3 replies to this topic

[thakilla]

I am curious to know if anyone has read any good information or has any input on this topic:What are normal swings for a limit hold'em player? Is it normal to go on a 70 Big Bet down swing? I have been playing $5/10 and $10/20 online recently and I would like to do that for my job in the future, and I want to know what kind of losing periods can be expected without reason for too much concern. I started out great winning about $4,000 in the first 3-4 weeks (I know this cannot be expected all the time, this had to be an abnormal run of good cards), but over the last week or so I have lost $700-$800 playing almost all $5/10. Is this a normal swing? I know as a professional player you are going to have losing sessions, days, weeks, and maybe even months. However, I want to know what are the worst of the worst losing spells going to be? At what point should you show concern and maybe try moving down in limits until it starts improving? Basically, is a 70 Big Bet down swing pretty bad or can I expect worse? I know you should beat the game for 1-2 Big Bets/Hour, but how many hours or how many hands (probably a better measuring stick) do you have to play for the law of averages to work their magic? Would a great pro player ever have losing periods over a 5,000 hand stretch? If you any input I would really appreciate it. Feel free to email me @ pncruse@yahoo.com as I am not sure how often I will check this board especially as time passes and this post isn't as fresh

[copernicus]

on Poker, sorry I forget the name deals with this very well. As I recall his estimate at that 1 out of 100 expert level players (1-2 bb per hour and a reasonably tight standard deviation) will face a 2 year losing streak. Not that they will lose the entire 2 years, but still be net negative at the end of 2 years.A swing of 70 bb in a week of steady play doesnt sound large at all. If you ve been playing online at full tables, you are getting in 45+ hands an hour, paying 3 bbs an hour in blinds, playing about 8 other hands an hour for and average around 4 bbs per hand. So youre committing something on the order of 35 bbs per hour. If you played 4 hours a day for 7 days youve bet something like 900 big bets, with an expected profit of say 30. Depending on how tight you play the standard deviation on 900 big bets is going to exceed 70 a high percentage of the time. The Malmuth book has tables for this. If I can find it later I'll add some realistic numbers for standard deviation to this.

[Spidurman]

70 is nothing.....I've had worse. Of course most player's lifetimes are a long negative streak with occasional plusses.

[jogsxyz]

In a 9 or 10 player game the standard deviation is about 7 or 8 big bets per orbit. This is about 11 or 12 big bets per hour for a B&M game and about 16 or 17 big bets per hour for online.The sd is about the same for low limit games and middle limit games. While low limit games are wilder, middle limit games usually play more deals per hour.Assume you are one big bet per hour stronger than your opps in a B&M games. Break your playing time into 125 hour blocks. You should win about 5 out of 6 blocks. If we arbitrarily call 125 hours one month, on average you should win 10 months a year.