If you’re one of the hundreds of sports bettors that’s taking advantage of the Bodog Sports Fantasy Tournament going on right now, you’ll want to have some basic poker knowledge going into the action. It’s pretty rare these days for someone who loves to bet on sports to have never played poker before, but for those of you who are not into the game a lot, and only play occasionally with friends, these tips will give you a better chance to succeed in the online environment.
The first thing to consider is that your goal is not to become a professional poker player overnight. The goal of the Bodog Sports Fantasy Tournament is to get your name into the draw. That means you have to finish in the money in three single table tournaments. You don’t have to win them, just finish in the cash. If you follow a basic tight strategy you should be able to make money in these tournaments by winning only three or four good-size hands. There will be so much action in these tournaments that you’ll go further staying out of the action until you have a premium hand to play.
When you do get dealt a premium hand you can make a big raise pre-flop to pick up the blinds, or you’ll have a big pot to bet at if someone decides to call your pre-flop raise. If there are players who are playing aggressively in late positions you can flat-call the blinds and wait for the aggressive player to make a late position raise in an attempt to steal the blinds. Once they raise the action you can come over them for a re-raise of your own. They’ll either get out of your way or you’ll most likely be able to bet them off after the flop.
It’s important to consider the situation of the tournament when you make decisions. If you have a big chip stack, and there’s only one player to go before the money, you might want to consider staying out of the action completely until the last player on the bubble is gone. Why risk anything when you have enough chips to pay blinds until another player gets knocked out? Fight the urge to win the tournament until you’ve made the money, then you can play for the tournament cash with all the aggression you want.
The big thing about tournament poker is to survive. The best way to survive in a poker tournament is to only get into hands with players that have fewer chips than you do. That way your tournament life is never at risk, and if you do lose the hand you’ll still have a chance to come back and win. This will be hard to do if your stack is short, but it’s a good thing to keep in mind when your stack is around the average.
And finally, have some fun playing poker. It’s a skill game but luck still plays an important role. You’ll win some and you’ll lose some, but someone’s got to win the tournaments, and someone also has to win the Bodog Sports Fantasy Tournament grand prize.
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