I was playing in tourney recently. Top 20 got paid. And I was outed right at 21. Never happened to me before. I was down to my last 3k in chips. Cards just weren't coming. Finally I get AJ, go all in hoping to just survive till 20th place. Make the 4 hours I just spent somewhat worth it. .I go all in. Player with like 100k in chips calls, he has 96. Flop comes up with a 9 and nothing for me. I'm busted out. SMH
The poker Gods can be so cruel.

It happens to me sometimes.
I play a lot of satellites and similar games where the prize structure is flat
so in-money means everybody gets the ticket or, perhaps, the winner gets two.
In such a case for most of the players the target is not to win a game but to be in money, which makes the bubble fight more determinate.

Its called bubbling or being the bubble boy. And sure this has happened to me many times. It automatically will, if you play a lot of 45-180 man SnGs and small field tournaments. Someone has to be that unlucky guy, who is last to not cash, and its just part of the game

Originally Posted by Blaze716

I was playing in tourney recently. Top 20 got paid. And I was outed right at 21. Never happened to me before. I was down to my last 3k in chips. Cards just weren't coming. Finally I get AJ, go all in hoping to just survive till 20th place. Make the 4 hours I just spent somewhat worth it. .I go all in. Player with like 100k in chips calls, he has 96. Flop comes up with a 9 and nothing for me. I'm busted out. SMH
The poker Gods can be so cruel.

Play for 1st place, not for paid .

hurts every time lol

Sometimes this happens, the feeling is not pleasant)

Yes I have gone out on the bubble several times. It is pretty normal, as another player was writing in the forum- if you play in smaller tourneys like sit and go's with like 45 or 80 people the chances are a lot higher that you will end up on the bubble. If you are really at that point that you need to make a move because your chips are average or low this is when you risk ending up being the bubble boy, and it kind of hurts because it is obviously 1 position off of the money. So good luck in the future to avoiding the bubble.

Originally Posted by blata8ruga

Yes I have gone out on the bubble several times. It is pretty normal, as another player was writing in the forum- if you play in smaller tourneys like sit and go's with like 45 or 80 people the chances are a lot higher that you will end up on the bubble. If you are really at that point that you need to make a move because your chips are average or low this is when you risk ending up being the bubble boy, and it kind of hurts because it is obviously 1 position off of the money. So good luck in the future to avoiding the bubble.

This was a tourney that had maybe 1200 people to start. I mean it only cost 3 bucks to enter so not a big loss there but when you spend 4 plus hours playing and you get outed right before you get something, its just deflating a bit.

Since I play Sit'n'Go 45 max 90 max, bubble boy is my middle name))

On the bubble you have to be extremely tight. The big stacks will try and eliminate you with trash hands. It is no risk to them so they will call with very weak hands.
You will also see the big stacks going hard to try and steal from the low stacks.

Originally Posted by Blaze716

I was playing in tourney recently. Top 20 got paid. And I was outed right at 21. Never happened to me before. I was down to my last 3k in chips. Cards just weren't coming. Finally I get AJ, go all in hoping to just survive till 20th place. Make the 4 hours I just spent somewhat worth it. .I go all in. Player with like 100k in chips calls, he has 96. Flop comes up with a 9 and nothing for me. I'm busted out. SMH
The poker Gods can be so cruel.

this will happen due the fact the big stack players will try to kill even with weak hands, but we´ve to play to win and not to survive to the paid area.

Yes, numerous times.

And for what it is worth I do not agree with the play to win not just to make the cash statements above which are rather silly.

Everyone wants to win or final table - that is stating the obvious and little else. However, the chances of a win are much lower than a cash so you have to be aware of where you stand regarding the bubble and aim at least to cash with regularity.

That was a pros advice I took to heart a few years ago. The point he wanted to underline was that cashing regularly was better for the bankroll than relying on a big score here or there to keep you afloat.

Originally Posted by DS3

And for what it is worth I do not agree with the play to win not just to make the cash statements above which are rather silly.

Completely agree. If you are playing for profit, you need to focus on your ROI and nothing else. And ROI is made up of both small and big cashes, so saying that only the win matter, or only mincashing matter, is obviously wrong. They both matter, so you need to play in a way, where you dont overly sacrifice one for the other. The only exception would be big events like WSOP main events. Nobody would have remembered Cris Moneymaker, if he came second.

How much a min-cash matter, will depend on the tournament structure though. The best way to look at it is by determining, how much of the price pool is already distributed, when players are in the money. At one extreme end we have satellites or DoNs, where its 100%, and obviously in these events we only focus on min-cashing, because nothing else is possible. Even a novice can understand that.

But if we take a format like a 9-man SnG, then the bubble is also very important, because when it burst, 60% of the pricepool is already distributed (50/30/20 payout). The remaining 3 players are now only playing for the last 40%, so how often you end up among those remaining 3 players is obviously going to be of critical importance to your results.

At the other end of the spectrum we find something like PokerStars 180 man SnGs, where only 17,5% of the pricepool is distributed at the bubble. Min-cashing is these events is far less important than in 9-mans, so it makes more sense to adopt an aggressive "go strong or go home" approach. In between we find something like the MTTs at 888 Poker, where often around 30% of the pricepool is distributed at the bubble.

Originally Posted by fundiver199

Completely agree. If you are playing for profit, you need to focus on your ROI and nothing else. And ROI is made up of both small and big cashes, so saying that only the win matter, or only mincashing matter, is obviously wrong. They both matter, so you need to play in a way, where you dont overly sacrifice one for the other. The only exception would be big events like WSOP main events. Nobody would have remembered Cris Moneymaker, if he came second.

How much a min-cash matter, will depend on the tournament structure though. The best way to look at it is by determining, how much of the price pool is already distributed, when players are in the money. At one extreme end we have satellites or DoNs, where its 100%, and obviously in these events we only focus on min-cashing, because nothing else is possible. Even a novice can understand that.

But if we take a format like a 9-man SnG, then the bubble is also very important, because when it burst, 60% of the pricepool is already distributed (50/30/20 payout). The remaining 3 players are now only playing for the last 40%, so how often you end up among those remaining 3 players is obviously going to be of critical importance to your results.

At the other end of the spectrum we find something like PokerStars 180 man SnGs, where only 17,5% of the pricepool is distributed at the bubble. Min-cashing is these events is far less important than in 9-mans, so it makes more sense to adopt an aggressive "go strong or go home" approach. In between we find something like the MTTs at 888 Poker, where often around 30% of the pricepool is distributed at the bubble.

fundiver - thanks for the reply and giving a much more detailed explanation than I had!

Many time this has happened to me. Worst was at the WSOP circuit event 2 years ago. Would have been nice to cash in that.

Its happened twice when I wasnt paying close enough attention to the bubble. You would think I woulda learned the first time.

I am extremely sorry to hear that lol that would put me in a bad mood for the rest of the day because tournaments take forever.. i just started playing kind of more regularly so it might happen to me too lol

Probably this may not be the only time that this is going to happen to you, and as this does not mean that you are not a good player or that I am wishing you badly in the game, it is that this is so, many times being so close you can To get to collide with plays that for sure you could not imagine could happen to you at that moment, it is difficult but that's the way it is, many times what remains is to learn from the mistakes we make, try to turn the page and improve

Well, yesterday only I was bubble boy twice, on the first I had set of queens on the flop, turn and river made flush to my opponent, and on the second AKs against AQo, Q in the river. So don’t be in the bad mood because of that, things like that happens sometimes, next time someone else would be bubble boy, and you will be the one who survive

You can try to open raise even if you get worse cards. So if everyone folds you can collect the dead money. If you have between 8 and 20 BB, you can choose between a small raise and an open push. You can open raise with K7s-K2s, A5o-A2o, K8o-K4o, QTo. But if your opponent pushes after you, I would fold. With 66+, A7s, A8o + you open-raise with the difference that you call when your opponent pushes. If your opponents often call your open raises, you can often opt for an open push. Then you increase your fold equity. The only disadvantage is that Push-or-Fold can only be used with a small stack, otherwise the risk-reward ratio will be too high. Your opponents are usually very tight in the bubble. Because of this, you can often win the pot with an open raise. Try it out

It happens to everyone eventually. The only thing you can do is to try and decrease the frequency it happens to you. The following steps should help you:

1) First and foremost you need to learn how ICM affects your play in a tournament. If you do not know what ICM means there should be a thread in the learning section here at CC.

2) When it is close to the tournament bubble, you should try to increase your stack. The fewer chips you have at the bubble stage, the more there is a chance for you to bust before ITM.

3) If you end up reaching the bubble with a short stack, play as tight as possible, try to steal the blinds when possible and only call down all-ins with premium hands.

4) Play aggressive against those who have fewer chips than you, and try to avoid any unnecessary clashes with players that have you covered.

Also bear in mind that the less there are paid spots in a tournament, the higher is the chans to bubble the tournament. For example, recently I played in a sit'n'go where there were 7 places paid. I finished 8th, even though I tried to avoid it. It's just the way it is, sometimes in tournaments, it is your time to bust.

Yes, many times, it's not the best feeling but as the old saying goes "No gamble, No Future." Sometimes the hands just play for theirself and you can't fold, or from the other perspective your ego gets in the way and you just don't want to fold. Sometimes you just have to risk it and go for the trophy, hard to just wait for hands, you have to play poker to win tournaments.

It certainly has happened to me and I’m sure a lot of other players. It’s tough to swallow, especially if you’ve been playing for a few hours but if you are fairly short you have to play a strong hand to get back into it. A min cash is usually just over your buy in back. You shouldn’t care too much about that. You’re gunning for at least final table and you can’t do that if you blind away just hoping for min cash. As far as you busting, the guy had enough chips to gamble with 96, especially if he was in bb and was getting good odds, you didn’t say what the blinds were.

I think you went right with AJ

well ... it has happened to me a couple of times too ... and the truth is very frustrating ... and during that time when you are about to be left out of the tournament ... it becomes distressing .. wishing someone would take some risk and save me ...!