The Amoeba

It has been a very interesting month for me so far.  I started out on a balls out heater at heads up, followed by SEVERAL tiltspewy sessions where I just couldn’t win a hand and then started spewing.  At this point I think I am down about 100 bucks for the month, which isn’t bad considering the way I’ve been playing.  Although I can win at the small stakes in autopilot mode, that is not what I am looking to do.  So for the past week or so I have been watching cardrunners videos, and 1-2 tabling HU and 6max.  Some things I have been focusing on in particular are assigning hand ranges with my own reads + the help of PAHUD. 

In particular I have been trying to look deeper than just VPIP and PFR tendencies.  Those are a good start, but don’t really tell me anything about the more important postflop streets.   The focus has been more on cbetting percentages, opponents’ positional awareness, and aggression statistics by street.  I feel like I’m just starting to scratch the surface of not BEING, but LEARNING HOW TO BE a good postflop player.  I definitely have a ways to go, but I feel like I am starting to get an idea of the work I should be putting into this game to be successful.  I am amazed at how I used to think I was a good player, when all I did was play a bunch of hands and post a few comments a month on a forum.  Other successful players are doing much much more than I am to be successful, and to reach their levels of success, I must outwork them.

Woohoo!  I’m finally done with this month! :)   It was a true test, and overall I give myself a C+.  I still have a ways to go with discipline and studying the game.  Enough dilly dallying, here is the meat:

 January Goals: Play 50k hands - FAIL

I didn’t quite make it to 50k hands.  This is part of the discipline problem.  If I had been disciplined and not tilted, I could have extended a few sessions by a few hundred hands, reaching my goal.  As it was, most of the time I spent at the tables I was playing a +EV game.  I am a bit irked that I did not reach my goal, but am proud of my performance nonetheless.

Some stats, and some pretty picture:

December Results

Playing at the $6.50s and 2k hands @ 25nl

- +$461 on the month, made it to silver star

January Results

12,050 VPPs  =  +10k from last month

~45K Hands =  More than last month, not sure by how much though

+$1521 = Almost 4x as much as last month

22000 fpps = ~ $330

Hourly = ~ $24 including fpps

February Goals

Maintain Platinum Status

35k Hands + 10k Hands of Heads Up NL

No tilties

FUCK I hate this game sometimes. Today was one of those days where nothing goes right at all. I wanted to play 2k hands but had to cut the session short cuz I was starting to get pissed. The only reason I’m not down a ton is some jackball pushed an underpair into my tptk. Sans that, horrible session. I didn’t make any dumb tilty plays but I may have been a bit gun-shy. I’m pretty sure that’s just because I was never in any situation where bringing guns would be good. I’ll wrap this torturous month up tomorrow and hopefully end it on a positive note.

Just played a quick 2k hands, 500 @ nl100 and 1500 @ nl50, +3 buyins, very solid concentrated play.

Keep it up, comin’ down the home stretch for 50k hands; just over 42k ATM.

I was planning on playing a thousand or so hands at nl50 yesterday, but after coming home and reacting negatively to some *interesting* activities by my lovely girlfriend, I decided I was still not in the right frame of mind to be playing poker. Good decision by me, and I think that I will be exceptionally fresh for my session today.

If you’ve been reading any of my posts recently you can see that Mirage has been commenting, offering advice, and even offered to take a look at some hand histories. I am not QUITE at the point where I will be taking him up on his offer, but I most certainly will some time in February. Grinding through < 100NL is pretty straightforward, and there has been really no need for supplemental advice beyond what I receive in the Ridge forums or at 2p2 small stakes forums. However, if I want to crush 100NL and move up to 200NL and continue crushing etc, a poker buddy is like a necessity. Playing thousands and thousands of hands at a high level can be incredibly strenuous, and having someone going through the same battles as me to bounce ideas off etc. is a luxury I am thankful to have. SO IF YOU ARE READING MIRAGE GET READY TO GO TO WAR W/ ME!!

Oh me oh my, Tiltmonster, how I loathe thee. Let me count the ways:

3k hands, -$669

I’d say $350 was probably just raw tilt. I cursed out loud a few times, (real loud), but did not carry on a lengthy discussion with my computer monitors or have the urge to go on a tirade and throw things. I was fairly calm, but I just wouldn’t listen to the little voice in the back of my head saying “dude, your behind, ez fold” or “dude, this is a horrible spot to make a play”.

I’m gonna drop down to 50nl for my next session and won’t move back up until I make a couple of buyins at 50nl.

So I stopped playing about 45 minutes ago, and I am trying to analyze why I tilt like this. Margins are slim in poker these days, especially as one progresses up limits. Any sort of established pattern of tilt can mean ruin. My pattern goes like this: Play good poker, breakeven for a while or win at a low rate. Then hit a giant heater. After this giant heater there is a small breakeven stretch and then a large downswing. Now I’m pretty sure this isn’t just normal variance; looking through my history I can see these patterns in graph form. Perhaps someday I will post all the dataz I have on here. Back to the point, I think I know what is causing this tilt. My mind becomes a positive environment for tilt. As the heater part of the cycle progresses, I get a sense of entitlement and overconfidence. When I inevitably cool off, I become frustrated when AK misses 10 flops in a row. I mean COME ON MAN. I-HAVE-ACE-KING… WHAT-THE-$@%#??? So my next major challenge as a poker player is to go back to the tables fresh for my next session, grind solid poker, waiting for that next big heater. I will make more detailed blog posts about my state of mind during my next heater, and post more hands, in order to make sure my thinking is not skewed by the tiltmonster. My game has brought me from $3 in october and the 6.50s in January to almost 3k, so I am not going to abandon my playing style or revamp my game. I will continue to try to plug leaks, and overcome my tilt demons.

I had a bad run at nl100 yesterday; after going +150 in the first 1 and a half hours, I dropped $4hundo in like 50 hands.  Some was cooler, but some was bad play.  This bad play I speak of was not terrible, I dont think, except 1 play.

POKERSTARS GAME #14776950892:  HOLD’EM NO LIMIT ($0.50/$1.00) - 2008/01/23 - 21:04:20 (ET)
Table ‘Geraldina III’ 9-max Seat #1 is the button
Seat 1: bennymac28 ($84.35 in chips)
Seat 2: The Amoeba ($99 in chips)
Seat 3: EtOi ($228.70 in chips)
Seat 4: xtioo ($100.15 in chips)
Seat 6: gonZodinHo ($101.10 in chips)
Seat 7: sofa604 ($106.05 in chips)
Seat 8: PanTax ($36.95 in chips)
Seat 9: XbonezX ($112.15 in chips)
The Amoeba: posts small blind $0.50
EtOi: posts big blind $1
*** HOLE CARDS ***
Dealt to The Amoeba [Th Tc]
xtioo: calls $1
gonZodinHo: calls $1
sofa604: folds
PanTax: folds
XbonezX: folds
bennymac28: calls $1
The Amoeba: calls $0.50
EtOi: checks
*** FLOP *** [8h 7c 9d]
The Amoeba: checks
EtOi: checks
xtioo: bets $3.70
gonZodinHo: folds
bennymac28: folds
The Amoeba: calls $3.70
EtOi: folds
*** TURN *** [8h 7c 9d] [As]
The Amoeba: checks
xtioo: checks
*** RIVER *** [8h 7c 9d As] [4c]
The Amoeba: checks
xtioo: bets $5
The Amoeba: raises $25 to $30
xtioo: calls $25
*** SHOW DOWN ***
The Amoeba: shows [Th Tc] (a pair of Tens)
xtioo: shows [6d Ad] (a pair of Aces)
xtioo collected $69.40 from pot
*** SUMMARY ***
Total pot $72.40 | Rake $3
Board [8h 7c 9d As 4c]
Seat 1: bennymac28 (button) folded on the Flop
Seat 2: The Amoeba (small blind) showed [Th Tc] and lost with a pair of Tens
Seat 3: EtOi (big blind) folded on the Flop
Seat 4: xtioo showed [6d Ad] and won ($69.40) with a pair of Aces
Seat 6: gonZodinHo folded on the Flop
Seat 7: sofa604 folded before Flop (didn’t bet)
Seat 8: PanTax folded before Flop (didn’t bet)
Seat 9: XbonezX folded before Flop (didn’t bet)

Okay… I TRIED TO REPRESENT TJ ON THE RIVER.  IT OBVIOUSLY DID NOT WORK LOL.  I have no idea what came over me… I would never play JT or any other powerhouse hand like this.  Here’s the even SICKER part of it.  For some reason, I thought he might FOLD A SET.  PEOPLE DONT FOLD SETS EVEN WHEN THE BOARD IS 1-SUITED AND THERE ARE 5 STRAIGHT CARDS.   Ugh so I guess that was a bit of tilt.  The good thing is that even though my thoughts were absolutely asinine, there were at least some thoughts going on heheheh…

So after my first tough mini-run I was thinking that today, I’d just drop down to nl50 for a quick crusher session.  However, I was reading 2p2 on my lunch break, in a good state of poker mind, I got home and took a refreshing nap, and when I woke up, decided to stick with the nl100 for today.  Hey, what are bankrolls for???  So I’m glad I stuck with it because I made a full recovery and a little bit more.  I’m sizzling hot right now, but @ the same time, when I do cool off I think I will be able to hang at nl100 for a while.  I really am looking forward to the end of the month, so I can look back at my completed goals and feel good while taking a 3 day break for the super bowl

My second shot at NL100 went pretty well. I started out by playing 3 nl100 tables, and gradually increasing the ratio of $100 : $50 tables. Over a couple day stretch I went on a heater and collected 9 nl100 buyins. That was fun. I was hitting hands, but I really think I was in a zone too.

Hopefully my good fortune can continue and I will be able to start taking shots at nl200.

Here are this months goal updates.

50k hands:

30,369 played so far

~ 2500 vpps left before platinum; should end up w/ around 13000.

Goal: 18k Hands.

Result: 14.5k hands - FAIL

Discussion: I could have made my goal of 18k, but the point of this ridiculous amount of hands was to play +EV throughout the entire stretch. About 12k hands in with a whole day left, I got to a point where I was in the middle of a session, and could feel myself playing badly. I decided to cut that session off, and just try to play an assload the next day. Well the same thing happened the next day…. I played 2300 or so hands very well, and started slipping towards the end, so I called it quits. I feel bad for not hitting my target which was attainable, but I think I did the right thing.

Goal: 50 Hours of work @ real job

Result: 47.5 Hours - FAIL

Discussion: I really tried hard with this one, but ended up at the end of the week with 8 things on my to do list, none of which I could proceed with until someone else could help me with them. Excuses excuses, there’s always stuff to do. 47.5 hours is the most I have gotten in for quite some time, so I will take solace in that fact. Besides that, FAILLL.

Goal: Lazy ass to secretary of state to renew license plate

Result: New license plate

Discussion: It took like 5 minutes total, including taking the old plate off and putting the new one on. What is it about my brain that makes these little chores so difficult to do? Who knows. If I keep including them in goals though that may be a way to get more done.

Goal: Clean up junk out of lobby

Result: Most of junk gone

Discussion: Not much to discuss, I got the shit out of there

In my first session back since the drunk session, things started off pretty bad.  I was down 2 buyins within the first 100 hands.  The rest of the session was pretty standard, and I kept going back and forth between even and down a buyin for about 1800 hands.  Then I went on a bit of a heater and took a dinner break at hand 2300, up 2.5 buyins from the start.  I think part of the rough start bouncing around even was due to the 2 extra tables I added.  It definitely took me around 2 or 3 hours to get adjusted.  I really don’t know how people can do more than 12 tables, especially with overlap.  I will stick to 10 for now, and see how it goes.

 Anyways, at this point, my bankroll was ready to take a shot at NL100.  I fired up 6 $50 tables and 2 $100 tables.  The shot didn’t go so well.  I played around 1000 hands and ended down about a buyin, leaving me at -$10 or so for the day.  I will need to grind the ole bankroll back to the shot-taking level, and hopefully take another shot or two by the end of the weekend. 

Updating some of my goals for the week, I have played only 4.5k hands, so I need to step that up quite a bit.  I am on pace for a 46 hour week at work, so that needs to be stepped up a bit too.  I did go and get my plates renewed at the sec. of state, and I have some plans to get rid of all the junk in my lobby room.

Given where I’m at right now, it will be extremely difficult, but I think I’ll be able to hit my goals for the week.