Pot-control

The most important distinctions between cash game and tournament poker are that in cash games, the stacks in play will be much deeper (usually 100 or more big blinds) and that you can rebuy if you lose your chips. This has far-reaching implications for your strategy adjustments in terms of both the hands that you are going to win with when big pots occur, and the way more marginal hands should be played.

Ordinarily, if two solid players get a lot of money in the middle during a cash game hand, you can be sure that they either have something very close to the nuts or, occasionally, big draws and bluffs. Because of this, getting a lot of money in with marginal hands like top pair-top kicker is not usually such a good idea when the money is deep; this is one of the principal ways that inexperienced players lose their chips in cash games.

For this reason, good players will often exercise what is called pot-control with marginal hands, which consists of checking and calling, rather than betting and raising. This is done so that their decisions are easier as the hand progresses, and they are able to protect their stack. Similarly, because there is no pressure associated with being forced out of a cash game by going broke, your play should be more oriented to gaining value on your hands against opponents who are only likely to have a small number of outs at best.

In tournaments you would want to raise to protect your hand, but this strategy is less important in cash games because doing so will often force an opponent to fold a worse hand or stay around with a better one. However, the most disastrous result would be if an opponent folded a bluff that they might have continued with!

KEY POINT

When the money is deep, getting all the money in with top pair-top kicker is a recipe for disaster. It is better to play a more passive game when you have a marginal hand

DOUBLE TROUBLE

These ideas dovetail well in strategy terms; sometimes playing cautiously and passively will serve the dual goals of keeping the pot small when you are behind and encouraging your opponents to put more money in when you are ahead. It may also allow you to make a value bet later in a hand that they will have to call since your holding is so under-represented.

The decision whether to play a big or small pot is something that you should be thinking about from the moment you receive your cards. For example, in very deep ring games, you might want to play hands with high-reverse implied odds (hands that you stand to lose a lot with in the wrong circumstances) like A-K very slowly. It may serve best to just limp in early position and then call a raise – or just call a raise with them in late position. This will disguise your holding well and if you flop top pair you may well gain value from a bluff or a worse hand.

If you play small pairs the same way as well, you may also be able to represent a set against trigger- happy opponents if you miss and the circumstances are correct, perhaps by waiting to check-raise the turn on an uncoordinated board. By indicating a wish to play a big pot with this bluff, you will force many better hands to fold if your opponents are remotely solid.

In this latter example, we are able to violate the tenets of pot- control in the hopes of misleading an opponent about the strength of our hand based on his likely assessment of our ranges and action. However, very strong players will do the opposite of this. Against weaker opponents, they will purposefully look for instances where a player is seemingly hoping to control the size of a pot and push them out of their comfort zone in order to force them to fold.

For this reason, it is important that these ideas are implemented as part of a balanced strategy to ensure your hand ranges aren’t predictable and easy to target!