Small ball review

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davidhoyle107

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I tried my first tournament playing small ball. Note. I made a huge mistake. I bought in a hour late. For small ball, that means I only had 20 minutes of blinds under 100. My starting stack was 1500. I had built up to 3000 before I lost a all in. There were 50 players when I joined. I came 27th. I ran into a straight vs 2pair. I had straight, guy hits full house on turn. Had 750 blinds here. I still worked up to 2700 with 750. I'm definitely trying this approach more. If I'd bought earlier, I'd probably of done much better with all the blind levels. I was ranked 16th before all in.
 
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davidhoyle107

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The all in was a ace high flush draw vs a k top pair.
 
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Napkins420

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Small ballers try to avoid going all in without the nuts
 
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Napkins420

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This is correct. But the blinds were starting to get high, and I had a short stack due to late entry .

Small ball is lame anyway, I'm all it does is induce many people to call and see a flop.

That shit def don't work at Betonline, those donks are seeing a flop lol
 
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davidhoyle107

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Small ball is lame anyway, I'm all it does is induce many people to call and see a flop.

That shit def don't work at Betonline, those donks are seeing a flop lol

Agreed the donks are seeing the flop. But isn't that kind of conductive to small ball? They'll miss more often than not. Easy delayed c betting opportunities in position. When you do hit something just double and triple barrel expecting calls. Again, I haven't played small ball or even mtt much, so I'm definitely listening.
 
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Napkins420

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Agreed the donks are seeing the flop. But isn't that kind of conductive to small ball? They'll miss more often than not. Easy delayed c betting opportunities in position. When you do hit something just double and triple barrel expecting calls. Again, I haven't played small ball or even mtt much, so I'm definitely listening.

If you think 6 people going to a flop is a good opportunity then idk what to tell you.

When I have a big hand last thing I want is half the table going to the flop, all of a sudden your 80% AA becomes 40% lol.

Someone is most likely going to flop some bullshit on you.
 
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davidhoyle107

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If you think 6 people going to a flop is a good opportunity then idk what to tell you.

When I have a big hand last thing I want is half the table going to the flop, all of a sudden your 80% AA becomes 40% lol.

Someone is most likely going to flop some bullshit on you.

That makes sense. Don't want to play multi way a ton. I guess it's one of those moderation situation dependant things.
 
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davidhoyle107

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That makes sense. Don't want to play multi way a ton. I guess it's one of those moderation situation dependant things.

I think though our strategy for ace ace is different than 78 suited or 22-jj. There we can hit big but don't want to raise a ton.
 
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I think that small ball is a good tactic when you are sitting at the table with a lot of tight players. Because you can steal many blinds then and after flop is much easier to read a tight player.
 
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davidhoyle107

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I think that small ball is a good tactic when you are sitting at the table with a lot of tight players. Because you can steal many blinds then and after flop is much easier to read a tight player.

The problem I'm running into is once blinds go up small ball doesn t work. This is a way to a get chips. Not how to pass the bubble.
 
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discintildeath

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As you said poker is very situational. Playing small ball works at a tight table to get people to join in. But when faced with a table of multiple very lose people calling 3x and 4x bets with hands worse than the average starting range you will need to throw in a 3-bet or an opener of 5x-8x and if they still all call maybe go back to small ball and try to outplay them postflop. they will knock each other out quickly playing as calling stations and can be replaced with more sane players.
 
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dominiq

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The problem I'm running into is once blinds go up small ball doesn t work. This is a way to a get chips. Not how to pass the bubble.
Generally you should have 150-200BB to use it. With 30BB doesn't have sense.
 
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davidhoyle107

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Generally you should have 150-200BB to use it. With 30BB doesn't have sense.

Agreed. Im considering doing bovada 10000 chip 10 min blind tourneys. That should get me plenty of deep stack time. The problem for me is seeming to be once stacks get smaller relative to the po/blinds. I guess spr would be a good thing to read about. Any recomendations?
 
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Napkins420

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To play a good small ball game you must be very good at reading hand ranges.

Small ball is a lot harder to execute online than live

Imo the best place to apply small ball is deep stacked cash games
 
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davidhoyle107

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To play a good small ball game you must be very good at reading hand ranges.

Small ball is a lot harder to execute online than live

Imo the best place to apply small ball is deep stacked cash games

Also agreed. What's your opinion of the bovada set up? I'm considering playing the 15 min blind structure instead of 10. It has 10000 chips starting stack and 10/20 blinds start. I agree that it's harder online. Most pros like small ball because it can utilize their skills. I think it has to be more value oriented online with lower bluff ratios. But I like the idea of a lot of small pots vs a few big pots. Especially in deep stack tourneys. It's just tightening up some and being situation aware. You CAN read people online. But it's more based off betting patterns and histories. I believe one girl won a tourney without seeing her hole cards the whole tourney online. She put cardboard over the cards to prove it was doable.
 
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Napkins420

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Also agreed. What's your opinion of the bovada set up? I'm considering playing the 15 min blind structure instead of 10. It has 10000 chips starting stack and 10/20 blinds start. I agree that it's harder online. Most pros like small ball because it can utilize their skills. I think it has to be more value oriented online with lower bluff ratios. But I like the idea of a lot of small pots vs a few big pots. Especially in deep stack tourneys. It's just tightening up some and being situation aware. You CAN read people online. But it's more based off betting patterns and histories. I believe one girl won a tourney without seeing her hole cards the whole tourney online. She put cardboard over the cards to prove it was doable.

The girl that won that tournie was some pro from eurpoe I think. She covered her cards and only played position the whole tournie, it was done to prove how powerful position is.

I don't play on borvada

I like to play TAG in the beginning of any free roll, just wait for an edge and use it

Small ball just isn't my style, maybe in a game with mostly good players, but the average person we encounter at the tables is a level 1 thinker, so I like to punish them for their fishy play
 
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davidhoyle107

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The girl that won that tournie was some pro from eurpoe I think. She covered her cards and only played position the whole tournie, it was done to prove how powerful position is.

I don't play on borvada

I like to play TAG in the beginning of any free roll, just wait for an edge and use it

Small ball just isn't my style, maybe in a game with mostly good players, but the average person we encounter at the tables is a level 1 thinker, so I like to punish them for their fishy play

I do that in cash games all day. Huds work wonders. Just find the calling stations and wait. Tourneys I like to do it differently. I noticed bovada software is funny.
 
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davidhoyle107

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As you said poker is very situational. Playing small ball works at a tight table to get people to join in. But when faced with a table of multiple very lose people calling 3x and 4x bets with hands worse than the average starting range you will need to throw in a 3-bet or an opener of 5x-8x and if they still all call maybe go back to small ball and try to outplay them postflop. they will knock each other out quickly playing as calling stations and can be replaced with more sane players.
Wouldn't small ball be great vs calling stations? I thought the defined strategy was to get a hand and raise the nits on calling stations.
 
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