Using 'M' in Online Tournaments
M is a concept made popular by Dan Harrington in his Harrington on Hold’em book series. It applies primarily to tournament poker. Many reading this will be familiar with the concept, but I will provide a brief introduction for those who are not.
M is a number that represents your chip stack in terms of how many rounds of forced bets – small blinds, big blinds, and antes – that you can afford.
M = Stack/Small Blind + Big Blind + Total Antes
As an example, if you have a stack of 5,500 and the blinds are 100/200 with a 25 ante at a 10-man table you would have an M of 10. 5,500 / 100SB+200BB+250antes = 5,500/550 = 10. M is used in conjunction with designated zones – green, yellow, orange, red, and dead – that determine correct strategy based on the size of your stack in relation to the pot. How I use M is very close to the recommended guidelines from Harrington with an extra zone I call the re-steal zone. It is the top part of the orange zone and the bottom part of the yellow zone. This area represents the best time to make a move over the top of somebody opening the pot. You should look for suitable conditions, which I will explain later.
This changes the zones to:
Green Zone: 20M and over – Play as conservatively or aggressive as you want to. Play low pairs and suited connectors for implied odds when in position by fl at calling or raising in the case of suited connectors. Try to avoid risking large portions of your stack without a clear edge.
Yellow Zone: 13M-19M – You need to start to loosen up your starting hand selection. Many hands become playable for opening the pot when folded to, such as K-10s, Q-J offsuit, and A-10 offsuit. It should be emphasized that these hands should be played when you are in middle to later positions most of the time when there are less people to act behind and possibly re-raise you. The exception is when you think the table will respect an UTG raise from you if you have a tighter image and the table is tight overall as well.
Re-Steal Zone: 8M-12M – This is where re-steal shoving becomes your optimal play in my opinion. Most strategies stress the importance of being fi rst in the pot at this stage but I think that it’s better to be second in the pot now by re-shoving over the top of open raisers. Suitable conditions can be obtained by choosing to strike when somebody has been opening the pot frequently or against somebody with close to your stack size or slightly bigger for best chance of folding. It is best these days to pull this move against people who are raising from mid-position when you are to act after them. If you do it against late position it loses much value because everyone expects it to be a re-steal. If you do it against early position it can be too dangerous unless the player is known to use UTG as a stealing position. You can choose to steal with any suited connector or gap suited connector like 5-6s, 9-7s, and even J-9s. 2-2 probably isn’t that good of an idea and neither is A-rag or K-10 – hands like that will be dominated too often. When a player who is opening frequently opens from mid-position, you can then shove if you have a re-steal hand or with a real hand, of course. This deserves to be differentiated between the lower zone where you shouldn’t steal with speculative hands and the higher zone where you should be open raising much more instead of waiting for spots to re-steal.
Orange Zone: 6M-7M – This is the traditional orange zone for me. Everyone hates this zone as do I, so I shortened it to only cover 6M- 7M but it still needs much explanation as it is what trips up players most. Again, most strategies stress the importance of being fi rst in the pot at this point. I still like to be second in the pot at this point with a shove over the top of an opponent. The difference is that I do it with good hands only. I actually wait for a hand like 9-9+ or A-Q+ at this point to re-shove. These re-shoves are usually called much more often, because the stack is shorter and I may have been reshoving with weak hands in the earlier zone. By waiting for actual good hands to play at this point in the tournament you can contrast what they are expecting you to do and when you end up all in you will have a better range then your opponents.
The problem with open raising at this point is that if you are doing this and then folding to a shove you are spewing chips and if you are raising with weak hands like you would in the yellow zone and then calling shoves you are going to have a worse range than your opponents. This means that you should actually play pretty tight in this zone and open raise only strong hands that you can comfortably call a shove with. Or more desirable in my opinion is to get second in the pot with a re-shove holding a good hand. This way you accumulate a lot more chips as it’s not just blinds and antes but the initial raise that you are going over the top of. You will also be called with a wide range from your opponents when you are in this zone. Sticking to good hands in this zone means your range will be ahead which increases the amount of times you will likely double up. Doubling up here is key in tournaments and going from 6M-8M to 12M-16M in one hand can really turn a tournament around.
By using this strategy you can focus on accumulating bigger pots with a raise in them and putting yourself into double-up situations. It’s well worth it to risk busting before you get into the red zone if you are getting into spots with an edge. Your reads and position play key importance when using M. You don’t want to re-shove a guy who raised under the gun when you have 9-9 and you don’t want to re-shove a guy who hasn’t open raised in fi ve orbits with A-J or 8-8, but you do want to re-shove a guy in the cutoff who is raising relentlessly when you have A-J or even 8-8 on the button, SB, or BB. Use your judgment with the M for the best results.
This is also the zone where I open shove any pair from 2-2 through 8-8. Folding these hands in this zone is a mistake and raising them with the intention of folding to a raise is a bigger mistake. You should either open raise and call a shove or just open shove. I elect to open shove with them so I have the most fold equity possible and increase the amount of times I take down the pot. Again, use judgment, don’t open shove 2-2 from UTG and don’t open shove 3-3 from second position when your table is very loose. Open shove all pairs more from later positions and mid position and more against tighter opponents. You should play tighter from early position, such as 7-7+, and tighter when your opponents are looser. Use the popular concept of playing tight on a loose table and loose on a tight table combined with your position and your M to decide whether to shove a pair when you are at the table.
Red Zone: 1M-5M – Open shove or fold. That is your only decision and that is what most strategies will tell you. The only specifi cation I make here is that I vastly prefer to shove from late position and I don’t shove hands like A-rag, K-rag, Q-rag, J-rag, and total garbage hands like 10-6, 8-3, etc. Choose hands like 6-7s or 4-4 from mid to late position where there is a smaller chance of getting called. Your main goal is usually to scoop the blinds and antes unless you have a real hand in which case your goal is to double up. Again, use your judgment. If the guy in the BB has a monster stack and is calling every shove from a small stack, don’t shove from the button with J-8. But if your table is excessively tight, feel free to open shove from UTG+1 with 8-6 offsuit. These days people’s range has opened up considerably in calling these all-in bets. The counter is to wait for spots a little better then before, by waiting to do your open shove when you have either a real hand or a good shoving hand in mid to late position against opponents who can fold.
Dead Zone: >1M – You should not get here by being blinded out, but if you do end up below 1M just shove whenever an opportunity to be the fi rst into the pot arises. Maybe you should take up checkers?
When you are in the middle of a hand at the table, you don’t have time to analyze all the necessary calculations to choose the optimal mathematical play with the most EV. But you do have time to calculate your M and use your judgment, your reads, and your position to make very close to the best decisions possible.
