Pitfalls
Thursday, March 02, 2006
Well, I fell into two pitfalls yesterday, causing me to bleed (hell, hemmorage) about $70 of my bankroll. This is the first big losing day in a while, and reminds me of shades of the past, where I lost between $30-$70 nightly for about a week straight, initially decimating my bankroll into what it was before this most recent surge.
This most recent surge has boosted the online bankroll from approximately $300 to about $600 (even after the loss yesterday, if you count bonus money and referral payments). Still, I cross my fingers and hope to play a lot smarter in the coming days, to ward off any repeat of the decimation debacle.
My pitfalls last night were familiar to me. First, I played $.25/.50 NL on Doyle's Room, hoping to earn my bonus. That is where I lost about $50.
Initially, I won $17 in about 10 minutes before dinner. I was so damn happy about the win that I fired up the computer right after dinner when wifey Kim turned on American Idol. Now, I'm no Idol fan in general. This is the first season that I've 'watched.' But is it just me, or do the guys suck in comparison to the girls?
No. No. I must not talk about American Idol. Not until this becomes Gay on Poker. Or is it High on Man Junk? Or Guy on Poke Him.
But back to the pitfall. I decide to sit with the max at the table, something that I'm not usually prone to do because of personal stop/losses. It's nothing official. I just can't stand the thought of losing $100, and when I play live at Robbie Hole's home game, we play .25/.50 with $20 buy-ins (when we aren't playing tournaments). I find that the $20 buy-in, while short, permits me enough space to manuever. But since all the players at the table had short stacks of $25 or less, I thought being a bully would be a good thing.
I was wrong. It was second-best-hand syndrome, with everyone and their sister hitting their flush-draws off of me. Worse, I wouldn't give anyone credit for any hands. Stated plainly, I played sloppy, and I should have known when to turn it in. But I didn't, and THIS, to me, is the 1st Pitfall: not knowing when to quit. The cards were not coming my way, and when they were, I wasn't playing well. This equals time to quit. That's why I prefer SNGs. I know when I have to leave those.
Lesson learned: Stick to SNGs or Limit cash games. My cash NL game online is not what it should be.
So, I am down $50 in .25/.50 NL, and I suddenly I get a pop-up IM from DNasty. D was one of the first bloggers I 'connected' with, playing the Limit Challenge against each other. I hadn't seen D in a while, so it was a pleasant surprise. Suddenly, SteelerJosh IMs me too. Steeler is another blogger, who I met through D, who has also been MIA as of late. Both wanted to play. TripJax was also on, and suddenly, we had a potential blogger SNG.
I was excited to play, but the clock showed 8:30, and Lost started at 9. I think I might love Lost more than Poker. There, I said it. But, I guess if Lost was on all of the time, maybe that wouldn't be the case. In any event, I turned to wifey Kim: "Honey, are you going to want to watch the entire American Idol." (It was a loaded question, but she didn't know what it was aimed at). "I want to." "GREAT!", I jumped on the opportunity, "I'm going to play a quick game with some friends online and then we'll watch Lost.
With American Idol ending at 9:30 and Lost on DVR, I set out to play a PokerStars 9-person SNG. As is common, we messed up and Trip and I got in the first one together. We decided to give it another go and we all got into a second SNG.
Things were going well. I was playing according to the strategy I posted a while ago. I was pushing big hands, trying to accumulate chips without a showdown if possible. On both tables, I was running strong. But then we got down to 5 people (Trip, D and I lasted until this point, Steel didn't) on both tables and my game fell apart....all because of Lost.
Well, I'm to blame also. With Idol over, wifey Kim insisted on starting Lost. Now, wifey Kim is right. I knew that she was a Lost-nut like me. I planned on NOT PLAYING until after Lost. I just didn't control myself, and instead of being able to sit back and enjoy Lost, and then play quality poker, I allowed the two to overlap. As a result, I'm sure all of my fellow bloggers can atest to my crumble at the end of both tourneys. I went from a large stack to bust in no time at the SNG with Trip only. My 55 all-in was called by QJ preflop and I lost the coinflip. My mid-but-large-enough to play stack at the other table was crushed when I impatiently pushed all-in on the bubble, first to act with A3 and was called by Trip with AK. Plain and simple, I screwed myself.
Lesson learned: Make sure I have ample time to play SNGs before I start them.
Let's hope I remember my expensive lessons.
So, now I am going to put those mistakes behind me. They were both avoidable. For the time being, I'm keeping away from NL cash games (except for live, where I can trust my reads), and I will only play SNGs when I have ample time (a harder proposition than the first). I also really need to cut down on my poker time, and maybe limit myself to 1 SNG per night for a while. It seems like I'm spending too much time with that laptop on my lap.
As for tonight, I planned to face off with the Poker Champ on PokerStars at 9pm. Unfortunately, it has to be postponed because the Champ has some commitment with a Cancer charity. It's hard to argue with that. Now, if next time he has a Cure for Lupus walk, I'm calling shenanigans.
If you don't know the backstory, the Poker Champ is a newer blogger that I 'discovered' when I saw that I received a hit from his page. When I checked out his site, I was surprised at how...opinionated he was, about his amazing poker skills, the role of women, and his attitude on life, generally. I don't agree with everything that the Champ says, but for an irreverant read, he's hard to match. Some people don't even think that the Champ exists; that he is just a goof made by some other blogger. From my experiences, its all real.
I faced the Champ in the first round of the DADI HUC, and I whooped him good. He might tell it another way, using words like "tourist," "suckout," and "LOLOL". Whatever the case, he slammed my play on his site and generally said that all bloggers were "tourists" (his word for fish), so I challenged him to a best of 7 Heads Up rematch. Hence, we face off for Round 1, hopefully at 9pm on Sunday. I encourage railbirds to attend. Look at PokerStars under the Private Tournaments for High On Poker v. the Poker Champ.
Other than that, we are in the final stages of setting up DADI 4- Shorthanded Poker. There is also SirFWalGman's birthday tournament, scheduled for Sunday. I'm going to do my best to be there, but if I can't make it, I apologize profusely. Lately, poker has been a little too....present.
That's all for today. Have fun people. I know that I am.
posted by Jordan @ 8:32 AM,
4 Comments:
-
At 9:22 AM,
said...
-
Hey, I just read the Champ's blog, and I think he hinted that he wasn't going to play tonight. Better check it out.
I am also a Lost freak and I was in the same dilema, except that our only VCR was tied up taping, what else, American Idol. I played for half an hour and won about 25 BB! Lucky lucky.
Hmm, maybe I should go pro with the Champ. -
At 9:48 AM,
said...
-
Hey Jordan,
Just noticed that the Waffle banner has the wrong time. Can you change it to read 8:30 p.m.? Thank!
Have a good day! -
At 10:14 AM,
said...
-
You better be there bitch! I fraggen expect you to show up for my Birthday!
And two words doofus: Tee Vo.
lol.
Gl Tonight. -
At 10:47 AM,
said...
-
I say go with GayOnPoker. You'll get a whole new reader base.
I would agree on the time issue...when I'm rushed, I suck.
From my brog post today:
When we got down to very shorthanded, it seemed like every time I took action on one table I was up with a decision on the other. At one point the second table popped up and I had AcKc with an all-in in front of me. I had enough chips to play and called the all-in. I immediately got whisked away to the other table and didn't even realize it was Jordan I ended up knocking out with my AK. Not sure what he had, but I'm guessing an A with a lower card, though I don't even know if I improved on the hand or needed to. Jordan, sorry I had to be the one knocking you out, but I would have done the same thing knowing it was you, and I'm sure you would have done the same. Like we've said before, we gotta play our games.
