The Difference

I was on a nice run for a little while, and it felt good, I have come back to earth a little bit lately. I can noticibly tell that I am no where near as focused as a I should be, the main reason is things have gotten hectic in my real life. With deadlines and high pressure situations it becomes very easy to fall into the trap where you job consumes everything you do, and that's where I have been the past several weeks. I played in a tournament at Hard Rock, and I played ok, but no where near the level I want to be at. This is a concept I refer to as "the difference", because it's where the line is drawn between amateur poker players and professionals. Let's look at my friend Adrian, he started achieving more success after he made the decision to quit his job, and stop going to school (I wouldn't recommend this for everyone of course),but it worked for him. He has the time to spend on poker because it's his job now, so he studies the game, analyzes his stats and plays a lot more, all of that has led to him becoming a much better player.

A lot of people don't have the ability to do that and be successful, in my case I really don't know to be honest. I feel I can be very successful at poker if I did it full time, but for my life it's not conducive at this point. I have to work, therefore work will inevitably interfere with poker from time to time. But on too more poker related things, I need to get out of this bad streak I am in it just seems nothing is going my way, and I am not making good decisions. Here are a few hands I have played during this period of mediocre play.

Hand #1:
Blinds: 25/50
I am UTG with I limp into the pot. Two players call the BB, the flop comes I check, seat 5 folds, seat 7 bets $200, the BB folds, I call thinking he has a K and if I hit my flush I can win a nice sized pot. The next card is a I check (hoping to conceal the flush) Seat 7 bets $200, I call. The River brings I check, and Seat 7 bets $600, I call and he shows and I lose over $1000 chips. This was a total bonehead play on my part, and I paid dearly for it. I was attempting to be crafty, and the minute I do that the ship takes on water and sinks.

Hand #2
I am UTG and I am dealt I decide to limp in order to see a flop and see if I hit a set other wise I figure I would be done with the hand. Clover is to my right in the BB, the jackal is to my immediate left. The Jackal limps, one more player limps, the button raises to $300 (the button player is very tight and easily bet out of pots), the small blind calls, Clover calls, I call, the jackal goes all in for his last $1200 (sqeeze play) everyone folds until it gets to Clover who thinks for a long time and calls (he only called because of the Jackals history of playing garbage), I look down at my hand and know that it's going to be tough to win this pot if I call, but I had over $3300 chips and it was basically $1050 for me to win a pot of over $4000, I knew I was ahead, but they had overs I was sure of it. But I decided to call for the chance to win a huge pot and make me the chip leader.

Clover had me covered, so we had a side pot that could develop. The flop comes:



Clover thinks for a while and just checks, I thought about pushing all-in and hoping Clover would call without hitting his hand and I could have the side pot just in case I lost to the Jackal, but I just checked.

The turn brings:



Clover: Checks
I checked again

The River brings:



Clover: Checks
I check

Clover turns over:


and

The jackal turns over:



So he wins the pot with Trip 7's


These 2 hands are just a few examples of the bad decisions I have been making as of late, I have taken several days off from poker to get my head together. I hope taking a little break will bring the synergy back to my game. Have a Poker tourney tomorrow night, so I am hoping I can start playing better.