Areas to improve.

Hi everyone. I'm new to cardschat, so I look foward to any feedback. Here are my stats over the last 2 months:

Year Month #H VPIP PFR 3Bet/F Steal/F AF CBet/F WSD/W


2010 10 10793 17 13 4/37 43/82 2.64 60/41 58/52


2010 11 7357 19 15 4/48 47/82 3.05 64/39 55/49

With these stats (which I presume to be good numbers) I have broke even/lost slightly. I know some people will tell me not to worry about stats so much and to just play my game. However, I feel that I am making good decisions at the table, and have taken some pretty bad beats. I play $6.50 turbo sit&go's, both 9 and 18 players, just so everyone knows. So my question is: Are there any stats I should probably be surprised by, and should look to change? Am I playing too aggressively? Should I try to get my VPIP around 20%. I appreciate any advice people have for me.

I'm new here too so others may have more advice. The numbers all look reasonable to me, but I think they're going to vary pretty widely even among winning players. Gus Hansen and Dan Harrington both make good money playing tournaments, but Hansen's VPIP/PFR numbers are going to be way higher than Harrington's, for example. I say just keep playing your style and try to get better at it. As long as you're not running 60/3 of course...

Yeah. I should rephrase my general question like this: Are there ideal numbers one would like to have playing these low stakes sit&go's? Not to sound cocky, but anytime I get online at this level, I feel confident that I am either the best or 2nd best person at the table, at least in terms of knowing when I should raise or fold pre-flop. I play very tight early, and gradually loosen up as the blinds increase. I feel like I get into a lot of favorable situations, and am perpetually smacked with bad beats.

If you're taking too many bad beats, is that a sign that you are playing too tightly, and perhaps you should loosen up so that you can dish out a few lucky blows of your own? First 10 minutes or so, I only play pretty much the top 5-7 hands, and I play them aggressively. By the time the blinds hit 200/400, I'm usually shoving anything with a positive EV (any 2 face cards, bigger suited connectors, any pp, etc...), as long as I'm not shoving into a maniac.

That's just a general outline. I always try to adjust to my opponents, but if anybody sees a problem with my logic, I'd be happy to hear why.

First-off, I'm a cash game player, so take my advice for what its worth. I briefly tried SNGs, but they just don't suit my game. Anyway, I find that if I try to artificially stretch or tighten my range just to reach some pre-specified numbers that my game usually suffers. I'd just stick to your game and let the numbers fall where they may.

As for the bad beats (again, don't know how much this applies to SNGs), I try to not let them get to me too much. I'd much prefer to get my money in good 100 times and take my chances than to get it in bad 100 times and hope for a suckout.

Definitely agree with Big Rudy. Try not to let the bad beats get you down. You'll dish them out from time to time too, but you don't want to start playing loosely in marginal or long-shot situations and hope to suck out. That's pretty clearly going to lose you money in the long run. Get your money in good, and if you lose, try to focus on whether or not your play was correct rather than the results.