Mastering Sit and Goes - Late Portion

There are five basic stages to every sit and go, table selection, beginning play, middle portion, late portion and the endgame. By mastering all five stages of sit and goes, you should be able to sit down at any of these tables, and walk away with a profit the majority of the time.

This section, the second of 5, will cover what to do during the end game of sit and goes, when there are four or five players left, and the blinds have raised to their fourth or fifth level.

By this stage of the sit and go, the blinds have raised fairly high. They are usually in the range of 50 - 100, so the big blind is approximately 10 % of the starting stack. Frequently what you see when you get down to 5 players left is that the play tightens up considerable. Most people do not want to bubble out, and will play tight until there are only 3 people left. How you play in this stage depends on what your stack size is.

If you are a short stack, less than 10 x the big blind, your play is pretty simple. You should not limp into any pots. You no longer have the option of playing a hand and then not seeing the river with it. With just about any hand you are going to play, you should be all in before the flop. This greatly increases your equity in the hand, as a lot of people will fold to you. When you have less than 10 x the big blind, and especially less than 5 x the big blind, the kinds of hands that you should want to move all in with are, any pair, any ace, or any two cards 10 or above.

A medium stack, which has about 15 x the big blind, is by far the hardest to play at this stage. You want to stay aggressive, and try to steal pots, but not commit yourself too far with bad hands. You need to be careful picking on small stacks if they have shown a tendency to go all in. The kind of short stacks that you need to watch out for are the people how had a larger stack and then just got beat. They will feel desperate and ready to gamble. People who have been gradually draining chips probably aren't going to change, and won't push on you. If a short stack has doubled up the hand before, it is a good time to push against him, because he is more likely to fold medium strength hands, since he feels a lot better with his chip count. However, you definitely shouldn't get into the, wait until there are 3 people left to play mentality. If you do that then the next thing you know, the short stack hits a 3 outer to double up, and you are the next person on the chopping block. Generally hands you want to raise with here are pairs, good aces, or hands that play well after the flop, like KQ suited.

A large stack, with more than 20 x the big blind should be pushing the other people around. Your goal is to dominate the table, and try to make it to the final 3 with a good chip lead. If the people at your table have shown a tendency to fold, think about raising preflop with just about any two cards. Since almost no hand is more than a 70-30 dog to any other hand, if you think there is even a 50 - 50 chance that your opponent will fold to your raise, it is right to do so. If they do push all in, if they are a short stack it is almost always right to call them and hopefully knock them out. After all, they could be very desperate and pushing in with things like low suited connectors or 22.

To view the other section of my sit n go strategy go here

1) Playing Sit and Go's --- End Game

2) Mastering Sit and Go's - Late Portion

3) Mastering Sit and Go's - Middle Portion

4) Mastering Sit and Go's - Beginning Play

5) Mastering Sit and Go's - Table Selection