MTT tournament structure, why does it matter so much? Many experienced players really criticize and comment on the various structures they encounter. Does it matter much if all the players have to face the same structure?

RossG - friend of mine had this to say...  What would you add?

 

The reason the tournament structure is so important is that a good structure gives more room for players to maneuver throughout. E.g. a structure that gives a large amount of starting big blinds allows players to play more pots on more streets without the risk of going broke each time they play a hand... whereas a faster shallower structure gives players less room to move and is more a case of who gets the better cards first, who is on the right side of the setups first... there is usually less chance of getting away from a hand as the stacks are shallower therefore forcing players to gamble more.

You are right that the structure is the same for all players but professionals prefer the deeper stacked longer blind level structures as gives much more room to show skills and exploit their edges at various stages of a hand, e.g. setting up turn and river plays.... which might not be possible in shorter stacks as players tend to get all in preflop or on flop instead.

Everyone seems to agree that the WSOP main event has the best structure of any tournament as even if you end day one with your starting stack of 30,000 chips you still have close to 100 big blinds going into day 2! That is unheard of in other live tournaments.

Also, if you compare the WPT to the WSOP you can see that the average stack at the WPT final tables is usually 10 - 15 big blinds, thus making it a shovefest and really a luck fest as it is almost always all in or fold preflop and usually only lasts 2 - 4 hours. The reason they do this is to shorten the playing / filming time. The WSOP on the other hand has a deep final table structure (if players stacks are pretty close to each other) and the game often lasts 8 -12 hours, allowing all players a chance to suffer a bad beat of make a big fold and still have a chance to come back and win.

Dusty Schmidt had an interesting blog recently advocating need for better structures and even suggested a month long tournament starting with 2000 big blinds lol! http://www.cardplayer.com/poker-blogs/51-dusty-leatherass-schmidt/entries/150636-wsop-wrap-up