My Poker Canary

Before playing poker online I always try to get in at least a short session on the PS2. I've found that this gives me a fairly reliable idea of how my luck is running. Am I in for a good day where all the cards fall my way? Or is it "one of those days" where nothing will go right for me and I'm better off not risking real money?

My virtual bankroll is acting as a canary down the poker mine shaft. If it sings sweetly then I know all is well. If it chokes, falls over and dies then bad luck is in the air.

This should, of course, be nonsense. My luck on the PS2 and my luck on PKR are totally independent. Yet (without having done a rigourous statistical analysis) I'm convinced it works. Why?

Because hot and cold streaks are real.

However they're about a lot more than just the cards. Much as I might hate to admit it, my cold streaks are largely my own fault even though they look like luck.

Poker hands rarely come down 7-2 off suit or pocket aces, they're usually somewhere in between. Deciding how to play a hand is a mixture of conscious analysis and subconscious "instinct" developed over many hours of play. Most decisions we make during the game are marginal - if our poker instinct is off then a hot streak can become a cold one very quickly. Maybe other players have more self-awareness than me, but in my case I know my brain often interprets a run of bad decisions as a run of bad beats.

So my cold streaks are real and what seems to me to be a frozen deck is often a clue that I'm not on form. I've learned to listen to my poker canary and either continue playing on the PS2 until it starts "singing" or give poker a miss for the day.

Labels: general, poker