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Blackjack Tournament Training - Part 4

What I want to cover here is how I play hands 14-20 in a 25-hand match. This would be the equivalent to hands 26-45 of a 50-hand match, so adjust your thinking accordingly if that's the type of tournament you play in. As you may know, we co-host a monthly Blackjack Tournament with Global Player Casino and I was able to defeat the latest challenger, which makes it four wins in a row. I wasn't able to compete in any tournaments at my local brick-and-mortar casino, but I have entered a tournament where the top prize is $50,000 and I'm really looking forward to that one. It's scheduled to be held January 18-20, 2002, so I'll report on it in February 2002.

The Middle Game

These 7 hands are important to your success, although any big mistakes made here can, with luck, be remedied in the last five hands of the match. But I hate to rely upon luck, so I really concentrate on meeting the goals I establish for these hands.

Set reasonable goals

Remember the old saying, "it's all in the timing"? Well, that certainly applies here, because we don't want to peak too early, but neither do we want to get too far behind the other players as we play these hands. Yet, this is also a point in the match where you can really hurt yourself if you over-bet, so I definitely err on the side of conservatism in the part of the match.

I do that by maintaining a goal of getting within one-half of a maximum bet of the perceived leader by hand # 21. I say "perceived" leader, because the actual leader, as measured by the number of chips s/he has, may be someone else entirely. In Part 3, I talked about sizing up the competition and this is the place where that will pay off. Just because a player was making a lot of maximum bets and is now far ahead of you doesn't mean you have to start playing catch-up at this point. If that player continues to make big bets, s/he will likely begin losing soon. Of course, that may not happen, so you'll just have to write-off the # 1 position, but in my experience the player you have to really worry about is the one who bets big, gets ahead of the pack and then starts betting small. The other type is the one who is making bets that are approximately the average of all the other players and who obviously knows how to play the game. That's what I mean by the "perceived" leader and he or she is the one you want to stay close to.

Let's say a player began by the match by betting big and now, at hand #16, s/he starts betting the minimum. The first thing you have to do is set a goal of how much you need to make in the next 4 hands to get within $250 of this player. For the moment, don't worry about the other players, although you can't completely ignore them, of course. But don't try to take on everyone at your table, especially when you consider that you'll likely be ahead of most of them if you catch up with the leader, anyway.

Here's an example using the rules of the tournaments I play most often. Let's suppose player "A" has $2500 in chips at hand # 16, you have $1900 and the maximum bet is $500. On hand 16, player A bets $25. That, to me, marks this player as the perceived leader and s/he is going to be tough to beat. On this hand you should bet about a third of A's edge over you or $200. It's great if you win and s/he loses, but if you lose and s/he bets $25 on the next hand, I'd go with another $200 bet, because there's still plenty of time left in the match. It won't seem that way, but there is. So now we're at hand # 17, you have $200 bet and Player A has $25 bet. This is a critical time so don't do anything stupid. If the proper Basic Strategy play is to double, then double, but don't make a weird play like splitting 10s or doubling 7 against a 5 just to get more $$$ on the table. The goal for the moment is to simply get to within $250 of Player A's total by the time hand #20 has been played. A maximum bet ($500 in this example) may be called for at some point and if it is, push the chips out there, but stick with playing the proper Basic Strategy, regardless.

Helpful hint: A risky, but potentially effective, approach to take if you're still somewhat behind at hand 18 or 19 is to use a "martingale" bet. For example, if you bet $100 on hand # 17 and lost, then bet $200 on the next hand. If you lose that, bet $400 on the next hand. Should you lose that, you'll be close to the end-game portion of the match (hand 20 or 21) and all you can do at that point is start chunking max bets, unless your opponents have also been losing.

Correlation betting

It's impossible for me to lay out some sort of formula that will work in every situation of every tournament, but any success I've had in the middle-game portion has come from understanding the relationship of the bets placed by me and my opponents. Let's say I have $100 bet and a player whose total is close to mine has bet $150. If we both win, he's gained $50 on me. If I lose and he wins, he's gained $250 on me, so I'll probably have to bet more on the next hand. If I win and he loses, then I've gained $250 on him and my initial thought will be to cut back my bet size in comparison to his on the next hand.

Don't let the word "correlation" mean just one thing to you. It may well mean "the same as" in some situations, but it might also mean "opposite of" in others. I'm sure my old English teacher would want to correct me here, but I can explain. Your bet and all the other bets at the table are related in two ways: between yourselves and against the dealer. If everyone except you bets big and the dealer gets a Blackjack, you'll gain on your opponents. But that's rare and won't work very well as a strategy to win tournaments. A better approach is to become real good at calculating the average bet on the table and then sizing your own bet accordingly. If you're very far ahead, bet smaller than the average (if not the minimum) and if you're very far behind, bet bigger - a lot bigger - than the average.

Those situations are easy to cover, but what's much less precise is if you have about the fourth-largest bankroll at a table of seven players at hand # 14. Of course you have to start betting bigger, but how much bigger? Well, you could make one maximum bet or, better yet, bet one or two minimum bets over the average and that's the way I recommend you proceed. A lot of tournament philosophy seems to be, "when in doubt, bet the max", but I disagree with that and try to do all I can to avoid making a max bet. Don't get me wrong, if that's my only choice, I can chunk with the best of them, but don't forget that you can (and will) sometimes win a match by losing less than your opponents and you can't lose what you don't bet. Plus, winning a max bet may make you the target and it's better to stay in the shadows as long as possible. Stealth Blackjack!

Helpful hint: If you feel you have to "bend" the Basic Strategy a bit to get more $$$ on the table, first see what kind of hand the perceived leader has. If s/he has a "good" hand, I recommend that you play only proper Basic Strategy. Save the weird stuff for when your target has a high probability of losing his or her hand.

Get ready for the end game

When hand # 20 is completed in my local tournament, the pit personnel conduct a countdown of the chips of everyone at the table. Because I've been focusing on the "perceived" leader, there may be one or two other players who have come into contention without me noticing. But from this point on, I try to ignore as many players with small bankrolls as possible, even though I recognize someone might make a great come back. But if they do, I'll notice that. You'll drive yourself crazy if you try to track five or six other players in the last five hands of the match, especially if two or more players at your table advance to the next round. Remember, second place is just as good as first in the qualifying rounds. The key, again, is to focus on those with bigger bankrolls than yours and set a monetary goal that will overtake them. Exactly how we'll accomplish that is the subject of the next article in this series, so I won't get into it now.

Helpful hint: While the pit personnel are counting down everyone's chips, I use that break to calculate my betting position for hand # 25. Knowing whether I'll be betting first or last or somewhere in between won't have much of an effect on how much I bet in those last few hands and someone may bust out, thus changing the order completely. Nonetheless, this can be valuable information to have and I'll show you what to do with it next time, but it's easier to figure out during a break in the action.

Summary for hands 14-20 (of a 25-hand match)

1. Target the "perceived" leader.
2. Set a monetary goal that will get you within half a max bet of that player by hand # 20.
3. Correlate your bets with the perceived leader.
4. Consider using a martingale betting scheme to catch up if you're way behind.
5. Stick with Basic Strategy for the play of your hand.
6. Don't think about chasing the "rabbits" (chunkers) until hand #18.
7. At hand # 20, calculate your position of betting on hand # 25.

In the next lesson, I'll cover how I play hands 21-25.

See you then.

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