March -- 5CD Playing
Week 1: It is fair to say that March began for me, much in the same vein as the latter part of February. The first week of the month saw me play a few sit n gos in the earlier part of the week, and despite feeling like my decision making was good and feeling generally quite sharp, nothing seemed to be going right. Two days later, after a few shots at the $500 guaranteed had also failed to bear fruit, I found myself $40 in the red for the week and needing a result.
Once again I managed to find a result when I needed it, as I made a deep run in the $500 guaranteed on Friday, final tabling the tournament. The disappointing aspect of this final table was that three handed, I had a fairly passive player on my left, and an opportunity to feed off their blinds.
Despite this I found myself involved in a huge hand with the other big stack who had been very aggressive up to this point. With my opponent having raised from the button, I decided to make a three bet from the SB with 66 to try and take the pot down. As soon as the BB folded and the button called and drew 1, I could narrow down his range to 2 pairs, three of a kind, or a big draw, of the Flush or Straight variety. I had seen this player make 2x raises with draws as a big draw semi bluff pre draw on two previous ocassions, and this is important in terms of what followed. He had also shown a tendancy to raise bigger than 2x before the draw with mediocre to weak 2 pairs in order to protect their vulnerable nature from multiple callers. Big 2 pairs were still in his range, but I really didn't feel that strong trips were at this point, because I would have expected a four bet from this player before the draw.
I opted to draw 1 card at this point, mostly because drawing 2 in order to represent trips is so over used andd obvious when most player will in fact draw 1 to disguise their trips when they have them. He also knows I am very unlikely to have reraised predraw with four to a straight or flush, I'm more likely to either fold, or flat call - given the min raise, the antes, and the possibility of inviting the BB to call given the value in the pot.
To my way of thinking, my mistake came after the draw. My opponent checked, and I fired out a bet hoping force weak two pairs to fold. I wasn't thinking clearly here as I had already figured it unlikely he held such a hand because of his predraw bet sizing. Another point is that my raise looked slightly like an underbet given the pot size already and I had left enough behind that I could still fold out to a reraise. As my opponent sat thinking I knew he would probably notice that. When you consider my read of his hand was that he had raised initially with a big draw of some kind, my bet was really terrible, because my 66 in fact had decent showdown value to check behind with. Just through a simple rushed reaction that I hadn't thought through, I had dug myself into a big hole. My opponent then shoved, and I convinced myself he had picked up on my weakness and was trying to steal the pot with a busted draw. I made the call to see him turn over a Flush, and was understandably very annoyed with myself for making such a mess of the hand. I had played a 250,000 chip pot with just a pair of Sixes the whole way, and some 5CD player might call that insane, but the fact is, my read of his hand predraw was spot on, and if he misses the Flush, I'm sure that given the way he was playing, he tries to buy the pot with a big bet after the draw. I would have called any raise he made, because I read him as being on a draw, I know he misses it a large percentage of the time, and I also know he isn't the type of player to give up on a pot.
I certainly didnt deserve to win the tournament after that mistake, but after playing well for most of it, 3rd place was a fair result, netting myself $103.
The week ended a mere +$58 after my earlier losses during the week, and I was left to reflect upon the blown opportunity of that final table.
The graph below shows my results for March.
Comments
Week 3:
This week really brought home the difficult side of trying to play poker for money. When you really need money to arrive at the end of the week, and every play you make seems to backfire whether you go in with the best hand or the worst.
But I won't spend too much time complaining about it - I know poker well enough to be aware of it's fickle nature. It doesn't owe anyone anything, and can batter you with bad luck whenever it likes and for as long as it pleases. August last year was the last time I had a losing week and this week came very close to being another, as I tried to go for the BOP leaderboard. Day 1 started ok with +$26 profit, but days 2 and 3 were so abysmal I had to call off my run at the leaderboard. I had a few shots aat the $500 guaranteed only for the variance to reear it's ugly head again in crucial pots. Nevertheless I managed two small cashes and called a halt to the week after day 6 at +$0.67 for the week.
Week 4:
After having a nightmare of a week 3, I knew that i couldn't afford week 4 to disappear down the drain in the same fashion. Despite this intent, day 1,2 and 3 passed me by in a blur of bad luck. It felt like I was losing 80% of the hands where I went in winning but in reality it was probably just my spirit slowly breaking with each passing day that made things appear this way.
It's always bad streaks like this that make opening tables feel like a chore, and in turn your concentration and will to win is affected. Downswings maybe start as runs of bad luck, but we can unwittingly perpetuate them with the feeling that everything is going against us.
As main event champion Bobby Baldwin once said "The mark of a top player is not how much he wins when he is winning, but how he handles his losses." There's a lot of truth in that, because anyone can enjoy the game and win when they're running well, but it's how you dig in and battle against adversity when the world is against you, that makes a difference.
And so it was, that on day 5, I sat down and considered my options. I felt tired, worn down by my recent bad run, and really I coud do with just leaving the poker for a week or two and coming back fresher. That would involve digging into my bankroll to cover weekly costs which I didnt want to do, and above all else - it would feel an awful lot like being beaten by my bad run. I knew I still had the same talents that had propelled me to a +210% ROI over the $500 guaranteed tournament and so bad run or not - It had to still be +EV for me to be playing it.
Day 6. I did the maths, im -$40 for the week so far with 2 days left to save it. I'm not taking a break, it just doesn't seem right to. So I log in and enter the $500 guaranteed morning event. Several hours later, I've fought all the way to the final table with an average 72k stack. 1st place would be $130...I could really do with that right now. But again, things conspire against me, I go in leading twice in big pots and come out losing, and the shortstacked player on my left keeps shoving out pot sized bets far too regularly for my liking. I finally end up calling one of the 15k raises with KK99. My opponent draws 2 cards, before putting the last 10k in. I know drawing 2 to dress up a pair and an ace kicker as trips is standard practice so I decide to go with the overactive bettng frequency suspicions and call the 10k. They turn over JJJA3. Im still convinced they kept JJA and hit the jack on the draw due to the amount of pots they were raising but it doesn't matter anymore - my reward for 3 and a half hours work is $32. Not even enough to take me out of the red for the week.
Final tabling a tournament is nice but I couldn't help but feel like it was a missed chance. My worn down sense that the poker gods had cursed me this month was as raw as ever, and it would have been so easy to think "I'll play some $2 sit n gos tomorrow and get myself back to break even for the week." The way I felt right then, it seemed a attractive option, but I couldn't accept defeat 2 weeks in a row. So I took a deep breath, composed myself and bought into the next $500 guaranteed in the afternoon. Blinds 10/20, starting stack 3,000....back to the start line.
5 hours later I had drawn on every bit of skill and determination i had left to come back from numerous damaging hands. 999 against AAA was particularly paainful, but id kept losing the minimum and fought back each time. With 7 players of 164 left I took another big hit, dropping from 65k to 30k. The player on my right was good, and he clearly understood the psychology behind players bet sizing, as i watched him make a hero call in one hand against a busted draw, and three bet an overactive players overbet from late position, only to show a pair of 4s. He was becoming a thorn in my side too, and it was looking ever more likely that one of us would deal a fatal blow to the other before long. He had already wounded my stack to 30k and it looked like being me that lost the duel, but then a hand came along which changed everything.
Battle of the blinds with me on 38k he had made a raise from 4,000 to 8,000 from SB and i called with 6,7,8,9. The min raise and antes gave me a good enough price to draw to a Straight when I considered he was bound to bet at least the minimum after the draw and if he drew 2, a pair of 6s-9s might even be winning anyway. I missed, drawing a J. He drew 1, before firing a fairly strong 12k into the pot. I had already noticed his tendancy to bet small when he was sure he was winning, and so I would have expected 8k from disguised trips, strong flushes, and big two pairs. He knows two pairs make up a large portion of my range, but he also knows id never have any reason to reraise with 2 pair, however high or low they are. He knows I can also have four to a Straight or Flush before the draw too.... I decide to do something unorthodox, and I know it's the only way I can possibly win the hand. His bet sizing and tthe fact he'd demonstrated he was good at reading what bet sizes meant led to me making the choice - I min reraised to 24k. After thinking for a while, he eventually made his decision, but I knew the thought that was stuck in the forefront of his mind. It just isn't possible for me to min raise after that 1 draw without having made a straight or flush. Its common practice for some players to reraise very small to extract value in that situation, i've seen it hundreds of times before - and I know he will have too.
He eventually folds, and I show the J high - not to gloat, but to rattle his cage and mess up his focus. If I hadn't shown it, he would have carried on feeling 100% certain it was the right fold and continued playing focussed and well.
This paid dividends as we assembled for the final table - 3 hands in and he raises 4x froom UTG. As I said before, I know he's unlikely to overbet whn he's certain he's winning, so with KK33 I checked the stack sizes - he had 24k behind. I knew the best thing to do in order to trigger a call with weaker holdings, I min raise, and he instantly calls leaving 8k behind. We both draw 1 and he check/calls off the last 8k with 9966.
Clearly 9966 was never a spot he should call in. Its unlikely im ever reraising an UTG raise from mid position lighter than 9966, and when he's wrong, he stays wrong over 90% of the time - because he only has 1 slim shot at a full house to improve his hand.
With my biggest rival fallen and 120k chips, I could sense this was a big chance, and i pursued victory like a man on a mission, as my stack grew to 150k....250k....350k. Three handed I was working the payout structures alternating between attacking each players blinds, slowly forcing them downwards as they were equal 60k stacks and desperately wanting the extra cash for 2nd place. Finally i took a huge chunk out of one of them - leaving him with 15k. He typed in the chat box "You win viper, and you deserve it, gg i say now". Its always nice to hear someone in that situation graciously admit defeat and say you deserve to win it. I duly obliged, despite my heads up opponent sneaking up to 100k twice, I had the measure of him and always felt I was the stronger player.
1st out of 164 players and $196 to turn my week around.
So im taking today and tomorrow off, maybe even the res of March, because despite the heroics of yesterday I still need that break. Only difference is im taking the break on my terms, and not because any bad run of form has broken spirit and my will to win.
Week 2:The second week of March saw me only play 4 games in total, the first two being disappointing shots at the $500 guaranteed where I ran particularly bad. Knowing I needed to do something about the week before it dwindled away, I took another shot at the $500 guaranteed on the 10th of March after having barely played for several days. It seems the break had done me well however, as I can honestly say I played the best I have done all year. I can't recall a single error of judgement during the tournament, and despite a few nasty outdraws knocking me from 30k down to 13k with 20 people left, I still made a huge fold with trip 10s a few hands later. This composure and focus through my recent misfortune was crucial, as another player called the reraise for the rest of their chips with KK88, and was promptly busted by the Straight that had reraised me. I rebuilt to 25k before having to make another huge fold post draw with AAA. I can't say for certain as I never saw my opponents hand, but I feel very confident he had made a Straight or Flush with his 1 draw.
From that point on never looked back as I eliminated players, made excellent decisions and got to the final table with 100k chips. I had a slender chip lead which steadily grew to 150k as the short stacks fell by the wayside. Three handed things got cagey however, as the other two stacks moved back and forth between 50k and 100k. This went on for about half an hour before the passive play of the player to my right finally caught up with them.
Heads up was decidely less fraught with tension, as my opponent tried to bully their way back into contention, only for me to make two marginal calls with decent pairs, followed by a three bet reraise or two when the timing was right. I say 'when the timing was right' because had a fairly reliable read on my opponent, who raised 2x the BB when he had a playable hand , and 3x when he wanted the blinds. This led to his fairly swift demise, and I took down the $500 guaranteed for the third time this year. Only 103 players had entered, but the $133 for 1st place was a much needed boost for the week. Also had a quick half hour at the cash tables, ending up +$16, meaning that I finished for the week +$121.
I played a solitary sit n go just now which I won, making a really nice floated call heads up with 44 only to check raise, and steal the pot away after the draw. That just about sums up the second half of my second week in March, really playing well and reading situations excellently. Lets hope this continues into week 3, where I might be making a run at the BOP leaderboards and that ticket for the shootout tournament at the end of the month.