Howard Lederer
March 6, 2006
Many of the people crowding the tournament
circuit these days developed their interest in serious
poker from watching broadcasts of the World Poker Tour
and the World Series of Poker. With hole cards shown as
the hands are played out, viewers get to see how the
best players in the world ply their craft. They can then
apply the lessons they've learned in their own play.
In the last couple of years, I've noticed that some
of the less experienced players who have entered $10,000
buy-in tournaments don't fully appreciate what they've
seen on TV. Many are apt to misapply the techniques
they've witnessed. As a result, these players find
themselves on the rail early, wondering why a move that
worked so well for Phil Ivey or Chris Ferguson had such
disastrous results for them.
To avoid falling into this trap yourself, take note
of two key pieces of information the next time you sit
down to watch the WPT or WSOP: The number of players at
the table and the stack sizes relative to the blinds.
World Poker Tour final-table broadcasts start when
six players remain. Through the vast majority of
tournaments, however, tables are nine or 10-handed. When
10 people are at the table, you always need to be
concerned that someone holds a big pocket pair or
Ace-King. As a result, most good players tend to be
cautious at full tables. They won't get themselves in a
lot of trouble with speculative hands like a middle
pocket pair or Ace-10. At a short-handed table, however,
the chances of running into a big hand are greatly
diminished. When play is three- or four-handed, a pro
will likely play a hand like pocket 9s very
aggressively.
Usually, in the late stages of tournaments, the
blinds are extremely high when compared to the size of
the stacks. For example, in the recent WPT event from
the Gold Strike in Tunica, when four players remained,
the average stack had about 1.4 Million in chips. This
may sound like a lot but, at that time, the blinds were
30,000 and 60,000 with a 10,000 ante. The short stacks,
who had less than 1 Million each, couldn't afford to be
patient. If they failed to play for a mere 20 hands,
their stacks would be cut in half.
As blinds increase, good players get more aggressive,
making frequent pre-flop raises while attempting to
steal the blinds and antes. They know that if they sit
and wait for top-quality hands, the blinds and antes
will decimate their stacks. At these stages of
tournaments, you'll see a lot of attempted steals with
second-rate hands. Other good players, fully aware that
their opponents may be raising with very little, might
re-raise or fight back from the blinds with similarly
modest holdings.
Short tables and high blinds create settings that
necessitate near constant aggression and continual
action. So, for example, when you see a pro re-raise
all-in from the blinds with pocket 7s, it's likely he's
properly considered the situation and has made the best
available play. He's thought about the short table and
high blinds, determined that he probably has the best
hand and, most importantly, that his opponent likely
can't call the re-raise. The same player would treat the
same hand very differently at an earlier stage of the
tournament.
The final factor to consider when watching televised
poker is that the shows are highly edited. At this
year's WSOP, it sometimes took 15 hours and hundreds of
hands to determine a winner. On ESPN, they usually
include about 20 hands in an hour-long broadcast. So,
you can be sure that much of the context if missing from
these telecasts. A call or re-raise that seemed odd on
TV may have made perfect sense in the course of the
event. For instance, if an aggressive player raised
eight consecutive times on the button, the big blind may
have decided that he had to fight back with rags, just
to let his opponent know that he was willing to take a
stand. It's not a play that person would normally make,
and it may look strange on TV but, in context, the
re-raise with 8-high made perfect sense.
I suggest that you TiVo the next poker event you plan
to watch. Keep track of the number of players and the
size of the blinds. By paying attention to the details,
the big picture will likely become clearer.
Howard Lederer
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