Abusing the Bubble

When you're playing a poker tournament, remember to keep a close eye on the number of players left and the number of players who get paid. When you get close to the beginning of the payouts, it's called the bubble. Players tend to play very tight (conservative) near the bubble if they don't have many chips – they are trying to squeak into the money.

If you have a healthy chip stack at this point, you can take advantage of this. The best situation is when you have the biggest stack at the table by a nice margin, or at least you have the biggest stack compared to everyone who hasn't already folded. You can raise with any hand, confident that the small stacks may realize what you're doing, but they'll have to fold anyway unless they have a strong hand.