It's Turbo Time

The Turbo SNG table experiment I talked about in my last post has really thrown me off my game. Every time I think I have the game figured out, something really strange happens and I have to re-evaluate my approach. I’ve have experienced more variance and poor results in the past 5 days than the entire duration of my SNG experience. However, I am winning on the whole, but the wins seem to come in chunks. Each run consists of 8 tables at a time. I’ve played a total of 186 games, with average winning per table at a very mediocre $2.33. At first, I was dominating, an in my first 100 games I had only one losing run. But since then its been loss after loss. I can’t pinpoint where the leak is, that is if a leak exists at all. Due to the nature of these quick games, luck is such a factor that if you don’t pick up any good hands, you are going to lose no matter what.

What these games really come down to is the late game. Once it gets down to 4-5 players, the blinds are generally around 200-400, which means everyone is pressured to accumulate chips. It’s a delicate balance trying to sneak into the money and trying to accumulate chips to avoid the blinds eating you. For example, say you have KT on the button and it is folded to you, you have 2500 in chips with the blinds 200/400. The SB has 1500 in chips and you are down to the final four. One of you isn’t getting paid. The BB has 3500 and has shown that he will call all-ins with much less than he should (any ace, any pair, any 2 cards above 9). If you push all in from the button and steal the blinds/antes your stack will be elevated to around 3200, twice as much as the competing short stack. However, your problem of course is, that someone in the blinds may have picked up a hand they will call you with. Now while KT is statistically favored against two blind hands, do you really want to take that chance when you could just fold and force the SB to push against that calling station in the BB? There are a ton of these types of scenarios that come late game, and since the blinds get so big so fast, there is no room for blind stealing without pushing all in. Its very difficult to consistently come up with a correct move for each situation. What it usually comes down to is two short stacks waiting each other out until either the blinds really become a factor and they are forced to push / call with any 2 cards, or that they actually pick up a strong hand and get some action with it. I’m not sure if the smart play is to constantly push, hoping to pick up the blinds/antes while chipping up against your competition, or just sit back and wait for semi-strong hands to push where you are sure you will be a decent favorite against all but the strongest of hands, as well as hoping your opponent will bust before you. I guess it depends on how aggressive your opponents have been, as well as how likely they are to call an all in. Probably the most annoying thing about bubble play is when you push with a semi strong hand like A9 or KJ and get called by total trash like J9, K5 or A2. Players with that low of calling requirements make this little dance around the bubble extremely frustrating and difficult. Since if you are short stacked, you really do have to push occasionally with total crap in hopes to pick up the blinds. But when you are called by absolute garbage, you just can’t help but get angry, especially when the caller is somewhat short stacked themselves. Perhaps it is just a feature of the semi-low limits that I’ve been playing ($25) where they just like to gamble or something, but it happens way more times than I would like.

What has been truly helpful has been the installation and registration of my new poker helper, PokerAce HUD. It’s a third party software that overlays the statistics of your opponents right on your screen. It tells you how often they put money in the pot (VPIP), how often they raise preflop and how aggressive they are. And the more times I play against certain opponents, the better, since you’ll get a more accurate set of data. If you notice that someone has a high VPIP, you know they like to see flops and are pretty loose. These are the types that you want to avoid when pushing late game, as they are apt to call you with anything. It’s really helpful when multitabling since I can’t get a strong read on anyone by paying attention. I just glance at their numbers and make my move. If someone has a high preflop raise %, then I know that they are raising with shit like any ace, QT and the likes and I can play off them accordingly, knowing that my hands are actually stronger than they appear. I am happy I finally registered the thing so that it works on multiple tables. Hopefully as I continue to use it I will be able to exploit my opponents characteristics more efficiently, based on my experience with this program.

All in all, I’m not sure if I am loving these turbo tournaments. The amount of luck involved late game makes for a lot of headaches that have nothing to do with your choices or skill. But, I sure can get a lot of games in per day to compensate for that loss of late game skill. Really, if I just make sure I’m constantly making +EV decisions, like any play in poker, it will pay off in the long run. It just seems that the edges that you have to push are so slim most of the time that they it is hard to notice that you are making the right decisions. Its all about confirming to yourself that you are making the right play, and in the face of bad results, continue to play exactly the same way. Its tough, especially when on an extended losing streak, but hey, that’s poker.