This is also poker.

Wow, I am really running bad. Today, before dinner during a two hour session, I had the following interesting experiences, all in pots 3-bet preflop or raised and called on flop (in case you don't know, this means big pots, $200+ even before the turn)). I had a set of queens on a KQx board, I slowplayed turn out of position, and lost to an ace high straight as turn came Jack, Ten. I had AQ on an Axx flop, and lost to KQ when turn and river came running kings. I had aces cracked by AQ on a Queen high flop, when the second queen hit the turn. I had a nut flush redraw, and wouldn't it have been sweet to hit that and tell him to put his trip queens somewhere dark and moist. Obviously, that remained a fantasy. Also during the session I had two versions of TPTK or overpair destroyed by sets. I enjoyed only a single suckout as I made a straight on the turn, only to get a resuck when he made his boat on the river. The whole thing set me back about $3000.

Now when we add this all up and throw in an extended period of running bad, we have material for a bit of an emotional challenge. This I intend to meet, reconsider my game slightly, and regain the momentum. When all is said and done, I am only slightly down for the month, adding in rakeback and bonuses probably about break even, so the end is not coming anytime soon. However my active bank roll has taken quite a hit since last cash out, so I can probably only lose so many extra buy-ins before moving down. No worries about that though.

On a strategic note, as I mentioned in my last posts, I have been watching some videos by Stoxtrader, and there are some major differences between his style, and that which is mostly advocated on twoplustwo and elsewhere and also played by myself. Stox is a much more passive player. Not exactly passive in the sense that many bad players are passive, but in the sense that he needs just a little bit more edge than is standard to commit himself. This strikes a chord with me as lately I am getting a whole lot of wonderful experience having good or great hands against even better ones.

The classic example of that would be an overpair of QQ-AA against a post-flop aggressor with standard 100BB stacks. What kind of information do you need to lay that down? I think a case can probably be made for never laying it down against a single opponent, unless you know him as a solid unaggressive player, and there are no draws on the board. If he plays back at you aggressively even then, chances are pretty good he has a set. If the board is very coordinated, I am able to lay overpairs of KK-AA down very rarely (read: never) against a single opponent, I usually get it in on the flop to charge the max from any good draws playing back at me.

Stoxtrader, on the other hand, I have seen him lay down KK overpair twice in just a few hours of video, once on the flop(!) on a QT9 board with a flush draw, and once on the river of a QQ958 board (boards loosely remembered, probably somewhat wrong). This has really surprised me, but it is certainly worth taking note of, considering he is one of the top online players. I am obviously not going to start laying down overpairs in droves, but maaaybe, I could avoid getting stacked with them just a little bit more often than I am doing at the moment. However, one thing you have to keep in mind if you want to adapt his style, is that he usually also bets less money preflop and when c-betting, leaving him with more space to get away from hands, but also giving his opponents better odds to hit their hands. I like to charge big early, so even though I do get stacked more often than a passive player, I also make more money when they don't hit their hands. You have to make sure there is a good consistency in your strategy.

Now, let me see what I can do about that downswing.