In Miami for Golf

After busting out of the LAPC, I took the next week off and am now once again sitting on an airplane, this time headed to Miami. I am going to meet up with some friend and play a little golf for the week. I have been playing pretty regularly on Full Tilt, and have been running fairly well. I have been playing mostly 6 handed PLO, anywhere from 5-10 to 25-50. I have been playing online for just over one year, and finally feel like I am getting the hang of it. One thing that has helped is accumulating notes on most of the regulars I play with, and just like live play being able to get a read on their tendencies. The other thing I have started to do is when I finish a session, to go back through the hand histories and think about how hands were played both by myself and my opponents. Trying to be as honest as possible about my play and where I might improve.

In tournament play you need to run decently to survive a large field multi-table event, but in cash games I believe that you can run below average and still have a winning session. Critically looking at the decisions you make in big situations is of paramount importance. In poker, as in many things in life, I believe in the chain of critical events theory. What this means that usually it's not one bad decision that gets you in trouble, but usually at least two and often times three. It goes like this; you wind up sitting in the back of a police car, after having been arrested for drunk driving and ask yourself, "how the hell did I get here?" Well it all started when you answered the phone and Layne Flack said "hey let's get some dinner, drinks, and women."

Well losing money in poker can go the same way. You haven't played a hand in a while and pick up J 7 suited in mid position and raise. You get a couple of callers and flop something like 789 with one of your suit. Well it's not all bad, a pair, a gutter-ball and a back door flush draw. You decide to make a continuation bet and get a caller. Now you get what I like to call the tease card, let's say the 3 of your suit, so you pick up a flush draw. You decide it's worth firing a second shell and your opponent calls, or even worse, raises you. The river is of course a brick and you try to convince yourself that your bottom pair might be good, or a river third shell bluff has some merit and you empty the clip. Of course you are called or raised and there goes your money.

So where did you go wrong in this hand? It all started when you looked at J7 and decided to play a marginal hand out of position. Once you are in it you can justify your way down the road, and you of course you remember when you played this hand a while back and the flop came JJ7 and you won a good pot. Each decision along the way can by itself look semi-reasonable, however when taken as a whole it is just one bad decision after another. By the way the Layne Flack phone call was fictional and just used for illustrative purposes, but hey it could have happened.

I am really looking forward to this golf trip. I'm going to seeing two of my closest friends whom I worked with in Atlanta at Emory Hospital. We are playing at Doral in Miami which is a great course. The PGA tour will be there later in the month, which should mean it is in great shape. We might hit Hard Rock in Miami for a little holdem one night. Hopefully I will get to see Noah Schwartz as well.


For more information on Roy Winston, you can visit his website: www.oraclepoker.net or send him an email. The contents presented herein on this blog are purely the opinions of Roy Winston, and are not intended to reflect or promote the opinions of any other person, group, or entity. If you like what I write than thanks for reading, and if not well, thanks anyway.