball becomes a pretty bad strategy. If you've got 12 big blinds left, the last thing you want to do is go min-raising 98s, and especially not from middle position.

Newbies always bring up small ball, because they heard about it on TV. However, its rarely applicable in most online games that they're playing.
 
cardriverx

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agrred. like in the WSOP Main Event the stacks are extremely deep, allowing small ball to be a good strategy. In usual tournaments, in usually just leads to a fold and loss of chips.
 
Bwammo

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I have been recently learning more about Daniel N (Small Ball Strategy). From a past post it appears most people disagreed with my 9Ts open raise from MP.

There is a chance I am overdoing it with the strategy as I am excited about utilizing it in my game. Question is, how should I play my suited connectors with this small ball strategy. Should I be only waiting for LP or is there a time for them to be played from EP and MP as well.

When answering, please consider the fold equity I have. ex: Pot with both blinds and antes is 2650 and I open for around 2 and a half time the big blind 2250. Risking 2250 to win 2650 because of the antes...Liza

The main problem with raising out of position, like from MP, is the pure amount of players behind you that have the opportunity to call you. Playing postflop is incredibly difficult from out of position, especially if you do not know the players you're up against inside and out (and usually in an online MTT...you really don't know much). Sure, we can consider raising and c-betting when the flop comes haggard...but what if he calls us? Does that mean he has a superior hand and we need to give up? Not really. Players often call there with overcards, or gutshot draws, or really anything if they have any hopes of trying to "outplay" you on the turn. So in a sense, our c-bet cost us even more money into a pot we didn't necessarily need to be in, and we still haven't learned very much about our opponents hand.

When you're raising from MP (lets say there's still 3 players between you and the button) you've got to assume these players have a certain calling range. We can use HUD stats and their stack size to help us with that assessment...but the average unknown player is going to be calling at least 10-15% of hands in position there. Add it all up and subtract a little bit for various math factors and you've got approximately 28%-42% that someone is going to call you and have position on you. We also must account for the times where someone reraises us in position...and then the chances that a blind plays back at us...and so on. It's just such a dangerous play unless we have gathered a ton of intel on our opponents and know that they are going to be calling a bit tighter than 10%.

That all being said, I LOVE small ball. Being a skillful postflop player, it adds a ton of equity to my overall game if I'm in the pot mixing it up on the flop. But...I do it from position. Why? I'll have a greater chance of having position on my opponents, should they decide to enter the pot with me.
 
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