There have been considerable amounts of articles written on the subject of SNG (Sit and Go) play. The advent of the one table tournament made it possible for a very specific style of play to gain long term profits when playing online poker because of the possibility of multi tabling and repeating chip counts and tournament specific spots. I recently began researching the possibility that SNG tournaments are now solved and there is now such a small margin or edge to be had by playing proper strategy that they are almost redundant as a means of exclusively using them to profit from.

SNG strategy is basically the same as a multi table tournament. You should play tight in the beginning and gradually loosen up as the blinds get bigger to avoid being blinded out of the tournament. Along the way you will make some good decisions and get some good hands and you reach those top three spots for the money. The key difference between the SNG and MTT is in a one table situation your cash is not going to be many hundred times your buy-in like a big MTT. Mathematically based players say that there is no need to gamble with marginal situations in an attempt to accumulate a huge stack as your equity to win the tournament is not increased enough even with the big pot win. This means that gambling for chips does not necessarily equate to extra winnings and are therefore not worth the risk in the early stages.

As online poker tournaments are not filled with many new players as they were a few years ago most players start each and every new poker tournament with that little bit more experience and slightly more learning under their belt. Poker training websites like Leggo Poker or Deuces Cracked further seek to educate the poker masses. This means that our edge in tournaments could be very small compared to what it used to be.

Professional players look for tables where they are the best player. Possibly more importantly, they need players to be weak so that they make exploitable plays. On a SNG table, if there are eight other grinders then the skill edge is marginal. The result of this skilled player pool is that the determining factor on profits becomes our old best friend and worst enemy, luck. If the only deciding factor on who cashes and who does not is the cards we are dealt then any skill we have is only break even. This does not give a good edge to professional SNG players and why I believe SNGs, as a bankroll building mechanism of Poker has diminished considerably.

There is a counter strategy. The wealth of learning dedicated towards playing tight in a SNG means that good players remain in the tournament longer. By definition this suggests that any bad players playing too many pots early on will be eliminated quickly, unable to hang in there with the best players who use the optimal recommended strategy. In order to gain their equity, whilst it is basically mathematically incorrect to do so, playing deep stack pots against these players in the early stages gives you an edge not easily found in other parts of the SNG. This can translate into a real edge over equally skilled opponents later in the SNG.

Proper cash game strategy suggests countering the table tendencies and this applies to modern SNG play. SNGs are becoming too solved and predictable when it comes to tight early tournament strategy and the profitable players will need to change their game to continuing succeeding. I believe we will see a loosening of play as the edge on having a few more chips outweighs the edge of playing properly against a skilled SNG table. Try loosening a little in the early stages as the skilled players will fold leaving you against weak players. These extra chips buy you a few more rounds in the late stages to wait for the hand with which to “obey” standard strategy and jam later in the SNG. This new approach may maintain the SNG as a bankroll builder moving forward in online pokers development.

By Malcolm Clarke