oh, i missed a question. SnG and MTT play - never play Counter-play. Not ever. It's a HORRIBLE strategy for tournaments. My advice for tourneys is UBER-TIGHT and UBER-AGRESSIVE WITH THE SHORT STACK, and more carefully with average or better stack. I can't count how many times I've heard good players say they bubbled out getting their chips ai WITH THE BEST HAND. My answer, "did you have to commit all your chips?" A buddy - who won an entry into the US Poker Open, was telling me how he went from 5th in chips to bubbling out through a series of AI moves with "the best of it" (which in one case was pocket 9's). WE argued for 30 minutes on whether he should have been that AGRESSIVE anyway. "well you can't tell me you would fold there" yes i can and i do all the time. I'm 4 for 4 deep in the money my last 4 MTT's with 3 final tables (1 2nd place where I got knocked out with GUESS WHAT, the BEST of it). I've said this before and I'll say it again - WHEN YOU'RE ALL IN, IT'S A 7 CARD GAME IF YOU GET CALLED. That means that ALL the odds come into effect, and your "coin flip" is just that. And your overpair/underpair battle is a 4/1 favorite, but it's a 1/4 dog. and it will be beat 25% of the time. SO IF YOU MAKE THAT MOVE 4 TIMES IN A MTT, YOU WILL BE KNOCKED OUT. Play smarter than that. win pots without ai moves, lay shit down when you don't need to be involved. use your chips to BUY TIME when you have them. don't get stupid even with the "best of it". Case in point, the mtt i played this morning I laid down TT with "the best of it" against 66 and A5s. A5s made a straight and I made the final table (finished 2nd). The last one I laid down a big pair in the same situation to take 5th instead of 12th, the pp in that one was below mine but the 78s made a flush. Anyway that's another post.

there are alot of general misconceptions about "good" play in mtt's. Counterplay is not for mtt's or sng's. It's for playing massive #'s of hands in nl ring. Which i didn't mention in my post. if you only play a few hunderd hands per week then you might as well play TAG because you don't play enough hands for counter-play to give you the emotional payoff you want from playing poker. I play 3-4 hours a day at a rate of 200-250 hands per hour!!