Winning vs. Cashing, Part II

About six months ago, I submitted this post, which more or less originated from debates between Billy and myself about how to play coinflip situations in Multi-Table Tournaments (MTTs). He has consistently argued that it's better to gamble early -- to always take the statistical edge even if means the risk of busting out before hitting the money. OTOH, I have typically advocated picking your spots and occasionally folding these races. I doubt we'll ever really agree on this question.

In reading through several threads of the Two-Plus-Two forums, I was surprised to find that the successful online tournament players don't unanimously agree on this topic. I thought I would be able to gather evidence that would either prove me right or explain to me just why I was wrong. It turns out that there are two basic camps when this question is raised -- the survivalists (me) and the accumulators (Billy). The survivalists' main argument is that in order to make the money in a tournament, you have to last a certain length of time. The accumulators counter that it is impossible to survive long enough without taking some gambles early to build up your stack.

If you have any experience playing in MTTs, you can see why this is such a heated debate.

BOTH SIDES ARE CORRECT!

The theoretical hand being discussed on Two-Plus-Two was this: It's the very first hand of a large online MTT. You start out with T10,000 chips. You pick up pocket tens. Assuming you know he's holding AK suited (whether he shows, or tells you -- whatever) and his raise all-in causes the rest of the table to fold to you, would you call?

The question seems fairly straightforward. With so many known variables, you would think the hand would just about play itself. Wrong. The accumulators responded flatly that the call is correct, no matter what the stage of the tournament is. You're a 54% favorite to win the hand. You're a favorite, so you should call. Simple as that.

But the survivalists retorted that it's not that simple. On the first hand of a tournament, the blinds are probably small relative to stack sizes. So is it worth risking your entire shot at the money just for a slight statistical edge. The survivalists put the burden of proof on the accumulators. How could they prove that winning T20,000 54% of the time was better than folding and keeping T10,000 100% of the time? Naturally, the poker mind may be tempted to head in the direction of expected value for find the explanation. But one must remember, winning the first hand does not necessarily affect one's expected value for the tournament all that significantly. Losing the first hand clearly does. If the tournament has 500 entrants, are you that much better off with T20,000 and 499 players remaining than with T10,000 chips and 500 players remaining? Twice as many chips, sure. But how long will that last? I think it's pretty rare that all the early chip leaders remain in front and end up taking down the tourney.

I can see the arguments for both -- much clearer that I could before. I am less blinded than I once was about my personal opinion on the matter. But that opinion remains my opinion.

I think, for one, it's generally better to be the aggressor in pots rather than calling someone's all-in. Two, I think in most tournaments as blinds go up and opponents begin to panic, they will be more than willing to dump their stacks holding top pair against whatever superior hand I'm holding. I've done much better in tournaments where I trapped a guy into betting his stack on the flop with only overcards than in those where I happened to double or triple my stack at the first table.

HOWEVER, if I have attained a big stack relative to my table, I have to admit that I put on the accumulator hat. I will certainly call all in with 10s if I know my opponent can't knock me out or cripple me. I'll push those marginal edges as far as they'll go when my stack is big.

The poker world may not come to a concensus on this topic in the near future. But I think it's beneficial to have the discussion. In the end, a more central point of view probably works best. You can't be so timid that you blind yourself to death -- at some point you HAVE to get in there and gamble. I've never cashed in a tourney where I didn't get majorly lucky at least once. At the same time, if you're not one of the better players in the tournament then all the marginal edges in the world aren't going to save you from busting out 10 times out of 10.