***Official November Chat Thread: The Golden Duck***

[KurtSF]

Thanks in advance for listening. The hand:

One limper to me on the button with Q[img]/images/graemlins/club.gif[/img]J[img]/images/graemlins/club.gif[/img] and I raise to 4bb, limper calls. Flop comes 9[img]/images/graemlins/club.gif[/img]T[img]/images/graemlins/club.gif[/img] and a blank. A check, and I fire a 3/4 pot c-bet which gets called. Pot is $10 and the turn comes a blank. Check to me and I check behind. River is another blank, and the limp-caller checks to me. He's now checked to me 3 times... he's got nothing. I fire $6, villain thinks for a second, then calls and turns up KJo, unimproved.

I say "awesome call". He says "You bluff to much". I make a note on him that he thinks I'm always bluffing, and think no more of it.

But I can't get it out of my head! My game has fallen apart over it!

I proceed to run ice cold for a long time. Seriously, I've rarely seen anything like it. I can't remember the last time I won with AA, I can't remember the last time I got any action with KK (oh yeah, it was when I stacked off to a set on the flop), every flop I whiff gets called or raised, and $0 goes into any pot that I make any sort of hand. 3-outers, 5-outers, and 2-outers hitting against me are the norm. I can see the cards before they come now (A[img]/images/graemlins/club.gif[/img]K[img]/images/graemlins/club.gif[/img] all in on the turn against A[img]/images/graemlins/spade.gif[/img]Q[img]/images/graemlins/heart.gif[/img] on a A[img]/images/graemlins/heart.gif[/img]X[img]/images/graemlins/club.gif[/img]X[img]/images/graemlins/club.gif[/img]Xx board? Q[img]/images/graemlins/spade.gif[/img] ldo, says my brain. Oh, never mind, it came Q[img]/images/graemlins/diamond.gif[/img]) And just to twist the knife the only two big pots I HAVE won over the last 10k hands were ones where *I* sucked out. I've played a lot of hands in my time, and this run is truly something.

So I tighten up until it comes back. My 16/13/3 game had turned into 14/10/2. The lack of aggression is the worst. I feel like I have no FE anymore, *ever*... so I don't bet without the nuts and I calldown all comers when I have a hand. This is losing poker, and its starting to show. I used to bluff to much. Now I need to win a hand at showdown. Over the last 20k hands I'm down 5 BIs.

I know what you're thinking... 5 buyins? Thant's nothing! And you're right. I'd be the first to say it if it was someone else complaining. Heck, I took a 6 month hiatus from online poker and only returned in October, and in my first 3 days I was down 16 buyins, and I could just shrug that off. I was playing badly and I knew it, I put my game back together, and pulled out of it to end the month up online. It was, however, my first losing month in over a year, given that I bled money at live games in a combination of tilt and bad luck. Its so hard to say, because the sample sizes are so small but the dollar values are so big for live poker, but even though I'm on a live downswing, I consider it meh.

But of late, even though the $$ isn't "monumental", I can't get ANYTHING going. I feel like my cards are face up for everyone to see. I'm lost in every hand. I get no value. I suck out and I'm up a BI, but then 3k hands go by where I don't win a hand. Almost literally. And now I can't find "it" anymore. I feel like I haven't won in two months.

I *know* how to play this game. I've studied my ass off for years. I played hundreds and hundreds of thousands of hands. I get the maths. I've got a proven track record in the games I'm playing (where do you think all this money I'm losing came from?). I'm not being conceited when I say I have a great foundation in poker. But I've lost "it". I can see the pieces, but not the whole. Nothing fits together.

Frankly, I'm a wreck.