Friday, September 21, 2007

Losing Patience

I have started to lose patience with the game and that means it is time to re-focus or take a break. I have mainly been playing on-line these days as I am taking a break from the club due to other obligations. It has mainly been sit-n-go's and here is the basic gist. I continually have been losing the high percentage plays.
After awhile it gets truly annoying and what I notice is that it makes me lose patience which in turn makes me play more hands I shouldn't or play more mediocre strength catches.

For example, night I was playing a $20 SNG as well as the Fifty-Fifty on FullTilt. In the $20, there were 7 of 9 left. Blinds were 50/100 and I had about 1800 (started with 1500). An aggressive player pops to bet to 250, I am in BB with A-7suited. I call the bet. Flop comes Ad-8h-5h. Aggro bets 400, I figure him on a draw or maybe pocket pair so I go all-in. He ends up calling with Kh-Jh. So at this time I am about 65% to win. But of course, the next card to come out is the Qh, giving him the flush and I am busted out of the SNG.

In the 50-50, we stared with about 940 players. We are down to 450 or so and I have AcKc on the BB. I have a mid-stack of about 3800 (about average) and the button minus one pushes all in for about 1900. Figuring he is short stacked I make the call. I am way ahead (about 4 to 1) at this point. The flop comes out rags, the turn is no help and the River hits a Q, giving him the hand. I do my best not to go on tilt, but I can tell it affects virtually every hand I play after as I just get sick of getting sucked out on constantly. I end up going broke at 276th with AJ against AK. The issue I have is that after a beat like that, where I should have been in the top 20% of chipstacks, I then get into the bottom 30% which changes my style of play and frankly, is a place I need to work on. I usually am very patient with this game, but the sheer amount of low percentage plays that are hitting against me is staggering.

I think about it like this. If you knew that all the things that have a low chance of happening, getting in a car accident, losing your job, having a child with defect, getting robbed, whatever they may be, if those started happening more frequently to you specifically, while still working within the odds of them happening in life, it would change how you lived every day. I feel that that is an extreme example, but if I am consistently making high percentage plays, and they end up getting busted, it makes me feel that there is little I can do to beat this game, despite getting my chips in the middle as the favorite. I know in the long run it should work to my advantage but almost 35% of my online bankroll has evaporated because of these beats and admittedly, how they make me play after.

Hopefully, I can re-focus and get back on track as I do not want to give up the game and yet want to enjoy it as well.

1 comment:

Anonymous said...

I feel ya.