Customer Reviews

Sit 'n Go Strategy

5 star:		(37)
4 star:		(12)
3 star:		(4)
2 star:		(2)
1 star:		(2)

 

 

I have mixed emotions about this book, because if every poker player were to read it, online Sit `n Go tournaments would become much more difficult to beat. It is appropriate for SNGs with an entry fee of $10 through medium stakes, although many advanced, higher stake players will probably benefit from reading this book. Many of the topics presented are too advanced for the beginning player, who should first gain some tournament experience, and an understanding of basic concepts before purchasing this book.

Sit `N Go Strategy is one of the best poker manuscripts ever published, and a major contribution to poker, as there has been relatively little literature on SNG tournament strategy. It is a well written, fairly comprehensive guide to playing low and medium buy in, one table tournaments. Sit 'n Go Strategy is logically divided into sections on Low Blind Play, Medium Blind Play, and High Blind Play, as well as a chapter, titled Sit `N Go Career Play which covers some additional concepts.

For low blind play the author teaches a very tight aggressive style of play, although he acknowledges, that other playing styles can also be successful, if the players are skilled at post flop play. In the medium blind section, Mr. Moshman also advocates tight aggressive play. However, he demonstrates how an extremely aggressive play can be the optimum strategy when the blinds increase, and table conditions are right.

Part Three, High Blind Play is an outstanding section, and is the highlight of the book. A systematic analysis of table conditions, individual player styles, stack sizes, blind sizes, payouts, and chip values, and how they effect optimum strategy is provided. A wealth of valuable information is provided for the intermediate player, and advanced players should also benefit from reading this section. Concepts such as steals, resteals, stop `n go, and continuation bets are well explained and the concepts are reinforced by a large number of hand examples provided to reinforce the learning of each concept.

This is not just another poker book. Many readers will be surprised at the strategies Mr. Moshman teaches for mid blind and high blind play. It is a very interesting and informative book for the online player who wants to improve his play at one table Sit `N Go tournaments. This book may be as valuable for the SNG player as The Harrington No Limit Series is to the Multi-table tournament player.

This is an amazing poker book.

After you read the theory part each chapter where Colin describes how to play in different situations and why, you get to see actual hands and the reasoning behind each play. This book and the Harrington on Hold Em books are my favorite because of how many detailed hand examples they give.

For example, Colin describes "SNG Equity," and it's a good description, but I learn better through concrete examples. I was very happy he went right on to a hand:
Two guys go all-in against each other in the 1st hand of a Sit N Go with 2 2 versus Ace-King suited, and Colin explains how both these guys are losing money and how everyone else is gaining SNG Equity in the long run.

After reading it I understood the idea of equity (even the term in general) so much better than before.

I was also very surprised how aggressive you should be during high blinds ... Not just when you have under 10 blinds, but during the bubble, and Very Important, before you get blinded down to nothing. He says how it's better to push all-in with trash than not be able to steal pots in the future, then explains why and gives examples. It doesn't matter even when you're getting constant bad hands so long as you make your move at the right time.

I finished the book in two days and immediately put another $250 in my PStars account. I am now very confident I will be profiting from SNG's and highly recommend this book to any player.

I really like how the book is geared toward online SNG play. There are so many players just doing it for fun, and Moshman goes into detail on exploiting such weak players. He discusses how to use software to monitor multiple tables, how/when to force a play as short stack, and coming over top of HBLs (weak recreational players who treat the blinds as an ante and limp even into high blinds).

Preliminary concepts such as pot odds, expectation versus equity, etc. are also treated in full for newer players. I rate the section on manual reading very highly, and the discussion of buy-in differences and bankroll decisions are likewise very useful for many forms of poker, live or online.

Highly recommended.

I agree with the first reviewer: really good poker books need lots of examples. It doesn't matter how good the rest of the writing is ... I want lots of specific examples and lots of actual hands, and this book is bursting with them.

Doyle's chapter on no-limit in Super System 2 has solid advice, e.g., but there just aren't enough hands and details for me to feel confident implementing a lot of it into my game. Well that isn't a problem with this book.

Favorite chapters of mine in Sit & Go Strategy are primarily the high-blind stuff

(Lower blind chapters are good too, but we all know S&Gs are decided at high blinds):

Bubble Play (and the awesome ICM-justified queens fold to an all-in there)

Heads Up

Ante Adjusting (I hadn't realized how important antes were in S&Gs...)

Fund. Theory of High Blind Play - best part of the book

My only criticism is a fair number of small typos (even the back cover...), but that's well worth navigating to get this ultra-solid info on a game with huge profit potential.

This book is a concise reference and workbook on SNG strategy. If you are a regular player, most of the concepts in this book will be familiar to you. Key points in the book include distinguishing equity from chip expectation, the independent chip model, tight play early, aggressive play during high blind play, and the gap concept (not explicitly named but talked about). One nice part about this book is an entire chapter dedicated to passive plays that are correct in special situations.

I cannot give this book 5 stars however, because there are a few typos like where chip stacks are given in text as if you were in the small blind when you are shown in the picture to be in the big blind. I also didn't like the fact that going from one example to another, there might be a subtle difference in say the hand you were dealt, and that lead to a drastically different conclusion. The truth of the matter is that small changes in the calling/opening ranges of opponents, and small changes in stack sizes can drastically change whether it is right to push or fold in a high blind situation (which is why I recommend SNG wizard, the software). Also, even though the book argued for a differentiation of chip expectation and tournament equity, sometimes a certain play was advocated for on a purely CEV argument.

Things became much more clear with the use of sit-n-go wizard (computer software). SNG Strategy by Collin Moshman gives the ideas in words so that us humans can better understand what SNG Wizard does. There are no steadfast rules that hold for every situation. Every hand in a SNG is fairly complex and there are many parameters needed as input (to determine the most profitable-- or highest equity play). Relative chip stacks, pay structure, blinds, required edge, calling/folding ranges all factor into the mathematical equity equation. Of course in real poker play you will not be making complex equity calculations. You will be putting to use concepts to develop instincts on when it is right to push, fold, raise, reraise all-in, etc. Moshman gives you these concepts. SNG wizard will help you develop your instincts via 'quiz mode' where you can cycle through 1000s of hands.

Another minor issue I had with the book was was the overuse of the terms loose-tight, aggressive-passive. These terms are very standard, but still vague. Loose can be loose calling or loose limping. Passive can be passive calling or passive folding. Much more useful in push-fold situations are the calling and opening ranges you can put your opponents on. Saying an opponent will call with all but 30% of the worst hands is much more specific than labeling him loose (which could mean he likes to limp or he likes to call).

By labeling opponents simply as loose, tight, passive, aggressive, a lot is lost in terms of deeper poker thought, in my opinion. During high blind play where most decisions are push or fold (or during mid-blind play when the decisions are raise, reraise, call or fold), more precise thinking is required than typing players as tight-aggressives or loose aggressives. Better would be to consider image, tilt, the possibility of impatince or fatigue, antagonism between two players, deceitfulness, adjustments players make to position, adjustments players make to you or your image-- all these things-- in piecing together opening, reraising, folding, and calling ranges (to raises and reraises). The more we know about a player's range, the more we can eke out equity from making the correct pre-flop play. Your own image, and card history (maybe you pushed the last 3-4 hands)are critical factors that are completely neglected in the book.

If I recommend this book, it is for intermediate to advanced players, and together with SNG Wizard. In my experience, most who play as a living already understand everything in this book.

This book has become my favorite out of the dozens of poker books that I own. Before reading this book I was a marginal to losing player at on-line poker. Since reading this book, I have become a consistent winner at low and medium stakes SNG's. I honestly can't say that about any other poker book I have read.

Once you have read and understand the material in the low-blind, mid-blind and high blind sections it becomes an invaluable reference for constantly tuning your game. The organizational structure of the book makes it easy to quickly find a situation that you might want to review after an on-line session.

This book paid for itself within 24 hours of reading it. If you are serious about playing SNG's, but haven't been getting the results you desire, then this book is a must read.

This is a great book for SNG strategy if you are new to the concept.

But one could save themselves a lot of trouble by breaking it down to these three points:
1) there is going to be some variance in your wins, so make sure you have a large enough bankroll for the level you are playing (what "large enough" means varies by the player's skill and playing style)
2) play very tight early in the game, loosen up and be more aggressive later in the game
3) use SNG Wizard to review all of your games to learn where there are non-intuitive spots to get your money in when the blinds are high

Note that while this book is about NLHE, the basic concept will apply to nearly any SNG strategy, keeping in mind that for limit and PL games, it is slightly harder as your bet sizing is not always going to be much of a threat, therefore your fold equity does not count for much, which much of this strategy is built around.

Otherwise, this is essentially the mathematical model for beating the games.

I personally I have had less success (or perhaps just way more variance) in the turbo games, but crush the regular ones. The better you are, your skill is going to come from you making fewer mistakes, and you exploiting your opponents mistakes - that means in a turbo, there is going to be less time for your opponents to make mistake and so in theory the variance should be higher.

I was very disappointed with this book. I liked Moshman's treatment of equity in sit-and-go's at the beginning of the book, but after that the book is basically nothing but examples. That worked for "Harrington on Hold 'em Volume III," but Harrington's third book had two volumes of theoretical behind it. Moshman's book has virtually no theory.

And his examples were, I felt, dubious. For example, in one early example he says to raise three times the big blind (for a raise of 150) with AKo in late position. So far, so good. But then he says if you have three limpers ahead of you to raise to 175. Huh? If someone's going to call a bet of 150 (early in a tournament with a BB of 50), am I supposed to think they won't call 175?

(In "Winning Low Limit Hold 'em," Lee Jones recommends raising in similar situations to a multiple of the big blind equal to 3 plus the number of limpers. So, for the above example of Moshman's, Jones would be recommending that you raise to 300. That makes far more sense to me as a way to thin the field. And if one's goal isn't to thin the field with AKo, why is Moshman recommending raising with it in the first place? If you want to see a cheap flop and hope to trap people by hitting a monster, why wouldn't Moshman just recommend limping along with everyone else? Regardless, if I'm playing AKo pre-flop behind three limpers, I'm sticking in a big raise to thin the field and clarify my position -- unless I'm intentionally just trying to mix up my play.)

In my opinion, if you're looking to improve your tournament results, just buy Dan Harrington's three-volume set and go carefully through it. Harrington isn't dealing specifically with sit-and-go's, but I believe his books will teach you far more than Moshman's. And Harrington won't give you any dubious advice. Also, Lee Jones's excellent "Winning Low Limit Hold 'em" now has a 3rd edition with a chapter devoted to No Limit Hold 'em as well as sit-and-go's. I think Jones's book is far superior to Moshman's, even though the first parts of Jones deals with limit hold 'em. Much of Jones's limit stuff carries over nicely to no limit play, and the extra chapter he's added to his third edition outclasses anything you'll find in Moshman.

I have been a winner at SNGs from $6 to $60 over thousands of games. I was able to breeze through the hand examples and thought processes and finished the book in a hour at the bookstore. Nevertheless, this book is totally awesome.

SNGs are a relatively simple form of poker, but the concepts required to succeed are completely different from any other form of NL Hold'em. This book is written by a reputable and consistent winner. It covers everything from SNG theory, calculating tournament equity, and proper aggressive strategy.

For sit'n go strategy this book is the absolute nuts. I'd hate it if everyone read this book, but I'm recommending it because the author deserves the $$$ for closing the chapter on Sit'n Go strategy.

I've read a few poker books and I play almost exclusively SNG games the exception being the recent addition of rush poker which I play a little bit of now and then. But for all practical purposes, I'm an SNG player.

What I like about this book is that there is quite a bit of solid advice. I've seen other reviewers mention that the majority of the book is examples with no theory behind it. I couldn't disagree more. In many of the examples, the book explores the scenarios for what would happen if you did something else. In many cases, the book lays out multiple ways to deal with a given situation. Most books don't dare do this, and basically give you hard and fast rules to live by. Unfortunately for them, holdem is a very dynamic game and there is no one-size fits all strategy for every situation. There are just too many factors to make hard and fast rules. This book does well at teaching one to be flexible, shift gears mid-game, and provide multiple outlets and theories for especially tough situations. Having said that, the book doesn't deal with every day, simple situations, which one should already be familiar with when picking up this book.

The vast majority of the book were things I already figured out through years of play. I have to say, I agree with much of it. I did pick up a bit of insight and learned a few angles that I hadn't considered before. Employing (albeit with big reservations) some of the tactics in this book had me win an SNG as a direct result, so the book paid for itself in one game.

So why 3 stars? I'd like to say 3.5 actually, but there are some things in this book that can get you into trouble, the author knows it, and then makes excuses for it.

Here's an example; we're told to push all-in in middle position against a pot sized reraise in UTG position with AKo when the blinds are low or the tourney is just starting off. Ok, well many players will both agree and disagree with this tactic. The problem however, is that this contradicts lessons in the book. For instance, up to that point we're told to avoid big pots early in the game unless we're certain that we're winning. Ok... furthermore, we're told to lay down pocket pairs up to and including QQ when facing a reraise early in the game. To me, this seems inconsistent at best. I'm supposed to fold a made hand early on, but push all in out of position. The reasoning the author gives? You're gonna love this...
Because he's assuming that you're up against a pocket pair, and because you're about 50% to win, this is a good move considering the blinds left in the pot when everyone folds. A 50% chance to win 1.5 blinds more than you bet, in a section of the book about low blind play. Then, we're told basically to expect defeat, move on, and just be happy that we made the right move.

But what really doesn't make sense is making an argument for a 50/50 hand where one 50% is somehow better than another. That would be akin to us flipping a coin for $10/pop, and you agreeing to play every time if you can pick tails. But if you have to pick heads, you'll never play? This doesn't make sense. 50/50 is a 50% chance regardless of whether you're the first 50 or the second 50. Even worse, any pocket pair is actually slightly higher than 50% to win against AKo. So really, if you wanted to pick one side to play, the advice should be reversed. Fold the AKo, push with the pocket pair. If you were say AKo against QQ, you're 43% to win. Not counting split pots, consider 43% vs. 50% x 1000 times in that situation and see that you're making a negative ROI move when compared to doing the exact opposite with the pocket pair, but whatever...

I don't know about you, but I don't push all in expecting to lose. I might bluff with an all in push, but only if I think I'm going to win with it.

Truth be told, the argument here in this example can go either way. BUT! The real problem here is that the play is inconsistent with the perspective the author tries to instill in the reader. So whether you agree with the example or not, the author tells us to do something that his theory contradicts. So you either disagree with the play, or his theory. Your choice.

Another example is that we're told to call on the button with A4s with four other players in the pot. Ok, if you like that move, why then are we told to fold AJ in the same position earlier? I agree with the author that AJ is often a second best hand and leads to trouble. But I don't understand how A4 isn't.

I could go on, but just bear this in mind; the advice here is mostly good. That which is questionable can be argued for either way. The complaint however is that the author provides examples contrary to his tactics and theories. This gives the work a high level of inconsistency and will confuse many players. The other problem with it is that going by this book, one won't have a clue what to do in situations where there aren't examples (at least, they won't have learned from here), and the previous samples have the tight and loose play contradicting one another.

Another case in point is that the author, Moshman, is a more successful author than he is poker player, which may lead some to believe that he's selling an idea rather than working it. Take a look at Johnny Chan, Hellmuth, Hansen, Bruson, Ivey... in all of these examples their poker careers far overshadow any media they've produced, but I suppose it's worth noting that one doesn't have to be well known to give solid advice. I know from experience that there are nearly bulletproof players earning a living from poker in high stakes that nobody has ever heard of, so I give Moshman a pass here.

In summary, the book is good enough to have me trying a few new things, and that's after 4 years of SNG play. I've just now started to break even, having learned by sitting at the table for the first 3 years alone, and no help. I'll be making a new database for poker tracker and see how things turn out.

Good luck out there!

And yes, I do recommend this book. It is better than most.