Doubling up through a donkey

The quickest way to double up in poker is through a donkey. It's actually a pretty safe play. The thing about donkeys is they don't seem to care if they win or lose. They're willing to go all in with extremely weak holdings. Last night, I identified a donkey early on. He went all in preflop on hand 9 with 9h Jh, and lost $41,940. He went all in three hands later with Td 7c on a flop of 6c 4c Ac, and lost $31,432. When he went all in on a flop of 3s Ts Th the very next hand, I'd seen enough. I called; of course it helped that I'd been dealt pocket rockets :-) I won a pot worth $69,240, and called it a night shortly afterwards.

During current Hold'em session you were dealt 20 hands and saw flop:
 - 1 out of 4 times while in big blind (25%)
 - 1 out of 4 times while in small blind (25%)
 - 7 out of 12 times in other positions (58%)
 - a total of 9 out of 20 (45%)
 Pots won at showdown - 3 of 3 (100%)
 Pots won without showdown - 1

delta: $30,091
cash game no limit hold'em balance: $4,865,809
balance: $7,222,762

An amazing coincidence

I've now played 227 straight sessions of cash game poker. I have to admit, there are some features of tournament poker I sorely miss. Here's a partial list:

1. the adrenaline rush of playing for big sums of play money
2. how ridiculously difficult it is to make a profit, and what it says about your poker skills if you do
3. the hand-to-hand combat of playing heads up

Every now and then, I get to practice my heads up skills while at a cash game table. That's what happened at the end of last night's session; the final 21 hands I played were against a single opponent. At the start of that stretch, my opponent had $8,897 in chips; at the end, he had nothing. I was curious to see how many heads up hands I've played in cash games, so I wrote a utility to find out. When I saw the result, I couldn't believe it! How's this for an amazing coincidence - the number of times I've been heads up in cash games exactly matches the number of times I've gone all in in cash games - 459 to be precise (out of a total of 32,442 hands).

During current Hold'em session you were dealt 60 hands and saw flop:
 - 16 out of 18 times while in big blind (88%)
 - 14 out of 17 times while in small blind (82%)
 - 18 out of 25 times in other positions (72%)
 - a total of 48 out of 60 (80%)
 Pots won at showdown - 5 of 10 (50%)
 Pots won without showdown - 14

delta: $11,710
cash game no limit hold'em balance: $4,835,718
balance: $7,192,671

A walk on the wild side

Whenever you go all in, you're signing yourself up for a walk on the wild side. Funny things can happen, and often do. Last night, I went all in four times. I won all four. That may sound good, but in this case it wasn't. In cash games, you want to go all in very rarely. Four times in one session is not nearly rarely enough. When you're going all in that often, it's probably because you're short-stacked. That was the case with me. Funnily enough, only one of the four all ins was truly an act of desperation. At the start of that hand, I only had $3,874 in chips. I was dealt 3s 8s, and the flop came 4s 8d 4d. I threw caution to the wind and put all my money in the middle. That was a bit foolhardy, since I'd be a big underdog if any of my opponents had a four. As it turned out, one of them did, but I wriggled off the hook. I made a full house on the river to live another day.

During current Hold'em session you were dealt 148 hands and saw flop:
 - 13 out of 15 times while in big blind (86%)
 - 10 out of 19 times while in small blind (52%)
 - 66 out of 114 times in other positions (57%)
 - a total of 89 out of 148 (60%)
 Pots won at showdown - 9 of 25 (36%)
 Pots won without showdown - 10

delta: $-32,691
cash game no limit hold'em balance: $4,824,008
balance: $7,180,961

7 hand span

Last night, my session was saved by a 7 hand span about 2/3 of the way through. On the first hand of the span, I won a pot worth $39,602 with an ace high flush. On the second hand, I won a pot worth $8,977 with a pair of aces. On the seventh hand, I won a pot worth $29,700 with a pair of aces. I needed the span badly, as I'd hit the felt only 28 hands into the session. I came out with another min win, but it's better than a loss. The more I play poker, the less worried I get about slumps; I know a saving span of hands is never far away.

During current Hold'em session you were dealt 96 hands and saw flop:
 - 11 out of 15 times while in big blind (73%)
 - 7 out of 14 times while in small blind (50%)
 - 35 out of 67 times in other positions (52%)
 - a total of 53 out of 96 (55%)
 Pots won at showdown - 5 of 18 (27%)
 Pots won without showdown - 8

delta: $475
cash game no limit hold'em balance: $4,856,699
balance: $7,213,652

Jetpack blip

Looking at the bar chart of my stack size over the course of last night's session, one hand immediately stands out. At the start of the hand, my stack was just over its starting amount of $40,000; at the end of the hand, it was at $58,418, its zenith for the night. That alone isn't the reason the hand stands out, however; on the very next hand, I gave back almost all the chips I'd just won. I hereby dub such a circumstance a jetpack blip. It looks like my stack got strapped to a jetpack, went straight up, hit its apogee just as the jetpack ran out of fuel, and fell straight back to earth. I obviously got too frisky on the following hand. Let me check the archives...

Ah yes, I remember now. I was dealt a suited big slick, and took exception to getting reraised before the flop. I felt like having the last word, and reraised back. I whiffed on the flop, however, and had to fold when my opponent went all in. It was a bit silly to engage in that preflop raising war. The good news is, I still came out of the session with a small profit.

During current Hold'em session you were dealt 120 hands and saw flop:
 - 15 out of 18 times while in big blind (83%)
 - 10 out of 20 times while in small blind (50%)
 - 48 out of 82 times in other positions (58%)
 - a total of 73 out of 120 (60%)
 Pots won at showdown - 9 of 20 (45%)
 Pots won without showdown - 7

delta: $4,348
cash game no limit hold'em balance: $4,856,224
balance: $7,213,177

The perfect underwater session

No poker player likes being underwater. However, being underwater is the most common state at a poker table. The vast majority of the time, you have to be patient, waiting for your turn to break through the surface. This poker reality got me thinking about underwater sessions, and what the perfect one might be. I think I've come up with an answer. For me, the perfect underwater session is one where you were underwater for every hand but two - your first and last hands of the night. By definition, you can't be underwater on your first hand. If you weren't underwater on your last hand, there's an excellent chance you had a winning session. Both of my last two sessions were perfect, underwater-wise :-)

During current Hold'em session you were dealt 42 hands and saw flop:
 - 9 out of 9 times while in big blind (100%)
 - 9 out of 10 times while in small blind (90%)
 - 15 out of 23 times in other positions (65%)
 - a total of 33 out of 42 (78%)
 Pots won at showdown - 5 of 10 (50%)
 Pots won without showdown - 4

delta: $18,587
cash game no limit hold'em balance: $4,851,876
balance: $7,208,829

Flopping fatties

One of the fascinating things about poker is that the improbable happens like clockwork. I've mentioned this before, but it bears repeating. What I mean by this is that no matter how unlikely a particular event is, you can rely on it to occur with its own particular frequency. You might think that flopping a fatty is an unusual event, but I'm here to tell you that it's actually not. Even though you can only expect it to happen to you once out of every 694 hands, you can expect it to happen to you once out of every 694 hands. This sounds like a tautology, but it's not. As long as you keep playing, you can expect to keep flopping fatties every 694 hands. In other words, you will never stop flopping fatties! Is life great, or what? :-)

Since I turned on the PokerStars feature which auto saves the hand histories, I've been dealt 31,976 hands. Of those hands, I've seen the flop 19,087 times. Of those flops, I've flopped a fatty 35 times. In the last month alone, I've flopped a fatty 4 times. In the last two sessions alone, I've flopped a fatty twice. The odds of flopping a fatty are 3,744 in 2,598,960 or .1441 percent of the time. I'm currently beating the odds; right now I'm at .1834 percent.

During current Hold'em session you were dealt 110 hands and saw flop:
 - 8 out of 15 times while in big blind (53%)
 - 9 out of 16 times while in small blind (56%)
 - 43 out of 79 times in other positions (54%)
 - a total of 60 out of 110 (54%)
 Pots won at showdown - 9 of 19 (47%)
 Pots won without showdown - 7

delta: $17,318
cash game no limit hold'em balance: $4,833,289
balance: $7,190,242