Thoughts about the Poker 'Standard' and the Phobia Surrounding Nitty Play

I was playing a session recently vs an opponent who was a true breakeven HU grinder. A guy who probably gave up too easily in pots and really wouldnt get his stack in the middle unless he had the goods. He possessed the basic knowledge of the game; EV, pot odds, showdown value, but lacked any real sense of creativity or imagination. About 100 hands into the match we were even when this hand came up.

Full Tilt Poker $0.50/$1 No Limit Hold'em - 2 players
The Official Hand Converter Powered By DeucesCracked.com

Hero (BB): $103.20
BTN/SB: $210.40

Pre Flop: ($1.50) Hero is BB with T T
BTN/SB raises to $3, Hero raises to $10, BTN/SB calls $7

Flop: ($20.00) 5 2 8 (2 players)
Hero bets $13, BTN/SB calls $13

Turn: ($46.00) 6 (2 players)
Hero checks, BTN/SB bets $23, Hero requests TIME, Hero raises to $80.20 all in, BTN/SB calls $57.20

River: ($206.40) T (2 players - 1 is all in)

Final Pot: $206.40
Hero shows T T (three of a kind, Tens)
BTN/SB shows A A (a pair of Aces)
Hero wins $205.90
(Rake: $0.50)


On the turn my thought process went like this:

"Well, I have an overpair in a 3bet pot, automatic all-in."

When all of the money went in and I saw I was behind, I immediately brushed it off

"Sick cooler. Overpair vs overpair in a 3bet pot, nothing I can do about that."

I'm thankful I was able to suckout or maybe I would have begun to tilt and remained in that mindset. Upon further thought however, I realized my play was not only misguided but may be attributed to much a much deeper issue.

There's no debate that the poker world has it's own culture and way of doing things. We have our own lingo which we apply to poker strategy discussion and often to our mundane day-to-day conversations amoungst ourselves. "Both girls were hot! But my sex EV was higher with girl B over girl A, so I went for B." We have our ideal lifestyle, which consists of living in vegas and flaunting our money by spending it lavishly on things we don't really need. However, I would argue that there is even a culture within our style of play which can often be detrimental to our games. The idea of being "nitty" or a "nit" is vastly looked down upon in the poker community. So much so that players will go out of their way to not be one, even at the expense of their winrate.

A similar argument exists: "Players think they have to play like the pros in order to win, so they stop thinking for themselves and start thinking about what the pro would do." As true as I think this statement is, my argument goes deeper. In my HU career I can think of many hero calls, overbet bluffs, and ultra slim value-bets I've made, but I'd be hard pressed to think of many hero-laydowns I've ever made. I'd much rather just get the chips in and brush it off as a cooler as opposed to folding. I am an avid poker player along with being a 2+2 member and am certainly not immune to the culture forced up me from such. In theory I should make just as many hero laydowns as I do hero calls, so why isn't that the case? Acts of agression and big risk are highly regarded in the poker community, where as actions of low risk and plays assiciated with low variance are considered nitty. DOGISHEAD's J high call in 2k HUNL game was considered by many to be godlike and he gets all the praise in the world for it, and I'm not saying he shouldn't. I assure you however, that the hand would not have received nearly as much worship if DOG had a set of Tens, layed it down, and was shown a set of Aces. It's this type of mass envy that propagates this playing style.

My advice to myself and anyone else who reads this is to remember that poker is a game of numbers of logic, you have to forget about everything else when you play. Your red line, blue line, and yellow lines all have one thing in common; are all infinitely inferior to your green line. Don't worry about looking stupid for wanting to fold a big hand if you believe it is correct to do so. There is just as much proffit to be made by making good folds as there is to making good calls, valuebets, or bluffs. You may not look like a hero in the short run and you will most likely be berrated in BBV if you try to show off your hero-folding skills, but in the long run you'll be better off having this skill and your green line will thank you for it.

Gotta Grind - New Goal in Mind

Haven't posted in here at all lately but that's really because there hasn't been a whole lot to talk about with regard to poker. The past few months have been pretty dismal with a low amount of hands and I have generally just been breaking even from month to month. Last month I put in a decent effort to log some hands and managed about 20k which I'm somewhat proud of. My new job has officially begun so now I'm in the office just about every day putting in close to 40 hours every week. Add in the fact that I spend all of my weekends with Ashley and I go to the gym or play tennis just about every day after work, it leaves very little time to play poker.

However, I'm hoping this will change. I now make a little more money with my full-time status and I'm hoping I'll be able to save a little bit each month after paying rent and bills. So I've been thinking that I'm going to need a new car soon. The one I have now is a 1998 Mitsubishi eclipse spyder GS. It has about 90k miles on and generally rides pretty rough. It's also never pleasant when I come back to my car after leaving it out in the rain to sit in a puddle that has a accumulated on my drivers seat because the convertible top leaks. I've looked up the blue book value of the car and it comes out to around 2.2k. I have a savings account my father started for me when I was a freshman in college which is now at about 4.5k. I estimated that with my new job I'll have ideally 7k in my savings account by the end of June. So:

2.2k + 4.5k + 7k = $13.7k base car fund.

This is what I will ideally have, before poker, to put down on a car. I want to purchase this car cash and have no payments. Given what I think I can afford, and the quality of car I wish to have, I will probably looking to spend somewhere in the range of 15k-20k. This means I will have to take a substantial withdrawal from my poker BR. Right now my BR stands at about 13k, I'm thinking I'm going to need to w/d at least 5k but probably not more than say 10k. The amount of money I take out will probably depend on the current size of my BR at the time. So the better I do over the next 4 months in poker, will have a large effect on how nice of a car I will own for the next 8+ years. My goal is to put in 30k hands per month through the next 4 months. I really hate making monetary goals because all you can do is put in the hands and live with the results... but if I could average $1.5k per month with rakeback, I would be a happy man for the next 8+ years.

What it Takes

To be a winning poker player, one must possess a combination of many qualities, the easiest of which being skill. Poker as a skill is quite easy to learn and most people of even modest intelligence would be able to learn a +EV playing strategy, either by reading forums & literature or being mentored from someone else who knows the game. I've known players who are smarter than I with a better understanding of the game who have had results far below my own. It's all of the other qualities a player must possess that makes it so hard to be a long term winner in poker.

Gugel made a post in his blog saying in summary, that a player needs to master 3 things: hand reading, emotional control, and strategy. In my opinion, hand reading and strategy should count as one entity. Both of these are your concious mind at work trying to defeat your opponent. It's no coincience that both of these things go out the window when you are not emotionally stable. What I am saying is this, there are rarely instances when a player player is great at one of these and bad at the other, the two qualities go hand in hand.

For me, emotional control is far more important and should be broken down into even smaller parts. The first and most obvious part is tilt. How easily and badly does the player tilt? The worse they tilt, the worse off the are. The second part is how sensitive they are to money and it's real-world value. Some players are not capable of keeping the monetary value of their bets out of their mind. Instead of playing for BB's these players see dollar signs and fear enters their game. For these players, success at the higher limits will never happen until they can let go. A third segment is mental endurance/focus. Sure it's easy to win over the course of a month or two, but when faced with a bit of bad luck is this player able to maintain his level of play? It's easy to get tunnel vision when playing large amounts of hands. Some players simply get bored with the game and dont put in hands unless they get stuck. A fourth aspect is confidence/self-awareness. Some players tilt and dont even realize it. They are unaware that their play is at such a low level so they go on feeling good about their decisions when in reality their play is poor. Conversely, there are players who, when in a rut, doubt the quality of their play and start to adjust their game when no adjustments were necessary to begin with.

In the short run, it's not hard to be a very good poker player, but what I admire most is when I see someone's graph, regardless of limits, looks like a positive linear line over a large sample of hands. My graph of course consists of spans of steady winning followed by a sharp dropoff repeated a few times over 200k hands. I can never seem to quite keep my mind in check for too long without crashing from time to time.

The level of thinking that goes on in Phil Ivey's mind versus a 50NL grinder on a good day is not as desparing as some may believe. To me, it's those who are mentally sound within themselves who are truely great. When a player can continue to play top notch poker regardless of stakes or previous shortcomings and do so day in and day out. This is what I aspire towards.

October sucks

October has been so awful. I'll precede this rant by saying I havent played enough hands to be as mad as I am right now. I played my B- and ran very bad to go in the hole about 1k over only 6k hands or so. Since then I've played another 6k hands at my A- game and have broken even. Just so many coolers in a short run of hands really has me rattled. Boat over boat, flopped flushes over flushes, 2-pair in 3bet pots vs better 2 pair, it's just sickening. My EV luck in pots is also pretty sick, losing every flip in sight and people sucking out quite often. My EV graph has me at 800 below EV. To my credit I've really been crushing these guys over this small sample. To be break even given the poor run of cards I've had to deal with is a small victory. I had to stop just now however, cause I've boiled over with anger. I get coolered, grind it back, get coolered again and grind it back up... coolered and repeat. I've certainly been doom-switched in the short run. The thing that's bad is I'm so rattled right now I dont even know if I could handle getting sucked out on or coolered again. The quality of my play with go straight down the drain.

New Place

So I got a new place in Amherst for the coming year. The computer science department offered me a full-time job with them programming educational software. It's a super plushy job with no real rules or real boss looking over my shoulder. I can pretty much come in whenever and leave whenever so long as I get my hours in. I can also work from home if I chose which is an added bonus. It doesnt pay the greatest as far as programming jobs go, but with the economy as it is I could be doing much worse. So ya, my place! It's 1900 sq ft 3 floor condo. It's owned by an older couple who uses it for their summer home and they just want someone to take care of it so it's fully furnished. It has a 80" HD projection screen w/ surround sound in the basement, a gas fireplace, a huge 2 person office, a private patio, marble counter-tops in the kitchen, memory foam beds, a covered parking space, just so so nice. It is pricey, but it's another luxury afforded to me through poker. My programming salary alone could never afford this place.

Poker in the month of september has been one of my best ever. I've been completely crushing 100NL HU and beating/running good at 100NL 6max. It's my best month ever in terms of BB, I'm up about ~3100 about 60/40 HU and 6max respectively. I've been doing everything right lately. Making huge calls and huge bluffs alike; really reading my opponents and exploiting their weaknesses. Here's the graph:



Then add ~950 on cake 100NL HU over about 6k hands. I've been playing super well, but the real test is seeing if I can maintain this level of play amidst an imminent downswing and run of shitty luck. That's all for now.

Playing Awesome, but Not Enough Volume

So I've been playing so little lately. I really need to buckle down on my thesis work and my work work. Weekdays are spent doing work and weekends are spent with the gf which leaves almost no time at all for poker. Despite that fact, I'm playing super well as of late. I decided to play only 2 tables instead of 3 and I think that really helps you to re-focus on your game and make sure you are playing tip top. I also noticed my long term graph has a very steady, sharply descending red line. I long thought this was because I wasn't bluffing enough but but I think it's more, much more, because I'm not calling enough bluffs and playing far too tight especially preflop. Playing only 2 tables really lets me play to my opponent as well exhibited in this hand:

Hero (BB): $281.50
BTN/SB: $154.60

Pre Flop: ($1.50) Hero is BB with Q A
BTN/SB raises to $3, Hero raises to $10, BTN/SB calls $7

Flop: ($20.00) 6 7 5 (2 players)
Hero checks, BTN/SB checks

Turn: ($20.00) 9 (2 players)
Hero checks, BTN/SB bets $12, Hero calls $12

River: ($44.00) 9 (2 players)
Hero checks, BTN/SB bets $20, Hero calls $20

Final Pot: $84.00
Hero shows Q A (a pair of Nines)
BTN/SB shows Q J (a pair of Nines)
Hero wins $83.50
(Rake: $0.50)

I'm not trying to brag about this call or anything, I actually think it's somewhat standard but had I been playing 3 tables I may have overlooked the fact that this guy was a bad player playing very LAG. I called turn cause I though I could be good and I had overcards with spade outs if not. On river I'm getting 3:1 to call and I'm certain this opponent will be bluffing that often. His line doesn't make sense for anything. He wasnt good enough to v-bet slim with one pair so his hand is very polarized between air and monsters.

Anyways I really wish I could play more but I have a lot of pressure on me right now to finish my thesis work and get a full-time job come august and september. We'll see how that pans out, in the mean time, with the little time I spend playing poker, I hope I can keep playing at this level.

Whoa Variance

So I went over Jasons last night to hang out and we ended up playing some poker. I was playing pretty well then hit a huge downswing that was totally out of my control. I lost every AI possible; it was so sick. Over 1k hands I managed to lose 700 playing very well, and tilting off a stack at the end. I have recently set a stop loss at 500, but the hands I was losing I was playing well, I think i've finally experienced the sick HU variance. This is why I dropped to 100NL to learn HU instead of playing 200NL HU. Rather than post each hand, I'll just post links to the hands in pokerhand.org if you're really that bored to look.

Setup after small 3bet, he was 3betting 35%
Lost coin flip #1
Lost coin flip #2
KK < AK, aipf
cooler, 66 is the only hand i lose to and hes calling with worse
cooler, this one is a bit questionable i suppose
bad beat, set in 4bet pot cannot hold
my tilt bluff to cap it off

Aside from my tilt bluff, all of these hands more or less played themselves and all of it can be chalked up to variance. Yet again my classic "have a good month then dump it in one session towards the end of the month" strategy has come into play. Obv I just havent been putting in enough hands and if I did this would just end up looking like a little bump on a graph but it's still pretty sick. But it's an enlightening experience to know that running this poorly is probably not that uncommon over large samples of hands.