Hi all!

I followed the statistics of Nashvegas excellent article 'SNG BR and stats'. The aims for SNGs should be according to him:

ROI > 35%, ITM > 45% and 4th place finishes <8%.

Well, I have a ROI of 45%, an ITM of 45%, but I finish in 25% of all time on place 4. But on the other hand I finish only in 5% on place 5. The ROI is very nice, but that high number/low number means something.

2 questions:

1.) What are your statistics on 4th place finishes?
2.) How to improve that number (playing more tight or aggressive or what)?

Regards, MH Flush

On PP $10 games I am 42% ITM, ROI 23% over 150 games

Finishes:
1st 12%
2nd 17%
3rd 12%
4th 16%
5th 16%
6th 12%

Obviously your ITM and ROI are ahead of mine, how many games was this sampled from? My 4th place finishes are too high also, but recently I have started to turn up the aggression slightly earlier if I am down to 600-700 chips, and going all in preflop against tight/weak player's blinds.

My proportion of 5th and 6th bustouts has increased, but so has my number of 1sts and seconds. It's quite unusual for me to be 3rd or 4th now, unless I get a bad beat.

Anyway, with stats like yours I wouldn't worry too much!

I have a sample size of 70 and play 5+0,50 SNG at Prima. My stats are okay but of course I want to improve. And I want to get rid of this 4th-problem before I move to the 10+1 SNG

MHFlush

I play very tight until the blinds are 50/100 and then play aggressive. By then there are only 5 or 6 plyaers left in the game. (At least one or two go out early going all in with less than premium hands).

The problem I've been having playing this style is unless I get a couple of good hands early I'm usually the short stack by the time it gets down to 4. If you can get a good hand early with the above mentioned early all in, then you can usually coast to the money. If not then you have to play a lot of coin tosses in 4th to get into the money.

I finish mostly 2nd or 3rd with some 1st. Usually heads up short stacked so I have to go all in and hope for a decent flop, turn, or river.

MH, did you mean 25% just counting your first 4 spots? like

1st 25%
2nd 25%
3rd 25%
4th 25% ? (out of say 100 sngs, you placed about 11 times 1st, 11 2nd, 11 3rd, 11
4th...is that what you meant?) (thus your 4th place finishes would be 11%
and close to that 8% figure....not bad, sounds like you're a good player)

That'd be typical for many "good" players...

Over my last 300 sngs, $20 and $30 buy ins, my ITM is about 40% but ROI has to be good, i don't even bother figuring it, since my 1sts are double my 4ths and lead the pack...goes like this...
1st 51
2nd 36
3rd 33
4th 24
Yes, i used to spread evenly over the first 4 spots too...till tried a new strategy...don't usually give it out much, but yes, you need to get more aggressive...once you're down to the final 4 or 5 players, start implementing it...hint...read about Slansky's all in play, it's only about 1 or 2 pages. It takes a lot of guts to do it, you'll find out, it seems to fly in the face of being rational...but it seems to be working for me...course i play on UB tho. Yep, the numbers will tell you things...let your first sample be 100 then 200 sngs before you start drawing conclusions. GL

Here are my stats after 96x 5+0,50 SNG at Prima:


1 13 14%
2 16 17%
3 13 14%
4 20 21%
5 8 8%
6 13 14%
7 8 8%
8 3 3%
9 1 1%
10 1 1%





ROI 31,63%

ITM 43,75%

4th places 20,83%

$ win in total $167

$/Tournament $1,74

Hourly win rate $6,91

I am not so satisfied with the results, especially not with the 4th finishes.

I found sunbobs answer intersting from Thu Apr 28, 2005 11:30 am, and give my play as comparison in blue:

sunbob:
'My first goal when we are on the bubble is to get ITM. Depending on my chip stack I will adjust my play. If I am the big stack I will pound the short stacks and try to steal blinds and small pots. I try to avoid doubling them up, though. I want them gone - not getting stronger. If I am short I will steal when I can with an all-in play but will be very patient. If two others are in the pot I will let them go at it unless I have a very good hand. My goal here is to get ITM.'

Hm, with a big stack I want to become first and with a short stack I want to be ITM. Should I always try first to be ITM? I often push as short stack with let's say 8BB first in and a A5o with my whole stack. Is it maybe better to raise only 2BB , because it has a better risk/reward ? Often I get called and I be eliminated. Any suggestions?

Well, MHFlush, on the rare occasion that I am the chip leader when we are at four, it is definitely my goal to win the thing. I was trying to say that I don't want to let the short stacks see a cheap flop but I also don't want to double them up so I don't call their all-in with nothing. I do think that an 8xBB raise is large - 3X to 5X is usually my bet. A lot of the time a minimum raise will do the trick when the blinds are high relative to the stack sizes. The texture of the table will guide me on that choice. If I am short and the raise will be more than about 40% of my stack then I go all-in preflop.

I play pretty tight, so I am usually one of the shorter stacks when we get to the bubble. That is probably why I have too many 3rd place finishes relative to 1st. I do think, though, that this tight image works for me because I can steal blinds and bluff effectively at this stage because the table has seen me play only good hands. I have been working on my aggression earlier in a trny. I'm still picky but when I get a hand I push hard. At least for now it is working - yesterday I played 2 SnGs - 1st and 3rd and one small MTT for a 2nd place finish using this strategy. That is a very profitable day for me.