3 Early Stage Deep Stack Strategy Tips for MTTs

1. When you play deep at the start of a tournament, act the same way you would in cash games.The situation becomes a little less cash game-like if you're playing a freezeout tournament like the WSOP Main Event, but even then, your preflop and postflop strategies should be very similar to those you use in cash games. You might simply want to avoid the most marginal spots and focus on playing hands against the weakest players.

2. Your strategies for playing with 40-50 big blinds aren't suitable for deep stacks (200+ big blinds).
Suppose the button opens, you 3-bet from the big blind, and the button calls. The flop is A♦ 4♠ 2♣.

You might think this is a good flop for you and that you should continuation-bet quite often. After all, you 3-bet preflop and your opponent just called, meaning you're the type of player who's more likely to have strong hands like AA and AK.

If you were playing with 40 big blinds, you'd be right to use a high-frequency continuation-betting strategy on this flop.

3. Avoid playing big pots in marginal situations
Finally, make sure you're not wasting a ton of big blinds early in the tournament. You should play good starting hands, be accurate when it comes to postflop aggression, and allow your opponents to make big mistakes.

If you're playing tournaments and regularly blowing your 200 big blind starting stack in the first two levels, carefully analyze the hands you're playing.

Did you really need to make that big bluff or that hero call in a 400 big blind pot early in the tournament? Sometimes the answer is yes – sometimes great spots for big bluffs and hero calls arise. But this should happen rarely, so if you feel like it's happening to you "too often," you should adjust your strategy.