180 SNG Turbo Sessions (Analysis and Nonsense)

It is REALLY cold around Maryland right now.  It makes me wonder why the hell anyone ever settled here in the first place.  Maybe the majority settled during the three fifths of the year that actually had a decent climate.  Then winter came around decimated a third of the population and suddenly it became OMG THIS PLACE SUCKS.  I guess the logical short answer would be that my somewhat close ancestors settled around here because it was near a convenient port city with JOBS.  I guess not much has changed there.  No one ever said the jobs would be great, but sure jobs can be found.  And the cloesest city has a port BABY.  So if your kids are bitching and you have to move around here just explain: THERE BE BOATS!  YOU LIKE BOATS RIGHT?  That being said I wish I was in Vegas right now grinding away with a reasonable climate on my side.

I have been putting in a good amount of volume with regards to $12 180 turbos since December 5th 2009.  Before I get into the analysis I will say that this format has single-handedly revived my interest in online poker.  For the first time in a while playing online hasn't felt like a chore.  These tournaments are fun, I look forward to them, even know I'm a terrible sport and get really pissed off when I get sucked out repeatedly.  And I love how I can fit in a decent session playing 5-10 tournaments in less than 3 hours.  These things are perfect if you have a crazy busy life with a 9-5 job on top of that.  Perfect if you win that is..........

I can't say I've been pleased with my results.  I just can't seem to break another big win off.  I know the variance in this format is ridiculous, but it's getting really fucking old.  As of today I decided to take all of my notes and start looking at some stats (instead of doing any work at my corporate job during the morning).  When my boss comes by I normally just stay really still because I think her vision is based on movement, so I should be ok.

Anyways, whenever I play one of these tournaments I have been trying to track:

A)  The start and end time.

B)  Finishing position (including profit/loss).

C)  My strength as I busted out seperated into three categories.  Did I bust with the best hand?  Was I a slight underdog?  Or was I dominated?

I have played a total of 117 games since Dec 5th, which took about 35 hours combined.  When I play I have been playing 5 at once.  I wait until all of the tournaments finish until I start another grouping of 5.  Below I have some stats that I pulled together.  Not as nice looking as the excel sheet, but maybe I can work on that.

First I will look at the finishing stats:

Total Games	117
Hours	35
Net Profit	$71.00
Finishes	Amount	%
1st	1	0.9%
2nd	0	0.0%
3rd	0	0.0%
4th	2	1.7%
6th-9th	4	3.4%
10th-18th	13	11.1%
19th-32nd	18	15.4%
33rd-180th	79	67.5%

The numbers don't tell the  full story obviously, but I can draw some good data from the finishes alone.  32.5% of my finishes were in the top 32.  This means I am consistently getting myself in striking distance to go after some nice profits.  Top 18 finishes fell considerably to 17%.  A goal going forward may be to finish within the top 18 20% of the time.  Not sure if this thinking is logical.  But it might help knowing that it is indeed normal to bust out of the top 18 AT LEAST 70% of the time.   Not that you WANT too, but hell it COULD happen.

Without the first place finish I would have been royally fucked.  Then again it is all relative in a way.  If I bumped those two 4th place finishes a few higher I could have had some really nice results.  One thing that jumps out at me is the ridiculous amount of finishes around the bubble.  In 26.5% of the tournaments I finshed 10th-32nd place.  Furthermore, in 15.4% of my tournaments I finished 19th-32nd (just out of the money).  With my kick-ass excel filter I can check my results in that 15.4%.  Was I busting in the 19th-32nd bracket with reasonable hands?

ABSOLUTELY YES.  In those 18 finishes I was all in with the best hand TWELVE out of the eighteen times.  Over 66% of the time I busted sucked out and was really pissed off.  Furthermore, one of the times I was a coin-flip, once I was a slight dog.  And 4 out of those 18 finishes I was dominated.  Sometimes you're going to be dominated so you have to expect this.  Looking back A4< A8 when stealing the blind all in, A9<AA with a low stack push,  QKs < AQ trying to steal one guy off a blind, and JJ < AA all in pre. 

Oh and by the way stealing blinds in these formats is about as risky as deciding to settle around Maryland even know a winter is looming that could decimate half your population.  It's risky, but necessary.  Sure the natives could come through and bail your unprepared foolish ass out, but fuck if you REALLY know what they are doing in those woods anyways.  You may not even see them until spring with your luck!

As for the 1st-18th finishing bracket, I had 19 results that fell within that range (1st place finish was excluded since that was the only tourney I didn't actually bust out).  3 out of those 19 finishes I was dominated (55<KK, 55< 10;10, 55<AA).  Note to self, stop playing 55 with 18 players left?  lol.  Also I was a slight dog 3 out of the 19, and had one coin-flip lost.  However, out of those 19 finishes I busted all in with the BEST HAND 13 out of 19 times.  That equates to me wanting to dive into the computer and kick the shit out of someone Matrix style 68% of the time.  This is the variance boiled down to the very core.  I should have busted in maybe 40% of these situations (5 losses out of the 13), busting 68% of the time here (nearly 9 losses) is ABSURD.  losing 5 out of these 13 really important situations would have been normal, not losing 9.  These 4 variance driven busts were a huge deal considering how deep I was.  I could have easily turned one into a top 4 finish so fuck off Poker Stars, you're horseshit.

The story of my last 117 tournaments played could be titled "devastating bubble finishes".  If I could have bumped more of the 13 finishes that fell under the 10th-18th bracket into the 1st-9th bracket this would be again; a very different post.

The next chart will look at my hand strength as I busted:

Hand when bust	Total	%
Best Hand	64	54.7%
Slight Underdog	22	18.8%
Dominated	20	17.1%
Coin Flips	11	9.4%

Overall 54.7% of the time I busted out with the best hand, 9.4% I couldn't win a coinflip, and 18.8% I was a slight dog and failed to improve.  This leads me to belive that about 83% of the time I busted out with reasonable holdings.  As for the 17.1% dominated, this does not seem like a high percentage to me.  It's hard to get away from hands like QQ< KK, or JJ < QQ, especially as you get deep, the blinds are huge, and you have to take down pots to survive.  Also there are times where you have to steal the blinds with holdings like A5+, then again they could be holding an AK in the blind.  So we are back again to the risk involved, yes EXACTLY like the settling in Maryland situation that humanity faced on this very soil not so long ago.  Also note I included hands where I was "dominated" but I did not include hands where I dominated the other person and lost.  I vividly remember a span of 10 tournaments when my QQ was all in pre and got smashed 3 consecutive times (by all ins 66, 66, and 67).  It's funny I don't remember winning shit when I'm dominated and down to 2 outs, but my opponents have no trouble turning that 2 outer.

It's a little demoralizing, but I think this post has brought some justification to my mind.  I laid everything out, and it confirms that I haven't just felt like I was running really bad; I really have been running like absolute shit the past week.  And beyond all the bullshit, I'm still up around $75 during that span.  So it's probably best the bury the hatchet and move on.  Though it's troublesome, because if I take out the 1st place finish and have another week like that I am in a world of hurt.  

I may adjust to playing only 4 tables at once.  This will equate to very close to 2% of my bankroll being in play at any given time.  Though I now know money can still fly really fast when playing format, it is not for the weak-hearted.  I really don't think I have been playing poorly, I just can't catch a break to save my life.  Also I am new to this format.  Hopefully I have somewhat improved over the last 120 games played straight.  I would almost deposit money into the site rather than go back to playing the mind-numbing low limit hold-em cash games on Stars.  Perhaps a DIFFERENT site.

A lot of break-downs were posted above, but I'm still really not sure what constitutes "normal" results for this format.  I'm just trying to feel things out based on my playing ability, and the above break-downs help me put everything in perspective.  Finishing within the top 32 places 32.5% of the time sounds decent to me though.  Please correct me if someone has massive playing experience on this format and knows that finsihing in the top thirty-two 32.5% of the time is BAD.

I want to battle through this variance storm, but I fear the storm could destroy me before that ever happens.

I haven't really thought about online pokers place in my life when I move to Vegas.  I want to keep a bankroll, but I want over 90% of my investments going to live play.  Live is where my heart is at, it is where I have excelled at over the last few years.  I don't like the idea of sitting in a basement 40 hours a week grinding away online, that really isn't me.  It would be nice to develop into a profitable player on 180 $12 turbos online to start, but that's obviously far away.

Anyways it's about 12:30 p.m and I haven't done an ounce of real work.  Tomorrow I had the honor of being invited a team dinner from 5p.m-8p.m.  It was marked "mandatory" and "please don't forward".  That's really funny a MANDATORY DINNER.  That's right "EAT WITH ME OR ELSE".  Great logic and all, but no thanks and fuck you.  I'm done acting like anyone actually gives a shit about anyone other than themselves at this place.  I could easily put on an act and show-face, but I'd rather not even bother anymore.  I am beyond the games.

Cool strategy though.  Maybe I should start assigning MANDATORY dinners with girls I really like.  Or I mean with girls that I WANT to like me.  I'm sure they will dig the shit out of that.  I'll also include "please don't forward this invite".

Cheers,

bag

Comments

[Laz]

Great analysis. If you can run this bad and still make a profit then that's got to be a good sign.

I think that, as you sort of mentioned near the end, it's also significant to look at the times that you weren't busted when the odds were against you...