My re entry into poker!

Variance. For a fish like me, what a f-in difficult term to fully understand. To wrap my head around losing while still making the correct plays and not change a thing is a hard thing to grasp for me. It becomes harder when I go on losing streaks continuously getting my money in when I have the best of it and coming up short. One of the main reasons I have a coach is for this reason. He informed me of tough times to come and why poker is such a hard game to consistently be good at let alone maintain a level head when you encounter tough times.

At the beginning of April I felt on top of the world. Playing 1/2 at my local casinos I didn't have a losing session in the first couple weeks. I added roughly 2,500 to my bank roll enforcing the teachings of my coach and breaking down every hand I had a question on in a deep hand analysis. I would sit there with my little notebook and pen writing away, describing big hands, how they played out and every hand I was involved with that I had a question or i won/lost curious about different ways to play it. But now, oh boy. Something happened. I continue playing the same way, analyzing the table as best i could trying to put hand ranges on everyone but no matter how good of a read I have I keep getting outdrawn on turn/river and it has been costing me some money.

Before I go further, this is me whining. Everyone experiences this i know. I'm sure some people reading this will just roll their eyes at another fish complaining so im sorry in advance. This is just my little blog and i just feel like ranting and whining.

I will do my best to remember a semi-large hand i was involved with that really began this trend of losing.

1/2 Table . Hero has 650-700 in his stack. Table is relatively tight with the exception of 3 individuals who limp/call just about everything and bet random amounts with both strong and bluff hands.

Villain #1 700 in her stack. (no fucking idea how she got it) is a female who is actually pretty hot, doesn't understand a damn thing about cards and has begun taking a barrage of tequila shots from villain #2.

Villain #2 is a older gentlemen who plays extremely loose. He over bets a lot of hands and limp calls with just about anything. His hand range is about anything the dealer throws to him.

Hero is on the button with As,Ac

Villain #1 utg limps in followed by 2-3 limps from early position to villain #2 in the cut off who limps. I raise to 25. My image is a bit more tight and I have been 3 betting a lot of my stronger hands pf against the loose canons. The 25 bet is a bit much in a lot of other circumstances but with villain #2, he tends to limp call with anything no matter the pf raise. I almost think it could have been more but, shoulda woulda coulda.

Both blinds fold. Villain #1 calls. All fold to villain #2 who calls.

Flop: 10s, 4s, 5s (pot 85ish)

Villain 1 leads out for a 20$ bet. Villain 2 calls. Hero Re-raises to 125$.
Villain 1 thinks for awhile like she does every single hand. Looks at her hand a few times... calls. Villain 2 folds.

Turn: Qd (pot 335)

Villain 1 check. Hero bets 300. Villain think and thinks and thinks and thinks. She looks a little nervous by the amount she is up against and after 5 or 6 minutes ends up on calling. At this point in the hand i'm not quite sure what in fuck I am up against. On the flop I thought a flush draw with maybe 2 overs... She has been hitting a lot of hands but generally played stronger hands. She didn't play very many wonky hands and called down a lot of people with top pair and drawing hands which is how her stack was built. The few times she made her hands that she knew were strong she fired pretty strongly into the pot. I was all sorts of fucked up by the call. She had a couple hundred left and I would have thought a flush would have just shoved.

River: 9h

She checks. Hero goes all-in. Again she thinks FOREVER. The more she thought gave me a little bit of comfort that she missed her flush. I really didn't put her on a straight draw since she called the flop raise. She called.

I show Aces with a sinking feeling in my gut that im up against a dumb hand like Q,10. She shows Ks,Jc for the straight.

It's just one of those things that i'm sure there were better ways to fold and i had severe tunnel vision with my aces vs her. When she won she jumped up like she won the lottery as i sit and stew for a minute and say nice hand and walk away tail between my legs.

Shit happens. Do I feel like I played it wrong? Meh, I could have picked up on her calling the 125 that aces may not be good. I just really felt like she had some flush draw with a pair. This very well may not even be variance but it was the hand that began my downward spiral.

Beyond that it was small things that began happening like hands with two pair on the flop getting beat by villains hitting trips on the river. A lot of this is my fault as i was playing an immense amount of poker while i was winning and started to wear myself out mentally.

I began losing stack after stack and started to feel like every hand no mater how well i hit wasn't good enough. An absolutely terrible mental state to be in. I more or less needed to use my coach as a therapist to re-instill my confidence that i was playing the hand correctly but variance is the reason that bad players players play hold'em.

Well, there is my whining rant. I went on to lose about 5-6 buy ins within the last 2 weeks until i finally decided to take a break and re-evaluate everything to make sure we aren't making mistakes. I couldn't imagine being a high stakes player and going on streaks of tens of thousands of dollars being pissed away by players catching cards vs us.

Anyways. I hope everyone has a great day and don't beat up me to badly for complaining. I know I am a results oriented player and i'm am really really trying to knock that off. I have a lot of faults still but i am dedicated to fixing them.

Have a great day everyone!

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I just wanted to add a little 1/3 beat I had the other day before talking about the wsop satellite, dont mind me. :-p

If you have read my little blogs about my adventures swimming among the fish in my live 1/2 games you would know I have been on a successful streak lately. Yesterday was another decent day with leaving with 740 stack after buy in for 200. My bank roll for 1/2 has almost doubled since i began and I'm feeling pretty good. I really haven't had a bad day minus one day about 3 days ago and it sort of went like this:

10 minutes into session: Bought in for 200, 1/3 game, not even through first orbit yet...

Ks,Qs, on the button. Two limps to me and I make it 18 to go.

Both blinds fold, one limper calls. Flop comes 9s,Js,4s. Not bad right?! I have no info on the limper as I have just sat down.

He checks to me and I make a 35$ bet. He calls.

Turn, Ad. He checks again and I bet 75, a little small perhaps but I'm bad. He shoves over the top and I sadly call. I thought he might have the As but needed another spade as most fishies love chasing.

River was a blank (no spade or board pair) He flips over As,2s. FML FML FML

My only joyful moment in that night was going to take a leak with the song "car wash" playing on the speakers and the guy in the urinal next to me was moving his hips from side to side to the beat of the song until I heard "damnit!" I think he got a little too excited with swaying his hips and pissed outside of the urinal. It made me smile.

Anyways!! The Horseshoe Casino that I play at is having a wsop satellite every Monday. A 120$ rebuy, 200$ add on after the second or third break. Start with 800 in chips and can add on for 2000 more. A little awkward I thought but they usually have 150 people and a prize pool of over 60k.

The reason I want to play is I have had decent success playing at Horseshoe tournaments taking 10th, then 6th at my last 2 events. I am in much better form than I was when I previous entered and have a great coach from liquid poker to help me get ready. The few people I have seen make it into the money are complete DONKS. No exaggeration to the word. People who blow through at least 1k when they play 1/3. I feel good about joining but what do you guys think?

Let me know and thanks for taking the time to read this!!

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So I have been taking lessons from a fellow member on liquid poker and I haven't felt in better poker shape than i currently am at the moment. We go over hand scenarios, any questions I have, and not just say what the right answer to a question is but go into great depth talking about why people make certain decisions. ie Why would someone bet a certain amount in a certain position, why we bet a particular amount and not another, how we can extract the most value from our made hands. I'm sure this is basic stuff but it really helps me out. I asked a while back "how do you beat 1/2?" The generic answer was, value bet your hands and play safe with rarely a bluff. Only now can I slowly understand a little bit of what that truly means.

So I sat down yesterday with 200 like always. I was sat down at a floating handed table that was both adding players and moving them to the big game that game going on across from us. I go into my usual routine FOLD FOLD FOLD. While I fold hand after hand I take the time to study the table and get out a character profile on everyone (tight-aggro, loose-aggro,tight bla bla bla) As well as do my best to remember any hands anyone shows down. A lot of people like to remember all types of hands that involved a lot of money but I just like to remember the hands which i know what the hole cards were. I just don't think it makes a lot of sense to remember possible bluff hands. Anyhoot! Since I live in the south most of the table are the country talkin, dip in the mouth while playin, drinkin liquor early in the day, Southerners. I like it. Never mind they talk the ENTIRE time they are at a table, I just do my best to tune them out and remember all they faults they make when they play.

The table at this point (1 hour in) is being raised constantly by 1 bully. The bully, a guy who for whatever reason ended up taking 6th in some 60k tournament and had a lot of money to blow. He was going through buy-in after buy-in with me slamming my face into my hands every time he stacked off with mediocre holdings and me never being able to take advantage of it. Due to my hand range being fairly tight with this table i had the image of a tight player though i doubt any slack jawed guy at my table even knew that... I look down at:

A,Ko on the button 180ish in my stack.

3 limpers then the actions is to me. I make it 17 to go. The BB is the tourny winner guy.

The BB calls, 1 other calls and the 2 other limpers fold. I didn't have much info on the other caller. He was more tight than anything else and would usually bet a small amount in all pots regardless of how much was in the pot.. odd player.

Flop comes Q,10,6 (i think it was rainbowed, hard to remember)

Both players check to me and I make it 40 to go. BB calls, other player folds.

Turn is a jack of spades. I believe the jack added to another spade on the board. BB checks and I make it 100 to go. He thinks and thinks, sais some bullshit like I have trips or something and he has two pair and folds. After I won this hand he just wouldn't stop talking about how he played it right and I got lucky as well as talking about what was on the TV on the wall above us with the show being "Dr. Phil" and the headlining topic is "man who was raped by girlfriend". Fun stuff... lets play cards and not watch TV I thought to myself. Although i did laugh at a few things that this guy would say. "Somebody tell me what i have to do so my ex's will rape me!" Ohhh the joys of 1/2.

Soon after I was moved to the big game. I spot a few regulars that i don't regard as particularly good players but good enough to fold top pair which sadly is an impressive trait to see in someone at these tables.

(I apologize in advance if I come off cocky or arrogant. I am a newby learning as well but sometimes i feel some people are just......SO BAD!)

I sit down, go over my routine of studying the table again and re-making all of my profiles on people. I notice that a very nice but PLUMP lady is sitting next to me from England. I begin talking to her just a little chit chat doing my fold marathon and it comes to this:

On the button with As,2c. 5 people limp and the action is to me. I limp as well. SB (the big lady) limps and BOOM 7 people. I can feel the readers rolling their eyes at me already. :-p

Flop comes A,T,T - Everyone checks and decide to see who has anything to call with so i bet 5 bucks. I figure an A will call, Ts will call. No biggy. The SB calls and one other person calls. Not too bad for 5 bucks. haha.

Turn comes an A. People at the table gasp for whatever reason talking about a possible bad beat pot. But they are retarded if two people limped with A's and T's. The SB checks to me which i thought was strange anyways. I figure we are going to chop if they has an ace and fold if they has a T, no big deal. I wanted to make it fun though and make her sweat a little. I make it 80 to go. A weird bet but i figured we are just going to chop this pot so whats the problem with a little fun. She think and thnks and thinks and actually startled me a little since i was like "what in fuck could she be thinking so hard about???" She make the call.

River a blank, i think a 3 or 4. Can't remember which. She checks. I couldn't quite imagine what she called down the 80 with that gave her mind such a headache. Maybe she really did hold 10,10 haha. She checks and one again, for shits and giggles, i go all in. She thinks and think and begins talking outloud, breaking down the hand with quiet mumbles. I just couldn't understand what the hard decision was. If you have an ace, call. If not, fold. EZPZ. she thinks and finally sais call. I show my ace and she flops over her 10 instantly complaining about the call she made and way she played the hand. It was probably the easiest money i have ever made at a hand that i shouldn't of. But that's 1/2 for ya.

The rest of the night was a bit of a blur since i never really had any large hands like that until my last hand. Everything else was picking up 40 dollars here and 30 there. Slowly making my stack around 700.

So I have been at the table for about 7 hours and have a massed quite the reputation of a solid player only having the nuts. Which was semi-true. There were times i won with mediocre holdings but through a short string of good hole cards and bad opponents I was able to take stacks from a few different people.

My last hand of the night. I look down at As,KS in the cut-off. Not to shabby for a last hand.

2 Limps to me and I make it 15 to go. Both blinds fold, UTG calls, and someone in middle position calls. Both of these players have around 400 in their stacks and one seems fairly competent.

Flop comes Ac,Kc,3d rainbow. Both check to me and decide to make it 40 to go. both of them take time and take sighs as they don't want to get involved with me in a big hand. I have never had opponents feel that way about me before so it felt pretty amazing. :D they both call.

Turn comes Ad. they both check to me and I am trying to find out how to get the most money out of this hand. I put one guy on chasing some sort of flush and the other with some sort of K,Q - A,Q, Jc,Tc. Something along those lines. I think I made a bad bet but I wanted they to be able to continue chasing for relatively cheap and hope they hit. i bet out 40 again. I wanted to go up to 100 but i didn't want them both to fold which i felt they would do given my tightness and they possibly needing good odds to call a pot. One guy i think is chasing calls and the other folds.

River comes 4s. He checks to me. I feel he is in some form of check fold here so i wanted to give the impressive i missed some wonky flush or straight draw. So I lead out of 200. He thinks and thinks but ultimately folds. But not so bad for my last hand!

I started with my 200 buy in and left with 920! I was pretty excited. I haven't left down from these cash games in quite a long time now. I am starting to be consistently up and this is the second time in a couple weeks where i came out a big winner. I guess we will see what happens.

Thank you for taking the time to read this and I will be going to the casino again today and i'll be sure to type another one of these with better detail and a little more complicated hands other than my nut hands.

Also: A big thank you to my coach!! I wouldn't be where I am without you. No homo. :-p

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