The lower 48

The most hands I've ever played in an MTT NLHE without making the money is 76. On Friday night, in my final MTT NLHE of the session, I played 48 hands without making the money. I got curious to see how I've fared in 48 hand MTT NLHEs over the course of my career. It turns out I've played three such tournaments, and failed to make the money in any of them.

style flavor buy_in entry players hands entries paid place winnings

MTT   NLHE    17500  2500       6    21     524  132   301        0
MTT   NLHE    45000  5000       6    62     153   42    36    82000
MTT   NLHE    45000  5000       6     5      93   24     -        0
MTT   NLHE    17500  2500       6    48     397   96   133        0

delta: $-58,000
MTT NLHE balance: $2,465,548
2017 balance: $548,400
balance: $11,966,230

The lower 48

I set a new personal worst last night. I had the worst eight tournament stretch of my tournament career. When you're playing 6-max, the worst you can do in such a stretch is to come in sixth all eight times. I didn't do that, but wasn't far off. The sum of my places came out to a gaudy 38 out of the worst possible total of 48. I call that the lower 48 :-)

The only way to do so poorly is to bet too big, too early, and too often. When you do that, you don't give other players the chance to make donkey moves. In effect, you're the one who's being the donkey! There's no excuse for playing that friskily in tournaments. I promise not to fall into that trap tonight.

buy_in entry_fee num_players num_hands place winnings

 45000      5000           6         2     6        0
 45000      5000           6        15     3        0
 45000      5000           6         5     6        0
 45000      5000           6         8     6        0
 45000      5000           6        30     3        0
 45000      5000           6         9     5        0
 45000      5000           6        14     5        0
 45000      5000           6        14     4        0

delta: $-400,000
tournament balance: $643,590
balance: $7,526,289