Bad Dog

I have a dog, a big dog. No, scratch that: I have a very, very big dog. She’s a bullmastiff and on a light day she weighs 120 pounds or so, all of it rock-hard muscle. On our morning walk, if she wants to go left… well, left is where we’re going to go. When she was a little puppy, we thought it was cute when she would look longingly up at the kitchen table, sniffing at us with sad puppy eyes and a wagging tail. I remember stealthily dropping a scrap or two down to her whenever we ate dinner. That “cuteness” stopped suddenly one day when we found our still growing adult-sized dog standing on top of the table one afternoon, finishing off what was supposed to be dinner for the family. You cannot imagine the amount of work it took to break this cute beast of the habit of begging at the table after that little episode

So, what the hell does this have to do with poker, you ask? A lot, actually. I am picking up some bad habits that are getting harder and harder to break. Call it success syndrome, if you will, as I’ve been on an incredible tournament run lately, moneying in 75% of the games I’ve played during the past week. As a result, I’m starting to do things and make plays I know I shouldn’t, but they’re paying off, which only makes me do even sillier things. Not good.

Yesterday, I played in a $2 SnG at lunchtime. My buddy Bret is in town, and he logged into the same game while sitting across from me at my office desk. He was immediately upstream of me and, knowing Bret, was certain to be stealing my blinds all afternoon if I let him. A few hands into the game, I was in the SB and Bret on the button. It folded around to him and he said something to the effect of “well, I suppose I should steal your blinds.” He then sighed and pushed in a 3x BB bet. Some little warning bell began ringing in the back of my brain, telling me that something was up. Weak means strong, and all that stuff that Caro talks about, I was thinking. He’s got a hand.

Unfortunately, I also had a hand. Ace Queen, to be exact, and I immediately re-raised Bret. The BB folded, and Bret made some feeble attempt at looking weak again… and then pushed all-in. Uh, oh, my subconscious was yelling, He’s got me beat! Get out! Instead, I called, telling myself that I was getting the right price to make the play (yeah, right). Bret, of course, turned up AA and I was a significant underdog…but, then I won the hand when the river filled in my gutshot straight draw. Can you say “ouch?” Bret sure could.

Bret, of course, was demoralized. My recent winning streak in SnG’s is matched only by his current losing streak. Having your pocket rockets cracked by AQ is a tough nut to swallow. Worse, I know I shouldn’t have made that all-in call, but I was rewarded for doing so. When I’m winning, I find I start taking more chances, playing a little more aggressively than I normally do, making questionable calls like this one. Intellectually, I know that being rewarded for bad behavior like this is going to bite me in the near-term future. But try telling that to my itchy trigger finger the next time I wake up to AQ in the SB and am faced with a “steal” attempt from someone I know is not bluffing.

Woof.

Moneyed in 2 of 2 SnG’s yesterday.
24-Hour Bankroll Change: +0.6%
All-in for now…
-Bug