1 Big Bet Per Hour

Yesterday started off fine. I took my car to Melody Toyota for an oil change and dumped 200 uneventful dollars at Artichoke Joes. Once the car was done I drove up to The Oaks and promptly won $240 playing 6/12 in 15 minutes. From UTG and then the BB I won back to back pots by flopping top two (JTs and K7o) against Ray, the resident 30/60 maniac. Both times he had me dominated and yet I won. I assure you this never happens at 30/60. Ever. It was just surreal, knowing full well I'd outflopped him for once from WOOPS (Way Out Of PoSition) with the worst hand and dragging two pots in a row with a silly grin on my face. Of course a rack at 6/12 is only $200, but at least at that level I've been winning lately (I'll discuss some random stats later, but as a preview...I've won $1100 in my last 13 hours of live 6/12). I then moved up to 15/30 when a new game was called and promptly won a rack in about 30 minutes. It would have been way more, if it weren't for the hand I'm about to tell you about. These two hands display the opposite ends of the continuum of events that can happen with your big hands in limit hold'em:

I open raise AA UTG (humorously The Grinder just came over and asked Norm and I to start a coup by getting up from the 15 and moving to the empty 30 table so The Oaks board would call it down...Norm declined and took his big blind. Had he not, this never would have happened) and Ray calls me with two napkins in middle position. Steven 3-bets me and Norm calls two more cold in the big blind. I of course cap it and they all call. This is a fantastic situation obviously, and for once I'm confident it's going to work out. The flop comes down:

K72r

I'm not even kidding here. The flop is K....7....2....with 3 suits. When you read a limit hold'em book and they need an example of a "dry" flop, one on which there are practically zero draws available, this is the one they use. It is impossible to even have a gutshot on this board! Norm checks and I bet. Ray calls, Steven thinks for a second, gives me one of his patented "I hate you so much I can't believe you're so lucky even though I win 2 racks a day by cold-calling twice an orbit" looks and folds getting 18:1 with long implied odds. Norm calls, and I'm already starting to count all my money in the pot. To the turn:

K72-5r

The fourth suit is now on board and nobody can possibly have a straight. Norm checks, I bet, Ray raises, and then shit starts to get funny. Norm says "What do you have over there Ray?" and since I'm in the hand I can't resist. "He has two pairs, and one of them is a five." Ray shoots me daggers. He and I are usually pretty friendly with each other, but at a slightly smaller game I feel safe rubbing him a little to see where it goes. The look on his face, however, is one I've never seen before. He's almost....angry. "I couldn't be slow-playing a big hand, Jess?" he replies. I respond in rhythm, "Two pair, probably Kings and Fives. Definitely fives though." Ray is furious and yet somehow Norm calls two more bets, cold. I call, since even if he does have K5 I have 8 outs to scoop the pot and am getting 15:1 closing the action. I could call two bets cold here, actually. The river bricks off and Norm and I both check. Ray bets, Norm calls, and I can't make the hero fold at 18:1. Ray shows the exact hand I called out, K5o, for two pairs. Norm has K3o, which had three (3) outs to chop the pot, and I quietly muck my aces.

Shortly after this I do make it over to 30/60 and at first win for a bit. At one point I'm up a grand for the day and even contemplate going home early. Then I lose a pot and text Batman "The doomswitch has been engaged." I proceed to lose slowly for the next three hours, put myself on the 15/30 list after the game un-softens (I wouldn't want to say "got tough" because that wouldn't be true, but most of the players were not actively lighting chips on fire...or at least they didn't have any lighter fluid with them) and in my final two orbits before getting into the 15 I drop almost an entire rack running JJ into AA and AK into AQ (you'd think that second one would work out, but you'd be wrong).

So I go back down to 15/30 now stuck something like $1500 for the day and the game is just hoppin'. I still manage to lose $400 more, but not before watching Batman play the following hand. He opens in early position and gets about 5 callers, some limpers, some behind him, some blinds, I don't know, freaking everybody was in this pot except me. The flop is:

K72r

Remember that flop? Right, dry....The small blind check/raises him, then caps it after he 3-bets. I don't remember if there are any other opponents left, but if so they'll be dropping shortly. The turn brings:

K72-T

And the SB leads out (not a donk, since he capped the flop). Batman raises, at which point I realize he has at least 77 and probably KK. The SB then 3 bets and I think "Oh how sad, Batman just got set over setted by a dumb ass who just cold-called with kings preflop." Batman 4-bets and I laugh out loud. The small blind calls, and the river pairs the deuce. The small blind checks, calls, and upon seeing Batmans KK tables AKs like it's some sort of cooler and we're supposed to feel sorry that he lit 6 bets on fire drawing dead, at least 2, arguably 3 more than necessary. So in short, I take AA to war and my opponents flop ten outs between the three of them in a 4-handed 8 big bet pot. They hit instantly and I fail to hit my 8 out redraw. Batman's opponent flops sort of a cooler, then proceeds to light an extra 60 to 90 dollars on fire because he's (apparently) completely insane. Them's the breaks I guess.

So after another rough day today I spent some time getting my spreadsheet in order and I noticed a few striking statistics:

1. In the last 6 weeks I have played 13 hours of 6/12 and won $1140
2. Over the same 6 week period (roughly) I have played 80 hours of 20/40 and won almost $120/hour.
3. Again in the same 6 week period, I have played almost 100 hours of 30/60 and lost around $100/hour.

If you do all the math on these three things you'll note that over about 200 hours I won about 200 big bets, but basically broke even (I also have 30some hours of 15/30 over that time period where I won a couple of racks). Of course my opponents are worse on average at smaller games, but a discrepancy this large is just dumb (bad) luck. Alas, tomorrow is another day, and, armed with a shot of fake confidence that I can crush 20/40 for absurd sums of money, I'll be for-going The Oaks 30/60 for some San Jose shenanigans.