A Texas Holdem player who expects to win poker tournaments consistently needs to understand why the blinds are so important and how to steal them effectively and on a consistent basis. Stealing blinds is the single most important key to winning Texas Holdem tournaments. This article will provide some tips on how to do just that.
Winning a Texas Holdem tournament obviously requires that you last until the later rounds. To do so, you must grow your chip stack constantly so that you can keep up with the ever increasing blinds. At some point, the blinds will become so large that they become some significant percentage of your stack. When the blinds become this large in a Texas Holdem tournament, it becomes necessary to steal them at least once per round just to maintain your stack size. It is during the later rounds when you will begin your blind stealing activities in any Texas Holdem tournament.
To be considered as a worthy player for this tournament is considered a matter of pride for many people and this is something most are willing to die for because it provides an insight into the world of poker like no other and Texas Holdem has been a successful venture for a long time while bandarq online can be called its miniature version.
Playing Texas Holdem passively will not win you many poker tournaments. However, trying to steal the blinds early, when the blinds themselves are low, will not work because players will call you much more often since there is far less risk in doing so. You do not want to be called when you are trying to steal blinds. You simply want to take the pot down immediately and get on with the next hand. Blind stealing in a Texas Holdem tournament should be reserved for the mid to late rounds as the blinds become larger.
Players will generally tighten up during the latter stages of a Texas Holdem tournament and you should use this to your advantage to steal the blinds. Although you should have only been playing premium starting hands throughout the early stages of the tournament, you should begin to raise with even less than perfect hands when you feel that you have a chance to steal blinds. For example, you should raise 3-5 times the big blind in a no-limit Texas Holdem tournament if you are in late position with even just a mediocre hand such as J-10 and all but 1 or 2 people in front of you simply limped in. The fact that they limped in tells you they probably do not have very strong hands so by raising heavily, even with a mediocre hand, you may be able to steal the blinds and increase your stack.
If you can steal the blinds at least once per round during the mid and later stages of a Texas Holdem tournament, you should be sitting quite nicely as the final table approaches!
