Concerned in Colorado

[Skinnypete13]

I've never posted on this site before, but it seems like it's a really informative and well put-together site. But anyways, I need to set this post up with some background information...

First, I recently turned twenty one, but have been a semi-professional player here in colorado since I was seventeen, playing in home games and underground casinos. About six months ago, I decided to try to make extra income playing online. I didn't know how potentially lucrative PokerStars could be, so I pretty much dedicate most of my poker playing to online, rarely playing in casino's, even since I turned twenty one...But here's where I need some advice. I started playing sit n' go's online, being pretty successful. I played two thousand or so 9-handed turbo's, sustaining an average ROI of about 17%. Then I decided to try cash games. I grew up mainly playing tournaments, but occasionally playing cash games, but for the most part I was relatively new to them. I've recorded around 90,000 cash game hands on PokerTracker. After about 75,000 hands, I had a win rate of 3.2 BB/100 hands, but I recently have been on a downswing that has reduced my BB/100 all the way down to 1.9. So my question to some of you much more experienced players is, how should I calculate and regard my BB/100 hands? Should I realistically expect my win rate to return to what it was after 75,000 hands, or is where it's at after 90,000 hands a more realistic stat? Or should I pay little to no attention to the fluctuations in my win rate at all and just keep playing? Is this kind of swing common for professional internet players or is this an abnormally large downswing?

Also, I always multi-table twelve tables when I play cash games, so I would have to assume that this would be cause for larger swings. Should it be pretty safe to assume that I'm a long-term online winner after 90,000 hands and a profit between 1.9 and 3.2 BB/100 hands, or is this still too small of a sample?

...I know some of my questions are far too situational to be concretely answered, but any advice that anyone could give me would be much appreciated. I'm sorry for the lengthiness of this post, but I'm just kind of in a state of flux and could really use some advice from fellow pro's.

Thanks,
Nich K.

[taz115]

In general, you have a pretty decent sample size after both 75k and 90k hands. Certainly enough to say that you are statistically a winning player.

15k hand downswings are a bit long but certainly not unheard of... I know of players that I respect very much saying that they are confident they were on downswings longer than that.

The problem with assessing the severity of a downswing or estimating your true earn rate as you are asking about is that any statistical method of doing so assumes that everything is constant... your ability, your actualy play, your opponents play ect.

You have likely improved after playing 90k hands. You may just be running really badly this past 15k hands and you might be able to expect to return to 3BB/100 after playing 1M more hands. But you could also be playing poorly, or slightly poorly as result of running bad, or your opponents could be improving or a combination of all of these factors could be present.

So the real answer is it depends

If everything was equal I'd say that your overall earn rate is likely to rise back up over time but everything is certainly not equal, ever. The games online in general are getting tougher and that may be a major factor for you. A players ability is always changing, sometimes improving and sometimes making more mistakes.

So, to perhaps offer advice that may have an actual impact on your game tell us what games your playing, what limits, whether or not you have moved up in limits over the 90k hands, your earn rate over the past 15k hands.

Also, welcome to ITH! I think you'll like it.

taz115

[mchilger]

Hi Skinny, welcome to the Forum. I'm not sure what earn rates are expected in NL cash games. Someone on here might be able to provide typical ranges of good to advanced players. I'd find that out to determine if your earn rate is close to what you might expect. I was a victim myself of running really hot online when I started and then my results fell back in line with what is expected (even after my game was improving).

It's possible you were running really good the first 75K hands, and are now running really bad. For sure, there is still a decent amount of fluctuation in your earn rate even after 75K hands.

Matthew

[Skinnypete13]

I started playing nine-handed NL and PL ring games at the .50/1 limit and moved up to 1/2 when I doubled my bankroll. I've played about an equal number of hands at both limits. I had a short stint at 2/4, but when I lost down to my base bankroll for 1/2, I dropped back down to the1/2 limit. I keep a constant bankroll of atleast twenty max buy-in's and I send myself a paycheck each week which is a certain percentage of my week's winnings.

I really appreciate the advice that you gave me Taz and I'll keep pluggin it away at the tables. Hearing some sound advice is alwyays good to keep your head on straight and not tilting off all your money at the table, so thanks again.

-Nich