Hero calls [$0.06 USD]
Player7 shows [8, K ]
Hero shows [3, 3 ]
Player7 wins $3.02 USD from main pot
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I am currently trying to build my bankroll up from 50 dollars. I have managed to make about 30 dollars in two weeks, which I feel is slow. I am currently 3.5bb/100.
Anyway the situation above happens all too frequently. I start having doubts about my play and whether I am wrong to play that way.. I have a few other scenarios that I encountered that is similar to this. I am having huge doubts about myself. I look through many hands, and try to understand what goes wrong but the above-like scenario happens quite often, it wears me out. There are worse that this. How do i cope with this and is my betting size wrong? I am sure there is some kind of leak in my play. I get exploited by crazy maniacs like this all the time. Some of my friends told me to bet lighter and check more. But I feel that is too passive and weak. I mean when sometimes I am quite sure I have the nuts, shouldn't being aggressive an obvious thing to do?
Please give me advices, I am still a fish, thank you.

Btw, this is the stats of the player: VPIP: 53, PFR: 12, 3B: 3, AF: 1.5, Hands: 266

Nothing. Keep playing like this and you will eventually be paid off
Nl2 is crazy because many ppl call with everything because it's just 2 $....

wp.. it's NL2 and you got all youre monney in with a FH vs a passive line from Villan. Thats how you make money imo. Btw Villan had 4 out, means he had 8% to hit on the river, so this can never be -EV for you in the long run. Start accepting variance in poker.

It burns me out whenever I face situations like this. It is not only variance, but all these people. There are so many discussions on how to deal with fishes like that but I feel like I am the one being exploited by the fishes. When I get into a table, it is easy to identify the fishes(usually by the stats). But the swings are incredible. Sometimes I can be up more than 10 dollars because of the fish, but down by the same amount because of crazy suckouts(not coolers). I start to become weary of cards, and feel anxious whenever the turn and the river comes. Maybe I should learn better to deal with tilt, but it is exhausting to face situations like that.

again.. start accepting variance. If you make better decisions then your opponents you will win. Be prepared that it'll get even more swingy as you move up. 20 buy in down swings are nothing special these days.


also it's only for 10$.. you really need to work on that, because you will have to deal with waay bigger swings on higher limits obv. just accept it and keep playing optimal.

Idk why pll say that its w/p i think its an easy fold pre flop.

When I first started poker, I was highly repulsed by the idea of playing small pocket pairs in early position. But as I started to read books on poker as well as read through forums, they recommended playing small pocket pairs quite frequently as they are very well disguised if they connect with the board, and easy to throw away if there is nothing. So that is the reason why I raised UTG+2. I don't really like the idea of limping and then facing a raise from someone, because that would narrow down my hand range for the villain as well as receive little information about the villain's hand. I may be wrong. But I hope you can explain why it is an easy fold preflop so that I may understand your perspective as well as improve my game. Thank you!

I wouldn't say so, it depends how you create your preflop ranges.

I dont said that you should me limping that worst that open raise.
At first idk what books you are talking about but keep in mind that even good regs that right books 4-5 years ago looks like was wrong with a lot of concepts.
I just start playing few months fr but am sure that i cant opening EP hand like 22 and not losing $$.I mean even at nl2 that pll not 3 betting aggressive.

So i say fold pre cos:

There is many players to act after you and they can 3bet so you prob cant call.
If you get called you will play oop or ip vs strong range
Sometimes you will flop a set and will be hand to pay off cos you will be oop
Sometime you will be flop set and lost 100bb vs begger set,i know its not happent often but then its happening you lose 100bb
Also at nano you will be go a lot of time multi way oop so you will be x/f ton of flops that you miss.

Fwiw, this is more of a reason to open the hand pre than to fold it. More weaker players in the pot, higher chance of us getting paid when we hit. Plus opening 33 totally depends on the table and there's plenty of merits to do so. I definitely wouldn't say it's an easy fold pre.

Using Holdem Manager, I managed to understand my small pocket pairs(22~77) stats.
Netwon USD: $14.28
bb/100: 137.80
VPIP: 92.7
PFR: 63.2
3Bet: 8.7
WTSD%: 33.7
w$SD%: 51.6
From these stats, I can gather that Small Pocket pairs do supply me with a certain amount of profit(a healthy amount actually).
So i still don't understand why I shouldn't play them pre-flop.
Not saying you are wrong Noobis but I hope you can convince me so, or provide me with certain numerical statistics that will re-butt and prove my reasoning otherwise.

Yes i see,if you show profit opening these hands from EP on a fr game then dont listen to me and go ahead raise them.But keep you need huge sample and idk if you have it.
After 100k hands i see that i make money opening 22 but lose in the same spot with 55,so there is a variance fact that you should keep in mind.

Also Mzbourg imo when you open that hands you want be hu post flop and not multi imho!

Ah I understand what you mean now. As I filter to mid, I notice that I am losing money there. But in early positions, I am still making around 87.5bb/100. My stats tell me that in early position, I should play but in mid positions I should fold them, which is slightly strange. I guess it could be variance and it will balance out later on. Hmmm, it is still very interesting though. Opens up my mind to what I should consider when I am playing pocket pairs in different positions now. But overall, I like playing them since they give me big money when I hit the set.

If it`s profitable keep doing it in this situation. At 2nl players are bad enough that they will donate to you and make this an open pre if you have weak players behind.

The more you move up, the more you`ll be facing 3bets and not get paid as often, so you should definitely consider stronger ranges in EP.