You’ve Got That Leavin’ Feeling …
You may have noticed a few new faces hanging around these parts … We’ll be telling you more about our most recent friend-adds as soon as their criminal background checks come in clear. Donkey Bomber is, of course, Tom Schneider (high-stakes pro, PI-06 champion, WSOP final tableist, yadda yadda). For now, the story is that he lost a huge bet to me and was supposed to become my butler … but we renegotiated, and he’s becoming a blogger instead. And though he’s not yet aware of this responsibility, he is being charged with making me (and you) a better poker player.
Recently, Tom and I have been talking a lot about identifying the right time to leave a game. His “winning wisdom” rang true a couple weeks ago at the Batface homegame when I was up $100 at 12:30 when half the table (and more than two-thirds of the chips in play) were going home to their wives … only to finish down about $400 a few hours later. Also had to suffer the indignity of TBR telling me “I’m going to take all your chips” and succeeding.
Anyhow, the concept of identifying this “feeling” — and then acting on it — is starting to sink in. Here’s my report I sent Tom via email a few days ago after a less-than-dramatic bustout at one of my favorite local card rooms:
So I took note today … I was in a 2/5 game for $500. my stacks had dwindled below $300 when I first got the feeling that maybe I should leave. It wasn’t clear, but I took note that I was at least assessing the question. But I stayed … and it’s hard to tell you about a bad beat when I called a pre-flop raise of $20 with 48s … but anyhow, I got it all-in on the flop, and upon realizing I was ahead I did everything I could to look weak … I succeeded in getting him to call, and lo and behold he caught his 13-outer on the river.
Mathematically, over time, I played the specific hand and situation right. But on a more macro scale, it cost me $300 to set me up for the future.
Donkey Bomber says:
March 16th, 2007 at 2:38pm
You can go broke setting your self up for the future.
DanM says:
March 16th, 2007 at 2:49pm
I actually think my math might be off, too. I had 4d8d. He had 9c9s.
The flop came 4s-8s-7s.
On the plus side, I did leave only about 10 minutes after I began to think I should … I just did so without any money.
Tim B. says:
March 16th, 2007 at 3:40pm
equity win tie pots won pots tied
{ 8d4d }: 46.364% 46.36% 00.00% 459 0.00
{ 9c9s }: 53.636% 53.64% 00.00% 531 0.00
Donkey Bomber says:
March 16th, 2007 at 7:46pm
I think when you’re playing no-limit or pot limit, when one player is all-in, you ought to get in the practice of running the remaining cards out at least twice. Whether you are in the lead or behind, this practice lowers your variance substantially and makes your results less dependent upon one or two hands during the night. If you are a better player, which might be a big assumption in the case of Dan, you will most likely have your money in with the best of it. The more times you run the cards, the closer you get to the actual winning percentage anyway.
Scott Chaffin says:
March 19th, 2007 at 6:22am
A post on the mechanics and protocol of ‘running them twice’ would be helpful. I always hear that, but I’ve only ever seen it once.
Ed says:
March 19th, 2007 at 2:12pm
Here is a blog entry someone did with lots of words and some numbers. On it. Scroll down past the Insurance part. Not a lot out there with any details on how it can help or how it changes any numbers up for you.
Ed
Ed says:
March 19th, 2007 at 2:18pm
Tim B just sent me this link. It made my head hurt so it should be very helpful.
The Link Is Here
Scott Chaffin says:
March 19th, 2007 at 7:38pm
I just woke up from trying to read that mess. “Mechanics” and “protocol.” That’s what I was hoping for. A small arithmetical breakdown is helpful, but it needs to be in the dumb-sales-mule numbering system. That NASA stuff is too powerful.
Fresh Princess says:
March 19th, 2007 at 10:13pm
Insurance and dealing it twice is very common in Houston (at least in old school games).
Fresh Princess says:
March 19th, 2007 at 10:16pm
The other downside is insurance holds up the game. You have arguments about how many outs are left, the house has to come over and approve and there is always at least one player who needs the insurance play explained. On top of that you have players that will shove all their money in just so they can take the insurance.
Donkey Bomber says:
March 19th, 2007 at 10:38pm
Here is the answer so that you can stop reading all of this crap that most people don’t understand. Mathematcians rarely explain things so that I can understand them so I take an easier approach.
First of all, the reason that I told Dan to consider running it more than once is that it would lower his variance/swings during a poker session. That to me, is the main reason for running it more than once.
I didn’t say that it would change his expected value. His EV will remain the same no matter how many times he runs it, but keep in mind the key word “expected” If you run something one time you either win 100% or lose 100% of the time even though your EV is 25%.
Let’s say that you and your opponent turn your 2 cards face up on the table and the flop and turn have been dealt…one card to come. That makes 8 cards known and 44 cards unknown. Let’s say that you have 11 cards to win and your opponent 33. If you deal just one card, you will win 25% of the time, 11/44. However, that will never happen just dealing one card. You will either win or lose 100% of the time.
What would happen if you ran all 44 cards, you would win EXACTLY 25% of the time.
We play poker with the goal of getting our money in with the best EV. Let’s say that your opponent has just 1 out in 44 cards. I would like to run it 44 times, thus earning the wonderful EV postion I put myself in.
All of this said, I hope you can see how running more cards out will reduce your variance during a poker session. This concept is very helpful to people on short bankrolls. As for Dan, he was the favortie in the hand he wrote about, but he ended up leaving due to lack of funds. Had he run it 4 times, he might still be playing.