[Jerrod Ankenman]

[ QUOTE ]
Thanks for all your comments on early big hands. Since my post, I've won a lot of big early-round all ins, but I do understand why being in a turbo makes differnce with AK. [img]/images/graemlins/smile.gif[/img] Now I'm pondering the later part of a tournament. Chen and Ankenman, in The Mathematics of Poker, say in their page 136 chart and related commentary, that in a tournament it is always mathematically corect to go all-in with ANY pair when you have less than fifty (50) big blinds. I'm starting out with a small bankroll and going more for the place (simply cashing), rather than taking more risk for the win at this point, and the authors admit that with this strategy they have big wins, but also a lot of just-out-of-the-money finishes. Always something new to ponder in the world of poker I guess.

[/ QUOTE ]

Whoa, whoa, whoa. It is totally incorrect that you should push with up to 50 BB. In fact, the entire section of the book immediately following the jam-or-fold table examines the question of when you should play the jam-or-fold strategy when headsup, and concludes (on p 139) that you should do so when the stacks are less than 10-12 blinds.

Later, on pages 269-271, we address the question of when to jam-or-fold when we are first in outside the blinds, and we conclude that you should do so if your stack is less than 6-7 times the pot, depending on position.

The values in the jam-or-fold table that go above these limits (up to 50) are simply the solutions to a particular toy game and presented for completeness and because some readers may be interested, but not to imply that you should play this strategy when headsup. I'm not sure how you could have concluded that the "related commentary" supported the view that you should jam with up to 50 blinds.

If you were playing headsup and the rules were that you could only jam or fold, this would be correct. However, you can conveniently raise a smaller amount.

Hope this helps with anyone's confusion about this point.

Jerrod