Strategy: 7 Ways to Compete for Pots in Tournaments

Player and coach Faraz Jaka has nearly $7 million in live tournament earnings. In one of his recent Twitter posts, he talked about seven ways to fight for pots in tournaments so you have a better chance of going the distance and not getting eaten by the big blind.

Here are the words of Jakas:

Players often try to go far in tournaments with short stacks. In the old way of thinking, they would wait patiently for a good card and try to double down. The level of play has risen dramatically over the past decade, and to get far in tournaments you have to fight for pots.

Here are 7 ways to fight pots:

1. Blind Stealing: Try to find out which players at your table usually don’t defend their big blinds, which ones don’t check, and which ones don’t “check One shot. They raise a lot and are passive against continuation bets out of position. Against these types of players, you can expand your hand selection and raise pre-flop when they are in the big blind.
2. 3-bet: Look for players who raise too much pre-flop, don’t 4-bet a lot and play passive post-flop. If someone with these characteristics raises pre-flop and your hand is in your Within the calling range, you can respond with a 3-bet bluff.
3. Defend the big blind often and check and check. Increase: It is tempting to scrutinize and increase. On a draw or pair, call from the big blind to keep the pot small, but it’s old school. Better think about reviewing and reviewing. Raise because you might win the hand and avoid Bluffed on the turn.
4. Use a large c-bet against the big blind: If the flop contains multiple items within the big blind’s calling range, consider making a large c-bet Bet, that is, bet 2/3 of the pot.
5. Bet often on the flop and turn (double barrel): if the turn card is a card that fits your range better than your opponent , you should bluff more often. If you are in the big blind and checks come up on the turn, you should bet when the flop is planned to prevent them from happening on the river.
6. Use small stakes that don’t need to work often: Many players are afraid to bluff using small stakes because they think if it doesn’t work, they are doing it wrong. You need to train your brain to think in a more mathematical way : If you bet 4,000 into a 14,000 pot, it only takes 23% of the time to be profitable.
7. Note that when fighting for pots, it often comes down to who wants to win more. If you listen carefully to your opponent’s play and conversation, you can gain valuable information about them. Using these clues, you can predict how they will react to offense and find pots where you can bluff.