So I know I don’t have a TR up and running just yet, but it is currently still in the works and I figured I’d post a quick update instead.
Winning at live poker is intoxicating to say the least. To able to see your winnings directly in front of you after a session makes you realize that the game actually does involve cold hard cash and not just some numbers you see on a computer screen. I was fortunate enough to win 5-figs from my last Borgata trip, and even after a couple days coming back from the trip I couldn’t help but daydream about how much money was involved and how much money I’ve won over the span of just merely a couple days. I don’t think I necessarily ran super hot since it’s not like I coolered people left and right nor have I sucked out on people like they have done to me in the past. In fact, I remember thinking to myself before this trip remembering how I’ve lost all of four 5-fig pots that I have ever been involved in: 3 of those times when I got the money in as a huge favorite (including a 1-outer on the river for the biggest pot of my life around $20k), and 1 of the times when we had about 1/4 PSB left in our stack by the river and he obv hits a flush on me on the river against my set. Anyways, I still believe I ran very good during this recent trip in the sense that I had a lot of significant pots go my way and that I did not lose any huge pots, which is really all it takes and is a huge factor that goes unnoticed and gets taken for granted. The big pots that I did win from this trip weren’t me holding the absolute stone cold nuts, but I was still very fortunate to not run into the tip-toppity of my opponents range to have the pots come my way.
Also after playing predominantly against regs at the Borgata, I felt perhaps for the first time the differences between live and online play. So lately I’ve been trying to delve deeper into the world of live poker by thinking of hands on and off scene, reading hands on forums, and the like. The biggest difference is that live play usually plays super deep, esp. in the 10/25 games I play in which the structure is uncapped. Although I def. have a lot of experience with deep play online, it would usually only go up to about 200, maybe 300bb effective stacks. Besides, I would say my real expertise is usually 100-150 bb poker anyways. But these games are easily 300bb effective, and can sometimes get up to around 1000, even 1200bb deep and is a totally different monster. Thus, I’m still learning more about the game and more about how to play deep poker effectively. I also still need to fully develop the skills of assigning an accurate hand range of my opponents as they do play a bit different from what I’m used to. There are def. more “fancy” lines that I encounter, such as situations where I flat a preflop raise IP, check/check, then face a c/r on the turn on AK3Ar. Or something like I flat a preflop raise and original better c/c’s a relatively dry flop, check/check turn, then check/raise river on what seems like an innocuous card. Situations like that do trip me over, and then I start asking myself questinos such as “what do they have? Do their hands contain non-nutted ranges, and can I fire a big enough raise that will get them to fold?” These are questions that I have been running in my mind lately and honestly I haven’t been able to pull a huge trigger just yet. But I can see myself experimenting in the future as I become more used to the deep structure and get a better read on my opponents. I just feel like there are a lot of different areas and spots that I haven’t explored yet and it is def. exciting to be able to uncover them. So I would say I play a pretty tightish game who occasionally 3bets with speculative hands here and there, but doesn’t get out of line too often. Most of my play consists of playing small pots that get to non-showdown when I take it down on the flop or turn and thus building up my stack slowly while taking the more pot-controlling route in bigger pots. I think a little more looseness could potentially do me a little good in the future, but at the moment I’m just trying to work at my comfort level rather than spewing chips in spots that I’m not used to.
I know I rambled a lot, but in short what I’m trying to say is that I have been doing a lot of thinking and I still think there’s a lot to learn in the live setting which is definitely exciting. At the same time, regs are still a lot more softer in the sense that the double barrel on a scare card will work almost every time and etc., so I still believe I have a strong edge in the game. Just need to explore more areas of the game that could potentially be more profitable. The only downside of live poker is that it is so inaccessible to me, esp b/c I have other responsibilities back at home and the casino is like at least an hour and a half away. It is also more time consuming and if I don’t dedicate at least a whole day then it would be absolutely meaningless to make the trip. But as I said, winning a huge sum of money became very addicting (or rather, the feeling of winning a lot of money) and I found myself degenning up for another short trip this weekend to win about $3.2k or so. Maybe I somehow run insanely good every time I go to the Borgata since I only had one losing session there out of the 9-10 times I’ve been there. Anyways, it is def. exciting to win again after having very annoying sessions for the past 2 months. It is also exciting to explore parts of the game that I have never explored before; you’d think after around 2 milliion+ hands you’ve seen it all but I really haven’t. It’s also very humbling at the same time. Anyways, I hope I can get this streak going while having more opportunities to play!
-Dan
