the perils and triumps of cash game variances, and a recent 9th place finish in an MTT

not that i've been running entirely too bad recently, but i haven't been seeing alot of anything with cards lately. alot of nothing, actually. so...i went back to some poker readings during the week, and reread through some pages of Scott Fischman's "Online Ace", an article of NL ring game bankroll management from Bluff magazine, and an excerpt on strategizing from Phil Hellmuth's books. i did this because i've been getting frustrated through the past couple of weeks with the recurring theme i have adopted of making no money online monday through friday, and even sometimes going through a bout of bad beats, being felted here and there as well because of a donkey player's dumb luck. the temptation to play NL cash games spurred over the weekend when i decided to give not one, but two tables, a try (i used to steer clear from these because of my lack of discipline with a stop-loss and stop-win rule of thumb).

to my surprise, i was running really well on saturday. i played two .05/.10 cent 6-handed nl tables, and profited $17 dollars on one table, and $32 dollars on another after an hour or so. but as the week approached, i started to hit a severe losing streak when i would put all my chips in it with the best of it (both pre and post-flop), getting "out-donked" on several occasions to take a $60 dollar blow to my bankroll within a matter of an hour, purely out of reloading frustration. in the end, i had to step down to .01/.02 cent. so far, i feel my week has been a total waste, outside of work. this could just be superstition on my part, but i was beginning to come to the conclusion that the likelihood of being dealt a premium hand at the smallest of nl tables was just about slim to nothing. altogether, it feels absolutely crushing to have to drop entirely to the lowest of limits, and grind out an average of a .20 cent profit an hour. i feel like i am doing slave labor, as cruel as that may sound by any contrasting comparison. but i've been getting burned out on those as well.

so...last night, i was watching my taping of the latest WPT final table, and this kirk morrison guy who has been getting a ton of buzz recently, ends up finishing second on this episode. and apparently, he has cashed in 4 tournaments in this past years' WSOP events after being MIA from any poker for the past several years. i took that, in no relation, as a tiny bit of inspiration, and ended up going back to the 180 player MTT i was so adament about writing about in this blog. shocking as it seemed, about every playable hand i got dealt last night ended up being the nuts in every pot against any opponent who called my pre or post-flop raise...until the final table. the luck of big slick ran out in exactly the first hand at the final table. i raised two times the BB from mid position with AKo with the intentions of just stealing some blinds and antes, only to get called down by the chip leader, who was positioned at the button. the flop came out all low cards. i bet, he called. the turn brought another low card. i checked (seeing that he called my bet), and he bet, pushing me to call with about two thirds of my stack. i figured he paired with something on the board. so i folded, and he showed a King rag hand that ended up pairing on the board. Big slick failed me, and i was left severly short stacked. i look back on the hand and the opponent now, and think that pushing all-in preflop wouldn't have made a difference either. he had me covered in chips six times over and was playing alot of face card suited hands when it came down to the last 30 players (i've been starting to pay attention to the swings of the leaderboard in the later rounds, to get an idea of the opposition).

a few hands later, i am sitting to the right of the button. having been dealt a king, i was about to push all in, when the player to my right pushed all in. i fold, and the SB and BB call his raise. the flop comes out with two kings. i'm pissed at this point, except the player to my right has now pushed with nothing more than J10s, and somehow catches a runner runner to make a straight. i guess, had i committed, it would have made no difference. so the next hand, i push with 9-5o, and get called by the button who is holding A5s. guess who went out? yours truly. ;)

of course, it's easy for me to get pissed over not finishing with a better payday (i only received twice the amount of my buy-in for my efforts). but, as i go to check my stats on "thepokerdb.com", i'm still pleased with the fact that out of the 6 ITM finishes so far, 5 of them have been at the final table (which is where i want to be every time i'm ITM. i took it as a decent win, nonetheless, watched a movie, read a little bit, and went to bed.

something to note about "Online Ace" though when it comes to cash games. apparently, if i was loking for a return on my investment playing cash games, the suggestion is that a full ring game is possibly more profitable than short-handed, because more limpers will call with anything, allowing you to be the aggressor with premium or close to premium hands, stealing blinds pre-flop with ease, and raking some pretty pots.

so this morning, i decided to try out a full ring nl table at the .02/.05 cent limit, folding the first couple of hands, and not really observing the table all that much. but as i'm sitting on the button, i get dealt A10s, and watch as a couple of mid position opponents limp in. three spots behind me, the big stack at the table raises the bet to .60 cents, immediately beind called by the next player. i decide to call, seeing that .60 cents is nothing to cry about, and for the pure fact that i would be the last to act post-flop with a pretty decent hand. everyone else folds after me, including the SB and BB. the flop comes out all face cards (i can't remember specifically, except that i paired my ace, with two face cards to my suit for atop pair and a flush draw and a gutshot straight draw). the original raiser bets, the player that called the original bet calls the raise, and i decide to put all my chips in the middle of it with seing that my outs and percentage to catch a straight or flush, with the possibility of even stealing the pot with my reraise, are entirely good. both players now call, and all three of us are now all in. the turn brings a rag, at least keeping my ace flop alive, and the river brings my fifth card to my suit, giving me the nut flush, with no possibility of a full house to my opponents. original raiser shows AKs to make two pair on the board, the caller imediately after shows an ace rag hand (obviously a fish who is committing to the ace on board with the worst of it, and i steal the pot with my flush, netting a profit of around $10 dollars in just one hand. i take my winning, log off, and go to work. life is sweet this morning, and it's friday! woot woot!!!

crucial folds and table ettiquette

65 players left. i'm dealt AJs from mid position, i double the blinds in an attempt to at least steal from the SB and BB, and get called by three players (the big stack to my left, and both SB and BB included). flop comes A-J-x, all heart. i've hit top two pair and am first to act. i make a pot size bet, get called by the player to my left, and the other two fold. turn brings another heart. the player to my left has been committing himself to the pots everytime he has either Ax suited with the possibilty of catching a flush, or offsuit face cards to catch a straight. so i now had to consider that he was chasing a flush. i just couldn't put him on a straight draw. i check, and he goes all in. i think for about ten seconds, and fold. he turns over KQo (no heart), basically bluffing me with nothing other than a straight draw. i went from 6th in chips, to just about the shortest stack in the tournament. i hung around to end in 34th. needless to say, i'm still thinking about that hand. the board was just too scary to commit to with four hearts now on the turn, and the big stack still in. i couldn't risk all of my chips in the hopes - in my mind, at least - of catching another one of my two cards to make a full house.

so anyhow, i'm now at work on my day off, figuring it'd be best to blow off some frustration by playing catch up in the office before i approach the virtual felt again today. plus, i finally got a long-needed haircut for summer. no more long locks. hello beautiful babies! :)

5th place is for losers! ha ha

i am willing to become a firm believer of the fact that sometimes you just don't see hands. not like blind stealing when short stacked to run up against a pocket aces hand all in, but just more so the fact that when you get pretty hands to see a flop with, there's always someone at the table in early stages being super-aggressive trying to come over the top. same thing applies at the final table. example:

a player was sitting with over 100,000 in chips last night when it came down to the final 18. in the time it took to get to 9, i saw maybe two playable hands, at the least to steal some blinds with, where this player either was calling every pre-flop raise from any position, or going over the top with an all-in.

with seven players left, one severly short stacked, and another sitting out, i was not about to go out in a lower place than them when i was comfortably going back and forth between 3rd and 4th in chip count. needless to say, i made a faux pas based on the number of times i attempted this by basically losing a hefty amount of chips in the process. the downside for me was that i sat at the same table with this player the entire way. my goal was to get to the final 3, although at this point, i had to settle for 5th. there was absolutely no way to push him out of a hand. he was willing to risk up to 1/5th of his chip stack in the attempts to kiock another player out with the worst of it in hands. i can't say that i'm not happy with my progress, and my return to the final table after a week of not coming close. but, i'm not sure i would have gotten farther than 4th based on his table actions. to my surprise, his mannerisms somehow got him finishing in third. so, i guess, in a way, his actions caught up with him.

i had to do a little bit of rereading, just to maybe pinpoint some recent leaks in my game. and to my surprise, there have been many, especially emphasized with the recent win i made last sunday night. so, i went back to the game last night with an emphasis to fine tune my game, hence the fifth place finish. i'm hoping to have better results over this weekend. i would love nothing more than to move up in limits. two things to remember though: bankroll, and table image. ;)

the remedy of a home game

after getting pocket kings cracked by pocket aces about 65 hands into last nights MTT, i made a last second decision to join in on a home game and give Pokerstars a break. it's been almost an entire week with no ITM finish, as opposed to the three i cashed in over the weekend. this is leaving me with a convincing feeling that i'm better off as a weekend online player.


anyhow, i joined up with my brother and his friend (from the valet business that they run together) over at a local restaurant by his house, sat for about fifteen minutes with them before they finished their beers, and was able to grab another player in the process.


the game started at about 10:45pm, almost an hour later than what i was told previously, and we had about seven players. i decided to organize the structure of the chips and clock for the night, since we were starting so late, and most everyone else involved was interested in smoking weed and drinking beers. so, i did what any poker player does when there's money on the line: play smart, play hard, and fold without aggression.

anyways, i won! and pocketted $60 dollars for my efforts. i'm happy!

save it for the weekends?

my stop loss plan is already failing in its infancy. i logged in time for 4 MTT's last night, failing to cash in all of them. a net loss of $17.20. and although, i had been playing my hands to perfection, the river failed me again. one thing that is obvious about low limit stakes is that there is no respect for the bet. and although i had a pretty good read of my opposition at the table, somehow that miracle ace reared its ugly head on the turn, sending all of my chips to two different players. i'm sure as the day goes on, i'll rethink my latent decision to commit to a wired paired of jacks severly early in the game, but i knew with two opponents committed pre-flop to whatever the bet was, my hand would most likely hold up on the flop against the two players holding aces. my misread was that they both were holding big slick. a king wouldn't scare me, cause most players would fold against an all in and two callers pre-flop with a king high hand. it's just those crying callers that are ready to die without thought as to whether their hand might not hold up.

anyways, the upside is that i have yet to bring any emotion in to the game, which is a plus for me. i play the best to my ability. but i must stay focused on my stop loss plan. so, tonight, i will allow myself only one MTT.

again, here is an updated graph of my progress (and in this instance, my decline):

i know where my recent leak lies

i'm discovering that the recent leaks in my game have resulted from pushing all-in on draws, and mostly flush draws super early in the MTT's. granted, they work from time to time (and have frequently as of late), but not always. i seem to be relying on them all too often to save me from grinding against the donkey culture in the early to mid stages to gain a significant chip lead.

for example, big suited connectors are nice to limp in with early in the game, in my opinion. but my recent slide has been due to overagressiveness on a flush draw flop against the donk who calls your all-in with ace rag and gets lucky on the turn or river as you miss your flush entirely. if the pots is sitting at less than 400, why on earth should i be moving my remaining chip stack in when i don't even have a read on the player yet? i think my dreaded mistake also lies in getting monster hands early in the tournament (specifically within the first several hands). i think it's more of a mental trap for me. like getting dealt pocket Q's, pre-flop raising to push all the limpers out, and isolating the donk who carries Ace rag and is willing to go to the river to catch his ace, or at least see if i had anything. now, if the ace comes on the flop, i can easily throw my hand away to a raise-call, or a check-raise-call (depending on who is first to act). but if the ace comes by the river, and my opponent follows me through four rounds of betting, only to turn over his ace rag hand to win what would by then be a significant sized pot early on, i'm left crippled and superstitious over monster starting hands.

anyways, i went back to view my hand histories for the last seven tournaments i failed to cash in within the past two days, and see where my most recent leak lies: trusting the board to hold up for me, especially since this is low limit MTT holdem i'm trying to move up from.

tonight's goals:
1. restrategize
2. limit myself to two tournaments tonight (if i fail to cash in the first).

i must discipline myself to maintain good bankroll management skills. there's always another game around the corner.

until the next post,
adios! ;)

when other outside factors are involved...

i had said in my first post that one of the reasons i stepped away from online poker was due to burnout. looking back at my spreadsheet (and i highly recommend anyone who plays online poker to keep one of these up and current), i was logging in alot of hours for practically miniscule financial gain. the profit margin was just not there for the time committed. it was like physically participating in the interest rate growth of a bank account.


having upped the ante now, sticking mainly to MTT's, as opposed to the S'n'G's (which i was mainly sticking to), i've found that the profit margin increase is tremendously generous in comparison. the downside though is the time committed. as opposed to an attack that would take roughly an hour (if the cards were running your way), i find myself having to make room for a four hour rollercoaster ride if i find myself going deep into the 180 player tournament.


i had some success over this weekend, cashing in 4 tournaments, making three final tables (winning 1). but in the past couple of days, i haven't come close. i noticed that what burned me out before is slowly creeping up on me again: the determination to play until i cash. on monday, i ended up playing 3 MTT's (going as far as 46th place), and as of last night, playing 4 MTT's (placing 62nd in the first one, and 60th in the fourth). so basically, my investment loss over the two days has totalled a sad little $30.80. the convenience of tournaments beginning ever several minutes makes my mouse clicking finger go trigger happy. so, i am going to discipline myself by putting a stop loss to my account for the day.


yes, there are many factors that contribute to this maniacal behavior:


* donkeys who don't fold ace rag
* players who chase
* big stacks who steam roll over the other players with rag hands that pair up on the turn or river
* the occasional all-in every hand player who cracks your monster pairs with a lucky runner runner straight, flush, or two pairs.


i am willing to accept the fact that this is normal. i don't want to believe anymore that luck is the reason, and that it was not meant to be for me. i see the way my opposition play and remember the days when i too made the same wild calls and donkey decisions.


this is definately a grind, so i must continue to look at it that way. therefor, i am going to discipline myself to play no more than two (perhaps even one if i place in the money the first time) to deter a rapid loss of my profits.


my goal by the end of 2007 is to withdrawal from my account a handsome pocket of change. and in order to do so without sufferring the burnout again, i must accept the fact that not every day will be my day, and that there will be days where even sometimes the donkeys get the best of you. so, today, i will go on to work as i do every day, so that when i return to play at night, i will approach my tables with an open mind, and a stop-loss plan in mind.


i'll end this entry with an updated graph to show where the seven losing games have put my progress. hopefully, the cards and opposition run better for me tonight. enjoy! :)

a cool way to track your winnings and percentages in MTT

thepokerdb.com

it'll give you a whole bunch of percentages to let you see where you are at with your poker progress. although this seems to apply only to MTT's, as opposed to S'n'G's.

so far, i am looking at it like this:

total winnings: $329.04
biggest cash: $216.00
average cash: $82.26
biggest buy-in: $4.00
average field: 180

wins: 1 - 7.14%
seconds: 0 - 0%
thirds: 1 - 7.14%
top three rate: 14.29%
final tables: 3 - 21.43%
cashes: 4 - 28.57% (this is equivalent to the ROI [Return Of Investment] percentage)
total played: 14

tourney results (for ITM [In The Money] finishes, which is the last remaining 18 players or top 10% of field):
7/29/2007 - 1st place - $216.00
7/28/2007 - 3rd place - $85.68
7/27/2007 - 14th place - $8.64
7/21/2007 - 8th place - $18.72

go check it out! it'll let you see the results of other players as well, perhaps even the ones that may face you off at the final table. ;)

let's try this again!

ok folks. so, this is my second attempt to keep my own poker blog. my mission to stay currently updated was heavily thwarted by many overwhelming things in my life at the time. and although they have changed slightly, my determination to commit to writing in this, hopefully, are still the same. my goal here is to spend a short period of time every day, just adding a story or several side notes of my previous days outcome in the world of online poker, sharing with anyone who comes to read, my ups and downs, on what i eventually hope is something that could greatly change my life in the future.

a quick background -

so, like most others newly fresh to the world of texas hold'em within the past several years, i too quickly became an regular internet poker player; and for several reasons. i started showing up to a home game with several high school friends a few months after returning home from college. my skepticism was strong at first when as little as $5 dollars was thrown into a pool for each game. i was handed a strength of hand chart and basically was taught how to play as i went along. at first, it was the family pot type of game, whereas most of us all knew nothing more than what we witnessed on episodes of the WSOP a la ESPN. every week, one of us was walking away with winnings comparable to the equivalent of gas money, enoug to keep us all in. at first, i looked at it as nothing more than a fun social gathering. but with my english degree in hand, i soon found myself diving in to books about the game (as well as history and biography snipets of more recognizeable names), and also relying as well on the internet for as much information as i could absorb in a short period of time. to the lack of my liking though, we were only meeting once a week, if that at all. this did not coincide with my growing interest in the game. so i found the world of online poker.

but let me back up again for a moment.

and so, with my fascination in researching he most random of things, which to this day is a proud habit of mine, i read the poker stories: of overnight success, the changing of lives by the deal of the cards, the emotional triumphs and misfortunes, and the determination by many of what i now too deam as a continual grind of building a bankroll out of either nothing more than a little bit of pocket money put away.

at 27, money is not easy for me to hold on to. i see about 90-95% of it disappear to bills and obligated back debt payments from college every month. basically, i'm working just to keep from being broke. having to let go of money saddens me for the most part. i find it harder and harder to squeeze by as the year goes on. and having failed or lost interest in many other extracarricular endeavors, i decided to give a real money account a try.

of course, there was naiivety involved in the beginning. like most others, i started out with the play money games, having gone from the intial 1,000 in play to 0, and over and over again, until i finally started to stop following the all-in method everyone else was using in the beginning hands and play like i did at my home games. so, over a period of several months, i built my play money up to 80,000+ with many different buy-in levels through the S'n'G and MTT's.

i placed a minimum deposit allowed of $25 dollars on line, and initially had the same up and down experience as with my play money account. i would play the $5 S'n"G's, and watch my account soar in the matter of a few days from $50+ dollars down to my final buy-in. this happened many times over a month or so , until i fould myself spending more time on it than anything else. so, i stepped away for a bit to really research as much strategy as possible. if i wanted to succeed with it, i need to obtain as much knowledge of the game as i could allow myself to.

i'd like to add here that i also promised myself that if i went broke within the $25 dollar deposit, that was going to be the end of poker for me as a serious endeavor.

so, to continue, i learned about bankroll management, disciplinning myself to try as hard not to exceed a percentage of loss in any given day. the standard is 5%, but because i was playing in the $5 dollar S'n'G's, i was basically absorbing 10-20% of my bankroll per day. i would score a big win, followed by several losses in a row. i ended up accumulating the bonus money based on the number of FPP's (Frequent Player Points) that have to be earned so that the site will basically give you another 100% free of your deposit. the jump in money was nice, but soon went away.

through my first 200 games, i watched my bankroll go as high as $175 dollars to as low as $6 dollars within a couple of days. the variance of wins and losses was overwhelming. so, along with other factors involved in my life, both socially and monetarily, i soon found myself in poker burnout. with my account sitting at $146 dollars, i signed off, not to return for what i thought was eternity. i averaged about a $1 dollar profit per week, which realistically got me nowhere.

and so, i went on to other endeavors, until the return of this years WSOP on ESPN. i went looking for my account on my computer, and after watching a few episodes of the final tables for Event 1 and others, i decided to see if i still knew a thing or two.

rather than play the $5 dollar S'n'G, i went down to micro limits, and decided to give an MTT a try. on saturday, with not much to do, i entered a $4+.40 buy-in for a player field of 180 entrants, and coming to the game with an attitude that was very foreign to me: not bringing my emotions into the game. to my surprise, i found myself at the final table within a few hours, going out in eigth place as the short stack at the table for a nice little profit of $18 dollars, and was convinced that i needed to give this thing another go.

as of today, monday the 31st of july, i have cashed in 3 MTT's, winning one tournament the other night for my biggest score ever of $216 dollars, and placing third in a previous one for a profit of $85 dollars. so, to sum it up, after sitting on my ass for a saturday and sunday in the accumulation of about 10 hours of play, and making a total profit of $319 for, that puts me way above my in a shorter period of time what i previously grinded out in the S'n'G's over a period of several months. if you think about it, i basically made about $32 dollars an hour for doing nothing more than playing online poker. i guess i could say that the time away was good, and that i still know what i'm doing. so, to leave off on this very first post, i will insert a graph chart showing the grinding process through my first 200 games, to the enormous profit jump i made within the matter of a weekend. more to come. i'm excited again! until tomorrow...

cheers,

brandt