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In the Money - Chapter Five
From In The Money: Strategies for Winning Texas Hold'em Cash Games
by Antonio "the Magician" Esfandiari
Chapter Five – Cash Games Versus Tournament Play
Before we dig into specific cash-game strategy, let’s take a minute to look at some of the fundamental differences between cash games and tournaments. With the tremendous popularity of the World Poker Tour, many new players are first introduced to Texas Hold ’Em via tournaments. They watch the latest WPT final table on Wednesday night and want to know how they can play that game. While the fundamentals of Texas Hold ’Em are universal, tournament strategy is greatly different from cash-game strategy. So if you are watching the final table of a major tournament, do not walk into your local cardroom and think you are going to beat the cash games by emulating what you saw on television.
The first major difference between cash games and tournaments is that in tournaments you can only lose the amount of your buy-in. In a cash game, you can lose your entire stack. It’s a lot easier to be fearless when all you have at risk is your $50 tournament buy-in as opposed to the $1,000 you bring to the cash game. In a tournament, the chips have no value other than as a means to determine where you place. This brings us to the next big difference. In tournaments, you get instant feedback as to your results. You know by the end of the tournament if you made it to the money and how far you advanced. Cash games are measured over the long haul. Success or failure should not be measured in one session or even a few sessions. If you are looking for instant gratification, cash games are not for you.
Next, in tournaments, everyone starts out with the same number of chips. No one can sit down with a larger stack than anyone else. Everyone starts equally. Also, everyone starts at the same time. (Unless you are Phil Hellmuth, who is notorious for
Commerce Casino’s Tim Gustin, Vince Van Patten, Shana Hiatt, and Mike Sexton toast Antonio after his winning the 2004 L.A.Poker Classic.
showing up late to tournaments.) You are not entering a game in progress. In cash games, it is up to you to decide how much money you want to put on the table. In the great majority of sessions, you will be sitting down to a game that has been playing for quite some time.
In tournament play, you must constantly adjust to the changing blinds and the introduction of antes Your table can break up, and you can be moved to a new table. The size of your stack in relation to the blinds and the average-sized chip stack will go a long way in determining your strategy. Since you cannot reach into your pocket to buy more chips, you must make do with what you have. If you are busted in a tournament, you are done.
In a cash game, you can always buy more chips.
There will be times that you will play much more aggressively in tournament play than you would in a cash game, and times that you will play much more conservatively than you would in a cash game. Finally, in tournaments you should be playing to win, not finish as high as possible. Anyone can play supertight and advance to the middle of the pack before being eliminated. If you want to make money in a tournament, you have to gun for a top finish. Tournament payouts are weighted heavily to the top three spots. That is going to require you to take a lot of chances to get there. In cash games, your only goal is to make money. You are not competing against anyone else. You should not care if someone else is making more money than you. All you care about is whether you are making correct decisions in your play and are maximizing your profit and minimizing your losses depending on the situation.
The final table of a tournament is remarkably different from even the rest of a tournament, let alone a cash game. Keep that in mind when you are watching the World Poker Tour coverage. You can learn a lot from both the play and the analysis. Some of the things you will learn will be universal to all No Limit Hold ’Em games, such as using position and chips to your advantage.
However, a lot of what you will see will only be relative to a tournament final table. Let me offer an example of a couple of hands I played at a final table of a World Series of Poker event that were critical to my winning the tournament and that prestigious WSOP gold bracelet.
With six players left, I was the shortest stack and needed to make a move. Even though I was the short stack, I still had enough chips left to hurt the bigger stacks. So I wanted to make a move before the blinds and antes ate away any more of my stack. With pocket deuces, I moved all-in. I was called by a player with pocket eights, and I was a pretty big underdog. To make matters worse, the flop came 9-10-J, giving my opponent an open-end straight draw to go with his bigger pair. I was down to two outs. The turn brought a five, but the river was the most perfect deuce I’ve ever seen, and I doubled up. In a cash game, moving all-in with a pair of deuces preflop would be idiotic. If we had deep stacks in the cash game, then calling an all-in bet with pocket eights would be worse. Yet, at the final table of a tournament, both of these moves were correct. I had to make a move, and I could do a lot worse than move in with a pocket pair. Unless someone had two high cards or another pocket pair, they were not going to call me. Even if I got called, I was even money against two high cards. I could only be dominated by a bigger pair, which was what happened here. However, during the course of a tournament, there will be times that you will have to survive an all-in or get lucky when you are making a move with a short stack. In a cash game, you should never be relying on luck. There is never a reason why you have to make a move. You cannot be eliminated from a cash game. If you are short stacked and do not want to buy in for any more chips, then do not squander those chips. They can be used another day. Unlike a tournament, you can walk away from the table and keep the chips you have remaining. Those chips have real value. I see a lot of players watch their stacks dwindle in a cash game and then once they are short stacked just throw in the rest on a whim. I do not know what they were thinking, but they were not protecting their bankroll. Cash games are measured over the long term, and how you should play does not vary like it does in a tournament.
Let’s get back to the World Series of Poker tournament I was playing. The very next hand after I doubled up with deuces, I looked down to see two beautiful red ladies (queens) in my hand. I raised, only to be reraised by Phil Hellmuth. I moved all-in and Phil called. I showed my queens, and Phil turned over two black kings. Uh-oh. I was in trouble. To make matters worse, the flop came three smaller clubs—J-9-7. I was down to one out—the queen of spades. The turn brought the queen of clubs, giving me a set but making Phil a flush. This did open up some more outs for me, though. The queen of spades was still good, or the board could pair. Any jack, nine, or seven would give me a full house. So I had 10 outs. The river brought a nine, and again I doubled up. I would go on to win the tournament.
I would never commit all of my chips preflop with a pair of queens—especially against Phil Hellmuth—in a cash game. That is not a smart play. You are only going to get called by kings or aces. Late in a tournament, though, is a different story. Phil could have reraised me there with a number of hands, and I did not want him seeing a flop with a hand like A-J or K-Q that could out draw me. In a cash game, if I get reraised when I have queens, I am only going to call at best, and I may even fold depending on my read of my opponent. Even in the tournament, if I had a deeper stack, I could have folded the queens.
For more great tips from Antonio, buy his book from the WPT Store.
