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Andy Ward pointed out that, when things are not going well, it's far more of a slog than when they are running prettily. The week (ending today) will be only my second losing week of the year and, unless some kind of Lazarus-like reinvigoration strikes me later today, by far my worst. The strange thing is that I am not in the least bit downhearted about it. I'm not at new stakes. I know that I can beat this level. I'm just suffering a short-term bad run.
However, in my latest session I did notice some worrying shifts towards caution. Pavlov is at work here and when you get stuffed time and time again over a three-day period, it's hard to remember that your aggression paid off for the two weeks before that. Here's an example.
I get AJ suited in MP2 and raise first in. A noted loose player (50%/14%) who is on the button calls, as he has every other raise I have made this session.
Flop comes KJ9 with two spades and none of my suit. I bet, loosey calls. Turn is another Jack, giving me trips, top kicker. I bet, he raises, I just call. This is mistake number one. No need in pointing out to me why. But like I say, when you find people cold-calling your raises with QT and flopping straights with monotonous regularity, you get a bit scared of grasping hold of the rod, because you fear another electric shock. River is something innocuous. I check (this is mistake number two), planning to call, and he checks behind (which is why I should have three-bet the turn). I win, but I have thrown away one, possibly two, big bets.
Getting used to the downturns and not letting it impact your play negatively in this fashion is an important part of being a winning player. In one sense, having the rather tough bonus schedule at Empire is good for me, because it means that I have to "play through it" and I have to do so now. So there's no recording a quick win and then sodding off because I am frightened of losing it back again and, as a result, recording another loss for the session.
The other point, of course, is that the more hands I play, the more frequent will be downswings of more than 100 BBs. I reckon that I should expect them once every three weeks or so. Once again this is, believe it or not, good. Because the more often you experience this kind of thing, the less badly it affects your play. Even now my errors are what might be called "on the margin" -- but my style of play seems to dictate a long-term win rate of 1BB a hundred. I try to plug the leaks, and this works in the short term, but by doing so, other leaks spring up, and back I come to that long-term 1BB a hundred. This is also accompanied by a rather low standard deviation compared to that experienced by other players. You don't need to be a hold'em genius, therefore, to see what is happening. I'm winning a lot of small pots without showdowns (many of which I ought not to win), but my aggressive play mitigates against the building of large pots (as recommended by Mr Miller in Small Stakes Hold 'em). This means that I suffer fewer suck-outs, but I am probably reducing my long term EV by raising in places that I should just be calling (the so-called "build the pot" hands). To be frank, this is probably the best way for a person like me to play.
+++
I decided to tidy up my online passwords, records etc. Without much thinking, I compiled a list of 43 sites that require a password to access and which I use on a fairly regular basis. Some of these sites ask you to change the password once every 8 weeks or so. Others "allocate" the password. Some have several different things you have to remember, such as user name (is it pbirks, peterbirks, peter.birks, or peterjbirks?) "LogIn ID", password and a pin number. Then you have to remember the e-mail address (not such a problem for me, but presumably hell on earth for these compulsory e-mail address changers). Luckily, I tell the truth and only live in one place, so things like birthdates and home are not a problem, but I can imagine these causing problems elsewhere.
So, to hell with the warnings, I write the stuff down and keep it in a file. Except that even the file stuff is now out of date, so I have to update it.
My particular bugbear at the moment is American Express, which asks for a 4-figure code before you can speak to them on the phone The problem is that it is usually the four-figure code that I have forgotten and I want to get them to tell me. But they won't tell me. What they will let me do is set a new one. So I set a new one. And, of course, this means that I can't remember which one of the five regular codes I use I have used in this particular case. So I have to phone them up, and the cycle repeats. I think that the only way to solve this is to add a sixth "regular" code, that I can assign in my brain to Amex.
++++
I am not renowned for the smallness of my ego. But some bloggers/ contributors to blogs appear to have an ego so large that they have some system that notifies them whenever they are mentioned in another blog. I presume "crawlers" exist for the major blog operations (i.e., all the ones except the one that David Young uses) and that these guys religiously set them to run to check whether they have been mentioned in any other blog. Frightening. If I get that worried about what people are saying about me, shoot me now, please.
However, in my latest session I did notice some worrying shifts towards caution. Pavlov is at work here and when you get stuffed time and time again over a three-day period, it's hard to remember that your aggression paid off for the two weeks before that. Here's an example.
I get AJ suited in MP2 and raise first in. A noted loose player (50%/14%) who is on the button calls, as he has every other raise I have made this session.
Flop comes KJ9 with two spades and none of my suit. I bet, loosey calls. Turn is another Jack, giving me trips, top kicker. I bet, he raises, I just call. This is mistake number one. No need in pointing out to me why. But like I say, when you find people cold-calling your raises with QT and flopping straights with monotonous regularity, you get a bit scared of grasping hold of the rod, because you fear another electric shock. River is something innocuous. I check (this is mistake number two), planning to call, and he checks behind (which is why I should have three-bet the turn). I win, but I have thrown away one, possibly two, big bets.
Getting used to the downturns and not letting it impact your play negatively in this fashion is an important part of being a winning player. In one sense, having the rather tough bonus schedule at Empire is good for me, because it means that I have to "play through it" and I have to do so now. So there's no recording a quick win and then sodding off because I am frightened of losing it back again and, as a result, recording another loss for the session.
The other point, of course, is that the more hands I play, the more frequent will be downswings of more than 100 BBs. I reckon that I should expect them once every three weeks or so. Once again this is, believe it or not, good. Because the more often you experience this kind of thing, the less badly it affects your play. Even now my errors are what might be called "on the margin" -- but my style of play seems to dictate a long-term win rate of 1BB a hundred. I try to plug the leaks, and this works in the short term, but by doing so, other leaks spring up, and back I come to that long-term 1BB a hundred. This is also accompanied by a rather low standard deviation compared to that experienced by other players. You don't need to be a hold'em genius, therefore, to see what is happening. I'm winning a lot of small pots without showdowns (many of which I ought not to win), but my aggressive play mitigates against the building of large pots (as recommended by Mr Miller in Small Stakes Hold 'em). This means that I suffer fewer suck-outs, but I am probably reducing my long term EV by raising in places that I should just be calling (the so-called "build the pot" hands). To be frank, this is probably the best way for a person like me to play.
+++
I decided to tidy up my online passwords, records etc. Without much thinking, I compiled a list of 43 sites that require a password to access and which I use on a fairly regular basis. Some of these sites ask you to change the password once every 8 weeks or so. Others "allocate" the password. Some have several different things you have to remember, such as user name (is it pbirks, peterbirks, peter.birks, or peterjbirks?) "LogIn ID", password and a pin number. Then you have to remember the e-mail address (not such a problem for me, but presumably hell on earth for these compulsory e-mail address changers). Luckily, I tell the truth and only live in one place, so things like birthdates and home are not a problem, but I can imagine these causing problems elsewhere.
So, to hell with the warnings, I write the stuff down and keep it in a file. Except that even the file stuff is now out of date, so I have to update it.
My particular bugbear at the moment is American Express, which asks for a 4-figure code before you can speak to them on the phone The problem is that it is usually the four-figure code that I have forgotten and I want to get them to tell me. But they won't tell me. What they will let me do is set a new one. So I set a new one. And, of course, this means that I can't remember which one of the five regular codes I use I have used in this particular case. So I have to phone them up, and the cycle repeats. I think that the only way to solve this is to add a sixth "regular" code, that I can assign in my brain to Amex.
++++
I am not renowned for the smallness of my ego. But some bloggers/ contributors to blogs appear to have an ego so large that they have some system that notifies them whenever they are mentioned in another blog. I presume "crawlers" exist for the major blog operations (i.e., all the ones except the one that David Young uses) and that these guys religiously set them to run to check whether they have been mentioned in any other blog. Frightening. If I get that worried about what people are saying about me, shoot me now, please.
