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Note: This is going to be tl;dr for most though I think it's worth reading for other struggling midstakers.
Alright, I realize these last few posts have been a bit of a mess, but I think I'm finally arriving at some sort of 'aha' moment, or at least I feel like my poker related thoughts are a lot clearer than they have been in this volume heavy blur of a month.
I spent quite a bit of time today reading about tilt control, the psychology behind playing your A game etc. And it is crystal clear to me that I haven't been even close to achieving that this month. My excuse is that I wanted to grind through bonuses, but I see now that those bonuses are not as important as being happy with how you play, avoiding high variance downswings which have a horrible effect on your mood and life EV and also don't help you progress as a poker player.
So today, I sat down in the whee hours of the night, eliminated 3 tables, and 9 tabled very calmy, focusing on my breathing, thinking through each play, tweaking my bet sizes, adding overbets to my arsenal (something I had inexplicably stopped doing), and lo and behold, I played the best poker all month and had a solid winning session. Obviously those two things are mutually exclusive, but it made me realize something that had creeped up on me so slowly, so casually in the daily grind that I hadn't realize it had happened: I had completely lost faith in poker.
I had lost faith in the idea that I can be really good at it, that I can crush the games, that I can still get better and move up in stakes and be successful. Instead, I allowed myself the luxury of hoping that variance wouldn't own me, I hoped that I would run good to balance out my previous downswings, I hoped that by putting in massive amounts of volume the profits would come knocking at my door. It's so much easier to auto-pilot 5 hours/day and say that you're putting in a lot of work and doing your best. It's harder to play 2 hours, focus on every hand, and stop when you feel like you are starting to make mistakes. It's harder to play less, think more, and discipline your emotions.
I also resonated hard with something I read today from Leatherass's new book - In response to a hand where he recommends folding top pair on the flop to an aggressive player on a dry board. He writes:
"This may sound like 'weak' and 'exploitable' advice. Worrying about being weak and exploitable will only get you so far. It's more productive to think about being profitable".
That really stuck with me today, and it helped calm me down when a few aggressive regs put me in tough spots and I felt the urge to spew and fall into my high variance B game. Another idea that I related to today came from Daven's great link (thanks a ton for posting that in my thread). This is something that has been all too common for me - what I have previously dubbed the 'heat check'. Crashwhips describes the psychology of it a lot better, and I am definitely a guilty culprit of this:
"Another trap of results-oriented thinking is that it can lead to overconfidence and crises of confidence. If you put too much stock in short term results, you will tend to get overconfident after a good session. Then, if things don’t go your way during your next session, the loss will contradict the image you have built up of yourself and the positive expectations you had going into the session, and you might get very upset and try to force things. This is why big losses often follow a big win."
And so, this brings me to what I'm going to do in April, but before that I want to put March behind me. I pretty much achieved my volume goal as I played more hands in 1 month than ever before, but I think this personal record will stand since I have no intention of playing this much ever again. With bonuses, it's not really a month to complain about, though I had high expectations with all the volume I put in. I only beat the game for 1.4bb/100 (HEM).
March
April
I intend on playing no more than 9 tables and I'm not going to place any goals on amount of hands played or hours. I'm just going to try to play as close to my A-game as possible, and most importantly I'm going to try to stop playing the very SECOND I feel like my emotions have been compromised. While I'm not going to check results as I play, if I feel like I'm down more than 5 buyins, even if I feel I'm playing fine I'm going to force myself to stop for at least an hour. Because today when I was playing, I realized how I can absolutely destroy 1-2 when I'm playing my best, and it's not even close. I easily made 3 buyins more today than I would have yesterday because of my frame of mind and the small adjustments I made through careful observation and having more time to think.
Here are some examples of hands where I took different lines than I would have only yesterday:
Villain is a bit of a fish reg who splashes around. In retrospect this is pretty standard but usually when my huge draws all brick my normal reaction would've been utter disgust instead of calmly thinking about villain's river donk range.
No-Limit Hold'em, $2.00 BB (5 handed) - Hold'em Manager Converter Tool from FlopTurnRiver.com
SB ($220.95)
BB ($235)
UTG ($593.45)
Hero (MP) ($391.05)
Button ($209.30)
Preflop: Hero is MP with K, A
1 fold, Hero bets $7, 1 fold, SB calls $6, 1 fold
Flop: ($16) Q, 7, 10 (2 players)
SB checks, Hero bets $12, SB calls $12
Turn: ($40) 4 (2 players)
SB checks, Hero bets $34, SB calls $34
River: ($108) 3 (2 players)
SB bets $79, Hero calls $79
Total pot: $266
Results:
SB had 9, 8 (high card, Queen).
Hero had K, A (high card, Ace).
Outcome: Hero won $263
Villain is unknown but seems competent. Again, what is he valuing this river with? Seems like he's always c/calling 10x on turn.
No-Limit Hold'em, $2.00 BB (5 handed) - Hold'em Manager Converter Tool from FlopTurnRiver.com
SB ($232)
BB ($197)
UTG ($200)
MP ($72.45)
Hero (Button) ($251)
Preflop: Hero is Button with 6, 6
2 folds, Hero bets $7, 1 fold, BB calls $5
Flop: ($15) 10, 5, 4 (2 players)
BB checks, Hero bets $9, BB calls $9
Turn: ($33) 5 (2 players)
BB bets $25, Hero calls $25
River: ($83) 5 (2 players)
BB bets $62, Hero calls $62
Total pot: $207
Results:
Hero had 6, 6 (full house, fives over sixes).
BB had 9, Q (three of a kind, fives).
Outcome: Hero won $204
This was interesting because it revealed a huge leak in my emotional thinking. My intial reaction when I saw this river was 'puke' and I almost instantaneously checked back HOPING to split. Then I realized I wasn't thinking about villain's hand at all, realized that he has two pair/flushdraws and he's usually going to shove any J into me so I came to what should have been my natural reaction which is to put him in.
No-Limit Hold'em, $2.00 BB (5 handed) - Hold'em Manager Converter Tool from FlopTurnRiver.com
SB ($70)
BB ($106.55)
UTG ($197)
Hero (MP) ($306.25)
Button ($269.65)
Preflop: Hero is MP with 7, 5
UTG bets $6, Hero calls $6, 2 folds, BB calls $4
Flop: ($19) 8, 9, 6 (3 players)
BB checks, UTG bets $12, Hero calls $12, BB calls $12
Turn: ($55) 10 (3 players)
BB bets $14, 1 fold, Hero raises $45, BB calls $31
River: ($145) 7 (2 players)
BB checks, Hero bets $145, 1 fold
Total pot: $145
Results:
Hero had 7, 5 (straight, ten high).
Outcome: Hero won $287
Nothing fancy, but it was a spot where I instinctively wanted to check back the turn before I took a second to think and realized there was value in a smaller than normal bet:
No-Limit Hold'em, $2.00 BB (5 handed) - Hold'em Manager Converter Tool from FlopTurnRiver.com
SB ($96.45)
BB ($211.30)
UTG ($62.75)
Hero (MP) ($397.85)
Button ($379.30)
Preflop: Hero is MP with 10, 7
1 fold, Hero bets $7, 1 fold, SB calls $6, 1 fold
Flop: ($16) 9, 7, 9 (2 players)
SB checks, Hero bets $10, SB calls $10
Turn: ($36) A (2 players)
SB checks, Hero bets $19, SB calls $19
River: ($74) 5 (2 players)
SB checks, Hero checks
Total pot: $74
Results:
SB had 10, J (one pair, nines).
Hero had 10, 7 (two pair, nines and sevens).
Outcome: Hero won $71
That's it for now. It's fun to be a bit excited again about poker, and not just in the 'can't wait to grind this bonus' sort of way.
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