'Blending'

Culchie

Just finished Harrington's 2nd book (Highly Recommend it).

Towards the very end he mentioned something very interesting (to me anyway), that I hadn't thought of, but it makes perfect sense, and is just so obvious, I kinda feel silly for not thinking about it before....Not conciously anyway.

A couple of scenarios.... playing agressively on a final table.

What type of people are you up against?

Do you have a student/novice type, who will hang on for every every improvment in position, they have already won more than have ever dreamed of, they are just going to keep out of pots and hope more people keep getting knocked out.
Do you have a wily old 'pro' who has seen it all before, and knows exactly what you're at etc...?
Do you have a guy at the table you know has financial problems and needs every single penny he can get his hands on?
Do you have a recent winner, who might not have any pressure on their play?

He talks about weighing up the demographics of your opponents as well as your previous hand histories etc...


Another interesting play he makes, is let's say there is money for all at the final table, but really only the top 5 make the big bucks.

You have 3 or 4 bigs stacks, and 3 or 4 verly low stacks. He talks about the fact that mentally the big stacks have allocated the top 5 prize money amongst themeselves, so a move against one of these stacks that could see them wiped out with pittance going home is a very strong play, and would need a monster of a hand to call you, if you were a mid or big stack.

Anyways just thought it might be something a little different to discuss??



P.S I'd highly recommend Harrington's two books, the info seems to sink in a most practical way. Next up is 'Ace on the River' from Greenstein !

ianmc38

The book that has most improved my play is:

"Zen in the art of archery".

Recommended by Howard Lederer.

Washout

yeah i love poker books. reading them brings a smile to my face as you can relate to being in situations that the pros talk about.

im just about finishing Matt Matross's "The Making of a poker player" which is more like a biography but some tips that I have incorperated into my game. and also studying hand histories. I was never one for looking up on what happened in similar situations b4 and thus was very inconsistent but thats a part of my game im trying to tighten up.

You have 3 or 4 bigs stacks, and 3 or 4 verly low stacks. He talks about the fact that mentally the big stacks have allocated the top 5 prize money amongst themeselves, so a move against one of these stacks that could see them wiped out with pittance going home is a very strong play, and would need a monster of a hand to call you, if you were a mid or big stack.

This one comes up all the time. Specially at a final table where the binds are crippling to small/mid stacks.

Some of the big stacks do try to bully by raising 3x BB but if your in a BB position then a reraise always has them thinking especially if they have you down as an extremly tight player which i have become and it sure does reap its rewards in the latter stages of a tourney.

never read Harrington but i must give it a bash.

Lex

I'm just on hte 1st book at the moment. Excellent read.

Interesting stuff there Culchie. Its easy notice the dramatic adjusments in people's stlye of play when things get down to the last five or six on the final talbe.
The players with the bigger stacks will become extremely tight due to the fact that they've gotten this far and see themselves "deserving" of a higher finishing place than the shortstacked guy with only 3 BBs left. This fact increased by the the big prize money difference for say placing 6th or 3rd. This can be alot to anyone who has grinded out the couple of hours to get that far in the tourney. Especially someone who does not make final talbes that often (a fact easily found out on Ladbrokes by having a quick search of the MTT leaderboard for any of your current opponents during the last break before getting down to the final talbe ).

This gives enormous opportunities for aggressivness and exploitation of the sometimes very slight shows of weakness as players are more reluctant to risk a big chunk of their stack than they would have been earlier.

The moves that are made in this situation can sometimes give the chance to get heads up with a decent stack and reduce the prospect of pressurised by a lager stack urself!

Looking forward to seeing what he has to say about it in the book.

Fatboydim

And of course the same holds true in MTTs when playing down to the money. Around this time it's relatively easy to steal blinds. However - the short stacks can be more dangerous than the large stacks at this point as they are more likely to make a move in order to improve their position. For example if 18th place only pays you your stake money back... as this is already an amount the player is willing to lose.... He may be willing to risk the bubble for a chance of doubling up.

Lafortezza

Apparently Harrington has Volume 3 of his books coming out soon enough , probably in time for Christmas. It won't have the same amount of tournament discussion and theory, it'll mostly be problems and situations of the "What do you do if...?" type.

De Deraco

hey culchie i just finished Ace on the river would you be interested in a swap for harrington's first book. sorry for going off topic.

Doc Farrell

Culchie give me a call at work on 6774754

nice post man.