Rolled up nines

I love poker slang. It's rich in imagery, color, and atmosphere. I love it so much I try to coin my own. I'd be ecstatic if a single one of my poker neologisms ever made it into the poker lingo mainstream. For that to have a chance of happening, though, the readership of this blog would have to increase dramatically.

What do I mean by rolled up nines? Seven card stud players will know. Technically, the "rolled up" term can only be applied to stud hands, but I'm appropriating it and applying it to hold'em. In seven card stud, rolled up anything means three of a kind in the first three cards dealt to a player, which are the first two down cards and the first up card. Rolled up nines in seven card stud would be two nines dealt face down to a player, followed by a nine dealt as the first up card to that same player. Rolled up anything is a killer hand in stud.

In the context of hold'em, what I mean by rolled up nines is when a player is dealt two face down nines, then a third nine appears face up in the flop. Rolled up anything is also a killer hand in hold'em. The usual hold'em term for this is a set, but I think the "rolled up" term is much more colorful. Unfortunately for me, the rolled up nines which showed up in hand 43 of last night's session belonged to someone else. Even more unfortunately for me, I had a really strong hand - a king high straight which I made on the river. To add insult to injury, my straight was the nut straight - the community cards were Js Jh 9c 8d Tc, and I'd been dealt Qc Ks. This gave me what I call the "high end plus" straight, which beats the plain high end straight. I guessed that my opponent had the high end straight, and that I was going to make a killing. Instead, he had a full house of nines full of jacks, and made the killing himself - a $72,446 pot. Had that one hand gone my way, I would have had a very successful session.

During current Hold'em session you were dealt 68 hands and saw flop:
 - 10 out of 10 times while in big blind (100%)
 - 6 out of 10 times while in small blind (60%)
 - 21 out of 48 times in other positions (43%)
 - a total of 37 out of 68 (54%)
 Pots won at showdown - 4 of 10 (40%)
 Pots won without showdown - 7

delta: $-23,865
cash game no limit hold'em balance: $4,912,530
balance: $7,361,938

My new Lazarus line

Some time ago, I introduced the concept of the Lazarus line - a percentage of your starting stack size below which you must not let your stack fall. At the time, I judged the Lazarus line to be around 22 percent. That now seems ridiculously high to me. My current thinking is that the Lazarus line is around 8 percent. With a starting stack size of $40,000, that means you've crossed the line when your stack falls below $3,200. When this happens, you must quit playing immediately. As you may know, I'm not very good at following this particular rule of thumb. I just ran some numbers to figure out roughly how much money I would have saved had I been religious about following this rule. Here's what I came up with:

    435: # of sessions of cash game no limit hold'em I've played
 
     47: # of such sessions when I've lost exactly my starting stack size of $40,000 

     60: guesstimated percentage of such sessions which were Lazarus sessions, where a Lazarus session is defined as one in which I hit or crossed the Lazarus line and had chips left to play with after hitting or crossing it

   28.2: guesstimated number of Lazarus sessions (47 * .6)

 $3,200: maximum amount of Lazarus money, where this is defined as the amount of chips left to play with in a Lazarus session after hitting or crossing the Lazarus line

    50: guesstimated average percentage of the maximum amount of Lazarus money in a Lazarus session

$1,600: guesstimated average amount of Lazarus money in a Lazarus session (3200 * .5)

$45,120: guesstimated amount of money I would have saved had I been religious about following the Lazarus line rule of thumb (28.2 * 1600)

It's interesting to note that simply by following my own rule of thumb, I would have spotted myself more than enough to play another session essentially for free. If I'd followed this rule last night, I would have lost $36,977 instead of $40,000.

During current Hold'em session you were dealt 53 hands and saw flop:
 - 4 out of 8 times while in big blind (50%)
 - 5 out of 8 times while in small blind (62%)
 - 23 out of 37 times in other positions (62%)
 - a total of 32 out of 53 (60%)
 Pots won at showdown - 5 of 10 (50%)
 Pots won without showdown - 1

delta: $-40,000
cash game no limit hold'em balance: $4,936,395
balance: $7,385,803

A flawed tactic

Many moons ago, when I was in college, there was a video game I liked to play called "Star Castle". You controlled a space ship which could fire ammunition out the front, similar to the one in "Asteroids", but the object of the game was different. In "Star Castle", your mission was to shoot a target which was surrounded by several concentric layers of protection; each layer was in a circular shape made up of multiple line segments. Each layer rotated in the opposite direction from its neighboring layers. To be able to shoot the target, you first needed to destroy line segments from the spinning walls of protection in order to get a clear path. If you flew your space ship into a wall, neither the wall nor your space ship was destroyed, but the orientation of your space ship was flipped 180 degrees, so that if you flew straight into a wall, you'd bounce off it and be flying straight away from it after the contact. As soon as you had a clear shot at the target, however, it also had a clear shot at you. I got quite good at the easy, early levels of the game, when the target wasn't so diligent about trying to shoot you. I learned a very easy tactic for winning the early levels - simply fly straight at the target all the time, continually shooting, and rely on the fact that the game automatically flipped your ship when you hit a wall to start your assault on the other side. You'd fly in from the left, blasting away, bounce off a wall, then fly back towards the left side of the screen, still firing; the software made your spaceship immediately reappear on the right side of the screen as soon as it disappeared off the left side (and vice versa). So you'd alternate breaking down the defenses on each side of the target, first the left side, then the right. I perfected this tactic, but it was a flawed one; it made your spaceship a sitting duck at the higher levels of the game. It was essentially a kamikaze tactic. A friend of mine perfected his ability to fly and shoot to such a degree that he essentially conquered the game; he could play as long as he wanted. What he was able to do was fly in a continuous diagonal pattern; he'd fly from the middle left side of the screen to the middle bottom of the screen, disappear to reappear at the top middle, fly to the right middle of the screen, then disappear and reappear at the left middle to start a new flight cycle. He would rotate the ship to fire, then rotate it back to the diagonal before hitting the thrusters again. He would only hit the thrusters when his ship was in the diagonal pattern, and only fire when his ship was pointing at the target. To any onlooker, it was clear that he was a virtuoso; no concert pianist could have better control of his playing than my friend had control of his flying and shooting.

How does this relate to poker? Simply in the fact that there are flawed tactics in all games, including the game of poker. Last night, one of my opponents employed such a tactic. Like my "Star Castle" tactic, it had some early success, but was doomed to failure. His tactic was to raise by $3,000 or so preflop whenever he felt that he had a good hand, hoping everyone would fold; in that case, he'd pick up a small pot of anywhere from $700 to $1,800. This worked for him multiple times, until a hand when he was dealt a pair of fives and I was dealt a pair of kings. This time around, he raised by $3,600; I reraised him another $3,600. He went all in, as I'd suspected he might, and I called. My two pair of kings and tens bet his two pair of tens and fives, and I raked in a pot worth $93,402. Funnily enough, both he and I were done for the night at that point :-)

During current Hold'em session you were dealt 62 hands and saw flop:
 - 3 out of 7 times while in big blind (42%)
 - 3 out of 7 times while in small blind (42%)
 - 25 out of 48 times in other positions (52%)
 - a total of 31 out of 62 (50%)
 Pots won at showdown - 3 of 7 (42%)
 Pots won without showdown - 4

delta: $56,057
cash game no limit hold'em balance: $4,976,395
balance: $7,425,803

One Hand to rule them all

At this point, I've sort of lost track of the number of times I've used this title. I think I'm up to four, but couldn't swear to it. Last night, the ruling hand came early on, on hand 14. I was dealt pocket rockets, and hit a fatty on the turn. I won a pot worth $56,300, $28,500 of which was o.p.m. (other people's money). The bar chart of my stack size over the course of the session is a picture postcard for punctuated equilibrium; a flat line for the first quarter of the session, a big spike, and a flat line on the upper plateau for the final three quarters of the session.

During current Hold'em session you were dealt 65 hands and saw flop:
 - 9 out of 10 times while in big blind (90%)
 - 9 out of 13 times while in small blind (69%)
 - 25 out of 42 times in other positions (59%)
 - a total of 43 out of 65 (66%)
 Pots won at showdown - 8 of 9 (88%)
 Pots won without showdown - 4

delta: $21,201
cash game no limit hold'em balance: $4,920,338
balance: $7,369,746

The most dangerous kind of opponent

Given the amount of poker I play, you'd think that I'd run into the most dangerous kind of opponent fairly frequently. I'm happy to report that this is not the case, although I did run into this kind of opponent again last night. The most dangerous kind of opponent is not a highly skilled player. In fact, he has no skill at all. He simply doesn't care if he wins or loses, and therefore is able to make an endless series of risky bets. Endless until his money runs out, that is. Such a player is ludicrously easy to spot; he bets way too much way too frequently, keeps hitting the felt, and keeps reupping for the max. The main problem one has playing against such a player is resisting the temptation to teach him a lesson. His style of play is truly a sore trial. It's not poker, and it's not fun to play against. I hereby make a promise to myself to leave the table immediately whenever I next encounter this style of play. Last night, I couldn't resist calling all in preflop against Mr. Dangerous when I was dealt a big slick; he'd already hit the felt three times and I felt it would be good for him to hit it a fourth. Two players acting after me also called Mr. Dangerous's huge bet, one of them going all in to do so. Wouldn't you know, Mr. Dangerous lucked out, and won one of the largest pots I've ever seen in my PokerStars career - $230,023. I just ran the numbers and found that he'd only had a 19.85% chance of winning. I'd rather play a highly skilled poker player every time.

During current Hold'em session you were dealt 53 hands and saw flop:
 - 4 out of 7 times while in big blind (57%)
 - 2 out of 7 times while in small blind (28%)
 - 17 out of 39 times in other positions (43%)
 - a total of 23 out of 53 (43%)
 Pots won at showdown - 1 of 4 (25%)
 Pots won without showdown - 3

delta: $-40,000
cash game no limit hold'em balance: $4,899,137
balance: $7,348,545

Show me the money

Last night, I only went all in on a single hand, but made it count. It was a "Show me the money!" kind of hand. I was dealt a pair of sixes, and hit a set on the flop. I bet $4,000 into a pot of $9,000 and got two callers. On the turn, I bet $9,000 and both players called again, one going all in for his last $8,400 to do so. On the river, I went all in with my remaining $17,991, which was a bit of grandstanding, seeing as the only player still in the hand with chips to bet had just $5,399 left. He called. My set held up and I raked in a pot worth $57,578. That was hand 23, and I felt like playing longer, so I did - to the tune of 104 more hands.

During current Hold'em session you were dealt 127 hands and saw flop:
 - 12 out of 19 times while in big blind (63%)
 - 15 out of 21 times while in small blind (71%)
 - 40 out of 87 times in other positions (45%)
 - a total of 67 out of 127 (52%)
 Pots won at showdown - 10 of 15 (66%)
 Pots won without showdown - 6

delta: $24,399
cash game no limit hold'em balance: $4,939,137
balance: $7,388,545

The third floor

All poker sessions begin on the first floor. That is, when you sit down and start playing, you're essentially walking through the front door of a house. You might have to make some trips to the basement, but your hope is to ascend to an upper floor. Most hands result in noise; you win or lose a small amount, and end up essentially where you started. The hands that provide signal, which are infrequent, are the ones where you win or lose a significant amount. When you win your first significant hand, you're on the second floor. When you win your second significant hand, you're on the third floor. After playing cash game poker for more than 4 years, I've come to realize that it's a really good idea to quit playing when you've reached the third floor. That's what I did last night. I had a nice flourish of four straight won pots at the end, but it was the first of them which put me on the third floor; the others were just garnish.

During current Hold'em session you were dealt 46 hands and saw flop:
 - 4 out of 6 times while in big blind (66%)
 - 4 out of 5 times while in small blind (80%)
 - 21 out of 35 times in other positions (60%)
 - a total of 29 out of 46 (63%)
 Pots won at showdown - 6 of 10 (60%)
 Pots won without showdown - 5

delta: $57,391
cash game no limit hold'em balance: $4,914,738
balance: $7,364,146