Losing Sucks

It really is amazing how quickly your performance in this game can change. I always kick myself to write as much as possible about what I'm feeling, about how I'm playing and how I'm approaching certain hands and certain situations when I'm on a winning streak. I goad myself to try to get as much of that feeling, and of that style of play, down on (virtual) paper when I'm running hot, because I think in some ways the goal of every poker player is to find a way to constantly be playing your absolute "A" game. Since my vacation weekend in Pennsylvania and New Jersey, I went from running hot to being on a major cooler. The roll that I had built up over the previous few months has uncommonly been shrinking. And I am playing pissed off poker. I'm still having my shots in the big mtts -- last night I was top 10% in the donkfest known as the 28k for most of the first two hours -- but eventually I keep making donkey plays that I know are donkey but I'm just tired, frustrated or both, and I'm not lasting much beyond the early levels of the cash in anything.

When I say frustrated, I mean that I am experiencing what seems like far more than my share of dumbass beats and hugely unlucky cards in bad spots, and as usual when I'm losing, my dam draws are just not filling. Ever. Just Tuesday night about 50 minutes into the token frenzy, I open-raised with pocket 7s, got one caller from the big blind and saw a flop of 732 rainbow. I bet 600 into the 900-chip pot with my set (because I'm a man), and the guy raised me allin. Bingo. I call, and he flips up pocket Jacks for the standard overplay with overpair move. Turn is a rag, and the river is a 2-outer Jack to send me packing. Fun stuff any time you can get a 2-outer working against you. And I think I mentioned in the Labor Day 100k guaranteed tournament that on the very first hand I flopped a 15-outer, had my allin raise called by two pairs and whiffed on everything. It's plays like that that basically were not happening to me for two months and that now seem to be lurking around every single corner.

It's not a fun way to play poker, and for the life of me I wish I knew the way to turn things back around to how they were just a couple of weeks ago. In the past I have never been helped by taking a break, and switching to other poker games has worked eventually but I guess I'm just not quite to that point yet. I'm not going to ask everyone for their suggestions, again, because I've done that several other times in the life of the blog and frankly nobody's ever actually been able to help me shake the losing cardma. I guess I'm just going to slog through it and see if I can bust out with a big score or something to get me back to my winning ways.

One thing I will be changing for the time being, however, is that I don't plan to buy in to any larger mtts for a while. My roll can easily support playing things like the 50-50 and the $100 satellites into the Monday 1k tournament on full tilt, but I'm not going to play those for a while. I know that over time I have proven to be a very streaky player, and when I get on a bad jag it can often be several weeks in between wins of any real significance. One measure I intend to take in light of this streakiness is to try to limit my overall losses during the streak by limiting my tournament buyins. So that's the plan. If I ever log on early enough to play the 50-50 satellites then maybe I'll play in that biatch, but if not, no more $50 and up mtt buyins until I show myself that I am ready for prime time again with consistent, solid tournament play.

Playing my "A" game. That's what I'm always striving for.

And that's why I'm playing the Mookie tonight at 10pm ET on full tilt. Password as always is "vegas1". Come out and play the Mook tonight, and hope you start off at my starting table because folks, I am once again back to being the deadest money there is out there in poker tournaments. I can't even remember that guy who should have won two consecutive Mookies just a few weeks back. Now I'm just the donkey who gets caught resteaing 20 minutes in to a blonkament with 52o, or the guy who calls of my stack with KJ on a Jack-high flop. This is how I keep my perspective on donkey play as well as I do -- because half the time, I am the donkey, and for some strange and I'm sure masochistic reason, I willingly put that donkery on display and for donation week in and week out in the unwinnable tournament called The Mookie. See you tonight at 10.