It's 1am and i thought i'd post some random advice, Alright?

[gjshand]

I notice a lot of players online use a tournement type statagy in a cash game.

The following is an extreme example but it illustrates what i mean.

If in a cash game i had AA in the hole on the BB and the guy under the gun went all in for $300 (Assuming the Blinds were $1/$2) i'd fold - Simple.

You only have $2 invested and you risk losing all $200 (100 times you investment so far) to win $200. Let it go and use your skill to win in another pot.

Look at it this way, with any two under cards your opponant still has around a 1 in 10 chance of winning, double that with an under pair, it's far from a sure thing. Differant if you have a decent investment in the pot.

Remember Cash game theory is very differant from tourney theory, each has differant goals. The cash game goal is to make as much money as you can while putting as little of your money at risk as possible. Tourney theory is to AMASS all the chips in play, you NEED to put all your chips on the line to do that one way or another hense it being an acceptable risk.

 

[SexyAceJoker]

If you cant call an all in raise with AA, you shouldnt play pocker. I remember someone once using a extreme example to ejemplify this. If your in the BB in the 10000$ wsop tournament , UTG goes all in for 10000 chips and everyone on the table goes all in, you have AA on the BB what do you do, CALL, JFC CALL . A lot of people will argue, i will get bad beat, someone might get lucky etc. The fact is you cant be result oriented without a big example, AA is a favorite against any hand postflop, and with this small edge you got to play . Even if you dont call ur opponent will have 90kchips versus your 10000( or less since you posted the BB ) stack and will problably break you. I hope this didnt soundt bitc$@ as its late here also .

 

[ChuckTs]

I am not the most experienced cash player, but i see no reason why you shouldn't call under the circumstances you gave, gjs.
You are ahead of him regardless what he holds.
I understand what you mean by saying that you have so little invested, but i would make that call 100% of the time.

S.A.J, in the example where every single player at the table pushes, here is where i'd have to fold.
You have a great starting hand, but in that situation i wouldn't even look at my hole cards; i'd just muck em.
AA is something you want to push with heads up, or vs 2 people.
I wouldn't put my WSOP tournament on the line in a ten handed all in.
It is still the favourite, but only about %30 or %40.
i dunno this is a tough argument but i'd have to say fold here.
I think that the significance of the tournament is also a factor here; If it were a $10 tourney i'd push in a second.

 

[Jesus Lederer]

I agree with the main point you are trying to say gj, but i think that your extreme example was too much extreme.
You must try, if it´s possible, to make your big decisions while you hold a very strong hand and you know you have a good advantage. You don´t need to be gambling because the blinds won´t grow and you can stay at the table all the time you want. When i say that you must exploit your opponent´s weakness by making big moves while you have a very good edge, and not a slight one, i´m talking about NL, because in limit i think that the story is completely different, and there the key to be a winning player is to exploit those little edges you have (FP can correct me if i´m wrong). That´s the reason of why i think that in the example you gave you must call. A push like that (althought it would be very weird) probably means a big pp that doesn´t want to see the flop (lets say it´s QQ). In that situation you are 80% favourite, which is one of those big edges you want to take advantage of. Think about this: Lets say you have JQ and the flop comes KT9. You have the nut straight (and there isn´t flush draw) and you bet the pot. Your opponent goes all in (a huge overbet like the one in your example). Do you call? If the answer is yes, then i don´t know why you don´t want to call with those AA preflop, because when you called with your straight the opponent showed 99, which makes you a 65% favourite. Even if he showed two pair you would be 80% favourite, which is the same as the AA preflop situation. But if your answer was no, then i don´t understand when do you think it´s correct to make a big call. Is it correct only when you have the absolute nuts?
In my opinion making the call with AA in the situation you said IS a sure thing, it doesn´t matter if i had an investment in the pot or not.
Anyway i agree with you that cash game is very different than tourneys, and you must be the guy who gets a whole stack by calling with a set against top pair and not viceversa. One pair isn´t enough to fight a big pot, but when you know you are big favourite you must take advantage of it, especially if you have a big pocket pair preflop.
There´s another point that i disagree with you gj. You said that it would be a different story if you had some investment in the pot. What i understood from that, is that if you commit chips to the pot with a big pocket pair you must continue until the end, and in my opinion it´s completely different. If you decide to keep fighting with the big pp no matter what comes (especially with a coordinated board), then the only thing you´re doing is giving huge implied odds and you´re going to pay big your opponents when they hit their sets, straights or flushes.
Making as much money as you can while putting as little of your money at risk as possible sounds to me like a contradiction. To win a lot of money you need to risk a lot of money, but please note that when i say "risk" i´m just refering to the money you must push into the pot, and not to the odds of you winning the hand, which must be huge to make a huge decision.

 

[Dorkus Malorkus]

Sorry, but the OP is horridly off the mark. You will never have enough of a skill edge to make passing up a (circa) 80/20 chance preflop 'correct'.

Besides, you have things the wrong way round anyway. Cash games are all about pushing small edges, because it's +EV in the long run, and if you bust you can always reload (just make sure you're sufficiently bankrolled). Tourneys may well in certain cases require 'waiting for a better spot', as when you lose your chips that's it (assume it's not a rebuy). So you may fold a biggish hand preflop in the second hand of a tourney say, because if there's a slow blind structure and you are a good player you will be able to find better spots with your superior postflop play. Plus, there's far more negative EV in losing all your chips (you're out of the tourney) then there is positive EV in doubling your stack early (you're not actually that much more likely to cash/FT/win).

The cash game goal is to make as much money as you can while putting as little of your money at risk as possible.

This is the quickest way to become far too weak-tight.