Freerolls can be a very tricky thing if you are actually going to try and build a bankroll. We have all experienced ups and downs in these tournaments, but the most important thing to remember is that most of the players in these tournaments are either trying to build a bankroll, or are trying to learn the game.
If you are a good player there is no doubt that you can do very well consistently in these types of tournaments. Although time consuming and frustrating at times they really help out your game overall. My advice to you is to play the players during the tournament, play the tables, and play the times in the tournament.
You can gain a lot of information at the tables on how to play and in the poker forum. No one person has the magic key to cashing in freerolls, so read alot and figure out your own strategy that works for you and go from there. Here are a few pointers for those of you starting out and even those of you who are experienced card players.
1) Play the Players - Do you want to be able read players like Daniel Negreanu? Well … alright, maybe not that good, but playing in freerolls will definitely help you learn to read players and this is by far the best experience of the freerolls.
You will see all types of players in these tournaments and you will develop your own scale of what types of players are out there. There are generally four types of poker players ... tight-aggressive, tight weak, loose weak, loose aggressive and in my opinion there is also a 5th type of player to watch out for - The Desperate Short Stack Player.
I think this type of player is very important as no matter who you are if you are short stack and desperate you will go all-in with the best hand you think you will see.
Freerolls will definitely help you read players as you are sitting at a Sit and Go for $1 buy-in, and experience the same type of play. Play the correct cards well enough against the right players and you will be very successful. This section primarily comes into factor when all of the weaker and dangerous players who will gamble a lot more.
2) Play the Tables - This is very important, you must know the style of your table and who is there. If you got chip leader, you are most likely going to get someone to call a lot of your raises, take advantage of this, but be cautious as they play their suited connectors, low pocket pairs, and just cards for the hell of it. You may run into a table where even a raise 3 times the big blind garners three or four opponents into the flop, this where you need to raise about five or maybe even six times the amount of the blinds to either get a player to reraise you all-in, or get some of them to fold so you can go up against only one opponent, but only when you have an outstanding starting hand (AA KK QQ AK AQ).
Lets say you are at a very tight table where there is a lot of folding and only big hands are being played. I would suggest then either playing suited connectors, or connectors for that matter, or raising a lot to set-up a big play. Losing chips is part of the game and if you are able to lose a few chips by raising all the time pre-flop and then folding, they are going to try to take advantage of you. This is where you hit them hard with a big play when you’ve got the nuts (best hand possible).
3) When the Time is Right - Timing is very critical in freerolls. At the very early part of the tournament a lot of people believe in risking their entire stack for the sake of not playing two hours and end up not winning a thing. You should really focus on playing only the bigger high ranking starting poker hands in the early stage, when you know you will definitely win to accumulate chips. You can definitely get a lot of chips out of the weaker players.
For the most part, after the first half an hour, some say hour, things start to settle down and people are here to play. This is when you should try to add to your stack at opportune times as you head into the later stages of the tournament. You will be able to play a little more loose in this area of the game as the more experienced, better players reign during this time of the tournament and you really have to play the player here and develop your own style of play.
This is different then the first hour as you will need to up your playing ability as you will not get the same type of plays against from the stronger players. If you are just trying to cash, I would take things slow and be very patient and gain chips that way and stay in contention the whole way.
Until cashing I would be very very careful throughout the tournament as any bluff you plan on playing will very likely be called by a dangerous and unbluffable table of players in a freeroll. You will almost get someone to call one of your bluffs, so beware.
Author - Brad coopb2005 / 4kingpoker.com forum member
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