Feeling the outliers

It's easy to spot outliers when you're looking at a bar chart. They're the bars which are head and shoulders above (or below) their neighbors. However, most often you'll only have access to such a chart sometime after your session ends. It's a good poker skill to be able to feel the outliers as they happen.This can be very easy to do, such as when you double up or hit the felt, but it can also be quite difficult, such as during those sessions where no hand delta comes anywhere near even half of your starting stack amount.

Last Thursday night, through 83 hands, the largest amount I'd won on a single hand was $2,247, and the largest amount I'd lost on a single hand was $3,200. On hand 84, I won a pot worth $13,100 for a hand delta of $8,300, and immediately felt that this was an outlier. Since my general trend had been downward, I decided to call it a night right then.

delta: $-15,342
balance: $6,262,049