Tournaments
What the bubble does to the value of a chip
In a tournament, chips won are worth less than chips lost. Near the money that gap widens far enough to change which hands are worth playing.
Poker News Strategy
Cash games, tournaments and the arithmetic behind them
Rising blinds, shrinking stacks and the places where survival changes the maths.
Tournaments
Below a certain depth, a raise that is not a commitment is just a smaller loss. The threshold is set by the blinds, not by the cards.
Stack depth in a tournament is measured in big blinds rather than in chips, because the blind level rather than the chip count decides what a stack can still do. A stack that could contest three streets an hour ago may only be able to contest one now, without a single chip having changed hands.
Tournaments
In a tournament, chips won are worth less than chips lost. Near the money that gap widens far enough to change which hands are worth playing.