Harrington's Zone System 5

We have now come to the crux of the zone system as described by Dan Harrington. The final two zones are not the positions you wish to find yourself in whether you are in a home Texas Holdem poker tournament, or gambling and gaming with professionals in Las Vegas, at the World Poker Tour or at the World Series of Poker. Your customized poker chip sets are in severe trouble and there is very little you can do other than to pray for a bit of luck and move all-in with what remains of your customized poker chip sets.

4. The Red Zone: M is 1-5

We once again find ourselves at this make believe Texas Holdem poker tournament where the blinds and antes are $10/$20 and $0 respectively. If M is one, that obviously means you have $30 in your customized poker chip sets (your customized poker chip set value is 1 times the starting poker pot value). If your M is 5, what value does that put your customized poker chip sets on? We hope you successfully calculated that 5 x 30 is $150 so that you will find yourself in the red zone in a Texas Holdem poker tournament if, when the blinds are $10/$20 (antes zero) you have between $30 and $150 in your customized poker chip sets. How does ‘Action’ Dan recommend we play our customized poker chip sets when we find ourselves in this position? How would he gamble if he found himself in this position at the World Poker Tour or the World Series of Poker (if he ever found himself in this predicament!)?

Dan says this is really the time to gamble because your poker tournament is very nearly up (more so when your M is 3 or less, i.e. $90 or less in relation to our example). Any raise will pretty much render you pot-committed, meaning that your only choice is really to fold, or move all-in with your customized poker chip sets. If your M is 3 or lower, you are most likely to be called by another poker player holding any two cards because they will sense desperation in your all-in move! Essentially, it is all-in or nothing and you need to pray to get lucky. You are very likely to be an underdog in the poker hand. You can play more poker hands from a later position but essentially, it is worth gambling what remains of your customized poker chip sets to see if you can get back into zone three!