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.