In my amazement

1/25/07 - Aladdin -$1250

OK it has taken me two days to write this blog, and with good reason. This was by far my biggest losing session I have ever had. I needed a couple of days to just get over it. All said in total I was down $1250 playing 1-2 No Limit at the Aladdin. So first I question myself, "A good player should never lose this much in a session right?" "What the hell were you thinking when you were down $800 re buying again?" Honestly I have no answer for this session. I felt I played well. I did not make any crazy moves, I just kept running into better hands. It is almost like I was being tested to read my opponents more. If I had made all these good lay downs, I would have never made a show down.

See it was constant, I never had Aces, I had KK once, QQ 8 times, JJ 6 times. Only QQ was good once. Three times I was up against aces, twice I was up against the same player. Twice we flopped set over set. What the FUCK. Twice set over set with QQ and AA. This was just not my day. All my other big hands we no good. I had a set flopped against my Kings, and anytime I made a large bet my opponents mucked, unless I had JJ or QQ then they would lose their minds. My QQ was beat by a range of hands from pocket 8's to K-8 off.

This session ends my month, although I had a good month, this was not the way I wanted it to end. I know I still have a lot to learn. One of the things I need to learn is better discipline and self control. Also as I have been playing more hours the last month and a half I also noticed that I have been getting angry more at the tables. This is something I had been doing before, I need to control my comments and emotions.

In Baseball I would teach pitchers if they gave up a hit, or a particular batter was beating them constantly, to never let their opponent know. It was easy I would tell them, Keep your chin up, and focus on something besides them. This worked well cause their opponent never knew when the pitcher was beat, tired or just didn't have good stuff. I guess the same thing can happen with Poker. You limit your ability to play back, if an opponent thinks that you are beat easily by him, he will call more of your raises and play back.

I was watching the 2003 WSOP and Annie Duke said something interesting, something I need to add to my game. She showed pocket Queens to an opponent after she had re raised and he had folded. She leaned back and told the cameras, that she wanted to keep this player on her good side as he was the big stack and she didn't want him coming after her. This makes sense, whenever I have befriended a player at the table, they have given my instant respect. Now I don't want all players to do this, but I want to set up these types of players, to fold when my hand is marginal and to call when I have a monster. This will be another added element to my game.

Well my stats for January.

Hours: 128
Profit: +$3200
Hourly Rate: $25/hour

My goal for the month was $30/hour. I didn't make my goal at Poker, but when I add Black Jack into the equation. Then my stats would look like this.

Hours: 143
Profit: +7700
Hourly Rate: $54/hour

So overall a very good month.

My goals for February.
1) No Black Jack
2) Make $30 per hour
3) Play at least 120 Hours
4) Only Play Monday through Thursday
5) Play at least 1 tournament per week. (I want to add tournaments into my play each month)

Next month is right around the corner. I am off to Spokane, WA for a week. I will resume posting Blogs on the 3rd or the 4th. Good luck to you.