Bad few days, need some advice

[Kevin]

I have spent the last hour staring at the ceiling. It has been a tough last 3 days.

Some background.

I got Poker Tracker 4 months ago. I had poker stat for Paradise and had a very good 2002 playing very low and micro limits. I won about $9,000 - chump change to most, but it was a pretty good run for mostly $.50/$1.00 and $1/$2. I sat out most of last year. We had a second child, built a new house and along with being time-starved from the day job, I donated a lot of my bankroll to granite countertops. I would play an occasional home game, but for the most part, I was content with playing the occasional tourney on Poker Pages, reading here, and studying my books.

While watching the travel channel early in the year, I saw the advertisements for the poker sites. Out of curiosity, I logged on and saw the incredible numbers at Party. I watched a few games and my jaw dropped at what was being shown down. I took a trip to Vegas in February, won about $1,500 in the 8/16 over the week and when I came back, I deposited $1,000 into neteller. Since mid February, I have made about $6,000 online. I keep $1,500 on account, $500 in Neteller, and every two weeks for the past 2 months, I have pulled $1,000 out.

I play 3 games at 1 time. 3/6 and 2/4 depending on game selection. I have about 42,000 hands in my data base and up until this recent downturn, I was at 2.79 BB per 100 hands (which has stayed pretty constant throughout)

I see rounghly 18.5 vol preflop (about 19.5 in 2/4 because the 1/2 blind structure gives odds to complete with so many limpers), My hands, based on BB/Hr are right on track with how they are supposed to come out (Aces, Kinds, Queens, Jacks, AKs are my top 5 money winners). When I broke down my stats in two week increments, it comes out to about 22-25 hours per week and the win rate/flop %, win % is consistent.

The past two weeks have been a struggle.

After pulling my $1,000 out a week ago Sunday night, I proceeded to lose about $450 Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday of last week. This is not out of the normal set of cicumstances. It was a little more noticeable because I was going backwards from my $1,500. Thursday put about $300 of it back and by Sunday, I was back up to around $2,100. Monday put me up to about $2,350 and then BAMMO, the last three days, I have lost right at $1,000 - so that I am at $1,350. -$400 Tuesday, -$100 yesterday, and -$500 tonight. As I said, I have another $500 in Neteller and $4,100 in my slush fund, so I have backup bankroll, the $1,350 is my active on account. It has been the perfect storm. Big Hands don't flop, big pairs don't hold up, big draws don't get there, Sets are cracked when the draw comes. Nothing out of line, a two outer here or there against me heads up, but for the most part, it has been just a cold deck.

I went back and filtered to the last 3 days. My numbers look very similar to the last 3 months, however, the win percentage is way down. I normally win about 55% of showdowns and that number over the past 3 days is 44%, but I have checked off on the end when I see an obvious draw that gets there and I can sense the CR coming.

I counted foolish big bets lost and in the past three days, which equaled about 18.18 hours and 3,250 hands, I could see somewhere between 12-15 questionable calls on the end when I would have been better off throwing the cards in the muck and saving the bet - in hindsight. My blind play has been less than steller. My steals - have not worked, rags flop, I pay it off, the defends that I three bet with a big hand have come a miracle flop for the stealer and I pay it off... blah blah blah.

Although my aggression numbers have stayed constant and my preflop raise numbers still look ok - around 7.5%, I have this weak tight fear coming over me when I am expecting to get a bad flop, I can predict the check raise coming on the turn against the aces and it is invariably the rag two pair that connects and I pay if off. I look down and see AKo in early position and raise it, get 4 cold calls, get a rag flop... it has been a rough 3250 hands.

I read David Sklansky's article about 2 years ago in card player figuring out bankroll requirements and risk of ruin. If I remember right, it was 300 big bets. I think I have lost about 160 over the past couple of days and am beginning to wonder if this run over the past 40,000 hands was nothing but a severly lucky streak and I am regressing to the mean. My win percentage through the first 45,000 was about 8.9%. It has been 7.75% in the last 3 days.

I had trouble with a couple of players - both loose aggressive. One guy saw 92% of the flops and raised preflop 22% of the time. He bet any flop like he had the best of it and 5 different times I played right back at him with a big hand. Every time, he would catch an unheard of draw on the end and it would be a severe beating. (AKs he had J10o flop is A and 2 diamonds, turn, K, river, Q, he is raising and reraising the whole way, etc..ugh). Another guy is about 58% preflop, 22% pfr, same thing. After they get me once or twice, they start taking shots at me. I probably lay down too many hands against them, but I am so baffled because I cannot put them on a hand. Of the $1,000 lost, over $200 went to those two. I know that it will come back on them, but they will then give my money to someone else, so I am not able to reap the benefit of their play.

After a couple of raises on a preflop hand like AQs do not connect, I get a lot of overcalls when the next one comes, and it seems to snowball from that point. success at a table seems to breed success, early failure seems to breed continued failure.

I don't want to become weak tight and wait for Aces while I am blinded away, but I am really struggling.

I will post a couple of hands, however, nothing seems out of the ordinary (to me, and of couse, I just lost $1,000 in 3 days).

I had Aces 15 times and won 86% 3.2bb/h I had Kings 10 times and won 70% 1.83 bb/h. The drawing hands where I have 4 to a flush and 4 to a straight as well as some mid pairs where I flop a set and get cracked seem to be the big loosers.

Sorry to ramble, just wanted some advice from someone with similar numbers in their database.

It is -6.34bb per 100 hands in the last 3 days. Were the first 40,000 hands an anomoly (I am now at 2.1 bb per 100 hands with the last three days included) or is it a large enough sample that this is a big downswing (8% of my total hands).

Any advice on how to tackle weak-tight syndrome as I get back at it this weekend?

I could have probably wrote this in a word doc as therapy, but I thought I would put it out there.

This is the biggest short term BB swing that I have had and self doubt is beginning to creep in. If this is normal, smack me upside the head and I will get it together and get back to the grind. If it is not and someone wants to sweat a few hundred hand histories, let me know and I will send them off. If it is time to find another hobby/second income source, I guess now is the time to find out.

Thanks,
Kevin

[tech]

[ QUOTE ]
If this is normal, smack me upside the head and I will get it together and get back to the grind.

[/ QUOTE ]

*Smack* [img]/images/graemlins/grin.gif[/img]

Other posters can probably give far better advice than I can, but it looks like mostly normal variance to me. I went through a 150BB downswing not too long ago -- mainly due to making lots of second-best hands. It just happens sometimes.

Take the opportunity to plug any leaks (like the ones you have identified) that might have exacerbated the swing. If necessary, take some time off to clear your head. The worst thing you can do is lose confidence.

Hang in there.

[SinCityGuy]

This happens from time to time for all winning players. I had a similar downswing (online) about six weeks ago, and I did a thorough examination of my biggest losing hands. In almost every hand, I had high pot equity going into the turn and river, and ending up losing to substantial underdog hands.

This reinforced my confidence, and I continued playing solid poker. Soon, everything returned to normal.

[roGER]

In short, try not to worry, take a few days off if necessary and then, play on!

My biggest critisism of poker books in general is they fail to emphasise just how small our winning margin is, and consequently how brutal and long some losing streaks can be...

True, Mason has written several essays on the topic, and shown with stats how you can anticipate and measure the degree of fluctuation in your results.

But some respected player somewhere really needs to fess up and show us a graph of their long term results, and discuss some of the harrowing vertical dives that graph would show.

If it's any consolation at all, I'm in the midst of a brutal streak right now that means I'm still 105 BBs down after playing over 8000 hands. This is my current worst ever, but then I've only been playing on-line a couple of years - about 45,000 hands.

At least you are still well bankrolled, and have have taken an objective look at what is causing your trouble. Don't beat yourself up too much about a lose call or a missed raise. Your figures will show these "mistakes" to have contributed very little to your overall loss.

The one great hope is "regression to the mean" - or should that be "acession to the mean?" In the past, I've found a long bad streak is often ended by a phenomenal good streak that sends the graph spiking upwards to more or less where you expected it to be after n hands.

Things WILL turn around for you, so long as you continue to play solid winning poker.

Do hope it happens soon.

- roGER

[Spyder]

[ QUOTE ]

After a couple of raises on a preflop hand like AQs do not connect, I get a lot of overcalls when the next one comes, and it seems to snowball from that point. success at a table seems to breed success, early failure seems to breed continued failure.


[/ QUOTE ]

This is absolutely true. Once you've lost your table image, it is very difficult to push people around. Once you can't buy those cheap pots, your losing sessions begin to get WAY more expensive.

I have found that when I get to a table and I get a few hands that don't hit (AK, AQs, etc), but I bet them out and get called down; and, after a couple of failed steal attempts, everyone begins to call you down, and they will not be bluffed. It becomes VERY difficult to win at that table, even with good hands because you're getting no respect. If the cards are hitting, that's a good thing...if they are not, its time to change tables.

Spyder

[bernie]

[ QUOTE ]
But some respected player somewhere really needs to fess up and show us a graph of their long term results, and discuss some of the harrowing vertical dives that graph would show.


[/ QUOTE ]

Davidross did a 52 week series on it.
GuyonTilt i believe made his graphs of his swings available in a thread somewhere. I think Homer did also. Homer had 3 different types of graphs.

It also helps to have someone who's game you trust, that kind of knows your game (and hopefully a winning player himself), talk to you about your game.

b

[davidross]

You don't need to change anything except your attitude, and that won't be easy to do until you're back winning again, and you will be.

There is no doubt that the hardest thing for me to do in the past year was to accept the losing streaks, and I've had 3 doozies in a year. While you're in the midst of it, you start to worry that your game has gone south, or maybe you were just lucky for all the time before that, which of course are just stupid ideas. Your win rate is much higher than mine ever was, so I would expect your losing streaks will be less sustained and for fewer dollars. I bet a week from now you'll be wondering what all the fuss was about. I have had 200+ BB losing streaks, and a 3 week stretch (45,000 hands) where I broke even.

It helps you appreciate the winning even more. Give us an update next week, I'm sure you'll be out of it.

[thehip75]

David, I may print your reply off and hang it over my computer.

I am a winning player through 65000+ hands, but have been stuck in neutral for the last 12000 hands or so. Over that time, my stats have remained roughly the same, but I am just not getting the results. At times I have felt like Maverick in Top Gun after Goose dies:

Maverick: "It's no good."
Back seat guy: "What do you mean it's no good? It doesn't get any better than that!"
Maverick: "It's no good."

I know that if I keep plugging away, and playing solid poker, the results will come.

But they better come soon!

[Kevin]

Guys,

Thanks for the encouragement and the support. (My name is Kevin and I love poker...Hi Kevin)....

I was really uplifted by some of the comparative stories.

When I got home from work, I filtered to all 3200 hands and filtered by won/loss. I then looked at all of the big losers in sequential order. I saw a bunch of cracked big pairs, cracked straights, big draws that had huge, huge multi-way pots and just didn't get there, and a few heads up hands that I midread my opponent, got check raised and paid off with a hand like AKs or TPTK when a turn card made them a better hand.

I also noticed terrible heads up blind play when someone came in for a steal, I called, got a piece of the flop called the flop, raised the turn, only to find out that they got more of the flop and sometimes part of 4th.

Finally, I saw a couple of frustration hands (normally late in the night while the losses are mounting), a big hand like AK or AQs doesn't hit, I get raised on the turn, I three bet, then bet out on the end and shown a hand like two pair or a set. obviously, I was very far behind and it would have been in my best interest to lay it down, however, I had been losing and felt that people were taking a shot at me with a worse hand. I need to continue to play every hand as if the score 0 for the night, heed Spyder's advice and don't worry about pride or ego if I get cracked and have the shots taken at me - just leave the table and start anew.

BTW, Spyder, I thought I might have you in my database (I have about 8500 players with specific notes on 751 and advanced export on everyone over 50 hands - so at a normal table, I have notes on 4 or 5 of the lineup). I have a Spider23 or something like that, labled as a watch out, but I assume you go by you handle here - so no dice (I have about 2500 5/10 hands as well).

In short, I am responsible for about $250 of the $1,000 - $750 is a cold deck - so I can fix 25% of my game and hopefully enjoy it on the upswing.

I will post in a week with an update.

Kevin

[John Deere]

Kevin,

Same thing has happened to me in the past week. It has been basically my second big slide since starting to play online at the beginning of this year. My first one was really tough, eating up about a third of my bankroll at the time (I worked $100 up to $1200, and over a weekend was back down to < $800). In two weeks after, though, I moved it back up to $1500 without any hitches. I've since moved to higher limits, and although money-wise this one was worse, it wasn't as bad BB-wise. Knowing that I got over the first bad streak, however, gave me confidence that I would get over this one as well.

This one did have its low points, though. At one point, I chased 34 (suited, maybe... not sure) to the river. One of my friends, who was concerned about my poor run, was watching and started yelling at me in chat to get out. I turned off chat. He called me on my cell phone. I put it on silent mode. Finally, I realized what I was doing, and took a break. I know that I can't avoid going on tilt sometimes, but I do feel that I can catch myself sooner now and know when I've hit rock-bottom.

That being said, today I sat back down at a table and got crap cards for 2 hours. Ate dinner. Sat back down, and won AK, KK and JJ within a span of 5 hands. I wanted to catch some of the O's game, so I took a break and told a friend, "You must take my seat when I get up... these idiots are calling with Q4 to the river every hand." He sits down and proceeds to lose $50 in 15 minutes (KK cracked by AA, amongst others), then quits for the night. I decide to play a few minutes more, and hit a boat with my 66 in the BB with a huge 17 BB pot my very first hand (beat out 88 and KK). I call it a night before the blinds get back to me.

It happens, you know? Man it is a crappy feeling to lose a big hand, but man does it feel great to win one! Good luck, I'm sure you'll turn it around.