Sunday, October 25, 2009

Have I Finally Found The Golden Goose?

I mostly play on Full Tilt because I have a rake back deal and for the most part it is just as good as Pokerstars. I happened to be exploring over at Pokerstars a couple of weeks ago and I noticed they have "Double or Nothing" Sit-n-Go's. This means they start with 10 players at one table and if you make the final 5, you double your money.

I have been bemoaning the fact that there were not tournaments like this just for cash. I have been decidely plus expected value in my satellite experience because so many players make tournament killing mistakes when they could afford to fold their way into the money.

My prayers have been answered. Apparently they have been running for months and I was ignorantly unaware.

I know it's still a small sample size but I have now played 39 of these tournaments at the $21.60 level and I have cashed in 26. I can play up to 5 at a time without much trouble and today I accomplished the ultimate goal which was to play 5 and cash in all five.

There are extensive posts now on 2+2 about these tables and I'm sure the hard core players are quickly figuring out the mathematically perfect way to play these tournaments. But for now, there are 5-6 fishes at every table and I am happy to take advantage.

In other news, I have finally put together a winning streak at Casino Arizona. The last 3 times I have played, I have left with more money than I started with. To make things even more amazing, it has been in three different games: 3-6 limit hold'em, 1-2 No Limit Hold'em, and 3-6 limit omaha 8 or better.

Sunday, October 04, 2009

Still Backsliding

My poker bankroll is all the way down to close to $2,000. I don't know what I am doing wrong. When I play PLO or No Limit Hold'em it seems that whenever I make a good hand, nobody pays me off. I am still pretty good about not losing a lot, but I never win the big pots to get me to a big winning session.

Lets do some analysis of my last few No Limit Hold'em online sessions:

10/2 299 hands won $52.45
Hands won over $20 5 for a total of $202
Hands lost over $20 3 for a total of $161


9/29 339 hands lost $35.75
Hands won over $20 2 for a total of $46
Hands lost over $20 0

9/22 243 hands lost $21.65
Hands won over $20 1 for $39
Hands lost over $20 1 for $51

9/19 574 hands lost $394
Hands won over $20 3 for $84
Hands lost over $20 9 for $417 Ouch!

9/17 329 hands lost $197
Hands won over $20 6 for $184
Hands lost over $20 7 for $300

9/13 100 hands lost $108
Hands won over $20 0
Hands lost over $20 1 for $100

9/12 469 hands lost $125
Hands won over $20 6 for $232
Hands lost over $20 8 for $285

So over my last few sessions I have won 23 big pots and lost 29. So it would make sense to lose less big pots. However I still think that I am not winning enough on the big pots to offset the losses. It also seems like some of the big losses were cold decks or bad beats so maybe I just need to run a bit better as well.

After some struggles with Hold'em Manager I finally broke down my hands by starting cards to see where I was losing money. I have only had Hold'em manager for almost 3 months so I only have approximately 5000 hands. My suspicions were confirmed.

AA 15 times won $22
KK 16 times lost $73
QQ 17 times even
AKo or AKs 42 times lost $152

These are supposed to be very profitable hands. I went back and reviewed the hands and I saw a few minor mistakes but I did not see any horrible misplays. The main thing I noticed was that I five bet shoved a few times with AK and got called with 99 and TT, but I never seemed to get called by those hands when I did it with AA or KK. They usually folded after my first raise. I'd say that's a bad run of cards.

The Casino Arizona is still treating me like shit. I must lose 80% of the time in limit hold'em sessions this year. I am really striving to improve on reading people and choosing my times to bluff much more selectively. However, I can't seem to catch a break when I do have the winning hand on the flop or turn. I seem to be running pretty bad on the river. I know I sound like every other whiner on the internet forums, but since hardly anyone else reads this blog, I'll shout out into the void.

I will be heading out to Fort McDowell tonight for another football promotion. If I can't win the money from the players I might as well try and win it back from the casinos.