More importantly, can short-stacking be as profitable as playing with a full stack? Clearly, the answer is yes.
Short-stacking is a much maligned strategy. Log onto any poker forum or facebook groups (except my group called “Short Stackers Anonymous”) and ask innocently, “what’s the best strategy to use when playing with only thirty big blinds?” Then prepare to be subjected to such clever comments as “the strategy of buying seventy more big blinds, LOL.” Those are the ones with a sense of humor. Others will seem downright angry at you for playing a short stacked strategy.
There is a reason for the rancor.
What is short-stacking?
Short-stacking is a way to make poker reliably profitable by deliberately playing with fewer big blinds on the table than a typical full-stack buy-in and by employing a strategy intended specifically for that short stack.
This is a deliberate short stack strategy, not just buying in for a hundred big blinds and then getting ground down to thirty, or buying in for thirty big blinds because you are afraid to lose more than that.
It is also not at all the same as the push/fold strategy a tournament player uses after the blinds get so high that his thousands of chips are a “short stack.” Unfortunately, searches on the term “short-stack strategy” find primarily information about the tournament short-stack strategy.
When I first read mention of a player being a professional short-stacker, I found little information until I Youtubed searched on “professional short-stacker.” Then I found only a couple of pretty old vids on Youtube, each describing the exact same strategy.
The principle behind short-stacking is fairly simple, as is the strategy itself. My own 30BB strategy was is very similar to the above 20BB strategy modified mainly by adding suited aces in position so that the starting hand range has some bluffier drawing hands that a typical short-stacker would not play.
When short-stacked, meaning less than fifty big blinds, the lion’s share of the starting hands that you play for value will be two big cards, most often including an ace. You also play middle to big pairs. You wait patiently for these hands and you raise them strongly pre-flop, between four and eleven big blinds, depending on the number of limpers.
A strong pre-flop raise will get folds from observant opponents who have seen you wait for a big hand. If you are called, it will often be by players who are not observant, who are loose callers, or who are both. Thus the strategy selects opponents of lower skill.
When you see the flop with an unpaired hand, you will flop a pair about one third of the time. Since you are mainly playing unpaired big card hands, such as an ace and a face card (“ace-face” I call it), your pairs will often be top pair/top kicker or aces with a face kicker. You also play big pocket pairs of course, which often flop an over-pair.
With top pair/strong kicker or an over-pair, you are very likely to have the best hand and there may well be worse hands that will call a near pot-sized bet. A player with a strong second pair will likely call for at least on street. So will a player who flopped a strong draw, such as four to a flush or an open-ended straight draw.
Poker theory is that a player with a hand like that will only call bets on a limited number of streets. Therefore, if you continue to bet the turn and river with your single pair hand, any calls you get would indicate two pair or better. The solution is to pot control, i.e., only bet out on one street.
The problem with pot control
Pot control is a great idea . . . so long as your opponents go along with it. If you are in position, and cbet, you will often have action folded to you on the turn. So, you can see the river for free. But, having checked with no possibility of check-raising, you have represented exactly what you have – a single pair that needs to pot control.
Thinking villains can then bet out the river, either as a bluff or to get value with a big hand that the villain was hoping you would keep betting against. That will put you to a decision – fold your top pair or risk being value-towned.
The answer provided by full-stack poker advisers is to find a table with lots of loose calling fish who will keep calling if you keep betting with top pair even if they have a worse hand like second pair or a backdoor draw. That’s fine, if you can consistently find such tables. They are usually to be found at the lowest stakes.
Move up even one level, from 5NL to 10NL and you will often find it difficult to pot control and you will find that betting multiple streets with a single pair hand will mean you most often get called by better hands.
With a short stack, this is not nearly as much of a problem, because pot control is automatic.
Suppose you start a hand with 26.5BB. You get ace-jack on the hijack after three limpers, so you raise to 7BB (4BB plus 1BB for each limper). If the cutoff calls, and the limpers and blinds fold, the pot is now 18.5BB and you only have 19.5BB left in your stack. Your SPR is barely above 1.
You hit your top pair and bet out 2/3 or 3/4 pot. If called you only have less than 5BB behind. No matter what the turn is, you either bet all-in or check if you think Villain will bet if you don’t and you check call.
How Short-stacking Makes More Money
The idea that you can win more money by playing with less money seems counter intuitive. It is counter-intuitive because it is false. I never advocate playing poker with “less money.” I advocate sitting down with fewer big blinds.
In fact, in my book, Poker Winner to Poker Beginner, I advise my readers to avoid play money “stakes” altogether and to start playing at the lowest levels, 2NL or 5NL only long enough to familiarize themselves with how to play online and to get used to losing some money.
To start the 1,000 Hand Challenge, my readers move up immediately to 10NL. So if they learn the mechanics of online play at 2NL with a full stack of $2.00 and then move up to 10NL with a short stack of $3.00, that’s more money not less. When they move to 25NL, they sit down with $7.50, which is more money than if they stayed at 5NL with full stacks of $5.00.
Once they make the move to 100NL, they play with $30.00. That is five bucks more money than a full stacker plays at 25NL. I have found it to be much easier to double up with a 100NL short stack than with a 25NL full stack.
You may well have a higher BB/100 if you play with 100BB, but you sure won’t make more money winning 20 BB/100 at 10NL than if you made 5BB/100 at 100 NL.
By using short-stacking to move up in stakes, you can dramatically increase your per hour win rate. Yes, online players love the BB/100 stat, but if you are playing poker for a part-time income, you need to know how much you are making per hour.
You likely will enjoy playing one fishy 100NL table much more than playing ten 10NL tables, trying to keep up with the HUD stats of up to eighty opponents.
In short . . . if your goal is to earn an income by playing poker, short stacking is certainly the place to start. You can build your skills from their so you can start buying in with a larger and larger stacks. Or you can learn to a range from short to deep stacked. Then you can start with a short stack, double up, and then keep playing until you find yourself deep stacked.
If your goal is to be perceived as a good player who plays with a full stack and has a high BB/100, and if the money means nothing to you, by all means struggle at full stacking until you get good at full stacking.
The Downside of Short-Stacking
The number one main drawback of short stacking is exactly what I described in my search for information and instruction on this strategy. Information and literature about the short-stack cash strategy is sparse, mainly because so many online sites raised the minimum buy-ins from 20BB to 30BB, and the short-stacked strategy is designed for 20BB.
I played thousands and thousands of buy-ins at 30BB, starting with the 20BB strategy and widening it just enough to allow for some lighter pre-flop raises with hands like suited aces in position, and adjusted the post-flop strategy to include some bluffs in specific situations. It is still a very tight strategy heavy on value bets.
I wrote a book about the strategy and it is for sale on this website for a very low price. You can also get a one-sheet of the default short-stack strategy for 10NL and 25NL for free, right here. You don’t have to buy my book. You can download the basis strategy and play it and learn more about full stacked poker from better authors than I. I wrote the book to help other beginners not make the same mistakes I did. I make my money playing poker, so I don’t stress out about book sales.
The other drawback to short-stacking is that the strategy is maligned as discussed above. There are no short-stacker forums and on most poker forums, it is impossible to have an intelligent discussion because minds are made up.
There is a lot of rancor and it comes from the fact that there are some short-stackers out there, quietly winning money from full stackers and then cashing out and re-buying. No doubt that is frustrating for a full-stacker who thought I was a fish with a dwindling stack who was raising the flop to burn off my remaining twenty-three big blinds. When I showed up with kings and then jumped off the table, he knew he had been had. When I jumped right back on, he had no way to be sure it was even me, because I play on anonymous sites.
The image of David and Goliath is somewhat misleading. In truth, it is a rare full stacker who knows how to recognize and beat a strategic short-stacker. Even then, they beat us by stealing our blinds and folding to our raises. Pre-flop, because of the widened range of my particular strategy, they are often folding better hands.
In my strategy, when I blind down to below twenty big blinds, I revert to a very tight, and very aggressive that most often puts me back up to more around thirty big blinds. The fact that I don’t top off, makes it hard for opponents to change their estimate of me as a fish.
There are few places to get advice, exchange ideas and review hand histories.
That’s why I started this website, the Poker Winners Forum, and my Facebook Group, “Short Stackers Anonymous.” I hope you find some useful information there.