Whoops.

I just played a HU session with a guy who kicked my butt. He was good. It was hypnotic almost how badly I was letting him beat me. There go 35 big bets.

Mini-sesh: HU and 6max limit.

During my lunch break I played some HU and 6max limit hold em. Swongy swong swong. It's hard for me to make dead reads against some of these guys and I wind up on the unerlaggy side of things, letting weak-tight opponents just induce semibluffs from me street after street. Boo!

I did try some 1/2 HU. Man, the deck can KILL you in that game. One guy was running great against me for half the session but then slipped out of focus. He was definitely more experienced than me, but probably less adept in actual poker decision making (hands he took to showdown and where he chose to bluff all seemed odd and too... predictably devious, maybe?). He played maybe 40 minutes of hands against me and it was a battle. Beyond a doubt, I had the edge by the end. I think he lost sight of my hand ranges in the end of the game and resorted to spewy play. I had to go back to work, so I said "peace" in the chatbox and that I thought I was very lucky to have beat him (didn't say: by that much).

Shortly after I finished typing my farewell in, he said "F U Peace". Oh boy, did that make me a little up set. I wanted to put the hurt on him so bad. Any time something like that happens, I go online and check to see if he was a winner. It looks like he's a marginal tournament winner and has his nose open in the middle and low limit shorthanded and HU games. He's down about the amount he's paid in rake, according to the site. I can believe it.

Now I feel sympathy for the guy. I figured he was a slight winner if he game selected well, but the data indicates he pays a double rake.

The lesson to learn: these aren't friendships, these are transactions. Like an insurance adjuster or a judge, the professional objective is to be courteous and quick in doing your job no matter how you feel about the people you are dealing with. "The Professional" knows that there's no point in looking for sympathy at the table. I should trust him.

Session Report 5:45-6:14

I played 319 hand on stars and FTP before it was dinner time.

I hads 3 goals:

1. Sound moments of mindfulness, lost and found... a la Tommy Angelo. I deliberately tried to cultivate an active presence in the moment by attending to my breath and the position of my hands and feet. For the first 10 minutes, I only had 4 tables open and I drited off only once. As I added tables, the drifting became more frequent, possibly twice more. I also found myself correctly re-centering myself after I spaced twice. Once was after a big cooler.
2. Play for 1 hour or until dinner. Success! No tilt, slight profit.
3. Play tighter in UTG position. I raised 7/21 times and adjusted to my new standards fairly well. I only got out of line twice.

So put it in the books. I logged a nice winner before a decent meal.

I'm going to post a few hands on value betting.

Plans through the next 5k NLH hands.

#1. Tighten up my starting hand range towards 12/12 UTG and a little looser in the hijack. I don't need suited cards in my range UTG (I don't need balance) and few things besides big aces and pairs. I want it to be moronically simple to play OOP for now.

• Make a starting hand chart (or print Brystmar's) and abide by it.
• Review my hand frequency after every session and track it.
• Make a results chart of "before", "before w/ good hands", and after.

#2. Work to Control my "nano-tilt". Meditation has clearly improved my ability to recognize and stem my emotional responses, but I occasionally slip back into a loose-taggro, -EV style. Unfortunately, the pot sizes are not sobering enough to bring me back into focus (they were at higher stakes). I will also implement additional approaches.

• Re-watch Jared Tendler's videos, once to browse, and once to make "crib notes".
• Continue to practice zazen.
• Write weekly goals and read them before every session.
  
• Plan sessions more thoroughly. 1) Have an ETD and a duration in mind. 2) At least two unchanging qualitative goals and no more than 1 quantitative goal.
• Write and think more consciously about the process of tilting (or not tilting).
  

#3. Play better in pots that get big on the turn and the river. I feel quite comfortable playing in three bet pots, at least compared to my opponents. However, I feel a little out to sea in many large pots. This by no means surprising; they are hard streets to play against weak players without many stats and the variance can bet stressful. Also, much of the advice is too conservative compared to the style advocated by microlimit gurus. In game theory terms, the style is minimax, rather than maximally profitable. Since I play with larger bankrolls than most- I rarely start at a new limit with < 30 buy-ins- and I bet the turn more frequently than most players, I need to improve my bet-sizing and decision making there.

• Post every tough river decision and more tricky turns.
• Watch 2 videos per week on turn and river play.
• Design an in-game checklist for big pots. Test it, perfect it, memorize it.
• Design an in-game checklist for AFTER big pots. Test it, perfect it, memorize it.

Implementation strategy.

1. Continue to lightly play .5/1 and 1/2 limit to pass the time.
2. Continue to play turbo SNGs as a break and to stay in practice.
3. Sleepy Bastard Challenge continues. Videos + MTT 6am, most days per week.
4. Scheduled afternoon sessions. Log hours using Databases, etc.
   

I think these will keep me busy for now. More updates to come.

10k hands of muckity muck no limit at the $25 tables.

I have finally gotten through around 10k hands of NLH since I rebooted my system. I don't have the data with me, but here is my assessment off the top of my head.

1. Results: I am slightly in the red. I am still out of the red since March, but I am closer to 0 than I would like to be, but who wouldn't say that?.
   
2. I let myself get into a lot of tight spots on turns and rivers, paid off too often, and ran under EV with my semibluffs. When I am running badly, I play often play too Laggy, so no doubt these things are interrelated.
3. My play with premium hands is on the whole very solid, however I seem to get less value from AK than I'd expect. I will post more as I think about it.
4. Early in the sample set, I played far too many hands UTG and from the hijack. In a loose, spewy game, position and straight value betting are what wins the day. Suited connectors below broadway and suited aces need position and preferably a player to exploit.
5. I am probably cold-calling too much. There are fewer opportunities to play pots in position against players with tight raising ranges and high postflop %cbet and aggression factors. Their hand ranges are such that bluff shoving is nearly a spew.
   
6. I am starting to improve my aggression level, but I need to assess my cbetting and deeply study my line in big pots on the turn and river. **Especially vs. fish. I have given people air when a ton of cards kill my action on the next street, and I have snapcalled in a couple bad spots.

Successes:

• I think more about my individual plays, I challenge myself to develop reads and adjust my play to exploit them.
• I have re-acquired a verve for multitabling, but I am not on the level I once was.
• I have been active in the forums, acquired more poker conversation partners, and developed as a player because of it.
• I have been getting good value on my premium hands.
• My mindfulness of the present situation as an independent event has improved.
• I am considering the rake and rakeback more carefully in my decisions.
  
• Quitting. I generally quit sessions better than most. Once I catch myself out of line, I shut down the system and get up.
  

Shortcomings.

• Tilt. I was letting frustration shape my game too often. I am better than I have been at microstakes in the past (by a TON), but still have a ways to go.
  
• Boredom. I am letting longer sessions get the best of me and slipping into a non-optimal mindset. This feeds into my other problems.
• Short sessions. My mental endurance is lower than it has been.
• Poor hand selection UTG.
• (Possibly) over-estimating fold-equity in semibluff situations.
• Losing EV in big river pots.
  

Clever idea that never occured to me:

Use the "Fold to any bet" button for tough decisions with plenty of time. Don't hover near the call buttons.

I saw brystmar do it. So far, it is the most valuable thing in his videos.

A few things ignored by most "experts" in the poker boom.

1. There is an enormous amount of parity accross poker advice.
   
2. The majority of poker sites have a volume of content that is unwatchable due to low quality, sheer volume of content, or well beyond the point of diminishing returns for their intended audience.
3. The majority of the audience has a very different set of values and motivations from the pros and often, (I suspect), from their stated goals.

In the low stakes, the net result is that these sites wind up creating, and marketing to an image: an imaginary player who watches and studies 10-14 videos per week, thinks critically about every hand, and is open and honest with themself about their results, strengths and weaknesses.

I would say that maybe 10-15% of individuals in the forums I read (and I don't include myself as "always there") have an admirable level of self-awareness and many just don't have that kind of time for video watching. Most, by and large are just unable to parse the critical concepts in correctly. Poker is hard enough to begin with, let alone in an environment that encourages denial.

So, with that in mind, I would like to propose concepts that are important in improving in poker.

1. Join a group of people who will help you manage the information. Make sure you have "trust tree". Fill it with people who have access to the same resources as you, know how you play, and are trustworthy enough that you let them tell you when you are out of line or not living up to your goals.
2. Set your goals. Seek help from smarter people in revising them. Make sure you have a plan to achieve them.
   
3. Learn the ropes. Acquire (or bookmark) a database of core poker knowledge. Make sure the logic underlying your decisions are rooted in this set of data.
   
4. Seek mentorship. Find an environment where you can talk about your game and get good critical feedback.
5. Constantly revise your strategy on all levels. From "Should I even play poker?" to "What the hell do I do with KJs if my opponent 3bets me from OOP?".
6. Recognize that the majority of your poker goals should contain particular strategies for managing your study time, assessing your play, your play time, and your goals. I learned this the hard way, but it pays off.
   

Weekday Update.

I had a decent poker weekend. I got in some live play and did ok at the cash tables. This morning, I got off my butt and installed some much cleaner table mods for FTP. Now I can look at it without thinking about crappy CGI graphics.

Feeding the fish?

Please click for enlarged view.

A solid session.

I finally put in a short winner. I was by and large pleased with my play, but I did pay off an obviously better ace on the river once (yay), and found myself out of my comfort zone without setting it up on a tricky river (boo).

Nonetheless, 1/20th of a statistically meaningful sample, played like a winner, and I wasn't even dealt aces. Hell yuh!

Wisdom from master Dogen.

I practice zazen and occasionally take the time to read about the philosophy motivating it; many times it reminds me of poker. The following is from Dogen's Bendowa.

7. Q: Those who do not know Buddhism have to attain enlightenment by zazen and training. What use is zazen to those who have clearly obtained enlightenment?

A: Though I do not talk about last night's dream and cannot give a paddle to a woodcutter, I have something to teach you. The view that training and enlightenment are not one is heretical. In Buddhism these two are the same. Because this is training enfolding enlightenment, the training even at the outset is all of original enlightenment. So the Zen master, when giving advice to his disciples, tells them not to seek enlightenment without training because training itself points directly to original enlightenment. Because it is already enlightenment of training, there is no end to enlightenment. Because it is training of enlightenment, there is no beginning to training.... Because training even at the outset transmits a part of superior training, we fortunately gain a part of original enlightenment in this natural way. You must understand that the Buddhas and patriarchs emphasized the need for intensive training so as not to stain the enlightenment that is self-identical with training. If you throw away superior training, original enlightenment fills your hand. If you abandon original enlightenment, superior training permeates your body. In China I saw Zen monasteries in many districts, each with a meditation hall where 500 to 1,200 monks lived and practiced zazen day and night. When I asked the Zen masters who have been entrusted with the Buddha seal, "What is the essence of Buddhism?" they answered: "Training and enlightenment are not two but one."

A reflection

Last night I played a longer session with bad results. I was committed and beaten in several "what can you do pots", made a very savvy check behind against what I correctly saw to be a suited connector on a combo draw, made a classic "call-to-commit" with aces on a dry board to have the guy hit the hidden part of his five-outer, and lost maybe 2.5 buy-ins due to loose and passive play in large pots. Sigh.

Nonetheless I recognized some problems that I will work on next session.

1. I am not tight enough to 3bettors OOP preflop. You can only outplay yourself there.
2. I did not play fit-or-fold right against a bad LAG. I should have been setting him up with check raises with good hands, not pushing teeny edges.
3. My river sense is gone. I spewed there and failed to protect a few hands with position raises and semibluffs. You can only make up for that with river calls infrequently.
4. Nano-tilt. One bad decision can often encourage the next. I need to recognize it and batten down.
   

Adjustment.

1. Practice 4 table play for some time tomorrow.
2. Adjust to tighter UTG/MP opening ranges. Open raising like 12/16/28/50 from the non-blind 6-max spots.
3. Watch some videos on these subjects.
   

The longish story on flopping top pair with a good kicker.

Recently I saw a posted hand exemplifying the poster's difficulty with responding to check-raises with top pair, good kicker hands like KQ. I instantly saw the connection with an old hand of mine from the "lost databases".

The last real AHA! moment I had as a player was against a straightforward, weakish TAG at $1NL. I raised with QQ in the CO and he called in the SB. The flop came something like Th6d4h. He checked, I led out for the pot, and he minraised. Without much thought, I flat-called. The turn brought a 7s and the villain bet again.

At this moment, I looked at the bet and saw I was committed to showdown if I called. I looked at the villain's stats, saw that he almost always folded to continuation bets, almost never defended his blind, and played for pot control on the turn most of the time.

Instantly- like a bolt of lightning- this came to me: I should have folded on the flop. There was just no reason to continue in this hand. Moreover, the turn bet made it 100% certain the villain either hit his set or had a pair bigger than mine. But the only worse hand he had on the flop was JJ and I would have to call at least two bets to see a showdown against that range- I'm not sure he wouldn't check-call AA on many turns.

As trivial as it might seem, this was a watershed moment for me- and I am a worse poker player now than I was then. I could suddenly interpret an opponents actions well enough to fold an overpair to the board on the flop even when it was fairly benign.

Of course, TPGK on a semi-coordinated board is another thing entirely. But, like the decision above, the entire hand comes down to your opponents hand range once he calls your raise preflop and his postflop style.

And indeed, the texture of my decision making with those hands transformed after my AHA! moment. Suddenly, many more lines were available to me. For example, if a villain is very tight preflop and very aggressive with his made hands and draws on the flop but fit or fold otherwise, it's tough to get value from him without a monster on a semi-wet board. This might be a spot to take a card and try to induce action. There's not a lot of turn cards that move you off of TPSK, after all.

... I could do this for a ton of styles and hand ranges, but it really comes down to this: the better a player is, the harder it is to play TPGK against him, even in position. The reality is that you have to have more data to play it well and even then, it's a volatile spot.

With no read, it's just marginal. That's not to say it's not worth thinking about, but I think it is something that a good player must accept.T he nature of no limit can sometimes make TPGK tough to play in NLH, even when you have position. the more exact your read and the more experience you have in that spot, the better it works out for you. But it's still only picking up a few bucks here and there.

My A-game, my B-game.

My B-game

1. I can beat most tables I play.
   
2. I recognize opponents weaknesses and make slight preflop adjustments to beat them. I can alter my 3bet and cold-call frequencies, I can defen my blinds differently, I can flat call with aces or shove AQ. I just make the right move given what they have.
   
3. I recognize when my attention is flagging. I will slow down, or make a commitment to continue for a short while.
4. I will recognize if I am slightly off and adjust or quit.
5. I will recognize mistakes and catalog them for later.

My A-game.

1. I recognize when my opponents are starting to lose their "A" and "B" games and adjust.
2. I push the envelope, trying to put opponents to the test for their money.
3. I feel energized by my play.
4. I reason my way through very tough decisions.
5. I have highly reliable reads on my opponents hand ranges and exploit that.
6. I move readily into third and fourth level thinking.
7. Less straightforward folds, bluffs, and semibluffs are obvious and have less emotional context.
8. My aggression ramps up because I put more confidence in my reads.
   

My C-game.

I played a 90 minute session of 25 and 50 NL yesterday. During which, my girlfriend called and seemed stressed out that I wasn't able to accomodate her change of plans. This of course made me upset and my game went off kilter right away. I tried to straighten it out, but I did not succeed. As an exercise, I am making a list of attributes for my C-game. The poker game I play when I should really think more seriously about ending my session early.

1. I lose my "intuitive" grasp of marginal hand values. Really, I do not recognize things that I should be processing. The cutoff doesn't fold to c-bets often enough, the UTG player has a VPIP of 16, etc, etc.
2. I pay off obvious value bets. I let bad players take my money. I let good players take my money when they shouldn't.
3. I fail to recognize good semibluffing situations. Example: a villain led into my set on a threeflush turn. Obviously I am never folding and the villain will not fold his flushes. But, I am thinking about that instead of the likelihood that I can get the villain to commit to a worse hand with a raise or fold something with nine outs to beat me.
4. My game selection goes out the window.
   
5. I play fancy poker instead of ruthless poker.
6. I abandon core strategy ideas. I will make thin, slightly minus-EV plays without considering them and neglect really solid decision making like: 3betting a folder or flatting a strightforward player to peel one street, no more.
7. I stop recognizing my table image.
   

Tourneython.

Man, I HATE the way MTTs mess with my mind. The fact that I invest so much time in them without a cool story to tell(sometimes not even one fun hand to play) . But the overlay in them is enormous and I can easily multitask while I play them. Lately, I am realizing that the only thing that matters in these games is pushing absurd edges as directly as possible. Push, push, push. Make your opponents play marginally if they're are good and put your bad opponents through the ringer.

I get it, but I get bored. It's actually very hard to remember that my opponents are as bad as they come and I need to stop giving them credit for being sophisticated.

What I need now is a victory in a huge field (>500). I need a boost to my frail and craven ego.

This morning went fairly well, although I was pissed at how I busted from the $5 MTT (can you tell?).

My biggest bubble mistake (and theirs).

I always-always-always overestimate the fold equity I can offer my bad opponents. Limp-calling and defending their big blinds too much. My second biggest failure is missing a lot of easy, unexploitable shoves.

Why? I don't think about poker hands in terms of "perceived value", simply their value to me. So when an opponent limps up front, I put them on a hand I would probably raise or fold in that situation and if I have a hand that rates well against those hands, or well enough that the added fold equity makes it a go. So I shove. Then they call with weak aces (generally rating 60-40 against the bottom of my range here) and low pocket pairs (coin flips vs. K9 and the like).

But bad as this mistake is, I can tell you a worse one. Failing to observe the dictates of the independent chip model on the bubble when defending your big blinds. With less than 10 BB in play, you CANNOT call for your entire stack without a hand that rates as a HUGE favorite (think roughly 2-to-1) against your opponents range.

For example, many opponents open any two cards in the small blind with less than 10 bets. With hands like 44, A2, and K9, you are about even odds to play. But if you lose and it cripples your stack or eliminates you, you lose. If you win, you make it to 3rd or 2nd place. The trade-off is not worth it.

So, how do you deal with it? Let them steal. No fun, I know. But calling is costly.

Week summary.

I did alright in sit n gos- Wizard says my decisions are good, didn't pull any big cashes in MTTs, barely played any limit, and had a swinging but about EV-neutral week at 25NL.

This week, I want to:
1) Grind into 50NL. I will probably start adding 1-2 juicy 50 NL tables per session, starting tonight.
2) Start playing tournament poker more critically. I think I am posting every hand I bust on from now until I make a nice cash.
3) Vids: I want to watch more tourney vids (probably reviewing Matros' stuff), start learning PLO vids- I play like a showdown happy donk in that game so far- and learn Jackal's SNG perspective.
4) More $1-2 NL strategy work. Finish out Dixon's videos, start posting stats.

April Goals

My goals for April:

1. Grind 25 NL and 50 NL. Start adding 50 NL tables at BR >= $1250
   
2. Improve Grinding Session Structure. (a) Table selection and game changing. "Better position leads to better fishin'". (b) Session length. Work up to 2 hour straight sessions. (c) Breaks. Time sessions and take breathers AT LEAST every 60 minutes.
3. PLOmahahah. Download old school PokerAce, PT Omaha. Learn how to grind and multitable PLO.
4. Improve MT tournament results.
5. Wizard and review SNGs. Improve streamlining.

I was watching a video of Stox and Dusty talking about poker (#513 on Stoxpoker) and their discussion of moving up. Their emphasis on the difference between "good enough" and "exceptional" was a reminder that things are going pretty good for me. I am good enough to handily beat $25NL and it's only a matter of time before I get back to $100 NL, a game I loved to play and made a decent heap of money playing.

Update.

The Sleepy Bastard challenge has done well for me. I am definitely awake in the hours of 6 AM - 9 AM. However, I am still lazy about sturcturing the poker play and the rest of my day.

Perhaps I should focus on that (+ a video + the tournament) while I play? I haven't decided. Poker goals and some informative hands to be posted soon.

Using position and aggression to control the flow of the game.

This post will sound braggy to experienced players. But to somebody who is just learning, this illustrates the power of aggression. In both cases I used aggression in position, to control the flow of the hands.

http://www.stoxpoker.com/pokertools/session/610/replay/

These are two tournament hands against the same opponent ten minutes apart. Look at my play on the river scare card in both hands.