Trying to get Better

Since my last blog entry, I've decided to make an effort to actually improve my poker game. I admit it -- I've gotten lazy. I no longer think about how to play specific hands... I don't post hand histories in forums and I don't comment on other people's play very often either. Some of this is from a "good" perspective -- I don't want start pointless arguments on the internet. But some of this is "bad" -- I've gotten lazy. So, I've started posting several hands on at thepokerforum.com to get opinions on how to play certain hands.

Another thing that I have decided to do is to start bonus whoring again, at least at a small scale. This decision was made when UltimateBet, Poker.com, and PokerStars all had reload bonuses going. I decided to withdraw $150 of my $180 in my Poker.com account to take advantage of PokerStar's bonus. I then attempted to withdraw that $150 and deposit it into UltimateBet, but the process was too slow and I missed it. It's no big deal, really, because I have over $900 of bonus money waiting to be cleared at UltimateBet. I have since withdrawn the $150 from UltimateBet and I am going to leave it in my Neteller account for now. Assuming that Neteller doesn't ban transactions with online gaming sites anytime soon (a tenuous assumption), that'll be the start of my new bonus-whoring bankroll.

After withdrawing much of my money from Poker.com, I quickly proceeded to lose almost all of what I had left. Last night, my balance was less than $5 for a short period, but then I won a 6-person $2+0.20 sit-n-go and I am back near $14. I don't care if I go broke here, but I like their 6-person SNGs. They're fun and quick and cheap (only 10% rake at the smallest buy-ins). I built up my balance there playing them, so I think that they're profitable too. If not, meh.

I have continued to grind at UltimateBet. Eventually, I got sick of playing full-ring no limit at the $0.01/$0.02 (blinds) stakes. I kept getting impatient and making dumb plays. Instead, I decided to play $0.05/$0.10 limit full-ring. It's a nice change of pace to play a little limit hold'em and the robotic-like style of limit allows me to simultaneous play SNGs at Poker.com without losing much in terms of reads. The good news is that I accumulate bonus money fairly quickly, so I am slowly grinding my stack upwards. I had it as high as $10.50 last night, but then I had a bad session where I flopped sets two different times and lost huge pots to people chasing inside straight draws. I'm not complaining; I'm merely pointing out that I should have lost 20 big bets or so, but instead I lost only 5 big bets because of the bonus. Goot!

The other fun news is that I've been playing a little at Poker Stars too. I'm only playing at Poker Stars when I have Poker Tracker working (a long story) but I've been really profitable. Playing $25 NL, I'm winning at a rate of like 25 PTBB/100 hands. Once I hit 1000 hands, I'll probably post a screen capture. Earlier this week, however, I lost $50 playing $50 NL by pushing in bad spots, but I won all of that back (and more) today in a single, short session (56 hands). I also had a ridiculously good session at $25 NL, winning $49.30 in just 77 hands. Hopefully, this streak of good luck will continue!

Update: I just finished 1000 hands playing $25 NL at Poker Stars. I've pasted a screen capture of my pokertracker stats (nearly impossible to read), but the key point is that I won at more than 42 PTBB/100 hands over this period. That's just sick. In my most recent session, I won a HUGE pot when I flopped set over set against another big stack. Nice!

The Good Side of Variance

As I've chronicled lately, I've been playing well but catching numerous bad beats. Well, that's variance.

Between yesterday and today, though, the other side of variance has caught up to me in a big big way. I've been playing some heads-up no limit and doing really well. I'm generally out-playing my opponents. Even better, however, is when I make a big mistake... I've managed to outdraw my opponents. Life is grand!

It's strange, but I have a much better memory for the bad beats imposed onto me rather than the ones that I dish out. Even so, I remember this hand because it was the most recent one and because it involved a HORRIBLE read by me.

I'm playing $25 NL and I have about $12 in my stack. I haven't been playing very well during the session; I'm actually down $13 after pushing all-in with top pair, weak kicker and not outdrawing my opponent who had slow-played AA.

During the suck-out hand, the guy under-the-gun raises to $3 (i.e., 12x the big blind), which I usually view as a tell. The guy who does this usually has a weak hand that he doesn't know how to play and he wants to simply steal the blinds. So, I push all-in with AKo. Everyone else folds and my opponent flips over AA. Lucky for me, the flop comes K T K and I double up. Like I said, I have been enjoying the good side of variance lately.

In other news, my Chris Ferguson experiment is going really well. I've built my stack at UltimateBet from $0.46 to its current high of $3.77! I played one really bad hand with 2c3c from the small blind, otherwise I'd have close to $5. I posted a thread about the hand at www.thepokerforum.com, where I eventually figured out my mistake on the hand.

The really curious thing was that one guy there started explaining poker to me as if I had never played before. He even started his own thread to warn off other players from playing trash hands from the small blind (http://www.thepokerforum.com/ubb/ultimatebb.php?ubb=get_topic;f=4;t=003258) in which he goes on to explain the concept of pot odds and implied pots odds to me as if I can barely spell. Certainly, trash hands need to be played carefully from the small blind, but it's a profitable play if done correctly.

The Chris Ferguson Experiment

For those of you who have not heard, Chris Ferguson once won a proposition bet turned one dollar into 20,000 dollars playing online poker. Why am I mentioning this?

After yet one more bad beat at UltimateBet (all-in preflop with AA, losing to KK when a king came on the river), my bankroll there was $0.46. Impressive, huh?

This might sound weird or stupid, but I am going to try and rebuild my account there, starting with just that $0.46. Why? Just for giggles, really. I have been playing really well lately and I have been making money at both PokerStars and Poker.com. I have a reasonably healthy bankroll for the stakes that I am playing (mostly $25 NL), so it’s not a financial thing. I am actually enjoying playing poker more now than I have since July and flailing away at $0.01/$0.02 (blinds) no limit seems like fun to me for some reason.

The good news is that I’ve already tripled my stack. My account currently has $1.66 in it after I pushed all-in with middle pair plus a straight draw and improved. I then flopped a set against a guy who flopped two pair. So, I now have enough to buy-in for 50 big blinds (and even a little extra!)

In spite of the bad beats

Although I haven't had much time to play, when I have played... I have played very very well. I have built my stack nicely at Poker Stars, which looks like it will be my primary site from now on.

Ironically, I have been taking bad beat after bad beat at a site other than Poker Stars lately. I lost two buy-ins at UltimateBet on bad beats. In the first, I flopped a set of fives; I pushed all-in on the flop and I got called by A8s (ace-high), only to lose to runner-runner hearts (for a flush). The other bad beat at UltimateBet was when I raised preflop with 88. The flop was 8 2 2 and I pushed all-in again. This time I got called by 99, only to see a nine come on the turn.

The other two bad beats happened at Poker.com. I pushed all-in on the raggedy flop with JJ and got called by TT. Again, a ten came on the turn. The second bad beat happened just now. I flopped a set of fours on the flop... I checked-raised all-in and got two callers. One of them had top pair, the other JJ. Yep, you guessed it... a jack came on the turn.

I might sound a little bit bitter, but I'm not. I'm actually really happy with my play right now. I've toned down my aggression a bit and I am avoiding bad plays. The bad beats are standing out, in fact, because I am almost always getting my money in as a huge favorite. That is, what else do I have to worry about except bad beats?

Other than that, I am taking a week or two off from my real job to be with my kids. I don't know how much poker I am going to get to play. I doubt that my wife will let me play cards while she juggles two crying kids.

A Weird Dream and Returning to Poker Stars

I am not playing much poker these days, so I figured that I should blog about something else. This blog entry, therefore, might entertain you or disturb you (or both). And just in case, I do discuss poker towards the end.

I rarely remember my dreams but when I do... wow, they are strange. I remember a substantial part of last night's dream.

I was in a hotel for some reason that I cannot recall... but things were pretty relaxed and I didn't have anything important to do. As I was waiting to get on the elevator, some guy walks out of a nearby dorm room (remember, this is a dream; I have no idea why there was a dorm room inside a hotel) and convinces me that I should go to his room.

When I get there, I learn that I am mistakenly the guest of honor at a private concert performed by the Smashing Pumpkins. I am quickly ushered to the front row where I literally sit on a throne, crown and all. As soon as I sit down, the band starts playing... complete with a psychedelic laser light show. After the first song, however, everyone in the crowd (which is about ~1000 people, even though it's a "private" concert in a dorm room) decides that the band sucks, so they head to the backyard for a barbeque. I didn't feel like doing that, however, so I just quietly left, even though I was the guest of honor at the concert.

That's all I remember.

Regarding my poker, I have been playing a little bit. Last week, I donked away my last $100 at Trident Poker playing $50 NL (and playing poorly). I had a very small amount of money at UltimateBet (~$10) and a small bankroll at Poker.com (~$60). Outside of that, my Neteller account had only $200. Needless to say, I have a VERY short bankroll these days. It's definitely time to either bust out completely and retire for good or to start taking the game seriously and try to rebuild. I decided on the latter.

After thinking it over, I decided to invest my remaning bankroll at PokerStars. Since Party won't accept my business anymore, PokerStars is my best guess for having the largest number of fish. I've had horrible "luck" at PokerStars in the past, but I know that at least some of that was due to poor play, not actually bad luck.

For now, I have decided to play short-handed $25 NL, since my bankroll was decent (but not ideal) for that game. Most people claim that 20 buy-ins is a good bankroll for no limit. I usually buy-in for 50% of the maximum, so I should theoretically have a 20 x $12.50 = $250 bankroll to play the game.

One of the things that I quickly learned was that play at PokerStars can be very tough. The first table I played had six people with VP$IP's around 20-25% and pre-flop raise percentages of 10-15%. Sure, it's possible to beat this game, but I would definitely prefer to find a better spot. So, I quit that game after a few orbits and then decided to impose a little table selection. I quickly found a table that (according to PokerStars) had more than 50% of the people seeing the flop. Based on my experience at Party Poker, this information was usually meaningless, but it actually seemed to be valid at PokerStars. The table was soft and I booked a small win after playing 80 hands or so. I've continued to play well; after 198 hands, I've won over $35 (36.2 PTBB/100 hands). It's not much, but it's a start.

I've also continued to play well at Poker.com. I'm almost exclusively playing $5 + $0.50, 6-person no limit hold'em sit-n-goes. The play is poor but it's rather difficult to win these because the structure is so fast... that is, I can play perfect but still lose because of the cards. My bankroll is now at $100, which I've heard is a legitimate bankroll for playing $5 SNGs.

In conclusion, I'm playing well but not often. I'm a little worried about my stamina, but I am actually quite excited about my success so far at PokerStars. The loss of the cash-cow known as Party Poker has been a mental blow... If I ever had a bad streak, then I always felt that I could go back to Party and re-build. In theory, I should be able to win everywhere, but it's not that easy in reality. Being able to have long-term success at PokerStars would give me a comfort level that would be a serious boost to my confidence.

No Poker, Just Diapers

Well, it finally happened...

Last Thursday evening, I played poker for a few hours and then went to bed. I fell asleep around 10pm, but then woke up around 10:30pm when our 14-month old started crying. After settling her, I went back to bed. A few minutes later, I heard Mrs. Frazwood call from downstairs, "Fraz... Fraz... Come help me please." (No, that's not my real name). Her water had broken. So, we quickly called some friends to come over to watch our out-of-the-womb child, and then drove to the hospital. Six short hours later, I had a second child, this one weighing in at 8 lbs, 4 oz.

With the frenzy associated with all of these kids, I've hardly had any time at all to play poker. On Saturday night, I had about an hour of quiet time all to myself. I surfed the internet for much of that, but I also played about 40 hands of $0.05/$0.10 no limit hold'em at UltimateBet. I won $4, so that was nice.

To be honest, the break from cards has been good. I have figured out a few of my biggest problems. First, I have little stamina (i.e., I can only play my best game for 30 minutes or so) and I tilt easily. Second, I am far too aggressive. I am trying to win every hand and I need to learn to let hands go. Third, I am playing scared. When I'm dealt a big hand, I always put people on bigger hands. Anyway, when I get back to the game, I am going to try and play better. I want to slowly rebuild my bankroll, playing the mini-stakes for awhile until I have a bankroll sufficient to play the games that I used to play.

Until then, anyone want to babysit?