Monthly Stats + Thoughts on Losing

I wrote the post below a few weeks back and after a crappy losing month it seemed appropriate to post it now.


Stats for March: Party $2816 ( - $94 ) ,Stars $ 1194 ( - $366 ) Full Tilt $484 ( -$19)

Total $4491 ( - $479 for month)

I noticed Rosie includes a Stu Ungar quote at the top of her blog which says " I never want to be called a 'good loser'.Show me a good loser and I'll just show you a loser".It's a quote often used in sport and my first thought upon seeing it in a poker context was that Stu Ungar obviously never multi-tabled sngs! For me, being a good loser doesn't mean accepting long term losses and just carrying on regardless.It means being able to combine being highly competitive and totally focussed on winning, with the reality of dealing with the losing hands/sessions which are unavoidable due to the very nature of poker.You can't will yourself to win at poker, but you can will yourself to remain as unaffected as possible by the cruel ( and totally standard) variance we all endure on the virtual felt.

Being a bad loser in sporting terms usually means throwing temper tantrums,letting anger and frustration show and not being courteous to opponents.The main benefit of being a bad loser is that the loser shows that they care deeply about the a result or performance and act accordingly.Personally I don't think the traits of a bad loser are helpful to many players.I don't doubt that for some it probably helps to behave in this manner, ( to release steam) but in general I think being a good poker loser some of the time is essential to being a long term overall winner.

I notice when watching sng poker training vids that the pro's will usually mention they have another couple of games going in the background for when they go out of one of the games they are currently discussing.( they're usually 4 tabling).They're not being negative or defeatist by doing that.It's simply realistic to expect to crash out of 1 or 2 games when playing 4 at a time.

I wrote the paragraphs above before I attended the recent cup final against our rivals.In football there's a gentlemans agreement that if your player goes down injured ,the ball gets kicked out of play and returned to the team in possession after the injured player is dealt with.At the game a Rangers player was injured in the first half when we had the ball and our rivals failed to return the ball in the usual fashion after we put it out of play to allow treatment.

Fast forward to the last minute of extra time,we're 1-0 down,their diving Greek goes down like he'd been shot and their keeper kicks the ball out of play in line with their penalty box.Our so called Captain chose to give it straight back to them instead of taking the throw-in to a Gers player and trying to equalise.( of course they went up the park and got a penalty to end any hope of a comeback)

Some fans on the Gers forum I read reckon we're a team of sporting integrity and don't need to resort to bending unwritten rules.Personally when play them I think there should be no quarter given or asked and I felt so angry with Ferguson ( our captain) I could have killed another penguin!

Back to last night and my Stars doomswitch operator must have had an evening off.I only played 3 games ( 18 player $16's) and managed a 1st,2nd and a bubble finish.One 3rd place from 4 games at Party ( $22's) wasn't so good, but I didn't feel I was at my best there so I'll take it.

Pokey tonight and the s-man is visiting tomorrow night....