Correlating to take the lead!

I've been troubled by a comment that I heard mentioned elsewhere by Blair Rodman. I've been studying it from a mathematical perspective and can sort of see his point but on the whole the usefulness of the strategy eludes me. He said that he often correlates his bets with the chip leader when behind as a tactic for getting a swing. I can see that it is a way of minimizing a negative swing but it also minimizes the chance of a positive swing. The swings can also be bigger than with the more usual contrarian approach. Anybody got any thoughts?

Cheers

Reachy

 

Did he mean correlate as in 'match the bet'

or correlate as in 'bet enough so that a swing would give you the lead'?

The latter seems likely.

Suppose the min bet is 100, you are 800 behind, and the leader bets 600.

You could bet the min, and hope to take a big chunk out of the lead by both losing. If that happened, you would still need a similar result on a subsequent hand in order to gain the lead.

Alternatively, you could bet just slightly more (>200), so that a swing would give you the lead. If you both lose, you are not actually much worse off than if you had bet 100, and if you both win you are slightly better off. Of course the nightmare scenario is that there is a swing, but it goes the wrong way.

If you're betting first, you can bet half your deficit plus a chip, so that if the leader matches your bet there is automatically scope for a swing to give you the lead.

I view this level of aggression as the next rung up the ladder from simple min betting. Whether it's worthwhile seems to me to depend on the size of the bets and BRs involved. If it would cause you to make a bet that is much larger than the min, and a considerable chunk of your BR then it may be better to either stay on the bottom rung of the ladder and bet the min, or jump straight to the next level and seek to overtake with a big bet.

 

I don't think so

I'll try and dig up the reference but I'm pretty sure he meant correlating his bet as in matching it.

Cheers

Reachy

 

Maybe

Lets say you are down 500 - 700. Correlate at 105 to leader 100 swings you to lead if it works out? For example..

 

can't see it Barney

If you're $500 down on BR1 and they bet $100 and you bet $105, the best you can get is just within $300, or $200 if you double, or $100 if you both double and you get a swing. Seems like a low %age approach to me.

Cheers

Reachy