Live Grind: How to Fall Asleep at the Table (Without Getting Caught)

ugh unlucky man, hopefully the family takes it ok. let us know how it goes, merry xmas mate

Condolences Have the best Holiday you can under the circumstances.

Condolences, Matt. Be safe and well.

Condolences as well, always hard to lose a member of the family but especially around a time of the year meant to be full of happiness and relaxing times with the family. My thoughts to you and your's over the Holidays Matt.

sorry for your lose Matt
Merry xmas mate.

Thanks for the well wishes everyone. They are seriously appreciated. Christmas was nice despite recent events, and it felt really good to have the means to give my parents meaningful gifts this year. My dad has been pretty seriously learning to play guitar, and is planning to purchase a nice-ish one for himself in January, so I got him some accessories for it. My mom does a lot of gardening, so got her a book on winter gardening, and a nice gardening-related figurine. It conveniently matches with some others she already had (but wasn't the same - phew!).

I received a couple token gifts, but nothing too significant, as my parents paid for my plane ticket home. My mom went absolutely mad with the baking this year though, since we were expecting to see extended family (6 of them were going to be with us for almost a week). But that fell through because of my grandmother passing - we were going to be in Cleveland before they even got here.

I'm in Cleveland through Tuesday - funeral is tomorrow - so was hoping to meet up with Sand, but unfortunately he was tied up. In the meantime though, while I was waiting to hopefully meet up with him today, I played some live PLO for the first time ever. Played ~3.5 hours, was in for $300 and cashed out $2,300 exactly.

My biggest winning day to date by at least $700, but probably by more. Pretty sick thing to have happen, especially with how badly live poker in Cleveland was kicking my ass at the end of my academic career this year. It was a much-needed injection for my bankroll.

While I obviously ran redic hot (lol hourly rate = $571.43), I did see some pretty consistent and massive errors from almost everyone at the table - many of them PLO regs at the 'Shoe.

I'm hoping this means that someday I won't have any qualms about hopping into the 2/5 NL/PLO rotation game or the 2/5 PLO game that runs at the casino near me. The only thing is that the massive variance inherent to PLO means that anyone not playing full-time will really struggle to actualize their win rate in anything resembling a reasonable time frame. We'll see though. Not having something to shoot for has always been a detriment to me when it comes to poker. And now that I'm focusing on live play a lot more, there aren't as many opportunities to move up. With a new long-term goal, I'm hoping my motivation sustains better.

Anywho, still hoping to get some pictures of my home game setup on here soon, but no promises. I hope everyone had a great Christmas/Hanukkah/paid time off/whatever else, and I hope everyone has a happy new year.

'Til next time.

That's all amazing; glad to hear it. Thanks for the update. Things are surely crazy.

Sorry for your loss.

Glad to hear your hols are going well considering, and that PLO session sounds ridic! Why are you deciding to focus in live play more? I thought Bovada was meant to be pretty soft?

Happy new year

Sorry again we couldn't meet up. :/ Hopefully we can in Spring or early summer for the big tournament at the 'Shoe if you decide to play.

That PLO session sounds so sick. Now you've got me debating whether or not to dig in to PLO a bit.

@Benji: Thanks - things are crazy indeed.

@micro: Thank you - the funeral today was tough, but went about as well as it could. Beautiful service, and just a very nice sending off for my grandmother.

As for your question, focusing on live play is more a product of doing what I enjoy more. It comes and goes in waves, but I've always had more of a passion for live play than for online. Plus while I was upswinging in my private game I was downswinging on Bovada - I don't have much of a roll there currently and haven't felt like depositing. I'm actually thinking of trying to grind it out at 5 PLO and see how that goes, just to keep my interest in PLO alive (and since I only have like $44 left online lol). The only PLO game at my local casino is a 2/5 game or 2/5 NL/PLO rotation, so I won't be hopping into that until I don't mind having a -3k day or so lol. -1k days I can handle, but 3k is like 1/2 my BR right now, so that seems suicidal lol.

@Sand: Yeah I was a bit bummed, but def hoping to make it out in the Spring. Would be sick to play in the 1.5k together - would absolutely want to swap action tho.

I think you should delve into PLO a bit - especially since you can try it out online. But def read up on preflop strategy, since that will take you pretty far and protect you from some of the bigger errors that NL players make when transitioning. Text me if you're interested and I can send you some good starting resources.

Will do. I think I'll wait a bit. New game, higher risk. I'd rather not take that on at the moment. I'll wait til things settle down a bit more - maybe when I start working again.

Grats on live session mate, sounds like you have a blast which is great for distraction considering the bad time family passing.

If planing play just PLO on bovada this mean you are droping NLHE for good online?.

Mr Sandbag said:

Will do. I think I'll wait a bit. New game, higher risk. I'd rather not take that on at the moment. I'll wait til things settle down a bit more - maybe when I start working again.

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Makes sense, though you said you're reasonably rolled for 2/5 NL - this means you're probably very well rolled for soft 1/2 PLO imo. But it is a new game so swings will be worse etc, so I totally get that.

/Logan/ said:

Grats on live session mate, sounds like you have a blast which is great for distraction considering the bad time family passing.

If planing play just PLO on bovada this mean you are droping NLHE for good online?.

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Thanks. Yeah, was a nice win for a lot of reasons, and bought dinner for my fam that night, which was fun.

I'm still playing the private online game here and there. I play both PLO and NL there, but on Bovada, I don't want to grind up from like 5NL. It's just so hard for me to enjoy it. With PLO though, I care a lot less about the stakes because the game is more novel - it's newer to me.

Godd for ya on the PLO hit. I'll have to look into that 'Shoe schedule.

Jillychemung said:

Godd for ya on the PLO hit. I'll have to look into that 'Shoe schedule.

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Do it up! The tourney is in early May I believe and has a 200k guarantee.

Mr Sandbag said:

Do it up! The tourney is in early May I believe and has a 200k guarantee.

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Am I sensing a CC Meetup?!?!!?

Scourrge said:

Thanks. Yeah, was a nice win for a lot of reasons, and bought dinner for my fam that night, which was fun.

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That's awesome. Fantastic haul at the PLO table and money well spent with family.

CC meetup sounds solid to me haha. Token PLO hand from my monster session:

(It's a 1/2 game with a $5 bring-in, so "limps" are for $5.)

Several limps, and I pot it in MP with AJJTxydd ($30). I get 5 calls and we go 6-handed to the flop.

Flop comes Jx9d2d, and the guy who is first to act jams for $150 into $180. Couple folds, and a guy who has like $700 starts tanking. He's looking at me, trying to figure out what I'm going to do, so I feign indifference (not too overtly) to look like I'm just done with the pot and waiting for the next hand.

He tanks for like 2 min and calls. Short stack with about $60 over calls, and I pot it. The guy to my left calls with about $150, and it's back to the only other guy with a stack. He pretty quickly sigh-folds, which made me wonder if I should have bumped it to like $400 instead of re-potting it.

Turn was a blank, and river paired the 2, giving me the second nuts - beaten only by 22xx. I scooped a massive pot vs. the nut flush draw (A773), 2nd set no redraw (99xx), and two unshown hands.

I can only guesstimate the other hands, but based on what I assume they had, I had somewhere between 60 and 70% equity in the pot OTF. This is slightly misleading, since the guy with only $60 left wouldn't have won the whole pot, and he likely was blocking even more diamonds, but that's the best approximation I've got to represent my EV.

But it just goes to show how much variance there is in PLO. Even with top set and blockers to every draw, I'm only something like a 2:1 favorite to win the pot. The other bigger hands I won were similar though less multiway, and I did have more equity, but the point remains. I want to dive into PLO at my local casino, but they run 2/5 way more often than 1/2, and my BR is just nowhere near ready for those swings. So for now I'll bide my time.

Arguably worst mistake of my poker career last night. Live 1/2 NL:

UTG opens to $7, UTG+1 calls, folds to me in CO with AKhh and I make it $30. BB and UTG call. BB has $300, and UTG has $600. I cover.

Flop Kc8c7d. Checks to me, and I bet $45 into $95ish. BB calls, and UTG quickly makes it $295 by pushing out 3 stacks of red chips.

In a previous hand, he had opened 88 to $20 UTG against the same table lineup and approximately the same stack sizes, so I was really struggling to put him on a set. But he was pretty tight too, and the only hand I'd seen him showdown at this point was that 88 hand where he ended up flopping a set.

Anyway I tanked forever and jammed it in like I was born yesterday. BB folded and he basically made the fastest snap call I have ever heard in my life, and tabled 88. No sweat - 9 on the turn meant I was drawing dead.

Scourrge said:

Arguably worst mistake of my poker career last night. Live 1/2 NL:

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Ouch!!

87/88/77/KK pretty much imo, even putting in draws it performs pretty poorly
fold>>>>>>>>>call>>>>>>shove imo

Mastering TRP = simple formula. Figures are nehochu, so just an example to understand.
1) Our range of pre-flop raise, a certain percentage will fall into certain boards. (Flopzila and Crew to help everything corny)
2) We need a certain percentage of C bets on the streets waiting for 0 and balance.
3) Do we have the tolerance of the range on every street where we do not continue to play a check and fold (interest, too, do not want to talk)
4) And finally, a simple example that describes the concept (again without calculations)...

real measure of your mental game progress is how quickly you shrug that one off matt

duggs said:

real measure of your mental game progress is how quickly you shrug that one off matt

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^

Sucks, but nothing you can do now.

hulinada said:

Mastering TRP = simple formula. Figures are nehochu, so just an example to understand.
1) Our range of pre-flop raise, a certain percentage will fall into certain boards. (Flopzila and Crew to help everything corny)
2) We need a certain percentage of C bets on the streets waiting for 0 and balance.
3) Do we have the tolerance of the range on every street where we do not continue to play a check and fold (interest, too, do not want to talk)
4) And finally, a simple example that describes the concept (again without calculations)...

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Is this serious? Are we serious here? Wtf is it about my thread that draws spam...

duggs said:

real measure of your mental game progress is how quickly you shrug that one off matt

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xdeuceswild81xx said:

^

Sucks, but nothing you can do now.

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Weirdly, it didn't mess with my head much. I decided not to grind new year's day just to have no pressure, but I after the initial frustration of playing super solid all night and then blowing up, I shrugged it off.

Younger, reggy type had a hangnail that got irritated and bled on the table, so they were gonna move us and I just called it a night.

I will say that it's a lot easier to be up $500 and lose $650 than it is to be even and do the same. But I'm pleased with my resilience overall. Going back to play tonight, so we'lll see how that goes. Gonna be wary of my mental state. And on that note...

Sessional Goals:
1. Keep a tab on my mental state, and take a break if I think I need one.
2. Explicitly watch as many hands on the table as I can - the hands I'm not involved in are just as important as the ones I am.
3. Keep having fun and engage the people around me in conversation where appropriate.
4. Iso wider in CO/BTN, tighter in MP.
5. Be very aware of my image when deciding how wide to open from EP and MP.

The last goal I want to set apart, because it's sort of in a different vein than the others: Take my time. Even if I'm pretty sure I know what I'm going to do, it can't hurt to take an extra 10-15 seconds to go through things. This forces me to slow down my brain, move away from snap-decision defaults, and think at a deeper level.

Ironically, it can kind of bite me, like in that AK vs. 88 hand from the other night. But much, much more often, I find that I think about ranges more effectively, and incorporate higher EV plays that I otherwise might not have considered.