Wednesday, March 31, 2010

Jilted by an old girlfriend

I made one monstrously bad decision last night, and it took me down to the felt at the first table I joined. It was another case of falling in love with a hand, and letting my emotions rule. It was my favorite (but fickle) hand. I had another stealth two pair, and went all in with it, failing to notice the straight possibility on the board. I got beaten by a straight, as I assuredly deserved to be. Down -$40K.

At the next table, I did a shade better than doubling my original stake, so I ended the night slightly in the black.

delta: $2,456
balance: $478,383

Tuesday, March 30, 2010

Fool's gold

Last night I had another -$40K correction, and then there was a power outage. Poker interruptus! That's frustrating. The correction taught me a valuable lesson, though. I realized I'd been taught this same lesson several times before, but it had never "taken". I promise I've learned it now! The first time was when I hit the felt playing offline poker at my company's holiday party. I remember the hand that beat me was trip queens over my two pairs. There were two queens in the flop, and the third card paired one of my hole cards -- I'm pretty sure it was a king. This type of flop is what I now recognize as pure fool's gold. It's just not worth playing, period. I've sworn off it for good now.

I way overvalued this same type of hand last night, to the tune of about $32K. The one extenuating circumstance was that there were a lot of high rollers at the table, and they'd demonstrated to me on previous hands that they were willing to go all in without premium hands. I had top pair in my two pair. One of the high rollers had just rocketed his stack up to over $240K in front of my eyes, and I was blinded by all those dollar signs and got greedy. I hit the felt, deservedly. Again, it was trips that beat me.

I only got to play about three or four hands after I re-upped at another table before the power went out.

delta: -$41,300
balance: $475,927

Friday, March 26, 2010

Through the roof

Tonight I had my best poker session ever! I actually surpassed the audacious goal I set myself several posts ago. I'm over halfway to my goal! Not surprisingly, I won the biggest single pot of my career tonight also -- $111,300, for an ace high straight.

I'm dumbfounded, but happy.

delta: $98,200
balance: $517,227

Recovery

Last night I made a nice recovery from my previous session. So nice, in fact, that it was my second best session ever! I got a little practice in as the big stack, but didn't try to bully people. I went up about 50K midway through the session, and instead of profit-taking, I decided to hang out and see how much higher I could go. Turns out I couldn't go any higher, but at least I stayed up there!

Best pot of the night: $57,000, for trip jacks.

delta: $53,200
balance: $419,027

Wednesday, March 24, 2010

Invisible leprechauns

I bet with a title like this one, you're thinking my streak stayed alive. Sadly, that's not the case. I'm posting this the day after the event itself, since it was too late to post last night. Of course, a correction of fortune was inevitable at some point, but it still hurt. I won some pots at the first table I joined, but had several premium hands kicked ignominiously to the curb. Eventually, I hit the felt, $40K in arrears. I re-upped at another table, and had built my stack up to $62K when disaster struck. Here's how the penultimate hand of my night went down; this is taken from the PokerStars hand history of the hand, with my opponent's name changed to "frustrated":

PokerStars Game #xxxxxxxxxxx: Hold'em Pot Limit (100/200) - 2010/03/24 xx:xx:xx
Table 'xxxxxxxxx' 9-max (Play Money) Seat #7 is the button
Seat 4: frustrated (17200 in chips)
Seat 7: neostreet (62600 in chips)
neostreet: posts small blind 100
frustrated: posts big blind 200
*** HOLE CARDS ***
Dealt to neostreet [Qc Qs]
neostreet: calls 100
frustrated: raises 400 to 600
neostreet: raises 400 to 1000
frustrated: raises 2000 to 3000
neostreet: raises 2000 to 5000
frustrated: raises 10000 to 15000
neostreet: calls 10000
*** FLOP *** [Jd 3s Qd]
frustrated: bets 2200 and is all-in
neostreet: calls 2200
*** TURN *** [Jd 3s Qd] [Kd]
*** RIVER *** [Jd 3s Qd Kd] [9d]
*** SHOW DOWN ***
frustrated: shows [Th Td] (a straight flush, Nine to King)
neostreet: shows [Qc Qs] (three of a kind, Queens)
frustrated collected 34400 from pot
*** SUMMARY ***
Total pot 34400 | Rake 0
Board [Jd 3s Qd Kd 9d]
Seat 4: frustrated (big blind) showed [Th Td] and won (34400) with a straight flush, Nine to King
Seat 7: neostreet (button) (small blind) showed [Qc Qs] and lost with three of a kind, Queens

After doubling up through me so improbably, frustrated immediately left the table. Utterly shell-shocked, I paid out one more big blind in a final hand with someone who joined the table at that point, then called it quits.

You may be wondering about the title of this post. Here's the explanation: I remember reading a comic book about 35 years ago which was a collection of stories of the supernatural. In one of them, a young man captures a leprechaun and it grants him a wish in return for its freedom. His wish is to bowl a really high score in bowling. The leprechaun grants him the wish, but warns him not to try to bowl a perfect 300. The young man agrees. When he starts bowling, however, he gets caught up in the excitement of bowling strike after strike. After 11 strikes, he only needs one more to get a perfect 300 score. Ignoring the leprechaun's warning, he throws another perfect ball, which heads right for the pocket and looks like it'll be a certain strike. However, the leprechaun appears in the lane just before the ball gets to the pocket and kicks it out of the way; none of the pins go down. Only the young man can see him; he's invisible to everyone else. Everyone else if mystified and flabbergasted by what they've just seen. The moral of the story is that it's not a good thing to chase perfection, particularly not with hubris. "Pride goeth before a fall", basically. I know I've been guilty of poker hubris lately, and an object lesson was certainly in order.

The poker gods were my invisible leprechauns tonight. My incredibly bad luck on the penultimate hand had me lying awake thinking over it. It added insult to injury that not only did my opponent make a straight, he made that rarest of rare hands, a straight flush. Since I hadn't memorized the hand, for quite a while I thought that the reason "frustrated" went all in was that he'd flopped a set of tens. I remembered the following facts about the hand: 1. I was dealt a pair of queens 2. he was dealt a pair of tens 3. the flop contained a queen, giving me a set 4. the turn was the king of diamonds 5. the river was the nine of diamonds 6. he made a straight flush with the 9 to king of diamonds 7. the PokerStars engine reported that I lost with a set of queens. So as you can see, I remembered everything except for two of the flop cards. Using the information I remembered, though, I was able to deduce that frustrated couldn't have flopped a set of 10s, for if he had, then I would have lost with a straight instead of with a set. When I realized he hadn't flopped anything but a long-shot straight draw, I realized he had bet extremely riskily and unwisely. Not only that, he'd done so from the very beginning of the hand, even before the flop. Going all in was an afterthought, really; he'd bet most of his stack before the flop. The only explanation I have for this absurd betting behavior was that he was fed up and frustrated.

Thinking over QQ vs. TT with a flop of Jd 3s Qd, there are only four ways the tens can win, each less likely than its predecessor: 1. either ten completes a straight 2. one of the tens completes a flush 3. both the turn and the river are tens, creating four of a kind, tens 4. one of the tens completes a straight flush. I knew that no full house could beat me, since I'd also have a full house in that case, and a guaranteed better one.

When I get a moment, I'm going to calculate the odds that TT beats QQ with that flop; I'm guessing it will be somewhere around the 1% mark.

delta: -34,800
balance: $365,827

Monday, March 22, 2010

Another milestone

Tonight, I reached another milestone; for the first time, I cracked the $400K barrier. I have to say, this hot streak I'm on is surprising even me! I'm doing so well, I need to reset my short term goals to give me something really challenging to shoot for. My new goal for the end of this month is to break $500K. I realize that's brash, absurd, and unrealistic, but I'm gonna give it a shot anyway!

I chased a flush tonight, but got away with it. It hit on the river, and paid off handsomely, to the tune of $47,200.

delta: $24,400
balance: $400,627

P.S. I started reading "The Biggest Game in Town", by A. Alvarez, on my Kindle last night.

Friday, March 19, 2010

The art of folding

Folding at the appropriate times is vital if you want to be successful. It doesn't always feel good, though. Folding a good hand when the price is just too steep to stay in the pot can be like taking cod liver oil. Actually, I've never had cod liver oil, but I'm reasonably sure it doesn't have a delightful taste!

Tonight the hand that hurt me to fold was trip 2s. I was dealt 6h 2s and the flop came 2c Th 2h. On the betting round after the flop, I doubled the bet when it was my turn to act, then called a reraise. The turn card was the jack of hearts, giving a flush possibility. The table checked around to the button, who bet a whopping $38,400. That was just too rich for my blood; not only was it likely that the button also had a 2, making my 6 kicker vulnerable, I couldn't ignore the flush possibility. I would have had to go all in to call. So I folded, with regret. The button's hole cards were 7 2 offsuit, giving him trip 2s; he raked in a pot worth $118,000. If I'd hung in, I'd have split the pot with him, since the river was a king.

The very next hand, though, I made an ace high flush -- the hard way. I was dealt 5s Ac, and the last four community cards were clubs. I won a pot worth $38,800, and decided to call it a night.

delta: $12,334
balance: $376,227

Thursday, March 18, 2010

Lucky seven

Tonight I hit seven winning sessions in a row. I feel like I can't lose! I've had that feeling before, and know how misleading it can be. The thing is, though, when you're in a groove like the one I'm in now, you really believe you'll stay in it, despite all the proof to the contrary you have from before.

I actually think the quality of the competition was tougher when I was playing the $5/$10 tables. I was struggling to win $500 here, $600 there, and too often succumbing to the fate of losing my whole starting stack of $2,000. I hit some serious revenue-neutral and even revenue-negative patches. Now that I'm back at the $100/$200 tables, it just feels like Easy Street!

It's hard to believe I was despairing of reaching 300K by the end of this month; now I'm setting my sights on 425K for the same timeframe. That's a stretch, but possible. If I keep on the current trajectory, I should hit 1 million in play money in about 128 more sessions, which would be less than a year from now. Time will tell!

delta: $18,500
balance: $363,893

Wednesday, March 17, 2010

A new high

Tonight my balance hit a new high for the first time in nearly a year; I'm psyched! My new new rule to never bet the pot saved my bacon tonight. The old me would have hit the felt for sure.

Here's the hand I'm talking about:

I was dealt: 7c 8c
the flop: 4s 5h 7d
the turn: Ac
the river: 6c

As you can see, I made the top straight on the flop, and there was no flush possibility on the board. There were two players besides me who made it to the river. I was sure that either I had the best hand, or at worst would split the pot with one of the others, if one of them also happened to have an 8. That meant it was to my advantage to keep raising until the weak link in the chain (one of the other two players) either went all in or folded. I figured I'd be getting at least half of the weak link's bets. The weak link did end up going all in. I felt so good about my hand I raised a couple of more times, but the other remaining player kept reraising me, so I called the third time the action was on me after the all-in. Imagine my shock and chagrin when the remaining player turned over 8d 9d, beating my 8 high straight with a 9 high! What are the odds of that happening? I leave that as an exercise for the reader.

Anyway, my point is that my earlier poker self would have been undisciplined enough to bet the pot in that situation, and would have quickly gone all in and hit the felt. As it was, my starting stack of $40K was suddenly down to $13K, but thankfully that was enough of a stake for me to work with; I wasn't crippled.

delta: $6,300
balance: $345,393

Monday, March 15, 2010

In the zone

I'm in the zone again. It's such a great place to be! I don't know how long it'll last, but I sure am enjoying it! Thinking it over, I wish I hadn't wimped out last June, and relegated myself to the $5/$10 tables. Who knows what my balance would be now if I hadn't? However, it wasn't a waste of time; I got in a lot of practice, and kept refining my techniques.

Like any other skill, poker requires practice. The more you play, the more automatic certain decisions become, simply due to the fact that you've been faced with them hundreds of times before. The more you play, the more you feel the rhythm of the luck. You should actually welcome the crap hands you must fold with extreme prejudice, since you need to go through your share of them before a premium hand gets dealt to you. When you get a premium hand, you need to pounce on it, but stealthily!

If you have just a tiny bit more patience than your opponents, that'll pay off huge dividends over time. Tonight my monster hand, well worth the wait, was a full house. I was dealt a pair of fours, and the flop came 9 9 4. Contrary to what I said recently, I didn't bet the pot the whole hand; I just kept betting healthy amounts which I steadily escalated. My river bet of $10,000 wasn't called, but I still raked in a pot worth $34,000.

After not having an opportunity to read my Kindle for a while, I got a chance this last weekend, and have now almost finished reading "Positively Fifth Street". I highly recommend it.

delta: $8,167
balance: $339,093

Thursday, March 11, 2010

Another wild ride

I keep on having to revise my rules, because I keep breaking them! Maybe I should just throw them out altogether. The arc of my play tonight was remarkable similar to that of my first "wild ride" session. I started out playing cautiously, went up about 5 grand early on, kept playing, went down about 2 grand, and then decided to leave the table because one of the players was routinely taking forever to act.

At the next table, I eventually lost my whole starting stack of $40K. Here's the bullshit part about my short-lived rule about never losing my whole starting stack -- it sounds great on paper, but it's impossible to put into practice. Quite often you have to go all in to protect a strong hand when you're playing at an aggressive table. This second table had some super aggressive players -- one of them built his stack up from about 70K to over 400K right before my eyes.

I actually had not one, but two losing pocket rocket hands at the second table. I was all in before the flop on the second one. One of the other two players in the hand was also all in before the flop, so we all got to see each other's cards before any community cards came out. Wouldn't you know, both of them also had pairs -- one jacks, the other kings. The flop came 7 J 9, the turn was another 9, and the river was an eight. So the set of jacks won, and I ate felt.

So now I was down roughly $42K after two tables, much like the other night. Like the other night, I disobeyed another of my rules and re-upped at another table. I made a quick 11K at that one, but it also had a slow player, so I left. At my fourth table, I made a killer pot very quickly. I had a full house, and raked in $80,100.

I now officially strike my rule against re-upping. It's much too limiting!

delta: $9,800
balance: $330,926

Wednesday, March 10, 2010

Controlled aggression

Now that I'm playing at the high roller tables again, I realize my playing philosophy at the "low roller" tables had a serious flaw -- namely, I played too many marginal hands because the price seemed so cheap. That's a good way to lose all your stack. With the minimum bet now $200 instead of $10, I'll correctly (and gladly) fold a lot more than I'd gotten accustomed to.

I see now that the size of the minimum bet should have no bearing at all on whether one is willing to play a hand. Rags are rags are rags (to paraphrase Gertrude Stein). I also see that some of my rules of thumb need to be adjusted for the "big boy" tables. For one, I should never allow myself to lose my whole starting stack, as I was willing to do at the cheaper tables. New rule: if your stack dips below half its starting amount, quit then and there. No ifs, ands, or buts. No sense playing in "poker death spiral" territory.

Tonight I only played two hands. The first I folded before the flop. The second one, I was dealt a pair of clubs, flopped two more, and got the last one on the river. Sweet! Here's my second new rule, which also refutes an earlier one: bet the pot when you're confident you have the best hand. I actually started putting this new rule into effect a couple of sessions ago.

Being ultra willing to fold, while also being ultra willing to bet the max, according to the cards and the situation -- that all adds up to a killer strategy. Controlled aggression, baby!

delta: $18,600
balance: $321,126

Sunday, March 7, 2010

Unconscious

Friends and neighbors, I hit the 300K plateau tonight. On Oscar night, no less! To give credit where credit is due, "friends and neighbors" is a favorite locution of Stephen King. Stephen King is one of my favorite authors. When I first realized he's only 11 and change years older than me, I became cognizant for the first time of what a fuckin' slacker I am! He wrote "Carrie" at an age when I was still trying to figure out what to do with my life.

Anyhow. Playing a "big boy" $100/$200 table (maximum starting stack $40,000) again tonight, I can provide only really sketchy details of what happened. The bottom line is that I played only 3 or 4 hands, but went to town on the penultimate one! I need to digress for just a moment.

When I was thirteen years old, a remarkable thing happened to me at summer camp. I'd never been much for baseball, but baseball was one of the camp games. To make a long story short, I hit a home run that year. The really memorable component of that momentous event is that I felt like I'd actually whiffed. I hit the ball so flush and pure that it felt like there was no impact at all; it was like I was just swinging through pure air. I happened to see this little pill of white vanishing into the distance, but I didn't feel in any way responsible for its remarkable flight.

That's how it was tonight on my big hand. I can't even tell you what my hole cards were -- it was that pure. I just know I hit it out of the stadium, rounded the bases, and called it a night.

delta: $14,800
balance: $302,526

Friday, March 5, 2010

A wild, wild ride

I changed things up tonight, in a major, major way. After I had another losing session, I decided to disobey all my rules! Fuck 'em! Not only did I re-up, I re-upped at a $100/$200 table instead of a $5/$10 table. Since PokerStars keeps everything proportional, the maximum initial starting stack at a $100/$200 table is a whopping $40,000, instead of the measly $2,000 at a $5/$10 table. Of course, I put up the max. I was cautious early on, folding everything. Finally, however, I got what I considered to be a betting hand. I was dealt a pair of jacks. The flop came 10 5 7, and the turn was a 2. I was all over this hand! Just my (bad) luck, the river was an ace. My pair of jacks lost to two pair, aces and tens. I was crippled, and soon enough hit the felt for the second time in one night.

At this point, I was down $42,000 on the night. $42,000! As they like to say on the intertubes, WTF ???!!! In a couple of hours, I'd negated what it had taken me over three months of blood, sweat, and tears to amass. My current PokerStars worth was actually less than what it had been when I'd started blogging on November 25th, 2009. Had I taken complete leave of my senses?

Guess what I did at this point? Damn me if I didn't re-up for another $40,000! And this time, lady luck smiled on me. A stealth two pair of aces and tens won me an ungodly pot of $89,880. As far as I know, it was the biggest single pot I've ever won in my poker life. So let's break it down:

table 1: -$2,000
table 2: -$40,000
table 3: $49,680

delta: $7,680
balance: $287,726

The way I'm feeling now, caution be damned! Life's meant to be lived! I could easily make $300,000 by the end of my next session! Of course, I could just as easily backslide to $200,000. Tonight I finally realized that since starting this blog, I just wasn't willing enough to risk big to get a big reward. From now on, you'll see a lot more volatility in my results, but I promise it won't be boring!

Thursday, March 4, 2010

Two killer rivers

It's official; I'm still in my slump. I was done in tonight by two strokes of bad luck on the river. There's nothing you can do when that happens but take your lumps. On the first hand, I was dealt K Q offsuit and the flop came 8 9 K. The turn and the river were both sixes. I lost to a set of sixes. The only reason that player stayed in the hand was that he was dealt a 6 7 offsuit and was holding out for a straight. On the second hand, I flopped a flush, built up the pot nicely, but lost to a full house (made on the river). Losing that second one crippled my stack.

My bold goal of reaching $300,000 by the end of the month is looking more and more like an impossible dream.

delta: -$2,000
balance: $280,046

Good news and bad news

The good news: my streak of losing sessions ended last night. The bad news: it ended with a whimper, not a bang; for all intents and purposes, I ended up even on the night. It's too early to tell whether I'm out of my latest slump yet or not.

The thing about slumps is that a winning session here or there doesn't end them, just like a losing session here or there doesn't stem the tide of a rising moving average. I've had the good fortune to be on a slowly rising tide for most of my poker life, so I can weather an ebb or two!

Things got kind of crazy towards the end of the session. After not winning many pots all night, suddenly I was winning them in bunches. At first I just wanted my stack to return to its starting size, from being about $250 down. When I got there, though, I decided to play just one more hand; then when I won that one, just another, etc. I got up to $2,500 and should have cashed out right there, but succumbed to the desire to play just one more. Here's how my final hand went down:

chips at start of hand: $2,528
dealt to me: Qc Jh; I called a raise to $40
flop: Qs 2c 9h; I opened the betting at $100, and called a raise to $300
turn: 6s; the player who raised me on the flop bet $500, and I folded
net loss on the hand: $340

An expensive way to end my night. It was silly to call the raise on the flop, but I was lulled into a sense of invulnerability by having won 3 of the last 4 pots prior to that one.

Here are my stats from the session, according to PokerStars:

During current Hold'em session you were dealt 66 hands and saw flop:
- 15 out of 15 times while in big blind (100%)
- 13 out of 15 times while in small blind (86%)
- 35 out of 36 times in other positions (97%)
- a total of 63 out of 66 (95%)
Pots won at showdown - 7 of 9 (77%)
Pots won without showdown - 6

It would have been a great night if I could have just avoided that last call. Another costly lapse.

delta: $188
balance: $282,046

Tuesday, March 2, 2010

A bad read

I had a short session tonight because of a bad read. However, I don't feel too bad about it. Reads will be wrong a fair percentage of the time; there's no getting around that. What I feel obscurely good about is that I stayed true to my read, right to the bitter end!

Here's how it went down: the player to my immediate left lost all his chips, sat out for a while, then replenished them. I mentally pegged him as a player willing to take big risks. I was playing very cautiously, but was getting tired of not getting to any showdowns. When the button came around again to the player to my left, I was dealt a K 2 offsuit. Eminently foldable. I should have folded, but wanted to see if I could catch a king, so I stayed in the hand. Obviously not the most stellar reasoning in the world, since even if I caught one I'd be a sitting duck for anyone else with a king, thanks to my weakest of kickers.

The flop came K 6 A rainbow. I had middle pair -- very dicey. Nobody bet until it got around to the button, who bet like he had an ace. My read was that he was bluffing, since I had him pegged as a risky player. It's the easiest thing in the world to bluff when you're the last to act and nobody has bet yet. The thing is, if you're bluffing well, there's no difference in your betting pattern from the way you'd have bet if you weren't bluffing.

The button made continuation bets, and I called every one until I was all in. Wouldn't you know, the button did have an ace; my pair of kings lost to his pair of aces. I started the hand with $1,465 in chips and ended it with felt. A very expensive middle pair! Very foolish of me, you'll say, and quite likely you'll be right. But that's okay -- I'm just getting some more "seasoning" in :-)

delta: -$2,000
balance: $281,858

Monday, March 1, 2010

Poker archeology redux

After writing this post, I'll be all caught up with my mini-backlog. Of course, I wouldn't have had a backlog if I'd just kept winning :-) It's human nature to be more interested in crowing about one's victories than about cataloging and analysing one's defeats.

Saturday night's session was longer than Friday's, and I won my share of pots; that itself was an improvement on Friday, when I didn't win a single pot. However, the end result was the same -- felt; green, unforgiving felt.

I think the maximum stack size I achieved during the session was $2,300. If I could have heeded my own oft-stated advice, I would have quit right there. Woulda coulda shoulda!

In lieu of analysis, I'll just dig once more into the session archives to highlight some memorable hands:

- dealt: Qh 9h flop: 9c 9s 9d, turn and river immaterial. The first time in my poker life I've ever flopped a quad! pot: $1,250

- dealt: 6s 4s flop: Js Ts 6d turn: 9h river: 6h my trip 6s lost to a jack high straight. pot: $2,790

- dealt: Qs Ah flop: 5h 8c Qc turn: 6c river 7d my pair of queens lost to two pair, sevens and sizes. pot: $1,320

- dealt: Qd As flop: Js 2s 7s turn: Jd river: Qs my ace high flush beat two other flushes. main pot: $1,150 Unfortunately, I didn't have enough money left to bet more, and the better of the other two flushes won a bigger side pot of $1,670

- last hand: 5d 5h flop: 9c Qc Qd turn: Tc river: Ah my two pair of queens and fives lost to a full house, aces full of queens

delta: -$2,000
balance: 283,858

Anatomy of a poker death spiral

As a rule, I post on the same night I play. Of course, there are always exceptions! As I write this, I have a backlog of two sessions to record -- last Friday's and last Saturday's.

Friday's session was a textbook example of a poker death spiral. As it turns out, I didn't win a single hand. However, I wasn't making bonehead plays, either, so I played a lot of hands before hitting the felt.

Here's the anatomy of a typical poker death spiral, as I've experienced them:

stage 1: you lose the first third of your stack. This typically doesn't take very long. You don't catch any big hands, so you do a lot of folding. You nibble on marginal hands to see the flop if it isn't too expensive. This stage is usually a straight drop down. You don't feel any sense of urgency or panic yet.

stage 2: you lose the next half of your stack. The way this stage plays out can vary somewhat. Often, a big chunk of this loss will be on one hand, where you finally got a really good hand after dozens of mediocre ones, but happen to lose out to a better one. This middle stage lasts the longest of the three, and usually your stack will go up and down many times. You don't start to feel any urgency until you realize you're down to the last sixth of your stack. At that point, you adopt a fatalistic attitude; you know the odds are excellent that you're going down in flames.

stage 3: you lose the last one sixth of your stack. In this stage, you're typically severely short-stacked, and have no option but to play any marginally decent hand. You're guaranteed to be forced to go all-in without enough information for making that decision. Sometimes you'll get a Lazarus-like resurrection which will take your stack back up to half its original size, or almost half; the smart play to make at this time is to end the session. I haven't been able to make that smart play a single time!

There are two very common player behaviors during poker death spirals:

1. you'll be extra cautious sometime in stage 2, and will miss out on a big pot; this will influence your later play in this stage, causing you to play too riskily

2. you'll be so starved for good cards that when you finally get some, you'll tend to overvalue them; you can lose a lot of chips that way

I exhibited both of these behaviors on Friday.

delta: -$2,000
balance: $285,858