Digital Thinkbox

I’ve been playing poker online now for over three months now. You would think with my continuous play, reading and studying that I would be a poker genius by now right? I mean in three months I could have picked up a new computer programming language without problems and be hammering out code. Programming software is more complex that poker isn’t it?

Maybe it is, maybe it isn’t but I’ve been exposed to computer programming for almost 20 years. It all started when I was a kid and was typing in BASIC programing from magazines and books. Granted this isn’t “programming”, but it is exposure to code and how software works. Over the years I’ve developed a large amount of familiarity and skill with software development; I should be able to pick up poker and become and expert in a couple weeks right?

BZZZZZTT! Wrong. Poker isn’t software development (duh!). Playing poker has it own set of skills that have to be developed over time. You can’t just sit down at a table and start tossing chips any more than you can sit down at a computer and begin writing code with no knowledge or experience. Unless of course you hate money, and there seem to be a lot of players that feel this way. If you hate money, let me know so we can schedule a game.

Clearly it takes time to develop your “poker muscles”, for lack of a better term. Indeed to become good, and good is a relative term that is defined differently by different people, you will have to study, practice and read. In fact, more study and reading than play.

Poker also different from programming in that while it is a series of problems that require a solution (bet, call, raise, fold), it is a solution that is based on incomplete if not inaccurate information. Where in programming you can use logic to determine an optional solution, in poker you sometimes have to make the best decision based upon the information you have at the time. You will rely on your “gut” and your “instincts” as often as your brain.

Additionally, in poker you don’t get the opportunity to go back and corrector your errors. In software development you can always re-factor your code to make it better. If you make an error in poker, say buh-bye to you cash, its gone. There are no do overs in poker.

None of this should come as a surprise to anyone, but humans excel at self-delusion. We think “Hey! I’m smart. I should be able to dominate this poker stuff in a couple of weeks. How hard can it be?”

Two thousand dollars later we figure “oh its just bad luck.”

Two thousand dollars after that its “Those stupid players! They keep playing bad cards and hitting their hands and beating me!” I love it when I hear someone say “If I could only get on a table with good players, then I could really start making some money.” HAH! Good players will LOVE you, and your money.

So where does this leave me? Well after 3 months of play I am definitely a much better player. I read books, study my plays, and practice. I’m improving at a decent rate, although sometimes not as rapidly as I would like. I’ve decided to focus on one specific aspect of my game, namely single table tournaments or Sit-and-goes, for the time being. I’m hoping by focusing on this one type of poker I can become good and generate vast riches.

At least enough to buy lunch.

So bottom line, there is no way to become an expert overnight in poker, or most other endevours. It takes practice and experience. Unfortunately, unlike programming, experience in poker comes at a cost, to your wallet.

So I’m on a 10 session SnG loosing “streak”. I’d like to say it was because of bad beats, unlucky cards, and stupid players. Unfortunately, its because I played bad and made a number of very poor plays. Granted I had some unlucky cards, but no more than usual. Unlucky cards + really bad play =

In order to repair the chip spewing I went to the hand histories to study my play. Between me and my SnG coach I need to work on the following:

Pay more attention to how people are playing

This means
a) Not surfing the Intarweb, but concentrating on the poker game. You know the one I paid money to play in. Yeah that. This is huge. I’ve started doing this, and guess what, I’m loosing. Perhaps I’m getting bored with the slow early play. At some point I said to myself “Most of these guys will bust out anyhow. I don’t need to know how they play”. Well surprise, surprise. Some of these people actually survived and I end up having ZERO clue how they play.

b) Trying harder to put the players on ranges. Sometimes this is hard at the $11 level since these people will play anything.

Watch the stacks

I definitely need to be more mindful of the stack sizes. Not just mine. I’ve missed push opportunities because I didn’t look at the callers yet to act and determine how they might react to my push. This is especially true if I have a pushing situation and have more big bets (BBs) than the possible callers.

For example:

This should have been a push from me. Folded to me, and the BB only has 4.5xBB left where I’m sitting on 8xBB.

In summary:
1) Mind opponent’s stacks.
2) Put them on ranges.
3) Don’t do stupid shit.

I hope I can remember #3.

Sept 2nd, 2006 I ended my 10 game loosing streak with a nice 2nd place finish. We won’t talk about the game that followed this 2nd place game however.

I don’t feel so bad after seeing this hand in a SnG I played today. Keep in mind it is the FIRST hand of the SnG.

Party Poker
No Limit Holdem Tournament
Blinds: t20/t40
10 players
Converter

Stack sizes:
Hero: t2000
UTG+1: t2000
UTG+2: t2000
MP1: t2000
MP2: t2000
MP3: t2000
CO: t2000
Button: t2000
SB: t2000
BB: t2000

Pre-flop: (10 players) Hero is UTG with 3♥ T♥
Hero folds, 3 folds, MP2 raises to t80, MP3 folds, CO calls t80 (pot was t140), Button folds, SB raises to t220, 2 folds, CO calls t140 (pot was t400).

Flop: 6♣ 9♥ 6♠ (t560, 2 players)
SB checks, CO bets t426, SB raises all-in t1780, CO calls all-in t1354.

Turn: 4♦ (t4120, 0 player + 2 all-in – Main pot: t4120)

River: 2♥ (t4120, 0 player + 2 all-in – Main pot: t4120)

Results:
Final pot: t4120
CO shows 2♠ 2♦
SB shows A♠ A♦

Ouch! AA busted by 22 on the river. Sucks to be the SB. Glad I wasn’t in this hand, and it makes me feel better about some of my bad beats. Thanks buddy. The CO in this case ended up busting out on the 9th hand of this SnG, small consolation to the SB player.

Working towards my goal of 10 $11 SnGs per day. Well today I got in four. Whee! First one was good, I won it and I think I played well. Especially since I made it ITM with the smallest stack and managed to work my way to first. The next three games were not so great however. 8th, 5th, 8th. In all three cases I had hands busted by AQ. First one, AK vs AQ, queen drops. Second one AK vs AQ, queen drops, third one, KK vs AQ, ace drops.

However ranting about bad beats really isn’t the point of this post. Super passive players is. All three of these tables had VERY passive players. In fact the whole table was super passive. To illustrate the level of passivity I give you the following hand:

Yes, that’s right. Quads. Apparently four of a kind is only worth 85 chips. I can see his limp from the SB, it isn’t a really hot hand, but it isn’t bad. Worth completing, although against these suckers, probably worth a raise.

He flops a set, and checks. OK so I suppose that is better than folding a set :O, but alright he is slow-playing his set, or something.

Turn comes, and he bets 65. Whee! A whopping 5 chips over the minimum bet. You go girl! Of course he gets called. He probably could have bet the pot and gotten called. River is his nuts, and he bets like..err I have no idea what he bets like. YOU HAVE FOUR OF A KIND!!!11! Great he extracts 85 more chips from MP1, goodie.

That’s how passive these tables have been. It is very hard for me to get a read on what their hands are when they are playing like this. About the only thing I can do is continue to play tight and hope they bust each other. Which in this last table, didn’t happen. All they did was trade chips back and forth the whole time, never betting strong, never pushing, just sitting there. Of course the one time I act aggressive and push, I get called with AQ and bust. Granted, KK vs AQ I was the favorite, and the villain calling me with AQ was maybe reasonable, it’s still frustrating.

In the long run these guys will be +EV for me, I know that. I just need to figure out how to play against them better.

So I’ve been working on my single table tournament skills recently. In fact, I’m focusing almost all my efforts on improving my SnG skill to the exclusion of my limit and multi-table tournament game. I’ve even gone so far as to retain the services of a coach to help me not suck at SnGs (Sit and Gos). After eliminating (reducing at least) my most glaring n00bified errors, I’m trying to improve my bubble play.

The biggest obstacle I have to overcome is a mental one, in my opinion. Bubble play appears to be mostly push/fold, and in some cases pushing all-in with any two cards (ATC). Using a tool called Sit and Go Power Tools, I attempt to identify positive expected value situations where going all-in may be the right move. Frequently SNGPT shows that a push with total crap for cards is +EV. For example the following hand from a SnG I played recently:

Yeah, K4o from the small blind. Madness, but the math reveals it is a +EV push in some cases. This is perhaps the biggest concept that I’m trying to get my head around: Pushing with crap in certain positions, with certain stack sizes is +EV.

Take this hand, from the same SnG for another example:

This is even more of a +EV situation than the last one. +0.9%EV for me, and +2.1%EV for the Button, who folded with me giving the BB a walk. Although I should mention that ALWAYS following SNGPT is probably the wrong thing to do. SNGPT can only tell you that the situation is potentially +EV, not that you will win, or that pushing is the right move.

In this situation it could be argued that holding back and waiting for the Button to bust out would be a decent call. Indeed, the button only has 880 chips and the blinds will chew up 800 of that unless he does something. Waiting for him to get blinded out means I’m in second place, gaining $10 in prize money by just folding. However, I’m not all that healthy stack wise either. With less than 7 big bets remaining in my stack so I can’t just sit around.

I have to be aggressive if I want a shot a 1st place, but pushing with less than optimal hands is a difficult concept. It runs counter to everything you learn when playing limit ring games. SnGs are a different breed of poker, and I’m going to have to overcome this fear of pushing junk in the right places if I want to get better.