Variance and Online Poker
I was reading an article over at Pokerstarsblog.com, and the general thrust of the article is this: Why am i fairly profitable when i play Live poker, and generally not as profitable (or a losing player) when i play online poker?
The short answer to that question is this: you aren’t as good as you
think you are. That was enough to get me to read on….and comment
(note: i will reprint parts of the article, they will be in
italics…if you want to read thePokerstarsblog article, click here)..
First
things first. When figuring out if you’re a winning player or losing
player, having a good idea of what stakes you’re playing at, what your
monthly win/lose rate is and how much time are you committing to your
poker game are crucial.
Although poker is recreational for
me I take it very seriously and constantly work to improve my game. I
play live poker 8-10 hours a weekend and average close to $1200 a month
in earnings. It’s a good thing my live play brings home money since I
probably burn $400 a month online in about 8 hours a week play. So I
experience 1,000 live hands a month versus around 2,000 online.
So
this guy spends about as much time online playing poker as he does
playing live, and his win rate live is fairly good. Online however, he
sees roughly double the hands and loses 1/3 of the money he won to
online players. The reason for this is many fold, and that’s the meat
and potatoes of this article. Why is it that if all he did was play
live poker he’d be up $1200 in a 3 month period rather than down that
money?
More Hands = Ught Oh!
The common wisdom on
this is that by seeing double the hands in the same period of time the
true statistical nature of your game comes out…right out of your
profits. If you normally get caught throwing away some of your stack
to your live opponents with 7/8 suited, this happens far less live
(because of the fewer hands seen) and so you lose less money to that
donkey play. When you have multiple holes in your game, your online
losses will be significantly higher.
Distractions
We’ve
all done it…your wife is watching American Idol, the kids are playing
with something or other, and you just want to escape to online poker.
Nothing wrong with that…right?
I believe at the end of the
day it is because I don’t take it as seriously. Live, my focus is on
the game. I’m not much of a sports guy so there are usually no
distractions for me….I am never just playing poker online I am doing
work, writing email, have my kids on my lap, have my wife calling,
video editing, messing around onFacebook or CNN, watching TV, etc…
Very rarely just playing poker. In fact, as I write this I am playing
online. Sometimes I’ll catch myself watching poker on TV while playing
online and have to remind myself what an idiot I am concentrating on TV
games.
I think that paragraph is a good representation
of how powerful a distraction can be. It’s not only that you’re not
100% paying attention to the game, you’re actively doing something
else. “Oh, those cards aren’t that good, soi’ll just quickly check my facebook
/update my twitter/ finish getting that blowjob…whatever….more
cards will come any second.” While that’s true, there are a lot of
people who believe that there aren’t as many “tells” in online poker.
The reason is that people have so many distractions that they actively
aren’t looking for tells. Use the time when you’re not playing a hand
to see how your opponents play…you will pick up some pretty big tells.
Experimenting With Your Play
I
am a cowboy much more so online than live. Online I take many more
risks and push the boundaries of my creative play regularly. I treat my
money with less respect online since I play with smaller buy-ins than I
do live. It is, in a sense, now monopoly money. Sometimes I just have
much less patience and do stupid things.
This is
as self explanatory as it gets. If you aren’t respecting the $400
bucks you’re losing a week, of course you’re going to lose it. I dont
believe the “lower stakes = less respect for the buy in” or even that
lower stakes = more donkeys (even at the $200/400 tables there is
someone there that $50,000 means nothing to and will call your river
bluff), but if you defeat yourself before you even get on the table by
devaluing the money then you deserve to lose it. “oh, it’s only a $5
sit n go, and there is another one right here when i
lose”…yep..because you will lose.
There is a lot there to think about…….and now that i’m done writing that..i think i’ll fire up my online Pokerstars account… 
