A played in a rather odd online sitngo tournament a few weeks back. The game had progressed fairly normally up until the point where there were just four players left on the table. There was myself and two others with medium-sized stacks and one big stack. On one particular hand, the big stack (BS) went all-in pre-flop, and everyone folded. This is not unusual behaviour for a big stack, and is called 'stealing the blinds'. In the next hand, BS went all-in again, and everyone folded. Then he went all-in pre-flop again. And again. And again. And again.
By this stage I'd realised that this player had decided to just go all-in on every hand. As I had a slightly larger stack than the other two players I decided to just wait it out and let the other two players tangle with this character. So I resolved to fold everything but pocket aces or kings, and sat back to watch the fun.
Obviously, the other two smaller stacks couldn't afford to sit and wait, so they did what I expected they would. When either one of them got a decent pre-flop hand they went all-in or called the all-in bet. On these occasions, BS usually had the worst hand and usually lost, but he persisted with his strategy. Eventually his stack-size had dwindled below that of the other three and he got eliminated on one of his all-in bets.
After he'd gone play continued in a normal way, with no more all-in bets than you would expect to see in the later stages of a sitngo. We three remaining players had a few comments to make about Mr All-in. Basically, we couldn't understand the reasoning behind such a strategy. He was the big stack. If he'd wanted to, he probably could have sat out nearly every hand and still ended up in first or second spot. Instead, he just threw his chips away. Very odd.
Although this was a pretty extreme example, I've noticed that quite a few players have 'all-in fever'. This is particularly evident in tournaments, especially in the early stages. You get players going all-in pre-flop with absolute rubbish, and other players calling them with hands that are marginal at best. I've never really understood the logic behind putting your entire stack at risk to win a handful of chips. Likewise, calling an all-in bet with middle-strength card when you have no idea of the strength of the other hand is just plain stupid to me.
Now, it may be that these types of player have decided that it's better to take a risk early on and hope for a double-up than to play for an hour or more and then get eliminated. If that's the case then I guess it's a reasonable strategy, though not one that I would want to pursue. But I suspect that this is not the case for most of these players. I think that these players are just looking to gamble. They're looking for the thrill of putting their tournament life on the line and hoping for the rush of the double-up. In other words, it's a strategy that's not designed to win the game, but rather to provide an adrenaline rush.
This is typical gambling behaviour and it may well be fuelled by televised poker games. After all, TV is always looking for the dramatic and poker shows that cover many hours of play are edited down to a few of the most dramatic moments. So inevitably we see a lot of all-in situations, lots of coin-flips, lots of eliminations and double-ups, and of course, the occasional lucky, game-saving river card. So maybe some of these players want to be like the pros and put all their chips on the line, even if the circumstances are completely different.
Myself, I limit all-in plays to certain specific circumstances. I've always been aware of the basic principal that you need a much better hand to call an all-in bet than you need to make one. However, my recent analysis of my poorest plays has revealed that I still tend to call all-in bets more than I should. So now I work on the following simple rule: don't call an all-in bet pre-flop unless you have pocket kings or aces. Of course all rules have exceptions. Where I was the big stack I might well call an all-in bet from a short stack if I had a reasonably strong hand. Likewise, if I was very short-stacked I might very well call an all-in bet from a loose player or the big stack, if I had decent pre-flop hand.
Going all-in is a bit different because the aggressor has the advantage. It can be a very useful tool both pre-flop and post-flop, provided it is used sparingly. Use it too much and it loses its value. Most of the time when I go all-in I don't want to be called. It usually happens when I think I have the best hand but I'm not sure. I figure that if I go all-in, my opponent would have to have a VERY good hand to call. Most of the time it works.
The all-in play that really puzzles me is when a player hits a monster hand (say, the nut straight) and then goes all-in. In a situation like that I'm usually thinking 'what's the most that I can bet and still get a call?'. The funny thing is, quite often someone will call one of these all-in bets, and lose most or all of their chips. Why would someone do that? Did they really think it was a bluff? Sure, sometimes players bluff at the pot, but in my experience it happens a lot less often than you might think, at the lower level games at least. There have been occasions in the past where I've hit a monster hand and gone all-in, hoping my opponent would think I was bluffing. It hardly ever works for me, even though it seems to happen quite frequently for other players. Maybe they've noticed how tight I am. Then again, I doubt that they'd have that degree of awareness.
So my guidelines are pretty simple. Stay out of the way of players who want to make the big push. Leave the hero calls to others. And then use the all-in play when the time and circumstances are right, just like other poker moves. After all, if I want to gamble all my chips on a 50/50 shot, I'll put them all on red at the roulette table.
Thursday, 25 October 2012
Sunday, 14 October 2012
News Briefs
I've been watching edited highlights of the World Series of Poker Main Event over the last few weeks. I finally worked out that Sky TV was showing it late on Sunday nights, so I started recording it. They started with Day 3 and now we're down to Day 7, with just 29 players left. I've been careful not to look at any poker news sites so I don't know who's going to make the final table. Although they usually call these players the 'November Nine', I think the final table is actually played at the end of October this year. As usual, all the big name professional players are out of it. At least my favourite pro, Daniel Negraneau made another deep run this year, before getting knocked out by actor/comedian Kevin Pollack. As always, it's highly entertaining stuff. Over 8 million dollars first prize. A nice payday for someone.
My own results continue to be in the negative zone, although the downward slide has levelled out a bit. My bankroll is still below the break-even point and I have now played ten online tournaments in a row without cashing. Sitngos have been up and down, but mostly down.
On the plus side, I'm actually doing pretty well in six-max fixed limit holdem. Since dropping to a lower level game I've won four sessions in a row, more than doubling my buy-in in two of those. I really don't see how this sudden success can be down to the drop in level as the type of play is much the same, and many of the same players from the higher level can also be found at this level. So I figure I must be getting used to this game type. When I play next I'll go back up to the next level and see what happens.
My wife and I went and played in the NPPL tournament at our club on Saturday night. I just felt like playing some live poker and approached it as more of a night out than a serious game. As expected, there was some incredibly loose play. One example: a player raises THIRTEEN TIMES the big blind with pocket aces and gets called by another player with K 4! Of course - you guessed it - the player with K 4 hit two pair and won. My wife and I both played for a couple of hours before getting knocked out, but it was just a bit of fun. However, she says that certain players at her table seemed to have much larger stacks after the break when the chip denominations were changed. That's disconcerting and I guess it's another good reason not to play in this game.
I went on holiday a few weeks ago and took a poker book with me to read. I originally wanted to take Doyle Brunson's Super System, but couldn't get it. So I took Barry Greenstein's Ace on the River. It's not really aimed at novices like me (the subtitle is An Advanced Poker Guide), but it was still an interesting read. It sheds a lot of light on the fascinating world of the professional poker player. Greenstein comes across as an odd mix of ruthless poker professional, philanthropist and philosopher. Or maybe that's what he wants us to believe. Anyway, I enjoyed it and recommend it to anyone with a general interest in the world of poker.
Another TV show I've been watching is The Big Game. This is a great concept. A novice player (called the 'loose cannon') is given a $50,000 buy-in to a ring game, and goes up against five professional players. After 150 hands, if the loose cannon has more than the original $50k, they get to keep the balance. It's a lot of fun to watch and involves some very big names in the poker world (including Daniel Negraneau). This show is on TV3 and they seem to be doing the same thing as Sky does with its poker shows. It was on for a while earlier in the year for a few weeks, then it stopped without warning, and now it seems to have started again in the middle of a series. This series is particularly good because Phil 'the poker brat' Hellmuth is playing and it's always entertaining to see him throw a tantrum when things don't go his way.
I got an email from a ghost today. This message was from a poker site calling itself 'Fulltilt Poker'. Sounds vaguely familiar. Wasn't that the site that was closed down by the FBI a couple of years ago? Didn't they have their licence revoked by the Gaming Authority of whatever tax refuge they were operating out of? Didn't they meet all requests for information from their customers with a resounding silence? Well, apparently they are starting up again on November 6th. And they are inviting all old account-holders to come and play. Yeah right. Have I got 'sucker' stamped on my forehead?
My own results continue to be in the negative zone, although the downward slide has levelled out a bit. My bankroll is still below the break-even point and I have now played ten online tournaments in a row without cashing. Sitngos have been up and down, but mostly down.
On the plus side, I'm actually doing pretty well in six-max fixed limit holdem. Since dropping to a lower level game I've won four sessions in a row, more than doubling my buy-in in two of those. I really don't see how this sudden success can be down to the drop in level as the type of play is much the same, and many of the same players from the higher level can also be found at this level. So I figure I must be getting used to this game type. When I play next I'll go back up to the next level and see what happens.
My wife and I went and played in the NPPL tournament at our club on Saturday night. I just felt like playing some live poker and approached it as more of a night out than a serious game. As expected, there was some incredibly loose play. One example: a player raises THIRTEEN TIMES the big blind with pocket aces and gets called by another player with K 4! Of course - you guessed it - the player with K 4 hit two pair and won. My wife and I both played for a couple of hours before getting knocked out, but it was just a bit of fun. However, she says that certain players at her table seemed to have much larger stacks after the break when the chip denominations were changed. That's disconcerting and I guess it's another good reason not to play in this game.
I went on holiday a few weeks ago and took a poker book with me to read. I originally wanted to take Doyle Brunson's Super System, but couldn't get it. So I took Barry Greenstein's Ace on the River. It's not really aimed at novices like me (the subtitle is An Advanced Poker Guide), but it was still an interesting read. It sheds a lot of light on the fascinating world of the professional poker player. Greenstein comes across as an odd mix of ruthless poker professional, philanthropist and philosopher. Or maybe that's what he wants us to believe. Anyway, I enjoyed it and recommend it to anyone with a general interest in the world of poker.
Another TV show I've been watching is The Big Game. This is a great concept. A novice player (called the 'loose cannon') is given a $50,000 buy-in to a ring game, and goes up against five professional players. After 150 hands, if the loose cannon has more than the original $50k, they get to keep the balance. It's a lot of fun to watch and involves some very big names in the poker world (including Daniel Negraneau). This show is on TV3 and they seem to be doing the same thing as Sky does with its poker shows. It was on for a while earlier in the year for a few weeks, then it stopped without warning, and now it seems to have started again in the middle of a series. This series is particularly good because Phil 'the poker brat' Hellmuth is playing and it's always entertaining to see him throw a tantrum when things don't go his way.
I got an email from a ghost today. This message was from a poker site calling itself 'Fulltilt Poker'. Sounds vaguely familiar. Wasn't that the site that was closed down by the FBI a couple of years ago? Didn't they have their licence revoked by the Gaming Authority of whatever tax refuge they were operating out of? Didn't they meet all requests for information from their customers with a resounding silence? Well, apparently they are starting up again on November 6th. And they are inviting all old account-holders to come and play. Yeah right. Have I got 'sucker' stamped on my forehead?
Monday, 1 October 2012
A Game of Two Halves
I played in a rather unusual game of fixed-limit Holdem last week. Unlike most of these games there was some very aggressive raising and re-raising, both before and after the flop. At first I thought I'd stumbled upon a table full of aggressive players, but after a while I realised it was largely down to one individual. Although there were a number of players raising and re-raising in almost every hand, it was in response to the tactics of this one player - let's call him Mr A. It didn't take me long to figure out that a pre-flop raise or re-raise from Mr A wasn't any indicator of the strength of his hand. Therefore, a further raise was often correct with any decent hand, after which Mr A would cap the betting. The other players had also figured this out, so the betting was often capped pre-flop, with three or more players in the pot. This made for a real action game.
Some examples:
I pick up AA and raise and re-raise until the betting is capped. There are four callers! Much to my surprise, my aces hold up against four other hands.
With K8 I call a re-raise by Mr A. The flop is T 8 5, giving me middle pair. I bet and get called on the flop, turn and river. Mr A had 4 2. Middle pair wins.
With AJ I raise and the betting is capped by Mr A. I call him all the way to the river with only ace high. He shows K2 for a pair of twos and wins.
I get J9 and keep calling raises until the betting is capped. In a normal game I probably would have folded to the first raise, but there are five players in the pot and I figure I have the odds to call. No hit on the flop so I fold.
I don't know whether Mr A always plays this way or whether or not it usually works for him, but on this particular occasion it didn't. I came into the game with 100 blinds and at that point Mr A had about 200 blinds. A couple of hours later Mr A lost his last few chips and left the table. I had doubled up.
After Mr A left, the table settled down into the usual passive play you generally find in these games. Players who had previously been raising and re-raising with all sorts of hands pre-flop were now happy to just call and see the flop. This confirmed my assumption that the other players had adjusted their play to accommodate the 'action man'. I left the table after a couple of hours and found that I'd lost about 30 blinds since Mr A left. So I actually did a lot better on the aggressive table than the passive table.
Some of the differences I noted about 'aggro FLH' are as follows.
*You can call raises with marginal hands because of the size of the pot.
*You're less likely to limp in with poor hands because of the likelihood of a raise.
*You seldom raise with a good hand because someone else will probably raise for you.
*It's harder to judge the strength of other players' hands.
*It's harder to defend the blinds.
*You often have the pot odds to keep calling post-flop.
Although I did pretty well in the aggressive phase of this game, I don't think I'd like to play in this type of game too often. It seems to me that there is the potential for both big wins and big losses. This time I got the wins and Mr A got the losses. If we meet again, it could just as easily be the other way around.
Some examples:
I pick up AA and raise and re-raise until the betting is capped. There are four callers! Much to my surprise, my aces hold up against four other hands.
With K8 I call a re-raise by Mr A. The flop is T 8 5, giving me middle pair. I bet and get called on the flop, turn and river. Mr A had 4 2. Middle pair wins.
With AJ I raise and the betting is capped by Mr A. I call him all the way to the river with only ace high. He shows K2 for a pair of twos and wins.
I get J9 and keep calling raises until the betting is capped. In a normal game I probably would have folded to the first raise, but there are five players in the pot and I figure I have the odds to call. No hit on the flop so I fold.
I don't know whether Mr A always plays this way or whether or not it usually works for him, but on this particular occasion it didn't. I came into the game with 100 blinds and at that point Mr A had about 200 blinds. A couple of hours later Mr A lost his last few chips and left the table. I had doubled up.
After Mr A left, the table settled down into the usual passive play you generally find in these games. Players who had previously been raising and re-raising with all sorts of hands pre-flop were now happy to just call and see the flop. This confirmed my assumption that the other players had adjusted their play to accommodate the 'action man'. I left the table after a couple of hours and found that I'd lost about 30 blinds since Mr A left. So I actually did a lot better on the aggressive table than the passive table.
Some of the differences I noted about 'aggro FLH' are as follows.
*You can call raises with marginal hands because of the size of the pot.
*You're less likely to limp in with poor hands because of the likelihood of a raise.
*You seldom raise with a good hand because someone else will probably raise for you.
*It's harder to judge the strength of other players' hands.
*It's harder to defend the blinds.
*You often have the pot odds to keep calling post-flop.
Although I did pretty well in the aggressive phase of this game, I don't think I'd like to play in this type of game too often. It seems to me that there is the potential for both big wins and big losses. This time I got the wins and Mr A got the losses. If we meet again, it could just as easily be the other way around.
Tuesday, 18 September 2012
Analyse That
Having already come to some conclusions about my poker game choices, I thought I'd take a closer look at my results from the two types of game that have yielded the best results.
Looking at single table tournaments (sitngos), I can see that the winning sessions are quite frequent, with many periods of successive wins. Where there are losing sessions, they usually occur singly, or occasionally in groups of two or three. Until recently, the biggest run of losses I had was eight in a row, but the next highest group was only four losses in a row. Then, in July/August, I had the following sequence: 5L, 1W, 8L, 1W, 8L. Fortunately, this is followed by three winning sessions in a row. It's starting to look like I hit a rough patch. Although it's early days, I seem to be returning to my usual W/L pattern in these games.
In multi-table tournaments, listing the number of losing games between each tournament cash, the pattern looks like this: 1,4,2,WW,1,WW,7,16,3,6,WW,1,1,WW,2,1,(7). Where there is a comma, there is a single win and WW means two wins in a row. The number in brackets is my current string of losses. It should be noted that any cash is counted as a win, even if it is barely a money-back win. It seems to me that I am doing pretty well over-all, and there's no need to panic just yet. I've had a run of seven losses before; in fact my worst run amounted to sixteen losses in a row. I have no desire to break that particular record, and I think it's unlikely that I will. Patience is required.
As if all that wasn't enough, I've also been looking at the notes that I sometimes make during games to see if I can detect any patterns. After trolling through these comments, I've come up with a list of my most frequent mistakes. Going from least frequent to most frequent, here they are:
**Calling all-in pre-flop with KQ or a weak Ace
**Trying to bluff a donkey
**Calling an all-in bet with top pair or less
**Playing marginal hands from early position
**Pushing all-in in the face of a raise or re-raise
**Calling an all-in bet post-flop when an obvious draw appears on the board.
It seems to me that the best thing I can do to improve my game is to stop calling all-in bets, unless I have
(a) the nuts or
(b) a very good reason to believe that my opponent is bluffing.
When you have a good hand it can be hard to believe that someone has drawn a better one. If you raise pre-flop with AK or QQ and someone re-raises or goes all-in, you just don't want to believe that they have AA or KK. When you finally hit top pair on the flop and get re-raised, you don't want to know about overpairs or trips. When you flop trips and your big bets get called until a third heart hits the board on the river, you don't want to give your opponent credit for his rivered flush. Nevertheless, it's something I'm going to have to learn to do. Discipline is required.
As for playing marginal hands out of position, I do it far less often than other players. Even so, poker is a game of information, and you can't get much information from early position. I need to keep an eye on that bad habit.
Finally, I need to keep reminding myself of the golden rule: YOU CAN'T BLUFF A DONKEY.
Looking at single table tournaments (sitngos), I can see that the winning sessions are quite frequent, with many periods of successive wins. Where there are losing sessions, they usually occur singly, or occasionally in groups of two or three. Until recently, the biggest run of losses I had was eight in a row, but the next highest group was only four losses in a row. Then, in July/August, I had the following sequence: 5L, 1W, 8L, 1W, 8L. Fortunately, this is followed by three winning sessions in a row. It's starting to look like I hit a rough patch. Although it's early days, I seem to be returning to my usual W/L pattern in these games.
In multi-table tournaments, listing the number of losing games between each tournament cash, the pattern looks like this: 1,4,2,WW,1,WW,7,16,3,6,WW,1,1,WW,2,1,(7). Where there is a comma, there is a single win and WW means two wins in a row. The number in brackets is my current string of losses. It should be noted that any cash is counted as a win, even if it is barely a money-back win. It seems to me that I am doing pretty well over-all, and there's no need to panic just yet. I've had a run of seven losses before; in fact my worst run amounted to sixteen losses in a row. I have no desire to break that particular record, and I think it's unlikely that I will. Patience is required.
As if all that wasn't enough, I've also been looking at the notes that I sometimes make during games to see if I can detect any patterns. After trolling through these comments, I've come up with a list of my most frequent mistakes. Going from least frequent to most frequent, here they are:
**Calling all-in pre-flop with KQ or a weak Ace
**Trying to bluff a donkey
**Calling an all-in bet with top pair or less
**Playing marginal hands from early position
**Pushing all-in in the face of a raise or re-raise
**Calling an all-in bet post-flop when an obvious draw appears on the board.
It seems to me that the best thing I can do to improve my game is to stop calling all-in bets, unless I have
(a) the nuts or
(b) a very good reason to believe that my opponent is bluffing.
When you have a good hand it can be hard to believe that someone has drawn a better one. If you raise pre-flop with AK or QQ and someone re-raises or goes all-in, you just don't want to believe that they have AA or KK. When you finally hit top pair on the flop and get re-raised, you don't want to know about overpairs or trips. When you flop trips and your big bets get called until a third heart hits the board on the river, you don't want to give your opponent credit for his rivered flush. Nevertheless, it's something I'm going to have to learn to do. Discipline is required.
As for playing marginal hands out of position, I do it far less often than other players. Even so, poker is a game of information, and you can't get much information from early position. I need to keep an eye on that bad habit.
Finally, I need to keep reminding myself of the golden rule: YOU CAN'T BLUFF A DONKEY.
Tuesday, 4 September 2012
Analyse This
I've been keeping records of my poker results for almost four years now. I started on the advice in some poker book I was reading and the original idea was to keep track of my overall progress. Since then, I've added a lot of detail to my record-keeping, the idea being to be able to compare my results in different game types and buy-in levels. Considering my recent loss of form, I thought now would be a good time to try and make some sense of all that information. Maybe it will help me to find a way of at least slowing the current downward trend.
First, the big picture. I've been record-keeping since October 2008. Nowadays I use a measure of big blinds won or lost to gauge my results, as this allows a comparison between games at different buy-in levels. However, I started out just measuring dollars won/lost, so I'll use that measure for the whole period. I just have to bear in mind that that will tend to skew the results towards the earlier period when I was playing in the more expensive live games.
In those early days I was buying in a lot and not winning much, so my bankroll built up a big negative balance. However, I eventually started winning more than I lost and in time I started approaching the break-even point. In September of last year I finally hit positive territory and I stayed in the black until last month. The downhill slide that started in July dropped me below the break-even point and ever since then I've been flirting with that line, sometimes being above it and sometimes below. In July I lost 21% of my total bankroll and in August, another 19%!
Looking back at the last four years of poker play, I can see that my games fall roughly into three periods. Although these periods overlap each other to some degree, they still provide a useful basis for comparison. Period 1, from October '08 to March '10, was dominated by live ring games, usually with a large buy-in. Period 2, from February '10 to October '11, was dominated by live Texas Holdem tournaments, with somewhat cheaper buy-in levels. Period 3, from February '11 to August '12, was the online poker period, involving a variety of low-buy-in games. So, looking at each of these periods in turn, how did I do?
1. THE RING GAMES. The only game from this period that shows a positive result is my home game. This was an occasional spread limit dealer's choice game that I played with some friends. Even though there was a significant rake in this game, I still did pretty well over-all. The other games were all in the negative. I had a small loss in the casual 9-card games played at a local pool tournament. But Texas Holdem games yielded the biggest losses. I had moderate losses in both live and online TH no limit. The online games were played on Fulltilt Poker and I started at a much higher level than I should have. The live games were played at the casino and were the most expensive games I've ever played in, typically costing around $100 to buy in. But the worst results of all came from three games of TH fixed limit that I organised at my local club. The total loss from these three games alone wiped out the gains from the home games. Fortunately for me, I couldn't find enough players to keep these games going.
2. LIVE TOURNAMENTS. These tournaments were invariably pub games, typically costing $10 to $20, usually with rebuys and add-ons. I played in these on a regular basis for about a year and a half, starting out badly but eventually chalking up a few wins. Overall, I had a good result with these games, about the same as that from the home games.
3. ONLINE GAMES. The online games are much cheaper to play in than the live games, so their results don't have such a large effect on the overall result. Of the four online game types played in this period I've had the best results from Multi-Table Tournaments. The win from these games is comparable to that from the home games and the pub tourneys. Of the three other game types, I've had a moderate win from SitnGos and a moderate loss from Fixed Limit TH, so these two more or less cancel each other out. The worst results from this period come from Omaha. The Pot Limit Omaha that I played online last year yielded a significant loss, as did the handful of Spread Limit games that I played live. Taken overall, this period showed a neutral result.
So, what can I learn from all this?
Well, the obvious conclusion is somewhat surprising to me. I've always preferred playing in ring games rather than tournaments. I consider ring games to be 'real' poker. I seek out tournament structures that are deep-stacked, and therefore closer in style to ring games. But I actually have much better results from tournaments.
My best results have come from Texas Holdem no limit tournaments, both live and online, single and multi-table. The only other significant positive comes from the Spread Limit home game. Unfortunately, that game died out some time ago and is unlikely to return.
The worst results come from ring games, Texas Holdem and Omaha, live and online, all limit structures. You could knock me down with a feather.
Two important principles of poker are bankroll management and game selection. It seems to me that much of my losses derive from playing games that I haven't mastered at levels that are too high. Even though my recent losses have been in tourneys, things would not look so bad if I hadn't lost so much in previous years, playing in poorly chosen games. From now on I'm going to concentrate on my strengths. Although I still fully intend to keep trying different versions of the game, any new games I try will be at the absolute lowest level. Meanwhile, I'll keep plugging away at the online tournaments.
After all, spring is in the air, the kowhai is in flower and the birds are building their nests. What better time to spend hours staring at a computer screen?
First, the big picture. I've been record-keeping since October 2008. Nowadays I use a measure of big blinds won or lost to gauge my results, as this allows a comparison between games at different buy-in levels. However, I started out just measuring dollars won/lost, so I'll use that measure for the whole period. I just have to bear in mind that that will tend to skew the results towards the earlier period when I was playing in the more expensive live games.
In those early days I was buying in a lot and not winning much, so my bankroll built up a big negative balance. However, I eventually started winning more than I lost and in time I started approaching the break-even point. In September of last year I finally hit positive territory and I stayed in the black until last month. The downhill slide that started in July dropped me below the break-even point and ever since then I've been flirting with that line, sometimes being above it and sometimes below. In July I lost 21% of my total bankroll and in August, another 19%!
Looking back at the last four years of poker play, I can see that my games fall roughly into three periods. Although these periods overlap each other to some degree, they still provide a useful basis for comparison. Period 1, from October '08 to March '10, was dominated by live ring games, usually with a large buy-in. Period 2, from February '10 to October '11, was dominated by live Texas Holdem tournaments, with somewhat cheaper buy-in levels. Period 3, from February '11 to August '12, was the online poker period, involving a variety of low-buy-in games. So, looking at each of these periods in turn, how did I do?
1. THE RING GAMES. The only game from this period that shows a positive result is my home game. This was an occasional spread limit dealer's choice game that I played with some friends. Even though there was a significant rake in this game, I still did pretty well over-all. The other games were all in the negative. I had a small loss in the casual 9-card games played at a local pool tournament. But Texas Holdem games yielded the biggest losses. I had moderate losses in both live and online TH no limit. The online games were played on Fulltilt Poker and I started at a much higher level than I should have. The live games were played at the casino and were the most expensive games I've ever played in, typically costing around $100 to buy in. But the worst results of all came from three games of TH fixed limit that I organised at my local club. The total loss from these three games alone wiped out the gains from the home games. Fortunately for me, I couldn't find enough players to keep these games going.
2. LIVE TOURNAMENTS. These tournaments were invariably pub games, typically costing $10 to $20, usually with rebuys and add-ons. I played in these on a regular basis for about a year and a half, starting out badly but eventually chalking up a few wins. Overall, I had a good result with these games, about the same as that from the home games.
3. ONLINE GAMES. The online games are much cheaper to play in than the live games, so their results don't have such a large effect on the overall result. Of the four online game types played in this period I've had the best results from Multi-Table Tournaments. The win from these games is comparable to that from the home games and the pub tourneys. Of the three other game types, I've had a moderate win from SitnGos and a moderate loss from Fixed Limit TH, so these two more or less cancel each other out. The worst results from this period come from Omaha. The Pot Limit Omaha that I played online last year yielded a significant loss, as did the handful of Spread Limit games that I played live. Taken overall, this period showed a neutral result.
So, what can I learn from all this?
Well, the obvious conclusion is somewhat surprising to me. I've always preferred playing in ring games rather than tournaments. I consider ring games to be 'real' poker. I seek out tournament structures that are deep-stacked, and therefore closer in style to ring games. But I actually have much better results from tournaments.
My best results have come from Texas Holdem no limit tournaments, both live and online, single and multi-table. The only other significant positive comes from the Spread Limit home game. Unfortunately, that game died out some time ago and is unlikely to return.
The worst results come from ring games, Texas Holdem and Omaha, live and online, all limit structures. You could knock me down with a feather.
Two important principles of poker are bankroll management and game selection. It seems to me that much of my losses derive from playing games that I haven't mastered at levels that are too high. Even though my recent losses have been in tourneys, things would not look so bad if I hadn't lost so much in previous years, playing in poorly chosen games. From now on I'm going to concentrate on my strengths. Although I still fully intend to keep trying different versions of the game, any new games I try will be at the absolute lowest level. Meanwhile, I'll keep plugging away at the online tournaments.
After all, spring is in the air, the kowhai is in flower and the birds are building their nests. What better time to spend hours staring at a computer screen?
Friday, 17 August 2012
Twenty Questions
I was watching a TV doco the other day called 'Stephen Hawking's Grand Design', in which the great physicist asked the question: 'what is the meaning of life'. Well, I have a few questions of my own; perhaps not as weighty as this, but important questions nevertheless. So, here they are:
Why is Sky TV unwilling or unable to label their poker shows so that viewers know whether or not they are worth recording or watching?
What is the point of going all-in and risking your entire stack just so you can win the blinds?
Is KQ the most over-rated hand in Texas Holdem?
What makes Peter Jackson think he can stretch the material in The Hobbit to make THREE movies?
Am I a reasonably good poker player who has hit a sudden downswing?
Am I an average poker player who has been enjoying a lucky period, but has now entered an unlucky period?
Am I a poor player who has been on a long upswing but is now returning to his normal form?
If a Christian stripper gets slapped on the arse, does she have to turn the other cheek?
If you have a medium to big stack, why would you call an all-in pre-flop bet with anything less than KK?
What should you do when the board pairs?
How likely is it for a player to win a satelite tournament and then do well enough in the main tournament to make the money?
What's the point of making a sequel to Into the Blue without Jessica Alba in that little blue bikini?
Should I loosen up my tournament pre-flop starting hands?
Should I play more aggressively in the early stages of tournaments?
What's so great about small pocket pairs?
Just how big does a hand have to be before it's safe to slowplay it?
Do agnostic dyslexic insomniacs lie awake at night wondering if there is a Dog?
If my bankroll ever reached the point where I could afford to play in one of the Sky City long weekend tournaments, would I be using a walking frame to get to the table?
Seriously, how can you call a big pre-flop bet with K7 offsuit?
What is the sound of one hand clapping?
Why did I call this post 'Twenty Questions'?
Why is Sky TV unwilling or unable to label their poker shows so that viewers know whether or not they are worth recording or watching?
What is the point of going all-in and risking your entire stack just so you can win the blinds?
Is KQ the most over-rated hand in Texas Holdem?
What makes Peter Jackson think he can stretch the material in The Hobbit to make THREE movies?
Am I a reasonably good poker player who has hit a sudden downswing?
Am I an average poker player who has been enjoying a lucky period, but has now entered an unlucky period?
Am I a poor player who has been on a long upswing but is now returning to his normal form?
If a Christian stripper gets slapped on the arse, does she have to turn the other cheek?
If you have a medium to big stack, why would you call an all-in pre-flop bet with anything less than KK?
What should you do when the board pairs?
How likely is it for a player to win a satelite tournament and then do well enough in the main tournament to make the money?
What's the point of making a sequel to Into the Blue without Jessica Alba in that little blue bikini?
Should I loosen up my tournament pre-flop starting hands?
Should I play more aggressively in the early stages of tournaments?
What's so great about small pocket pairs?
Just how big does a hand have to be before it's safe to slowplay it?
Do agnostic dyslexic insomniacs lie awake at night wondering if there is a Dog?
If my bankroll ever reached the point where I could afford to play in one of the Sky City long weekend tournaments, would I be using a walking frame to get to the table?
Seriously, how can you call a big pre-flop bet with K7 offsuit?
What is the sound of one hand clapping?
Why did I call this post 'Twenty Questions'?
Thursday, 9 August 2012
Swimming in the Fishpond
Call me, call me. Call me call me anytime. Blondie
I was playing in an online Sitngo game last night (yet another in a long line of losses) when I came up against a 'superdonkey'. This guy - let's call him MrX - was calling anything with absolute rubbish. The first time I was in a pot with him I hit top pair on the flop. I bet 3/4 of the pot and he called. On the turn I bet 3/4 of the pot and he called. On the river I got worried that he was slow-playing a monster hand so I checked. To my surprise he also checked and revealed nothing more than a busted inside straight draw.
Another player - let's call him MrY - wasn't so lucky. He kept going up against MrX with big hands and getting beaten by absolute rags, usually on the river. When his AA was beaten by some rubbish like Q3, he went ballistic. He started abusing MrY and calling him all sorts of names, most of them unprintable. In the end he went all-in with a marginal hand against his nemesis and was eliminated. Not long afterwards I was knocked out (no, not by MrX) and went to a new game. MrY was in this game too and he was still going on about the 'donkeyfish' on the other table.
This sort of thing happens all the time in low stakes games. I've been going over my game notes recently, and here are some of the comments about particular hands:
*? How do you call a 4x raise with K7 offsuit? [then a few lines down...]
*? How do you call a 3x raise with K7 o?
* All-in with top pair and beaten by fish with J7 - two pair. This player previously went all-in with J5 against KK and won!
* Getting short-stacked. Raise x2 with A8. Called. Flop A J 6.... all-in. Beaten by J6! How do you play against that bullshit?
* All-in, short-stacked with AT. Called by K3. I get trip Aces, they get flush.
This sort of thing used to really burn me up, just like it did MrY, although I don't get abusive towards other players. The thing is, if you're going to swim with the fishes in low level games, you have to learn to cope with donkey plays. It comes with the territory. Getting mad is going to affect your game and lead to bad decisions.
The point is that MrX was making bad decisions but getting lucky. But luck is only ever going to take you so far. Eventually, those bad plays will result in bad losses. On the other hand, if you keep making correct decisions, you will be rewarded, in the long run. The problem is, if you are sitting at a table full of MrX's cousins, it can get very frustrating. If you're playing against the dumb-luck tag-team it can be hard to keep your cool. But if you keep plugging away at it, the results will come.
For example, I know that if I have an open-ended straight draw, the odds of hitting that straight with two cards to come are about 3-1 against. I also know that the odds with one card to come are around 5-1 against. So if someone bets big or if the pot is small, then I don't have the odds and I don't call. No matter how many times you see someone call those big bets and then hit their straight on the river, you know the odds were against them and they just got lucky. If a lot of players are making foolish calls then some of them are bound to get lucky.
There's no point in going on tilt because someone calls your big bets and then draws out on you on the river. For every time that happens, there are multiple times that the calling player loses a lot of chips. It's just that we tend to remember those bad beats and forget about all the other times we had a nice collect. By the same principal, the fish who is always chasing that inside straight will always remember the one time they hit their straight on the river, and not the five times they missed it.
So my advise to MrY is to cultivate a Buddha-like calm. When you get beaten by the ragking, refrain from making comments about has mother or using words that get turned into a string of **** by the software. Just type in "nice hand". The sarcasm will go right over MrX's head.
My advise to MrX is very simple. Call me. Please.
I was playing in an online Sitngo game last night (yet another in a long line of losses) when I came up against a 'superdonkey'. This guy - let's call him MrX - was calling anything with absolute rubbish. The first time I was in a pot with him I hit top pair on the flop. I bet 3/4 of the pot and he called. On the turn I bet 3/4 of the pot and he called. On the river I got worried that he was slow-playing a monster hand so I checked. To my surprise he also checked and revealed nothing more than a busted inside straight draw.
Another player - let's call him MrY - wasn't so lucky. He kept going up against MrX with big hands and getting beaten by absolute rags, usually on the river. When his AA was beaten by some rubbish like Q3, he went ballistic. He started abusing MrY and calling him all sorts of names, most of them unprintable. In the end he went all-in with a marginal hand against his nemesis and was eliminated. Not long afterwards I was knocked out (no, not by MrX) and went to a new game. MrY was in this game too and he was still going on about the 'donkeyfish' on the other table.
This sort of thing happens all the time in low stakes games. I've been going over my game notes recently, and here are some of the comments about particular hands:
*? How do you call a 4x raise with K7 offsuit? [then a few lines down...]
*? How do you call a 3x raise with K7 o?
* All-in with top pair and beaten by fish with J7 - two pair. This player previously went all-in with J5 against KK and won!
* Getting short-stacked. Raise x2 with A8. Called. Flop A J 6.... all-in. Beaten by J6! How do you play against that bullshit?
* All-in, short-stacked with AT. Called by K3. I get trip Aces, they get flush.
This sort of thing used to really burn me up, just like it did MrY, although I don't get abusive towards other players. The thing is, if you're going to swim with the fishes in low level games, you have to learn to cope with donkey plays. It comes with the territory. Getting mad is going to affect your game and lead to bad decisions.
The point is that MrX was making bad decisions but getting lucky. But luck is only ever going to take you so far. Eventually, those bad plays will result in bad losses. On the other hand, if you keep making correct decisions, you will be rewarded, in the long run. The problem is, if you are sitting at a table full of MrX's cousins, it can get very frustrating. If you're playing against the dumb-luck tag-team it can be hard to keep your cool. But if you keep plugging away at it, the results will come.
For example, I know that if I have an open-ended straight draw, the odds of hitting that straight with two cards to come are about 3-1 against. I also know that the odds with one card to come are around 5-1 against. So if someone bets big or if the pot is small, then I don't have the odds and I don't call. No matter how many times you see someone call those big bets and then hit their straight on the river, you know the odds were against them and they just got lucky. If a lot of players are making foolish calls then some of them are bound to get lucky.
There's no point in going on tilt because someone calls your big bets and then draws out on you on the river. For every time that happens, there are multiple times that the calling player loses a lot of chips. It's just that we tend to remember those bad beats and forget about all the other times we had a nice collect. By the same principal, the fish who is always chasing that inside straight will always remember the one time they hit their straight on the river, and not the five times they missed it.
So my advise to MrY is to cultivate a Buddha-like calm. When you get beaten by the ragking, refrain from making comments about has mother or using words that get turned into a string of **** by the software. Just type in "nice hand". The sarcasm will go right over MrX's head.
My advise to MrX is very simple. Call me. Please.
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