how to play towards the ends of freerolls

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miko122

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I always find towards the end of freerolls i never have a clue how to play certain situations. There will be about 40 people left and 30 are in the money I look at the position and im sitting at about 25th so in it but very short stacked. I try not to play any hands and just wait it out but if i get a premium hand i find i ship it and can never seem to win that one hand even though ahead preflop. Any ideas/ suggestions on how to play close to the bubble. It just seems like everytime i play these freerolls end up getting called by the big stack and losing. Should i try and only ship top hands against big stacks and ship marginal against short stacks in the blinds?
 
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CANDYMAN1414

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DONT look at he payouts or people left. This will keep you playing just like you did the whole tourney. youll find that youll play alot better also and who wants to cash in a free roll ? winning is where the money is.

good luck
 
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miko122

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alright thanks il keep that in mind
 
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NYRebirth

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I agree play your game and dont watch how many people are left until you are 1 or 2 away from the money. You can pay attention and see who is trying to fold their way to the money and make attempts to steal blinds from them.
 
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MIShroomer47

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I too am struggling with this. i seem to have no problem with the large field, my last few tournys i've made it to less than 100 people from thousands, but I'm having a hard time stacking up chips when it gets to this point. I like the mention of not watching how many players are left and I'm not one to count them down, not often anyway. Like the thread poster it seems like when I do get my money in I just can't take the pot down because i have no fold equity with <6 BB left. When i'm getting towards 8-9 bb left do i need to start being more aggressive (table action depending) and making a move at some blinds or what?
 
dj11

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At the end of any tourney (including freerolls and huge buy-in games) that started with lots of people, unless I am short stacked, I take a general Monsters or Nothing attitude. This is not to say I don't play to win, it does (for me) mean I know I have to get in ITM before I can win the whole thing.

Getting in the money is high priority for me, and I am fine with letting others feel the panic, and act on those feelings.

All bets are off when I find myself short stacked and looking like I can't get ITM without doing drastic things. I thus do drastic things. But not just ATC, unless absolutely last ditch (like you are the BB next hand and you can't cover).

Conventional wisdom, and most books, suggest you go kamikaze when your stack hits about 10-15 BB's. I don't do that, I can let myself blind out if it means some money over no money.
 
micalupagoo

micalupagoo

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shove or fold, with good position, hopefully against only 1 player
forget just trying to cash (hard I know) and play to win
its okay to bubble many if you play properly cuz when you get it in good, you will win more than you lose, and you're playing to WIN, not min cash!!!!
1 win worth more than many min cashes
gl
 
Yoshimiii

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At the end of any tourney (including freerolls and huge buy-in games) that started with lots of people, unless I am short stacked, I take a general Monsters or Nothing attitude. This is not to say I don't play to win, it does (for me) mean I know I have to get in ITM before I can win the whole thing.

Getting in the money is high priority for me, and I am fine with letting others feel the panic, and act on those feelings.

All bets are off when I find myself short stacked and looking like I can't get ITM without doing drastic things. I thus do drastic things. But not just ATC, unless absolutely last ditch (like you are the BB next hand and you can't cover).

Conventional wisdom, and most books, suggest you go kamikaze when your stack hits about 10-15 BB's. I don't do that, I can let myself blind out if it means some money over no money.

And that's why you will never win a tourney... this is the wrong way to go around playing in a tournament. The bubble is the BEST place to get AGGRESIVE and start stealing. Also your aim every tournament should be to get in the top 3 or to win, nothing else. The money gained from 'cashing' is pitifull compared to the top 3.
 
bz54321

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"i ship it and can never seem to win that one hand even though ahead preflop."

You should float it into the money then do this.

If you get it in good pre-flop every time eventually you will win one of these flips. If you can wait until you are in the money before doing the flip you get the best of both worlds.

Another thought is they expect you to have good cards when you do the flip. So wait for the money then do a flip with any two cards maybe low connected or just 10 8. Other people are slowing down at this point and are willing to let more hands go in the upper ranges. This makes it hard to say all these other people folded the low cards so high cards must be coming. Actually they probably folded some high cards because they want to float in so more likely low cards will come.
 
kidkvno1

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And that's why you will never win a tourney... this is the wrong way to go around playing in a tournament. The bubble is the BEST place to get AGGRESIVE and start stealing. Also your aim every tournament should be to get in the top 3 or to win, nothing else. The money gained from 'cashing' is pitifull compared to the top 3.


[old link~tb]
That post is from DJ's Epic Win (But he's still depressed ;) )
Record of Big Wins!
Care to show us one of your Big wins??
 
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MIShroomer47

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So i finally cashed (25th top 30 cash) in a HORSE freeroll today on carbon. but went out at my own dismay. with about 45k (blinds 8k 16k) left caught A9 suited and tried to take out a smaller stack preflop all in and they had AJ, and lost that one which cut me in half. Was I wrong to go in battle with A 9 and fooled by the spades i was looking at? Next hand I catch AQ should i take this chance with 2 bets left, or wait til my BB gets closer (i had 4-5 more free hands to see) for a better hand i.e. pocket pair to put my money on.

(btw I raised my AQ and got my money in preflop, the BB ended up having AK and that's what got me eliminated!)
 
bz54321

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So i finally cashed (25th top 30 cash) in a HORSE freeroll today on carbon. but went out at my own dismay. with about 45k (blinds 8k 16k) left caught A9 suited and tried to take out a smaller stack preflop all in and they had AJ, and lost that one which cut me in half. Was I wrong to go in battle with A 9 and fooled by the spades i was looking at? Next hand I catch AQ should i take this chance with 2 bets left, or wait til my BB gets closer (i had 4-5 more free hands to see) for a better hand i.e. pocket pair to put my money on.

(btw I raised my AQ and got my money in preflop, the BB ended up having AK and that's what got me eliminated!)

It is hard because you did so much work to get in the top 30 but you should flip your idea of good cards here. You dont want to give up one of your cards, in both hands your ace was forfit and you had to play with only one card. Try playing low verses there high.


This has worked for me. I was getting low there were around 9 people left all the sudden 5 people go allin and i have 84 or something like that but with a 4. So they all have high mixed cards no pockets and all low cards come out. Well I hit my 4 and won that hand, ended up coming in 2nd and this was the key hand at the end that got me to heads up.
 
MadMaddie

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[old link~tb]
That post is from DJ's Epic Win (But he's still depressed ;) )
Record of Big Wins!
Care to show us one of your Big wins??
Still does not mean that what he wrote above is incorrect because as far as I know it is just about the opposite of how a player should be playing in a tournament as you are approaching the bubble.

What I have been learning and working on trying to do is to be shoving before you get short and even better is to look to be shoving allin over the players who seem to be trying to take advantage of the bubble situation (the ones who are stealing the blinds alot). You can pick up alot of chips this way and then can keep your stack at a size where you will actually have enough chips in your stack so you can be seen as a big enough threat to other's stacks and they will think twice about getting involved in a pot with you.

At first I would just sit and wait and wait and wait for a good hand and then when I did shove I would often get called and lose. I got told to not do this. Trying to do things differently was not comfortable at first and I find I have to really force myself to work on it. I feel like it is working though and the past few weeks I got some good scores ( a 2nd in a freeroll and a 2nd in a smaller buyin private tournament).
 
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MIShroomer47

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Playing the low cards strong later on totally makes sense, cause you know at least you have live cards (long as no one holds a high pair in the pocket). It would seem you'd want to do this in an instance where you shove to steal, or to double (8 9 suited or something) and only high cards are gonna call u typically. Stealing the blinds is definitely part of survival... something i need to get better at!
 
dj11

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Assuming my stack is not in immediate danger;

I have nothing against the hyper agro donks, they generally take themselves out early. The overly agro players often get deep, but that doesn't mean agro is the style to beat. We all know we need to be changing gears throughout a tourney, and yes, there are opportunities near the bubble, but that is often where being overly agro will kill you.

I'll go as far as to say that at the bubble, if you can afford it, dialing up the agro about 1/2 notch works fine. Else I want some return on my time investment and will coast into the money rather than donk bet 67o for my stack. 1/2 notch equates (in my book) to increasing steals maybe 1 hand every 2-3 orbits.

Everything changes when you get down to about 15bb's (m=10). We have to become more alert and willing to pounce. We still have FE, but only if we haven't abused it. Above 20 bb's you can still wait, for a good while before pouncing. Below 10 bb's and we are all near panic mode, certainly concerned, but it is there where you enter the do or die time.

Often, the cards will dictate what we do. If I'm seeing nothing cardwise, I can easily blind down to super small stack, and maybe get ITM. In those cases where you see no faces, nor aces, and no suited cards and the deck feels like it only has 2's or 7's for us, I will seldom shove ATC just to hope to get lucky.

Yeah, hindsight is wonderful when we fold 47o and it wodda won. You keep on dwelling on that K?

Toward the bubble, I change my hud to only show me like the last 40-50 hands. This gives me a better read on how my villains are playing right now. Not last week/month, but now. I think most players with HUDS do not do that, they will be looking at me like I played last year or something.

I titled myself contrarian because I play the game differently than conventional wisdom suggests. I know how to be tight, I know how to be loose, I have a reasonable post-flop game, and if anyone had a serious critique on me, they would probably point out my preflop penchant for min bets or limping.
 
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frozensprx

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an alternative strategy in this situation is to shove slightly lighter but do it when you have a larger stack--thus you will get called less frequently because your shove constitutes a larger portion of the big stacked player's remaining chips and they usually won't make loose calls (when they do have premium you will be out, but its usually worth the risk). From what ive read you are waiting for premium and in my experience that strategy isn't always as effective cuz when you wait till you have like 3BB left and shove with AA you might get called by both SB and BB simply because your all-in basically means nothing to them cuz it is so small, and even if you do double up at that point you will still have under 20bb....so why not start taking risks when you have between14-20 bb and then your shoves will earn more respect and you can possibly pick up some blinds.
 
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This happened to me the other day on a JuicyStakes freeroll finished 8th and we all know there are only 7 tickets so bubbled and felt like a complete.....well we all know but it happens to the best of us.
 
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MIShroomer47

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Finally got to a FT today in the 8pm NLHE freeroll on carbon, 6th overall... so I caught two ITM placings today. Thanks for the advice guys
 
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stevertrmurray

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Congrats on getting there....I've found the best thing for me to do is remember its not just about getting chips but also about not losing them.....sounds simple enough but....I have to remind myself of this constantly!!!
 
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MIShroomer47

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I know i'm always asking myself, "do I really wanna pay for this hand?"

I often find that when I start limping in hands often rather than just folding those like J9s in bad positions, I find myself getting involved in a pot (or just losing my flat call) that i wouldn't regularly call with J9uns per-say. and if i lose to a cooler flush or higher two pair i say, "why did i play that hand?"

I look at the status of my tourny by what the last hand i played was. why did i get knocked out? was i right? or was i trying to make too much happen, and get caught up... usually i'll find some kind of answer
 
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most freerolls is just as loose as the end as it was in the beginning.. but you have to pay attention becuase some people start slow down and play tighter. so play looser to take advantage of the people tighting up... and in most cases in freeroll they dont play any different at all.. The best thing to do is to pay attention at your table and figure out who is playing loose and and who is playing tight... and after you figure it out pay attention becuase it could change. You could have a very loose player in the beginning and tightens up in the end and only plays high pocket pair and goes all in. if you dont realize he has greatly tighten up up you could end up losing a bunch of chips to him.
 
dino

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I would suggest when get closer to the money with decent stack, play more tight just to get ITM (in the money) and you will see when more people do that then you can open up and play more aggresively and pick up few more good size pots easily without risking much
 
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end of the free rolls

so hard to play serious once most of players are out. Also, i have trouble not spending the winnings immediatley when im probably exhausted . Any suggestions?>
 
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