SnGs – or how not to get bored with ring games.

I think I have mentioned a few times that I do not like risking my stack. This is why I love SnGs. I know what I am risking, and the profit seems to be there for any tight player. So to add a little variety to my game, I have added them to my poker learning experience. Since they pay 3 places, you do not need to kill every table every time to show a profit.

But I should mention that when I started playing them in December I gave my self a new nickname, Bubble Boy. I came in 4th place so much that it was getting really annoying.

So I began looking at my play. I found 2 things right away, and maybe they will help you too. The first thing I noticed was that I was playing way to conservative. I do not mean in my pre flop decisions, I mean in post flop play. To survive in the SnG world, you have to build your stack. This means you must win larger amounts in your post flop play. As an example, lets say you catch rockets early, and the blinds are $30. You have nearly 1500 in chips ( at least where I play you do). Now you raise to 5x BB and get 2 callers. Flop comes up K84 rainbow, and it gets checked to you, what do you do? In a ring game, I might bet big, to take it down here or check to slow play. In an SnG, you need that pot to grow, and for your opponents to get more involved in that pot, so I bet again, about 5xBB. If they fold fine, but if one of them has a king he will call. If the turn is good for me like a 3rd A I will keep betting 5 to 10 BB to suck him in All ins tend to scare off the money, but if some donk wants to semi bluff an all in at you then take it.

But it is hard to remember that every chip you lose is twice as hard to get back, so I will fold against all ins unless I have the nuts or near nuts for that hand. This strategy has moved me into the money, and my SnGs are starting to show a profit at last.

The 2nd thing I noticed about my SnG game is how I let the blinds talk me out of action. By this I mean when the blinds are at say $200 and my stack is about $2000 I am shy about betting, or calling a bet. It is a mental thing, because just 30 minutes ago when the blinds were $30, a $200 bet said big strength. Now a $200 bet is a min bet, but it is hard to see it that way sometimes in a SnG game. I find if I make very sure I see those bets for what they are and not just the amounts, I can see who is afraid to bet, who is min betting a weak hand hoping to take it cheap, and it gives me much more power at the table then I had before. This gets even more important as the table gets short handed and people begin to get closer to the money.
I am going to test this next in the MTT SnGs and see if it works as well.