Cold deck from the beginning

I hadn't played for a couple of nights, so I sat down today for a few hands of Rush Poker.

I played 12 hands and then had to stop to:

a) Catch my breath
b) Write about the extraordinary hands

After folding rubbish for the first few hands, on hand 8 I pick up the Cowboys in mid-position. I raise to $0.20c (4xBB) - the guy behind me tanks and raises it to $0.50. Everyone else gets out of the way and it's back to me. I pop it to $1.50 and he insta-shoves for enough to put my stack at risk. I have to call, he turns up the Bullets.

Needless to say I don't catch up and I've don my starting stack in one hand.


However, these things happen - so I reload to my original starting stack of $4.00 and dive in again. 4 hands later, this happened.

I pick up the weapons of mass destruction, in the SB. There's a raise to $0.15 from early position, and I re-pop it to $0.50 - he calls. The flop comes down Tc-4h-Kh, so I bet $1.00 and he insta-shoves. I've got a horrible feeling in the pit of my stomach and actually say out loud (to myself), "He's got Kings!". Secretly I was praying for A-K, but sadly those prayers went unanswered as he flipped up pocket 10's, for a flopped set.

I was rather annoyed, as you can imagine, after running into Aces when holding Kings, to run into another pocket pair who flopped a set, when I'm holding Aces, 4 hands later, is just cruel.
I was facing down the barrel of losing another full stack in one hand. It was going to have to be an Ace, or runner-runner for a straight.
The 8c on the turn left me with 2 outs and, yes, miracles do happen, the Ad lands on the river to give me the pot. It was, in my mind, the least I deserved.


I'm going to take a short break to collect my thoughts then sit back down to play some more, stay tuned.

A punch in the guts followed by a kick in the teeth

What are the odds of losing both of these hands, back to back?

It's the sixth hand of the evening, and the first where I have invested any money in the pot. I limp behind, from middle position and along with the BB, three of us see a flop of 9d-Kh-Th. I'm holding Jh-Qs and have flopped the nuts.

The BB kicks off with a small bet and this is min-raised by the player to my right. I decide not to slow play (as it seems these guys have a bit of something) and bet the pot. The BB flat calls and the guy to my right pushes his stack in. I go over the top, and the BB makes the call, turning up Ks-3c. To my right I see pocket 9's for a flopped set and I am slightly gloating at his misfortune, running into a flopped straight.

The turn is the Qc and now bad memories come flooding back - of a couple of hands I had to chop a few weeks back where the board ran out a straight. I was fully expecting to see a Jack on the river, but it was much worse than that - Td, pairing the board and completing a full house.

After no more than 2 minutes I've blown all but $0.45c of my original $5.00 stack. I take a deep breath, sit out and reload. By the time I have topped up and come back to the table we are on hand 14.

UTG I pick up pocket Queens. I make a standard 3xBB raise and it is folded round to the BB. After a few seconds he shoves his whole $4.00 into the middle. What the heck is going on, this is only the second hand of the evening that I have actually invested any chips in and I could be all-in again.

I am convinced I've run into Bullets or Cowboys, but I can't be folding Queens to every re-raise, so I make the call. It's a classic race, as he turns up Ad-Kc.

The flop is pretty safe, 7d-Th-2h, so no back-door flush draws. I just have to fade an Ace or a King (or so I think). The turn is the Qc, giving me a set, but now he has a gutshot. The 3 Aces and 3 Kings are no good any more, buy he still has 4 Jacks working for him - and regular as clockwork the Js lands on the river.

It's the ultimate 'kicking a man while he's down hand - after doing my entire stack on the previous hand to a river full house, this board goes runner-runner straight.

Played 2, lost 2. Both times for complete stacks. I've just shipped over $8 in two consecutive hands. It's enough to get the conspiracy theorists choking on their coffee.

Crazy boards

A pretty uneventful evening - didn't have all my chips in the middle once, but missed some opportunities to capitalise, but also lost the minimum on some other reverses.

The two most interesting hands of the night were...

Raised from the BB, with A-Q, and saw a Ad-Kd-Jc flop - seriously scary. It went check-check and another Ace (Ah) pops up on the turn. I'm pretty sure I'm ahead, but I'm still losing to Q-10, or A-J, so I check with the intention to call. It's checked-back. The river is the case Ace (As) and I decided now is the time to see if my opponent has a King or a Jack and might think their full-house is good. No action, quick fold. Didn't make a penny.

I was on the receiving end of an almost identical board, later in the evening. I've got Kd-10d under the gun and manage to see a flop with a limp. Ah-Jd-Qs - I've flopped Broadway on a rainbow board and now I am praying my one opponent has some sort of Ace. I am desperate to maximize and check; he checks back. The turn is another Ace (Ad), and now I am starting to get a little worried that I am up against A-Q or A-J. But, I now have a straight-flush draw on board, so I lead out for half-the-pot and get quickly called. Unbelievably, for the second time this evening, it's another Ace on the river (As). Now even a naked Ace is beating me, so I have to check - fully expecting to see a decent bet. It would have been an impossible call - I'm losing to any Ace, and Queen, any Jack or any other pocket pair - but thankfully he checks back, flipping up Pocket 9's for a full-house.


I actually chortled at losing the minimum, and cursed at not betting out on the flop. But I got out of Dodge losing the absolute minimum - but if I had even had the balls to bet on the river I probably would have taken it down - how many times have I had an underpair to that kind of board and folded immediately, on the flop, to a lead-out bet?

Hallelujah!

They say the odds of being dealt any pair is 16/1. So, statistically, once in every 17 hands you should pick up a pocket pair. Tonight, I played 358 hands and picked up 20 pocket pairs, so that's pretty close to average (17/1, or 1 in every 18 hands).

Once you pick up any pocket pair, the supposed odds of flopping a set is 15/2 (or 7.5/1). So, two out of every 15 pocket pairs you are dealt should result in you flopping a set. Of my 20 pocket pairs, I saw flops with 16 of them (amazingly, three of the other four were dealt to me in the BB, and I was given a walk - in a nine-handed game!), and made a set with just 1, the last one. That's way, way over the average. Statistically I should have flopped about two sets out of the 16 pairs I saw the flop with - but no.

Once, I got my stack in with the Cowboys, against a short-stack with Jacks, only for him to suck-out on the river. The same thing happened a couple of days ago when I got my Aces in against Kings and the King came on the river. Now, the odds of an underpair coming from behind is about 4/1 - so once in every 5 times you see all 5 board cards you can expect to lose to an underpair. This has happened to me twice now, in two sessions.

No exaggeration, my luck has been at an almost all-time low over the last week, or so. Every suck-out you can think of has happened (just read some earlier posts). The last hand of the evening was nearly the icing on the cake.

I'm reeling from calling large pre-flop raises every time I pick up a medium/small pocket pair - I must have called off about 40% of my stack as each (and every) time I pick up pocket 2's to pocket 10's, someone either massively raises before me, or re-raises after me. Not once did I pick up a pair less than Jacks and get the table to fold to a pre-flop raise. And, as I have said before, not once did I hit the flop.

I'd had my Kings busted by Jacks earlier and on two other occasions, with Aces and Kings, in the BB, I had a walk. So, I pick up the Cowboys again, in the BB. There's a couple of limpers and the SB decides to make some action, raising it to $0.25, 5xBB. I pop it up to $0.85 and the limpers get out of the way. The SB pops it up to $2.00, with just over $2.00 behind - at this stage I know he isn't folding, so if I push I am going all the way. I put it all in the middle, a total of $4.40 and he insta-calls. I actually have my hands covering my face and am talking to myself, "It's Aces, it must be Aces", secretly hoping it's Queens, but deep down knowing that it was going to be Aces - it was Aces.

Insane - seriously, SB v BB battle, I've lost a huge pot earlier in the evening with Kings, busted by Jacks, and now I run into Aces, holding the Cowboys again. My entire Full-Tilt bankroll is on the line - I started the evening with $10 left in the account and the $4.40 in the middle was the last of it.

Hallelujah! Miracles to happen - I came from behind to bust Aces. The flop came down Kd-Qc-6c. The ultimate pessimist I am now expecting a club in the turn, as he has me out-clubbed it it were to go runner-runner. Failing the club, I wholly expected a Jack or a Ten, just to make it interesting - why not make it the Jack of Clubs!

But no, the turn is a blank - the 2s. So now, I just have to dodge a 2-outer on the river. But, as we have seen earlier tonight, the 20/1 shots do happen, when I had Kings busted by Jacks. So, I am fully prepared for the ultimate suck out of the "Ace on the River".

Instead, it's another King and my pocket pair, that turned into my only set of the night, turned into Quads on the river.
At least I now have a few quid left in the account to play with, and perhaps this is a turning point.

Experts talk about variance, and you need to be able to handle it, but surely within variance you are supposed to win some hands. I started with about $5.00 in my account just over 1 month ago, and spun this up to $32.00 in the first week. Since then, as series of insanely bad beats have cost me that whole $32.00, plus another $17.00 of the $25.00 I reloaded with. Surely I haven't turned into that bad a player that I could spin up $27 in profits in 7 days, then just fritter away $49 over the next 21, or so. If I looked back at the BIG pots I lost, I could probably attribute about $30 of the $49 losses to bad-beats, hands where I was ahead and massive favourite either pre-flop or when all the money went in.

There's no way I am ahead of the odds, with regards to looking at the probabilities of the hands I've lost over the last three weeks, or so. I'm due and upturn, but what is more likely is that I'll lose the entire stack tomorrow evening, when I get Aces in against Queens, only to lose.

Watch this space.

Win small pots, lose big ones.

Why is it that when I have the nuts I cannot find a customer, and when I have the 2nd nuts I lose my stack to the player with a better hand.

For example, look at some of the hands I played this evening.

With Pocket Jacks I raise, pre-flop and he calls. With an over-pair I bet out, he raises, I shove and he calls. Surprise, surprise, he turns up a set of 5's and I've done my stack.


I reload, and am card dead for about 100 hands, losing half my stack on blinds and calls that turn into nothing. Then, I win about my only decent pot of the night - bit the action was killed because of the scary flop. My pocket Tens flop a set on a three-spade board. It turns out my opponent has top pair, top kicker, but I cannot get any major action due to the texture of the board.

The Ace on the river makes me a few dollars, and the $2.99 is my biggest pot of the evening.


I manage to squeeze the maximum out of a later pot - blind on blind I catch a King on the flop and it turns into a house on the river. Luckily the BB is not a believer and calls me down with Ace-high. A half-decent pot.

Then comes a string of opportunities that could not be capitalised on. I flop the nut flush but the opponent is scared off and I can't make a penny.


I then flop a full-house, holding pocket 2's and, although my only opponent makes runner-runner two-pair on the river, he won't commit any chips and I make a pittance.

Again, I flop the nut flush and again cannot find an opponent to give me any action.


Then come the two hands, in quick succession, that ended my evening. First, I run into Quad-Queens after my opponent limps with the big pocket pair and I limp with a suited Ace. The Ace on the flop is enough to keep me interested to the river, and I lose half my stack.

Only a couple of hands later the rest of the stack is gone, in a real sickener of a hand. I limp from the button with suited connectors and flop an up and down straight draw. The action goes check-check and I complete my straight on the turn. This time he bets out and I just make the call, praying that there is no heart on the river. I get my wish, but the board pairs, 3's.

My opponent bets about half the pot, and perhaps I should have just flat-called, as there was a paired board, but I decided I needed to maximise this and was actually willing him to have a 3, so he would call. I pushed and he actually hesitated for about 5 seconds before making the call and turning up Q-3 for a rivered full house. I just sat back and giggled, trying desperately not to throw my laptop across the room.

Why is it that any time I call and chase to the river I miss completely, and any time I have a massive hand and, as the experts say, "get my money in good" I come a cropper.

I had my opponent down to a 4-outer on the river, that's less than 10%. So, every 11 times we run this hand at the turn I should win. So why is it that when the money is on the line the 1 in 11 chance lands on the river - coincidence? I don't think so.

I've long had gripes with Full Tilt and actually emptied my account a couple of years ago and boycotted them in favour of fairer sites. I was tempted back by this 'Rush Poker' and in the first week I played I took an initial bankroll of $10 up to nearly $40 - that was just lulling me into a false sense of security - and I have come out losing every session since.

It's like you win a few quid, just to get you interested and hooked, then the tide turns and you take some astronomical bad beats, depleting your bankroll to the position where you have to top up - and they got me, I was hooked on Rush Poker and after losing the $40 I had built up I added another $25. Since then, I've lost another $15 of that, including $10 this evening with two nightmare hands.