As we all go through life we either learn lessons or repeat our mistakes. Most of the lessons we learn come at a relatively small price while others can be significantly more painful. For instance, many young men learn early in their high school athletic career that showing up for football practice without a cup can have negative consequnces.
The lesson I had the wonderful opportunity of being presented with last night was that the poker gods are cruel and wicked gods who enjoy inflicting measured amounts of pain on their worshipers. Last night I played approx. 500 hands on Party and lost approx. $400. Not a bankroll buster as I had won about $250 the night before but the importance was not in the dollar amount but in the methodology of the loss.
For instance, one expects to flop trips about 12% of the time when they hold a pocket pair. Trips is usually a winner as it beats any pair or two pair hand and has an excellent chance of making a boat. It’s also a money maker hand because it’s so well hidden. You go in with 77 and flop a board like KQ7 and the K and Q hands will call any bet or raise to the river with you. Out of 30 starting pair hands ranging from 22 – TT, I had exactly 2 of those hands take a pot. I lost $107.50 just on pocket pair hands.
You also know you’re in trouble when the big hands don’t pay off either. AA was seen 3 times, winning once, and showed a whopping profit of $2. KK did slightly better showing a $8.50 profit winning 1 of 3 times. Even QQ, which is usually a money hand for me, lost $22 the one time I saw it. My most profitable hand of the session was JJ which I converted twice out of the three times I saw it and netted $45.
I know it sounds like I’m ranting or going off onto some bad beat thing but I really do think there’s a lesson here. Hey, when you sit there with KK and the flop comes AAx and it’s a bet, raise and re-raise to you, no matter how well you play post-flop, you’re a dog in this hand. When you’re sitting there with AA and the flop comes Axx all suited and the turn and river are suited cards as well, you’re not a big favorite in that hand either.
I never think that I’ve played perfectly but I know when I’m playing well and when I’m letting tilt or some other factor impact my play and last night I don’t think I would have played many of those hands differently given the same cards. Sure, I might have put in a few extra bets here and there that I would take back if I could but for the most part the cards played themselves.
I think the most important lesson that can be learned in these painful situations is that you have to keep playing your game. If I had caught the cards in the percentages that one would expect I would have been up $400. The tables were so loose that it was painful to watch someone pulling down 25BB pots with 8Ts with a runner, runner flush but if you let that get inside of you and change your game you’re dead meat. Sure, when you’re winning it’s easy to write off the occassional bad beat but when you’re being kicked in the nuts hand after hand it can be a substantial challenge to stay focused and playing your game the way you need to play it.
Of course, that’s easy to say but tough to do. The again, as Jack Handy would say “If you think a weakness can be turned into a strength, I hate to tell you this, but that’s another weakness.”