Breaking incredibly even over 2000 hands

[AsusFull]

Hey guys,

I'm posting because I've been breaking incredibly even over the last 2000 hands playing .50/1 at PartyPoker, which as I understand is a pretty "soft" game.

I started an account the beginning of this month, and at around the same time began reading sklansky. I had some interesting swings, which ended up with me having the same amount of money as I started with, $60 (I lost the $25 bonus -_- ). I tried limit/nl tournaments, and I was good at surviving, but wasn't aggressive/good enough to place high and well enough to do more than break even.

Over the next few weeks until today I've followed a pattern of playing solid poker, winning a relatively large sum (perhaps $20-$40), and then bleeding it off the next day or days playing fairly tight, but slightly weak poker.

I've learned to pick tables better( find loose passive tables with little Preflop raising and family pots), and I can sense traps better than I could when I started out, but I'm still _not_ making any money. Should I just be glad I'm not losing money(because I need more experience?), or am i playing bad poker?

My style:tight passive, aggressive with top pair/decent kicker, calls are always statistically correct, I never preflop raise without huge pairs or face cards. I play marginal suited cards in family pots only. I play mid-low pocket pairs only with 6+ callers or 2- callers. I fold a lot after flop.

[LeftBack]

Do you want the standard reply?

2000 hands is not significant.
What you've experienced is normal variance.
Post hands here for analysis.

The judges will decide whether you're weak, tight, passive, or aggressive.

/images/graemlins/smile.gif

Get Poker Tracker.

[RED_RAIN]

I would like to see some hands. You stat you have all the skills of a winning player yet can't win. Yes your hands of 2000 is extremely small as I'm barely winning at this new level I went to at a little over 5000 hands even though I see a trend where I should be able to beat it at over 3 BB/100. Post hands if you want your post to mean more.

[AsusFull]

I don't know if showing one hand would be very helpful, but here's a marginal call I made today that may be incredibly wrong(you tell me)

Party Poker 0.50/1 Hold'em (9 handed)

Preflop: Hero is SB with T/images/graemlins/spade.gif, Q/images/graemlins/spade.gif.
UTG folds, UTG+1 calls, MP1 raises, MP2 folds, MP3 folds, CO folds, Button folds, Hero calls, BB calls, UTG+1 calls.

Flop: (8 SB) 7/images/graemlins/diamond.gif, 4/images/graemlins/spade.gif, J/images/graemlins/heart.gif <font color="blue">(4 players)</font>
Hero checks, BB checks, UTG+1 checks, MP1 bets, Hero calls, BB calls, UTG+1 calls.

Turn: (6 BB) K/images/graemlins/club.gif <font color="blue">(4 players)</font>
Hero checks, BB checks, UTG+1 checks, MP1 bets, Hero calls, BB calls, UTG+1 folds.

River: (9 BB) Q/images/graemlins/club.gif <font color="blue">(3 players)</font>
Hero checks, BB checks, MP1 bets, Hero folds, BB calls.

Final Pot: 11 BB

Results in white below: <font color="white">
BB shows Kd Ad (one pair, kings).
MP1 shows Kh As (one pair, kings).
Outcome: BB wins 5.50 BB. MP1 wins 5.50 BB. </font>

It's good to know that 2000 hands isn't a lot /images/graemlins/smile.gif

I think it's possible I didn't belong in this pot at all, being the small bilnd, but I figured that my queen and possibly ten were not likely to be shared with anyone else if I hit them? Or is this just wishful thinking.

[Matty]

I would fold that preflop. You shouldn't be playing many hands after a preflop raiser - especially when there aren't many callers.

I would fold the flop as well. You're 6.8-1 to turn a Q or T - and a T probably isn't a clean out anyway.

[ QUOTE ]
It's good to know that 2000 hands isn't a lot /images/graemlins/smile.gif

[/ QUOTE ]My first 14,000 hands I made $400, (approx. 3 BBs/100).

Over the last 8,000 hands, I'm essentially break even just like you. (made around 10 bucks).

It's taken some discipline, but I've taught myself to not check my bankroll very often and just concentrate on individual hands instead.

[Cosimo]

I play 2000 every 2 or 3 days, and I don't play that much compared to some of the posters here. I expect to be ahead about 20 BB in that time, which is one giant pot, two large pots, or three normal pots.

Think about that. Three normal pots, over 2000 hands. If I lose three extra pots, there goes my profit. If I win three extra pots, I've doubled my winrate.

After about 10,000 hands, I have a good chance of being ahead. After about 100,000 hands, I'll have a good idea of what my win rate really is (assuming my play doesn't change signifigantly over those 100,000 hands).

[RED_RAIN]

The reason you fold QTs in the SB after a raise is the raise came early on, there will be at max 4 players to the flop, and your hand could easily be dominated.

[Jaran]

Hey AsusFull,
Fold pf to a raise.
Fold the flop.

-Jaran

[AsusFull]

Thanks for the analysis and insight, guys. I seriously feel a lot better now and will try to read more Lee Jones and Sklansky and try to apply it. I guess QTs needs more than 4 players to stand to a raise hehe.

It's been hard to gauge whether I'm improving, getting worse or playing the same based on my bankroll, and it's nice to know that I still do have a bit of a chance /images/graemlins/grin.gif

Gray, when you say you make 20BB over 2000 hands average, are you talking about at .50/1 or higher limits? I've seen a very few players who play .50/1 phenomonally whom I would expect would make more than that awith crafty/very good play, and I heard .50/1 is really soft.

PS Haha you guys really like to stay up late huh? HEPAP's back cover is no joke! this seriously is the best forum for poker online. RGP, RIP.

[babigm]

I essentially agree with the other posters, but I think it's important to understand why exactly we're recommending what we are, as you're likely to come across similar situations again. It's good to learn what strategy to adopt, but IMO it's better to know why that strategy was adopted, so you can extrapolate and apply it later on. I haven't looked at what hands won, so hopefully I don't come off as too much of an ass when it turns out I'm horribly wrong.

If you don't particualrly care, well they say the best way to learn is to teach, so at least I'm getting some benefit from it, nyeh. /images/graemlins/tongue.gif

Anyway, pre-flop isn't the worst thing in the world, but it's still not that great. While QTs isn't a horrible hand, there's a very good chance it's worse then at least one of the other hands. Think about it from your perspective...how many times have you raised or called a raise without a face card or a pair? You're behind any pair at this point, and of the eight cards still out there, given that they've put two bets in the pot, there's a really good chance at least one of them has one or both cards that beat yours. At this point you have to acknowledge that you're probably behind and need to catch up.

While not really mathematically correct, it's not horribly off to call, so you get a break there. It's hard to calculate odds on the fly sometimes, and if you've been running cold a while, a QTs looks really good. At this point you need to look for a favorable flop...a flush, straight, two pair, two spades flush draw or an open ended straight draw, approximately in that order. Anything else you have to be very careful with and ready to abandon.

When the flop comes, you should have the check/fold button already clicked. This is where I think the major misstep is personally, not preflop. At this point, unless every single one of them is bluffing, you're beat. Even if they all missed the flop as well, all they would need is a K or a A to be beating you, and given the preflop action that's a very likely possibility. In order to win this hand, you would have to catch two perfect cards, either two spades, or a 9 and a K, or a T and a Q...as you can see, catching just one of them doesn't help that much, and the odds of it happening are enough to make this an automatic fold. On top of that, even if you do catch your cards, you could still be behind, none of those combinations is the absolute nuts.

I imagine on the turn you saw that you had a OESD, so it looked like it was worth calling, but you have to remember that the odds of hitting a OESD are a lot better when there's two cards left to show vs. just one card. I don't remember the exact odds, but intuitively I don't think the pot is big enough to chase it here.

Anyway, those would be my thought processes as I played that particular hand, hope that helps. I welcome any corrections or additions from other players, I'm pretty new myself so I'd be glad to hear it.

[HajiShirazu]

I would never be in the situation in the first place as I wouldn't cold call the raise with QTs out of the SB, but the flop call isn't THAT terrible except for that you aren't closing the action. Closing the action getting say 11 or 12 to one, I would call and hope to pick up a Q K 9 or spade on the turn.
Then again I think you usually are going to need two running cards to win...maybe you'd be better off just folding this flop.