This is the first entry in the CardRunners.com blog that will be posted regularly on PocketFives.com. This article was written by Jsup.

Rebuy tournaments are my favorite types of tournaments to play. I am not much of a gambler away from poker; I rarely play table games like craps or blackjack and I never bet on sports. My tournament style, and overall poker style for that matter is more of a tight aggressive style, but during rebuy tournaments I use a different strategy that is fun to play and has given me a great deal of success in the past. <READMORE>

Many people have different strategies for rebuy tournaments, and I think that people should use whatever is comfortable for them. I have tried different strategies from not playing any hands during the rebuy period, to playing and raising almost every hand during the rebuy period, and everything in-between. The strategy I have found to be most fun and most successful, has been a hyper-aggressive style. I use the first few hands to make it known that I am ready to gamble, and it always seems to get the table to cooperate with me. Whenever I am playing in a rebuy tournament, I am always willing to make at least five rebuys. Getting a big stack early can be a huge advantage, as I will explain later. This hyper-aggressive style sometimes works in regular tournaments, but the problem is if you lose, you are out of the tournament, whereas in a rebuy, if you lose you can get right back to square one by rebuying. After I show the table my willingness to gamble and have the entire table gambling themselves, I continue my chatter but ease back on being the maniac that they all think I am. I recently played in a $150 buy in rebuy tournament at Foxwoods in Connecticut, with $60 rebuys and 186 participants. I will explain some key situations and important concepts, which ultimately lead me to winning the tournament and taking home a first place prize of $14,000.

The rebuy hour was one hour long and had two levels, thirty minutes each. During the first level, the blinds were $25-25, and in the second level, the blinds were $25-50. We started with $500 in chips, and for $60 in real money you could get $500 more chips. I always rebuy when the tournament begins. The reason for this is that you always want to have as many chips as possible, so if you find yourself in the position to double up you can have a big stack. The reason for my hyper-aggressive style during the rebuy period is that I am trying to obtain the biggest stack possible. As soon as I sat down, I began to chat with everyone and tried to create a positive atmosphere. A few hands into the tournament I managed to get all my chips in preflop with KK, and I was called by two players, one with A 10 off suit, and the other with Q9 off. After the flop was AQQ, I failed to improve on the turn and river and I immediately rebought two more times. (In rebuy tournaments, when you lose all of your chips you have the option to rebuy two times.)

Instead of complaining about the bad beat and going on tilt, I did the exact opposite. I continued to talk a lot and keep the table gambling and having fun. A few important hands came up during the rebuy period were created because of the gambling style I portrayed during the first half-hour or so. With the blinds at $25-50, I went all in early position with A6 suited. I would not typically play this hand in early position. However, I was trying to build a stack and get calls from weak hands. To my surprise, after getting three callers, the hands were turned over and I had the best hand! I was up against KJ off suite, and two players had KQ off suite. The flop came down ace high and I now had an above average $4k stack. Once I reach a certain chip stack, I tend to tighten up a lot, and my goal for this tournament was to have a 7500 stack by the end of the rebuy period. Luckily, I had two other situations that put my stack over $10k. The first hand was just a lucky situation that I happened to be on the right end of. Four of us got all in preflop and my JJ was somehow the favorite against 1010, and 2 players who both had AK off suit. After this hand, I was around $8k in chips and one of the tournament chip leaders. At this point, I was not playing the hyper-aggressive style anymore, but the table kept giving me action because they thought I was in every pot with nothing. A few hands before the rebuy period ended I limped in with 33 from middle position after two players limped in front of me, and the flop was 732 rainbow. One of the early position limpers made a weak bet into the pot, and I made a small raise. He instantly went all in and flipped over his J7 proudly. I took the last few hands off and finished the first hour with about $11k in chips, making me one of the top five chip leaders.

The issue of whether or not to add-on is something that people have different opinions on. I look at the blind structure of the tournament, average chip stacks, and things like this when deciding if adding on is correct or not. In this particular tournament, it cost $60 to add on which would give you an extra $1000 in tournament chips. I looked around and figured the average stack to be around $3k in chips, and I had an $11k stack. I figured that the average stack for the final table would be around $40k in chips, and I already had ¼ of that. If the add-on were something like $2000 chips for $60, then I might have considered it, but I did not feel like an add-on was a smart investment on my part.

The main reason why I feel like getting a huge stack during the rebuy period is so important is because making it far and doing well in tournaments is so much easier when having a big stack. When I say it is easy I do not mean that playing a big stack is easy, but I mean that taking bad beats or getting a cold run of cards can be managed when having a big stack. People always complain about taking a bad beat late in a tournament, but if they had put themselves in a position where the bad beat did not make them go broke then they would have survived to play longer. In my tournament, I went on the coldest run of cards I have ever had in my life. Every time I tried to make a steal, I got caught. Every time I had a marginal hand in position, there was a raise and a reraise in front of me. By the time we were down to 60 players, I had an average stack. After 4 hours of blinding away chips and never making any progress in the right direction, I was still in contention to win the tournament. This was because I built such a big stack during the rebuy period. Some people were calling me crazy during that first hour for rebuying 8 times, and I do admit that 8 is more then I feel comfortable doing, but I wasn’t doing it to waste money or to satisfy some gambling urge. I wanted to put myself in the best position to win. I took four or five awful beats after the rebuy period, and although they hurt, none of them killed me because I was prepared by having a big stack.

When we were down to about 40 players, the tournament really started to get exciting. There were many short stacks due to the structure of the tournament, and my goal was to build my stack and never let myself get too low. My table was relatively week, and the only player I had trouble against was sitting directly to my right. Amazingly, after switching tables 4 times throughout the tournament, he was seated to my right at each table. The ups and downs for me were crazy. I got lucky a few times, and got extremely unlucky. There were points where I was feeling like I had a great chance to win, and then 5 minutes later I was worried about making the money (top 20 spots paid). I never play tournaments just to get into the money, but being that I was in for eight rebuys I wanted to make sure I did not go home empty handed. With that being said, I was still playing to win. I said to myself if I have a chance to get some chips or possibly go out on the bubble, I am most definitely taking that chance to get chips. A few interesting hands occurred with about 25-30 people left. I made a steal on the button with 57 of spades, seeing that both players in the blinds were low stacks and playing just to get into the money. The big blind woke up with AK of spades and I was pot committed. After a flop of 774, I was back over the average chip count.

I was amazed by how many people were playing so tight just to get into the money. I was able to build my stack from as little as 10k to around 40k just by stealing from the tight players in the blinds. I do not want to say it was easy, but when your table is eight handed and only one other player at the table is willing to play back at you, taking advantage of the tight players is necessary. I had won a few hands in a row and came in for a raise in middle position with AK of diamonds. It was the fourth hand in a row I raised, so I knew the other strong player at the table must have been getting suspicious. He was in the big blind with about 15k in chips, and he went into the tank. I knew he was not stalling, because after talking to him throughout the day, he told me he had won this tournament numerous times and other people had confirmed it for me. I knew he was playing for the win just as I was. The blinds at this point were $600-1200, and I had opened for $3600. He was thinking hard and the more he thought the more I felt like he had AQ. I said something along the lines of “if you push I will beat you into the pot.” My reason for saying this was that I wanted him to fold. At this point, picking up the blinds and antes every hand was huge for me and everything was going just as I wanted it to. I did not want to be forced to call $12k more in chips versus the only other player at the table that worried me. He finally said, “Ok let’s gamble” and as I promised, I beat him into the pot with my AK of diamonds. To my surprise, he turned over AA and doubled up the only good player at my table. By the time we got into the money, I was relatively short stacked, but now the tight players began gambling more. I picked up AA when another player had AK and considered myself lucky to reach the final table with a $42k stack. The average stack was right at $40k, which put me in fourth chip position.

The action at the final table started out fast and furious, with three players being knocked out on the first two hands. The hand that eliminated two players was dramatic to say the least. The short stack player went in ahead with QQ, another player with about a 30k stack had QJ off suite, and the big stack player who I previously mentioned as being a strong player had 55. QQ was looking to triple up until a five spiked to river and we were down to seven players that quickly. The player with the 55 was sitting directly to my right as he had been all night, but I considered myself lucky throughout the final table because he was very passive in the small blind. Most times when the action was folded around to him, he folded to me in the big blind giving up the pot, which was very important for me. Most of my raises were getting respect and I had built my stack to around $70k with six people left, without showing down many hands at all.

An important hand came up with six people left. A short-stacked player had moved all in for $18k under the gun. I was in the big blind with Q7 of clubs, and the blinds at this point were $4k-$8k with a $1k ante. Previously, short-stacked players had moved in and inexperienced players with big stacks folded their blinds without even thinking about the situation. Although I knew I was beat, I figured I was in perfect position to call the extra $10k. There was already $18k in the pot and it only cost me another $10k out of my $70k stack. He had A10, which was about a 3/2 favorite, and when a Q hit the river knew I was in good position to win. The most important hand of the tournament occurred when we were four handed. The blinds were $6k-$12k with a $2k anti, and I opened from the button for $36k with 44. At the start of the hand, I had $125k, the small blind had $100k, the big blind $75k, and the player to my immediate right had $80k. The player in the big blind who was clearly a novice player pushed all in as soon as the action got to him and I felt a little sick to my stomach. He had already shown down AA twice, KK, JJ, and QQ and that was just at the final table. He had made a few severe mistakes along the way, however, which made it clear he was a beginning player. I asked him how much more it was to call and the dealer said it was $40k. He had a grin on his face and I knew what it meant; he had another monster. My first mistake was not recognizing his chip stack before I raised, because if I had I would not have put myself in such a tough situation. I felt like if he did have a hand like AK, then I would be racing for a huge pot, which would put me in an amazing situation to win the tournament, and if he had a big pair and I lost I would still have $50k to work with which wasn’t too awful. I made the call and to my disgust, he turned over KK. I could not believe he had another big pair, but that is poker. I went from complete disgust to utter joy when I saw that the door card was a four. The flop was QJ4 and I had taken the lead. The turn brought a ten, which gave him an extra eight outs, and with one card to come, I was trying to dodge two kings, four aces, and four nines. The river was a blank and we were down to three people.

I now had $200k in chips, another player had $100k, and the player who I had been playing with all night was the low stack with $80k. The tournament director announced that we would now be playing with $10k-$20k blinds and a $3k anti. That meant that it would cost each of us $33k every three hands, and there were only about $400k chips in play between the three of us. We decided to stop to clock and talk about a deal. I normally am opposed to deals, but there were a few factors that made me want to chop in this situation. For one, it was 2:30 AM and I had a two and a half hour drive ahead of me that night. The main reason, however, was the structure of the tournament. I felt like we were at the point where it was a crapshoot, and being that I was in the best chip position, I thought making a deal would be the smartest move on my part. I clearly was not thinking as well as I should have been, and because of that, I did not make a very smart deal for myself. I took into consideration the fact that I had sucked out to knock the player out in 4th, and felt like I should not be greedy, especially because I was so lucky to have hit the 4. I have not had a tremendous amount of live final table experience, so I used this experience to learn from my mistakes. I offered both of the players $10k, which would leave me with the other $14k. In retrospect, I should have taken $15k, but overall it was a solid payday for a $160 buy in tournament. We all agreed, and I drove home with a lot of cash in my pockets and a big smile on my face.

In my opinion, experience is the best way to get better at poker. The hundreds of rebuy tournaments that I have played online played a huge role in winning this tournament. Finding a style that makes you comfortable and brings good results is key to becoming a successful player. I hope this has given you some incite to how I go about playing rebuy tournaments, and that it helps to bring all of you success in the future.

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