We all love an occasionally Sit N Go when playing online poker. They offer up the opportunity to only lose a small amount, win a big amount, and keep us entertained for what we hope to be
about 45 minutes. Unfortunately, we don’t always make the money and often will find ourselves crippled against the blinds. First, as an overall strategy tip, don’t ever think
you are playing against the average stack size – you are not, and your only real enemy is the blinds.
In the middle stages of a SNG, whether it be a normal structure or a turbo, the average stack sizes should be approaching between 10 and 15 big blinds. This is the time to use a
tight-aggressive play style, start stealing blinds (from the tight players), and start looking at being in a raise-or-fold mode. At this time is when your stack size is small compared to the
blinds (again in that 10-15x range) that you simply should be shoving instead of making a standard raise. This is done for two main reasons:
1) With a standard raise you are committing yourself to the pot as it is.
2) You have fold equity, meaning there’s a good chance that the player will fold once you shove and you just win the hand right there.
To demonstrate the concept of “when to shove” let’s take a look at our replayer. In this hand the blinds are high at 200/400 (with an ante of $25) and our hero has a stack of
1,580, meaning he has less than 4 big blinds! This is almost a situation where you shove any two cards, but our range (which we will define soon) definitely includes K9 here.
There’s no point in a raise, as a min-raise represents more than 50% of our stack. It’s simply time to shove.
For our hero, the blinds didn’t defend and couldn’t risk their chips to this powerful bet. When your stack is only 8 to 10x the big blind you really have to be looking for spots to
get your money in, even with hands like 75 or Q8. Let’s say you had that 57 and you get called by a much bigger hand (AJ for example), you are still only a 63-37 underdog which
isn’t horrible. The concept is that it’s very important you don’t let your stack get chopped down to less than 7 big blinds, because if that happens your fold equity has been
tremendously reduced as big stacks are getting a great price to try and knock you out.
Your range when you have about 10x the big blind should include any Ace or pocket pair from early position, good Queens hands (Q8+) and good King Hands (K8+) and any Ace or any pocket pair, and
from late position we’re looking at any suited connectors, any suited one-gappers, good King Queen or Jack hands, any pocket pairs, etc etc. Let’s now take a quiz using the
replayer followed my some discussion of each hand.
Hand 1 – Q8 in the small blind vs shortstacked big blind
What do you do – shove or fold? Obviously this one is a slam dunk – this is a shove every time. You don’t even have 3 big blinds and there’s already a ton of money
in the pot as it is. Although we have very little chance of the big blind folding to your raise, your Q8 is approximately a 54-46% favorite over any possible holding he has.
Hand 2 – A9 suited in EP
Do you shove this in EP or make the fold and wait for a better hand? Again this is another easy example of a very clear place to be raising all-in. You have a decent hand, and considering
your stack size compared to the blinds, this is much more than you need to get the right price to stay alive.
Hand 3 – KJ in the Small Blind
This is more of a tough call. What would you do? Well, this one is definitely debatable but we’re going for a fold here. You have approximately 11 big blinds but there’s
an opponent showing some good strength. If you were to shove here you still have the big stack to act (who could call you) and our original raiser who might have a hand he’s willing to
live and die with – meaning your fold equity is poor and against the top 15% of hands your holding of KJ offsuit is a 58-42% underdog!
In conclusion:
1) When blinds get too big your only move is to shove or fold.
2) Know your shoving range once your stack is about 10-15x the big blind.
3) Watch out for spots where you don’t have fold equity and make sure if you do get it in at that time you have a decent hand, or at
least a hand that has some decent chance of making a pair.
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Check Sean's blog for updates on his poker journey at: http://www.icemonkey9.com
Read Related Playing Specific Situations Articles:
In this article we'll look at some hands from my hand histories at low stakes, specifically $0.50-$1 No Limit Hold'em (both 6max and Full Ring) and also give HUD stats of the villains and see
how that might affect our thinking in terms of making a decision.
