Ask me what is the most essential consideration when playing a hand in a cash game? I would say it’s not position or my cards or my opponents. It’s my stack size relative to the blinds.
Consider a hand like the one below in a deep stack game with effective stacks (the smallest of the stacks involved in a hand) of 400 big blinds.
3♦5♣
How much are you likely to lose with this hand?
I doubt you are going to put a lot of money in the pot with a single pair of 3s or 5s because there will be overcards on the board. You will only get committed when you make a hand like a straight, trips, two pair, etc.
So, the times that you lose, you’ll lose a small pot, but there is the potential to win big.
In a short-stacked game, you have much less potential to win a lot of chips. Your implied odds are minimal. But as the stacks get deeper, most hands become playable due to the high amount of money you can win if you hit a monster.
To learn more about the importance of the stack size and how it should influence your starting hand selection, be sure to visit the 888poker Magazine to read the full article.
