Too Unlucky For Poker?

I know a lot of you will say I'm just being silly or stupid.... But I have concluded that I am just too unlucky for poker. My friends used to tell me that I'm just on a bad streak and it'll pass, bla bla bla. But I've known for quite some time that I'm the one poker player that the odds and percentages simply do not apply to. And to finally prove this to myself and everyone else I performed a little test.

I decided to write down every time I go all-in with the best hand. I mostly play SnG's on Full Tilt, so that's where I got all of my hands from. Just to make sure this is clear, I only wrote down the hands in which I was in the lead at the time I went all-in. Out of 200 hands in which I put all of my chips in the pot, and I was ahead at that time, I won only 40 hands.

Some of the people I play with on a regular basis have openly admitted to me that they will almost always call a big raise from me no matter what cards they have. The reason for this is because they know the stronger my hand is, the more money I'm likely to lose with it.

So is it time for me to give it up? Or is there a way to break this cycle? I guess I could just reverse my play and try to make sure I'm always all-in with the worst hand. Any advice?

[eastbay]

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I know a lot of you will say I'm just being silly or stupid....

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You are being silly and stupid. Variance is a bitch, but NO ONE escapes regression to the mean.

eastbay

[Alex/Mugaaz]

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I know a lot of you will say I'm just being silly or stupid....

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You are being silly and stupid. Variance is a bitch, but NO ONE escapes regression to the mean.

eastbay

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Actually, I'm not crying about bad beats, because I don't consider them bad beats. When I get all my money in with the best hand I usually expect to lose. It's not so much that someone makes a bad call against my bets, it's more that they simply disregard my bets as any type of threat. Here's a good example of what I'm talking about.

Playing in my first casino tournament. The table that I started on was full of idiots and fish. They would call any raise with any two suited cards or any face card. And they wouldn't fold no matter what. They would continue calling with bottom pair when there was four to a flush or straight on the board. At least ten times I heard "I had to call, my cards were suited." So I figured my best move is to wait until I have a premium hand before getting involved. About twenty minutes into it I'm on the big blind with KK. The blinds are 50/100, seven players limp in ahead of me, and I raise it to 1000. Every limper calls the 1000 until it gets around to the button. The player on the button looks at his cards again and then asks me how many chips I have left. I count them out and it turns out to be about 1/3 of what he has, so he decides he's going to put me all-in. My first thought was that maybe he was slowplaying AA... But I figured that's probably wrong because people usually make that play from an early position. Not that it never happens from the button, but not very often. Then I remembered that this guy had played almost every hand and usually refused to fold, no matter what was on the board. So I decided to call.

I turn up KK and he very confidently turned up his J9 offsuit. I should have been happy to see this, but I wasn't. The first thought I had was "Well, there wouldn't be much point to playing J9 that way if he wasn't going to win with it." And sure enough the flop comes J97.

I didn't even bother watching the rest of the hand. I walked off to watch and see how some of my friends who had entered the tourney as well were doing. When they realized I was out of the tourney their first question was "Aces or Kings?" They knew that I had most likely got all of my chips in with a big hand.

It wasn't all bad news though. While I was waiting for my friends to finish in the tourney I went to the 3/6/12 table and made about $300. For some strange reason I can almost always do well at a limit table. Now if I go to a casino with my friends I just go to the limit tables while they play in the tourneys. I guess I shouldn't complain if I'm making money there. But for some reason it really bothers me that when it comes to any type of tourney play, I automatically lose.

[Lestat]

<font color="blue"> So I figured my best move is to wait until I have a premium hand before getting involved. </font>

Well, see what happens when you post a first example? It quickly becomes obvious that you're not just unlucky, but you don't play all that well. Against the type of players you describe, you don't NEED to wait for a premium hand in order to bust them (as long as you play well after the flop). In fact, waiting for a premium hand is poor strategy here.

Also, did you even realize you still had outs before you walked away from your hand?

No offense dude, but you're a bad player. Yeah, you might be unlucky too, but having no understanding of the game is your biggest problem. Work on that and get back to us.

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<font color="blue"> So I figured my best move is to wait until I have a premium hand before getting involved. </font>

Well, see what happens when you post a first example? It quickly becomes obvious that you're not just unlucky, but you don't play all that well. Against the type of players you describe, you don't NEED to wait for a premium hand in order to bust them (as long as you play well after the flop). In fact, waiting for a premium hand is poor strategy here.

Also, did you even realize you still had outs before you walked away from your hand?

No offense dude, but you're a bad player. Yeah, you might be unlucky too, but having no understanding of the game is your biggest problem. Work on that and get back to us.

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I must disagree. Absolutely every book, article, and forum I have read, advocate no bluffing or risking a large amount of chips with weak hands when playing against a bunch of calling stations. Now, if all of these books, articles, and forums are wrong, why does everyone reccommend reading them?

I might actually be a bad player as you say. But I know that a large majority of the time I get my chips in with the best hand and a majority of the time I end up losing. I also know that in that situation I'm not going to make a lot of plays with mediocre (at best) hands with 7 or 8 players seeing every flop. If that's wrong, I'd like to see the documentaion on it.

[vexvelour]

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When I get all my money in with the best hand I usually expect to lose.

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Negative thinking brings negative outcomes.

[papilindo]

Tony, you are not being silly or stupid. It is quite normal to ascribe "higher powers" to a "higher being". Any individual who does in fact believe in a higher power/being, while at the same time deriding the possibility of that being's potential manipulations at the individual level, is the one who is silly and stupid. Perhaps your destiny is elswhere and you are being guided there (and away from poker/gambling). Maybe your spiritual energies don't mesh with poker, etc. There are any number of possible explanations that go beyond statistical variance, IF you believe in God/spirituality. If not, then one is correct to assume that the numbers will eventually balance out. Either way, I wish you happiness and success in life...

[eastbay]

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Maybe your spiritual energies don't mesh with poker, etc.

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How could I have been so blind. What you really need to do is a variance dance after sacrificing a virgin to the poker gods. They are angry with you. Today they are simply causing you to lose races. Tomorrow you may be turned into a pillar of salt.

eastbay

[papilindo]

as long as she's a hot virgin then this too would be sound strategy... [img]/images/graemlins/grin.gif[/img]