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My last post was all about looking for profitable situations to take a shot at a higher limit. If that post was a good “how to” for taking a shot this one should be titled “don’t try this at home”. As I stated last time I had no intentions of continuing the $200PL heads up games. I had taken my shot and was done with it.

However, I received some requests for a heads up video. I sat at a $50NL table for a while, but couldn’t get a video rolling as nobody would stay for more than a few minutes. Wanting to get a video up before I left MI I decided to jump to the $200PL HU tables for a bit, because I knew I could get a video in there. I played a guy there for about half an hour and we were even when he left. Someone else joined the table while I was checking to see how the video turned out (it ended up with no sound…so no video for another day or so), and I continued playing him while I waited.

This player was super hyper aggressive. Every pot was raised, close to 50% of the pots were reraised, and all his bets were pot sized. He wasn’t your average maniac, and actually a pretty good player. His style was one that I usually destroy, even if it is a bit of a roller coaster. I thought I was in for a pretty big pay day when I broke him in the first few minutes.

This is the point where taking a shot can go very very wrong. While I knew I had an edge vs. him he was a decent player and had an incredibly high variance style. That is exactly the type of situation you want to avoid when taking a shot. You want to be playing against soft money not someone who, even though you have an advantage, can cause huge swings in your bankroll.

It was a very odd match because almost every pot we played was huge. He would usually reraise me and fire out a pot bet on the flop. That meant pretty much every pot I played past the flop was $100+. I should have left after I broke him. I had just reached the bankroll to move up to $100NL and had no reason to take a risk. I guess I got greedy and everything went down hill from there. I have never had a session where everything went so bad all at the same time. We played for an about 750 hands, and I don’t think I made a single set the entire session. When I would flop a good hand the turn card would always kill my action. On many occasions I called a huge turn bet (pretty much an all in) with middle or bottom pair only to have his higher card hit on the river.

Before I knew it I was down 3 buy ins. I had to decide whether to continue in a game that I knew I had an edge in, or get out of the high variance game and take my loss. The fact that I was on such a bad streak blinded me from the correct move of getting out then. I started to mount a come back when I was dealt KJ. The pot was reraised (like almost all of them were) and the flop came JQJ. We got our money in and he showed AJ. This situation occurred a few more times when my come back was stopped by AA vs. KK, and him spiking a FH on my nut flush.

While I have never been in the cooler quite as much, I still have to give him some credit. He was a pretty good player and took advantage of his insane rush. I will try to get the HH log; it was really the most bizarre poker session of my life. I went broke for the last time when my pair and flush draw failed to improve vs. his AA. I ended down $1450 when the dust settled.

I felt like I played really well, but the point of this whole post is I never should have been in the situation in the first place. There is a time and a place for taking shots, and this was definitely not one of them. Hopefully these two posts give you a good perspective on the topic.

I wasn’t upset over the big loss. It’s happened before and will probably happen again. If you have never experienced something like this before the first time will shake your poker world. You will find yourself questioning your poker skill, asking why you are even playing. There is a lot to learn from incidents like this. You have to realize its part of the game, and correct any errors that led to it, whether it is tilt or bad game selection. Hopefully my incident will prepare you for your first poker disaster. It will come at some point, so be prepared to soften the blow. I'll post more about how this incident affects the project in my December review.

Bankroll: $2454
Hands Played this month: 25025
Bonus/rakeback this month: $520