<$BlogRSDURL$>

♠  Tuesday, June 01, 2004

Week Seventeen Wrapup

I did several things this week that may have deserved their own posts, but as it happens, I'll be combining them into one long Iggyesque über-post.

The long and the short of it is that I had an "average" week, +$520, but because of a below-average week last week, I am running below trend. (Or, possibly, my idea of what the trend is, is overstated. I'll talk more about that below.)

Tuesday was a good day of $3/$6, followed by some futzing around with Gaming Club Poker, who gives away $15 for the real-money games, without a deposit. I made a couple bucks, and lost a couple bucks, but the Gaming Club is going to be unlogged play until I have enough there that I can play at reasonable limits. So, look for sometime in the future when $100 or $200 just shows up on my logs from Gaming Club. And then, at the end of Monday night, I won that ridiculous Omaha tournament that I mentioned in my last entry. Not bad, really, for a short day, even if it is an example of a "stop-win" like I mentioned in my Week Sixteen Wrapup.

Wednesday was another stop-win day, up $15075 in a little over an hour. But Thursday was horrid, an example of a no-stop-loss day. I put in a "morning" session where minor losses on each table added up to a $250 (42BB) loss in total, followed by an Intertops $250 added multitable where I finished poorly, and some futzing around with 7-card stud. I tried some $3/$6 stud, figuring that the relatively lower antes and bring-ins would benefit me as a tight player. But I ended up discovering that there is too much I don't know about stud, which truly isn't much of a discovery, and got shredded by the (presumably) regular $3/$6 players. I made some back at 50¢/$1 stud, the first wins I booked all day, but still ended the day down over $300.

That had something to do with my decision to play in Greektown Friday night. I did so well last time I was there late-night, that I was looking for a repeat. Didn't happen: The players were a lot better then they were last time, with very few drunks. I dropped nearly $300 before rallying with some nice cards to an $18 win. Well, I paid for the gas to get there. Almost. While I was gone, Gil played in an Intertops freeroll for me, promised half the win, and did very well—but out of the money. Sixteenth isn't bad at all out of a 100-person field, and as he described the hand he went out on, I can't fault his play at all. There were two all-ins ahead of him, and he called all-in with KK. The board provided someone with an Ace, and Gil was done. The consensus at the casino he went to on Saturday morning was that he played correctly if his goal was to win, but incorrectly if his goal was to money. I can't fault that logic.

On Saturday I set the alarm to wake me up for another freeroll, a much larger one with a much smaller prize pool. So many people weren't playing their chips that my table was essentially four- or five-handed, and I played it that way (hyper-aggressive). But aggressive moves only work until they don't, and so I busted out 166th out of 218, ahead of the people who were being blinded off, which is a bit comical. It didn't occur to me, as it did to Halverson in the same situation, to conspire with the other players to raise-fold until the absent players were blinded off. Ahh, que sera sera.

After the freeroll, Hdouble showed up on chat, and we discussed a dilemma that I'll talk about in a bit. But one of the results of that conversation was that I became very tempted to give the $15/$30 game a try. After Hank went to bed, I sat down, posting behind the button. I got dealt 66, which isn't a bad hand to get when you've posted. The player to my immediate right raised, which I knew would give me great odds for my small bet, presuming a couple of callers to that raise. There were probably five people in the pot, which meant I got 9:1 odds for my 66. Those odds paid off, in that I not only made my set on the flop, but there was another pair (tens), too, meaning that I had just flopped a full house. I called on the flop, and raised on the turn, whereupon one of the blinds (who was still in) responded with "??????" and folded after a long pause. (I found it amusing that he was stymied.) The original raiser check-calls the river, and I pull down a $447 pot, which is/was my new record pot. I hit-and-run for a $252 profit, leaving before posting a blind, having spent less than five minutes on the table. Not bad at all.

Sunday, Gil decides after I've been playing video games all night, that we should go to a casino. He really, really wants to play in Chicago, turning aside all other ideas of where to play. I'd rather play almost anywhere else, because in Chicago, the $5/$10 games (and above) are pretty tough, and the rake for the $3/$6 (10% to $5, plus $1 for the bad beat jackpot) is not beatable in the long term. I end up relenting, only the gods know why, and we end up going down there. It takes a while for me to get a seat, so I sit down in the $1–$5 stud game, the first time I've sat stud in the casino with a feeling like maybe I could take some money out of it. I get some nice cards, including two Broadway straights, in about an hour, and finish up a bit over $60 (I think). Then my $3/$6 seat gets called, and I move there. There are some big pots, fed by a couple of new players, and I took my share, but I also took my share of beats. The pattern seemed to be win, beat, beat, win, beat, beat, win, beat, beat, all the way until we left. I was up $47 at this point, so I logged the day as a $47 win at stud followed by breakeven at holdem.

Monday I returned to the $15/$30 tables, planning a bit more hit-and-run. It doesn't happen that way. I made a few bets in an hour on one table, lost about 12 on another table in another hour, took a break, and then won about 11 bets in a third hour, for a $127 (four bet) day. Not a bad day if I were playing $3/$6, but not that great if I'm playing $15/$30.

And so I find the week over, up $520, which I was worried about reaching after that horrid Thursday.

Concerns

I've had a growing unease over the last few weeks about my results. I'm a winning player. But I'm not winning enough to live on, not at $3/$6. That's a bad thing, for a poker pro. Fortunately I started with enough of a bankroll that I still have a good bit left, so I'm not to the mac-and-cheese point of poverty. When I started this, I said that I need to make about $500 a week, which pays my bills and leaves a little bit left over, but doesn't make me wealthy by any means. Even now, that $500 is an "average" week. But, like last week, I don't always get there, and it's been a long time since I've had a week significantly better than $500. In short, I'm not making my nut.

It would seem that there are two ways to remedy this: I could play more hours, or I could play higher limits. More hours is probably counterproductive; my effectiveness goes down a lot after three hours, and three hours might even be too much. Higher limits is problematic. I can win at Party's $5/$10, but I don't seem to be able to consistently win at $5/$10. I've sat $10/$20 only a couple of times, and it seems to be similar to the $5/$10, which jibes with what I read from others. Which leaves $15/$30, which I had never sat before that conversation with Hdouble, but I've always read is softer than either $5/$10 or $10/$20.

The dilemma is that I can't increase my hours, and I can't move up in limits, but I'm not making my nut. I've been stuck on that thought for several weeks, now.

The little bit of $15/$30 I've played may provide a solution. And I do mean, may, because the 263 hands I've played of it so far are nowhere near an appropriate sample size to determine this. (Actually, all of my numbers are in the appropriate range, except my earn, which is a ridiculous 12.71 BB/c. And that can't continue.)

My thought is that I can single-table $15/$30 for a while, hit-and-running, mostly. I don't truly have the bankroll for this, having only about $2000 in my PartyPoker account, but I can hope that hitting-and-running will minimize my losses. There are only two reasons that this might be true, though. One is that hit-and-run means that I'm not on a table for long, and thus I'm fresh the whole time I am on the table; the other is that by not being on a table for long, the other players will find it harder to get a bead on my play. These are both small edges; sheer statistics don't support the proposition that hit-and-run is more profitable.

What I am hoping is that I can make the transition, over time, to about three hours a day of four-tabling $15/$30, the way I do/did with $3/$6. This will mean I need about $6000 in my Party account, enough for two buyins at each of four tables, which seems/seemed to be my minimum bankroll for $3/$6. But if I can get there, and my supposition is true that the competition is approximately equivalent at $3/$6 and $15/$30, then my earn should be about 50–60¢ a hand, or maybe more if you factor in the relatively lower rake. Simple division has my profit at $3/$6 at just under $400 a week; the change in limits (and lower rake) would put that at about $2000 a week.

I'm getting ahead of myself, though. By the time I reached that point, I'd have put a bunch of money together (I still figure about $10,000) and moved to Las Vegas, which would probably—almost certainly—change how much time I spent online as opposed to in cardrooms.

And I'm ahead of myself in another, far more important way. I've played only 263 damn hands of $15/$30. And, obviously, my earn won't stay at 12.71BB/c, $3.81/hand; that's impossible. In the near term I expect to be single-tabling $15/$30 in short sessions. But, in my previous attempts to move up to $5/$10, it worked great for a while, until I hit rough water, and my fortunes sank faster than the Titanic. My fortunes at $15/$30 must sink, the numbers tell us this, but will they sink so far that I'm chased back to $3/$6? I don't know, and I can't know, because my time machine is stuck on Thursday.

Wish me luck.

May summary

I did this for April, and it was instructive, so I'll do it for May, too. The number of hands is deceiving: PartyPoker went through a several day stretch where it was impossible to get hand histories. But it "feels" like I played fewer hands in May than in April. These numbers won't jibe with my published logs, because of those missing hands, and so I feel like I must mention that these numbers reflect only those hands that PokerTracker is aware of.

As in April, there is much to be concerned about in these numbers. On a per-hand basis, my winnings actually increased in May, at least as far as PokerTracker is concerned. If I had to guess, I'm making a few more "artful" plays than I did in April. This is probably why the percentage of pots I've entered (VP$IP) increased slightly from April to May, because (we assume) I've seen more opportunities, and taken them. The number of times I've won money at the showdown, which I was particularly concerned about in April, actually decreased in May. Maybe this isn't as big a concern as I thought? The comments I got to April's numbers seemed to think that was the case. Finally, the percentage of rake that I paid went down, which indicates to me that I'm winning bigger pots. And that certainly can't be a bad thing.

What concerns me most is probably an artifact of small sample size. That hardly seems possible over 15,000 hands, but the wackiness of the list of winningest hands, at least below the first three, makes it likely that sample size is affecting these lists. I'm assuming that 44 and 55 aren't hitting their share of sets, is why they are on the losingest-hand list, and 66 and 22 are hitting more than their share, which puts them on the winningest-hand list. I have no explanation whatsoever for the prominent position of KQs on the losingest-hand list. It doesn't belong there at all; it belongs at the end of the winningest-hand list, but we find it where we do. This is something I'll have to delve deeper into PokerTracker for. The remainder of the high-VP$IP hands are high suited connectors and one-gappers, which is similar to April's findings. Perhaps these are simply the hands that didn't hit straights or flushes, but my guess is that I tried to get clever when the hands hit top pair. So, as in April, I hereby resolve to not do that.

And Now for Something Completely Different

DATE LOCATION START END  SB   BB  #VALUE!  RESULTS   $        -    $        -          
5/25 PP Bohemian Rhapsody 7:10 PM 7:50 PM  $ 3  $ 6 1  $     80.00 ######## ######## WEEK SEVENTEEN  
  PP Tbl 12753 7:10 PM 7:55 PM  $ 3  $ 6 1  $    (24.00) ######## ########  
  PP No woman no cry 7:10 PM 7:50 PM  $ 3  $ 6 1  $   126.50 ######## ########  
  PP Tbl 11374 7:10 PM 7:50 PM  $ 3  $ 6 1  $     72.00 ######## ########  
  IT MTT Cash 12:01 AM    PL    1  $      4.00 ######## ######## Omaha hi/lo: WIN! 1/4  
5/25 TOTAL:     0  $   258.50 ######## ########  
5/26 PP Tbl 12238 4:20 AM 5:10 AM  $ 3  $ 6 1  $     45.00 ######## ######## Night of 5/26  
  PP Tbl 11374 4:20 AM 5:40 AM  $ 3  $ 6 1  $     72.50 ######## ########  
  PP Tbl 11409 4:20 AM 5:40 AM  $ 3  $ 6 1  $     (2.75) ######## ########  
  PP It's Your Life 4:20 AM 5:35 AM  $ 3  $ 6 1  $      7.00 ######## ########  
  PP Push and Pull 5:10 AM 5:30 AM  $ 3  $ 6 1  $     29.00 ######## ########  
5/26 TOTAL:     0  $   150.75 ######## ########  
5/27 PP High Hopes 6:30 PM 8:40 PM  $ 3  $ 6 1  $    (52.25) ######## ########  
  PP Flombe 6:30 PM 8:40 PM  $ 3  $ 6 1  $    (25.00) ######## ########  
  PP over the horizon 6:30 PM 7:00 PM  $ 3  $ 6 1  $    (26.50) ######## ########  
  PP Tbl 12238 6:35 PM 8:40 PM  $ 3  $ 6 1  $    (70.00) ######## ########  
  PP Tbl 12421 7:00 PM 8:40 PM  $ 3  $ 6 1  $    (76.50) ######## ########  
  IT MTT Cash 2:00 AM    Limit  1  $    (22.00) ######## ######## $250 Overlay; Finish: 13/19  
  IT Tbl 12278 1:40 AM 2:00 AM  $ 3  $ 6 1  $    (76.00) ######## ######## 7-card stud  
  PP Two to Tango 3:35 AM 4:15 AM  50¢   $ 1 1  $     33.50 ######## ######## 7-card stud  
  PP Tbl 10779 4:15 AM 5:00 AM  50¢   $ 1 1  $     (2.25) ######## ######## 7-card stud  
  PP Tuff Turf 5:40 AM 6:30 AM  50¢   $ 1 1  $     10.50 ######## ######## 7-card stud  
5/27 TOTAL:     0  $  (306.50) ######## ########  
5/28 Greektown 12:01 AM 11:00 AM  $ 5  $10 1  $     18.00 ######## ########  
5/28 TOTAL:     0  $     18.00 ######## ########  
5/29 IT MTT Cash 9:00 PM    NL    1  $          -   ######## ######## $1500 overlay freeroll; Finish: 166/218
  IT Tbl 12753 3:10 AM 4:00 AM  $ 3  $ 6 1  $     (9.50) ######## ######## hdubble on table  
  IT Gallopin gooseberry 3:40 AM 4:10 AM  $ 3  $ 6 1  $    (13.00) ######## ######## hdubble on table  
  PP Miranda 5:53 AM 5:57 AM  $15  $30 1  $   252.00 ######## ######## Flopped 666TT, first hand, $447 pot
  PP Tbl 13888 6:00 AM 6:20 AM  $ 1  $ 2 1  $     (4.25) ######## ######## 7-card stud  
5/29 TOTAL:     0  $   225.25 ######## ########  
5/30 Trump Gary 12:30 PM 1:30 PM  $ 1  $ 5 1  $     47.00 ######## ######## Spread-limit 7-card stud  
  Trump Gary 1:30 PM 5:30 PM  $ 3  $ 6 1  $          -   ######## ######## Big pots but breakeven  
5/30 TOTAL:     0  $     47.00 ######## ########  
5/31 PP regal brigade 3:20 AM 4:20 AM  $15  $30 1  $   163.50 ######## ######## New record $531.50 pot  
  PP King &Queen 4:20 AM 5:20 AM  $15  $30 1  $  (360.50) ######## ########  
  PP My my delilah 10:10 AM 11:10 AM  $15  $30 1  $   324.00 ######## ########  
5/31 TOTAL:     0  $   127.00 ######## ########  
TOTAL FOR WEEK SEVENTEEN: $520.00   0   ######## ########  
CUMULATIVE WEEKS 4-17:   $5,308.47   0   ######## ########  
// posted by Unknown @ 4:08 AM //

♠  Comments:

♠  Post a Comment