Playing Small Stack Poker

A small stack player – also known as a short stack player – is someone who has a relatively small stack of chips.  Clearly, a small stack player is a player in a rather disadvantageous position.  However, given the right poker playing strategy, a small stack player can still become the winner.

Playing with a Small Stack Sucks

Being the small stack player at a poker table means being the underdog at that table.  The other players are wont to pick on you because you are so clearly not in the position to fight back.  Having a small stack of chips does not give you a lot of room to maneuver.

Let’s say that you are short-stacked and dealt AA.  In a furious round of betting before the flop, another player goes all in.  Unfortunately, you cannot call his bet because you lack the funds.  Thus, you fold and waste your great cards.

That being said, there are still ways of getting around such an obvious disadvantage.

Strategy for Playing Small Stack Poker

You can still win with a small stack of chips.  Your first goal would be to build your stack, obviously.  Thus, you should try to steal the blinds when you can.  However, don’t forget to use this tack selectively.  The other players know that you want to build your stack.  Thus, they may very well conclude that you are trying to play a fast one and call you out.  When that happens, you’d better have a good hand or you’ll lose your stack even quicker.

When you’re short-stacked, you obviously have to play tight poker.  You don’t have a lot of chips to waste on speculative bets.  However, instead of playing passively, you should play aggressively.  If you’re trying to steal the blinds and raising to scare off other players and thus improve your odds of winning, you’d better go all-in rather than making mini-raises that can lead to your loss of control over the round.  In other words, your stack may be very small but you can grow it if you maximize its betting power.

Finally, when you’re short stacked, remember that you don’t have a lot of time to build your stack, especially if you are playing at a short-handed table.  Therefore, you have to grab whatever opportunity comes your way.  It’s much better to gamble and probably win than to play very safe and certainly lose because you no longer have enough chips to pay the blinds.