She Plays Poker

It’s not just me. Scanning through the 2+2 forums this morning there were a couple of “is my downswing unusual” threads. They crop up from time to time, guys who have been winning at, say, 1.5 big bets per 100 hands over 20,000 hands (say $3000 a month at $5/$10) who suddenly drop 500 big bets ($5000) in 5000 hands (say, one week). WTF, they think, ‘What the fuck’?

The responses are always the same: “It’s just variance”, “Your sample size is too small”, “Don’t be results-orientated, concentrate on playing good poker”. But today one poster got it spot on:

“I do think it’s important to understand why people make these posts though. I know I made one. I think it comes from the need to extrapolate out and see how much you stand to make in the year. You get a 2BB/100 win rate playing $3-6 over 15K hands and you think to yourself “ while I'm making $12.00 an hour per table playing four tables; assuming I play 40 hours a week I should make 100 grand this year! And if I could keep the same win rate at $5-10 and play 6 tables I’d make a quarter million next year” and the next thing you know you’re mentally shopping for a BMW. Then you hit rough patch and you have images of yourself living on rice –a-roni for the rest of your life. Don’t fall into this trap, it’s too stress inducing. ILOVEPOKER is right; have monetary goals, but don’t focus on your win rate as a function of improving your game.”

All this reminds me of the most humbling post I ever read. The guy was a legend on the board, he wrote well and he analysed play brilliantly. Unfortunately he found out how long the long-run really was and it forced him to give up the game and get a job.