How to Play Modern MTTs: Tips from Daniel Negreanu

If you started playing poker 10 years ago, you probably know that back then there were a few pretty simple strategies used by most players. This is especially true for MTTs, where constant pressure on the stacks made it hard to deploy a variety of tactics.

But that’s not the case anymore. Tournament strategy has changed and moved far ahead. Playing styles, bet sizes and the general approach to specific situations have changed dramatically.

If you’re new to tournament poker, we have some tips for the different stages of a tournament from a Team PokerStars Pro – Daniel Negreanu.

Early stage of the tournament

In the early stages of many tournaments there are no antes, which allows you to play conservatively. I’m of the opinion that you can’t win a tournament in the early stage, but you can easily bust out of it.

If you can spot one player at the table as weak, especially postflop, you’ll want to play more hands against that player to realize your edge. That’s true in theory, and you could limp a lot to play postflop with them, but I don’t think you’ll see many good players doing that.

The problem with limping is that you give the big/small blind a chance to realize their equity by seeing the flop almost for free with something like 92s or 96o.

And although raises in today’s game are very small, it’s still much better than limping because you can take the blinds out of the hand with those kinds of hands. But generally you shouldn’t worry about growing your stack by 20-30% during the first two levels. You need to try to preserve your chips and wait for better spots.

Situation 1: You’re involved in a big pot in the early stages of a tournament. You win the pot and land in the top-20 chip leaders. Should you play cautiously or constantly pressure other players?

In the early stage you don’t have much ICM pressure. There’s no bubble everyone is trying to reach, almost no short stacks, so winning a big pot shouldn’t drastically change your game.

If you started with 200bb and suddenly have 400, it doesn’t matter much. It becomes important when there are enough players around you with 30bb or less that you can bully, because every decision could eliminate them from the tournament.

Situation 2: You’re involved in a big pot early and lose. You’re left with 20-25bb and you find yourself at the bottom of the chip count. Should you keep playing?

In this scenario you haven’t lost the tournament, you’ve just lost the ability to play deep-stack poker. So you need to adapt and switch to plan B, which is much more conservative.

Now your task is to look for pots where you can double up. And that’s the main difference from 200bb, because doubling up there is much harder.

Bubble play in MTTs

Many players overrate this stage. In fact, it’s not that significant unless you have a very short stack.

The strategy here entirely depends on your stack size. If it’s short, you need to estimate how many more blinds you can afford to lose to make the min-cash.

If you have a big stack, you still shouldn’t play wildly. Yes, you can exploit the situation by putting pressure on short stacks, but don’t risk your entire stack.

Bet sizing

Bet sizing is extremely important and the situation with it has changed a lot since I started playing. People used to raise 3-4bb and it was standard to pot-bet on the flop.

That’s why I developed a strategy where you choose smaller bet sizes that give you a chance to play more hands.

If you watch HighRoller series tournaments from the last 2 years, you’ll see lots of small preflop raises and small continuation bets on the flop. However on the turn and river bets could be overbets of 2 or 3 pots. Those overbets allow you to put maximum pressure on opponents.

In general, bet sizing depends on the texture of the flop, your stack sizes and the range your opponent is representing.

Overbet is your weapon in polar situations, when you either have a very strong hand or nothing. That’s when you put in 2x pot to make life difficult for your opponent.

Small preflop raises and small flop bets are something every good poker player uses. But play on the turn and river has become interesting, with many opportunities to adjust and exploit opponents.

Late stage of an MTT

Situation 3. You’re in the top third of the tournament chip leaderboard. You’re moved to a new table. You raise with pocket kings from MP and get called by a player on the blinds who you slightly cover. The flop is as follows:

Your hand: KK

Flop: K98                     

Your opponent checks, you make a small bet and get raised. What to do?

In this situation you should usually call, unless you’re 100% sure the opponent will shove. But since there’s always a chance of a bluff, I prefer to call and give them a chance to bluff.

Shoving all-in wouldn’t be very smart, even though you have the best hand. Yes, sometimes you’ll get action from worse hands. But by calling you get one of two situations.

A blank turn that doesn’t complete draws gives you a chance to catch any bluff or to barrel yourself.

If a draw completes, you can minimize losses. Say a T comes, you need to play much more cautiously. You block many king hands, except a flush draw or a low set that he could have check-raised the flop with.

Here you need to think about balance and what you would do with your whole range. If you call a check-raise with Kh or 9h, or with a gutshot at all, then you need to have a set of kings in your range, otherwise you become easily exploitable.

In this spot your play depends on whether you have position. If you don’t, you’ll have to reraise more often on the flop because the opponent can check the turn and take a free card.