The guy who got blinded away

I think every poker player has at least done the following themselves or know someone who matches this description. Usually the following player is new to poker and taking the first steps in bettering their play. This player is the one who reads their first Harrington and feels they now have enough knowledge to play some tournaments. They jump online and take their shot at a decently sized MMT. Next thing this player knows is he is down to an M of 4 and is getting desperate. "FINALLY! Pocket Queens, definitely a hand I am shoving all in on the cutoff", thinks the player. The table folds to our player and he makes his shove. Big Blind calls with 7-8 suited and nails a straight. Our player is now on tilt and goes running to his friends to tell them about his bad beat story. Usually these stories go something like this, "I didn't played many hands, I followed what Harrington said. Play premium hands and start to discount suited connectors if your down on your chips. Now I am down to an M of 4 and dealt pocket Queens on the cutoff. I shoved all in and the guy calls with 7-8 suited and sucks out. How can he call me when I been tight the whole game with just 8 high? This is the worse bad beat ever".

What our player's friend should do is tell him the truth, it's not a bad beat. In fact, it was probably a really good call by the big blind and he just got unlucky. I see these type of post a lot on message forums; go to any poker site that has a "Bad Beat" section in their forums and you will see post like this. A lot of players, claiming to be knowledgeable - knowing their Harrington, still get busted out in similar fashion time and time again. Why?

The problem these players fail to realize is that when Harrington, and most other professional poker players, wrote their tournament books they did so with in mind structures of big MMT games (WPT/WSOP). These games have long blind levels and deep stacks and because of their structure you can wait for big hands and play conservatively. You can even play the opposite and take chances to get chips... you can play however you want because you have a lot of chips and time. When you look at online tournaments, most of them do not have such a relaxed structure. The blinds come up fast and they do sneak up on a lot of players. For an example let's take a look at a live tournament structure and an online structure, then let's compare the two and see what differences they have.

For our live tournament structure, let's use the 2005 Caribbean Poker Adventure. Players start with 10,000 in chips. The first 6 blind levels are:

For our online tournament structure, let's use the $26,000 Guarantee on Full Tilt Poker. Players start with 1,500 chips. The first 6 blind levels are:

At first glance the online tournament doesn't seem so bad. After all your going bust in the 6th level assuming you do not play nor win a hand in the live tournament while in the online tournament, at the same blind level, you have $1,150 of your starting $1,500. This can not be a bad thing, can it? Actually, it's not as good as it seems. Before I explain the reasoning behind this, let's take a deeper look on what the chart is representing.

Each chart outlines the values of the first six blind levels. They then take the starting chip amounts and calculate the average amount of times one would sit through the blind levels. For an average we use 20 minutes an orbit for live games and 12 minutes per online orbit. These of course are just averages and for simplicity we consider ten players per table. What these charts actually reveal to us are the blind off times for these two tournaments. In the 2005 Caribbean Poker Adventure you can play 8.67 hours before being blinded away. In the $26,000 Guarantee on FTP you can play 1.81 hours before joining the rail, netting a difference of 6.86 hours. For fun factor, here is the chart showing when you would be blinded out from FTP:

What does all this mean? The most obvious difference is how long it will take before your blinded off. When playing in a tournament you need to consider how fast the blinds will be moving and calculate how much time it will take until your stack would be blinded off. Obviously the more time the better, but when your facing a difference of 6.86 hours of play - you have to make moves sooner then you normally would. The extra hands you get to play in an online tournament do not make up the difference of missing 6.86 hours of play. I'm not claiming that online tournaments are too fast and justify erratic play to ensure money. In fact, the $26,000 Guarantee tournament starting out with 75 big blinds is not as much as a speed tournament then others. Some might even say that this tournament is anywheres from a medium-to-slow tournament for online standards. Maybe a better example would have been to use a popular No-Limit Las Vegas tournament structure hosted at the Flamingo Hotel and Casino. Let's take a look at their structure: Each player starts with 1,000 chips.

Surprisingly the blind off structure for this game is 1.26 hours, 0.55 hours shorter then the online tournament on Full Tilt Poker. Even more surprising is that such structures are common in casino's across the world since the poker boom. Casino's want fast tournaments so they can run more daily and accumulate more rake. It makes sense for the casino, but it doesn't make sense for a player to use the same strategies in the Flamingo tournament as they would in the Caribbean tournament.

What a player must realize is when your faced with rapidly increasing blinds, you must make some moves and turn on the aggression switch faster then you would in a slow tournament. Every tournament; whether a slow tournament or a fast tournament, has a point where everyone at the table tightens up allowing an alert player opportunities to accumulate (steal) chips. In Sit-N-Go's this is usually the bubble position. In MTTs this might not be the case and some times happens a few places away from the bubble. Great poker players know when such nirvana is in effect and act on it immediately. Decent players act on this as well, but usually get involved a little later then they could of and don't fully exploit the situation. Weak players miss this opportunity, either too scared or don't even realize it's there. I am assuming that almost everyone reading this blog post knows what I am talking about. But what I want to stress is that unless you are a complete master in recognizing when this happens, and can fully exploit this time period to build enough chips for a healthy final table battle, you need to start accumulating chips earlier in a fast tournament. You are just not going to be able to collect the chips needed in this time period to build up a decent stack for a final table battle and still fight the ever increasing blind levels. You want / need chips going into that final table - more then you would when the blinds are slow and long. You need to have the cushion to play strong poker and be able to put pressure on your opponents. It does no good if your final table seats 10 and you have a short stack and need to make a move in the next 3 orbits. You have no fold equality and no one is folding to your all in. This is a common situation for many players that can be avoided.

This blog has seemed to become pretty long therefor in a following post I want to talk more about what types of "moves" and "shots" I mean when playing in a fast tournament. What I am hoping you gather from this post is the understanding that when you are about to play a tournament you need to analyze the blind structure. Is this a fast or slow tournament? What is my blind off time? What is my starting stack divided into the starting big blind? When do I need to start making moves so my chips mean something when I make a play? These questions can help you focus on a game plan and not be another player riding the short stack hoping to fold their way into the money.

Arnold Snyder's website, Poker Tournament Formula, is focused around his book with the same name. In his book he describes the differences of slow tournaments and fast tournaments in greater detail. I recommend anyone interesting in learning more about why it's not only important to change your style of play in a fast tournament then if you were in a slow tournament, but also how you should do it. Arnold's website also includes the excel spreadsheet used to calculate the blind off time. I think you will find the information in his book and on his website very informative regardless of your skill level. I look forward to further discussing how to overcome fast tournament blind structures in future post. Until then, may your Aces hold up (mine never do) :-)