I think freerolls have their place for new poker players. I started playing poker this summer on Sportsbetting.ag without depositing, and freerolls were how I got my first 14 bucks. I definitely spent way too much time on them, but I learned worthwhile things frmo them.
It is bingo poker at first. I absolutely agree. But believe it or not, the endgame pretty closely resembles that of a real tourney. You see the same player tendencies: Players tightening up on the bubble, with the aggressive players running over everyone. The time invested isn't meaningless: everyone spent 2 hours getting to that point. So they play seriously. Freerolls let you develop the bubble play aspect of your tourney game, before you go off to a $50k GTD.
Freerolls serve as a counterpoint to real tournaments. In a freeroll, you can just wait for good hands and shove, chances are you will get a caller with 10 high. If you can survive a few all-ins, you're in the money.
But you can't play a real tourney like that. If the cards don't come and you dwindle down to a short stack, your fate is no longer entirely in your hands. With the speed and progression of the blinds and antes, you'll pick up AK or AQ, or 99 or 1010, go all in, and lose to a random hand. And you bust.
So freerolls teach you that to make deep runs, you have to chip up well before the bubble. That means you have to find ways to take blinds and take pots postflop when you'd otherwise just fold.
Also, I was a huge nit in cash games. I wouldn't even complete with Kj out of the small blind sometimes. But freerolls were the place where I started to know what it was like to raise up hands like J7s, then following up with a c-bet when the caller who has a small pocket pair doesn't hit his set.
I realized a fundamental principle of poker: At the times where we're all equally card dead, whoever persuasively represents that they have big hands is the one who wins all the chips. Before, I was always sure that none of my bluffs would ever get through. But seeing the c-bet (learned from reading Cardschat!), and the properly judged double barrel, actually work thrilled me.
This is something that opened my eyes up to cash game play. I only play a single table at 1c/2c and 2c/4c microstakes at Sportsbetting.ag. If I feel players are getting timid or people are just halfheartedly limping, I will ramp it up, and have five successive hands where I pick up 50c each with mediocre hands. That's a virtual buy in right there. A few months ago, I wouldn't dare do this in a full ring game.
So I think a valuable thing freerolls can offer to the new poker player is the confidence to go beyond playing your hole cards in a riskless environment.
