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.

The sleepy lion returns.

I went spend crazy this weekend, buying a nice new office chair with lumbar support, a new monitor, and a backup hard drive.

I have also played a heap few more sit n gos. They have sat and gone a little worse than I would like. I am using SNGWizard to check my performace- I have made some loose shoves (always a problem for me) and have been gun-shy shoving from the small blind and button with a short stack- but I have also caught some really tough breaks on the bubble and in three handed play.

Basically, when the tournament is down to 3 or 4 people, the value of NOT losing is much higher than the value of winning, so responding to conditions and player tendencies is very positive EV. If you're doing it correctly, you pick up a ton of chips and when you get it all in you are doing it with a positive expectation overall. But, the cards have not been falling that way. Today was a big improvement, but I am still short more than a few buy-ins this week. That's life.

On the bright side, I made a deep run into a shootout tournament this morning. Shootouts are fun- you need to win the table to advance to a new table until there is just one remaining. The $5 buy in field was incredibly weak. I just killed these clowns. I ran well and made it to the penultimate round of tables, but ran into a wave of tough breaks. Nonetheless it was a nice cash.

25 NL is going very, very well. Having watched videos and posted on hands has improved my understanding of this game immensely. I am eager to see the results in my old stomping grounds, 100 NL.

In the PC, the mighty PC...

... the problem persists further.

My PC is busted. After two reformats with "all the fixins", there were still substantial errors on my hard drive. This is sucky. Although, after the second reformat my sound drivers were installed incorrectly, so all the sounds acquired a Floydian reverb quality. Playing FreeCell was like listening to an interactive "Dark Side of the Moon".

I sent it in for repairs to some guys who have a shop at the creepy end of the U District. They seemed to be bullshit-free so, I like my chances of getting it fixed. They said Friday at the lastest. Yay.

Still, I have played more than a little. And I have been KILLING IT. I have made up for my Full Tilt Downswings by ripping up pokerstars. I've been playing a few things:

• $25 and $50 NL. I have been grinding it well there. Who knows if I am playing differently or just running well. Right now, I'm just glad for the change.
• $15+$1 Turbos on Stars. These games are a cakewalk compared to turbos on FTP for a couple reasons: one extra level of blinds, antes instead of a blind up, and a more even distribution between poor players and multitabling grinders. I can beat the entire group of them, but with many more poor players around there's more money lying on the table. Thanks both to my edge in play and a huge amount of good luck, I am running up and down these games 30% ROI over the month... 15% higher than my expected result on FTP at the same stakes. I am in the money in 9 table games 42% of the time and finishing first more than half of those.
• Baby stakes pot limit Omaha. I don't understand why people like a game that plays the same as big bet poker but gives professionals an even bigger edge. I am nowhere near to "grokking" play in this game but it is fun. A few observations:

1. The change in hand value from preflop to flop is enormous. But, that is a relative thing. If two hands of the same type, their relative value seems to stay the same or increase in difference most of the time. A wet flop favors the wettest hand that hits it pretty hugely.
2. Nobody gets the outs in this game at the microstakes. Not nut outs are not outs, they are minus outs for your opponents. Which is about the same for bluffing, but way different for calling.
3. Showdown value changes radically. Hands can basically become worthless in one card.
4. Position is superhuge. Because of the radical change in hand values, position is an even bigger premium than in big bet hold 'em.

• Badugi. This game is ridiculous. It's structure like hold 'em, but with no board cards. The goal is to make the "worst" four card hand. Hand rankings are always in combination (like razz), except that suits matter. All hands with four different suits beat all hands with three and so on. Aces are low, so the best hands are four suit A234, A235, A245, A345, 2345, A236, and so on. Given the number of draws, the complexity of hands, and its format, it is basically lesson in hand reading, pricing opponents in, and pot odds.
  
• HORSE. I am pretty good at playing weak tight and fishy opponents in all these games. I will be good enough to get winner in the "for a living stakes" pretty soon.
  

I have been watching a ton of poker videos. I was home sick the past two days, so I just got through a ton. The "intermediate poker course" on stox has been fantastic. They have basically isolated and dissected the two most difficult concepts in playing deep stack big bet poker and hammered them out. The first is recognizing where villains leave value on the table to allow you to bluff and draw. The second is finding good value bets. A good example of how well this informs your game can be found here.

I also watched a few cardrunners freebies and this one by OMGClayAiken, poker supergenius. Although his site has the least content of any of them. 1/2 of them are by Galfond himself. I love the way he plays and thinks, so I am consdering joining up.

I'm feeling better- well enough to plan and meditate, at least. So hopefully once I get my hard drive fixed, I can resume my game and get back to work.

In your face, pokerbots.

In 40 minutes of superturbo play "to pass the time before I shower" I had a 15 game hot streak that tripled my return on the three dollar sit n gos.

They're poker the way MacDonald's is food.

As far as game theory contests go, it beats rock-paper-scissors*. I play these so good I get death threats.

* Free tips: the unexploitable RPS strategy is random. Humans cannot be random- they fail to repeat themselves often enough. If you throw whatever loses to the last hand they threw, you probably win more than your share. Also, few people start with paper. Start with rock.

Session.

Today I played for a little while: two hours of tournaments and cash games. I did pretty well for myself.

Here are my big cash game hands from the day. I should also make the point that the autoreplayer ALWAYS has positions wrong at this point. I am definitely not the guy labeled HERO on most hands.

I did alright in the single table SNGs, and then I won a two table tourney.

All in all it was a nice night for me. I made some goals and I started towards them. Off we go.

Pre-strategy. An end of month summary.

As far as first months go, January of 2009 did not go great or even well. I lost money overall trying to adapt my rusty, unsteady my NLH game to the modern $25NL 6max. At $10NL, limit, and in tournaments, I was a winner, but not enough to compensate for my craptacular results in $25NL.

To put it in perspective, the amount I am down is roughly a bad night at $3/$6 limit hold em, or a live tournament buy in:$100. The Kirktholemew J. Thompson of April 2008 cackles at the thought of lamenting a loss of that small size. Nonetheless, it sucks and it's kind of quaint that money the size of a medium pot is now a good or bad month.

I will go into details about zee plan for the next month and overall evalutation by the end of the weekend.

Tournament Borenament Snorenament.

I played sit n' gos and several large buy in tourneys. My day was slow and a little unsatisfying monetarily. However, I did book a winning day and made a deep run in a 400 person tourney. It exhausts my patience so quickly.

I lose track of the fact that in a tournament, the later decisions are worth, far far more money. I need to have some sort of ritual for ramping up for the end. They way I busted was quite vexing - I decided to make a marginal shove and went headfirst into an overpair.

I'm reading a Schoonmaker's book "Your Best Poker Friend". When I bought it, I thought it sucked. After a few months of thinking about it, this book is right up my alley- it is systematic and thoughtful about the process of self improvement, it relates everyday life things to poker and vice versa, and talks about how to be realistic about plans and data evaluation. Neat.

Check out an awesome example of good poker from a limit hold 'em scenario. I think my opponent played very well and was likely bluffing high hearts the whole way. Also, see my worst misclick of the day on the hand below.

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HAND 1

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$0.25/$0.50 Limit Hold'em Cash Game, 4 Players

Poker Tools by Stoxpoker - Hand Details

Replay This Hand



CO: $6.20 (24.8 bb)

BTN: $26.65 (106.6 bb)

SB: $19.45 (77.8 bb)

Hero (BB): $23.30 (93.2 bb)



Pre-Flop: Hero is BB with A 9

2 folds, SB raises, Hero 3-bets, SB calls



Flop: ($1.50) 5 5 4 (2 players)

SB checks, Hero bets, SB raises, Hero calls



Turn: ($2.50) 8 (2 players)

SB bets, Hero calls



River: ($3.50) 6 (2 players)

SB bets, Hero raises, SB folds



Results: $4.50 pot ($0.20 rake)

Hero mucked A 9 (a pair of Fives) and won $4.30 ($2.05 net)







--------------------

HAND 2

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$0.25/$0.50 Limit Hold'em Cash Game, 6 Players

Poker Tools by Stoxpoker - Hand Details

Replay This Hand



BB: $19.25 (77 bb)

Hero (UTG): $21.25 (85 bb)

MP: $5.35 (21.4 bb)

CO: $25.10 (100.4 bb)

BTN: $10.45 (41.8 bb)

SB: $4.25 (17 bb)



Pre-Flop: Hero is UTG with A 9

Hero raises, MP calls, CO folds, BTN calls, 2 folds



Flop: ($1.85) 9 T 9 (3 players)

Hero bets, MP calls, BTN calls



Turn: ($2.60) Q (3 players)

Hero bets, MP calls, BTN calls



River: ($4.10) 8 (3 players)

Hero checks, MP checks, BTN bets, Hero folds, MP calls



Results: $5.10 pot ($0.25 rake)

MP mucked A 3 (a pair of Nines) and lost (-$1.75 net)

BTN showed 7 7 (two pairs, Nines and Sevens) and won $4.85 ($3.10 net)

Derek Heater.

Two hours of play today ran positively swimmingly at both.

First hour of $25 NL Griding. 60 bucks I barely deserve (even after blowing a stack- badly, terribly- against a loose and fast player).

One hour of 12 tables SNG action: 50 bucks. I even mouthed off back at a guy. Anybody who shoots their mouth off on SNGs had better be aware of Sharkscope. Basically, I know whether or not you lose money playing poker. So, umm, yeah don't tease me.

All in all a good day.

Before I played today, I watched a video from a cardrunners player and Kyle Hendon about playing no limit in a looser, more showdown oriented way. I have an itch to play no limit soon, so maybe I'll do that next time I play.

I started off playing limit hold 'em, but I was neither winning nor playing particularly well. I still deviate from a solid strategy too much when I am not focused on it. This is very frustrating. So, I decided to move on and play some tournament poker. Holy smokes, tournament poker can be a breeze. I ran pretty well in my larger buy in tournaments and my multitable tournaments, so I made some decent scratch. After a few hours though, I was pretty bored, so I decided to make an effort back in limit play. I feel like I did much better.

In wrapping up, I reviewed my data from the year so far. I think I have been running a little poorly, but my play has some leaks. I am paying off too much with one pair and losing some money with suited connectors. I'll post some more analysis and my ideas of how to improve tomorrow.

Meanwhile, behold! My awesome tournament result: 66% ROI over 12 tournaments.

You're an apex predator! First day of the grind.

The grind remains the grind. I sat at $0.25/$0.50 6-max limit hold 'em today for about 2600 hands, or roughly 4 hours. I also played an hour of sit n' goes. The goal of the day was not to make a heap of money, but rather to adjust to playing with my new approach. I made out ok and played as well as I could have. I'll rate it as a 7 out of 10.

After the sessions, I posted some hands on 2+2 and stoxpoker. My names are kirkt and kirkthompson if you want to look them up.

Playwise, I am pretty rusty. I can no longer easily octo-table, even with my sexy monitor. I start to auto-pilot a litte, loosening up against raises, playing my hands more straightforwardly, and forgetting my reads and lines on previous turns. This will improve with practice.

Observations:
The game is far more aggressive than I remember from the sunny days of 2004. Value betting is a standard skill in 6max and calling down is much more nuanced.

I am far less aggressive postflop and not accustomed to heads-up play postflop, especially in marginal spots.

I have a lot to learn, but I am still pretty good an I learn quickly.