Boy this game is fun when the cards work WITH you!

[LetsRock]

After a couple of absolutely dismal weeks in hell, I caught a couple of decent runs this weekend which put a band-aid on my emotions and helped to restock the BR. Here's a couple of the great hands that helped to make it a good weekend.

TruePoker 2/4

(let my preface these hands by saying that I do have a rockish rep amongst the couple of decent players that I play with here - my aggresive actions are usually very highly respected - both these hands feature at least a little bit of trickyness because of this. There are usually 2-4 decent players at these tables and was the case in both these hands.)

1. AA slow play. Hero is in BB with AA. A couple of limpers to Button who raises. Button is reasonably solid, but not great. I usually 3-bet this, but my action has been getting killed because of my table image so I just call the raise, planning to jack it on the flop or turn. Others call. 4 or 5 to the flop for 2 bets.

Flop: A57r (Oh yeah) Don't feel the need to push this, I'll wait until the turn to crank it up. Hero checks, and it checks all the way around. Hmmm. OK I'll bet the turn.

Turn: 5[A57] Well, a bet now will just fold everybody out, so I check again and a MP player bets, PF raiser folds, I call and the other player calls. I figure my best option here is to wait until the end to jack this hand.

River: 7[5A57] Hero checks, check to Turn bettor who bets, I c/r, fold, Turn bettor re-reaises and I cap. The 7 delivered his boat which of course was totally dominated. AS much as I would have liked to see someone else with a 7 or a 5 involved in this, I'm sure I collected the maximum in this spot - any initiation of action on my part would have led to everyone folding or at most getting called down.

2. T7s hits flop very hard.
I'm in BB with T7s. UTG and UTG+1 fold, All others limp to SB who raises. Normally, I won't protect a T7s but there's going to be a huge pot (16 SB) so I fgure I have great odds to see the flop and SB has done some very weak PFRs so his raise is menaingless.

Flop 77T! Wow. Beautiful! SB bets, Hero calls, MP1 Raises, fold to LP who 3 bets fold to SB who calls and I throw the cap on it. Normally I wait for the turn, but with this much action I decided to keep it going - as good as my hand is, I'm not oblivious to the horror that a TT might be out there to crush me, but, I lower my horns to charge and cap it. MP1 folds, others call. (MP1's folding happens to be key and he probably wouldn't have folded had I not capped the betting. "there's the other 7" as he mucked.)

Turn: T[77T] Well now. I guess the TT isn't out there, but I figure to be chopping now. I bet (hind sight is making me wish that I tried a c/r, but I doubt they would buy it anyway) and LP and SB call.

River: blank [77TT] I bet again and both call. LP has A7 and the dork in SB has KQ but called it all the way to the end (this guy was really bad!).

MP said he mucked the other T, which I doubt he would have done had I not capped the flop. He's a good enough player to recognize when his 2 pair is beat and wasn't going to pay 2 more bets for his 2 outer (but he was getting 14:1+ to make the call!) I thanked him.

It's amazing how crazy this game is. 3 days ago, I couldn't drag a pot to save my life for the last 2 weeks and the last 2 days I made over $300 in about 6 hours at 2/4. As much fun as the last 2 sessions have been, I would gladly trade monster sessions like these if I could just have regular moderate wins and no long term fugly stretches. I KNOW in the long term it all works out the same, but 2 or 3 weeks of getting kicked in the head with few marginally profitable sessions is very hard for me. But, I guess it just doesn't work that way, so I need to continue to work on improving my ability to emotionally handle the fuglies. (Luckily, my "tilt" doesn't affect my play too much, I just don't have fun.)

[arkady]

Hey bro,

I remember you responded with some comforting words when I posted something about having a bad May. Well it ended pretty much how it started, I was able to scrounge up about 150 BBs - but that was it. June has already seen me fluctuate many hundreds of dollars and frankly it just isnt fun.

I know what you mean and sometimes those monster sessions make everything seem like its completely out of our hands. I guess no matter how skilled we are (or not are) in the short term it doesnt matter one damn bit.

Its those that shrug off these periods that are truly successful and it takes a lot of mental/emotional power to persevere. Sometimes wondering is any of this worth it? Still dont know.

good luck!

[LetsRock]

[ QUOTE ]
Sometimes wondering is any of this worth it?

[/ QUOTE ]

When I'm in the bowels of hell, I ponder this very heavily. As recently as last week, I was having just an awful session (8 in a string of about 20) and almost just cashed out completely. Getting hammered on-line has zero joy. At least live, there is usually some social fun to be had while getting raped, but on-line it is just pure torture.

I just deleted about 4 paragraphs of detail that you all don't care about, but, lets just say that I have very hard time dealing with substained stetches of misfortune and the thought of pulling out and spending all my winnings on play-dough (or something equally ludicrous) has crossed my mind.

[JDErickson]

[ QUOTE ]
[ QUOTE ]
Sometimes wondering is any of this worth it?

[/ QUOTE ]

When I'm in the bowels of hell, I ponder this very heavily. As recently as last week, I was having just an awful session (8 in a string of about 20) and almost just cashed out completely. Getting hammered on-line has zero joy. At least live, there is usually some social fun to be had while getting raped, but on-line it is just pure torture.

I just deleted about 4 paragraphs of detail that you all don't care about, but, lets just say that I have very hard time dealing with substained stetches of misfortune and the thought of pulling out and spending all my winnings on play-dough (or something equally ludicrous) has crossed my mind.

[/ QUOTE ]

Play Dough - Thats great !!!

I just finished an incredibly nasty May. 13k hands of 2/4 and 3/6 and I managed to come out ahead $29. If not for the bonuses it would have been even worse. 2nd guessing your skill, the cards and the RNG and whining to symapthetic poker friends were common for me. I finally decided that May is history. June is what is happening now. SO far I am doing ok in June. Its amasing how in one month your AQo can lose 2BB hand but in June they make 2BB hand. I think I am finally understanding what "long term" really means.

I'll stop rambling and just say that I know exactly what you went through. Good luck at the tables. Punish the fish

Jim

[BottlesOf]

I'm with all of you guys. I've been flat for several weeks (<10 hrs. a week, but going up now)
Up a thousand, down 800, up 600 down 800, up 400, down 300, up 5, down 5...)

My win rate is in the toilet, but I take breaks, post here, read here. I really feel that if it weren't for this board I would've given up long ago.

Good luck all and thanks.

[wayabvpar]

I am glad I read this...I am currently mired in the worst streak of my poker career. I have heard about the 100bb downswings and figured it would never happen to me. Wrong. Try 120bb in 2 weeks. Up is down, flopped set of aces gets rivered by the flush, etc.

This thread has helped in a couple of ways. First- misery loves company, and it helps to see that other folks are having (or have had) the same trouble I am. Second- it is a nice reminder of how good those rush sessions feel (and how healing they are on the BR!).

[LetsRock]

[ QUOTE ]
Up a thousand, down 800, up 600 down 800, up 400, down 300, up 5, down 5...)


[/ QUOTE ]

This would have been a welcome week (or series of sessions) compared to what I was going through. I don't have that big of swings but my days were more like (I don't have my numbers in front of me) -$120, -$140, -85, -$40, -$180, -$20, +$65, -$75, -$45, +$15, -$80, -$40, +$70, -$85... until I finally had some deliverance of +$85 (4 hours) and +$225 (2 hours) sessions. I'm a very tight player. I don't lose money chasing prayers. I don't lose money trying to buy pots. I pay very close attention to pot odds and rarely make calls that are not going to deliver the correct odds if I hit a draw. I rarely pay off when I know I'm beat. I rarely lay down when 1 bet will get me to showdown with a trong hand. While I admit that there was likely a bet or 2 per session that was poor play (I'm not perfect), most of it was just bad cards and worse beats - what can you do? Most of the big losses came at 5/10 where th cards were particularly freezing (seems like everytime I stick my toe in that pond I get frostbite and the play at that level is WORSE than the play at 2/4, 3/6. I need to stop whining about this now........

[arkady]

jim, you werent whining - really you werent.

[Fitz]

I recently went through a horrendous stretch it consisted of ~ 21,000 hands over a six week period; I dropped over 300 bb's. Fortunately, my bankroll is sufficent to withstand a beating like that. More importantly, it forced me to take a serious look at what I was doing. I discovered:

1. I was tilting far more than usual.
2. I was not being patient enough and I was trying for force wins with sub-standard hands.
3. I was playing sessions that were much too long.
4. I had begun to chase hands I shouldn't thinking more of possibility than probability.
5. I was bluffing too much and at the wrong times.

I took some time away from the game, and I began to reread HPFAP and TOP. I have made a nice comeback, although it has been a little slow, and I'm within 50 bb's of my all time bankroll high again. I don't enjoy the downturns any more than the next guy, but it sometimes takes this kind of ugliness to force us to take a critcal look at what we are doing.

Good luck,

Fitz

[PokerNoob]

I too had a horrible May. Suckout after suckout begat "too-tricky-for-my-own-good" play, weak/tight play, overaggressive play, you name it. I did two things that helped me. The first was in my style of play. I just went back to basic small stakes a-b-c poker. I tightened up a little, particularly in EP. Its hard to detect, but you start thinking "I can outplay these yokels postflop" and maybe you start making some EP limps you shouldn't and calling some raises preflop you shouldn't. I hit bottom about a week ago when in the span of about 50 hands I lost set over set, boat over boat and flush over flush, in addition to having premium pockets cracked by utter dreck calling raises. The second thing I did was to play other sites, which in retrospect I should have done a lot more of. I was getting killed at Party, but won at Pokerclub, the crypto skins and the prima skins. Because I was trying to make up my losses at Party, I kept playing there. I don't know what it is, but somehow the different sites play different. I think sometimes when you're game is not working at one site, it plays well at others.