Today’s video shows a final table from a WPT event won by Scotty Nguyen. In fact it only shows one hand as the heads up confrontation lasted for just one hand. Both players had a similar chip count so whoever won this hand was basically the champion. I love the WPT shows, sure they are glitzy and OTT but poker is about entertainment at the end of day.
It isn’t always played seriously and there are millions upon millions of players at home who look at these programs purely for entertainment and nothing else. So why shouldn’t they be entertained in their own homes and poker needs people like Scotty Nguyen!
But in this post I want to talk about aggression in tournament poker and the key importance of it. This is why some of the best tournament players in the world are the ones who have the most gamble. To wade through a large MTT event in online poker or a quality field in a WPT event takes a good solid poker game but it also takes more.
It takes guts and nerve to be able to make certain plays that could see you walking out of the tournament door. You have to be prepared for this and if you are not then you simply will not generate enough deep placed finishes to make a career out of tournament poker.
I have never played tournament poker seriously and have only played them as a diversion from cash games. I am not saying that they are all about all out aggression but you have to remember that to win the tournament then you have to get every single chip in play and you cannot do that playing it safe.
You need to take calculated risks and gambles in tournaments, if you are going to sit back and wait for cards to smack you in the face then you are going to find yourself with a whole lot of mid-place finishes and bubbles with a few minor cashes thrown in for good measure. Stop thinking that the big pay-off could just be around the corner because it won’t be and will merely be an illusion.
If you are in the cut-off and you go for a steal raise with a J-10 and the button three bets you. If you feel that they are making a move against a stealer then make a re-move on them. If you are wrong and they wake up with a hand like A-K then so be it. At least you have been eliminated trying to amass a tournament winning stack and who knows, you may just outdraw them. You could be one of these players who get a 100k stack early doors and the rest of the so called “players” are looking at you and calling you lucky. Of course you were lucky but you make your own luck in tournament poker.
Carl “The Dean” Sampson at poker loco
