Did it float?

I used to watch my fair share of "Late Night with David Letterman", but that was before I started playing online poker :-) One of the recurring segments which I found amusing was the one called "Will it float?". There was a small backyard-style pool on the set, and every time the segment came up, a different object had been chosen to drop into it. Before that happened, though, Dave had to predict whether or not the object would float. It was clear that some objects would sink like a stone. A surprising percentage of the time, however, objects which seemed like they should sink actually floated.

A poker player often asks himself this same question. "Will it float?", in a poker context, translates to "Is this play which I'm contemplating making profitable in the long run?" For certain plays, there's no way to find out. That can be the case when the decision you're about to make is not guaranteed to be your final decision of the hand. However, in the case where you're faced with an all in decision, that guarantees it will be your final decision of the hand, and you can retroactively find out the answer to the "Will it float?" question. Due to the retroactive nature of the answer, a more accurate way to phrase the question is "Did it float?" :-)

On Friday night, I hit the felt on hand 122. I was dealt a pair of jacks, and ended up going all in preflop with them. Three other players went to showdown. Even though I lost the hand, did my decision to go all in "float"? It sure did! I had a 33% chance of winning the hand, spent $25,950 on it, and would have won a total of $103,100 if I'd won the hand. Running the numbers 100 times, with 33 wins and 67 losses, the result is a profit of $807,300. That eases the pain of hitting the felt considerably.

During current Hold'em session you were dealt 122 hands and saw flop:
 - 13 out of 17 times while in big blind (76%)
 - 8 out of 20 times while in small blind (40%)
 - 61 out of 85 times in other positions (71%)
 - a total of 82 out of 122 (67%)
 Pots won at showdown - 12 of 17 (70%)
 Pots won without showdown - 7

delta: $-50,000
cash game no limit hold'em balance: $6,542,470
balance: $9,447,569