June Review - Near Consistent Mediocrity

The subtitle of this monthly review could of simply been "consistent mediocrity" had I not suffered a big downswing in the past two days. Over the first 27 days of June, I took five days off, and played 22 days during which I took a positive amount of money off the tables each day. The streak was neat, but it didn't produce the great results one might expect, as I also didn't have any real huge days outside of one Thursday early on.

It's also notable that I played less hands in June than in any other month since I started 24 tabling as a part time player in June of 2008 (outside of December 2009, which I took off after hitting SNE in the first couple days). This is for two real reasons: I only put in 125 hours of grinding, and that I only averaged around 900 hands per hour due to the games being really awful making it tough to get a good number of quality tables open. Stars has really shit the bed with their cash game buy in structure changes, and I'm really looking forward to when my SNE status lapses at the end of September and it makes sense for me to start spreading my volume to other sites. The one semi-positive result of the buy-in changes is that fish seem to be playing higher, albeit the 50bb tables. What I mean by this is that I've been finding big donators more frequently at 400 and 600NL than I used to be able to in the past. Because of this, ~30% of the my volume this month was played above 100NL. Further, due to there being some huge megadonks at 600NL I shipped some solid results there despite being out a bunch of AIEV (see earlier post).

I ran pretty poorly in June, especially at the end. Overall, it wasn't as bad as April or May, but I could really use a month where perhaps I'm only in the bottom 20th percentile of all-in luck (calling January or February, come back please!). I'd just really like to be able to win the occasional 98/2, 95/5, 90/10, 85/15, or 80/20, etc. etc. vs fish - not every one, but maybe say one out of five?



The Bottom Line:
$9597.92 table winnings
+$4189.20 FPP value (52,365 VPPs * 5 FPPs/VPP * 1.6c/FPP)
-----------------------------------------
$13,787.12 USD total profit. ~$14.5k CDN at current exchange rate.

Considering the lack of the volume, the runbad, and the lack of any profit sources outside of straight winnings and FPPs, I'm not entirely disappointed with the month despite the final number not being all that impressive relative to my earlier 2010 efforts.

Hopefully I put forth a better volume effort in July (31 days + 5 weekends is nice) and go on a massive heater (for me, that means running almost average). Combine that with the $3k free milestone money awaiting me at 400k VPPs and things could get back on track in a hurry.

I Die Happy Knowing You Fell For That

Despite being a solid four buyins below AIEV today, I still managed a pretty decent session. Story of my month I guess, a lot of "ok", but almost no "great" or "awful". The games Thursday afternoon/evening were pretty bad, but they ended up being downright decent at night. I actually managed to get 24 tables open for an hour+ stretch, which is a rarity these days.

Futurama aired its rebirth episode tonight. Unfortunately, it wasn't broadcast in Canada, forcing us to instead download both the first and second episode and watch them. Very entertaining, though they felt more like the movies than the TV seasons 1 through 5.

The NHL draft goes tomorrow. There's been a ton of trade rumours surrounding the Flames. A couple of them would make me really happy if they happened (Regehr + Nystrom's rights for Jordan Staal being one), but in my objective opinion it seems that they simply aren't grounded in reality. Hopefully I'm wrong.

Unfortunate

After a solid session yesterday that ended with something of a downswing, I was almost through another solid outing today when I suffered what in terms of sheer dollar amount (comparing AIEV$ vs actual $), is my biggest beat ever. As you might imagine, the hand was played at a 600NL table. I mentioned in an earlier blog post that I felt fortunate most of my runbad has occurred at 100NL versus 200NL and 400NL - with the caveat that over a very small number of hands I have run pretty awful at 600NL. I pulled up my 600NL stats for the year, and I indeed am out 500bbs of AIEV in a measly 4600 hands - that's getting close to $1/hand! 600NL results on the year are below, followed by the HH:



PokerStars No-Limit Hold'em, $6.00 BB (7 handed)
Hero (BB) ($580.20)
UTG ($183.70)
MP1 ($599.40)
MP2 ($331.05)
CO ($126.30)
Button ($111)
SB ($529.90)

Preflop: Hero is BB with A♣, A♠
UTG calls $6, 4 folds, SB calls $3, Hero bets $33, UTG calls $27, SB calls $27

Flop: ($99) 4♦, 2♠, K♠ (3 players)
SB checks, Hero bets $72, 1 fold, SB raises to $150, Hero calls $78

Turn: ($399) 6♦ (2 players)
SB bets $180, Hero raises to $397.20 (All-In), SB calls $166.90 (All-In)

River: ($1092.80) 10♦ (2 players, 2 all-in)

Total pot: $1092.80 | Rake: $3

Results:
SB had A♦, K♦ (flush, Ace high).
Hero had A♣, A♠ (one pair, Aces).
Outcome: SB won $1089.80

Professional Athletes: All Class

The unfortunate thing about the Stanley Cup Finals was that despite being entertaining, I had a really tough time rooting for either side. On the one hand, the champion Blackhawks are tainted by "20 Cent" Patrick Kane and Adam Burish, both incredible douchebags. On the other side, you had Chris Pronger. At least Marian Hossa managed to break his curse and finally won a cup.

A fun picture from the Blackhawks dressing room after their victory is located below. I guess I shouldn't be terribly surprised, but it made me feel somewhat mature for some reason. Granted, the Hawks are a young team (Toews and Kane are both a few years my junior), but that seems somewhat 2nd grade to me. At least we finally know for certain how they felt about Pronger.


Poker this weekend was pretty lame. I didn't have any really bad days, but no good days either. Between the three days I played around 23k hands and took $1k off the tables, in addition to ~$800 in FPP value. Bleh.

I did manage to get my 120th power star in Mario Galaxy 2 today. Now time to collect the 120 green stars to unlock the final galaxy. Once I'm through with that I'll probably get back to 3D Dot Game Heroes for the PS3.

Rapid Fire Thoughts

Point form blog post today with random thoughts about several different topics.

• Stars has really, really screwed the pooch with their buyin changes. The games are awful. I wasn't able to get 24 decent tables open at any point this weekend. You can tell they know they've messed up, but how long is it going to take them to fix it? At least when my SNE status lapses in September I'll be able to justify either playing cross sites or moving entirely.


• A side effect of the buyin changes I've noticed seems to be that a lot of the true maniac megadonk types have moved up from 100NL and 200NL to 400NL and 600NL 50bb tables. It could also just be that the true maniacs tend to gravitate to midstakes to gamble where the wins and losses are more financially significant.


• Last week my girlfriend bought me Mario Galaxy 2. It's a very good game. An entirely predictable conclusion given that they developed a very interesting and somewhat unique engine in the first, and simply needed to not fail big time developing new content with it in the second.


• The Stanley Cup Finals have been entertaining despite me not being fond of either team competing. Before the series started someone suggested it might be the weakest goaltending matchup in SCF history, and they definitely weren't too far off in that regard. The scoring depth on each team makes for very enjoyable hockey however.


• Can't wait until July when I'll be graced with Starcraft 2 and Persona 3 Portable.


• In some ways it really feels like I should be in Vegas for the WSOP right now, though I'm glad I decided to skip it this year. I'm something of a home body, and after the PCA and EPT Monte Carlo + Paris/Britain I'm all traveled out for a bit. Next year I think I'll probably go down for 2 weeks, play three to five events and sell a bunch of action.

Finally, a hand history from tonight that emphasizes how awesome bumhunting at 600NL has been to me this month. This hand actually ends up being my biggest net win in a hand yet, besting the previous record by a beastly $12.05! I've won bigger pots before, but because this one was multiway it showed a larger profit. The opener in the hand is an unknown who has played a very small number of hands at Stars - may or may not be a fish. The caller is the reason I'm at the table, an 80/20 type megadonk. On the flop once the action gets to me I knew I was priced in to try to peel gin, especially given it was rainbow (with a flush draw on board I'd have folded). When the turn peeled I said "thank you Jesus" out loud to my monitor. Fading the river four outer was awesome too. If you're going to run good at one stake, make it the highest you play! Averaging just over $3/hand over 850 hands at 600NL this month so far.

PokerStars No-Limit Hold'em, $6.00 BB (8 handed)
SB ($630.45)
Hero (BB) ($600)
UTG ($652)
UTG+1 ($411)
MP1 ($452.45)
MP2 ($607)
CO ($667)
Button ($612)

Preflop: Hero is BB with J, Q
1 fold, UTG+1 bets $18, MP1 calls $18, 4 folds, Hero calls $12

Flop: ($57) 8, 9, A (3 players)
Hero checks, UTG+1 bets $30, MP1 calls $30, Hero calls $30

Turn: ($147) 10 (3 players)
Hero checks, UTG+1 bets $60, MP1 raises to $120, Hero calls $120, UTG+1 calls $60

River: ($507) K (3 players)
Hero bets $432 (All-In), 1 fold, MP1 calls $284.45 (All-In)

Total pot: $1075.90 | Rake: $3

Results:
Hero had J, Q (straight, Ace high).
MP1 had A, 9 (two pair, Aces and nines).
Outcome: Hero won $1072.90

Fortunate

I complain a lot on this blog, often justifiably so, about how I'm currently running. Today I'm going to do close to the opposite.

Recently I got to thinking about two instances in which I have been very fortunate with respect to poker. The first is that I didn't experience a stretch of terrible variance during my early days attempting to grind up a roll 25NL and 50NL. It's quite possible if my career had begun with awful variance, I simply would have given up. Running well early on also allowed me to move up to small stakes more quickly, and have a very profitable first year before deciding to play for a living.

Secondly, while I have had some stretches of absolutely ridiculous runbad over the past year and a half, in general I have run worst at the lowest stakes I frequent (100NL) while significantly better at 200NL and above. The exception to this was my first couple thousand hands of 600NL where I was something like 5 BI below AIEV, but my recent results bumhunting there have somewhat rectified that. It's a lot more encouraging financially at the end of the day when variance is costing you less than it could simply because of where it's happening.

Trendbreaking

On Thursday I had the first day in a long, long time in which I ran above AIEV. Funny enough, I'm still below expectation on the month, despite that thanks to Thursday I definitely feel like I'm on a little bit of a heater. I've only played a handful over 9k hands this month thus far, but I've had some very favorable results bumhunting at $600NL and E400NL - the latter of which I've only played 5 hands of for ~$440, a winrate of 899ptBB/100!

In looking through the big pots I played at $600NL today for a fun HH to post, I really did end up in some uncomfortable spots. I also made one pretty big mistake in a 3b pot that I'm fairly certain cost me some value against a very good regular, though I suppose in theory he might have made a heroic fold. I won't post the hand as it's a super standard spot where I c/c flop instead of c/ring as I wanted to allow him to barrel, but the board texture was such that a lot of turn cards will suck and cause him to go into pot control mode (which he did, only allowing me to win half a stack) so I really needed to c/r flop.

Anyway, I was put in two spots I hated against two other good regulars, both times with the same megadonk involved in the hand. I'm going to post the two hands and provide some commentary. I think I'm happy with the way I played the first one, while the other I think I was very lucky to not get owned by the very good aggro reg.

PokerStars No-Limit Hold'em, $6.00 BB (8 handed)
CO ($607.80)
Button ($618)
SB ($613.65)
BB ($171.25)
Hero (UTG) ($668)
UTG+1 ($715.45)
MP1 ($711)
MP2 ($334)

Preflop: Hero is UTG with A, A
Hero bets $24, 1 fold, MP1 calls $24, 1 fold, CO calls $24, 2 folds, BB calls $18

BB is a super megadonk running around 80/50. Other two callers are good, aggro regulars.

Flop: ($99) 7, 8, Q (4 players)
BB checks, Hero bets $60, 1 fold, CO calls $60, BB raises to $147.25 (All-In), Hero calls $87.25, CO calls $87.25

I obviously want to get it in vs the donk, but I hate the call from the reg. He'd definitely flat sets and two pair here to keep the fish in the pot. He'd probably squeeze QQ pre most of the time. So I'd estimate his range to be something like AQ, KQ, QJ, 78, 77, 88, T9 and 56. I time down called the donk jam - I really don't think there's much value in raising with any part of my range here. If he jammed over the top I'd probably crying fold - which would be a sick play for him to make with Qx - sometimes he'd end up getting it in drawing near dead vs me, but sometimes he'd make me fold better or a chop and stack the fish. When he calls I figure he can definitely still have a nut hand, though it's probably a little less likely.

Turn: ($540.75) 8 (3 players, 1 all-in)
Hero bets $135, 1 fold

The turn is a pretty good card, reducing the chance he has a set. I decided to do what I'd do with QQ or 88 in this spot. He can't really peel a draw like T9 ever here as he's now dead versus some of my value range, so I don't think betting big is reasonable. I might still be able to squeek out some value from AQ. I'd really like to know what he had...

River: ($540.75) 7 (2 players, 1 all-in)

Total pot: $540.75 | Rake: $3

Results:
BB had 9, Q (two pair, Queens and eights).
Hero had A, A (two pair, Aces and eights).
Outcome: Hero won $537.75

Next is an earlier hand featuring the same megadonk in the SB. Note that we're rather deep. The regular involved is a good player.

PokerStars No-Limit Hold'em, $6.00 BB (9 handed)
UTG+1 ($645)
Hero (MP1) ($1064.35)
MP2 ($600)
MP3 ($600)
CO ($642)
Button ($836.25)
SB ($1344.10)
BB ($654)
UTG ($639.75)

Preflop: Hero is MP1 with A, Q
UTG bets $18, 1 fold, Hero calls $18, 1 fold, MP3 calls $18, 2 folds, SB calls $15, 1 fold

Flop: ($78) J, 10, A (4 players)
SB checks, UTG checks, Hero checks, MP3 bets $42, SB calls $42, 1 fold, Hero calls $42

I think not taking a b/f myself on this flop is a mistake. Even though I really just want to get to showdown cheap with my hand, as soon as I take a c/c line here against a good player if draws brick I'm extremely prone to getting barreled off the best hand. Plus there's value to be had from the megadonk. Definitely a mistake. Based on his bet sizing I doubt MP3 ever has a set or two pair. Really just didn't know what to do in the moment.

Turn: ($204) 6 (3 players)
SB bets $18, Hero calls $18, MP3 calls $18

This particular megadonk had very linear betsizing tells. Small bets were basically always either very weak showdown value or a draw. I'm completely lost here because I know that if I call the reg can so easily raise as a bluff versus me with worse, but for value against the fish. My roomate was watching the hand and I actually predicted that would happen and ranted about how much I hated the spot, but much to my surprise he just flatted.

River: ($258) 2 (3 players)
SB bets $36, Hero calls $36, MP3 calls $36

River blanks, and at this point I'm good a ton, maybe occasionally chopping with MP3. Really don't like how I played this hand though, b/fing the flop would have made it much easier.

Total pot: $366 | Rake: $3

Results:
SB had 3, Q (high card, Ace).
Hero had A, Q (one pair, Aces).
MP3 mucked 7, A (one pair, Aces).
Outcome: Hero won $363