Join Date: Mar 2013
Posts: 3,171
I used to struggle with the concept of things such as "tournament life" from a mathematical perspective. I don't mean ICM either. Even in a tournament where the winner takes all, the values for the chips aren't exactly the prize pool divided by the number of chips. It is the probability that you reach a certain place given the situation that you are in.
I thought of a cool scenario to illustrate this. There are two games. In game 1, you are in a $1000 HU cash game where you are dealt 72o every hand and your opponent is dealt AA. In game 2, you are in a $1000 HU SNG tournament where you are dealt 72o every hand and your opponent is dealt AA. In both games the strategies are completely different.
In game 1, you should fold every hand you get. In fact, you should probably leave the table. But given the fact that you cannot leave the table until you play x number of hands, the best option would to be always fold.
In game 2, you should go all-in every hand. Your goal is to try and get lucky since you know you are a dog and it is the only way to win the SNG.
In the second game you are focusing your thoughts on future hands to determine your best play. The reason we play different in tournaments and SNGs isn't solely based on the fact that there is an ICM payout structure. It is mathematically different since all the money is already invested before you've begun playing.
Even in a HU SNG, it makes sense to "wait for a better spot" in certain situations. A good example of this would be a nit who folds too much preflop and jams 12 BBs deep. We hold A3o and know we are a slight favorite. But we can fold, and determine based on their playing style that our chances of winning is greater if we fold and blind him down instead.
Perhaps this is why tournament players start jamming when their stack gets low even when game theory says otherwise. They make -EV plays in order to get themselves into a situation where they will be more +EV. For instance, if you are UTG with K7o with 5BBs in a tournament, it is a losing play to jam all-in. But I see players do this all the time. Me, I probably wouldn't do this. I would wait for the BB to see if I get something better, but maybe everyone else knows something I don't. After all, I'm not the best when it comes to tournaments.
When people gamble in the middle stages of the tournament to become a bigger stack for the final table, perhaps they are making -EV plays to establish a strong +EV situation at the final table when they have a big stack.
By -EV and +EV situations I mean specifically for the chips denomination even including ICM, but not in terms of the players chances of winning/placing higher in the tournament.
Okay, I'm done ranting. Let me know your thoughts.
