2015-quartely goals

[MidwestTom]

Happy New Year All,

Coming into the new quarter I plan to switch things up a bit. I'll be playing with a higher chance ROR, shorter sessions, and most importantly I will be logging everything 100% precise and accurate. I created an excel sheet, as well as a Microsoft word document for the quarters of 2015, as well as a set of realistic goals that I want to achieve in these next 90 days.
Below I have detailed what I will be logging to keep everything precise and accurate.
Excel: Date, day of week, shift/time, duration of play, rated/NR, denomination, spread, travel fee’s, cash in, tipped, win/loss, and rules.
Microsoft word: I basically roughed in a 4 month calendar and have space for remarks like:
1/1/2014 Day Shift Dealers & Floor Supervisor Review

xLocation : DealerX ( Older, balding, heavy set guy) over paid me 3 times and also dealt to me after the cut card was out on a positive shoe ( I asked for one more hand while placing a $3 toke). DealerX (Black woman ) good penetration, also mispaid me once. DealerIX, terrible pen, very fast dealer, had an attitude because I had over 8x’s my buy in in front of me and was only toking $1 chips/ Bad attitude, bad pen. Avoid by all costs.
XLocation ( same as above): Floor Supervisors. Didn’t notice any notable heat from floor supervisors. One older, blonde hair lady gave a comment of “you sure know how to play. I commented back very lightly and told her a Dealer the other night was teaching me the book” . Floor Supervisor asked me more than 3x’s if I wanted a players card for “free play and comps” I denied .
Extra: Security podium did not copy my ID, nor did they scan it into any computer. Flew under the radar, colored up $4900 and cage didn’t ask for any type of ID. Over tipped.

Quarterly notes/ goals to success:
-Precise, detail oriented logs
-no sessions more than 6 shoes or 120 minutes.
-Maintain a quarter level of play
-Log 45-62 sessions in 90 days.
-Win over 70% of sessions.
-Utilize all *playable*casinos in a rotating pattern within 130 mile trip 1-way.
-After a 3k+ win stay away from that shift for 28 days if playing rated, 14 if NR.
-do not exceed 1% tipping from earned income this quarter.
-no plopping out of frustration
-Play at 3-6 new places
-Make 12k. GOAL!!
I want to abide by every note listed above these next 90 days to get my projected goal. I have several other notes/goals that I didn’t mention for obvious reasons. I just want to know some of you guys notes/goals either annually, quarterly, or however you track your progress as an AP, doesn’t matter if you play full time, or just for a little extra income.
I will note; I am not playing BJ full time. I am currently working Full time, as well as managing a whole separate business, and squeezing blackjack in between everything else. Feel free to ask me any questions, as well as share your reply. We’re all on this site for a similar reason; let’s reach our goals as well as expand our knowledge together!

-Tom

[muckz]

Winning > 70% of sessions is unrealistic. For a game with a score of 100, you have ~55% of a result > 0, ~54% for a score of 50.

While your intentions may be good, this post does nothing to help you in the long run.

[bigplayer]

Goals for first quarter

1. To play 200 hours (Start 1200 Shoes)
2. To earn $30,000 in net EV
3. Play only good games.

[MidwestTom]

Winning > 70% of sessions is unrealistic. For a game with a score of 100, you have ~55% of a result > 0, ~54% for a score of 50.

While your intentions may be good, this post does nothing to help you in the long run.

Thanks for the reply Muckz. From June-December I played 106 sessions, and won 71 of them, which is about 66.9%. However, the results were very different from March to May (2nd quarter) . Although I was playing at a red level, I maintained to win ALOT more sessions then I lost the 2nd half of 2014 (June-Dec). I will also note that of the 71 winning sessions, 17 of those that I won were less than $150. I'm coming off of a 67% w/l ratio in the 2nd half of 2014 and looking to increase that number to 70%. Is it possible? I don't know, all I know is in 2015 I'm at 100% considering I've only logged one session and it's a winning one . Back on the tables here in about 3 hours.

As for your last comment, I understand the post may do nothin to help me in the long run, but accurately logging information will give me more of a cushion to play only good games, as well as help me conquer my quarterly goals .

[MidwestTom]

Goals for first quarter

1. To play 200 hours (Start 1200 Shoes)
2. To earn $30,000 in net EV
3. Play only good games.

That's awesome BP, thanks for sharing .

[ZeeBabar]

Sessions won is a silly concept. Early on, I would play at a casino till I was ahead and thus had 80% success rate. Unless your sessions are consistently the same length, it is meaningless. For example, once, played at two casinos for an hour each, where I left after being ahead by $300 and $400 and then I found a juicy DD game but luck was not with me and I was down $700 after the first hour, down $1700 after two hours, kept playing for another 4 hours till I recovered my losses, left after getting ahead by $60. So, I had 100% success. If I broke the time down by hours played, I was down 4 of 8 hours that day but was 100% winner at all three casinos.

[Nikky_Flash]

tom , you've won 8 times over your buy in , in one session ? I'm still new , does this happen often ?

[MidwestTom]

tom , you've won 8 times over your buy in , in one session ? I'm still new , does this happen often ?

Maybe for some people. However, for me it's the biggest session that I've logged since keeping accurate results documented.

[mofungoo]

Outstanding goals bigplayer. I think it very important to point out those final three words in BP's #2 goal.....in net EV.

Although I didn't have time to respond to MidwestTom's initial post yesterday, I was concerned about a goal to win a certain amount of money in a small 'fixed' time frame like 3 months. You just can't control whether you will win or lose in such a small time frame. You are better off focusing on the EV and in the end (the end referring to a much larger sample size and time period), the results will take care of themselves.

Understanding this will put anyone well on their way to becoming an effective AP.

[Nikky_Flash]

Maybe for some people. However, for me it's the biggest session that I've logged since keeping accurate results documented.

wow , that's some serious positive swing !

[ZenKinG]

You're seriously overthinking your log. Keep it simple before you go crazy. The only things you should write in your log is day, shift played, hours played, win/loss amount, and any heat on that shift so you know when to return again on that particular shift. Don't worry about so many of those other little things you mentioned, because then you're just going to become overly paranoid and not even get hours in and when you do get hours in, they won't be efficient hours and can possibly negatively affect your EV.

And yes keep your sessions short as you mentioned, but don't rely on shoes played as you have said, but rather focus on how many times you've shown your spread or max bet. Once or twice and you should be out of there. Hit them hard and dash even if you lose every single one of your bets. If you win big and you're somehow attracting heat, get out and dont cash your chips, but rather come back another day to cash it out. GL

[muckz]

Beginners to record keeping might find this useful. May even help you stick to a plan. Requires some basic excel knowledge to format it to fit your needs. Detailed record keeping is integral to any successful business. If done right, you will hopefully never remorse about not recording enough.

[Exoter175]

You're seriously overthinking your log. Keep it simple before you go crazy. The only things you should write in your log is day, shift played, hours played, win/loss amount, and any heat on that shift so you know when to return again on that particular shift. Don't worry about so many of those other little things you mentioned, because then you're just going to become overly paranoid and not even get hours in and when you do get hours in, they won't be efficient hours and can possibly negatively affect your EV.

And yes keep your sessions short as you mentioned, but don't rely on shoes played as you have said, but rather focus on how many times you've shown your spread or max bet. Once or twice and you should be out of there. Hit them hard and dash even if you lose every single one of your bets. If you win big and you're somehow attracting heat, get out and dont cash your chips, but rather come back another day to cash it out. GL

There is absolutely NOTHING wrong with keeping detailed records about your play, in fact, the more detailed and precise you are about your records, the better off you'll be. There's just no way to "take away" from a well kept record book when the time to "jot it down" is truly negligible. But there certainly IS a takeaway for not keeping records, especially ones with "enough" details.

As for paranoia, I personally think if you, me, or anyone playing this game is even the least bit paranoid, then they should stop playing immediately. In order to be "good", truly "good" at this game in this day and age the way things are, you absolutely have to be confident about your game, and that game starts with preparation, and that preparation starts with scouting and detailed information gathering, something you can check back on those well documented notes you should have been taking all this time :P


As for me and my goals.

By the end of this 1/4, my goal is to have logged 850 hours, that's it. I don't have a $goal in mind as I know what I "should" make in the long run, I don't feel that I need to make many adjustments to my game at all, aside from maintaining appearances for covers' sake, I just need to put in the time.

So far in 2015 there have been 98 hours to the year (my time), I've played for 51 of them :P

Good cards to us all!