I am not liking poker much lately. Yesterday afternoon, I fired up some tables, proceeded to lose 3 buy ins. It was mostly to one player who I should have realized was better than me, but I have a hard time quitting someone when I'm down money. Its a HUGE leak of mine.
So late last night I decide to try to find some donks and get back my loses for the day. I find 3 donks according to their PTR ratings, and get them on four tables total. Things were going great, I had erased my losses and then some and I was running really well. I was dominating 2 of the 3 "donks", while slightly losing to the other. Well, the 2 losing donks had enough and were immediately replaced by the 3rd. I guess he thought I was the donk. He ws right. I dont think he played particularly well, but I played pretty bad and before I knew it, it was 330AM and I had lost all my profit plus 6 buy ins more. UGH.
I was just at 7k, now I'm back down to 5k. It is unbelievably frustrating I dont really know where to go from here. I dont wanna give up on my HU goal but I dont really want to move down since I feel so over rolled for it. I am really lost on this, blahhhh.
Here is a graph of my last week. WARNING: MAY INDUCE VOMITING
After I finished my last blog post a few days ago I hung out, ate dinner then fired up some HU tables to try to win some of the money back. I searched for a player that I have had some success against, found him at three tables and joined all three. Long story short, I ended up dropping 8 buy ins to this guy. It was brutal, I played so bad, making bad bets, bad folds and even worse calls. It was horrid. It didnt help that he went 4 for 4 on flips, but w/e. It was really rough, but I think I am capable of winning it all back. Its just really frustrating.
On a much better note, I was on FT looking for some juicy HU games, when I noticed a player named bosoxx34 sitting at a table. I instantly recognized the name from deucescracked and knew he was one of there small/mid stakes HU coaches. I thought it might be interesting to play him for some hands and try to see if I could learn anything about my game from seeing how he might be trying to exploit me or play back at me. The match started off really well for me,
I dont really know how he can call me down here when I am repping so much strength. I almost never double check-raise but I was hoping he had an over pair on the turn and I could get him to call me down.
He grinds me down to almost even when I play this hand, which I think I played well, but it may be somewhat standard. I was trying to rep a K, its not clear whether or not Im actually bluffing with the best hand on that river tho.
I then lose a flip 150bbs deep with AK vs his JJ which hurt but I still wanted to play more, to see if I could learn something.
Ten hands later, I win a 300BB pot against him. I think the hand he shows up with is at the absolute bottom of his range and I was lucky to have him show up with it. He definitely could have had a overpair, but I knew that he over valued top pair somewhat so TP2K was good enough to get it in. His check raise doesnt really fit with an overpair type hand either, so I thought there was a chance he was bluffing with a FD or air and he would fold to my shove.
This was the very next hand:
He had been min 4betting some and he showed it down once with A6 so I knew it didnt always mean strength, so I wasnt done with my AQ, but I dot think 5betting is good cause I fold out all worse hands. I flop good and c/r him all in with 2 outs, it doesnt hold tho.
So we were back to even, we played probably 75 hands more. None of em were super interesting tho. We had a pretty aggro dynamic going tho and it was def a fun match because I knew he was a high level thinker. After 75 hands I was up 50 or so bucks. On the final hand, he 4bet pre and I shoved with AK to which he folded. He insta quit me after, but he was on tons of other tables still so it wasnt because he had to go. He quit me because I was too tough, me! A DC coach quit me! Thats not at all to say I am better than him, not even close, but it does show that I am doing things right in my HU game, good enough that I am not a donk. This is a huge confidence boost, its the best Ive ever felt 2 days after a 11 buy in downswing.
Everyone has something that just gets under their skin more than any other, and in terms of poker I definitely found mine. I sat down against a player HU, first hand he raises to 5 and I fold. Two hands later, he opens to five again, and I pop him up with AT, he calls and we see an A high flop. We end up getting it in by the river with my two pair vs his lower two pair. His starting hand? 73o!
So at this point, I search for him and see him at another table which I instantly sit at. This guy, in less tha 15 hands, has made it clear that he is an absolute donk. He bets pot when he has anything, anything! So, naturally I widen my range for calling on all streets and start to fire when checked to. I, initially win some money but nothing huge and then my opponent gets smacked in the face with the deck. If any other player makes some of the bets he makes, I usually fold, but I know calling him down light is the right play. He just is hitting better hands than mine. Nine times out of ten, I take multiple buy ins off this guy. But today, he over 3 from me. It was so frustrating.
The last two days have been pretty crappy poker-wise. After my last blog post I had a nice winning day where I won about two buy ins and felt like I was playing a pretty solid HU game.
Unfortunately, the high quality of play did not last. On Friday, I played a short session while watching TV. It started off pretty quick with me winning a buy in on the second hand with a set vs an overpair, but after that I just could not play well. I was stacking off light, giving no one credit and making stupid bluffs. I ended the day down two buy ins.
On Saturday I put in a marathon session, playing over 3k hands. The first 1500 hands or so, I was just playing bad, plain and simple. I was not going with my reads, I never thought they had it and I was down over 6 buy ins. Over the next 750 hands or so, I picked it back up. I was getting my money in good and making good decisions. I eliminated the losses and was up a little more than a buy in. The on one of my tables, a guy was talking alot of trash. I had played him before and didnt think he was particularly good (PTR agreed), so I asked him if he wanted to played more tables, to which he quickly agreed. In the first 10 hands I got it in with my set of sixes to his overpair of Q's on the turn only to have a queen fall on the river. And it was down hill from there.
My opponents style was really difficult to play against (57/55/4.07AF/9.73%3b/61%F3B). He was highly aggressive, 3betting a bunch and betting out when it was on him. I tried to adjust by 4betting and floating, but he would pick up on it and fire second barrels and shove over my light 4bets. I lost a ton of money by calling 3bets in position and folding to cbets or floating cbets and folding to 2nd barrels. Im not sure what exactly to do to combat this. Should I bet tightening up preflop, and if so, which hands should I eliminate out of my range, the low suited connecting hands (J9s) or the mediocre high card hands (K7o)? Or should I be eliminating them both? I was also losing alot of money by 3betting OOP and getting called then having my cbets called when I dont have much and having to fold to turn bets. Do I tighten my 3betting rage? Start firing more 3 barrels? Any help would be appreciated.
I ended up losing 4 buy ins to him, ending the day down 3 buy ins. I am going to start watching more DC HU vids and try to learn how to play against these guys and just play better in general. Hopefully I can tighten my game up and get things going again.
So I havent played all to much lately, only a few hundred hands of HU resulting in the win of a couple of buy ins, but I just recently found out that I won the prop bet I entered last month! I am now 1 for 1 in prop bets and I'm pretty proud of that. We'll see if I do any more soon, it would need to be a pretty ridiculous one to get my attention since I think alot of these prop bets can be won by the players if they put in the necessary hours.
With the win, my account balance only increased 200 bucks but since I also got my buy in back, it felt like I was getting back 800 weeeeee! With the new funds I have reached another milestone in my bankroll. Only a little further to go until I get out of my stake and can start making the real money!!!
It's Sunday which for most of the poker world means tourney day. I have a bunch of HW so I didnt wanna sign up for a lot of tourneys if any. I browsed the tourney lobby and noticed the mini FTOPS HU event was about to start so i decided to sign up and ponied up the 50 dollar buy in. My first opponent was a winning tourney player, including a win in the 50-50, but didnt play much HU. The match was short and ugly. Here are the two hands of note
I dont know what my play should be here. I guess I shouldnt be 4betting if Im gonna fold to a shove otherwise my hand is essentially a bluff. But I think calling the 3bet is too weak especially since he has been 3betting a bunch. I also think that folding is likely the right play since the blinds are just so low that it wouldnt make sense for him to get it in with anything worse the AKs ad QQ+. I dunno, I asked him what he had on that hand after the match and he wouldnt say.
On Monday, I had an epic day of poker. It started like any other day at the tables: I checked Poker Table Ratings to see if any of the usual donks were playing. There were only two players on the tables, one at .10/.25 and one at .5/1 HU. Since I was itching to play, I joined the waiting list for one of the HU tables the donk was playing. I had never played against the guy before, but he was one of the biggest losers at 100NL for the week so I added him to my buddy list.
I got off the wait list, sat down and played this hand. It was a sketchy spot pre, and I dont think a flatis best but I didnt really wanna shove. Also I obv knew I was gonna hit a boat on the flop
After this hand, he insta rebuys and Im dancing in my seat. A couple hands later, I cant fade his draw...
A hand later he asks if I want to play on more tables. Of course, I tell him I would LOVE to do so. He then requests 6 tables, most of them being deep and I get all warm and fuzzy inside. I had never played 6 HU tables simultaneously but I felt I didnt need my A game to beat this guy. I was right and wrong. I didnt need my A game to beat him, but I needed to not run like crap as well. After opening up the 6 tables, I found that this guy was unbelievably aggro. To give you an idea, his AF was 8. 8!!! 5 is extremely high, ive never seen an 8 AF in a large sample. Since he was gonna be betting into me a bunch, I figured Id wait for good hands and just let him bet into me. It worked for a while; after 75 or so hands I was already up 1.5 buyins. Then I cant fade hearts again....
That one still stings, ugh. For the next 200 hands or so, I run about breakeven and not much interesting happened (except for this hand where I soulread him). After that hand I win a nice 200BB pot where I check call TP9K on two streets for lots of value.
Then, disaster strikes. In less than 40 hands, I proceed to lose 10 buy ins. Then 5 more in 60 hands, less than 10 minutes later. It was unreal. The 10 buy in drop was only 5 important hands too, all for at least 160BB each. Here are two interesting ones (interesting because I get sucked out on)
In the other three, I flip once, get it in with QQ vs AA preflop and get it in with TPTK vs his overpair. Not fun. I was pretty tilted, but I knew I could beat this guy (famous last words, I know) so I continued playing him. I end up making 6 buy ins back in the next 250 hands, but then proceed to lose them back, mainly all in this hand (Which I played awful. I was planning to c/r the flop but he checked back. On the turn and river, I just wasnt convinced he didnt have a random ace since it AJ wasnt out of his 5bet calling range)
I kept fighting though, and made back 11 of the 15 buy ins, but then disaster struck again and I lost most of it back, including two simultaneous hands in which I got stacked for 200BB each.
But then, variance came back around to finally help me out. I went on a super heater, which started right after those simultaneous hands. In the next 175 hands, I made 8 buy ins. And the following hour, I was able to make back all I had lost plus about 200 bucks.
All in all, the match last over 5 hours, over 3700 hands, and spread over 6 tables. I came out up almost 2 buy ins and had some of the biggest swongs Ive ever had in one day, but as long as I profited, Im happy. If the timeline of the match is hard to follow, check out the graph below and it'll give you a better idea (although the graph is missing some hands because my internet constantly disconnected, Copilot says I only profited 27 bucks, but from my FT account I can tell its closer to 180).
Needless to say, I didnt play a hand all of today. 5 hours of poker is enough for a while.
So since I last posted I have played a couple thousand hands but Im just spinning my wheels in the mud. I've been dabbling with HU but I dont think I am good enough to make it my regular game yet. I'm gonna try to watch some videos on DC to help with my HU game and hopefully that will turn into a big money maker for me. It seems as tho HU games are generally a good source of winnings if youre doing things right and playing the right people, both of which are difficult tasks to accomplish. On the one hand, playing a solid HU game is not easy, youre playing many more hands and therefore you need to have much better hand reading skills (or skillz). Mastering HU can take months, but I hope that my months playing 6max and some occasional HU playing can help me transition. Finding people to play is also a crucial albeit frustrating part of HU NLHE. Since there are a lot of good players that realize the potential of HU to be a good money maker, they are often trolling around HU tables looking for games. When looking at HU tables lists youll often see 5-10 tables with 1 person there, well why dont they play each other? Since they dont wanna play any poker player, they wanna play the worst ones, the ones that will make them the most money, so they wait around hoping donks will sit with them. Because of this, finding a good game is hard since lots of player are either really good, or will just not play you.
This does not mean Im done playing 6max, I think Ill still put in good sessions often. I just really want to commit to this HU thing since I think the games could be really juicy once I get a good grasp of some important concepts.
Good Luck Everyone
PS Go check out my friend Ferocious Kitty's blog. He's studying abroad in London this semester and is blogging about his travels and experiences there (which will likely include some poker). Check it out!
I'm a Boston native and a junior at Washington University in St. Louis. I love sports, especially the sox, celts and pats, and I'm absolutely obsessed with poker
