Temper and Patience

I have a bit of a temper at the tables, especially live when I'm at the casino. Someone snaps me off on the river, it takes a lot of willpower not to go off on them because of their bad play. I'll bitch and moan about my luck to the floor, the dealers, anyone who will listen. I'll go all Phil Hellmuth, talking about being the best player at the table, when most of the time I'm not. I'm more laid back online, mainly because I'm playing amongst friends. Recently though, I've been working on my temper and how it affects my game.

When I get sucked out on, I get mad. When I'm mad, I play more aggressively, trying to force the issue and get my chips back. When that happens, I either make more mistakes playing too many hands or I notice a lot more that my 86o that I folded would have made a straight and won the hand. And finally when I play too many hands, I get sucked out on more. It's a vicious circle.

So I need to take a walk, take a break. Even at the online tables, when I get sucked out on, I disappear for 5 minutes or so, just to give myself time to cool down. I reset, I refocus, and I get back to playing my best game.

Temper and patience go hand in hand. I cool down, I can sit down and fold away, playing that tight aggressive game I've been working on. I pick my spots a lot more carefully, and my raises get a lot more respect. When I'm mad, I can't bring myself to do that. I want action, go go go, and I won't stop until I've got all or nothing. My ego pops up and I'm the best player in the whole world (in my head).

When I got 3rd in the Mookie a couple weeks ago, I played 9% to the flop. My preflop raises earned me some respect folds, my continuation bets worked more often and I even got away with check-raising the flop when I missed my hand. It worked because I stayed patient and calm. I was too nervous to try any funny business, it's been a while since I've been in that situation.

So that's the basic gameplan, at least for now. I'm going to put some fun stuff in the gameplan as it evolves. Let's call this a rebirth of my game. It might work, it might not. But everyone will get to see the journey.

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Oh yeah one more thing. This one's for Pirate Lawyer. He didn't believe me last night when in the Skillz Game, I bet at him on the river on a board of 22T85. He thought and thought and then asked me if I had quads. He folded and I told him I flopped a boat. He immediately called BS. What is it, am I not an honest guy? For some reason he just didn't trust me. So here's the proof.


I was in the BB. I so love Omaha. Maybe you'll believe me next time sir. Have a good day. :)

Fine, I'm back.

Well after some chiding from BamBamCan tonight, I've decided to return to writing here after a while away. In September, after a disaster tournament in Omaha, I felt like I needed to step back from my poker and sort of start from scratch. It was so bad I scrapped a lot of my view of the poker world around me and basically started over. I took some time away from the game, focused more on school and work, and had to find a way to feel better about myself. I was pretty down after that so it was much needed time away.

I didn't play a hand of poker for about 6 weeks, didn't even think about it in any seriousness. I wanted back in but after that, time away was real nice. Eventually I ended up playing a little at the casino, really basic tight poker. I've relearned the basics of tight agressive poker, and I'm better off for it. I've still got some of my trapping moves, but I'm smarter in picking my spots. I needed to learn how to change gears more effectively and use image to my advantage.

I came back to online poker last Monday and started fast. I took 3rd in the Tuckfard I and 1st in the Tuckfard II, as well as 5th but just out of the money in the Rambler PLO Dime Rebuy. On top of that I made my way through a field of 50 tough competitors to take third behind LJ and lucko for a nice payday. I played 11% of hands preflop, established the tight image and used it to my advantage. I was near the top most of the way, coming into the final table in 3rd. In the end, my ATo couldn't suck out on LJ's AQ and I was out in 3rd. All the support coming my way was really nice, it was a great feeling.

For the week I made a total of six final tables in blogger events, three cashes, three top threes and one win, my best week of poker in a very long time. On top of all that, I just finished off my title defense of the Tuckfard II winning it two weeks in a row. Switching gears was the key to this one, actually more like keeping the pedal to the floor.

59% of hands isn't exactly textbook Omaha8, but it worked anyway. Well I need to focus on the NY Rambler tonight so I'm gonna wrap this up. It's nice to be back and hopefully I can keep up this mojo I got going. See ya later, hopefully more often now.