Not only do massive downswings make me want to throw a kitten into traffic ...
... Specifically, the kitten pictured to the left ...
But they also make me wonder if I know anything about poker.
After continuously getting set mined and flopping top two pair or thinking I am pricing someone out of a draw on the turn and still seeing them get there on the river ... there just comes a point where I say, "Ok, what the fuck am I doing wrong? I should be able to win one of these, or at least make a fold."
The reality is, when I go back and look at the hand again I still can't think of a way to play it differently. Example ...
With a full stack in a 2/4 NL 6 Max game I raise to $14 UTG with AdKd and receive one caller - the big blind.
The flop is Ac Kh 4c. With $30 in the pot and him expecting me to c-bet, I bet $24 when it is checked to me. He smooth calls. At this point his range is really wide so I plan to see what the turn brings before trying to narrow it down.
The turn is 7d - completely safe card 99% of the time. He checks and I bet $60. Again, he just calls. Now I'm a bit concerned but he could be drawing to a fifth club or he could have something like AJ or AQ and he's afraid I have him crushed or outkicked.
The river is 7h and he thinks for a few seconds before leading for pot.
I'm thinking it's a missed draw or a weaker Ace like I originally suspected. I call and he has 4's full.
I'm 99.99% sure it's a complete cooler when you don't have a long standing history against the villain in this hand, but I've been running into this stuff a lot lately and it has me seriously questioning everything about my game so I've decided to take a break for a little bit rather than play scared money or in a way that leaves me open to get drawn out on constantly.
Hope you guys are running a lot better than I've been running.
3 comments:
Why would you be questioning your play here? You should be extatic that villain is the worst poker player on earth and you didn't get stacked. I probably shove river because it is so likely he does have Missed FD or worse ace. Obviously the missed FD folds but you get call called by any ace becasuse he thinks he chops almost every hand you have.
When I get into situations like this I honestly feel like I just made money in the hand.
I'm assuming you use software like PokerTracker. That's a good way to keep showing yourself that you are a profitable player if indeed, you are making the right decisions. Coolers, suckouts, etc all happen. But those are just variance. I go through that but then I look at how much I've made this year or this month or whatever and I tell myself I just need to get through it.
Yeah, I would simply consider that hand a cooler, and wonder why villain wasn't able to stack me. Top two vs. bottom set... I read a bumper sticker once that said something like 'this type of stuff happens.'
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