Setback and Mr. Invincible |
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Posted Thu Sep 07, 2006 5:17 pm GMT by rlb2252
Poker has a way of slapping your ass back down to size when you began to feel your oats. You get a little too big for your britches, and Bam! An inexplicable loss explodes out of no where, bashing you like a pipe wrench over the head.
I thought I was through with bad play. I thought I had conquered many of my most serious shortcomings, those demons that haunt any newbie player.
I’d been holding my own for over a week, followed by several days of winning poker. I had begun to feel that I had at least advanced from poker kindergarten to maybe 1st grade.
Then today came and I played my most bone-headed hour in weeks.
It was like I had suddenly regressed back to my 1st week of playing, like I had forgotten all the hard won lessons gained from this forum, from Skalansky, from the hours of play I’ve invested.
I found that I wasn’t in poker 1st grade. And not in kindergarten. Hell, maybe I was still back in Poker Pre-School.
Exhibit A: Without even checking I’m sure I played over fifty percent of my hands.
Exhibit B: I stayed in hands too long, going to showdown when the texture of the board and those screaming over-cards advised otherwise.
Exhibit C: Protecting weak blinds that weren’t worth protecting.
These were only the most egregious of my errors. I suppose progress in poker is not always the slowly rising graph line. There can be precipitous dips and cavernous valleys and abrupt jags.
Probably the most unnerving part of this session is that I’m not even sure why I played like a moron.
I wasn’t particularly tired.
I wasn’t particularly distracted.
I wasn’t on tilt as I understand tilt to be.
But there was this one player, though, 2 seats to my right. If I’m not on his victim list, I should be. I only lost 15 bucks in a full ring, 0.25/0.50 Limit Hold ‘Em game, but I bet he got almost all of it.
I found myself fixated on him, which is likely understandable when one player is beating you like you stole something.
I asked myself whether he threw me off my game by beating me so much. I’d like to say no. But maybe, on a deeper level, he instilled some doubts. If nothing else, he certainly got my respect. I began to think twice about going deep into hands against him.
I kept saying he can’t be right that many hands in a row. But each time he went to showdown he usually had decent hole cards and had only improved as the streets went along.
I suppose it happens to everybody. You run into the player who can’t seem to lose. You get the impression that they’re invincible—and they are—at least for the time that they’re playing against you.
I’m going to play again, later. I’m going to get back on that horse that threw me. I’m going to comport myself with the discipline with which I know I’m capable.
And someday I’m going to track down that guy who stole my fifteen bucks. I’m not saying I’m going to play against him. Right now, I’m a bit too chicken for that. But I want to watch him play again. I want to observe.
I want to see whether this guy can work another Houdini, be in 65 percent of his hands and pull another victory out of his hat…against somebody other than me, that is.
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Posted Sun Sep 10, 2006 12:19 am GMT by cheezewhiz
I know who that was 
Posted Sun Sep 10, 2006 3:52 am GMT by MrDarling
Being fixated by one player and changing your A game - Its official you were tilting.
One of the most important lessons I'm trying to learn is the errors rule : If I make more then 2 errors , I stop playing for the day.
Sure we all have bad days, but you need to take a step back, and see if you just got sucked by a fish or are you the fish for going to SD with rags.
Good luck
Posted Sun Sep 10, 2006 11:56 am GMT by rlb2252
| Quote: | Being fixated by one player and changing your A game - Its official you were tilting.
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Good advice, Mydarling.
Are you saying that you don’t find yourself “fixated” on the player that has beat you at every single hand?
I’m a new player and my self-control is probably not at its peak, but I think that’s a fairly natural reaction. If someone has a gun pointed at your head, you’d probably spend less time admiring the furniture in the room.
Maybe I was on tilt, a mild form. Maybe I’m just not sure what tilt is. Maybe I’m like the drunk who disputes the evidence of his alcoholism by explaining that he doesn’t have a problem; he merely likes to drink all day/every day.
| Quote: | Sure we all have bad days, but you need to take a step back, and see if you just got sucked by a fish or are you the fish for going to SD with rags.
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Seriously, I did try to step back and analyze my actions. I asked myself the hard questions.
As far as whether I was the fish or not in this game, I don’t know. I initially assumed that my pre-flop percentages were sky high. I assumed I was playing over fifty percent. It turned out it was in the lower thirties. So, in the long run, I wasn't too far off my usual game.
More likely I played too many hands during one phase of the game, and then got real conservative once I started getting my butt kicked, balancing out the percentages.
| Quote: | One of the most important lessons I'm trying to learn is the errors rule : If I make more then 2 errors , I stop playing for the day.
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At this stage of my game development, I make a lot more than two errors per session. I take that as part of my evolution as a player. I note them, file them away, and try to avoid them next session.
Posted Sun Sep 10, 2006 12:52 pm GMT by MrDarling
| rlb2252 wrote: | Good advice, Mydarling.
Are you saying that you don’t find yourself “fixated” on the player that has beat you at every single hand?
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No , I tilt often..Part of my tilt is stop believing other players and thinking every body try to bluff me. especially when I have nothing.
its all part of the learning process
Posted Sun Sep 10, 2006 1:08 pm GMT by mindgame
Can't you see this is your BIG BREAK!
This is the day you've needed to escape the cesspool of online poker forever.
RUN!
RUN now while you still can.
(Meet me at the casino at 4:30. 10/20 table. I'll be wearing the pokerstars hat.)
Posted Sun Sep 10, 2006 1:12 pm GMT by mindgame
OH GOD!
I noticed twice above that in the subject line you referred to MrDarling as MyDarling.
Is something going on that the rest of us DON'T want to know about?????
Posted Sun Sep 10, 2006 2:03 pm GMT by rlb2252
Sorry, Mister Darling.
Guess my eyes aren’t what they used to be.
Strange, isn’t it, that I would make that mistake. Twice. What ever could it mean?
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