Wednesday, December 31, 2014

Three firsts

Last night, I played in two MTTs, and achieved three firsts:

1. I made the money in an MTT for which I late registered
2. I made the money in an MTT where I actually lost money
3. I made the money in multiple MTTs in a single session

I've now played 17 MTT 8-games, and made the money in 10 of them. One beneficial side effect is that my Omaha game is improving slightly; to be fair, it couldn't have gotten much worse :-)

buy_in entry_fee num_players num_hands place winnings

  4500       500           6       122    13     5850
  4500       500           6        80    15     4440


delta: $290
MTT 8-game balance: $70,430
balance: $9,565,460


Tuesday, December 30, 2014

Late registration considered harmful

Last night, I played two MTT 8-games again, and again made the money in the second one. So far, I'm maintaining the MTT golden ratio. One thing I can't help but notice, however, is that I've never made the money in the first MTT of a multiple MTT session. Why might that be? I have a theory. I think it's likely due to the fact that a fair percentage of the time in such situations, I'm late registering for that first MTT. Late registration definitely has its pluses and minuses. I'm starting to think the minuses outweigh the pluses. The biggest minus is that when you late register, you're giving yourself a shorter runway for takeoff. If you don't manage to get airborne fast, you're going to crash pretty quickly. The biggest plus is that there's dead money in the prize pool - entry fees that belonged to players who have already busted, meaning there are less players to contend with.

I happened to notice that last night's second MTT and the previous night's second MTT both started at the exact same time - 11:42pm eastern standard time. That could be a coincidence, but intuition tells me it's not. I firmly believe another MTT 8-game will start tonight at that time. If I were smart, I'd wait around until 11:42 and only enter one MTT tonight. However, intuition also tells me I won't have the patience to do that :-)

buy_in entry_fee num_players num_hands place winnings

  4500       500           6        16    45        0
  4500       500           6       196     4    34800

delta: $24,800
MTT 8-game balance: $70,140
balance: $9,565,170

Monday, December 29, 2014

Sunk costs epiphany

Last night, I played two MTT 8-games, and managed to make the money in the second one by the slimmest of margins. I came in 18th, the final paid place. I was flirting with oblivion from hand 75 on. I made a costly mistake on hand 106 which made me realize I need to be much more systematic about calculating pot odds and using them to help me make good poker decisions. In other words, I need to start doing a little bit more math at the table, and a little bit less flying by the seat of my pants :-)

One of the positive outcomes of this realization is that I've finally taken the time to get to the bottom of a poker question which has been bothering me off and on for at least the last two years. Simply stated, it's this: does the amount of money one has put into the pot already have any bearing on a pot odds decision? Intuitively, it seems like it should, but it actually has no bearing at all. I had to go through the exercise of comparing and contrasting several poker scenarios to prove this to myself. I got corroboration of this by reading several pertinent articles I found on the topic of sunk costs, which I include here for reference:

http://www.pokerology.com/articles/the-sunk-cost-effect/
http://www.zeninvestor.org/behavioral-finance-2/the-sunk-cost-fallacy-what-it-is-and-how-to-avoid-it/
http://www.nj.com/onlinegamblingnj/index.ssf/2013/12/how_the_sunk_cost_fallacy_can.html

It's actually great news that each poker decision can be made on its own merits, without reference to what has happened before; it makes the math much simpler :-)

buy_in entry_fee num_players num_hands place winnings

  4500       500           6        12    46        0
  4500       500           6       108    18     5200


delta: $-4,800
MTT 8-game balance: $45,340
balance: $9,540,370

Sunday, December 28, 2014

Non-paying places no object

One of the quirks of tournaments with late registration is that there's no easy way to tell how well you did when you finish out of the money. Whenever you bust, you finish one place below the number of active players at that time. If you bust really early on, before a lot of late entrants register, your finishing place can look much more respectable than it should. A better barometer for how well you did is therefore not your finishing place, but the number of hands you played. Last night, I finished in 59th place, which doesn't look too stellar, but managed to play 47 hands, which isn't that shabby. The hand that really hurt my chances was hand 19, when the flavor was Stud Hi/Lo Limit; I lost more than half my stack. I ran the numbers afterwards, and I was a 65.29% favorite after sixth street, but it wasn't meant to be. This was another one of those times I wished Stud had a no limit variant :-)

buy_in entry_fee num_players num_hands place winnings

  4500       500           6        47    59        0


delta: $-5,000
MTT 8-game balance: $50,140
balance: $9,545,170

Saturday, December 27, 2014

The golden ratio for MTTs

Every poker style has its golden ratio. Briefly stated, that's the ratio of winning sessions to losing sessions which you must achieve in order to assure yourself of making a profit. For the first 3 1/2 years of my online poker career, the only poker style I played was cash game, so there was only one golden ratio I needed to worry about - the cash game golden ratio. It quickly became apparent to me that the cash game golden ratio is 2; as long as you win twice as many sessions as you lose, you'll be in the clover. From my brief experience of MTTs, I have a candidate for the MTT golden ratio. Not to keep you in suspense, I believe it's 1. Two slight alterations of the canonical golden ratio formula are required for MTTs:

1. rather than counting sessions, tournaments entered must be counted instead
2. rather than looking strictly at profit, what counts as a profit is "making the money", i.e., finishing in a paid position. It turns out that the payout schemes for MTTs on PokerStars sometimes have the lowest payouts below the level of the buy in plus the entry fee. In other words, you can "make the money" and still end up losing money.

Counting last night, I've now played 10 MTT 8-game tournaments, and have made the money in 6 of them. Therefore, I'm currently achieving the golden ratio in MTT 8-games, with a little room to spare :-)

buy_in entry_fee num_players num_hands place winnings

  4500       500           6       131    15     5730


delta: $730
MTT 8-game balance: $55,140
balance: $9,550,170

Friday, December 26, 2014

Staying above the clouds

I've figured out how to do well in MTTs. Unfortunately, I don't have any kind of recipe, or practical advice. The goal is easy to state, but there aren't any concrete steps I can enumerate which will guarantee success. What you need to do is stay above the clouds. By that I mean you must always have enough chips to be able to fold at any time. By having one of the largest stacks, you can pick your own fights, and stay away from any fights your opponents are trying to pick with you.

Last night I played two MTT 8-games. The first one was a bust, but I came in second in the second one. I stayed above the clouds most of the time. Understandably, I was very pleased with my play; however, it could definitely have been improved upon. Most notably, I made a major mistake when we got down to three handed play. Playing Limit Stud, I got confused and thought I was playing Limit Stud Hi/Lo. When I made the nut low on the river, which was also a five high straight, I bet it out, believing I had a chance to scoop the whole pot. I lost to a higher straight. Pretty stupid, I know. Luckily for me, there's no such thing as no limit stud :-) I would have finished in third place for sure if there were.

buy_in entry_fee num_players num_hands place winnings

  4500       500           6        84    31        0
  4500       500           6       225     2    60630


delta: $50,630
MTT 8-game balance: $54,410
balance: $9,549,440

Thursday, December 25, 2014

Second MTT final table

Last night, on Christmas Eve, I made my second ever MTT final table. Like the first time, it was an 8-game tournament. Also like the first time, I came in fourth. I'm now net positive in MTT 8-games, having made the money in four of the seven I've entered. One habit I've gotten into while playing these wonderfully fun MTTs is picking an opponent somewhat at random and tracking my progress against his/hers over the course of the tournament. The reason my selection is only somewhat at random is that I always pick someone who has more chips than I do :-) I figure if I can keep up with that person, I'll be doing okay. It's working out pretty well so far.

buy_in entry_fee num_players num_hands place winnings

  4500       500           6       149     4    32510


delta: $27,510
MTT 8-game balance: $3,780
balance: $9,498,810

Wednesday, December 24, 2014

Dream poker

I haven't remembered a dream in quite a while. I can remember remembering them, though :-) One dream I remember remembering must have occurred about 4 or 5 years ago. As I thought about it afterwards, I realized it had been a dream about poker. Like all dreams, this one had distorted reality for its own unknown purposes, but there was an underlying reality there all the same. How realistic can a dream about poker be if it doesn't include playing cards? As it turns out, quite realistic. Every poker player who's played long enough knows what it feels like to be running hot. In this dream, I was running hot. I could do no wrong. I knew I had this special skill, and the skill was working like a charm. I was sitting at a table, with other people. We were competing by doing something with our hands, but there were no cards. I remember this feeling of euphoria, and rightness; I remember feeling I was doing what I was born to do. I wasn't prideful in the dream; I didn't think the skill was something I could take credit for. All I knew was that I had it, and it felt so good and right to use it. I imagine that's how I'll feel the first time I win an MTT.

buy_in entry_fee num_players num_hands place winnings

  4500       500           6        40    61        0
  9000      1000           6         9    78        0
  4500       500           6        53    24        0
  4500       500           6        70    12     7350


delta: $-17,650
MTT 8-game balance: $-23,730
balance: $9,471,300

Tuesday, December 23, 2014

The beauty of versatility

By a series of happy accidents, occurring over a long period of time, I think I've finally found my perfect poker niche. For a long time, I believed it was cash game pot limit hold'em. For an even long time, I believed it was cash game no limit hold'em. At times I wanted it to be (but acknowledge it never was) cash game pot limit Omaha. At other times I wanted it to be (but acknowledge it never was) cash game deuce to the seven triple draw lowball. At other times I wanted it to be (but acknowledge it never was) cash game seven card stud. At still other times I wanted it to be (but acknowledge it never was) sit and go no limit hold'em. Imagine my surprise to discover that the most fun I have at a poker table is when I'm playing MTT 8-games. The best flavor of poker to play, regardless of how well you do at it, is the flavor that provides you with the most fun. Of course, the better you do, the funner it is :-)

Last night, I cashed in my third MTT in a row. The first and third were MTT 8-games; the middle one was an MTT no limit hold'em I entered the session before last when no 8-game was in the offing. Probably not coincidentally, I barely made the money in the MTT no limit hold'em, but finished quite a bit higher in the 8-games.

Am I really good at 8-games, or is this a fluke? I'm pretty sure it's not a fluke, since I did very well in sit and go 8-games before I ever thought of playing MTTs. Why am I good at 8-games? The answer's pretty simple. I'm not the best at any of the games, but I'm quite good at all of them. That means I can pretty much trounce anyone who's the best at one or two of the flavors.

buy_in entry_fee num_players num_hands place winnings

  4500       500           6       151     7    14470


delta: $9,470
8-game tournament balance: $395,620
balance: $9,488,950

Monday, December 22, 2014

Min cash

Last night, I cashed in my second straight MTT. It was a min cash, as I came in 18th and 18 places were paid. I think the total number of entrants was 90. One definite vibe I'm getting from MTTs is that a lot of not very good players enter them :-) That definitely increases my chances of doing well.

One really nice feature of the software is that you can see where you stand in the tournament at any time. Towards the end, I knew I was really near the money bubble, and also knew my chip stack was really short. I ended up folding my way into the money :-)

buy_in entry_fee num_players num_hands place winnings

  9000      1000           6        44    18    16600


delta: $6,600
MTT balance: $-23,950
balance: $9,479,480

Sunday, December 21, 2014

First MTT cash

Last night, I cashed for the first time in an MTT (multi-table tournament). It was only the third MTT I've ever entered. Pretty heady stuff, considering there were 77 entrants. I came in fourth. I was the chip leader when the final table began, but got way too frisky on a deuce hand, which dropped me quickly down to being one of the short stacks. I'm very happy with the way I played overall.

I realize I need to pick a buy in level and stick with it. The last go around with tournaments, I decided the $50,000 buy in level was my bread and butter. This time, I'm going to drop all the way down to the $5,000 buy in level.

I'm super excited about playing MTTs; it's such a rush!

buy_in entry_fee num_players num_hands place winnings

  4500       500           6       191     4    29450


delta: $24,450
8-game tournament balance: $386,150
balance: $9,472,880

Saturday, December 20, 2014

A wonderful new toy

Last night, I played two 8-game tournaments. However, for the first time ever in my PokerStars experience, they weren't 6 player sit and gos. Instead, they were multi-table tournaments. That meant that they were scheduled to start at a set time, regardless of how many people had signed up by then, and accepted late registrations for a lengthy period after the official start time. One of the really intriguing features of multi-table tournaments is that you never know when you register how big the prize pool will grow to be. Obviously, the more players that register, the bigger the prize pool gets, and consequently the bigger the prizes.

I have to say, I'm already hooked on multi-table 8-game tournaments. They're what I see myself playing for the foreseeable future. They're just so much fun, and such great value for money! The only quibble I have with the software is that in the auto-generated logs, the number of registered players at the time of one's tournament exit doesn't appear, so there's no way to know precisely how well one did unless one manually saves this number at the time of exit.

I'm going to give myself even a longer tournament leash than when I last played them. I'm prepared to lose five million play dollars (more than half of my current bankroll) playing tournaments, and will consider it money well spent for the entertainment value alone.

buy_in entry_fee num_players num_hands place winnings

 45000      5000           6        73    21        0
  4500       500           6        58    42        0


delta: $-55,000
8-game tournament balance: $361,700
balance: $9,448,430

Friday, December 19, 2014

Consolation

Every time I lose a session, I look for a silver lining. Sometimes, it's easy to find one. Other times, as with last night's session, not so much. The best one I can come up with for last night's session is that I was net positive on my all ins. Here are the numbers:

     -5174 3d 3s hand  65
      9927 Qc Kh hand 115
      5525 6s 2d hand 124


I have a hankering to play an 8-game sit and go tonight, so that's just what I'm going to do :-)

During current Hold'em session you were dealt 127 hands and saw flop:
 - 17 out of 20 times while in big blind (85%)
 - 12 out of 18 times while in small blind (66%)
 - 55 out of 89 times in other positions (61%)
 - a total of 84 out of 127 (66%)
 Pots won at showdown - 9 of 24 (37%)
 Pots won without showdown - 12

delta: $-91,515
cash game no limit hold'em balance: $6,598,331
balance: $9,503,430

Thursday, December 18, 2014

Aces cracked and mended

Last night, on the penultimate hand of the session, I had my seventh most lucrative cash game no limit hold'em hand ever. I was dealt pocket rockets, and went all in pre flop with them. I'm pretty sure my aces were cracked on the flop, then mended on the river. The flop had two queens in it, and I felt sure one of the three opponents who called me had a queen. Luckily for me, I spiked an ace on the river for a full house, aces full of queens. Let me check the archives to see if my foreboding was justified ... As it turns out, it wasn't; none of my opponents had a queen, so I didn't need to spike an ace to win the monster pot of $155,132. In reality my aces were neither cracked nor mended. Still, it makes for a good blog post title :-)

During current Hold'em session you were dealt 56 hands and saw flop:
 - 9 out of 13 times while in big blind (69%)
 - 4 out of 10 times while in small blind (40%)
 - 15 out of 33 times in other positions (45%)
 - a total of 28 out of 56 (50%)
 Pots won at showdown - 2 of 8 (25%)
 Pots won without showdown - 2

delta: $54,632
cash game no limit hold'em balance: $6,689,846
balance: $9,594,945

Wednesday, December 17, 2014

Getting it in good

I've used this blog post title before, but it's good enough to use again :-) In poker, you always want to get your money in good. Essentially, that means getting it in when you're a big favorite. Now that I have a "did it float?" utility, my modified definition of getting it in good means that the decision to put all your chips in floated, i.e., had a net positive long term return on investment. You don't always have to go all in to be able to answer the "did it float?" question, although that's the most usual case. The other case is when another player, who you have covered, goes all in, and you call. The key component of being able to answer the "did it float?" question is that the decision point where you're asking the question was your last decision of the hand.

Last night, my three biggest hands in terms of the absolute values of the deltas were all losses. In all three, the "did it float?" question applied. Here are the numbers:

558000 (2758000 2200000)
504152 (1903676 1399524)
-951920 (1600000 2551920)


What this boils down to is that I got the money in good in two of the three hands. If I'd won those two hands, I still would have lost money on the night, but it would have been a lot less than I actually lost - only $20,092, instead of $102,164. So that means I was actually playing pretty well for playing so shittily :-) Poker's like that sometimes.

During current Hold'em session you were dealt 128 hands and saw flop:
 - 18 out of 21 times while in big blind (85%)
 - 8 out of 20 times while in small blind (40%)
 - 42 out of 87 times in other positions (48%)
 - a total of 68 out of 128 (53%)
 Pots won at showdown - 7 of 16 (43%)
 Pots won without showdown - 9

delta: $-102,164
cash game no limit hold'em balance: $6,635,214
balance: $9,540,313

Tuesday, December 16, 2014

Double stealth double up

The poker hands where much money is both won and lost are the ones where multiple players have the flop hit their hands hard. One common way this can happen is what I call double stealth. That's when two players have stealth hands. By definition, no pair appears in the flop when there's a stealth hand. Stealth hands are wired in to the board. There are several double stealth scenarios. Here are two of the most common:

1. both players have a stealth two pair
2. one player has a stealth two pair and the other player has a set

A set, by definition, is a stealth hand. It's non-stealth cousin is called trips :-) Last night, double stealth arose on hand 20. I'd been dealt 5h 5c, and the flop came 7d 5d Th. I went all in, and actually got a caller. He'd been dealt 7c Tc, so he had a stealth two pair. My set held up, and I won a pot worth $103,504, $51,752 of which was o.p.m. (other people's money). That gave me the freedom to play a lot longer if I wanted, and still be assured of a profit on the night. I decided not to play that many more hands.

During current Hold'em session you were dealt 29 hands and saw flop:
 - 5 out of 5 times while in big blind (100%)
 - 3 out of 5 times while in small blind (60%)
 - 13 out of 19 times in other positions (68%)
 - a total of 21 out of 29 (72%)
 Pots won at showdown - 3 of 3 (100%)
 Pots won without showdown - 7

delta: $51,008
cash game no limit hold'em balance: $6,737,378
balance: $9,642,477

Monday, December 15, 2014

10 New York minutes

On Saturday night, I set a new personal best for futility. In just eight hands, I lost $150,000. The whole process took just over eight minutes - in other words, 10 New York minutes :-) I've only lost more money in a single session of cash game no limit hold'em once, and I've never lost that much money that fast. Here are the hands I was dealt, along with the hand deltas:

As Jc      $3,275
Jd Jc     $-4,000
8s 4s       $-500
Kh Kd    $-35,000
Ks Kc    $-13,775
9h Kh        $630
Js Kd    $-50,630
Jc Kh    $-50,000


I hit the felt at the end of hands 5, 7, and 8. On hand 8, I was a 95.45% favorite after the turn, but my opponent hit a 2 outer on the river. Whatcha gonna do? :-)

During current Hold'em session you were dealt 8 hands and saw flop:
 - 1 out of 1 times while in big blind (100%)
 - 0 out of 0 times while in small blind (0%)
 - 7 out of 7 times in other positions (100%)
 - a total of 8 out of 8 (100%)
 Pots won at showdown - 2 of 7 (28%)
 Pots won without showdown - 0

delta: $-150,000
cash game no limit hold'em balance: $6,686,370
balance: $9,591,469

Saturday, December 13, 2014

The cruelest hand

Last night, I suffered the cruelest hand of my career. At least, it was the cruelest I can remember. The cruelty of a cruel hand has nothing to do with how much you lose on it; rather, it has to do with the false hope it instills in you, and the irony that it is that false hope alone which causes you to lose your money. Of course, it adds to the pathos if you happen to hit the felt on the hand, and also if you happen to lose a good amount of money on it. The icing on the cake is if you use both your hole cards and the river card to make your best hand. The more wired in you are to the board, the less likely it is for an opponent to be wired in harder. All of these factors were true in the final hand of last night's session. I was dealt Ts Qh. The flop came 9c 6s 6h. The turn was the jack of spades. The river was the king of hearts. So, as you can see, I "got there" on the river; I made a king high straight. It was the higher of the two possible straights I could have made on the river. Since I was using both my hole cards, and neither of them was the low card of the straight, there was no straight that could beat me. Since the board didn't have three cards to a flush, my hand couldn't be beaten by a flush. The only hands that could beat me were a full house or a four of a kind. The fact that the river card delivered me my straight made it less likely that it also delivered my opponent a full house. And yet, that's precisely what happened. My opponent turned over Ks 6c, and won a pot worth $71,486 with a full house, sixes full of kings. I lost $35,118 on the hand, hit the felt, and quit for the night. That was the second time I'd hit the felt in the session. I know when I'm not wanted :-)

During current Hold'em session you were dealt 64 hands and saw flop:
 - 6 out of 8 times while in big blind (75%)
 - 6 out of 8 times while in small blind (75%)
 - 25 out of 48 times in other positions (52%)
 - a total of 37 out of 64 (57%)
 Pots won at showdown - 3 of 8 (37%)
 Pots won without showdown - 3

delta: $-100,000
cash game no limit hold'em balance: $6,836,370
balance: $9,741,469

Friday, December 12, 2014

Pocks and freqs

I want to talk a little bit about pocks and freqs. Pocks are pocket pairs. Freqs are frequencies of occurrence. Every pock has a freq of 221. That is to say, every pocket pair occurs, on average, once every 221 hands. Since the vast majority of the sessions I play are less than 221 hands in length, that means that it's generally more likely than not that any particular pocket pair will not occur in a session. Last night, a freq-y thing happened :-) I got pocket fours multiple times. Four times, in fact! That turns out to be 6.41 times as frequently as they should have occurred. I was aware that fours kept coming up, but only remember them coming up three times. The fourth time was the charm. I flopped a set, ended up going all in, and won a side pot worth $50,708 and a main pot worth $74,882. It was the most lucrative pocket fours hand of my career by far, and my 14th most lucrative pocket pair.

During current Hold'em session you were dealt 138 hands and saw flop:
 - 15 out of 18 times while in big blind (83%)
 - 6 out of 15 times while in small blind (40%)
 - 62 out of 105 times in other positions (59%)
 - a total of 83 out of 138 (60%)
 Pots won at showdown - 9 of 17 (52%)
 Pots won without showdown - 11

delta: $25,590
cash game no limit hold'em balance: $6,936,370
balance: $9,841,469

Thursday, December 11, 2014

The $500,000 yardstick

Though I measure my play wealth in millions, I often gauge my progress in half millions. $500,000 turns out to be a pretty good yardstick for how well or how poorly I'm doing. Encouraged by realizing last night that I'd had a very good eight session run, I decided to widen my observation window to see if I've been doing better for an even longer period. Sure enough, including last night's win, I've had a run of twelve winning sessions out of fifteen. In that stretch, I've made a profit of $499,979. My cash game no limit hold'em blue distance is down to a reachable $101,147. Things are looking up!

During current Hold'em session you were dealt 76 hands and saw flop:
 - 8 out of 10 times while in big blind (80%)
 - 6 out of 12 times while in small blind (50%)
 - 29 out of 54 times in other positions (53%)
 - a total of 43 out of 76 (56%)
 Pots won at showdown - 4 of 10 (40%)
 Pots won without showdown - 10

delta: $29,781
cash game no limit hold'em balance: $6,910,780
balance: $9,815,879

Wednesday, December 10, 2014

The new normal

One of the great things about poker is that it's constantly changing on you. It's truly protean :-) When you think you're really in a rut, you might happen to look up and suddenly realize you just won seven of your last eight sessions. That's what happened to me after last night's session. Welcome news, indeed! No matter how much attention you think you're paying to what's going on, these streaks still manage to get the jump on you. The new normal starts happening before you realize. Very much like life :-)

During current Hold'em session you were dealt 23 hands and saw flop:
 - 2 out of 3 times while in big blind (66%)
 - 3 out of 4 times while in small blind (75%)
 - 11 out of 16 times in other positions (68%)
 - a total of 16 out of 23 (69%)
 Pots won at showdown - 2 of 2 (100%)
 Pots won without showdown - 4

delta: $52,630
cash game no limit hold'em balance: $6,880,999
balance: $9,786,098

Tuesday, December 9, 2014

Many zeroes to cross

Last night, I had nine zero crossings. That tied for 13th place on my all time list of cash game no limit hold'em zero crossings. That means I achieved consecutive top 20s! I'm on a roll :-) Obviously, the more zero crossings you have, the more you're treading water. It's not a good idea to have a high zero crossings number. The best number to have is 0 (if you win your first hand of the night) or 1 (if you don't). If you're going to have a high number, you have to try to end the session when your last zero crossing was one of the good kind, putting you into the black. I managed that last night.

During current Hold'em session you were dealt 66 hands and saw flop:
 - 6 out of 9 times while in big blind (66%)
 - 4 out of 9 times while in small blind (44%)
 - 28 out of 48 times in other positions (58%)
 - a total of 38 out of 66 (57%)
 Pots won at showdown - 5 of 10 (50%)
 Pots won without showdown - 8

delta: $12,776
cash game no limit hold'em balance: $6,828,369
balance: $9,733,468

Monday, December 8, 2014

Another top 20

The more poker sessions I've played, the harder it is for a session to make it into the top 10 in some category. So I'm now declaring that 20 is the new 10 :-) If a session manages to make it into the top 20 in some category, I now consider that a pretty big deal. That was the case last night. In honor of how many pots I won without a showdown last night, I came up with a new poker statistic, pots won without showdown percentage; it's the ratio of pots won without a shodown to the total number of hands played. Here are the top 20:

0.2917  2014-04-25
0.2647  2013-04-08
0.2500  2013-05-08
0.2500  2013-02-20
0.2381  2014-11-17
0.2367  2013-10-14
0.2346  2013-05-28
0.2333  2013-08-05
0.2327  2013-12-06
0.2308  2013-08-23
0.2308  2013-03-29
0.2297  2013-10-13
0.2268  2014-10-02
0.2222  2014-01-06
0.2093  2012-03-24
0.2039  2012-06-27
0.2024  2013-08-29
0.2000  2014-12-06
0.2000  2014-07-03
0.2000  2013-08-21


The bar chart of my stack size over the course of the session has an unusual shape - a steady upward trend. I'll take it :-)

During current Hold'em session you were dealt 70 hands and saw flop:
 - 8 out of 8 times while in big blind (100%)
 - 8 out of 9 times while in small blind (88%)
 - 33 out of 53 times in other positions (62%)
 - a total of 49 out of 70 (70%)
 Pots won at showdown - 7 of 15 (46%)
 Pots won without showdown - 14

delta: $75,515
cash game no limit hold'em balance: $6,815,593
balance: $9,720,692

Saturday, December 6, 2014

Hello, Mr. Chips

Last night, two record highs in my poker career were set. One of them had nothing to do with me, and the other very little, but they were interesting all the same. The one that had very little to do with me was the record high for the number of chips at the start of a hand, summing the chip stacks of all the active players at the table. It was an eye-popping $1,814,762, over $34,000 more than the previous high. The one that had nothing do with me was the record high for the starting stack of a single player at the start of a hand; this one was was an incredible $870,640, over $194,000 more than the previous high. Hello, Mr. Chips!

Players at this table were playing aggressively, so I tightened up my play accordingly. I bided my time, and was ultimately rewarded with a monster hand. I won a pot worth $198,446 with an ace high flush, and called it a night the next hand.

During current Hold'em session you were dealt 45 hands and saw flop:
 - 2 out of 5 times while in big blind (40%)
 - 3 out of 5 times while in small blind (60%)
 - 15 out of 35 times in other positions (42%)
 - a total of 20 out of 45 (44%)
 Pots won at showdown - 4 of 7 (57%)
 Pots won without showdown - 0

delta: $97,946
cash game no limit hold'em balance: $6,740,078
balance: $9,645,177

Friday, December 5, 2014

Repenting at leisure

There's an old saying, "Marry in haste, repent at leisure". This lesson applies to poker as well; it can be paraphrased, "Be frisky in haste, repent at leisure". When you play poker friskily, you're likely to hit the felt. It generally takes a long time to recover from that, if you can manage it at all. Last night, I hit the felt on hand 17, playing much too friskily. I lost a whopping $41,204 on the hand. I reupped for the max, then settled in for a long climb back. I finally got there on hand 129, when I won a pot worth $100,250 with a queen high flush.

When I started playing online poker, I soon realized that a good way to limit my losses was to quit playing for the night if I ever hit the felt; I made it a rule and a point of honor never to reup. That lasted for a year or so, but finally I got fed up with that rule :-) Was I right to ditch it? I wrote some more utilities to find out. As it turns out, I was right. Here are the numbers:

I've hit the felt at least once in 241 of the 722 sessions of cash game no limit hold'em poker I've played. Had I not reupped a single time, I would have lost a grand total of $10,320,000 in those sessions. However, I did reup in a good number of them, and the total amount of play money I lost in those sessions actually comes out to $9,054,111. So I recouped more than a million play dollars by having the stubbornness to believe that hitting the felt is just a hiccup, and that a big rebound from a big loss is never far away.

During current Hold'em session you were dealt 130 hands and saw flop:
 - 9 out of 16 times while in big blind (56%)
 - 12 out of 17 times while in small blind (70%)
 - 61 out of 97 times in other positions (62%)
 - a total of 82 out of 130 (63%)
 Pots won at showdown - 12 of 27 (44%)
 Pots won without showdown - 8

delta: $16,749
cash game no limit hold'em balance: $6,642,132
balance: $9,547,231

Thursday, December 4, 2014

A night of busted flushes

I've mentioned before on this blog that I'm a bit of a flush chaser. I've also mentioned that the name of Travis McGee's boat is the Busted Flush. Travis is the fictional creation of mystery master John D. MacDonald. Tuesday night was a night of busted flushes for me. Of the ten flushes I chased after, fully eight of them broke up on the rocks. The first one took me down to the felt.

Thinking about flush chasing, and busted flushes, I decided to do some analysis to determine whether flush chasing is profitable for me or not. My definition of flush chasing is when you have four cards to a flush on the turn, and you pay to see the river. If you flopped a flush, there's nothing to chase. Similarly, if you make your flush on the turn, you can't really categorize that as chasing.

The verdict is in - my flush chasing has definitely paid off over the course of my career. So far, I've made a profit of $748,553 chasing flushes, although I lost $33,483 chasing them on Tuesday night.

During current Hold'em session you were dealt 142 hands and saw flop:
 - 16 out of 19 times while in big blind (84%)
 - 12 out of 18 times while in small blind (66%)
 - 59 out of 105 times in other positions (56%)
 - a total of 87 out of 142 (61%)
 Pots won at showdown - 5 of 14 (35%)
 Pots won without showdown - 17

delta: $-26,259
cash game no limit hold'em balance: $6,625,383
balance: $9,530,482

Tuesday, December 2, 2014

House money

Last night, I won a pot worth $139,514 with a stealth two pair on hand 4. That rocketed me to the chip lead, giving me "house money" to play with all night. That's what I proceeded to do. Unfortunately, I never caught lightning in a bottle again. When I managed to double up on hand 82, after giving back all but $12,158 of my early profit, I knew it was time to call it a night.

During current Hold'em session you were dealt 83 hands and saw flop:
 - 9 out of 10 times while in big blind (90%)
 - 2 out of 11 times while in small blind (18%)
 - 25 out of 62 times in other positions (40%)
 - a total of 36 out of 83 (43%)
 Pots won at showdown - 2 of 5 (40%)
 Pots won without showdown - 6

delta: $26,830
cash game no limit hold'em balance: $6,651,642
balance: $9,556,741

Monday, December 1, 2014

The beauty of the blinds

On Friday night, on the penultimate hand of the session, I had my best 54o (five four offsuit) ever. It was a real outlier; I won a pot worth $160,032 with it, $103,281 of which was o.p.m. (other people's money). For comparison purposes, my next best 54o only won a pot worth $90,350, of which $36,750 was o.p.m. Friday night's big hand illustrates the beauty of the blinds. The blinds exist to ensure there's a modicum of action on every hand, but one of their unforeseen consequences is that players can end up seeing flops they never would have seen otherwise. Most of the time, I won't pay to see the flop with 54o. However, I happened to be in the small blind on Friday's big hand, so it was worth it to pay another small blind to see the flop. I hit a straight on the turn, and went all in with it. Somehow, miraculously, I got three callers! I think the reason they called was that I was the big stack, and they thought I was trying to bully them off their hands.

During current Hold'em session you were dealt 27 hands and saw flop:
 - 3 out of 4 times while in big blind (75%)
 - 3 out of 4 times while in small blind (75%)
 - 12 out of 19 times in other positions (63%)
 - a total of 18 out of 27 (66%)
 Pots won at showdown - 5 of 5 (100%)
 Pots won without showdown - 1

delta: $189,588
cash game no limit hold'em balance: $6,624,812
balance: $9,529,911