Another bad beat, and it's off for the season.

Much like the other recent games I've blown, I played flawlessly this past Saturday, waiting out the right hands, and playing them perfectly. I played AA perfectly to extract money when I otherwise would have gotten nothing, and then played AK with an A and K on the flop flawlessly, pressing hard as well (unfortunately, one opponent took the very foolish route of paying big into a flush draw, and lucked out on the river - nine times out of ten, I clean up in that hand - it remains the right call, even in that one in ten times when fortune flows the other way). That bad beat put me back into a small stack again, and I just don't have it in me to do the painful play of the slow bleed short stack any more, so I pressed with all my chips every time I pictured myself with anything from a guaranteed race to a guaranteed advantage. It won me several hands, but even that only brought me back up to starting stack size and no more, and I eventually lost the coin flip when called on one of those hands when I knew I had a guaranteed race.

It shouldn't bother me. Any good and experienced poker player would still maintain that in a game like that, with those breaks, you just take the loss as an impersonal fortune, and move on to the next game.

But any other good an experienced poker player would expect to play more often than perhaps one more tournament in the next three MONTHS. That remains the deadly part of this for me... you can't ride out bad breaks in a streak when your games are separated by over a month.

Another bad beat, and it's off for the season.

Much like the other recent games I've blown, I played flawlessly this past Saturday, waiting out the right hands, and playing them perfectly. I played AA perfectly to extract money when I otherwise would have gotten nothing, and then played AK with an A and K on the flop flawlessly, pressing hard as well (unfortunately, one opponent took the very foolish route of paying big into a flush draw, and lucked out on the river - nine times out of ten, I clean up in that hand - it remains the right call, even in that one in ten times when fortune flows the other way). That bad beat put me back into a small stack again, and I just don't have it in me to do the painful play of the slow bleed short stack any more, so I pressed with all my chips every time I pictured myself with anything from a guaranteed race to a guaranteed advantage. It won me several hands, but even that only brought me back up to starting stack size and no more, and I eventually lost the coin flip when called on one of those hands when I knew I had a guaranteed race.

It shouldn't bother me. Any good and experienced poker player would still maintain that in a game like that, with those breaks, you just take the loss as an impersonal fortune, and move on to the next game.

But any other good an experienced poker player would expect to play more often than perhaps one more tournament in the next three MONTHS. That remains the deadly part of this for me... you can't ride out bad breaks in a streak when your games are separated by over a month.

Strategizing...

I've been thinking about it even further, since my post a few weeks ago about how out-of-practice I become from a lack of opportunities to play. I really think that the part of my game that suffers the most is the larger, long range game of choosing when to turn up the aggression and when to pull back and play conservatively. I feel I can play both extremes somewhat effectively now, as well as a couple shades in between. But WHEN to play them... now, that's what hurts when I can't play a real full tournament against living opponents for awhile.

This is largely because there are lots of factors to influence choosing the aggression level at any given moment, and many of them are on-the-spot, such as the styles and reads of the other players in the game, and the organic complexion of the entire table at the moment. Without living people to play against, it is extra difficult to practice making those in-game larger strategy decisions.

Saturday is the final Frog Tournament of the regular season, and as I pointed out earlier, I'm in the lead in the regular season standings by one point. I could approach this tournament in two ways. One would be an "outlast" approach, looking to stay alive at least one place higher than Dustin, no matter where that is (he needs to earn one point more than me to prevent my outright season victory with this last game, so any combination in which I survive longer than him does it - 0 and 0, 0 and 1, 1 and 2, 2 and 3, or 3 and 4)... I think this is a very dangerous game to play, however, and could be a mistake. Being less aggressive is just one more easy fold he could have to build up a healthy enough stack to make outlasting less of a finesse game and more a game of desparation. The alternative, of course, is to play to win. I think I'll be doing that... although it is unlikely the table will contend with as many reall major bluff gambits (when I don't have the cards but I know no-one else does and I've got the show and the bid to fold everyone else) as they usually do (although it's usually a bad beat that I played the right way that does me in, at least one bluff gambit is usually in my past on nights when I get that bad beat and can't survive it... it has to do with whether I'm doing the gambit against a larger or smaller stack than my own).

Well, only time will tell. I think I may fire up the old online poker room tomorrow or Saturday during the relax-time that we've been looking forward to and at least get a little warmed up.

A philosophical question...

So, I have recently heard some very elaborate and emphatic arguments on the topic of the nature of the game of poker. Specifically, the argument being purported is that poker has not deviated from its raison d'etre, and remains solely valid as a method of gambing for personal gain, for specific "stakes", and therefore remains inherently not a game of fun but rooted solely in the unhealthy side of gambling.

I disagree, and I feel that I've got to say so somewhere (since I don't usually have the chance to directly counter the people who purport the opposite). I enjoy poker as a game in which the object is to amass the largest portion of the available chips as possible, but real gain beyond the internal context of the game is NOT necessary in order for me to enjoy it. I liken it to many other games, especially many board games, in which other tokens are being amassed, whether they be fake money in Monopoly and its cousins, or other racing games where distance along a trail is being amassed (a measurable progress for comparison, just like money or chips, and thus still the same game philosophy). I would equally like to get together with a group of friends to play a friendly game for no external stakes as heading to the casino...

...unfortunately, there is another side to this. While I take the game seriously enough to keep it strategically equitable and challenging, I have noticed that many other people do not if there are not stakes attached. The result is that many friendly games, and especially those available with strangers and the general public, are almost unplayable for the non-strategical risktaking of the other players. When there is another game waiting as soon as you lose and nothing to be won but the fun of the playing and the bragging rights of the win, the result is usually a large body of players who will go "all-in" with almost any two cards, fully prepared to shrug off the deserved loss when called and just start a new game, but also aware that people trying to play the game in its honest, strategic, intended manner are usually going to be unable or unwilling to call the all-in, even though they know it to be nothing but a blind and foolish bluff.

Since my friends are usually far too busy for a friendly game outside of the planned monthly tournaments, the only options for friendly play and practice are with strangers, and the only source of stranger competitors are casinos and online... and the only no-stakes games are rife with the nonsense described above. It's pretty frustrating.

Am I very unique and alone in my enjoyment of the game for the game's sake? Is it really the case that almost all other poker players out there are only playing for the external reward of personal gain beyond the context of the internal game? It is inarguably a depressing prospect...

A pattern emerges...

It has been a long time since the last post, for several reasons. Perhaps most central and important is that this school year has been a bit of a monster for me, with lots of moving parts (indeed, lots of highlights and successes resulted, but that doesn't change how busy and harrowing it was). The effect of all that is that I've played a lot less poker outside of the Frog Tournaments over the past year. I don't know that I've been to the casino to play since last year, when Pam and I stopped through to cash in some of my video poker winnings from the card to help us get through a rough financial time; similarly I've been spending most of my hobby-available time dealing with the peripheral needs of my regular committments and recovering from such in much more brain-free vegitative methods, so I haven't played many online tournaments at all this year (none at all in 2006 thus far). Very unfortunately, we're heading into a no-income summer after two expensive setbacks (the car accident requiring us to buy a new car and our ferret Taz contracting lymphoma and needing $1,000 surgery), so I'm not optimistic that I'll have much of a chance to play over the summer, either at the casino or online, either.

So, since last summer, it's been pretty much only the Frog Tournaments. As a result, I think my own play has been a bit more erratic, weak, and desperate in those tournaments, and it's shown. When I've got the knowledge to play well but not the composure to weather the whims of the cards in the long term, the result is that I can manage good finishes some of the time, but take bad beats and the associated early exits the other part of the time, rather than hanging on through the dry spells to remain at least in contention.

It's actually emerged as a bit of a pattern, fairly consistently alternating. Observe my collapse (any top 3 finish is cited as a win for the sake of this argument):

W June 2005 (1st)
W July 2005 (2nd)
W August 2005 (3rd)
W September 2005 (3rd)
L October 2005
W November 2005 (2nd)
X December 2005 (no tourney)
W January 2006 (1st)
L February 2006
W March 2006 (2nd)
L April 2006
X May 2006

I haven't had back-to-back months without a win until now (although I'll grant you it's because there is no tourney this month, not because I lost a tourney this month). The real challenge will be this... if the pattern continues, I'm due for a "win" in the last tourney of the season just like last year, but then a "loss" in the annual tournament on July 8th. Since weekends this summer don't look good for the likelyhood that I'll be available when the next tourneys are planned (especially since the pressure will be on to make an August tournament happen later in the month due to the run of the summer Shakespeare play Dustin is directing), it might be a poker-free summer after the annual tournament, so the pressure will really be on to not let the pattern keep it going and thwap me out with a disappointing finish in July. At the same time, of course, I need a win in two weeks in order to fend off Dustin's threat to pull ahead in the regular season standings at the last minute, and it needs to be a win in a higher place than Dustin (even a win one behind him would tie us in the standings).

Too bad I've neither the time nor the bucks to get any practice in!

Strange Progress

Ah, well... another two Frog Tournaments have gone by, with the extremes in results.

In October, I had a rough run, in all poker in general... hit a cold spot for a few weeks in online tournaments, and it led up to a very sorry showing in the Frog game. I honestly can say it wasn't my play, but just some bad fortune with random odds... made all the right decisions, and just hit many bad beats on the hands that really counted. Then, in the Frog game, the most frustrating one yet: after barely half an hour of play, I held a full house, beatable by only two other very improbable potential hands. I bet strongly, over half my stack, as I'd rather just take the pot down that early in the game with low blinds rather than pull anyone out so early, but my wife reraised me all-in. I was placed in the position of having to make my wife spend potentially many hours for the rest of the evening waiting around, or folding out of the hand and fatally crippling my own chances. I wrongly chose the latter, finding out that I had her soundly beaten if I'd called (but again, I would have "lost" anyway, having taken my wife out of the game). It was very upsetting, and cost me the evening of sitting alone waiting; I made a clear pledge to myself after mulling it over for a few days that, due to the nature of poker, I have no more mercy whatsoever in my decision making, and if I have anyone beat, no matter who they are or how early it is, I am going to call it out and refuse to accept later grief about the consequences to them.

In November, I finally broke free of my bad streak and probability tilted back to normal, allowing my success in the online tournaments to resume. I've stayed relatively even, maintaining the same stake without outside deposit or withdrawl (remember, I play for fun and not for money - to me, that's a success). At the Frog game, I hit a very bad sequence of hold cards for the first several entire rounds, but I maintained the composure to play only the couple playable hands, and waited for real cards; my patience paid off, and I made it to the final two with Don, fairly evenly stacked. Now, he and I both know each other's play, including showdown style. He's a fairly loose and dangerous player, and will bet a partial stack with nearly any mid-quality hand or better. I'm a bizarre mix of tight standards and loose betting, only playing traditionally favored hands but betting them all in, usually before the flop, regardless of their comparative quality. It became pretty obvious fairly fast that when I went all in, Don would fold with anything but an especially fortunate winning hand, and he would generally take several blinds with partial-stack bets. If matched up next to each other, we would likely trade steals often for an almost indeterminate amount of time, making little progress in either direction, until we both had a monster pre-flop hand, in which case the results would truly have been a coin flip. Realizing that it was only 11:30 PM (nice and early for a showdown to be happening), I recognized that I was not feeling all that well and would just as soon go home earlier, and that calling one of Don's preflop raises with a midlevel hand of my own, then going all in immediately after (effectively in the dark) would produce the same coinflip. So that's what I did, and the hand was definitely a fair shot, which I lost, but won the chance to go home before midnight (and, for those keeping score, I did turn out to be in the beginning stages of a really rough illness, which I still haven't shaken to this moment - so it was a good choice, all in all).

The standings now, which I must indicate here because they aren't yet up on the Frog site, have Dustin at 8 points and myself at 7 points, again pulling away from the pack and duking it out for the top. I'm glad to be within a single game striking distance - it's sort of a "pacing myself" feeling. Most importantly, save that one ugly game with the misguided mercy fold, I've had a lot of fun with the games, and I'm glad that they feel relaxed again. Sadly, I don't think any arrangements were made for the next date, which could be not happening until after the holidays with how busy December is for most of us - and I know that Dustin will be pretty busy with his show opening at the end of January, so I'm worried about just when the next chance for a live game will be. There was some talk about doing a holiday tournament again, but we'll be in Yonkers visiting my grandparents for part of the holiday break, and I'm not sure if finances will allow a real-money casino trip at that time of year anyway. Perhaps I'll have to see about arranging a game at our place myself sometime in December, just a non-Frog for-fun night.

One closing thought: I've been playing a bit tonight as I've updated my blogs, and I've noticed again a phenomenon I've seen a few times over the past few weeks. A couple players seem to make fast decisions that are always perfect. They never raise the most carefully played trap, even when they have a monster hand of their own and have had no reason given them to suspect any hand at all in their opponent... they call bluffs with bluffs of their own just a card or two higher than the bluffer... they fold rather than check, and in retrospect one can see that they did so the moment a turn or river gave someone else the unbeatable hand... in short, they make decisions that are way too risky and always far too lucky with 100% success rates, never losing even one hand. I don't believe in mindreading nonsense, but I do believe in the inherent wickedness of many strangers around the world... and I have become sadly suspicious. I have occassionally seen spammers trying to advertise, before they get booted by security, software to cheat and view the hands of opponents. Most players write this off as scam myth technology, but I'm beginning to have my doubts. It's gotten so that, when I find myself in the room with one of these seemingly blesséd players, I loosen way up, waiting for extra strong hands to go all-in pre-flop, when any advantage they might have if such cheating exists can help them the least. I don't think I've caught anyone out yet, but at least I get out of that tournament relatively quickly and on to another table where one can actually play confident that it's an honest game. I do hope that this doesn't continue or get worse, as I particularly enjoy the platform company I play with, and don't wish to change to another for my fun.

A new season and a lot of change...

Well, it's been a loooong time since I've posted, and a lot has happened.

First, I came in second in the annual tournament to Dustin. I suppose justice was served, as we were so neck-and-neck throughout the season and I took the regular season title. On to the next season...

July was a month off from the frog tournament, but it was a notable turning point month for me. I bought Doyle Brunson's book on poker, and really studied the pertinent sections, then really thought over my game and my strategy. On the other end, I emerged with a very different approach, one that has me playing at least 40% of all situations very differently than I used to. I broke it in and honed it online, where I am now on the best run I've ever had - I'm up $100 since then (I play solely $5 tournaments), and am approaching a possible withdrawl, the first of pure winnings in my time playing online.

August and September have also seen the first two tournaments of the regular frog game season, and I've got two third place finishes to show for it, a standing of which I'm pretty proud. It's really the same general area I've been pleased to land in with my previous strategies, but I'm pleased that I've been able to adapt my new strategy to the frog game (a game very different than most other no limit games you're likely to encounter) in a way that is producing consistent results.

I'm looking forward to the tournament next month, and quite wish that there was more non-money play available. I'd like to play in more face-to-face situations, but everyone is so busy and there are rarely opportunities. It would help if there was a place to play online without a buy-in but where all the players play seriously, of course... the trouble with the current spots is that, since there are no money stakes, players tend to keep in mind that if they bust out they can just join another game, and so most of the table plays obscenely loosely. Now, if only someone would create a site wherein, for a modest membership fee, players can play a preset number of freeroll games, with a non-cash prize, like a cheap gift certificate or silly trinket. That way the players would value each game enough to really play their best, keeping the table challenging and realistic. Ah, well... that's the trouble with being someone who likes poker for the game and not the gambling - the money is nothing more than a necessary evil to get people to play for me, and I'm happiest when just playing for fun at the frog games.

Next tournament is in a few weeks, and I'm keeping my game sharp with some nightly $5 tournaments. Really just looking forward to that next frog game, though...

Another Frog Tournament Win / Reg. Season Title

Whew. Well, it's been about 24 hours now, and I've just about recovered from that last tournament. It was a long one and hotly contested, despite actually having only a median number of competitors (about halfway in between our largest and smallest fields of the past).

I stuck by my strategy and relied on the style of play with which I'm most comfortable, playing very conservatively, and it truly paid off. The first step was a very surprising development barely halfway through the tournament, when Dustin was knocked out by his own daughter. I'll freely admit that this took a lot of pressure off and changed my needs significantly both as they related to that one tournament and the regular season race - Dustin can be an aggressive player I don't match up well against so his departure allows me to be a lot more relaxed and cautious, and since both he and I were tied in the regular season standings meaning either a second or first place finish above the other will take the title I was able to sit back and nurse my stack several times viewing just making it to the top four with enough of a stack for a stab at the top two a good goal.

No doubt, though, it almost didn't happen. I did end up taking the stacks of a few all-in opponents and growing a significant chip lead, holding just over 50% of the chips when the field shrunk to 3 players - but both of my opponents (my good friend Mark and my wife Pam) wisely know how to take advantage of my conservative play and bought a very long series of hands with raises I would not call, eventually putting me clearly out of the lead and potentially slightly in third place. As is often the case, though, patience paid off, and I caught the right hands to play slowly, giving me the chance to jump back and take out one opponent with about three hands, and then a similar leap back and overall win in two hands a bit later. It was, without a shred of doubt, a deeply bitter victory, as both my friend and my wife are still looking for their first tournament win, and to have them both be so close and be the one to snatch it away again - let's just say it was far from a happy moment for me in that regard.

So, I have the fourth win and the regular season title, and also wrenched the all-time wins lead away from Dustin, who is no doubt already dreaming about wrenching it back away from me. Time to look ahead to the big one, our annual season tournament of champions in a few weeks (the end of this month). Personally, I'm rooting for Pam or Mark to take that one, as they both qualified with second place finishes in past tournaments, and it would be supreme justice for one of them to take their first win in the big annual tournament - both played outstandingly well last night, and I can see either of them taking it as real possibility.

Frankly, my wife has gotten scarry-good. She knows my philosophy and style well too, and only the cards really make the difference for me anymore with her - so the next time I don't get the cards and am up against her, I'm toast.