Pros, what's your biggest downswing?

[Lestat]

Hello everyone,

A poker friend of mine told me that if I want expert poker advice this is the place to go. This is my first time here and it looks pretty kool so far. I've been a live pro for over 6 years now and played semi-professionaly 3 years before that. I got a computer this xmas and I've been hearing so much about online I decided to give it a shot. A friend set me all up with Party Poker, rake back, poker tracker and something called game time plus. He said you guys would know all about these things.

Anyway, I got off to a decent start. After my first 11,000 hands I was doing 2.5 big bets per 100 hands. You online guys don't deal in hourly rates right?

My next 11,000 I made close to 1 big bet per 100 so I was really liking online so far and thinking I should have done this way sooner. Then I got absolutely positively destroyed in my third 11,000 hands LOSING 2.5 big bets per 100 hands!!

I broke even on my third 11,000 hands and I'm now losing about 1/2 big bet per 100 hands on this batch of 11,000 plus hands. The bottom line is I'm friggin stuck 3 dimes in 50,000 hands!! I gotta be playing bad but I have no idea where. This is the worst I've ever done in poker in my life. We get about 38 hands an hour out where I play live. This is like being stuck after 1315 hours!! I've never came close to playing that long stuck. If this ever happened to me in my live game, I'd quick poker for good.

I know there's not much anyone can say and I'll be posting some hands so you can get a feel for where the hell I'm going so friggen wrong. In the meantime, I assure you I'm no sucker at least in a live game. I told a friend of mine my results so far, and he couldn't believe it. But I think I might be the biggest fish who ever played online.

My first question is how big do you online pros swing? I'm on a +300 big bet downswing. I've never even came close to losing 300 big bets in my life and I've been playing for most of my living for over 9 years now! I'm going to post an AK hand I think I screwed up. But I'd really like to know what you pros have for a bankroll in the 15-30 game (I play 4 tables), and what number of big bets you think is reasonable to slide. Yesterday I was seconds away from taking a 5 iron and smashing this computer to smithereens. Any help or words of encouragement would be appreciated. Thanks.

[MoDOH]

First of all,welcome to the forum!

And if my math skills aren´t off, I think that according to your story you should have won something like 50BB or so...

Anyhoo...

I don´t question your ability as a poker player, in fact I´m sure that you are a very solid and winning player if you have been a pro for as long as you say.
But there is a big difference between live poker and online poker. The fact that you have been playing live poker for so long can have a detrimental effect on your online poker. On the other hand after 50k hands you should have been able to adjust.
The aggression factor online is far greater than I have ever experienced in a B&M and more so the party 30. That combined with the fact that you are multitabling could have a negative impact on your winrate...

Huge swings like this are pretty common in highly aggressive games like the party 30 but if you can adjust to the game it´s also highly profitable...

I´m sure things will turn around for you, although you are not on a downswing... [img]/images/graemlins/wink.gif[/img]

one tip could be to cut down on the numer of tables that you play...

[Lestat]

Thanks MOdoh!

I agree I'm definitely losing something to playing so many games at once. And while the live games I'm used to can get very aggressive, they are usually not so multi-way as what I've experienced on Party Poker. I suspect I'm not playing big pots well. I'm doing a lot of raising and isolating pre-flop and I'm sure my hands are gaining equity here, but if I'm not playing the hands well after that it's better for my opponents than me. By the way, when you said...

"I´m sure things will turn around for you, although you are not on a downswing... "

Does this mean you don't think I'm running bad, but playing bad? I can take the criticism. I'm sure no one thinks they play bad and I have to admit I have a hard time believing I'm not playing well enough to beat these guys. I am getting them to put in multiple big bets on the turn drawing to very few outs. Unfortunately, they keep getting there. I really do think that most of this is a terrible run of the cards. What I'd like to know from you is, how bad has it ever gotten for you? Thanks.

[MoDOH]

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Does this mean you don't think I'm running bad, but playing bad?

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I was referring to this...

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Anyway, I got off to a decent start. After my first 11,000 hands I was doing 2.5 big bets per 100 hands. You online guys don't deal in hourly rates right?

My next 11,000 I made close to 1 big bet per 100 so I was really liking online so far and thinking I should have done this way sooner. Then I got absolutely positively destroyed in my third 11,000 hands LOSING 2.5 big bets per 100 hands!!

I broke even on my third 11,000 hands and I'm now losing about 1/2 big bet per 100 hands on this batch of 11,000 plus hands. The bottom line is I'm friggin stuck 3 dimes in 50,000 hands!!

[/ QUOTE ]

though I´m not a math wizz by any means, I get this to (+2.5+1-2.5-0.5)x110 = roughly +50 BB that isn´t a downswing to me... though you are a substantial loser over your last 22k hands...

The worst downswing I ever had is 200BB over a 20K hands playing 3-6. but that is a while ago. If you are having 200BB or more in a downswing I think it´s time to stop and evaluate your play, I know I did. A good way to start would be to start posting some hands...

[DpR]

Last year I played A LOT. About 13k hands per week. I had several downswings of 250BB. Never quite made 300, but it is clearly possible. I would say if you play online long enough, it is 100% certain you will have a 200+ BB losing streak.....

[URMeowed]

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I've been a live pro for over 6 years now and played semi-professionaly 3 years before that

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Being a pro for this long and winning fairly consistantly, does not necessarily mean you have a strong grasp of poker. It could just mean your competition is very weak in relation to your abilities. That's the beauty of poker. It doesn't matter how good or bad you are, if the rest of the field is worse than you, you will win.

I would be really interested what limits you normally play live and more importantly is what cardroom.

Start posting some hands. That will give me the biggest indicator to your skill level.

Keep in mind that Party 15/30 has the most interesting mix of really bad players, aggressive players and some very solid players too. This site is by far the most frustrating site to play on because of the huge swings you will go through but it is also by far the most profitable.

My guess is you are a decent player but tilts frequently when you get shown the world's fair on here.

But what do I know, I'm just a cat.

Meow.

[Lestat]

"Being a pro for this long and winning fairly consistantly, does not necessarily mean you have a strong grasp of poker."

Can't say much on this. I'm not into bragging and you couldn't possibly know how strong or weak my grasp of poker theory is yet. Although you soon will as I start posting more hands. Let's say that it's better than average, but I don't think I'm above learning otherwise I wouldn't have signed up on here. See the AK hand I posted earlier. I do think I botched that up. What do you think and how severe were my errors?

"It doesn't matter how good or bad you are, if the rest of the field is worse than you, you will win."

Couldn't agree more with you on this. I know lots of players people view as good who I consider bread and butter. It's ALL relative. I do consider myself fortunate to have played most of my poker career against some pretty weak competition.

"I would be really interested what limits you normally play"

I log most of my hours playing 40, but sometimes have to settle for 30-60 on days when the 40 doesn't get off. I never play lower than that and will play high as 100-200. Especially when I travel and the game looks good.

"and more importantly is what cardroom."

I decided not to give that info out. I'm pretty well known where I play and even though I might not "necessarily have a strong grasp of poker", my reputation does not come from being one of the biggest fish. I can tell you that I do some traveling and follow the side games at some of the larger tournaments. I don't mean to be rude or sound like a snob, but I have my reasons for keeping my indentity confidential. At least for now.

"My guess is you are a decent player but tilts frequently.."

And I thought cats had good intuition? -lol. You couldn't be MORE wrong. I tilt less than any pro I know and I don't know too many successful pros who have problems with tilt.

Thanks for responding and I'll look forward to reading your posts. Good luck.

[URMeowed]

[ QUOTE ]
I decided not to give that info out. I'm pretty well known where I play and even though I might not "necessarily have a strong grasp of poker", my reputation does not come from being one of the biggest fish. I can tell you that I do some traveling and follow the side games at some of the larger tournaments. I don't mean to be rude or sound like a snob, but I have my reasons for keeping my indentity confidential. At least for now.


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That's ok. By stating this, I already know that you play in one of the smaller cardrooms, where the lineup is mostly all regulars. I would venture to guess Northern California but there are other cardrooms around the country that regularly spread 40/80 where the makeup is mostly locals.
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And I thought cats had good intuition? -lol. You couldn't be MORE wrong. I tilt less than any pro I know

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What I meant was that you tilt frequently when you play online thus leading to your bad stats. Online poker is a different animal compared to live poker. It seems much easier to tilt when playing online and I know many live players that struggle with the transition.

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I don't know too many successful pros who have problems with tilt.

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LOL. I know a ton of successful pros that tilt. Jennifer Harman is a known steamer. I don't think being a successful pro precludes you from tilting. I remember watching all those high limit pros all playing with each other and wondering who really wins up there. Then I remember hearing about the law of least tilt. All of them are very astute in most forms of poker. Where the edge comes from is some players are better than others in a particular form of poker and the one that tilts the least that session will win.

Meow.

[kemystery]

I don't think game selection has been mentioned in this post, as that can make a HUGE diff. in your earn. My take on the PP 15 game is that it is gift- but extremely loose aggressive games are not neccesarily the best 'average' earners. (You can make the biggest scores in these games, but somebody has to lose)
You can expect even bigger swings in this type of game (if you regularly play it, the swings (variance) can/will be bigger than the usual variance considered into the 'standard' 300bbs bankroll system)

[That guy]

There's no doubt I ran well in my first 11k. There's also no doubt I ran about as bad as humanly possible during my 3rd 11k. The one weird thing I've noticed is that other than when I first started, I have yet to go on any significant upswing (some call this a rush). There have been no upward pushes since.

Just something to consider... Nobody had any stats on you for the first 11k hands. It is possible others adjusted to your game based on the PokerTracker stats of you after your first 11k hands. This is not necessarily the right answer but something to consider.