Losing Streak

“Life is not a matter of holding good cards, but of playing a poor hand well.”  (Robert Louis Stevenson, 1850-1894)

Warning:  The following contains content suitable only for the mature poker player.

Since the beginning of the pandemic, I have been playing free online poker.  With over 20,000 players on my site, I worked my way up in rank to 62^nd place.  However, over the last 3 months I have lost about 20% of my winnings and have dropped down in the standings.  I need to figure out what’s happening.

The most convenient explanation is bad luck.  I remember quite a few hands where I had a big advantage going into the turn and river, but my opponent got a lucky card, and I lost a big stack of chips.  Blaming my losing streak on bad luck has a certain appeal.  I can rationalize how I’m still a good player, just on a run of bad luck . . . but then I will keep losing.  Alternately, I can succumb to the trap of superstition, seeking out amulets and charms in order to turn my bad luck into good luck . . . and keep losing.

I’ve toyed with a conspiracy-theory explanation.  Maybe the cards are not being dealt in a truly random manor but are in-fact rigged. Again, it's an explanation that protects my self-esteem.  I’m playing good poker.  I’m just the victim of an outside plot to set good players up for bad beats.

The more likely explanation for my recent losing streak is that I am now playing for higher stakes against more experienced and skilled opponents.  To win at poker you don’t have to be a great player, but you need to be better than the competition.

I’m sure that a poker pro, watching me for a few hours, could spot and correct some of the flaws in my game. Unfortunately, what I fear is happening is that skilled opponents are spotting and exploiting those very same flaws. Having no poker pro at my disposal, how do I turn losing back into winning?

I can start by being patient, trying not to win back all of my losses at once.  I will swallow my pride and, for a while, go back to the lower-stakes games.  I will seek answers to some fundamental questions. Did I size my bets properly? Did I keep losses to a minimum on my losing hands?  Did I win the most possible from my winning hands? Did I make foolish calls? Did I make good folds? How might I have better played the cards I was dealt?

With free on-line poker no real money is involved, and yet I put a fair amount of time and energy into thinking about the game I love. Poker is a game of probability, not certainty. It is an intriguing balance of luck and skill.  As in life, any of us, at any time, can get dealt a bad hand.  It’s not hard to play the good hands. But it takes skill and practice to play the poor hands well.

(addendum 3-31-23)  I have recovered my losses and then some.  I am currently in 48th place.