I am back, but who knows who'll find this interesting...

So, I am emerging from the self-imposed seclusion for the purposes of conjuring up unreasonable numbers of pages related to poker, NASCAR, and Larry the Cable Guy. While Larry still needs some more time and attention, the other two are done, turned in, and on the back burner, at least for now. The poker one turned out better than I expected and I am hoping to whip it into shape to use with PhD apps and perhaps find a conference to present it at. The NASCAR one I had not given much thought to, but one of my fellow classmates is trying to organize a panel for a conference and she asked if I would be interested, so who know, maybe that one has a future too.

I know, I know, this is not particularly poker related. However, I give you that brief background in order to do what I am about to do next. While I like my poker paper, I still think there is plenty of room for improvement. That being said, I am going to post it in segments on here with the hope that some eager and conversational poker players stumble upon it and have something to add/contest/question. Or, at the very least, I can make my one reader, Danielle, feel as though there is a reason to keep coming back here and checking up on me.

So, I present to you the introduction section of my ethnographic research project:

Tapping the Glass
Metacommunication, Reflexive Language, and the Performance of Poker

Two men, regulars in their local poker game, were playing no limit hold ‘em poker and, as they were wont to do, became entangled in a hand together. When the fifth and final card, known as the river, was dealt, the first man made a large bet. The second man took his time before eventually making the call. As he began to slowly and deliberately count out enough chips to match the first man’s bet, he remained completely silent. The first man, realizing he had been caught in a bluff, threw his two cards face down into the pile of discards, conceding defeat. In most casinos and home games, the rule is once your cards hit the pile of discards (known as the muck), your hand is dead and you have forfeited your right to the pot, even if you had the best hand. The second man paused, looked at the first man, and turned his hand face up, revealing he had absolutely nothing either, not even a pair. While he may not have had a good hand, what the second player did possess was information about his opponent, in particular, his bad habit of voluntarily folding his cards when caught bluffing so he would not have to show his hand to the rest of the table, and he decided to take advantage of it.

This story, recalled to me by a player who witnessed the event, is just one of many which reiterate that no limit hold ‘em poker (NLHE) is, first and foremost, a game of information. As questions of legality arise around poker, both online and in brick and mortar establishments, poker lobbying groups, such as the Poker Players’ Alliance, continually describe NLHE as a game of skill rather than chance.[i] For poker players, the game is more comparable to chess than to blackjack. In his regular column for Bluff Magazine, professional player Justin Bonomo directly compared poker to chess noting, “poker is not a game of perfect information, unlike chess; and there is a seemingly infinite amount of complexity stemming from just the various types of opponents you will encounter, even disregarding game theory itself”.[ii] A player I interviewed within my own research alluded to this complexity as what draws him into the game, describing the joy he derives from dissecting people as, “the rush of all rushes”. As a result of this complexity and the ever-growing, ever-changing field of opponents, NLHE is a game that no one can ever truly master and there is always something more to learn.

Since poker is a game of imperfect information, playing NLHE becomes about obtaining more information than everyone else as well as sending out false or misleading information to your opponents. Sometimes this task is more complicated because the table is populated with players who have never played together seated beside players who have been in the same game together for years. The way a person plays a hand against an unknown opponent differs drastically from the way they would play a hand with their best friend. With so many factors influencing the outcome of an already competitive game, it is no surprise there is a general consensus among experienced players that one should not educate people who don’t grasp the basic concepts of poker. These bad players, labeled “donkeys” or “fish” are considered to be easy money and, with the proliferation of poker literature, online training websites, and televised poker, their numbers sometimes appear to be decreasing. Therefore, the regular players, referred to as “sharks”, try to bite their tongues when it comes to criticizing the play of the fish because they don’t want to aid in their improvement. The popular proverb that circulates amongst frustrated players who feel compelled to comment when a bad player gets lucky in a hand is, “don’t tap the glass…you’ll disturb the fish”.

Humoring the fish is but one of several aspects of the game of poker which extend beyond simply knowing what two cards you hold in your hand and how they relate to the five community cards in the middle of the table. I hope I have conveyed the importance of psychology in what is sometimes considered to be a purely mathematical game and, moreover, at least suggested the many ways in which performance plays a vital role in a player’s success. Using Richard Bauman’s definition of performance as, “the assumption of responsibility to an audience for a display of communicative competence”, in addition to his emphasis on performance as a distinctive frame for a communicative event, the performance of poker can be broken down in a variety of ways.[iii] One could posit each individual hand of NLHE as its own separate performance within the bigger performance of a single session of card playing. Or, if one considers the ways in which social roles are performed, these ideas can be carried away from the game itself and applied to a person’s entire career as a professional gambler. The ambiguous boundary of poker performance calls attention to the importance of perceiving each unique hand of cards as part of larger, overarching communicative events. As the story recalled earlier suggests, past performances frequently influence the aesthetics of current ones. Moreover, these past performances are often referenced directly through both repeated actions designed to harken back to past situations and verbal communication in which players position the hand in relation to their history with a particular player.

This referentiality at the poker table is not only common, but an expected and integral component of a live game. Players obtain and disseminate information in a variety of ways, but this reflexive language and metacommunication is a central element of a winning strategy. Before proceeding further, I want to define my use of the term metacommunication. In her work on metanarrative, Barbara Babcock defines metacommunication as, “any element of communication which calls attention to the speech event as a performance and to the relationship which obtains between the narrator and his audience vis-à-vis the narrative message”.[iv] Using this as an operational definition, players’ words as well as their non-verbal actions can be analyzed through the ways in which they position the narrative message, the participants, and the singular event within a larger performance. As a player becomes more skilled, they show a growing competence of this metacommunication while they are playing as well as when socializing within the poker community.

Harris Berger and Giovanna Del Negro have already suggested the need to study the reflexive capabilities of nonverbal communication in their work, “Bauman’s Verbal Art and the Social Organization of Attention”. In addition to a call for further research in nonverbal performance, they also suggest two other means by which the connection between reflexivity and performance can be explored: first, examinations of the creative possibilities within the interpretation of a performance and, most importantly, metacommunication’s influence on the aesthetics of performance. Berger and Del Negro’s overarching argument is an emphasis on this third approach, hoping to:
show that reflexive metacommentary by which a performer signals her awareness of herself as a participant in an interaction—and by which she signals her awareness of the audience’s attention to her—colors and informs all of the “primary” communication in the performance and plays a crucial role in the overall aesthetics of the event (67-68).[v]
Rather than conceiving of metacommunication as a supplemental component of a communicative event, the authors instead take up Roman Jakobson’s suggestion that metacommunication is a dimension within the event itself and inextricable from the performance as a whole.[vi]

Their ideas, rooted in the phenomenological work of Edmund Husserl, position our awareness of ourselves as subjects at the foundation of experience. Applying that framework to my own research, poker players perform this awareness through their metacommunicative behavior. By consistently referring to the subject position of themselves and their audience, players are “tapping the glass” and drawing attention to the fact that their opponents are not simply free floating individuals, but part of a larger social structure. Through my analysis of the ways in which players and card dealers utilize and stifle reflexive behavior at the table, I hope to take up Berger and Del Negro’s call to arms and explore how both verbal and nonverbal metacommunication influence the aesthetics of poker performance.

[i] Poker Players Alliance. 2007. 12 April 2008
<http://pokerplayersalliance.org/pdf/PPATalkingPoints.pdf >. The PPA provides a list of talking points for local lobbyists.
[ii] Bonomo, Justin. “The Evolution of Poker.” Bluff Magazine March 2008: p. 48
[iii] Bauman, Richard. Verbal Art as Performance. Long Grove, IL: Wavelan, 1977. p. 11
[iv] Babcock, Barbara. “The Story in the Story: Metanarration in Folk Narrative.” Verbal Art As Performance. Long Grove, IL: Wavelan, 1977. p. 66
[v] Berger, Harris and Del Negro, Giovanna. “Bauman’s Verbal Art and the Social Organization of Attention: The Role of Reflexivity in the Aesthetics of Performance.” Journal of American Folklore 115(455): 62-91.
[vi] Ibid. Berger and Del Negro were using ideas from Jakobson’s closing remarks in Style and Language (1960)

The only explanation I can think of? Alternate universe

I played at Argosy last night. It was, I am not kidding, no exaggeration, the worst table of limit poker I have ever encountered in my life. I was at the point of wanting to find the chimp that plays poker and starting up a game with him in an attempt to improve the quality of play.

I know, I know, we love the fish. Don't tap the glass. If you can't clean up at that table how do you ever expect to be a winning player? But again, I maintain, that I would rather play at the high stakes table in Bobby's Room, because at least I am dealing with human beings who don't make me wonder how they even remember to breath they are so ignorant. Not card ignorant. Just ignorant. There was a guy who would call the flop bet, someone would raise, we'd all call, then the guy would re-raise with......10 high. 10 hi. 10. Yeah. He can be the Donk of the Week this week.

While one would think this is easy money, I have a hard time putting 40 bucks into a pot with A high simply because the man I am playing against is batshit crazy and it might be good. I hope to God, if I can go to Vegas this summer, that i can try some 5/10 and play in a game that isn't full of people who confuse limit poker with video poker or roulette. We'll see....

A Good Laugh

I saw this on Pocket Fives today:

Annette_15:

Saying ppl are lucky is just an excuse for being a losing player.

For those of you non-poker playing readers (i.e. my token fan/friend Danielle), a brief explanation of who this Annette_15 is. She is a 19 year old from Norway who makes a ridiculous amount of money playing online poker. Many consider her to be one of the best online players around and she won last year's World Series of Poker Europe Main Event.

Let me first and foremost say that I think Annette Obrestad is a very talented player. I think it is great that she is a female getting some respect in the poker world more for her skill and ability than her gender. I wish I could play one eighth as well as she does. However, as someone who is NOT a losing player and DOES believe in luck, I think it bears mentioning that this girl runs like every hand of hers was touched by the fingers of Jesus Christ himself. I continuely watch her tables in awe of just how many times she gets it in with an underpair to and overpair and hits a set or runs out a flush. While I think the vast majority of her success can be credited to her skill, I cannot help but think that if she ran like Mike Matusow she would not blindly dismiss luck as a concept for losers. I hope Annette is around for the long haul, but I am curious to see how she will hold up when, and if, she ever hits the downside of that sick sick thing called variance.

Oh, and this is terrible, but I can't help myself. On some of the forums they compare Annette to Ann from AD, so let's see for ourselves:

Before I forget

I meant to post this when Mitch and I saw it last week, but apparently Chad "lilholdem954" Batista inexplicably started railing Alex "AJKHoosier1" Kamberis in an FTP tourney a couple of weeks ago. In addition to some hilarious and...er....grammatically questionable remarks on Batista's part, it raises a fascinating and potentially dramatic possibility":

The WSOP circuit event at Caesars Indiana is generally lacking in start power and entertainment. Don't get me wrong, New Albany pulls in more names that in should for being in the middle of podunk. Last year we had Scott Fischman, Barry Greenstein, Mimi Tran, and Men Nguyen to name some notable live players. We also frequently get paid visits by none other than....Chad Batista, who won the event a couple of years ago. If the name doesn't clue you in, Alex Kamberis lives in Bloomington. Granted, I have never seen Kamberis at Caesars Indiana and, last I checked, he has been travelling to the more prestigious events, but the only thing going on close to the Indiana circuit event is the EPT in Monte Carlo.

In case you are a lil slow on the uptake, what I am getting at is that it is ENTIRELY possible that we could see a lilholdem ajk showdown right here in my own backyard and home away from home. Hey-yo! Mitch and I can't wait and plan on bringing the popcorn in case our wildest online poker dreams comes true.

Finally.

Ending Balance: $800.23

Isn't it sad that it took a big win to bring me back to blogging? To be honest, I had grown so frustrated and disheartened with low limit poker that I felt like writing about it would only make me more frustrated. Mitch has suffered through a number of frustrated phone calls, most notably when I got it all in as a 90/10 favorite and lost 7 out of 9 times in a span of 3 hours.

To say I am not happy when my friends log big cashes would not be true. But to say that it was growing an eensy bit aggrevating to watch each and every one of my poker friends final table at at least one big tournament might be kinda true. What was I doing wrong? Their game seemed so similar to mine and they were having so much success when I was not. While my two big cashes today pale in comparison to Mitch, Brad, Brian, or Robinette, I still feel like I have finally joined the club.

I played a $5 MTT this afternoon just to have something to do while I researched for my paper on the computer. A few hours and 2700 people later, we were at the final table. At that point the blinds had been capped at 30k/60k, but with the exception of one person, we were all in shove mode. I was content to finish 7th for $378, literally doubling my bankroll plus some. After that, I decided to grab some dinner and play the 5:45 $10 Stud Hi/Lo. It is a much smaller field, ergo a much smaller prize pool, but I am really trying to work on my Stud8 game and wanted to take advantage of the opportunity. A couple of hours and 88 people later, we were at the final table. I finished 3rd after I got short in a boat over boat situation and getting it all in with a flush draw a pair and 4 to a low for an additional $132.

I fully realize these are meager in comparison to others, but to finally be in a position where I can play $10 and $12 sngs fairly regularly is HUGE for me and something I have been working towards for a year or so. I can only hope I will have some success at them, but I hear they aren't THAT much different from the $6, so here's hoping.

An Update from your Lazy Blogger

Starting Balance: $449.80

I have made some progress and the bulk of it is not from SNGs. I am beginning to think the bigger swings may be the result of shifting almost exclusively to $6 sngs instead of $3s, meaning the swings are going to look a bit more dramatic than before. That being said, I still think that I am faring better in the Limit cash games, both stud h/l and full ring hold em. I thought I liked 6-handed limit better, but at the limits I am playing at, it is too difficult for me to open up my hand range and not get overly frustrated with the suck outs. The 10 seated tables are much better suited for me.

I also feel as though I have been in the Limit zone as of late. My visits to the boat, I have logged almost exclusively $4/$8 sessions and the one time I sat down at $1/$2 NL, I really didn't feel the level of comfort I had at the other table. The next step is to give 5/10 with a full kill a shot, something I have been aspiring to do for some time. As for my limit play online, I have been sticking to 50 cent/$1, even though I am dying to play a little higher. I like to sit down with $20 at these tables, which means I have, at this moment, right around 22 buy-ins. Or, to think of it in terms of big bets, I have 449. I can't remember what the recommendation is for # of big bets/bankroll, but I would not be surprised if I am being kinda nitty about it. I have just worked so hard to build it back/up from nothing and putting the extra $100 on a while back made me feel like I was "cheating". Not to mention the fact I don't really have funds to spare for online play at the current juncture. Maybe if I have a big score someday, but until then, I will continue my nitty ways at the microstakes and hope things go my way more than they don't.

I'm Back....

Starting Balance: 374.08

Keep in mind this is AFTER I put another hundred dollars on Stars. Also, that upswing on Sharkscope? It got up a little higher and now has been completely eradicated. I am playing games back in my head, trying to determine what times of day I am more successful, changing up the types of games I am playing, but still, nothing.

Mitch was in town and tried to play online. He had kings run into aces a couple of times, took a few bad beats, ran bad in general, dropped 5 or 6 sngs and promptly determined he was never playing online poker in my room here in Bloomington again. The last weekend he was up here, he dropped just as much, if not more money. This is not a guy who is running bad in any sense of the word either. In the last two weeks he has racked up over $1000 dollars in SNG wins---he comes to Bloomington, all is kaput.

I also realized that my upswing coincided excatly with my visits between Georgetown and Bloomington. Back from Georgetown, things began to take a turn for the worst. But this is stupid, right? It doesn't matter where I am playing. If I am losing, I am doing something wrong. Or it is variance. I am tired of blaming it on variance though. Mitch scolded me for being so pessemistic, but I have honestly just decided I am not very good at this. I have played for 18 months and turned a profit of eleven dollars. My sng ROI is something like 6%, which isn't awful I guess, but no amount of grinding has gotten me above the $6 range.

There is a really interesting thread on PocketFives.com where they are discussing a similar situation as mine. The posters are making some valid points, but I still firmly believe my game (which is rooted in fold equity and table image) does not work nearly as well against new/wreckless players (read: donks) as it does with people who are more familiar with how to play the game. In his latest Pokerroad interview, Mike Matusow asserted the same thing. If a major tendency of online players is to never fold, it is a big problem for me. Moreover, Matusow also conteds that he runs bad. I try to avoid all-in show downs and coin flip situations because I am not a good racer. I have been getting better about getting it in in a 60/40 (with me on the 40 end) situation in late stages of tournaments because the blinds are so big, but I still don't love those situations.

Here is an example from real life as to why I have to disagree with the posters about playing against bad players or people who don't know the game well. In the year between living LA and starting grad school when I was in Lexington, I played in several weekly tournaments and home games. My two consistent games were an after hours cash game at a free poker league, which consisted of some crazy calling stations who were still very new to the game. The other came a little later on, after I had befriended a few more serious players who played cash at casinos, had major tournament cashes, and had taken me under their wing as a mentee.

In the after hours game, I was a consistent loser and my winning sessions were leaving with maybe $10 more than I started with in a $15 buy-in. I would raise with a premium pair and by the time it got back around to me, four people would be all in and I would be like, "well, I have kings, I call." They wouldn't hold. The end. I work very hard in my bigger games to isolate my opponents so there are fewer opportunities to suck out. Here, there were rarely hands where I wasn't in a multi-action pot, calculating the price to keep people out, and failing miserably.

In the other game. I only left down once or twice. I would usually at least double my $25 buy in, because they knew I was a snug, aggressive player and they would fold when I would price them out of the draws I put them on. There were a couple of fishies in each game, but they didn't overwhelm the table. I could isolate them and play heads-up. Not only did I make money, but this is where my game really developed and where I think I played some of my best poker because I felt challenged by the caliber of player around me. While they normally played higher stakes when they were at the casino, they still enjoyed the mental challenge of playing each other and chose to keep the stakes low so they could work on their game together without losing a big chunk of change.

Ultimately, I realize I am still working on the game....always will be. I am just wondering if $3 and $6 sngs are ever going to be a productive place for me to develop.