| Three Big Mistakes Made by Tournament Novices
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Thanks in no small part to what television has meant for poker in the last year, tournaments have never been as popular as they are now. The prize pools have grown so large that even many good money players who used to shun tournaments, fearing that their profitable anonymity might vanish, have decided the money is too big to ignore, and the ancillary benefits — matters such as endorsements — are now potentially huge.
I will continue to believe that winning consistently is more difficult in money play than it is in tournament play, mostly because of the tilt factor and the way many tournaments can turn into crapshoots when the blinds get big, but I like tournaments more. You don't have to crush someone else in order to have a good day, they don't give trophies away in money games, and there are all those increasing ancillary benefits.
Assuming, then, that you're also interested in tournaments, either as someone who has just recently made the switch or someone who has been playing them for a while, what are some of the most common errors you can expect the huge influx of new players to make, and what can you do about them?
No. 1: Not Understanding When Someone Else is Pot-Committed
Ever since a friend mentioned this to me in a conversation a few months ago, I have been watching carefully for it, and my friend was certainly correct!
Here's an example taken from an online tournament I was playing recently. I held A-J suited on the button, an above-average hand, to be sure, but nothing overwhelming, either; against good players, it's a trouble hand because you're almost sure to be out-kicked if another ace is in play, you're a small underdog to most pairs, and you're not that big a favorite when you are up against two other non-paired cards. For example, A-J suited isn't even a 2-1 favorite against 8-7 offsuit, even though it looks so much better.
Because the button so often tries to steal, though, A-J suited looks pretty good; people will play with you with inferior hands. I had $1,900 in front of me, and raised the big blind's $400 up to $1,200. The big blind moved in, I suppose thinking there was a chance I could let the hand go, but with $2,600 already in the pot, it's pretty hard to get me to throw almost any hand away. The big blind had two fours.
If I had moved in, would the big blind have played? Calling with small pairs is one of the worst plays in poker, but because there was almost no chance I would fold, this was in essence what he was doing. Nonetheless, because he was a player I didn't know, I shouldn't have assumed he knew the meaning of "pot-committed" and just moved my whole stack in.
If you have a hand with which your raise commits you to the pot, you might as well go ahead and move all in with it. If you're winning, you'll win more, and if you're losing, there's a bigger chance that your opponent will fold.
No. 2: Underbetting the Pot
Earlier in this same online tournament, I had flat-called from the button with that same trouble hand, A-J suited; the player just to my right, the cutoff seat, had raised it from $30 to $150, and holding position on someone with whom I had played enough before to understand certain patterns, I decided this was one of those rare situations in whic
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