Poker Wannabe: 3/21/2005 - A Good Weekend, But...

So overall I had a good weekend. Playing almost nothing but 5/10 SH at about seven different sites (I had lots of bonuses to work off) I managed to win about 70 BBs while pocketing another 70 BBs in bonuses.

The problem: I twice had bad runs of about 100 BBs. This has been the trend for the last month or so--I swing wildly, and after the dust settles I'm up a rather uninspiring amount. My game is perpetual development--there's always lots and lots of room for improvement--and I'm beginning to wonder if maybe I've overthought myself into being a marginal winner at best.

I've become more aggressive, but maybe I'm overdoing it. I'm calling down with more marginal hands, but once again, maybe I'm overdoing it. I've certainly had my share of so-called bad beats in large pots, too, but that's nothing new, so who knows. That's the problem with poker: it's very hard to gauge with any degree of accuracy the level of one's play based on recent results. So are the last 20,000 hands or so of 1BB/100 play a result of my LAGing myself to death, or just a part of the natural variance of poker?

I wish I had specific hands to post. All I know is that my Fish Advisory System has just been upgraded to Yellow, "Elevated." It will probably take weeks before I can either go all the way to Orange, "High" or drop back down to Blue, "Guarded."

Okay, actually, I just remembered a hand. Very marginal. This was actually at 3/6 and we were seven-handed. There was one limper and I raised from LMP with KsJs. The BB and limper both call.

Flop: Ac-Tc-2s. Both check and I bet. BB calls and limper folds.

Turn: (Ac-Tc-2s) 6c. BB checks again. I bet. He takes a while, and calls. I'm convinced he really has a weak hand, and isn't trying to be tricky. I doubt he has a club.

River: (Ac-Tc-2s-6c) 7c. Four clubs on the board now. He checks. I know for certain that he would bet any reasonable club and feel he doesn't have a club at all, but most likely a small pair at best. I have lots of fold equity given the pot is 6.5 BBs. I bet. He thinks a LONG time and calls.

His hand? 8s7s, for the rivered third-pair.

"ty, fish," was his immediate comment, nevermind that he made some truly baffling calls.

Now, he obviously made some horrible plays here, but at what point here do people give up? I made my read that he was quite weak, and he was. I played the hand based on that read. Or so I thought...maybe I was just lucky that my supposed read happened to coincide with his actual hand. Chip-spewing?

Comments

i love his comment. classic. in so many ways. i've had similar frustrations as of late, just standing still if you take the bonuses out of the equation. Getting checkraised by underpairs that subsequently hit their sets or by successful gutshots, that seems to be a common theme for me lately. Or hitting legitimate full houses up against quads, stuff like that. Or flopping two pair in my unraised big blind, betting it strong, only to have the board pair on the end and lose to AA or KK. That has seemed to have happened more times than I can count. That's always a bitch.

I'm now under 4BB/100 hands since I started playing again, which is still great, but its been 0BB/100 for quite a while now and I just can't tolerate that. I've got to do something to rejuvenate my game. I've noticed lately that I've tightened up preflop a bit, so I think I need to consciously ease my requirements. I did this a bit last night and got killed. I kept hitting low flushes with my low suited connectors in late position and kept losing to over-flushes.

Ah! one great hand from last night, I have AQo in early mid-position, one limper, I raise, five callers including the limper and the blinds. I flop broadway, rainbow. It checks to me, I bet, the guy right after me raises, two others call, I just call. Turn is a K, I don't like this, I bet out, the guy just calls, the others fold. I like this (except for the others folding their gutshots). River is a blank. I bet out, he calls and shows KJ for the stone cold.

Posted by: eric c. | March 21, 2005 at 22:43