Sit and Go Tourneys: The Value of a Knockout

In Poker, when deciding to whether to call or how much to bet, a player will often calculate pot odds (what are the odds I will win compared to how much I am risking and how much is already in the pot). I don't necessarily count out the odds, but try to make plays that are close based on guess-timates. I have never tried in the past to put a value on effect of knocking someone out of a tournament. However, that is the ultimate goal in tournaments. Pot odds, chip stacks, and so forth mean jack squat if you never eliminate any other players. Thus, I believe there should be a value considered to knocking someone out of a tournament. I have reviewed several poker books, but haven't seen this addressed.

What's the EV of putting someone out?
In my experience, the EV of putting someone out MUST be counterbalanced against your chip stack as compared to the rest of the table (ie putting someone out is not a great concern if losing leaves you with next to no chips). Thus, I believe there is only a postive expected value of calling someone's all in (beyond the pot odds and so forth) if, should you lose, you would retain at least the average chip stack in chips (unless you are on the bubble - bubble play is a bit different).

So what value should one put on knocking out the all in player? If we go back to basic math, it could be argued that knocking one player out with 8 players left means that your odds of making the money go from 3 in 8 to 3 in 7. You would go from a 35% chance of winning to a 42% chance of winning, or a 7% increase in the likilihood of making the money. Under this analysis, calling a 60/40 would be almost the equivilant of calling a coin toss in a money game. Some have suggested you should only call a coin toss if you are getting 1.5:1. Whatever you feel is a good call in a coin toss, this is how I would propose those who are EV driven in their play address the appropriateness of calling an all in bet in a tournament situation.