How to Win Poker Satellites – Part 3

There are two reasons for this and the first is the payout structure. You’re not trying to build a stack that will get you into the top three, you’re looking to build a stack that will win you a ticket to the next event. Because the payout structure is flat, it doesn’t matter where you come after the bubble – all the prizes are the same, so all that matters is that you MAKE the bubble.
The second reason is that you’ll most likely find a lot of your opponents shoving all-in in the early marked cards stages of a satellite. This means that limping with marginal hands – as you would in a normal MTT – simply leaks chips, as you can’t call the subsequent all-in shoves and have to fold.
On the other hand, you can – and should – call the all-in shoves with big pairs. So don’t leak chips by limping with marginal hands. Instead, keep your chips to extract maximum value when you pick up a big pair and get to call an all-in shove from an opponent.

Poker Satellites: Working the Clock

When you get to the final stages of a satellite tournament, don’t forget to work the clock to your advantage. What does this mean? Effectively, it means stalling and using the maximum you can in your time bank to give players on other tables more time to make a mistake.
This only has an affect when the final stages of the poker satellite (that is, just before the bubble breaks and everyone else gets paid with their ticket) has more than one table, and you’re easy cards tricks playing hand-for-hand. When you play hand-for-hand, it means that every table must finish the current hand, then a new hand is dealt at each table at the same time.
The idea is that the longer you take to act on your table, the greater the chance someone on the other table/s will make a mistake and bust out.
Hand-for-hand play was brought in to reduce the problem of some tables playing slower in a tournament around the bubble, to give players on the other tables a greater chance of busting. In a bricks-and-mortar card room you’d get your ass kicked if each time it was your turn to act, you just sat there until someone called the clock and then you folded!
Some players seem to think working the clock is a shady practice online too. But it’s not – it’s just an effective way of using all the tools at your disposal to your advantage. So use them!