Sofa King We Todd Did

Blogging is a Cooler

2012-01-12T13:05:00.001-08:00

GDammit. I should never post happy. I go play today and totally suck. I constantly went against my better judgement. Of course I did flop a boat in a capped pot and got 2 outtered and flopped top two with AK with a diamomd flush draw out there and lose to hearts. I was steamed but really it was just a bad decision day. My last hand I raised and got one call from a total assclown who I have played plenty with. This dude is a beauty. About 50 years old, half a head of longish hair, slicked straight back (a poor man's Pat Riley look), sporting the last members only jacket, always raising and going all the way with no pair. Classic picture of a degenerate loser. Of course Im raising with J10 but thats not usual for me. He called with Q6 which is very normal for him. The flop is Q82. I bet, he raises, I call. The turn is another 8. I check raise him. He calls. I miss the gutshot and bet anyway. He calls. Im actually not upset for two reasons: I got up and left instead of continueing to play bad, and I played it so bad that I doubt this dude will ever lay down against me again. If wouldve had anything other than a pure bluff there, I wouldve had him crushed with a better Q or over pair or an 8. What else can chkrz the turn there? So I think it was very good but expensive advertising. I shoulda known not to go play after I got a suicidal/drunk/save me/fuck you for not saving me call from someone I care about but cant do anything for last night. Plus me n my gf broke up 2 days ago. Hey at least my kid didnt cooler me today!

2012 is Lookin Swell

2012-01-12T00:36:00.001-08:00

F'n Tigers. Way to not show up for a game that if you win you could be considered one of the greatest teams of all time. I guess I should exclude the defense from my dissapointment but the offense and the coaching staff should all be flogged. I hope Lee told Les to go f himself after the game. I honestly wonder if the fix was in. I remember one play where Jefferson was sacked where the two offensive line men were staring at one defender and they both turned inside as he b-lined for Jefferson. Same guy who already had 2 false starts. Just sayin.

Poker is going well. It's limit so it never goes overly well but Im happy. Most hands go to show down and the trick is not putting yourself in a call down situation where you are likely dominated. Im definitely happy with my play in the no showdown hands. Thats really a big advantage when you can steal some. I think my advantage is patience preflop and knowing when and who to barrell bluff. There are enough tards limping in with weak aces that you can probably beat the time rake just by only playing good aces and pairs. There are also enough players who are too fucking creative for their own good. Like raising on the turn with middle pair to "see where they are at". Do it on the half priced flop if you must. I think you lose more over time popping the turn and getting repopped or called by a normal strength hand than the times you run out people who are over playing big over cards or are totally bluffing. The flop is where to figure out the hand or to 3 and 4 bet to keep the lead and represent big over pairs n such. Most of these players over use the flop raises though. Some of then do this and basically turn their big hands face up and lose value on the big bet streaks. Others over use it to see if they are up against a missed AK. I just see a lot of obvious tendencies in this game that are very exploitable. Funny thing is a lot of the worst offenders play in the higher stakes games. Maybe its like trying to apply middle stakes moves in the low limit games. I just hope this game doesnt turn to shit when the snowbirds go back north. Ooooo spring training is starting soon a I bet its gonna be nice action. People come here in droves to watch their teams practice and scrimege other teams. As if baseball isnt boring enough. I hope its like the year long bowling thing that fueled the best games at the Belle of Baton Rouge.

The monthly bounty tournament is Saturday. $235 entry and $100 per knockout. I like it. I can break even or make a couple hundo way before the money bubble. People call some seriously thin draws if they have a bounty shot too. It will probably work against me Saturday just because Im talking about it. Whatever. I havent played a tournament since November and I miss it. I miss no limit. Hell I enjoy the spread limit games when I sit in them waiting for my table assuming I get some hands. One thing about limit is you get to see a lot more flops. People can never put 6 times the big blind in to run you out. Of course thats why many people hate it too. Ok goodnight. Im gonna watch Anchorman for the 1027th time.

2000 Hands Down. I Think Im Gonna Be OK :P

2011-12-11T23:28:00.000-08:00

Dude I was just doing some tourney results checking and holy shit. Congrats to Wild Bill and GeneD for the great showing at the IP in Biloxi!!!! And Shack reg Frank who keeps pop'n out big finishes all year.

Well I've played a good bit of $20/$40 Fixed Limit now but not as much as I wanted to. I would say I have played about 2000 hands so far and broke even. I had my nice starting streak and then ran into a wall and then went on another streak. When I filter my results for $20/$40 its funny because I have 5 wins in a row then 5 losses in a row and then 7 wins in a row. My losses are bigger than my wins unfortunately. I havent really had a typically big win yet. I really feel like I am just getting comfortable with the game and the stakes. I have also been reading whatever material I can find like Johnnie Chan's Limit Cash game book and the Limit sections of Super System. There seem to be more calling stations and tricky bluffers in these games than balanced players so its definitely a good game. I left a game today because it was more tricky players and it was short handed and since I had somewhere to go in a couple hours I decided not to risk such a swing prone couple hours. I would hate to lose a few pots and then be late to my thing or not even go because Im determined to win back to even. That kind o f thinking sometimes gets you even or up but being in the chase your loss mode also drops my level of play often into full steam tilt. I look around at the terrible players who are getting lucky with 9,7 offsuit and think that it should be me this time. That's the kind of thinking I have avoided these last 7 sessions.

Some peoples in my circle are puzzled by this desire to play limit. They dont like not being able to protect their hands. I actually prefer it. Im so sick of trying to protect my big hands and get out flopped by J,7 suited or getting gutshot. NL is so much about traps and bluffs and to tell you the truth thats really not my strong suit. I have trouble with really aggressive players. They are usually better at reading me than I am them which is why they play such aggressive styles. My strong suit is patience. When I was playing online my VPIP/PFR was always good but I was always struggling to get my aggression factor up. In Limit I actually like the players who would rather bluff than check out. Usually I am playing passive against these guys which only encourages them to attempt moves. Often I have to pay off real hands but I feel like its a good strategy against them. By me looking like I dont want to play a big pot I make more than if I take the lead back from them. They are fairly used to these grumpy old men playing back at them and then getting to decide what to do. Maybe I will change my tune one day. I am pretty new to the game. It may take them sometime to exploit me back. But at this point I like having the ability to control the pot size. Strangely enough I dont seem to have the same attitude in tournaments. I think I have done well in tournaments overall. Now by tournaments I mean the 200 dollar nightlies. I dont play the bigger buyins. I have played in two $500 buyins and done nothing special but its really not enough to mention. Of course NL tournaments are totally different than cash games. The blinds going up really hurts the call to trap play since less people see the flop plus the no reload factor. They dont run many $200 tournaments here. They have a daily $60 which is full of landmines. Whatever. I have way enough on plate trying to grind out a win rate at this new Limit stake.

Moved Up. Yikes.

2011-10-26T17:12:00.001-07:00

Ahhhhh. My first losing session in a week. How I have missed the sweet stinch of defeat. I moved up to the 20/40 Limit game last week and won 5 in a row. No big wins but solid grinder wins. I didnt want to say anything to anyone until the streak was over. I didnt even call my poker advisor who I talked to right before moving up. Superstitous. I played shitty today. I caught nothing and chased with marginal hands and I paid people off on the river. It was bound to happen I guess. I need to take a break tomorrow and evaluate my play. I know Im not playing optimally but I had been playing well above average for the table. Not today though. I can see about 10 bad moves today. Mostly calling raises in the big blind. Its so damn tempting to get in for a discount and hope to flop big but I spew when I flop a piece. I missed a bet on the river in a half kill pot too by playing to timid with pair of aces with a good kicker. I have also cost myself by playing too tricky on 4th street a couple times. I think about once every session I have had to take a break and refocus after I loosened up preflop because I lost a pot. Overtime these leaks are going to kill me if I dont do something about them. I feel comfortable in the game though and see great potential for my regular game. And when ready there' a 40/80 game to move up to. It was getting so ridiculous in the 2/3 spread game and the 8/16 Limit game. I was losing my shit racking up and quitting and slamming my chair in because yet another pot was taken by a gutshot. That isnt happening in the 20/40. I think most of the money to be made is the old men who got sick of the same thing. I think they dont mind losing to hands that make sense. Maybe I will have a different perspective in a couple weeks though. Maybe Im running good and will eventually run average and bad and run my bankroll into oblivion. I heard them spreading a 10/20 spread limit game today. Maybe that will soften up the 3/5 game because right now it just looks tough. I can say without doubt that I can look at the age, race, gender, and clothing style of a table and have a good idea if its tough or not. See stereotypes make life easier!

Down Month

2011-09-13T11:02:00.000-07:00

Well hell. I dont want to go into all the poker I have played in the last month. I have felt very good about my game and very bad about poker in general. I have been very comfortable at the table and always feel like Im in the top 2 best players at the table but I havent had a card rush since July and have pretty much just been shit out on constantly. I always feel so lame saying it though. Nobody wants to hear it. They always think its a losers excuse. Sometimes I feel that way too. The last time I played I flopped broadway with Q,10 and got allin against 2 players and lost. The thing that sucks is I raised with Q,10 of clubs and AK smooth called which brought in A7 of hearts who ended up winning the hand. If AK reraises I either fold or play and either win a big pot or give up my $10. But instead he wants to see the flop with a couple more people apparently and we both get screwed. I rebought after going to lunch and calming down and when I came back I played a hand where I bluffed off like $200. I raised and called a 3 bet with pocket 2s against a pretty predictable player. The flop came K high and he only bet out like 40% of the pot after I checked to him. I read it as weak but didnt raise. He made the same bet on the turn and I knew he was scared then. I raised him from $25 to $70. He called. I put him in on the river for his last $80 and he called. He showed Queens. He said he didnt think I had a King because I didnt bet the flop. I guess I polarized my hand to either a set or a bluff by waiting until the turn to raise. I really think he thought he was beat and called anyway. He said screw it cause he was rebuying anyway. I guess I shouldve shoved the turn rather than trying to look like I wanted value. I couldve raised the flop big. I dont know. This hand is bothering me. I dont bluff like that alot and I have played a lot with this guy and he usually lays down to shit like that. Oh well.

Im hoping to make it to Baton Rouge soon and look forward to playing at the Tiger Den.

I Remember It Like It Was Interesting.....

2011-08-11T22:10:00.000-07:00

Went for a 3 hour session during the day today. I had my head screwed on straight. I wasnt worried about being down or up but rather trying to make good decisions. Good thing because I didnt drag a pot till I was down like $350. I picked up AQ of clubs my second hand and cbet a missed flop and then got bet into on the turn. I gave up. I played a lot of hands that were interesting to me. I made a few mistakes too. I raised a $6 straddle to $17 and the small blind, big blind and straddle all called. The flop was 9,8,2. I bet out $50 after 3 checks. I get called by the small blind and the other two fold. Then on the turn a six comes and the small blind open shoves. I only had $112 left and I was extremely confused by this guys smooth call with two players still to act and the flush and straight draws being out there. I figured if he had a made hand on the flop he would want to shut out the draws and then I figured if he hit his draw on the turn he wouldnt open shove even though it wouldve been the right play but this guy seemed like the type to check the nuts. I called. He had pocket Aces. I along with everyone else were simply baffled by how he played them. Oh well. I bought more chips. In fact I had to see the chip runner like 4 times in the first hour. After an hour and a half Im in the game for $600 with only $170 left on the table. I had one hand where I limped UTG with KK and the small made it $15 and big blind called and I made it $50 to go. He called. Big blind folded. Both my Kings are red. The flop comes all spades with an Ace. The guy bets out like $100. I just fold in disgust. I got pissy and called a raise with J5 of hearts from a tight old fuck who raised in early position. I flop a 5 on a low board. He bets out smallish so I call thinking he will check his AK on the turn. Well he bets smallish again on the turn. I just call now because fuck it. I river a J. He checks to me and I make him pay $40 more for his pocket Queens. Nice read self. I just see so many old dudes bet weak when they are weak. Any way that was the first pot I won with any meat in it. I coulda won a nice pot on the button but the flush hits the river and with 3 players to act behind the small blind bets out $60 into this $150 pot. I bet top pair on the button on the flop and got 3 calls. I checked behind on the turn. The guys shows us his bluff. Wow. He Showed another bluff a short while later. And I know he was betting anytime he couldnt win. He was a young too smart to fold kid. He came from another table with about $600. A while later Im in the BB with 77. This aggro bluffer kid limps UTG and about 4 more people come in. The flop is 9,3,2. I bet out like $15. He calls. the turn is a 6. I bet out $25. He pops it to $75. I just know he is floating me to bluff. I has raised me off two pots already. I took a good look at him. I got no feeling about his comfort level. But I know he doesnt have an over pair. He could have a 9 but I dont think he would raise there. There are 2 clubs out so he could have a flush draw but I didnt think so because I think he wouldve raised the flop with any flush or open str8 draw. Im just sure he is floating. I call and when another 3 hits the river I check and insta call his $90 river bet. He had Ace,4. Ship it you play happy fuck. Then I needled him a bit about having air and he explained his thinking and I explained that I knew what he was thinking and then he said in a pissy way "congratulations" and I said really happily "thanks". Its fun to go with your read even when its the torture chamber as long as you are right. My day was getting better now. This poor guy next to me got rivered 3 times in allin pots. Poker is hell. I end up winning a nice pot on my second to last hand before I had to go get my kid from school. Another bet happy kid ran his trip queens into my Queens full of Jacks. He folded the river to a $150 bet. The pot was about $300 and there was a one card straight I was hoping he had hit. Oh well. He thought a loooong time about calling me with just a Q and two Qs on the board. I shoulda bet $100. So I come close to losing $600 in my return and only lose $6. I walked feeling like I won ya know. Back tomorrow. The day game seems pretty sweet. A good mix of old retired dudes and young student maniacs. Basically the unemployed by choice.

Old Dude Hell. (Old People Love the Desert)

2011-08-10T18:14:00.000-07:00

Not much to report. I havent played in over a week. The last time I played I told this old man in my most serious angry voice that he was a fucking idiot. Not because of his play but his fucking drunk old mouth. His play was horrible too but he kept shitting out on people and then rubbing it in. He didnt shit out on me though. He was ahead when the money went in. In the 2/3 game he pops it from the button to $40. Ridiculous over raise. He had been doing it for the last hour. The last time he did it he ended up all in preflop with the small blind who had picked up KK. He had A8 and made a straight. And then got drunker and talked nonstop to the guy he just felted spitting all the while. The kid eventually moved to a new seat and gave up the great postion in favor of not getting spit in his eye. When he popped it to $40 on me, I woke up with KK. We were both deep stacked and I was very sure I would get it in on a non-Ace flop. I just called knowing he would cbet the flop. Well he did but only for $40. I had a small oh shit alarm go off in my head because I would think if he missed he wouldve made it $100. I dismissed my alarm and raised him and he raised me allin and I called. He flopped a set with his pocket 8s. Good for him. I rebuy and pray for another shot at him. It was way later when he decided to start talking about how he had all the money and how all we play are Aces and Kings and then bragged about how I had to rebuy with my KK or something like that and then I called him a fucking idiot in the most serious voice with a dead eyed fuck you stare. Later when he busted a girl who had QQ with his J6 after all the money went in preflop and then he sorta taunted her the kid next to him just told him he was being rude to her. Well he got all offended and then had the floor called and then the floor came and he asked for the floor manager. I found it really amusing since basically the drunk old man with all the money is gonna cry to the floor about how we called him rude after he was clearly rude to nearly everyone. The floor manager knew him by name and Im sure he has to talk him down from being upset every time he plays there. He was on the 20/40 limit list and i really thought about switching games once he got called over. I really hoped this old dude would punch me at the table when I told him what I thought about him. I would've hit a sweet lawsuit jackpot there. I ended up leaving later after this different fuckin old ass clown mucked a bad beat jackpot. I, another guy and the old dude had limped in and the big blind pushes in for $25. I call with like Jack high, the other guy calls, and the old dude mucks A,10. BB had QQ and the board comes 3 Aces and no card higher than ten. It was so fucking depressing I just left. I decided to take a poker vacation and do some book studying. I said I was going to read this Ed Miller book I have twice before i go back but I havent even got through it once and Im dying to go play. I think I will go play after I finish it and just try to read it again in the mean time. Ive got a lot of good mp3 poker stuff to listen to also that my buddy in Panama dropboxed me. I wish I knew a good coach for live low stakes here in Phoenix. I really want to improve my game and I think books and coaches are great tools. Even if it just reminds me to pay attention and not play friendly fit or fold poker.

Back from Vegas and Getting the Typical AZ Treatment

2011-07-30T00:16:00.000-07:00

Check out my pic above of the crazy people who repell from the top of the Stratosphere.

Well after my big 4th I went out 100th out of 860 in the $350 Deepstack at the Venetian. 20 out of the money. After that I learned how to play Pai Gow and had some fun for a couple days. I was driving back to Phoenix when the 2 mile high dust storm plowed the city (so I missed it). The day after I got back I played my tournament rush in the CAZ $140 nightly and never got a single hand. I pushed A10 hard cause it looked like the nutz. Actually I raised UTG and this chick didnt see my raise and limped in so she couldnt pull back the bet so she called the raise. How lucky am I. I flopped top pair and she flopped open ended. We got me all in and she turned the flush. Wake up bitch!!!!! I played a $50 tournament the other night and the blinds went up so damn fast that I was having to play all in steals within 4 rounds. My last hand I pushed in with 9,6 and lucky me the big blind called with K9. My cash games have been typical. Slowly losing while never ever having a high pair to play. I keep waiting for the curse of CAZ to be over but it just keeps coming. The Wild Horse Pass curse isnt much better because over there I get constantly 2 and 3 outtered on the river but at least Im in hands. Ive had a couple winning sessions and my loses have been around one buyin even when I played a 16 hour session in which I was very active. In fact I was 3 for three with 10,2 and each time I played them a different way. Once I over raised preflop and took it. Another time I limped and took it. And the third time I 3 bet the UTG internet star to take it. Of course I showed every one. I snapped off the same kid when he raised preflop from the button and triple barrelled an Ace high borad with his K,10 while I had pocket nines. I went with my read but by the river I felt the heat. He bet $45 into the river and the pot was over $100. I wouldve felt like $55 wouldve been a better amount. The $45 seemed pretty valueish. But I thought his body language was uncomfortable or maybe I just wanted to think that. I love crushing the kids who think they are so fucking smart. I actually tried a lot of stuff that session I dont normally mess with and I think it worked well. If I would have had average luck card wise that night I think I wouldve had a decent win. I was in a nice zone. Im watching the 7th season of HSP and watching Phil Galfond destroy the table with his crazy bluffs only to donk it off to Jonny Chan with a terrible hero call. The internet God may be one of those too smart to flod kids.

Day 1 in Vegas Get a 4th Place in the Nightly

2011-07-17T21:48:00.000-07:00

Drove out to Vegas last week for the WSOP. Not that I was hyped up to play any events. I just wanted to play some small tournaments and see all the WSOP hub bub. I did have a little inclination to play the last $1000 event until I ran into one of my Baton Rouge friends who is a dealer in the WSOP and he told me how bad the structure was and encouraged me to play the Deep Stacks at the Venetian. So any way I drive out there with the plan of parking in the Flamingo. Thats the plan. No other. Play a lot and take car baths. I did have a small hope that my friends Elvis and Lindsey would let me crash on their floor some. Elvis had offered some floor space back in Baton Rouge a month ago. I dont know why I didnt just Priceline a cheap room somewhere. The second to last time I came to Vegas I had no place to stay either. I was there 4 days and got 7 hours sleep in the middle of the trip after renting a bed from a friend who was there for a wedding. For some reaon I just like being alone in Vegas with nothing but a backpack. I think its funny that I look like a street person who isnt worth robbing but really Im walking around with a nice wad of cash.

I show up and immediately buy into a $125 satellite for the $1k. Super turbo SnG but I really felt shitty when I busted out just because the players some how managed to make all the wrong moves. Really the worst poker I've have ever been privy to. People with 6 big blinds limping in with KK in late position with limpers already in the pot. I never got any cards and went out like 6th.

Then I buy into the $185 6pm WSOP nightly. I have cashed in like 6 out of the last 7 nightlies Ive played but that really never makes me feel great about my chances going into the tournaments. I start with 10k in chips. The field is only 270ish. By the time we get to 125 players I have swung between 5k and 12k. Im sitting on 5k when Elvis comes over to see my stack. I pick up AA. Finally a monster. I double up. Then I get moved to another table. I catch a big pair or AK or something and win a pot with a big reraise preflop. So sitting on 15k now and I pick up KK in the small blind as Elvis comes to sweat me again. I really wanted him to stay if that was the luck he was bringing me. A couple people limp for like $800 and this really cute girl raises to like 3k. I reraise all in for like 12k more. All fold to her and she tanks. She is really taking forever and looking me all like she needs to get a read. I really want her to fold AQ so Im very much looking comfy as hell. She calls. Ok here we go. She turns over 98 of hearts. Huh? Thanks for the free chips honey. She went on monkey tilt after that and was out in a few hands. I go on a good preflop run catching big pairs and big cards in late position in unopened pots. I get my stack up to 70k. Then we break the table. I get to my new table and its has a good many wanna be stars. There are two types of players outside of ABC players these days. The old guys who are too dumb to fold and the young kids who are too smart to fold. The old guys litter my cash games and river me often but I love them. They tell you exactly what they have by their bet sizes. The young guys litter the tournaments and make move after move. I just trap them and hope their shenanigans dont get lucky on me. There was this star child (ipod, hoodie, hat, shades, scruffy little side burns and a face that doesnt do well in prison)who early in the tournament was raising constantly and calling reraises with anything and he had run his stack up huge. He liked to talk about his play and the reasons he was doing things. Where was he now? No where. As the blinds got bigger his moves worked less and eventually he torpedoed himself. Well this new table has some hyper aggro players that will always be pushing the margins way too much. Unfortunately I dont catch cards and I lose about 40% of my stack over the next few hours. Unfortunately trapping only works if you get cards so its not a very good strategy all the time. But patience usually pays off. I do make a few blind steals and get respect because I never play a hand. Eventually I make the money bubble with like 20 bb. I basically played super tight folding a ton of AJ and KQ to raises. I play sort of a Kill Phill strategy with some position steals mixed in. We got down to two table and I made some progress mostly from raising with AA and getting reraised by this supper loose aggressive chubby kid with a backwards hat and a New York accent who apparently thinks 77 is a three bet kinda hand against the tightest player at the table. After that I really dont remember what happened but I chipped up to like 270k. Then I get AJ in early position and raise to 30k. Blinds are like 5k/10k at this point. I have been folding these in early position all day. Most of these players havent seen that and chubby guy gives me a call and maybe one other. The flop comes like JJ10. I check. Mr NY bets about the pot. Other guy folds. I move in. He insta calls with pocket 8s. Really? Thanks again dude. Now Im one of the big stacks with like 8 players left. The rest of the tournament is lame. Blinds eat me up as I catch no playable hands. We get down to 4 handed and one of the two constant raisers in the SB open shoves into me in the BB. I have 88. This guy has been doing this with a super wide range. I call myself allin. I was hoping for a naked Ace or an under pair but he has K,10. Yes El Diablo as Monkey would say. That's really the bottom of his range there but unfortunately it plays well against my hand. I lose my first coin flip of the day and go out in 4th. The payout is $3300. I tip the dealers $100 and clear about $3k. Looking back Im super dissapointed about the coin flip and Im pretty upset that my cards were so dead that I didnt get a chance to use my stack. Maybe I shouldve bluffed a few more times but the big stacks were so active that I think I played it right.

So my Nightly Tournament success at these WSOP events continues. I like my strategy. I play super tight and super aggressive preflop. I play pretty aggressive in late position against the right blinds and antes. I usually dont have a big stack until after the money bubble when the chips start flying. Sometimes Im one of the people who barely make the bubble with chips and I go out pretty quick. And sometimes I move up or even make the chop. Maybe one day I will win one of these damn things.

Special thanks to Elvis for letting me come in at 8:30am an crash for a couple hours until the $350 Deep Stack at the Venetian. Oh and fyi if anyone is playing with Elvis just push in. He flopped like 5 sets in the cash game and never won a hand. Sick.

Bye Bye BR for a While

2011-07-03T14:42:00.001-07:00

My last poker night in Baton Rouge was at the Love Shack game thats no longer at the Love Shack. Its called the Tiger Den due to the LSU decor overkill which is really cool. I was kinda bummed that a lot of the people I wanted to see were in Vegas for the WSOP. So not only didnt I get to see them but the game was small. Well I guess thats not true. They were playing PLO when I got there and the maniacs were ridiculously deep stacked. Bob was sittin with like $1500 and GP was up a few buyins (for the moment). I sit with a measley $200. I fold for like 45 minutes. I never see a hand i want to raise or call a raise with. I finally see AA and one suited four. I limp. GP makes it $15 and gets 4 calls before it gets to me. I pot it for like $80 more. I get 4 calls. FML. I get out flopped by Bob who probably made $800 on the hand. So I fold along and see some flops and eventually put $200 in my stack. Well eventually I get Aces with one suited. This time I play it different. I limp to GP and he makes it 15 and gets callers and I just call. Flop is A,4,5. I get it all in against 2,3 and a flush drawing GP. I run it twice with GP but it doesnt matter cause the one timer won the top and scooped it. So that was it. I played about 3 hands and dumped it all. I shoulda rebought but I didnt feel like it. I went and played 4/8 limit and had a little fun. Pretty uneventful. Of course while write this Im sitting in the $350 tourney at the Venetian. Woot woot. Stay tuned.

Pissin People Off and Getting Pissed Myself in Baton Rouge

2011-06-13T11:35:00.001-07:00

I've been playing a shit ton at the Belle and the Shop. Im way up in the 2/5 game at the Belle but moderately down in the 4/8 limit game. I play limit when I dont feel like thinking too much. Maybe there's a corelation? Im down at the Shop too. Ive lost a couple hundy in the PLO and half n half. Ive busted out of all tournaments and I dropped $200 in the only strictly NLH game i played over there. That was a depressing game. I would flop the nut flush, play it shitty and never get there. My last hand I went All in with QJ against my buddy in the BB who raised it to $25 without looking at his cards. I only had like $40 total. He flips over A9 and then flops an Ace. I decided to leave since I couldn't beat a blind hand.

I had an interesting scenario come up when playing a big pot with a close friend. This is a friend who I had outside of poker but we do play small games all the time. Any Im the one who got him to start coming to the bigger game in Denham. Anyway the situation is that I raised big preflop and we both flopped big hands. I bet, he raised, I reraised, he called, then I shoved the turn. He called eventually and I felted him and he left. He texted me after upset that I didnt check it out after the flop. He claims he would have soft played me. I dont remember us ever soft playing and frankly I never soft play anyone. I see other people do it and I dont mind but then again I think I would rather people not do that. I think some people feel like its unfair to the other players who had put money in and then folded. I had actually played a pot the night before with a mutual friend who we play in the same small game with and I popped him for a big bet on the river after my air bluff turned into the nut straight on the river. He folded after thinking long. He asked me at the crawfish boil the next morning what I had and never seemed to suggest I shoulda soft played him and my buddy who I felted was there and he didnt seem to think I shouldnt have put the screws to him. Maybe he was just mad because the pot was so big and it sent him home when I busted him. I did feel bad it was him but I still dont think I shoulda played different. I didnt have the nuts and I played the hand super standard so he really could have assumed I wouldnt be bluffing him and he coulda laid his hand down. If he woulda hit his kicker on the river (which btw I agreed to run twice) I would have probably bitched at him a little for thinking I was trying bluff him big and for then sucking out on me. Oh well. I guess when we all play above our financial well being we tend to get a bit emotional when we lose.

I had an interesting had I'd like to throw out here too. Im at the 2/5 NL game at the Belle. Its the wee hours and the game is on the verge of dying. We are 5 or 6 handed. I make it $15 to go in the cutoff with AK. The button calls and then the big blind who is a crafty local reg makes it $40 total. I hollywood a little like Im trying decide if I wanna see a flop. Im really just deciding if I wanna raise. I think raising is probably the play if I had a read that this guy 3 bets a wide range in a short game. I didnt. He hadnt really been raising too much. He seem to over raise every now and then to pick up the limps. But I did know him to be a thinking player so I could just assume queens or better. So I decide to call. If I spike then I play it. I only had like 60 big blinds so if he crushes me then oh well. The flop is K,10, both are spades and random 4. He leads out for $60. I raise $100 on top leaving my self $125. He calls. This is the interesting part of the hand. He just calls. Why? The turn is a blank. He checks, I ship the rest, he calls. He has Q,J of spades. Open ended Royal flush draw. The river blanks. He asks me if I woulda called an open all in. I think yes because why would he open shove a better hand than mine? Anyway how didnt we get it in on the flop is the question. I woulda shipped it if I were him. But I think he played it better than I woulda. He knows he has to hit. He assumes I cant fold for $125 more. So why not just call. That way if he misses then maybe his smooth call will spook me and maybe I dont ship the turn and he gets a chance to save it if he can see the river for free. Im sure there are plenty of people who would figure out some hand to be scared of and would check behind on the turn. Never under estimate the bad play capability of thee other palyers. Plus Im not a reg so he could count on me to make mistakes kinda like when I didnt 4 bet him preflop with AK. :)

Ok well Im off to the Monday night tournament tonight. Im $150 down for this trip. Hope I can come up a lot tonight.

Frikin Belle of BR is a Circus of Idiots

2011-06-08T21:30:00.001-07:00

Holy f!#%ing shit. I sit down at the shit hole Belle of Baton Rouge to the 4/8 limit game. I see one flop and fold on my second hand. On my 3rd hand im utg with 99. I raise. Its the one position I like to raise with any strong hand other than AA or KK. I gets raised and then the little old asian lady in the sb reraises. I call. Flop is 984 rainbow. I bet 4 an it gets raised twice and I cap it. The turn is a 7. Now J,10 is the nuts. Little asian lady bets out. I raise. Other player folds. She calls. The river is a 10 making any J or 6 good. She bets out. I call. She flips A,J. WTF. FML. I ask her what fucking game she is playing and she she just smiles like she isnt sure if I ordered noodles or rice. The waitress asks me if I want a drink as Im getting up and I tell her get these mother fuckers a drink. I take my remaining $36 to the cage. In all honesty she probably saved me $36 by pissing me off enough to leave. Then I get in my car to leave and this car is behind me and wont move and another car is waiting the other way for my spot and I basically have to back out as if Im going to hit her car since laying on my horn didnt do the trick. That is the worst parking garage ever built. Some fucking 4/8 player must have designed it for a meal comp. Probably the same idiot who designed the elevators. Or maybe it was the idiot driving the golf cart full of people who just dumped their social security or welfare checks who almost ran over me because she doesnt think driving to side where people arent walking is a good idea. What a collection of fucking tards. Hurry up Pinnacle and dont hire anyone from the Belle except Dana, Terry, and Jack (the poker dealers).

Be Careful What You Wish For

2011-05-26T01:02:00.000-07:00

Im looking through the results for the New Orleans WSOP Circuit event and seeing a lot of Love Shackers. Most impressive is Lindsey's 1st place in the Ladies NLH event. Congrats!!! Looks like the Capt chopped one 2 ways also. I will see you guys in a couple weeks.

I had a couple of good sessions and then wiped out all my profit in one hand after a long 3rd session. I was trying to get in a big pot with this guy all night. He had done some really erratic shit all night. All in river bluff/show. 3 barreling pots but only betting like $10 into the $100 pot each time. He had played so bad I actually semi-scolded a lady who was giving him advice on how to play flush draws in the future. He had doubled me up earlier by calling my all in on the turn with his flush draw. He felted me later with some river suck out. I dont remember it now but it was pretty nasty. I think I had two pair and he rivered 2 pair. He actually was doing that a lot. He dumped at first but was on a rush and was probably up $800. So I rebought for $300 (the max). I made some progress. I was sitting with $450 in play which was even for the session. I had moved right behind him to get position on him. But this hand im in the SB so out of position with pocket 4s. I flop bottom set of 4s on a A,8,4 board. The only players are me and the guy Im gunning for. I bet. He calls. The turn is a 2 and it makes a flush possible. I bet. He calls. The river pairs Aces on the board. I bet $60 into about about an $90 pot. He min raises me. I debate on just calling to play it real safe but I think this guy is gonna dump here with a flush or even just trip Aces. I reraise $100 more. He pushes in. Fuck. I have $200 left. Fuck it. Call. He shows the nuts. A8. FML.

I played the $60 tournament again a couple weeks ago. I went out 24th. They were paying 15 spots. I never had a good stack. Played most of the time with 15 big blinds on average. This old man get chastising me and this other guy for shoving preflop even though we only had 10 to 15 big blinds. I guess we are supposed to raise 3 big blinds and then fold to the reraise. I snapped back at him once and the other guy chimed in. Probably dumb to engage him but whatever. My last hand I was moved to a new table (I had been moved about 5 times and it sucked). I shoved on the button with K4 and was called by the BB who had pocket 3s. I was ok with that until I missed and was sent packing. Oh well.

I played a few hours of 8/16 Limit today. Swung wildly and eventually cashed out for $210 profit. I got river fucked plenty and only river fucked someone maybe twice. It was a really soft game especially since the majority of players were Asians. Asians tend to be a lot wilder in my experience than this crew was. Playing aggressive was actually profitable for me in this game but like most limit games really to make good money you have to make good hands and dont be a pay off wizard.

Even Steven

2011-05-09T09:18:00.000-07:00

I played Thursday and Friday. Thursday morning I played 2/3 spread. I doubled up some old guy after I flopped top pair of Jacks with a big 9 kicker. I bet the flop and he called. When the turn gave me a flush draw I bet it again and he moved in. It wasnt much more. I missed and he had AJ. A lot of these old dudes dont raise preflop with their big aces. Shortly after I called a $10 raise on accident on the button. I thought the guy in the cut off raised as he had done often so I called. Then I see the raise came from an earlier position. I may have called anyway with my Q10 but still I have to admit I called because I had position on who I thought was the raiser and assumed I had a good hand vs his cut off raising range. Anywhoo I flopped top 2 pair and every one checked to me. I checked. Dangerous I realize but I didnt think I could get any action if I made a reasonable bet. The turn was a blank and the first guy bets out $15 into the $45 pot. The original raiser calls, the guy in the cut off folds and I raise it $40 more. The guy who was in the blinds calls and the original raiser folds. A king hits the river and he leads out all in. I call assuming I could be crushed but I played a half buyin so I could avoid big river mistakes so my stack to pot ratio was way low. Probably was a $50 call. The guy had a whopping Q8. What a dipshit. As it turns out the original raiser had K10 and would have rivered me. That hand put me up $60 and I decided to buy into the $65 11am tournament. I didnt last long. I raised with AK of hearts and got 4 calls and the flop was 2,3,5 with two hearts. I cbet and a guy I had covered went all-in. It was 2000ish more. I had 1000 already in the pot. The total pot was about 2700 so I was getting the right odds with just the flush draw plus I had a guy shot and two overs. Unfortunately he had a set so the King on the river didnt help me. I played my short stack for a while making about 3 successful all-in moves until the last one which was the only one I got any action on. Oh well. I didnt hate the way I played. I left. Later that day I went to the Wild Horse Pass casino and played the 1/2 $100 spread limit. Nothing interesting happened and I broke even again.

Friday I played 2/3 $300 spread limit for only a few hours. I bought in half stack for $150. Most of the other players were under $200. It was a passive table full of limpers. Mostly old dudes. I never caught any hands. I double up though when I flopped top pair with one of my blind hands and the turned two pair. I assume he had two pair also the way he reacted to my hand. Then I proceeded to bleed of chips through the blinds and occasionally a late position limp with a mediocre hand. When people did raise they were getting two callers so I didnt want to try to pop it with nothing to steal. I eventually put a short stack allin preflop with my AK vs his AQ. I lost on the river. I raised AK two more times and didnt even see a flop because these geniuses limp shove with their AA and then always show it. I had gone from $285 to about $60. I had somewhere to go so I was looking get it in. I wouldve rebought if I didnt have somewhere to be. I straddled on what I thought was my last hand and picked up the pot by shoving with my A4. I showed the 4. So I played another round. I played all the way back around to UTG and pulled AK of hearts. I decided to pull a limp shove. I limped and someone made a small raise to $8 and about 3 callers behind him so I shove and act like Im saying fuck it. Everyone folds to the big blind who calls. I think he called because I had showed that 4 the round before. He had KQ and I held up. It broke me dead even and i cashed out. So two days, two casinos, two cash games and a tournament and Im dead even. Considering the cards I had Im ok with that.

Poker Soul Crushed

2011-04-04T13:54:00.000-07:00

My poker soul is dead. I cant take the suck outs anymore. Not for my whole stack. I honestly dont think Im cut out for NL. Actually I think God has put the hoodoo on my game. One can not run as bad as me without divine intervention. Constant 2 and 3 outters after Im committed to the pot lets me know that Im being told something. But in all sincerity I admit I am not a great NL player. My game is waiting for people to make big mistakes. I grind and until I cam to AZ made a decent but small profit. But the next level of play Im not at. My use of fold equity is so bad. Thats another way of saying that I play scared. Im going to play the 8/16 Limit game with a kill button and Im going to play some tournaments. I have always done well in tournaments so maybe this will be the way and also anyone with a half a brain has an edge in limit. There's so many people willing to put in bad money with little hope to improve their hands. Also I dont tilt in limit and I dont go home agonizing about this play or that play or this card or that card. Its gradual and way less stressful. I can loose a few hundred in a limit game and I dont beat myself up on the way home and replay the hands as I try to fall asleep but I cant because the hands have me restless. Im coming back to BR in a couple days so when I come back here in a couple weeks I will have to make some decisions on what I want to do with my time. I have some ideas other than poker but I will still play. I know there's a winning formula for meeven if I drift back into a hobby player.

Trying a New Casino

2011-03-29T13:34:00.000-07:00

Well apparently the Love Shack is moving its game to the Shop. Sucks I didnt get to play a last session there. At least now we can cuss more. I said I was going to try a different casino but I had to give the lovely CAZ one more shot. I played about 5 premium hands for raises and reraises (all made by me) and cbet 4 out of those five. I lost every pot and basically doubled up 3 short stacks with nothing but the cbet. In two dealers I was down $430. Then my baby's momma called me and I had to go give my boy a stern talkin to and do homework with him. Then I went to find the other casino. Theytold me Gila Lakes and I punched the address into the GPS but ended up in the middle of an industrial zone in the desert. Apparently Gila Lakes is 3 casinos and none of them are at the address listed. I got some vague directions from the casino operator and then I asked a nice old couple at the light how to get to I-10 to Tuscon. They werent too sure either but told me which direction they thought it was. I would run into them again in 10 minutes at the casino parking garage. We had a good laugh. Buncha lost tourists we are, looking for the money hole in the desert.

So I made to Wild Horse Pass Casino. I signed up for a players card and they gave me $10 in free slot money. I quit slots but if it aint my money it dont count. I ran their $10 up to a $50 profitand cashed out. I took that as a sign of changing luck. After getting on a list for a 1/2 game with a $2 min bet and $100 max bet I called my girlfriend. As I was talking to her I realized I wasnt on a list but rather an Interest list. I went up to the counter and they actually had immediate seating for the game I came there to play. Its confusing how they present these spread limit games to you but it was still a 1/2 game but the min bet was $5 and the max was $250. So there was no limping in. It plays really nice. I really like that structure. Keeps some of the trash out and also seemed to get people open raising for higher. So $15 seemed to be a standard raise which got action. So my plan would be to play premium hands for big pots given the opening mistake of a 7.5 big blind raise with a wide range of hands. Honestly I dont remember much about the play. I came out $470 up which covered my earlier loss at CAZ. The game was pretty loose passive. So tight agressive should clean up in that game over time assuming that was a typical table.

Bout to Cut Somebody

2011-03-26T01:06:00.000-07:00

I been playing long sessions at Casino Arizona. Ive seen some of the worst poker ever. Mostly by the old timers who show up starting at 6am. I've decided that they have to be the luckiest assholes in the world. How else could they play every morning and never quit? They should all lose $500 a session. Im running like Schlep Rock though. I left the casino yesterday morning after basically just losing my shit and cussing out the old donkey that just stacked my AK with his K9 and while I was at it I cussed out the old fuck that decided to play me heads up for a healthy raise with his 8,4 vs my AA. I lost the min against the 8,4 but the money was already committed against Mr. K9 and the idiot who decided to draw at his flush against us both with very little left to go in on the river if he hit. As I watched him stack up $800 and realizing that wouldve brought me back to the middle I wanted to fucking cut the mother fucker. Anyway I took my $97 off the table before I did something to get banned. Earlier that morning I saw a dude who I seriously think was mentally ill or maybe had Assbergers pull $2000 of the table. He called my all-in preflop for $65 with 5,4 offsuit and flopped trip 4s. I saw him drag an $800 pot after calling a big flop bet with nothing to match his K2 of spades which he raised with preflop to 7 times the BB and proceed to runner runner the flush. This fuck couldnt miss. He went all in on every draw and won everytime. When he was putting his chips into his 4 racks he said he usually loses. Ya think? I think I'm going to go try a new casino just to get the bad juju off me. I hear theres a wild 1/2 game with a $5 bring in at a casino closer to my apartment. I will be back in Baton Rouge in a couple weeks and cant wait to see the various crews and splash around at the love shack.

Casino Arizona

2011-03-13T13:53:00.001-07:00

Oi vey. Im in Phoenix so I went to the Casino Arizona. Wow. The nicest poker room I've ever been to. The poker room was huge. They had as many table if not more than Harrrahs. I played 2/3 Spread limit with a $300 max bet and max buyin. I dont think you can buy up to the largest stack or half the largest stack which is the only thing I didnt like. There was plenty of weak players and the room was packed. I think this place may extend my poker vacation. See I havent worked in a month. I havent had an alarm set in a month. The longer I can keep that up the better. Im in Phoenix for a good while. I plan to try and make money with my career trade too but I also want to see if I can step my game up to consistently make poker money. That way I can travel home to BR when I want to and wont have to fill out an RFTO form which always makes me feel like a loser. It took me a while to adjust to the new levels and I went card dead too so Im starting out in the hole but I got it together the last 4 hours and made a come back. I also felt really comfortable with my reads which for the most part turned out correct. If I didnt get pissed and chase an extremely expensive flush draw I would be doing ok. Ive probably played 600 hands so far and not one pair of pocket aces yet. Once I get my own place and get a better schedule I will get into more specific hand play. I miss my home crew at the Love Shack. I hope I can play some Love Shack poker soon.

Got Dicked in the Omaha Nutz

2011-03-05T10:47:00.001-08:00

I got destroyed Monday night. Mostly my fault. I made a big bet into a multiway raised pot with a open end straight draw. I got reraised allin by a Jack high flush draw. I called. It wasnt a smart call. The Jack high held up. The cash game started as straight Omaha. I did ok. I got up like $400. Once again I broke Bob when he didnt hit any outs. Of course he cant miss forever and later he would double through me. I went to the felt when I flopped the nut flush draw in a raised pot. The flop put out a possible straight and a couple people checked to me and the original raiser was to act behind me. I was hoping he had AA. Nope. He had a big ole pair of 9s with which he poted preflop. So lucky for me he flopped top set and called figuring he was behind. Well once Bob was getting 2 to 1 he called too. I didnt improve and the set of nines held up on a board where its really hard not to have a straight. I have no clue what Bob was drawing to. Probably a worse flush. At some point we had started to play half n half and I think I played every pot if I had any playable hand. I rebought for $400 and was just playing passive fit or fold poker. My last hand I flopped a set and put about $90 in by the time the river made a straight possible and the out of position floater bets $100 into me. I shoulda called but I didnt. I definitely got bluffed. I cashed out immediately. I knew if I stayed I would lose that $300 and maybe another $800 after that. I had planned to play till morning but ended up leaving at 12:30am. Oh well. At least I didnt try a desperate run at recooping my $500 loss. I went home and did some review and reading and had to admit that Im still not playhing optimal omaha and need to study a lot more. If I follow through with that then maybe that ass whipping will end up being profittable. I should have some posts soon from playing in Phoenix AZ. I understand they dont have NL but have a $250 max bet spread limit game. Shouldnt play too different and may actually be better for me because I get too conservative when I get up a lot because I dont want a big stack maniac putting me to an $700 decision.

Everyones Playin Omaha

2011-02-26T12:57:00.001-08:00

I played Sunday night and Monday night. Both games were mostly Omaha. Sunday night I hit the Shop game. I bought in for $240 in PLO $1/$2. I was on life tilt due to relationship stuff. Anyway I sit in the Omaha game and we are 6 handed and the button straddle is on. That shrinks my buyin a bit but I role with it. Because Im on life tilt Im more willing to push the chips around and I think I was playing better Omaha than I had ever played. Of course at the same time Im playing terrible too but aggression even misguided is better than passivity in freakin Omaha. I lost some and bought up. I had $420 in the game and about $280 on the table. Then as luck would have it a guy comes to the game who plays hyper aggressive and he sits on my direct left. Thats a pretty shitty spot to be in but since we all know each other I just take my turn with the worst spot on the table and dont look to move around. Actually there werent any acual seats to move into but if I was at a casino I would insta called for the seat change button. My buddy Matt was on fire and was taking the aggressive players stacks left n right. I bet he was up $2000 in an hour. Fortunately he wasnt running great against me and we kept getting it in and chopping every pot. I eventually went to the felt and rebought for $300. I started running better and the aggressive player eventually calmed down a little. Hand wise I had a couple to report. One, I flopped an outside straight flush/royal flush draw and bet pot. Got a call. The turn is and Ace giving me the nut straight and the check caller open bets the pot. I reraise the pot and we get it all in. He has the nuts too but no flush draw. We ran the river twice. I flushed the first and we quartered the pot. If anyone is reading this I wonder if I should have run it twice trying to win 3/4 of it or should I just freeroll for the whole pot with one card. I guess it doesnt matter over time. My biggest hand of the night I was in the cut off with KK and something else I dont remember but it was probably a 10 and a 9 and probably suited with a K or both. So I have Mr. Aggressive straddling the button and everyone knows he is gonna raise so they are limping to call a pot bet for sure or maybe raise. Im limping to reraise. He raises, everyone calls to me and I pot it. Well unexpectedly I got 3 callers and probably only lost one player. Maybe nobody folded actually. The flop is K high rainbow and the guy who was running real good had lost about half his monster stack at this point but has me well covered opens for a pot sized bet which is more than I actually have so I call. Luckily no one else calls. We had chopped everyone up to that point and I elected to only run it once. I was willing to gamble on the of chance he had a small striaght draw but I was pretty sure he had a set. I kinda got told that most people either run it twice always or never but I told em I didnt really give a fuck. I run it twice when I feel like it. I dont like people thinking Im gonna definitely run it twice because I think they can be more aggressive with me. Well he didnt care because he had two pairs. It was a good bet since the pot was so big and I didnt have that much left. He is unlucky I had the top set really. That pot pretty much brought me back to somewhere around even and thats where I ended up. Phew.

Monday night was steak night at the Love Shack. Man thems good steaks. The tournament was very uneventful for me. I was never up much and got shortstacked and went into allin mode which didnt work out so well when I lost a coin flip against Bob. The cash game started as holdem only. Bought in for $180. I had me a pair of 10s on the button and raised a few limpers to $14 and got 2 calls. The flop was 8 high and I bet. I got called. I put the guy on pocket 7s and was thinking he just wanted to check to see if I had AK. Well the turn is a damn 7. He checks to me and I check behind with the intention of making a crying call. He bet the river and I called. He had flopped top set. I wasnt too happy but I was glad I didnt get too beat up. I got him back later after I had moved to his right and I bet the flop with second pair and the turn with third pair and check called him on the river. I had put him on a draw and when he over bet the river I looked at him and said exasperatedly "You already did this to me once tonight!". However I think he wouldve raised me on the turn since the draw was there unless he had the draw himself. I made a semi-crying call but I was right about the draw and won a nice pot with 3rd pair of 6s I think. At some point had to put another $100 in to buy up.Fuuny how I don't remember the little $20 calls I make that end up felting. I only remember the good hands and the bad beats. Oh well. I don't want to act like I play so good so let's just say I'm sure the hands I don't mention I played like a gimp. At another point we started to play half n half. Mr. Aggressive showed up from Sunday night and as luck would have it he sat on my direct right. I felt very good about that. Also Bob was in the game and he is a big pot builder in PLO. We played about 5 hours. Eventually we just played Omaha. While we were still playing holdem I limped with 7,4 of diamonds and the flop was 777. I check called two streets and led out on the river and got called by a pocket pair. Love them sizzlin 7's. My big hand came when I called the $5 straddle with 7,8,9,10 double suited. The flop was 9,7,4 rainbow. I bet out and got raised by Bob. The call was $160 and I had about $400 left. Bob started trying to bait me into calling. He was saying shit like "I know you. You're not calling." and acting like he was ready to through his cards in and drag it. I knew he wanted me to call or repop it. I couldnt see folding there but I knew he had a set. I was hoping it wasnt the nines cause then my outs were way less. I decided to just call. Bob only runs it once. If he would run iut twice we couldve got it all in there. The 6 hits the turn giving me the nuts and I check. Bob gos allin and I call. I guess I really shouldve led the bet but it was gonna work out the same but maybe he wouldve folded and I wouldnt have had to sweat the river. The board doesnt pair and I pull a pot over $1000. Bob left not so happy. He was already pissed about a hand where he had AA in holdem and couldnt get a caller for $7 measily bucks on the flop is a multi way raised pot. Bob gets his AA paid quite often since you can never put him on em. I pretty much just hovered around that amount for the rest of the night and won $700-ish. Since that was my first day of officially being jobless I thought it was a great start to my poker vacation. Also it was my first day of my new life experiment of having no alarm clocks set. Livin the dream. At least for a month or so.

Omaha is Scary

2011-02-11T11:12:00.001-08:00

Ok cut me some slack. Im trying to sell my house that I've neglected for 8 years. I figured I would live there forever so I played poker rather than painting. I guess thats why poker addicts make shitty home owners, husbands, parents, and employees. We neglect everything. I have played a lot of poker since me last post. Ive played the Monday tourney twice since. I chopped top two the week after winning it outright. Then last Monday I got bounced in 12th after get 1 outtered on the river when all the money went in on the flop. It sucked. I called a raiase from the button with AK from the tightest player ever raising early. I couldve folded easily since he had Queens or better for sure. The flop is an Ace and he open shoves. I call. He had KK. 93% of the time he is gonna check fold there. Unfortunately he got his annual wild hair and pushed. He hit the case K in the river. Oh well fuck it. No trifecta for Sofa King.

Ive played 3 cash session since last post. I think Im bout even but I dont really remember. I can only think of about 4 hands that really mattered from all that. I do remember playing poorly overall. Im so stressed about my house that I think I pressed a little to hard. I tend to play loose when Im stressed. At least I think I played agressive rather than passive which is probably why I broke even. I did however play pretty passive in the Omaha game. I hate putting $20 to $40 preflop in Omaha in a 1/2 PLO when Im sitting with $200 even if I have AAKK double suited. The only big hand I won I potted the turn for $100 with the nut straight and got two called who were drawing. I wanted to fold for $40 more on the river when the flush hit. I called anyway. Turns out I faded like 24 outs and won the pot. I think I need to stay away from Omaha unless Im gonna buyh in for at least $700 and be willing and able to make pot sized bluffs ocassionally.

Marathon Monday Night Tournament

2011-01-28T17:08:00.000-08:00

So about that Monday night tournament. I told you that it was a first for me in the history of the Monday night tournament (well except for when it was 120 people playing at Big Mike's bar). Notorious open shover of the first hand RB showed up after a long long long hiatus so in the spirit of the return to the felt decided to ............. show up late and miss a few hands. Thats not the first time for that. I had to play one half of a league basketball game. I told them to let me play the first half and I would leave for the second. I didnt open shove and I didnt lose on the first hand which incidentally did also happen to me at Big Mike's once and it was to RB who was making his triumphant return. Ahh the circle of poker life. Actually a guy I played basketball with for years before we ever played tournament poker got second place in this very tournament. And the circle continues. I was really very active in this tournament. I made some good hands and I made some good bluffs. Unfortunately I also made some bad bluffs and made the second best hand quite a few times. I remember once after I had chipped up and had about 40% of the chips with 2 tables still playing I boldly asked what 1st was paying. It took less than 10 minutes to go down to about 20 big blinds for that peak. To get that chip stack I basically coolered Jack almost back to back and he still wasnt out. He musta had 50% in play before that. I think I also slow played AA against UTG raiser the nut ball of all tournament players who we shall call the White Rick Ross. The WRR hung in there a long time and even asked what first was paying a coupla times when I was short and he was stacked. So we got down to 6 and the chop talk started from the short stacks. I never said no but I knew it wasnt gonna happen. I doubled up a short stack and got down to 15k when blinds were 500/1000. I opened with 4s for 3500 and got a caller from the blind. The flop is an Ace and I get checked to. I bet another 5000 effectively risking my tournament and the other guy went into the tank. God please dont call. He folded and I showed like an idiot but it did ssend him on tilt and he was out soon. Now I really cant remember much after that. We talked about chopping at 4 handed when everyone was pretty even but there was a hold out. The same guy who won it last week. When we got down to three I tightened up a lot. The dealer gave me a wtf look at one point but I knew I was going to get heads up. The two guys left were gonna clash for sure. We talked about a save but decided to just keep playing. One of them raised every pot basically untill the other finally caught a hand. I had raised a few times in there but only with good hands. So I end up heads up with the non-chopper. This guy will definitely call with marginal hands and push back against raises real light. The last time we played heads up he demolished me. Well this one didnt start off too good. He had way more chips. About 70% of them I think. I was down to 21k in the 6k big blind and he pushed. I had 15k left in my stack and had 8,4. I figured I was live and if I folded I would have to push and gauranteed to get called the next round. I thought a while and opted to push the next hand. I picked up a K and pushed. I got called by an Ace. 30k in the pot and a King hits in the door and holds up. I think I push all-in again with a small pair and he folds. We get allin again and I have an Ace I think and he has Q4 suited. He atually called the allin with that and I win. I dont think he had to call there. I think he wouldve had about 40% of the chips left. Now Im chip leader. At some point he pushes and I call with an Ace. He flops a pair but I river an Ace and its over. 1st payed $400. The thing that had never happened was wining that tournament straight up with no save. I had only played the whole thing out one other time and it was against the same guy. It was 11:45 at that point and I didnt see getting to play cash since I would only really be able to play for 45 minutes (justifiably since I do have a job the next morning). Not that Ive never played until i had to go or be late to work. That really makes for a miserable Tuesday though.

Big Timer Now Biotchez

2011-01-25T16:24:00.000-08:00

So Im on the front page of GPC now (Gulf Coast Poker Dot Net). I hoped that one day I would be the worst player with a featured blog and finally its happened. Thanks Yalls.

Lotsa poker to talk about. I almost played 3 days in a row last week once. Im such a degenerate. I havent played no slots or table games though. Goin back to last last Sunday (thats 2 Sundays ago). I played the ole Half n Half game at the Shop. Not much to say. I was the only one folding Omaha hands preflop. I hit some hands and won some money. $260 I think. I had a funny hand where I told the dealer he flashed both the 1 seats cards and then lost a medium pot to the one seat. LOL. I thought he had Ace,4 but he had Ace,2. and flopped the wheel. JJ is thinking about flashing me his cards on purpose from now on.

On to last last Monday. I busted out of the tournament 2 from the money. I started off hot and went dead halfway through. Probably lost most of my chips to James aka Fat Jesus aka the Leprechaun. Off course he is gonna call a raise with 10 high offsuit and call me down with his pair of 10s. Then I played cash. I raised from the BB with AJ of clubs and the UTG limper called and basically anounced he had a bad hand. I flop second pair and a flush draw. I bet, he calls, I bet turn, He calls. Now I check the river to wien his range and induce a bluff. He bets quick. I call. I lose. He had K9 and had flopped top pair. Crapfest. I eventually leave down about $100. My girl was upset about a family squabble so I went to hang out with her.

Now fast forward to Friday night. I meet my buddy down at Harrahs to do something I aint never did before. I staked him. Not just for the night like a sucker but we got an agreed upon bankroll and an agreed upon cashout point. I got there before him and sat. It was a wierd table. The play was pretty tight but everyone was overbetting. I bought in short for $100 and lost it shoving a draw. I actually got called but a bigger draw. Niether of us hit and he won with 9 high. Then I rebought another $100 and eventually got me some pocket Kings. I thnk it went limp then raise to like $35, a call. I shove my $100 and get called by the raiser. I win. So now Im up overall. My buddy shows up and I give him his buy in. This dude is hilarious. He will sit but not play for like 20 minutes while he watches the action. Im sure everyone at the table just wants to bust his ass after that. Anyone with that much audacity deserves a backer right? A little while later I get 66. Someone raises to $13 and about 3 people call. Ok so maybe the game aint so tight. Then the damn small blind min raises to $26. Genius. Everyone calls. I flop a set and the small blind open shoves. Im the only caller and I win. Mr. Small Blind leaves to everyones disappointment. Thats just about the worst possible way to play KK in the history of poker. A little while later I catch AA. The UTG folds and exposes an Ace. Then the next guys goes all in for $40 and gets a caller. I make it $120 hoping to get heads up with shorty. Nope. Call. Now Im praying for a raggeddy no broadway flop. im sure the guy has KQ or something similar. The flop is K,10,6. He checks. I more less go all in by betting $200 and leaving $67 behind. He call. Shit. The Turn is a Queen. He checks. I shove. He calls. Now Im pretty sure by the celebration from the short stack Im behind on that pot. Im really pretty sure Im behind everywhere. The river? A Jack. I win it all with a straight. Weeeeeeeeeeee. That spretty much the story of my night for my part. I win a few more and lose a a few more than that. I went pretty card dead the last two hours but i didnt care. I was sweatin my horse. I end up winning $635. I had an awesome time. There were a lot of friends in the card room that night. A lot of my friends are dealing there now. In fact it was my girl Lindsey who flopped me that set of 6s. Also got to chat with Dana for a good while while I was waiting out the 30 minutes of the most socially inept dealer at Harrahs. I call him the Frog. I alsso had a good time with some cool people at my table. A dude and his girlfriend and an online tournament pro. They were fun to cut up with. It was a wierd table where one half were serious players and the other half were total friggin idiots so there was much makin fun to be had. Now my buddy is going up and then coming back to even all night. I see him stacking chips and I race over there and see him up about $300. Then he comes over and sits after gettting coolered. Then he hits the money hand. Not only did he hit it but he was given it. The guy he beat had flashed his cards. My friend had QJ and he was against K8 with one club he saw and couldnt make out the suit of the other black card. Flop is KQQ. Some money goes in. Then the turn brings a club draw. Now all the money goes in. The river is another club and my boys sphicter went into pin hole mode. No flush though. Just a shitty K8 and a $800 pot. He stood up and looked at me with a big shitty grin and I knew we were up big. He would eventually cash out $500 up. Over half way to the cash out point. I could tell he didnt like winning big and not getting to pocket any of it. I told him we could settle right there and be done with the whole deal but he declined. He called it a night and soon after so did I. I really wanted to sit and smoke a cig and dump $40 into the slots but i didnt. I haven't smoked since Dec 31st either.

Sunday I won the Superbowl bracket with a Steeler victory. The 6th seated Packer busted all other 7 brackets.

Well thats all for now. I will give yall the scoop on the Monday night tournament when I have more time. I will say it is another first in my Love Shack history. Peace.

3 Barreling into Oblivion

2011-01-10T22:26:00.000-08:00

Pissed. Starting with my last hand at the Love Shack tonight. Im on the button with a middle pair and I open for $18 against the straddle of $5. I get called by the straddler. The flop is a broadway flop. He checks. I bet 30sih. He reluctantly calls. This player is not someone who is going to put me on a stone cold bluff. He hasnt been sitting long so he hasnt seen me getting out of line in a nitty short handed game. He usually sees me nut peddling in the maniac game. the turn is another 10 and it puts two hearts out. I decide to fire again but first I ask him how much he has. About a $100. I bet $40. He reluctantly calls. i have no real clue about his hand other than he isnt strong but now I figure he is more less committed. The river is a Queen making an Ace a straight. I think he will fold his pair of Jacks now but still pretty much feel like Im probably throwing $60 away. I decide to shove it since i cant win any other way. He calls. He had flopped a gut shot and turned a flush draw. I picked up and cashed out. I was actually pretty pissed. He woulda folded any brick there. I leave down $120 in the cash game. All my loss came in that last hand. Other than that the cash game was pretty uneventful. Again the maniacs were playing Half n Half. I had a couple of other memorable hands. Once I had *#suited and raised the straddle limpers from the buton up to $30 and got 2 callers. One the straddler and the other the UTG limper. The flop is Queen high and the UTG limper bets $20. I would raised him but he only had $50 left. The other hand was me with KQ in the SB and the flop is Queen high. I check/call two streets to the original raiser UTG and shove the river when the flush card comes. He folds. I felt like I played it like a flush draw and think I got to win with the second best.

As for the tourney well I chopped it two ways. The only big hand I remember was when I got to get all in pre-flop against two short stacks when I had AA. I won that and cruised. I stole a good many pots especially right before that when I was trying to chip up or get one of the last cash game seats. I didnt get to crazy earlier because I was watching the damn game. If Auburn won by a TD I won $75 and if they won by less I won $25 and if they lost I lost $75. Im not a huge sports bettor so this was a big thrill for me. I really think Auburn under performed but so did Oregon really. I wonder if Auburn will get to keep this one for the record books or if Cam is gonna lose it for them when more shit comes out.

New Year, New Poker Goals

2011-01-04T12:12:00.001-08:00

Got to play poker finally. I've had my son in town so spent all my time with him. I think if you cant put the important relationships in your life ahead of poker then you really need to check urself. I went to the $40 love shack tournament last night. I splashed around and had some fun and didnt last too long. The last few times I played super tight and aggressive and still would get called by J9 for all the money. So screw it. Im gonna play jiggely and either chip up or not. So when I busted out I went to the cash game.

Now sitting down at this cash game I remind myself that last year I played like a loose passive donkey. My goal this year is to play semi-tight aggressive. Im done open limping. That right there will save me $75 per session. My other goal is to stop being scared money and start seeing the chips as chess pieces rather than money. I dont think total disregard for money is the way. I think a little fear is good but not to let it overcome stratgey or fold edges because of variance tolerance. Some other non strategy leaks I wanna bust are missing hands by smoking or gambling in the pit. My goal is to never smoke or stick one more penny in a slot or on a table game. That leak was getting bigger and bigger every trip. Along those lines I ran across a sweet poker table that converts into a craps table and a nice regular dining table. Put it in my side links too. Ok so I bought in semi-short and had the strangest night. I had a lot of good starting hands and hit almost every flop well. I probably drug 10 pots before I lost a pot where I put any money in post flop. On the rare times I open raised and missed and still cbet I won everytime. I didnt cbet everytime though and I even won a pot out of position with no pair that was checked down the whole way. Now thats running good. Unfortunately they opened a half n half game and all the wild boyz went there. I was winning a good amount for the NL game but coulda really donked it off quick in the Omaha game. I know Im weak at Omaha so I didnt play it. When the tables combined later and they all wanted to play half n half so I cashed out with triple my semi-short buyin and went home at midnight. No cigs, no open limps (that I remember), and no slots (of course there were none).

Smart Move and PLO

2010-12-15T00:08:00.001-08:00

Heard I missed the dream game last night. All the maniacs at the table. I was so looking forward to playing too. I didnt. I made a very wise decision. See I got in a spat with my girl and I also had to read my son the riot act. It seems like Mondays are tough to make it through without some disturbing event to put me on life tilt. I cant even count how many times Ive made it to the Monday game totally upset about something and really loving the fact that poker takes my mind of whatever it is. The problem is that I play too many hands on those nights. I cant just sit n fold and stew in my life tilt. So typically I go broke and think about how I had a feeling I should sit it out. So Im sure I wouldve dumped $500 last night and Im glad I skipped it.

I did play tonight. I show up to the game and they are playing pot liimit omaha. I typically dont play omaha and wouldve declined come had I known. Of course I dont just leave. I buy in short for $100. I get lucky and quickly get up $170. I would basically fluctuate between being up $50 to $200 all night. We did play half n half and strangely I did way better at omaha. I flopped top set against a made straight and got all in and rivered quads. I flopped a straight flush once and got paid by a river boat. I flopped a boat in a raised pot. I was in the small blind so I was out of position. I smooth called the flop and bet out on the turn when the flush hit. The original raiser would make a crying fold. I dont really know how I could play it better. I cant check cause the flush will have him check behind and if he was betting the flush draw then he will be raising. I hope that he can at least call hoping Im just representing. I had just got caught bluffing the hand before. I tried to look just like I did the hand before but to no avail. Oh well. When it was all said n done I won $200. I didnt play terrible but I did make a few rookie calls and was no where near aggressive enough. I enjoyed the game. Most of the play is post flop and I think thats pretty fun and sick. Im sure it was the all time tiddily winks game of omaha donkeys ever but how are we supposed to learn anyway.

Choppy Chop Chop at Nawlins Nightly

2010-12-06T12:29:00.001-08:00

Sofa King chops. Especially if I was wanting to chop earlier when I was in a worse position. I played the nightly Saturday in the New Orleans Bayou Classic. When got to 15 from 120 the average stack was 10 big blinds and we could chop for 5th place moolah. I was all for it. But there were a few hold outs who had 30 Big Blinds. Ive never been at such an evenly spread chip distribution with 15 to go. I had about 40k and blinds were 2k/4k with a 400 ante. So we played on. I have AK in BB and the kid who was raising and stealing a lot raised it to 10k which compared to my blind is a small raise. I decide to just call and hope to hit and check raise him. I do hit and Ace and he does bet and I check raise and he moves in. I gladly call expecting to see AQ but he only had A2. So now I got like 85k. And thats around the time we draw for the final table, sit and get a good look at stacks and blinds and decide for an even chop. A coupla short stacks but not worth nit picking. So sweet thats my 5th nightly in a row to make the money going back to last Bayou classic and including the IP last month. I sure wish I could cash in an actual circuit event soon.

Got Bob'd

2010-11-22T16:10:00.001-08:00

Bout to go play poker. Last Monday night was the fucking worst shit. I got Bob'd like 5 times. First Bob knocks me out the tournament. Then he felts me twice and Justin once with 8 high all three times. This was all in the first 45 minutes of the cash game. He just kept calling raises with 8 high and flopping trips or 2 pair. He made Quad 7's the first damn tikme against my AA. I had just lost a pot with two pair of 9s n 8s to the straight (dude had 7,5) so i decide to call a small raise with 7,5. If you cant beat em, join em right? Well I flop bottom 2 pair. Im pretty tilted after running into like 3 coolers so I reraise Bob all-in. Well Bob had top 2. I left. I have never lost $550 in a 1/2 game that fast in my life.

I played for 20 min at Harrahs Sat night. I was there with a group goin out for a buddies bday. We were all just hanging out at the bar in the poker room so i sat at this open seat about 8 feet from my friends. I put $100 on the table and told my girl I was gonna play for 20 minutes. I flopped open ended in my first coupla hands. I bet the flop and the turn and still had 2 riders. Luckily I made the nutz on the river and got my all-in called by a guy who was riding with second pair and my straight card gave hime two pair. No respect. I guess i wouldnt have given much respect to the dude who only sat down cause he was at the bar 10 feet away with his friends. My last hand was a doozy. I was small blind with pockets 10s. I know its my last hand so Im not gonna get crazy. I was happy that my double up covered my slot losses so far. Well a few limp and the button raises. Im probably ahead most times but i decided to just set mine. The flop is all 5s. It checks all the way. I probably wouldve folded to a big bet but once he checked and then a 6 hits Im betting. I get my chips to put em out but the dealer skipped me and had the table check around. She claimed that since she called for the action that my bet wouldnt play. I argued and my friend who sat argued too but she didnt see it. She seemed to be claiming that I had hid my cards and was only betting cause I saw the check around. I had her call the floor. She sure seemed like she wanted me to be wrong which I dont get cause I tipped her a red chip on my only pot. Then the next dealer came up and he took her side. Then the floor came up and she whispered to him and then took her side. Then I explained to him exactly what happened and he quickly took my side. Funny thing is the button ends up calling anyway. Now Im a little scared he has a big pair but Im not folding. I shoulda checked the river to him so he could bet if he didnt have it cause if he calls my bet which put his last $50 in then I probably beat. Oh well. He folds and I rack up. I never even had to pay a time rake. I made $190 and was happy to have paid for the outting. Ive never had to call the floor that I can recall but frokm what Ive seen the dealers are usually right. Im glad to be 1 for 1.

Les Miles is a Grass Eatin Lunatic who has Fantastically Shut Me Up Again!

2010-11-07T01:08:00.000-07:00

I sat down today to watch the LSU/Bama game by myself at my house. I was hopeful but fully prepared to see a struggling LSU offense lose. I knew our defense would keep it from being a blow out but knew that if we couldnt move the ball we had no chance. I put a steak on the grill and watched the first half which followed the pattern I had feared. I did see a spark in Jefferson before the end of the half and I told my buddy that I thought Les just wanted to let Jefferson fire some passes and was not thinking score since he wasnt calling timeouts as LSU was moving the ball at the end of the half. So we go into the locker room down 7 to 3. Not only was LSU down but Kansas and Penn State had both made huge comebacks to wreck my weekly College Pickem board. I had actually picked LSU but it was a fan pick. My brain told me the smart money was on Bama. And then came the second half. First let me say the MVP of this game was Drake Nevis. What a beast of a game and the sack that caused the fumble was so huge. Also let me give the runner up MVP to the FG kicker Jasper. But perhaps one of the top 5 moments in Tiger (aka Jacob Hester) Stadium was the play on 4th and 1. LSU was behind by one with like 8 minutes to go and Jasper could have kicked a 43 yd fg to put us up by 2. How you dont kick the FG there is beyond me. How you can muster up enough confidence in your offense to go for it there is also beyond me. Sure Jefferson had finally broke his no TD passes streak since the first game of the season but really? And how this team is 7-1 without their starting QB throwing a touchdown pass in 7 games is insane. Anyway, crazy ass grass eatin Les Miles (yeah he bends down and picks some grass and eats it when the pressure gets high) goes for the first down and calls for a short yardage package hand off to the running back with a flip reverse to the WR which goes for 40 yards and almost a TD. This was such an amazing call in the greatest regular season game in Jacob Hester Stadium since the Florida game in 2007 when we went for it on 4th down like 5 times and got it every time. After Ridley punches in the TD we go for 2 and Jefferson fires a bullet in to convert. Then Nevis causes the fumble and we get a clutch FG out of Jasper to go up by 10 with like 5 minutes to go. Then Bama drives and scores a TD which is why Les went for it on 4th because this Bama team is not just good but great.The ESPN guy said Bama was exposed as a one dimensional team after the game but I didnt see that at all. I saw a great running game and a shit ton of caught passes by Julio Jones. Now LSU has to get a first down or 2 to put the game away. First play is the controversial option play which nets us negative 3 yards and ohshit our QB gets injured and Lee has to come in. Lee had looked fairly bad today in his few series and everyone in the nation knew the second down ad 13 yd play call would be a straight up run. It was and now we see 3 and 13. Now for the next OMG how did he call that play play. Les lets Lee throw for the first down! Again how do you not punt and put the faith in your defense which is obviously the best in the nation? Well, Lee steps up and completes a pass that would go for 40 yards and the WR would run for like 10 seconds after the catch which may have also been the difference in the game cause giving Bama the ball with 18 seconds left instead of 28 when they only need a FG to send it to OT was huge. So there it is, LSU wins! So many plays and so many heros in this game. Nevis, Jefferson, Lee, Jasper, Ridley, the whole receiving core. Sure I've been bitching about the play calling, personnel decisions and clock management as usual. Hell Ive been bitching about Les since the Tennessee loss in his first season. But dammit if that dude isnt a great recruiter and it games like this that make players want to come to LSU and be a part of the Mad Hatter magic. Hell I will live with the head scratcher calls if we can always put the most talent on the field which always gives us edge in any game. Congratulations Les and the Tigers and the whole Tiger fan nation! Damn I wish I could rub it in to those Bama fans I played poker with last weekend at the IP.

Good Trip to the IP in Biloxi

2010-10-31T18:10:00.001-07:00

I drove straight to the IP after work Friday. Seemed kinda dumb to hauling ass to a little short stack turbo tournament. Last time i drove to Biloxi for the $350 i think i got AJ once and that was really exciting. I really figured I would bust out and play cash all night. I didnt have a place to stay but I figured I would get offers to crash if I needed it. I did. Thanks yall even though I stuck to my original plan of playing until sunrise and driving back. I had a good time in the tournament. Started at a very interesting table with two girls who the house had bought seats for. A nice touch putting dead money hot chicks in the game. I started out ok. Won a lot of little pots with bets. Then I raise with KQ and a limper calls out of position. He had a sweet mullet so I shoulda known what was going to happen. I whiffed and cbet and he pushed all in and I was getting the right odds to chase my pair assuming he didnt have a set. He didnt but I missed and was chopped down to half of the 3000 starting chips (thats with the extra 1000 for the $5 dealer toke). More to come shortly...

Meta Game (metaphysical that is)

2010-10-13T19:54:00.001-07:00

Ok no excuses. Whatever. Im in the midst of a bad run. Ive made it worse by playing bad at times too. Inevitable I guess. I play for 4 hours and will be down a buyin and will be lookin to play another buyin to break even. The last time I played I did ok for losing a buyin. Just never had the ATMs at the table give me a big pot. In fact my favorite ATM who I beat in 80% of the pots took a bigger one off me to make up for all the small ones. People like that should never be allowed to have AA. I had AK on a king high ragged flop. FML. Im really starting to believe that my attitude makes my luck. You ever notice how the people who bitch about runnin bad tend to run bad? I think Im that way. Ive experimented with some mystical type stuff like reality creation or karmic manifestations but its so much work. Ive had good results though. Tipping every dealer before they deal has had good results. I bet most people just see it as a leak. I dont have enuff data. Theres this energy level thing done by this Abraham Hicks lady who believes in the Law of Attraction and when I do it I get big pairs a lot. But the reality is that im naturally negative and pesimistic and its too hard to play long sessions and not be your natural self. I think we saw Mike Matusow experimenting with this stuff last time he got in the top 30 of the WSOP. I think he would agree with positive results. Not very logical but whatever. I hope I get to play poker some this weekend. I wish the Belle had a 1/2 game. I think I will play the Sunday morning tournament. Hope to see you there.

Return to the Felt and the Computer

2010-09-14T22:16:00.001-07:00

I just walked in to the Love Shack game and got blasted by my only reader. Apparently me talkin about a coupla hands ever now and then and whining about being card dead isnt gonna cut it. I have played a few times in the last few weeks and I played a $350 in Biloxi a few weeks ago but Im not gonna rehash any of it. Mostly I have been outta town visiting my son in Phoenix and having life shit pop up on poker night. I will say that last Friday I hosted a .25/.50 game at my house with just friends and the buyins were around $40 and we managed to get about $700 on the table. Unfortunately I had $400 in the game. I was on full tilt lookin to play big pots. I was down about $240 when I made a hero call with a pocket pair against AK playin it strong cept for a weak turn bet. His river bet was pot sized and I stuck it in. Maybe I fold if Im not stuck and pissed. After that I started big bluffing and then after that started getting my hands paid off. I ended up winning $40.

So I just kamakazied my way outta the $40 tourny. I was down to 4 big blinds and 2 people go all-in so I ask Chris if there were cash seats open to which he says a few so I call with 9,3 suited. If I win Im in it and if I lose Im in a good cash game. I lose and there were no open seats. Fuck me.

So now Im sitting here waiting. I guess I will just whine a little. So Biloxi sucked. Everytime I get pumped for a biggish tournament I get my feelings hurt by the poker gods. I pretty much blinded out of that fucker. I have never been so fucking card dead. I had pocket 10s once and 66 once. I never had any good Ace or King. Endless procession of J4off. I would be up so much this year if I never left Baton Rouge. Everytime I go to Nawlins or Biloxi it costs me half my roll. I never win at poker and if my girl is with me I dump to the slots too.

Congrats to my friend Linsey (who is always winning regular and womens tournaments) for chopping that tourney I played and also to Dave and Frank the night before. Oh and Devin too.

Sooooo I finally got in the cash game. Actually I got on the must move table where the action usually isnt as good. More often than not the big gamblin cash players dont last too long in the tourney. I bought in for $155 and bulled a coupla pots and pretty much stayed between $180 and $150 for the next 4 hours. I moved to the main game pretty quick. Then foldfest. I got a good laugh around 11:30 when I flopped the nut flush after open limping on the button against the two blinds and checked the flop and turn and then pushed all-in for $160 on the river into a $6 pot. The funny thing was that one of them guys had two pair and really thought about calling. I played a coupla pots where I raised and missed and cbet and won the pot. I somehow got up to $250ish. Then I catch AK suited. Mr. 60% PFR made it $10 and I just wanted to isolate him so I 3bet to $30. I get 4 callers including Mr. Big Bet Bluff, Mr. 60% PFR and Bob who announced he was calling just to piss someone off. So theres $150 in the pot. The flop was A,6,2 two spades. I bet like $130 leaving myself $100 behind. Now what fuckin drugs must one be taking to think I can fold to a raise here. Answer: Mr. Big Bet Bluff. He thinks I have QQ. If I do Im still callin. Well he raises and Bob moves all his chips in. I know Bob is flushing. I have not clue with raiser has but Im callin. Well Im up against JJ and the flush draw. My hand holds up. Hiyoooo. Now Im sitting on $800. The reward for my patience and good spot picking. I didnt sit on my chips and wons some more hands isolating against spewtard. I had AA twice and won a small pot and split a big one. I flopped top set and got all in vs a flush draw and ran it twice. Of coarse I won the first one. No regrets. I prefer the two run. I do think it hurts a little being known as a guy who runs it twice. It invites draws to play really aggressive against you. They maximize fold equity and split a lotta pots where they are behind. Maybe if I ever get a 50 buyin bankroll I will become a one timer. I guess I wont say what I won but it wasnt too much more than after my big triple up hand. I dont feel like a big winner since I dumped my last two poker sessions. I doubt Im even in my last 3 sessions. However it didnt suck to book a nice win to get my roll back to health.

BTW Mr. 60% PFR you keep being flabbergasted after playing these pots so strong and getting your all in called by 2nd pair. Of coarse under normal circumstances they should fold but for God sake please consider your table image as a factor. Try having a pair every other time at least.

I want to say congrats to Will the Poker Monkey on his big hit in Biloxi. I read his blog and you should too. Probably you do because he links to me and well its way more likely you wandered in here through his site or maybe the Gulf Coast Poker site where he is featured and I have a little link too. I hope I get to play poker with him one day. Ive really had a good time playing against some big gulf coast names this year when they've come slummin in the $1/$2 games. I feel like I dont care who is sitting or what my seat is. I wanna play higher and better and have been holding my own in all the games Ive palyed lately.

Finally Got Pocket Aces

2010-08-25T16:52:00.001-07:00

Jeez Im gettin behind. Let see.... A week and a half ago I played the Monday tournament. About 20 minutes in someone tells me the line up at the cash game. Its the fuckin juiciest possible game imaginable. So I shove all in over two all ins with 7,4. Yeah I spit in the poker gods face. I dumped. Guess what. Totally not worth it. I played like 7 hours before I got in the positive. By the time cards started going my way there was only one crazy player left on the table. So Im sitting in this little 1/2 game with $800 on the table and Im covered by 3 people. Its like 2am by now and Im looking for the door. Then it happened. No big deal just the first time Ive had AA in a cash game in like 2 months. I reraise the raiser who has me covered. I dont wanna play a big pot really. I wanna leave. My buddy who raised first points out my shaking hands and I tell him its cause I got a big hand. He calls my big reraise. I know he is putting me on AA and Im putting him on QQ or KK. I offer to run it out from here and I think he decided maybe I didnt have AA. I really just didnt wanna crush him and then leave. Also I had way too much money on the table. Well the flop is Queen high and he bets into me. Im not real happy bout it. Im sure he would play Queens like this. I call. He bets the turn too. Im figuring I gotta go broke if I call here and he shoves the river. Fuck. The river is another Queen. He checks and I check. I coulda got another $200 outta him but I just wanted to insta leave so I didnt. He had KK. I played another round and split. Got my minimum 3 hours of sleep and off to work. It was a long night. I spent a lot of time outside smoking and trying to talk myself into staying patient. So much money was flying and it was 7 hours before I won a freakin decent pot.

Hit n Run at the Belle

2010-08-21T13:59:00.001-07:00

Went down to the Belle again last Sunday. It was an ugly table but I had the best possible seat. I was on the insane Asian guys left. Unfortunately the rest of the table was littered with unpredictable players. I had Mr. Spoon on my direct left but he was buying in short like me ($300). The first thing that really happened was Spoon getting felted by the Asian guy who reraiased Spoon all in with top pair of 9's and a medium kicker. Spoon called and had a lot of outs he didnt hit. The game was basically to trap Asian guy. He wasnt a fool though. I actually hate playing those types. As soon as you take a stand against them with some big pair you end up all in with one pair against a ton of outs. If they have a lot of buyins you will go broke every third time you play a pot with em. My plan was to take me stab with my one short buyin then leave. I get my chance. Asian guy makes it $25 to go (its 2/5 NL btw). I find myself with 10s. Im not set mining here. I repop to $75. Well this weak tight behind me calls. Im thinking AK or maybe JJ. Well Asian guy calls. Im praying for a low flop but u never know with Mr. ATC whats gonna get ya. The flop is 9 high and Asian checks. I hi-de-ho my $205 into the pot and weak tight guys is instantly and openly fretting. Uh oh. He tells me only 3 things beat him. So he has JJ. I dont instanly cry or anything but Im thinking that most people make a crying call here. He folds. Phew. It was a good fold. My 3 bet range right there is very tight so over time I think he would lose money in that scenario. If you assume I dont ship it in with AK when I whiff then you gotta think 10s is the only hand you can beat there and people dont usually play tens like that anyway. Why I dont know. I think the only profitable way to play 10s or AK is to three bet but only cbet air heads up. Anyway Asian guy asks me how big my pair is and eventually calls. I say "Thats not gonna make this guy too happy." And I show my 10s to the folders dismay. Im thinking Asian guy had two high cards and was hoping to be good if one hit. If he is right which much of the time he wouldnt be then he is getting laid 2 to 1 but is only 3 to 1 to win (if he is live). Its a mistake Im happy for him to make once. He missed and Im up like $350 now and Im leaving in 30 minutes for a thing at 7. I played two more pots and won one and lost one. I also broke even on my $20 slots investment which is a nasty little leak. If I donate $20 everytime just waiting on a seat Im really eating into my win rate. Those damn Sizzlin 7's.

Fun $60 Tournament

2010-08-16T08:09:00.000-07:00

Well I didnt win or lose (other than time) in the $60 Saturday tournament. We got down to 6 and it took forever to lose the 6th and then we got down to 5 and it was taking forever. No one would call the 68 times the short stacks would push in. I proposed at that point that 4th and 5th get their buyin back and they agreed. About one hand later I flopped bottom two pair and got all in and got crapped on by the turn. Did I jinx myself with that deal or was I a genius? Whatever. Before that happened I started the tournament great. My first good pot I limped Aces UTG and the next guy raised everyone out. I decided to just call. I think if I reraise there I should just tell the guy I had KKs or AAs. So I let him bet the flop. I bet out on the turn because I know this guy and he is worried about that call and he might have checked behind. I bet out on the river too even though the flush got there. I was 90% he had JJ or QQ. He called and mucked when I showed. A little later I hit a queen high flop with AQ and made some good money against JJ and something else I never saw. Now Im doubled up and sitting pretty. I would run my stack from 25k to 85k before I lost my first big hand. It wasnt really a big hand. I called a raise from the button with 44 and the two guys in the hand checked the 10 high flop. So I make a big bet. At this point blinds are high and my big bet was 25% of my stack. The original raiser then reraises all in and I fold. It hurt. Both the guys in that hand would eventually out last me and they were both down to under 10k at a point. The rest of the game I just played short stack strategy. A lot of allins from the button and small blind with any ole Ace. A few standard raise and allin if I hit and dump if I dont. The only hand that sticks out with me was one I wasnt in. UTG who is very solid raised and kooky ass James pushes all in with 88. UTG decides to call. James is satisfied to be up against AK cause he was sure it was a coin flip. I asked James what he was smoking. UTG has a big hand. His range is AQ,AK, and Tens-AAs. Thats 7 hands and only 2 you wanna be against. I realize there are more combinations of AQ and AK but still lets not get too technical. To me thats such a bad move against this particular guy. But lucky ass James 88 held up. Of course the guy he left short stacked there would eventually be the chip leader long after James was busted out. This was a fun tournament and 4pm on a Sat is a great time for me. It doesnt kill Saturday night and if I bust out I can even play a coupla hours of cash before I go do something. And if i didnt have anything to do then it was cash all night. Actually I got a text at 10:45am the next day letting me know they were still playing. Jesus.

Chopped the Monday Tournament

2010-08-14T16:09:00.001-07:00

Played the Monday tourny. It was so strangely easy. Every big pot I played I won. Every time I bet the flop with nothing I took it down. I dont think I ever made any marginal calls and ended up folding to another bet. I got AA against KK allin preflop. That was the hand that set me up because that was against another big stack. After that I just more less cruised to the chop. I did have one hand against my buddy who actually reads this blog. I had folded AK to him the hand before where he reraised his wife with QQ. I knew at best it was QQ. Well the next hand he raised UTG and I just call with AK. I dont flop nothing but he checks. I know he knows I have a big hand. I bet and he tanks. Im really thinking he has a flush draw but the blinds are real big so this pot could get ugly quick. He folds. So we chop soon after. I actually didnt wanna chop totally. I suggested everyone take $200 and we play for the $400 left. We had 5 left and all with very even stacks except for one who took less. I also want to play because one of the guys left was maybe in the top 3 tournament players on the gulf coast. I think he wanted to play it out but didnt care enough to insist. He said he wouldnt be the guy who wouldnt chop in a $40 home tournament. So I netted $245 after dealer tip and went and lost $45 in the cash game that I could only play an hour in. Im playing in a $60 tournament as I write this. Doing ok. Above average chips. I'll fill you in prolly after the Monday game.

A Harrahs, a LoveShack, and a Belle

2010-08-08T13:56:00.000-07:00

Ok well I was not playing much but Ive gone a a playing frenzy (for me). I just got knocked out of the Sunday Double Deuce. Walked on 2 left feet the whole time. Mostly just had small pairs and Ace Kings and never hit a pair or a set. My big losing hand I limped in late position with QJ and flopped a pair. The open limper bet pot, pot, then half the pot on the river. I called the river because I had rivered top two but there was a pair on the board. Turns out he had open limped with Aces. I minimized my loses (givin that I didnt fold).

Yesterday I went to the Belle. I hadnt played that game in ages. It was the typical afternoon old man rock garden. I dont mind that. You always know where you are and its real easy to fold hands that in my Monday night game would be more of a decision. I still havent had AA or KK in a month now. Thats probably 1000 hands of live poker. There was only one guy at the table worth gunning for. He ended up insta calling an all in bet for like $400 dollars when he turned top two pairs on a board where any ole Queen wins. The guys had flopped the straight any way and bye bye went the one terrible donator. There were other bad players but they were bad on the tight side. I really like that game in the day time. Either the players play ABC poker but with no regard for position or they play limp in and be willing to go broke in a limp pot. Its really a game where I wanna not limp unless its in late position. Open raising or 3 betting is really the way to go there because they are usually gonna let you know where you are at. I only had one decent hand where I flopped good and made it to show down. I had AK and I three bet the original raiser from $50 on top of his $25. He just called. The flop is AA3. He bets $20 into me. Im thinking he either has an Ace and wants to see if I have a better Ace or he has a pair and is probing. I decide to just call. Im not too scared of the board. The turn is a Jack which I hate. He only bets $20 again which says that he isnt very strong. I just call. Im trying to represent KK or QQ and hopefully he will try to rep and Ace. He just checks the river. Now I just bet something pocket 10s can call. i bet $50 and he makes a crying call. He flips over KK. Whoops. Sorry dude. I stack my chips and realize Im $30 to $40 short. I say very low "damn how much do they rake here." Well my friend who was dealing heard me and started asking me what was the problem. I tell him how much I start with and we go through the last pot and Im $40ish short. But I tell him dont sweat it. We go back 20 years and know he didnt over rake me. Then we move on to the next hand and I say well maybe my stacks are tall. Yep I had an extra $10 in each stack. Idiot. I tip him another red bird and assure him I didnt think he had done anything wrong. I just knew something was wrong and obviously it was my stupidity. So that was my big pot. I took a picture of a guy who won with a straight flush against the nut flush because he had the baddest ass curly mullet ever. He even had his head shaved on both sides about 3 inches around his ears. Unfortunately the photos didnt come out good enough. I won a few smallish pots all day and left only $180 up.

My Monday game wasnt very fun. I was so very card dead. Sucks because I had 4 crazy players on my right. The only hand worth talking about was the time I flopped broadway holding A,10. I couldve actually went $300 in the black at that point and it wouldve made up for being card dead but how many times have I flopped the nut straight and lost especially broadway. Many many many times. The flop brings action and I make a big raise. A guy who hasnt had a hand all night goes all in for not much more than my bet and one of the crazies calls. The turn is nothing so I push in for like $130. The allin guy has basically told us he flopped 2 pair. Well mr crazy has 2 pair too but he knows they are no good. He folds after a long time. I ask the guy to run the last card twice. The other guy folded KJ so my opponent had 3 outs. Well the King hits and he wins the first and I win the second. I feel real smart and real lucky the other guy folded and opened up the running it twice possibility. It wouldnt matter though in the long run because i would eventually go broke. Lost $480.

The Sunday before that I went to Harrahs. Actually I stayed down there Sat night to play slots and table games and use a commp to the Besh Steak house. It was good food and we had a lot of fun but I dumped like $500 gambling. No regrets though. I did play the electronic roulette deal and that was fun. Sunday I hit the poker room. I was there for a really long time and I never had much. I didnt even get AK for the first 4 hours. Then of coarse AK would be my down fall. I three bet AK from the big blind and the UTG limper who was very very tight just called and the original raiser to $10 just called. So now there $100 in the pot and the flop is K,10,9. I bet out $100 to say I have it. and the UTG guy min raises and the original raiser moves in for his last $220. I only have like $130 left but I know Im drawing almost dead. I fold. I know the UTG has a set of 10s or 9s. I saw him check some huge hands and know he isnt doing that with out a set. Actually he flopped the straight with a heart draw to go with. the other guy had Aces. Damn. He fucked up just calling behind there. So that was my big hand. How I lost like $680 over the span of 6 hours and losing $130 in a hand was my big loss I dont know. I guess just calling too much with little pairs and suit connectors just adds up. I was probably chasing a little too much since I had dumped straight gambling the night before. Oh well.

So until my little cash yesterday I was on a 3 session losing streak and they were all pretty big in relation to my bankroll. Sucks coming of a good streak and then going on a losing streak right away. It pretty much wiped out my gains. Im still up for the last 45 days but it still stings a bit. I hope I can pull it together before the Bayou Classic. I would like to have some moolah ready to buyin to some nightlys and one $550.

Look for more updates since Im kidless and going to be playing more.

Played Fast and Stupid and Paid the Price

2010-07-17T15:13:00.000-07:00

Well it happened. I dumped. In less than an hour Monday I lost $620. I had put together 10 straight winning sessions. Looking back I guess I can see what went wrong. I was probably not in a good place mentally because of personal stuff. It never seems to fail that when I am preoccupied with life issues I tend to lose. For some reason I pick these times to play loose, aggressive even though the table doesn't really call for it. My first big hand I raised from the button against a straddle with 5,6. I got 2 callers. The flop comes 7,5,4 with two diamonds. Both check. I'm delighted with the flop. I bet like 3/4 pot. Small blind calls. Other folds. The small blind is a guy that will make moves, will chase draws, and could have had very little to be calling there. He is also someone who usually gives me a lot of credit. The turn is a 9 and he checks. Now I have to decide if I bet or check. I thought that he would put me on JJ or better if I bet the turn big. He also wouldn't chase his flush draw. I bet big. He pushed in. I call another $40ish. He flopped the straight and had the diamond draw. Pretty sick. 8,6 of diamonds he had. Ok so there goes my first $220. Then I lose like $100 more chasing a flush draw all the way to the damn river. I lost another hundred probably calling $12 preflop raises with shit likke QJ. Then my last hand I have J,8 of spades and I call the guy who raised the button and we get another caller. I call because this guy is constantly raising with crap and trying buy pots. Well ithe flop is Q,8,3 and I check and the other caller checks and the typical maniac bets. I see the other guy getting calling chips out so now I figure I can't just call. So I raise. I don't believe the maniac and I think I can get the other guy squeezed out. Well he begrudgingly folds. Well my maniac friend flips over pocket Kings and says all in. I have another $120 left and I have about that in the pot now. I decide to make a bad call and go home. I ask him to run it twice and he says now but woujld run it 3 times. I decided to just gamble. I called the extra to gamble so why would I run it 3 times just to try and win that same amount back? I woulda just folded. So I declined and the dealer turns a King and its over. So that's how I dumped 3 buuyins in an hour. I never even had a playable starting hand. I shoulda come into the game with a plan. I shoulda planned to play tight and wait for good spots. Why? Because that's how I won 10 in a row AND because I was stressed about something to do with my son.

New Orleans Poker on July 4th and Essence Fest = Maniacville

2010-07-05T19:45:00.000-07:00

Ok so normally I'm at the Monday night poker game right now. I got 2nd place in the little 27 player tournament last week I made the worst deal ever when it got heads up. I basically just upped second place by forty bucks and kept playin even though I had a 2 to 1 chip lead. Good thing I guess since I ended up getting second. My buddy was just pushing me around and when I picked up KJ suited I pushed back. Ended up all in vs Ace rag. Flops Ace high and that was that. Didn't play cash since I was supposed to be leaving 30 minutes later. I'm sure someone had something to say about that. Oh look he won so he's leavin. He don't wanna gamble his winnings. Whatever.

Went to Harrahs Sunday night. First time since the horrible circuit event weekend. How is it that I rarely go to Harrahs but I seem to make it there during Essence Fest every year. At least it wasn't Saturday night like last time when I had to park on fuckin Rampart and walk. I love the poker during Essence. The Essence festers tend to either be total maniacs or total chaser/calling stations. I sat there for the longest time catching nothing. I do remember a hand with this girl who had sat down with $100 and basically made the nuts like 6 hands in a row. She raised first and checked the all heart flop. I made 2 pair on the turn and it all checked around again. The Board is K,J, 10. She bets out $40 on the river and I laugh. She had been talking about buying a pair of $800 shoes with her winnings so I told her I was going to donate to the shoes fund because I put her on a set. Well she only had a straight. I think she would go on to cash out for like $800 within an hour of playing starting at $100. She only played the nuts and played them well. She was kind pretty too so maybe she gets a lot of why not calls. I didnt catch really anything else for a while. I finally got a chance to pretip the dealer before she sat down and she made up for it all in her 30 minutes. I had originally bought in short for a hundred to see what was going on. I kept buying up and up as the table got crazier. Buy the time that dealer sat I was $400 in the game and sitting on about $275. I was looking to play a big pot with the maniacs. Well I picked up a pair and raised to try an see the flop on my budget not theirs. They obliged and I flopped no help and folded. My set woulda come on the river. I mentioned quietly to the dealer she needs to tell me that's how she is gonna do it so I can stay in. See I feel like the Law of Attraction has given her a reason to deal me well because I gave her a reason to like me. I've done experiments before with tipping dealers as soon as they sit down. I think I have found a karmatic certainty. It also works is you know the dealer and they already like you. Anyway I received pocket 5s the next hand and raised to set the price again. The flop is like KK6. I check and the first maniac bets just $20 and the other one calls. I decide to chase a 2 outter for reasons of superstition, attraction and karma. I also may have had the best hand but I was never going to be able to stick around and I wasn't going to take a big stand against these guys in that spot with no outs if I was wrong. Well bingo my 5 on the turn. I check. The original lead better checks. Maniac number 2 bets $50. I decide that I really don't see them with much here and I would like to get the extra $50 from the guy behind me and raising here would likely end the hand. So I call and maniac behind me calls. The river is nice. It makes straight and flush. I decide to bet out hoping they had something. Nope. Two folds. I guess I shoulda checked to two maniacs. I'm guessing one of them is gonna bet something more often than not especially if like I was hoping they actually had something. Oh well. That pot brought me back to even. One pot made up for 3 hours of grinding and time rake. Very shortly after I pick up 99. The very passive calling station in the UTG raises to $12. I like the price and call. I don't see getting heads up here with a raise and I don't really wanna be heads up with this guy. Well maniac number 1 reraises. I think he was steamin a bit. 3 people call so I call. Flop is Ace, 9, 4 with two spades. UTG checks, I check, and maniac bets out $75. All fold to me. I decide to shove in for probably $275 more. The pot is pretty big and if he has a decent Ace he may pay me off because he just aint that bright. Well he looks at me and asks if I would do that with a flush draw. I kinda looked at him weird so he called. He wanted to make sure he had the only flush draw. He had 10,6 of spades. Your typical 3 bet hand. I fade the turn. Im leaning back kinda half looking when I see the river spade. Heart sinks. I belly up to the table and take a good look at it. Its the 4 of spades. I look all the way down at the first card on the board. A 4 of diamonds. Boat. I say "Ship it!" and then I hum the song from the Hangover about "wait till I get my money right" while Im stacking. I think my maniac friend left at that point. The other maniac who was still there was doing well and had me covered. It was weird how many times this guy bluffed, got called, and still somehow had the best hand. He was over betting the river with a lot of marginal hands too where if he was getting trapped he was fucked. It never hurt him though. He started hitting nut hands too. I decided I didnt wanna mess with him. My dealer had left and I had actually helped the new dealer out by giving her someones rake so the floor didnt have to come over. At some point I decided to rack up and o blow off some steam in penny slot hell. Thats a dangerous choice cause I can blow $400 in no time if the slots piss me off. Well the slots were kind and I broke even. I thought about going to the fireworks show on the levee. I didnt. I just rebought into a poker game and played a few more hours and ended up not losing or winning. I was tired at that point and cant even remember a hand worth mentioning. So another cash session win. Thats 10 in a row now.

I played the Wednesday night tournament at the H club. I didnt mind donating to a recently deceased poker players family fund. I knew the guy and he was super cool and a stand up guy. I decided not to rebuy or add on at the break cause I had 10k from a starting stack of 8k and another $40 would only buy me 8k more. I didnt see much value in 8k when blinds were at 400/800. It was about to be a shove fest any way. I just wanted to check out the club. It was real nice. Turns out the extra 8k would have probably kept me in the tournament since I probably wouldnt have shoved all in with 77 in late position with a coupla limpers in front of me and run into JJ in the small blind. Oh well. Had fun. It was good to have a long sad walk to the car having lost instead of won. I havent had one of those since the New Orleans disaster. Oh and the time me and my girl went to "have a little fun" in slot hell. Opps. I almost made it to the cage with a voucher that woulda put me at even. Almost. Fucking degenerate.

Streakin Still

2010-06-24T17:28:00.000-07:00

Well the streak continues. One more bust out of the tournament and one more good cash in the cash game. I started a new job this week so my desire to do extra work is low so I appologize to my one reader (who only likes to cuss me and call me names) for the late post. I bubbled out Monday. One before the chop. I don't care since I'm on a cash streak. I know its not gonna last forever. I know one time I will get it in good all night and lose my ass. Like last week when I had AA against 3 players and won, this week I flopped a straight and against two all ins on the flop I held up. The board didn't pair. I was more happy with my marginal hand play. I made some prudent laydowns and also some well timed bluffs. The regulars were giving me shit about being tight and saying saying since I was up that my chips weren't in play. I let em. It makes it easier to steal later. Not that stealing is a great idea in that game but there are go spots sometimes. My favorite hand was when I raised a guy on the flop because I read him as weak and then another guy went all in behind me and I had nothin but a weak ace but I rivered the Ace and got to advertise and win. I also had a had where I floated the flop bet and another guy behind me called so when iraised the leader on the turn I got got called by the draw chaser and the guy with the best hand folded. I've been plying really well and I can't think of many mistakes I made other than getting a little to frisky raising preflop a coupla times. I am itching to go to Harrahs soon but I just haven't seen a good spot at a good time. So for now I will ride my Monday night streak of 9 winning sessions and counting. I did fluff of some Monday when we switched to half n half. I should really never play Omaha. I'm just not comfortable or knowledgable enough about it. I hope my friends in Vegas do so well that they stay and the Monday night game sucks because of it. Good luck dudes.

Grindin

2010-06-14T12:54:00.000-07:00

Well crap I forgot to blog last week. I guess I have played twice. Last monday night and Saturday night. Last monday I played the tournament and got to the top ten with a short stack. I had A10 in the big blind and the super short stack moved in for 2k and the chip leader just called him and seemed iffy about it. I had 7k and I decided I was ahead of both of them. Well Mr. Chip Leader hemmed and hawed and called me with QJ. I dont rememeber what the short stack had but the Flop comes A,10, rag. Im almost about to get happy until the K hits the turn. I havent cashed in that tournament in the last 6 tries. Oh well who cares. Im doing well in the cash game anyway. I dont remember a whole lot about the cash game. I rememeber having bought in for $160 and still having about $130 when I get AA. I limp in early position. I do this because if I make a standard raise Im just gonna be up against 5 players. I pretty much grind with top hands so they arent gonna play back at me. Actually they rarely play back at anybody. So I limp and luckily a guy two to my left makes it $16. 3 people call and it gets to me. I make it $50 on top of the $16. I only lose 1 players. Seriously. And they know Im tight. Sometimes I think about mixing up my game but then I think why would I ever stop playing nut poker when I get all the action I want when I have my monster hands. If they dont change Im not gonna change. So the flop comes J,10, rag and I put the rest of my stack in. I dont love the flop but Ive only got $70 more and there $220 in the pot already. Guy to my left calls. I hate it. Im sure he has JJ or Tens. I also get called by both of the other players. I think they actually checked out from there. My Aces held. I was up against AK, Q10, and I think a low pocket pair. What a buncha degenerates. I cant believe I won that freakin hand. I tripple up and didnt lose much or win much after that. I hit quad 6's at some point and didnt get paid huge but maybe won $70 but that just paid for my $12 calls trying to hit flops. Fit or fold is so lame but against half a table of maniac calling stations what elese can ya do.

On Saturday night I showed up late. The game was small and I think I made 7 since they had just lost one. I saw him sitting in his car. I wondered if he was thinking about coming back or not. Maybe he was crying. I know that the previous Saturday night was a huge game and a real blood bath. Oh well I dont mind the table. Pretty quickly I won a pot off a guy when I raised the button with A10 suited and flopped the flush and he bet into me twice and I just called. I was representing the flush draw but I shoulda raised the turn. He says he wasnt gonna call. He checked the river because it paired queens and counterfeitted him if I had a big pocket pair and I bet and he folded. Oh well. Too many scare cards can hit the river. I need to raise the turn. Maybe even the flop. He might have stacked of the flop with two pair thinking I trying to end the hand with Aces. I didnt put him on a big hand though. I hadnt played with the dude a lot so I didnt assume he would put me on a big hand just cause I raised like some of the other playeers might have. So I won and he went broke a few hands later and I proposed a mandatory $5 straddle which was accepted. I dont really remeber much about the hands. I played a lot more aggressive and wwith a wider range because we were short handed and there was only one real aggressive guy at the table and he was on my right. I picked up decent amount of orphan pots and I made a lot of value calls against my player to my right. I did ok. I played my $200 up to $500 and then the cards kinda went south and I was back down to $260 eventually. And at some point my friend jumped to the open seat on my left which I hated because he loves to push me off hands. I would eventually win a good pot off him though. I had 10,9 and the flop is 8,7,3 with two hearts. I think I checked and he bet smallish. A ten hit the turn and I checked. He bets like $70 which isnt inline with his first bet for sure and he probably had $50 more behind. Its a big bet. He had been rebuying a lot and I figured he was pushing with any piece there. I decide that he probably has hearts and wants to take it away from me. I push him all in and he does and doesnt get there. I might not have played it like that if I didnt have the open end straight draw to go with my pair. The only other hand I remember was a hand where I had Ace, 6 and raised and got called and the flop is like 4,4,3 with two spades. I cbet and got called behind and a King hits the turn and I check and he checks and the river is another 3 and I check and he bets about pot. I guess he is repping a 3 here. That makes sense but there arent to many hands he is gonna call $20 preflop with that make sense. And if he had a three and thought he was good on the flop wouldnt he have repped something on the turn when I checked anyway? I really think he was flush or straight drawing. Anything else he is checking behind I think. I call and win with my Ace. He was flush and gutshot drawing. He had also bluffed a lot all night so it wasnt too hard to figure I had to call. I dont remember any big losing pots for me. Mostly my losses were chasing draws and cbets with nothing that got called or raised. But since the straddle was on it hurt to make any unsuccessful plays or calls. So after it was all said and done I won a little more than my buyin. Im going back tonight to play. I expect a huge action game which sucks cause Im a working stiff who always leaves before the real action starts. But Im not complaining. For now Id rather have a job and a girl to go see and grind out little wins. For now.

Jackpots and Regular Pots and My Leather Ass

2010-06-01T09:28:00.000-07:00

As I had suspected there was a chip dump tard fest last week after I left. I guess I should be glad I have a life that sometimes cuts into my already limited poker hobby. Last night was Love Shack night and before I get going I wanna say yipee for getting a table share of the bad beat jackpot. The BBJP is paid anytime Aces full gets beat with all hole cards playing. Last night my old buddy who I started playing no limit with back in like 2002 won the big part of the jackpot which was I think $900 and it was his birthday. The jackpot goes back to $500 and will stay there until the actual jackpot goes above that. They also pay I think $50 (maybe $40) for Aces cracked after midnight and that comes out of the jackpot too. Plus cash players get fed pretty well. At least pizza and sometimes BBQ and sometimes steak night. Ok now to the poker.

We had 3 tables run for the $40 tournament. I wasnt making any head way and was down to 3500ish from the starting 4000 when I picked up KK. UTG raised to 400 with blinds at 50/100. Made it 1500 to go. UTG calls. Ace Jack rag flops and UTG (who is a great guy and fun to play with) asks a player to move so he can see me and then insta shoves like he could tell I hated the flop. I doubt that was the case but who knows. I frikin hate it and I muck saving 2200. He shows QJ and has a good time razzing me until later when I started taking chips from him in the cash game. Then he turn around and loses all those chips I just gave him to another crazy cash gamer. He says oh well there goes *****'s chips. I said well at least I know they are in the right hands with you two. A little while later blinds are at 100/200 and I ship my 1800 in over the UTG raiser and we race my AQ vs his 10s. Out. The two wackos would join us shortly in the cash game. It looks like they both went felt in the same hand.

Before the cash game I went to buy cigs and got a new big chipotle burger from Backyard Burgers and man was it a tasty burger. The drive thru chick gave me a free Diet Dr. Pepper no one wanted too. Quit a contrast from the McDonalds a-holes who without going into the story too much I had a tug of war with a bag of food with. I wanted the food for free since they had me sit through the line and dont inform me the the card machine was down till I get to the window. I drove up to the second window and they started handing me my food and I really wanted to just act like I paid but I didnt but I did get my drinks in the car and a hand on the food bag before I came clean. Then me as I wont relinquish the bag he calls over the manager who wont budge. I did get to keep my 3 cokes though. One time I chased a little MickeyDs burger punk back into the freezer. I was wearing flip flops and almost busted my ass running past the deep fryer. I cant wait until they automate fast food places. Anyhoo.

I bought in for $160. I had a series of crap starting with the first hand flopping top pair from the button and playing to weak by not raising the preflop raiser. The turn makes a 4 card straight and now both players check to me so I fire $25 and one calls and the original raiser pops to $75. Shit. Fold. He shows the straight. Another hand I dont exactly remember but I was good and getting chased and the runner runner 4 card flush comes and I have to fold. Well I didnt have to but I did. So anyway somehow I end up down to like $70 when I pick up JJ and I limped and reraised all in over 3 guys who had put $8 in. For some reason this guy who apparently loves to win with the worst hand decides to gamble with me with K9. No bad beat. Courtesy double up. I also remember another hand where like 6 people called $16 preflop me included with my A8 of clubs and I flopped nut flush draw and I opened for basically pot with not much behind and everyone folded. Anyway I guess I was around $140 when I completed the small blind with 6,5 in a big virtual family pot and I flopped the nuts 7,4,3. I check and early position bets and a few call and I repop it pretty healthy cause there a flush draw. I get pushed all in my Mr. Courtesy Double Up from before and I tell the dealer not to deal after I call. I call and he shows top set and I show the nuts and ask him if he wants to run it twice. Instant no. Fuck. The next card is Ace of spades giving him a spade flush draw and the last card is K of spades crushing my soul. Apparently I had him covered and was getting chips back but I stormed out to smoke prompting someone to run out to tell me I had chips still. I wasnt leaving anyway. I came back in and was commended with my good handling of the beat. I tell em no big deal but damn I really wanted to run it twice. I then proceed to fold a shit ton looking ship my $55 remaining chips in but the opportunity never comes and I eventually buy $100 more in chips so as not to miss out on the multitude of players at this table willing to go broke in a limp pot. my buddy is still razzing me about the KK fold in the tournament so I took a shot at him to say ha ha real funny mfer but Im glad Im not stuck hard as you right now Mr. Poker Genius. I want so bad to take some chips from him even though he was stuck a few buyins. My big break came a good while later after endless folds and being down to $130 when I limped with AQ and many other limped and I flop top two. Small blind bets out $8 gets two callers and I pop it to $25 and my crazy friend on my left who bluffed me in the tournament makes it $125 to go. The original bettor who was obviously tilting before the hand started called. Well Im not folding although I know my buddy either has a flush draw or a nd big hand and I was certainly more worried about a set of 8s than a flush draw but I know he would raised preflop with 88 there so I guess Im good and Im not to worried about small blind. I think he has Ace King or J,10 double gut shot. I never saw his cards. My buddy had top and bottom pair and I triple up. The rest of the night was almost uneventful except for the jackpot and what was supposed to be my last hand. I played way too conservative and it probably cost me at least $200 in retrospect but oh well. The jack pot was QQ vs KK and 3 Aces hit the board. Weeeeee. My supposed to be last hand I was UTG and get QQ. I limp to the inevitable raise and just call. Im trying to get outta there. Well The flop is KQ8. We are 3 handed I think. I check and a pretty tight player bets out $35 and my buddy calls. I raise to $90 and they both call the $55. Im putting Mr. Tight on AK or KQ. Im putting my psycho friend on J10. Well the damn 9 hits the turn and Im first to act. SOB. I cant check and let them check behind me and some gut shot hit. I bet out $150 and they both make crying folds. As Im stacking my decent pot I get dealt in for my big blind. I play round to the cut off and quit only 30 minutes past my intended and announced at the beginning of the night leaving time. So an up and down night helped out with a jackpot nets me $320. I didnt mind leaving too much. It didnt seem like the game was too good and there wasnt a shit load of bad players left that were gonna be staying late. I gotta have them bad players in to pay me off when Im nut peddlin. Else I might have to put my money in marginal situations and actually think some. Fuck that.

Coupla Bust Outs, Coupla Hours Cash

2010-05-25T05:40:00.000-07:00

Very little poker to report. I played the $40 tournament last week and this week. Last week started out first hand with AK and got called by K9 and called on the flop when I cbet cause a 9 was there. I had never played the guy and ended up being glad I shut down because he never folded ever with anything. I would flop a flush draw against him too and same thing. I raised preflop with AQsuited and flopped the draw and bet and he called. I never got there and we checked it out. Being the true definition of a calling station this dude had pocket Aces and never raised or bet once. Anyway I went down and up a few times but never over my starting stack and eventually when I had 10 big blinds left and started pushing in preflop I got my little pair on the button called by AQ in the big blind and lost. Same thing happened last night. I got my little pair called by a bigger pair who only had a third of my chips but then the UTG limper who had me only slightly covered calls with 2 people all-in. He had the monster KJ and he put us both out.

The cash game was juicy from the start. I doubled my short stack of $100 to $200 pretty quick. The hands werent very memorable. I would pretty much stay around that same stack for the rest of the night. I only could play for 2 hours and man it was a good game. The big hand of the night for me I limped with 3,4 (cause I seem to do well with that hand for some reason) and no one raised. Flop 5,2,J and check. Guy to my left bets $15 and 4 people call so I call. There was a flush draw out there so I hate to draw to the worst draw but the perfect card would pay off so I chased. The turn is an Ace and I have the nuts. I decide to donk out $40 and the guy who had made the $15 bet raises. Then the guy to his left makes it like $150. It fold around to me and i ship it but I only had about $150 anyway. The original flop better and turn raiser flops top two pair. So what was I up against? 3,4. Chop. Lame. I had raised earlier with 3,4 out of boredom and history of running well with that hand but got reraised to like $100 and folded. My friend who dont give much of a shit called it with KJ. He was up against Aces. He flopped two pair and boated the river. Sicko. It was getting time to go and I hadnt really hadnt won or lost any big pots when I pick up AK. I decided I would limp and reraise. The straddle was on so I toss in my $5 and to my direct left makes it $80. Shit now I know its all going in and he isnt folding. But to my surprise the guy to his immediate left goes all-in for $150ish. This guy hadnt been messing around so I figured his range was pretty high and I would have to hope he had Jacks or Queens to play and I only had $5 bucks in. Plus the original raiser coulda had one or even two of my outs. I fold and the overbetter calls and evens up winning with his 88. The reraiser had 77 and said he was sick of getting nothing and ready to double up or go home. No Ace or King came so I was saved from going broke. So thats it. That was the big action. Net $65 for the night and it never sucks to leave up but man I know there was some serious chip dumping going on after I left.

My Only Reader Hates Me in a Scary Way

2010-05-14T13:09:00.000-07:00

My favorite commenter stopped by again. He left a 181 word comment about how much I suck and have no balls, I'm a lair and I dont tell the whole story to make myself look better and how I should quit playing poker. He knows Im not publishing it but I just love to talk about it. He doesnt agree with the way I played AA with the heart flush draw. I didnt love it either really but I was probably beat by a low flush and I had a shit load of money on the table that I didnt feel like losing it by pushing there. My commenter thinks he coulda had an over pair and a heart. Really? So he was raising with multiple players in the hand and firing 3 streets with 99 and a heart? Good read. He was either bluffing the whole way or he had the flush or some 2 pair or set. I guess you would really hate the fact that I check folded AA to one bet in a 5 way pot when the flop was 9,8,7. But here is the apex of bad poker player: Why would you spend so much of your life trying to convince bad poker players like me to quit playing? I admit Im bad a lot of the time. But if I find someone even worse than me Im surely not going to discourage him. I guess he is one of those Phil Helmuth types that like to run the bad players off. Maybe he plays such high stakes that he doesnt really care what he says to the $1/$2 donkeys like me. Oh and he doesnt like my "gay" terms like cbet or set mine. I guess he prefers words like "lingo". Come to think about it he likes the word fagmo too. Maybe he has a thing for words the end in "o". So heres to you Mr. Angry Obsessed Commenter Guy. I hope all of the 70% of poker players you think are fucking losers, liars, no nuts, dumb asses, goof fuckers, fucking queers, and fagmos all quit playing so you will stop being so successful at poker and can find your true calling as maybe a militia soldier in Montana. But until then I got a habit so I aint quitting. Im sorry if my blog negatively impacts your life. I hope for you all the best things in this world including peace and serenity.

Good Bye Roll. Hope I See You Again Soon.

2010-05-13T14:04:00.000-07:00

OK dammit I guess I gotta tell about my stupid poker Sunday. I went to Harrahs to play in the $555 6 handed nooner. I dont think 6 handed is a good format for me but fuck it. Its my big tournament splurge. I woulda rather the Saturday no limit tournament but family obligations didnt allow. Well I played $1/$2 cash before the tournament and was drooling over this numb nuts who raised it to $15 everyhand. He went broke every 2 hands. I got a coupla low pairs and didnt hit the flop. I woulda reraised the dude preflop with any pair but usually I had 4 callers of the $15 in front of me so I just set mined. Whatever. Probably a bad move. I dont really remember what happened but I went broke with AK with an Ace high flop against a set. I went to the tournament. Tried to oopen up just slightly and succeeded to fail. I didnt get any starting hands. I hovered around 9k for a long time. I moved tables to this dream table full of tight passives. I stole a few pots and lost a few too. I went up and down between 7 and 10K chips. Before the break I had JJ and raised pre and got 2 calls and the flop was 9 high so I cbet and got raised and then the guy behind the raise went all in for his last $2500ish. I wasnt worried about him but the raiser made it 4k to go so it was all or nothing. He just wasnt the kind to do that with A9 so I fold and he had a set of 3s. When I get back from the break I get a pair of 9s and I raise and get 2 callers and the flop is 8 high. I cbet and get basically min raised plus a few hundred from the only player at the table who was bluffing and being agressive with his position. Well my stack is pretty low now compared to the blinds. I just dont want to lay down every freaking over pair. I ship it. He has a set of 3's. Im out. Fuck it. I go put $10 on the number 3 a few times just to see if 3 wil give me some money back. I then go to play cash and do well and run good the first hour. Im up like $450 after an hour and would spend the next like 7 hours hovering around $400 up. Then I flop two pair and check raise and get called by top pair jack kicker and he hits a jack on the turn. I flop a set of Queens and get beat by a straight on the turn. I have AdAh and the flop is all hearts and I raised on the flop by a tight player so I call that and the turn and fold teh river. I probably shoulda ship it on the flop just on general principle. I reload and eventually go broke with an under set. That hand was shitty. Guy raises to $7 in early position and I call with 44. $7 was a sweetener. $15 was the standard raise. A guy in late position calls too. I flop a set and just call the cbet and so does the late position guy. I raise the turn which is a 3 and the late position guy puts in $200 over my $60. The original raiser must have AA because he is really upset even though he does have but $27 in the pot. I ship my stack to watch the guy turn over a set of Queens. He fucking smooth called in late postion with Queens. Maybe he had a read on the original raiser. I highly doubt it though. Just an old tourist dude with a wife running around the slots. I was really thinking a set of 3s made more sense but fuck me what do I know. So there it is. I dumped $700 in cash, $555 in tournament. Not to mention the roullette before and after my cash game. I just had to try and hit that 3. So 13 hours of straight poker and I busto. Fuck. But ya know Im ok with it. I have had a great week actually. Usually after a bad day I will stew in it for days but I never did. I may have missed a few marginal moves but Im not upset with the decisions I made that day. I had been running good and just had to give a few back to the cash gods and the tournament is a two or three times a year expense for me if i happen to have the bankroll. Anyway so it looks like Im in poker jail for a few weeks. My bankroll is loaned out except for a few hundred so I guess Im not gonna play this weekend. I may play Monday since I get paid and just play the tournament and 1 bullet for the cash game.

Big Fold. Good Win. New Orleans is on the Horizon.

2010-05-05T14:02:00.000-07:00

Well another night at the Shack. I played the donkament. Bluffed my way to even until blinds got high and I pushed with JJ and was up against AA. Oh well. Went to the cash game with a good attitude. I was very ready and willing to lose my $200 buyin playing good poker. Actually I dont know if I was going to play good poker but I was going to play aggressive and try to open my game up a bit in the right spots. I raised the very first hand with A2 up to $8 and flopped an ace. I cbet and got check/called by a solid passive player in the small blind. Basically an old Belle of Baton Rouge style rock who likes to protect his good hands, call his medium hands and call his draws. Well at least thats how I read him. Who knows really. I bet the turn again to see if he was flushing. He wasnt. He obviously had a better Ace. Well the board paired on the river and any Ace worse than AK was gonna split. He checked to me and I bet. He made a crying call and we chopped. From that point on he called me wild man which was fine with me. I think it paid off later but it coulda really reversed itself when I had to consider that he might make a move with less than I would usually give him credit for. A few hands later I called a raise from the button with A6 suited. I missed the flop but floated the pretty weak cbet into me to see if he would check fold the turn. He checked but didnt fold to my turn bet. He checked the river and I was pretty sure he had 2nd pair or a very bad kicker so I bet a nice size on the river and he mucked after some torturous consideration. When I get to the Big Blind I have KQ. A couple people limp and the button raises but its a guy who loves to raise the button to limpers (which is very +EV and correct btw). The SB calls so I make a big raise. It folds around to the SB who calls. Huh? ok. The flop is J high and he checks. I make a big bet because Im representing a big pair. He folds AK. I would see this guy later triple up after playing KK pretty bad and being behind two allins until the river hit his 2 outter. At this point I make a lame joke to the massage girl about how much $4 would get me and she takes the time to explain it to me so I feel like now I gotta get a massage so she doesnt think Im clowning her. I get a 10 minute massage and wow it was worth the $15 I gave her. I felt very relaxed and since I wasnt picking up any hand I could really just enjoy it. I felt super relaxed for like an hour after that. A while later I get KK in late position. UTG raises to $10 and the next guy calls him. I fold to me and I make it $35 to go. The wild maniac degenerate behind me calls having nothing in the pot and the original raiser calls. Well the original smooth caller makes it $100 more. He is the older dude who likes to protect his hand. Aces right? Im like 90% he has AA and 10% AK but definitely not QQ, JJ, or 10s. He would have repopped the first time for sure. He isnt gonna slow play any of those hands. He coulda tried to play AK cheap and then since he was calling me wild man decided I was being wild again and decided to run with AK. I thought that was a long shot really with two people smooth calling 3 bets behind me though. It had to be AA. I took forever to fold until the dealer asked me to please act. I fold and so does everyone else. He shows AA. I fell smart and like a pussy all at once. Well now I feel like Im free rolling. I eventually go broke in a hand where I flop a flush draw and open end straight draw against the maniac. I check raised all in on the flop and he called. He didnt wanna run it twice. He had raised with 87 and flopped two pair. They turned into a boat for him. That would be about the last time he felt good for the next 7 hours. I rebuy. Im not so excited about losing this next $200 so I switch to value bet mode. I did have one hand where I raised preflop with 10,9 spades and got a few callers. I flopped open ended and bet it and got called by the guy I folded KK to. The straight hits the turn but it makes a flush. He checks and I check. He checks a blank river and he is so sure Im going to check that he also flips his cards. I quickly grab some chips and throw them out. I think he thinks I saw him wanting to check/check so maybe I was trying a last ditch effort to buy it. I really was gonna bet it the same way but wanted to get it out before he did something dumb. He called the $60. I dropped back to $200 ($400 in the game) when I smooth called the flop and turn out of position with top pair and got rivered by the bluffing buddy with A6 who checked behind. Later I got AK and raised and got a call from a very tricky player. The flop is AK3 and I bet after he checks. He calls. I bet the run and he calls. I move in on the river for a little more than pot and he calls. he has AQ. Double up and almost even. I would basically stay right there for a couple hours. I went card dead and there was a drunk friend of mine raising everything behind me so I probably lost $50 bucks limping or calling small raises and folding to his raise. Eventually I moved to the open spot that opened up behind him. Cha ching. My luck changed and I was in a good spot to use it. I called a raise with 42 suited and flopped the flush. I checked, the orig raiser bets and drunk friend reraises to like $40. I make $150. Orig folds and drunk friend goes all in. Now Im really very worried that Im crushed and dead. But I only have like $150 more. Call and ask him if he has the diamonds and he nods yes. Im starting to get that sinking why do I play this shit feeling when he then says "if a diamond comes". By the time I can get the real deal out of him the pot is over and he doesnt improve. I was still was on edge until he actually mucked. Sweet. Now Im up a buyin and a half for the game. I would then start hitting a bunch of straights and sets and two pairs and they were holding up. One hand I had QJ and flopped a gut shot in a limp pot. The flop bet was $6 so called with 2 overs and a gutter against 2 players. The turn gives me the nuts. The very aggressive guy who bet the $6 bets out $10 and I just call to the small stack behind me who goes all in for $55. The original guy calls but isnt happy. I move him in for another $120ish since there a flush draw that he could have. He woulda called the flush draw but he folded whatever he had. I beat the short stacks two pair. I wanted to leave since I had work in a few hours but I woulda felt bad runnin with the money. Not that I was gonna risk too much anyway though. My drunk friend left and the action slowed down. He had actually started playing very much more passive by the end of the night anyway. The maniac was still there but he was playing half buyins. There were actually 3 big stacks and like 3 short stacks and maybe an average stack who did really wanna get to involved. The other big stack woulda put his money in play but he was a tricky good player so I wasnt seeing an opportunity there. The other one was just protecting his win. We just played small ball for a couple hours at the end and then I left. I left in time to go get 1.5 hours of sleep for work and up 3 buyins. The next day was pure hell but I'd say I would do it all again. Looking forward to New Orleans this weekend. Probably play the Saturday night and hopefully the Sunday 6 handed depending on how the cash game runs. I really wanna play the Tuesday Head Up tournament but I will have to do really well this weekend to justify taking work time off and getting my sons to stay somewhere else for that night. Last New Orleans event I played 3 nightly's and cashed in all three but not in the top 10 ever. I wanna pop a top 5 in there this time.

Another Card Dead Double Deuce

2010-04-25T15:17:00.000-07:00

Dammit I depressed. I just got knocked out of the Double Deuce again. I had one decent pair and it was in the small blind and no one came into the pot. I had A9 on the button later with no limpers and raised into AK and 10s. My last hand I flopped a flush draw with 2 probable overs and I check raised all in and got called by 53 cause he had a pair of 5s and a straight draw. His 5s held. Fuck this double deuce is pissing me off. I havent had a single rush in 2 tournaments. I just see donkey after donkey chip up with terrible plays and unreal luck. FUCK. I guess Im just gonna wire them some moolah cause Im sick of trying to convert my points to cash through tournaments. SHIT.

Another Shack Whackin (not that kinda whackin you sicko but we are a buncha guys in a circle)

2010-04-21T07:23:00.000-07:00

I returned to the Gay Man-Love Shack (my no life havin psycho heckler thinks the Love Shack sounds gay so I changed it)on Monday to play the tournament and a little cash. Prior to that I had played in a coupla dying cash games for an hour here and there and a coupla one table tournaments that I didnt cash in. I did play in the 10000 person double deuce $22 buyin on Sunday at FTP. I went out 2200ish. I never had a hand bigger than 99 or AK. It was a real donkament and I look forward to playing in it again sunday. Im buying in with my bonus points and I have enough for 3 more buyins. It was real maniac fest. We were in the first round of blinds 10/20 with 3500 chips each and I saw this guy raise preflop to like 60 and this other guy goes all-in for like 3400 more and the original raiser calls. They both had AQ off-suit. See what Im saying. There were a ton of players like this so expect to be crushed by the worst hand eventually.

Anyway I played the tournament at the Shack Monday. I never had any good hands but I grinded and stole my way to 7th place which wasnt in the money but getting pretty close. The cash game was lively but with mostly good players. I actually had a local guy on my right (I will call him the intimdator) who had won a world series 10K circuit event on espn a few years ago and he had some buddies at the table too who I figured werent going to be your typical weak passive calling stations. I had A10 of hearts once and flopped an Ace and a flush draw. It was just me and the intimidator who had raised preflop. He cbet the flop into me and I just called. Why did I just call? Well if Im ahead I dont want to discourage him from betting especially if he was on a heart draw too. If Im behind I dont want to play a big pot just because I have the heart draw. The turn is a brick and he bets into me again and I just call. The river is a queen and he gives up and I just check behind. He didnt have anything. He ask or commented something about why I didnt raise and I explained all this to him and then wondered why I was telling the intimidator how I think so he can use it against me. Also the way I play may be totally wrong in his mind which would I guess give him incentive to get in pots with me. There was another small hand that was interesting to me that I played poorly. Im in a pot with a guy (mr. loose I will call him) who will call loose, bet loose, raise loose. I have flopped a flush draw and I bet. He calls. Then I checks and he check. He either has a middle or bottom pair or a draw. The river is another brick and I check and he bets a pot sized bet. The pot is very small and I fold my Ace but I should have called. He isnt betting a middle pair there. He either had nothing or a big hand. Nothing was way more likely. He showed his nothing. I didnt mind since letting him get away with moves is good for the game in the long run. A little while later I limp with K3suited and the button raised to 12 and mr. loose calls so I call even though its a really high raise because I wanna play pots with mr. loose. The flop is KJ3. Bingo for me. Mr. loose checks, I check, and the button bets 15. Mr. loose calls and I raise $35 more. They both call. The turn is a 4 and mr. loose check and I bet like $80. Button folds. Mr. loose asks how many chips I got because he cant fold the river if he calls the turn. I have $90 more. He calls. I push the 90 in on the river and he calls with his AK and I win a nice pot. The button who is a normally tight good player told me he called the flop just because he knows how unlucky I am. How sick is that. Im getting action based on my unluck. The other significant hand of the night for me I had KK in early position. I raised a standard amount. I never understand why people with KK or AA open raise for too much preflop. Anyway I get a coupla calls. The Flop is K53 with two diamonds. I bet maybe 35% of the pot. Mr. loose calls. I really dont put him on anything but Im worried about the flush draw for sure. Well the turn is a diamond but its the 5 giving me a house. I bet the same amount hoping he has the flush now. Mr. loose pushes all in. Yahtzee. He had the second nut flush. I dont know how that pot woulda played out had I ever checked or bet more on either street but probably me and mr. loose were gonna get it in anyway. He was steamin from the first big hand anyway. I tried to offer mr. loose some sympathy in the form of lettin ghim know he got unlucky and coolered but he just said "fuck you". If you know mr. loose you know he is joking but really just complaining. I laugh and he gives me the fist bump and all is well and Im tripled up. I played another hour and a half and left at 11 like I told D I would in my text at 5:30. I dont hit and run. I hate that. BUT I will leave at the correct time where as if Im stuck I have a tendency to say fuck it and chase my loses after my self or girl imposed curfew. But I couldnt have done that Monday either way. I had very firm plans. My last hour and a half I played a good many hands and chipped up a little more. Oh there was one other hand that was weird and I dont know what they had but the board was 4422 by the turn and the original better bet $2 into this $15 pot and got called by the intimidator. The guy then checks the river which was a Queen, the intimidator bets $15 and the guy min raises him $15 more. It was a very weird play. The intimidator thinks for a while and fires out $85. The guy folds. I would loved to have seen those hands. I wonder if the intimidator really played a 4 or a 2 that way or if he just picked the guy off. So yippee for me I won. If I would just never play any limit games at the Belle I woulda be having a decent month.

Drinkers Making the Love Shack Very Lively

2010-04-11T03:11:00.000-07:00

Just got back from the Love Shack game. Got there late. The chips were already flyin. The chasers were doin damage. Within the first 20 minutes a guy who plays solid ABC poker got two outered on the river went ballistic cussin and chastising the biggest weak passive calling station at the table and then threw the cards at the dealer. I understand his pain but damn thats bad for the game. The guy he was berating left shortly after and it pissed someone else off enough for them to leave. I think they were both looking for a reason to leave anyway though. But without that reason one of them probably woulda stayed all night Im sure. Oh well. Mr. ABC was stuck big and drinkin so he just lost it. He left soon after too. Ive never done it to that extreme but I have left cussin and calling someone a fucking idiot before. Its really bad for poker but sometimes you just cant stand to not let them know how bad they played. Mr. ABC reads this blog so I will say dude I get it and I aint mad atcha. Its tough when you put your money in good most of the time but still leave broke. Thats the cruel thing about no limit. You can play good all night and never get unlucky until the last hand against the guy who has you covered and go home broke over one mistake or one suckout. Makes you question why ever play really. There was another dude there who was a real nice guy having a good time and bluffin a good bit. He eventually drank his way to the felt too. I dont think he really cared. I didnt get the felling he was a serious player. When the guy counts out $300 in stacks of 2 $5 dollar chips at a time its a pretty big sign that he dont play a lot. Watching then do it is like slowly scratching a chalk board. I pretty much got my usual terrible starting hands and folded for the first coupla hours. I bought in for $200 an stayed between $120 and $170 much of the first coupla hours. It wasnt till I played a 34off suit to a raise and a shit load of callers and hit a straight that I finally pushed above my original buyin. Actually it was a pretty big pot that tripled me up from my low point. I would venture below my buyin after that but I would drag another big one later with 34offsuit after flopping the straight. I stayed ahead after that. Later in the night my hands began improving and I won some good pots. I won with AK a coupla times against a really aggressive intoxicated player. I was in the small blind both times and just called him preflop and check raised him on the flop. One time he called and the other he didnt and I won both pots. My big hand at the end of the night was against the same guy. He was drinkin and playing very aggressive. I raised in the blind with QQ and got called by 2 players. Flop is AQ3rainbow and I bet out hoping Im against a good Ace. Mr. Aggressive raises and I go all in. I know its a pretty big raise but I thought he was pretty strong and I didnt want to call and let him check behind me on the turn. He called. I guess he had AK or maybe even A3. It was about a $500 pot. I was also betting a $1 a flop with my neighbor on the color of the flop and I swear I beat him like 20 to 6 and every time his color would hit it seemed like I won the hand anyway so I didnt mind. I do have one hand that has me talking to myself. I raised on the button with 10s and the flop comes 987 with a flush draw and I bet and get raised my Mr. Aggressive. I know Im supposed to push in there. I had $50 in the pot already and the raise was $75 more to me and was going to cost about $190 more if he called my allin and I lost. To make that bet normally he would have to have two pair at least or maybe straight and flush draw. I knew I could very well be a head and at the least I am open ended. I folded though. I just didnt want to put $250 more in on that marginal spot especially after I had just won a big pot. I realize how pussy it was but I dont care. I waited for a better spot and it came eventually. The game broke up after Mr. Aggressive busted my flop color betting neighbor. We had been 5 for a long time and had been 4 handed for a pretty good while too. We put the mandatory $5 straddle on after we went 5 handed so we wouldnt be chopping the blinds every other hand. I didnt want to play 4 hand really and certainly didnt want to play 3 handed against a very aggro player who had just rebought and was trying to get his chips back from me. So after all was said and done I cleared over $600 almost making up for last weeks Omaha fiasco. Very pleased.

The Cooler

2010-04-07T14:10:00.001-07:00

Well I havent played much real poker since the AA vs KK. I sat a little while at the 2/5 game in the AM hours Sunday morning but the game broke up pretty fast. I did lose a shit ton of money playing 4/8 limit and then 4/8/12 Omaha. I played all night and had a lot of fun but I lost big. It was really the wee hours Omaha session that got me. Never made my hands and was alway against the nutz. There was this loud drunk jackass who as soon as he sat down at the NL table one guy told the dealer he had learned his lesson and took off. Obviously this jackass shows up drunk quite often and runs his mouth big time. He played terrible and lost a lot in a very short time. He shoulda broke even though because he got all in preflop with QQ and a very regular chick up there called him with 10,7 suited. I dont know why she had it out for him but she flopped the straight. Then the game broke and we went to the 4/8 game and jackass immediately started a fight with everyone who would let him. It was funny. At one point this terrible player with a date there was getting it from the jackass with both barrels and the guy on the date called jackass a "dago". That really upset the table for some reason. I thought it was about as smart as date guys 4 betting the river with pocket twos like he was gonna push someone of their hand. His date was nice looking but obviously not impressed with him or his constant rebuys. Funny thing was jackass did well and sucked out a ton of rivers. Funnier was that when we started playing Omaha he turned into a very consevative player. And he ran like God. The morning crew started coming in and this old guy who was not familiar with Omaha started playing and if I wanted to I could see his cards anytime but I hate doing that. He ran good too and I eventually felted. It didnt bother me too much although I did dump a lot. I just look at those latenight limit games as gambling. Like I was playing slots or something. It doesnt hurt my poker ego to lose there. Just my bankroll and also my wondering if Im just destined to be unlucky. I wonder if I could make a living as The Cooler. The guy who goes and hangs around the lucky players to cool them off.

Why Play Through Misery

2010-03-30T14:03:00.000-07:00

When Im running bad and poker is miserable I sometimes get the questions about why. Why do it when it makes you so miserable so much of the time? Right after the beat I tend to be very fatalistic and talk about being cursed and pretty much just rant and rave for about 18 hours. But after I calm down I do return to the fact that I love to play. The best answer I can come up with is: Do you think Kevin Garnet should have quit playing basketball when he was with the T-Wolves because he was losing so much for so many years and it drove him absolutely crazy? Do you think his disappointment in the results shouldve caused him to give up the game? Im not saying Im the Kevin Garnet of poker or anything but the same way an NBA player practices and watches tape and gets ready to play, a lot of player including me like to read books, participate in online forums, and watch videos and learn more to play the game. Why? For the same reason. We love the game and want to play our best. I believe if you put in the work you can be at least a small winning player even with only situational math and no instinct for the game. We're not degenerates. If we get our money in good and get unlucky for a long stretch or if we get drafted by the Clippers and have the bad luck of being on a crappy team we dont just quit playing. We feel like everytime we step on the court or sit at a new table it is a new game. So why is it different to the wives or the friends who think we are just degenerate gamblers chasing cards?

Typical Results

2010-03-30T06:46:00.000-07:00

Well I went out on the bubble in the tournament and I left the cash game after getting all in preflop with AA vs KK and losing. My long fun night of cash poker lasted about 45 minutes. I knew I had to leave because I was so damn pissed. I was also pissed because I had stuck $30 in one pot and $39 in another and didnt even get to see the flop. One of those times I raised 7.5 times the bb, got called, then a guy goes all in UTG with a $39 short stack so I call (coulda raised all-in here I guess or just folded) then I get an all-in push from the SB behind me. So I have 77 and figure Im at least looking at 3 or 4 over cards to beat and probably one over pair. I figure at best Im 40% to win and more likely Im like 17% if either has an over pair. I almost called even though it didnt make any sense to call but the way they played the hand was fubar too. It was $107 more to me. I had $39 in there. I gotta call $107 to win $230 which if they have overs and share an Ace would be barely correct to call. I fold and they both have A10. I woulda scooped. Anyway after the AA vs KK fiasco I just left.

J4 is a Monster

2010-03-27T07:58:00.000-07:00

Going to play 1/2 tonight. I've quit smoking so I won't have that shit to deal with. I wonder how truly bad it is to miss a coupla free hands every hour due to smoke breaks. I'm bout to work out a little and maybe run. Quitting smoking have put 5 lbs on me. I hope I can not smoke through those spirit crushing bad beats. So anyway I played the Love shack tournament Monday. Started of playing loose and stupid. Cracked AA with J4 from the button but the raise was plenty to get me out. Maybe if this dude didn't love to show 7 duece in that spot all the time I wouldn't have put him on any two cards. But I flopped a flush draw and turned the flush and he bet it all into me since he had the Ace flush draw at that point. So I doubled up and won a few more pots playing stupid and then got called down light a coupla times and settled in a started playing right. Well right in my mind but I'm sure horribly wrong from a good players perspective. Blinds shot up fast and before you know it nobody has more than 20 big blinds and it was a shovathon. I'm usually pretty good about picking good spots to shove so I picked up a good amount of chips but then lost them not shoving and actually seeing a coupla flops. Anyway I bitched a cryed enough that we chopped it 6 ways. I was sitting with 4 big blinds when we chopped so it was a good outcome for me. Still made over $130 each. I made $80 in the short handed side table and ate good pizza and had to leave. I actually told then when I was leaving all night but it still feels crappy to win a little and bolt. Speaking of leaving my anonymous heckler made it pretty clear he is a Loveshack reg with his comment last post. Obviously he knows I left the game to go hang out with my girlfriend. Haha mother fucker. I'm at least glad that its someone fucking with me and not some random idiot who cares way too much.

Shit my game got cancelled. I thought about trying out the new club but just decided to hang out with friends. Looking forward to Monday night now.

Serial Killers and Florida Retirees and Life Tilt Session

2010-03-09T07:55:00.000-08:00

Well Ive played two sessions since my last post. One 13 hour marathon at Harrahs and one 4 hour debacle at the Love Shack. The Harrahs session was bizzare. There was always some mentally unstable person at the table who was non-stop talking. Usually there was more than one and they talked to each other. The first one talked for 3 hours straight about basketball. A fucking Duke fan. At one point I asked him to leave the dealer alone cause we are on a time rake. Then there was this very scary looking guy. He looked like a nerdy scientist serial killer. He acted even more like one. Just erratic. Getting mad a starring people down for a coupla hands because they had the audacity to raise him. I check raised him of top pair one time with my flush draw and showed it and I thought I might end up as a head in his freezer. My favorite hand of the night was when I made it $20 to go (playing $1/$2 No Limit BTW) from the button against two limpers and I get called by the small blind who had just lost a pot and was on tilt. He tried to talk serial killer into playing to justify his odds. I even told him he was tilt calling and trying to get people to justify it. Also calling was this idiot old man from Florida (pronounced Flaariduh). I had Ace10 and the flop is 10,6,2. I bet the flop when they check to me and they both call. The turn is another duece and small blind (a talkative nice brotha named Corey) donks out $100. The old idiot from Flaariduh calls the $100. I cant even fathoim how Im beat but I fold anyway. The river is another 6 and SB bets out another $100 and Flaariduh idiot pushes all in. SB calls his last $130ish and the flip the cards. SB has K2 for the low boat but he is beat by 76 for the high boat. SB jumped up cussin and left and I cussed under my breath for the rest of the session at Mr. 76 offsuit for $20 preflop calling $150 more dollars to hit a 2 out on the river. There were tons and tons of morons floating to the table that session but I never could get the right situations to win a big pot. The biggest pot I got was when Mr. Juicy Poker himself dealt me AA and KK moved in on me preflop and I held up. I did buy my share of pots and that kept me a float but at the end of the 13 hour session basically my meager profit was from the AA vs KK. I woulda shoulda coulda won a big pot when I flopped a flush but I got four flushed on the river. I still made money because the side pot I was in with this horribad dude was bigger than the main pot and he was drawing to a straight on an all spades flop with a lot of action. Genius.

My Love Shack experience was so bad and so avoidable. I wanted to play so bad but for the wrong reasons. I had gotten some very disturbing medical news earlier and wanted to get my mind off it and thought it wouldnt effect me. It did. I played loose and weak and talked a lot and made bad moves at bad times and chased my losses and didnt quit when I was supposed to in order to go see my waiting girlfriend who was pissed and hurt by the time I quit way to late to go see her. That about sums it up. No hands to talk about really. My last hand I went broke after raising the pot with Q7 of hearts and getting a lot of callers and flopping a flush draw. I bet big and got pushed in. I had more in the pot than I had left and I called. The heart came. He had K6 of hearts. FML per usual.

Feeling Better, Getting Better, and Expecting Better Results

2010-03-05T11:49:00.000-08:00

Went to the Belle after work Wednesday. I sat for 4 hours and except for the 30 minutes my friend was dealing I never had a pocket pair nor did I ever hit my Big Slick type hands. Fortunately (but sadly) there was a girl playing who had no clue and just kept pulling out $100 from her bra. She musta bought in for $1500 by the time I left. If the other players wouldnt have strung me up I woulda asked her wtf she thought she was doing at that table. The $100s were all the old style too which was weird. Maybe she raided Granny's sock drawer. Anyway she would call with bottom pair for her $100 so anytime I could get isolated with her I just value bet my middle pair and she kept me afloat. After 3.5 hours and no pocket pair I went to take a break. When I came back my friend was in the box and he hit me with pocket 3's first hand. I limped utg and nobody raised but like 6 people limped. The flop is 10,6,3. The small blind bets $15. The big blind raises to $45. I make it $120. The girl who cant play calls her last $95 and it gets back to big blind. He thinks and mucks 10,6. Nobody in that spot shoulda done that. He should figured I had limped with AA hoping for a raise. Thank God he mucked. The turn was another 6 and he woulda got it all. So its me and dumb girl who actually hits her gutshot that she probably didnt know she had on the river but I got a boat so no harm. Instead of stacking off once again to a hand that was way behind (as usual), I actually made a couple hundred due to someones mistake. I say mistake because over time he would make way more money pushing with top two there. Maybe he saw the hand I played 2 weeks ago when I pushed with top pair knowing 100% the guy had an over pair. But I woulda folded my over pair to a reraise so I guess I will never get the satisfaction of being in that position and sucking out. Anyway my buddy hit me with two more pocket pairs of KK and I won a couple more small pots. When he left I left. Im starting to believe in the law of attraction in regards to dealers who want you to do well (maybe because you will throw them a red bird for a $25 pot) and the cards they send you. I think Im gonna start tipping any new dealer who sits as a rule. Get them on my side. Im really starting to believe in metaphysics and the power of the mind to create its own reality. Anyway Im proud I didnt get too crazy when I was card dead trying to pick up pots that were not for sale. Im planning on playing more cards in the next few months so this was a decent start but really probably insignificant to the overall results I will achieve since basically I won an amount that will be wiped out with one single loss of a significant pot. Oh and btw I have talked about not being a very good poker player on this blog so part of my playing more is going to be learning more too. Im getting a coach and reading a lot. I did the leak busters program from my online database the other day. The results were not shocking or unknown but its just part of the process. Also Ive had a lot of highly emotional things go on in my life this last year and I feel like a few weeks ago I made a break through with how I handle my thoughts and emotions and Ive played only 2 sessions since then but I won both. The other one was a going away poker party for a friend and we played .25/.50 and I took $176 profit from that. I wont go into it but I ran like God hit a buncha sets and flopped straights all night. Too bad it was in a micro game with a few friends who only wanted to spend $20 to $40 bucks. But the point is that Im feeling good, Im staying in the moment, and Im not creating bad luck from negative energy (if you believe in that).

Dedicated to the First Comment of the Last Post

2010-02-21T14:09:00.000-08:00

Stop PMing Me Asking Me to Be Gay with You

2010-02-19T14:39:00.000-08:00

Good Money Cant Win

2010-02-14T17:52:00.000-08:00

Poker has felt like getting gang raped in a prison for retards. I had Saturday by my lonesome for a change so decided to play the 2/5 NL game at the Belle casino. Pretty much the first player I notice is this little old cajun man in a golf hat who plays poker like we did when we were 8 years old for candy. He saw every flop no matter what and would try to buy everypot or just call people down if he happened to have a hand as big as bottom pair. The kind of guy you pray for basically. I basically play a few pots and stay evenish. Then I pic up AK. The UTG guy min raises to 10 and crazy cajun calls and the guy who looks likke wolfman jack calls. I decide to isolated the UTG guy who obviously has a small pair. I raise to like 65. All 3 called and one maniac behind me called. The flop comes AA5 with 2 diamonds. I go ahead and bet like 85. I want whoever has A9 to think I'm scared and put it in. Well crazy cajun calls and no one else. Oh well. The turn is another diamond. Cajun bets 150 into me. I am not sold on his flush so I call. The river is another diamond. A 4 of diamonds. Fuck me. He puts me all in. I fold. He shows. He didn't have a diamond. He had pocket 4s. Nice boat. Later him and this big Aaron Neville looking guy get in a pot where the river makes a flush and a stright for anyone with a nine. The black guy checks to cajun and cajun bets 100. Black guy reraises all in for 300 more and stares at cajun like its WWE wrestling. Cajun calls. They both had a 9. Its like watching monkeys hump a football. A while later I turned a set of 2s in a limp pot with no action on the flop. I bet it and Wolfman called, Cajun called and big scary guy called. Wolfman tells me that now I got the cajun guy on the hook. I figured he was strong since he was encouraging me while he was in the pot. Well the board pairs on the end and I bet. Wolfman moves in for like $300 more. I'm sure he has a boat. He musta had 53 or 23. I fold my boat and he tries to convince me he had top pair with a queen kicker. Ok buddy. Anyway my lst pot I had J9 and limped after 2 guys. Well big guy makes it $20 and no one folds. I call 15 more and flop is J94 and we all check to raiser. I think he has AA. He bets pot $80. Flods around to me and I make it $280. He thinks for aminute and moves in. I call. He has KK. K on the turn. I get up cussin and went Phil Helmuth on him calling him a fucking idiot who shoulda known he was beat. I walked out cussin and talkin bout how I can't win no matter what and how its like playing poker against monkeys at the zoo (not in a racial way btw).

Dancing a Jig

2010-01-26T17:32:00.000-08:00

I said if I ever hit $1000 from my $80 bucks I left on my account I would be dancin a jig. Well it took like a year to get nowhere and then came RUSH POKER!!!!! I remember when I switched to HU SnGs and had my last $20 in a tournament. I ran that up to $750 and back down. Up slow and down fast. Titling into the higher stakes. Well a week ago I was down to like $150ish when I started RUSH. I cant tell you how many hands I have played this week but I didnt spend a ridiculous amount of time on it. But its so damn fun that I probably had my heaviest online playing week in a year and a half. Anyway Im stoked. I dont even know why really. I guess because I started with $1000 from my friend who wanted half my wins and took all the loss. I ran his money down to $300 and then up to over 3K. It took forever and I woulda done better working in an indian sweat shop but since I like to play it was gravy. I made him $1150 when he bought out and then I lost my $1150 down to $880. I couldnt bear to let him win and me go broke so i took $800 out. Now Im back up to my original bankroll again. Sure I may lose it all. that Rush poker is highly volitale and if you go on tilt you can dump 10 buyins quick. Anyway yeeehaa.

Rush Poker is the New Crack

2010-01-21T16:38:00.000-08:00

Holy Donkey Balls. I just had the greatest suck out of my career. I was playing .25/.50 NL on the new Rush Poker game on Full Tilt. I raise two limpers from the button with AQ and the small blind calls and the other two call. So the pot is like 11 bucks and the flop is QJ3 with two hearts. The small blind leads out for $5 and the guy in the cut off just calls. I hope the small is on the flush draw looking to see the next card cheap and i hope the smooth caller has a draw or KQ. So Raise it to 30ish leaving me about 30ish. The both push. I snap call because I got so much already in. Im against a set of Queens and a set of 3s. The turn is a heart and I have the Ace of hearts. You know the rest of the story. Cha ching. Nice little $185 dollar pot. I have been running very crappy on this Rush poker. Im still up. Mostly on being aggressive as hell and picking good spots to bluff. Im slightly above even with aces over 2400 hands and Im down with Kings. Im appropriately up with QQ and JJ. I DO HOWEVER LOVE RUSH POKER!!!!!! Getting to turbo fold and move to another table for another hand instantly is so sweet. I have been playing 2 tables and it probably the equivalent of multi tabling 8 tables. There are a lot of grinders. Its actually turning the loose passive people into tight players because they can just fold and move to the next hand. Its not the blind stealing contest you would think though. Seems like a lot of willing callers. I have done very well floating the first bet in position and bluffing the turn. I have basically played loose aggressive and have swung all over the place but have steadily moved up until that last suck out that launched me up to $580 bankroll. I was at like $140 when I started playing Rush. I also find that when I get a bad beat and get angry I actually play tighter which is the opposite in my normal tilt mode. I just get mad and fold until i pick up a really good starting hand. Not sitting there giving my self an excuse to do something stupid while Im waiting to fold is a big help when Im tilting. Plus my rake back is rolling in like never before. I havent had a $50 rake back payment in probably a year and Im sure I will have that this next payment. Im not playing that much more time wise but Im playing so many more hands.

On the live front I got clobbered the other night by the son of a bitch James (who is really the nicest guy you'll ever meet). Coolered to hell. Mostly in two hands. He raised preflop and flopped a flush when I flopped two pair. The last hand He and another guy in the pot I raise with a flush draw and they both raise behind me. So I finally decide to gamble my last $110. The first all in guy showed us a card so I knew he had a set and I knew James didnt put in the 2nd raise with a flush draw. So after its all exposed Im the only flush draw and i hit it on the turn. James had Js and 9s and the other guy had a set of 6s. Fucking J on the river. James wins a huge pot and the set flopper is none to freaking happy and Im plenty pissed to. How the fuck is the board gonna pair. They had all the damn cards in the hole. I decided to leave cause I was gonna lose the next $200 in about 12 minutes as annoyed as I was.

Trip From Hell

2010-01-14T12:56:00.000-08:00

I played in the $550 tournament on Saturday at the Beau Rivage. My first hand I played I had J10 and limped in last position. No one bet the flop or turn with a jack high board. I bet the turn and got called. Then a raggedy 4 hits the river and the caller bets into me. I call. He had J4. Why not. I played JJ pretty strong and had to fold to a guy who claimed later he flopped a wheel. I thought it was a set. I played about 7 more pots and won none of them. I flopped two pair once and got counterfeited on the river to have to split the pot. I went down from $8000 to $1700. Then I hit a set and went up to like $4000. I made it back to $6000ish when I had to switch tables. Then my soon to be ex wife calls me. She wanted to know if I was going to be somewhere that night so we wouldnt run into each other and I said no and then she said she needed to talk to me in the next coupla days. Not to fill you in on the details but any contact with her is traumatic and her needing to talk to me about something but not telling me what is cause for concern. So I sit at my new table and all I can think about is wtf could it be. Maybe she's pregnant. Maybe she is moving to Nevada to be a hooker. Maybe she has cancer. Whatever. This is going through my head. Somewhere in there I raised a coupla pots and won them preflop. Then I caught 55 UTG. I shoulda mucked. Someone raises to $800 and I call. The flop is J87 with 2 clubs. I check. He checks behind. Turn is nothing. I check. He bets $1500. Without very much good thought I decide he is on AK and trying to buy it now. I never even looked at him. I raise most of my chips and he puts the rest of me in. He had AA. I woulda thought with an over pair he woulda bet the flop. I guess he put me on a middle pair and didnt want to be up against a set so he checked and when I didnt bet the turn he knew. Oh well. Never answer your soon to be ex-wifes call during a tournament. The rest of the weekend was more losing. I lost most of my cash game money by flopping top pair top kicker and my opponent catching a set on the turn again. That accounts for most of my loses in the last 2 months. Also there was a fire alarm and they evacuated the hotel at 3am but didnt alert the casino people. So all our wives and girlfriends and kids and whatever were shipped outside in the cold while we played casino games. We started getting texts about it and no one got up from the table to go see what the deal was. I paid for that little fau paus later but I wont talk about it. Lets just say when Im gambling expect me to err on the side of being self centered. Its not personal. Its just being a degenerate who is stuck $300. Then the next morning I dumped like $300 into the slots on the way outta town. Genius. My girl friend was up $400 in the first hour on slots but was down $200 with 4 hours. We really tore that casino up good. Never up on any table or machine at anytime. I realize that Im a better tournament player than cash player. I play tight aggressive in tournaments but I play mostly loose passive at the cash table these days. I gotta change that. At least I need to play loose aggressive. I need to start experimenting with taking big stabs at pots when the time is right. I guess it just seems like everytime I stick my neck out on a bluff I get my head chopped off. Gun shy lately. So anyway Im looking forward to playing again soon. I may play Sunday at Harrahs.

Friendly Poker in the South and Biloxi on the Horizon

2010-01-07T13:57:00.000-08:00

Well 2010 has been like the food at Hooters. Ok tasting and fun. I've yo yo'd online but nothing new there. I played Monday night in the 29 person Loveshack tournament. I really just basically blinded down (with a few small lost pots) to 3 big blinds and then won two pots and was up to 9 big blinds which at that point was almost double the starting chips. Then I picked up AJ on the button with no limpers and went hidee-ho allin and Loveshack Dave called me with pocket 5's. You think I can beat Dave in a coin flip??? Hell no. I have to be very much behind to beat Dave in an allin. So at least I was the cash game bubble. Dave would go on to take it down. Bought in for a meager $120. With Cowboy Billy in the game I wanted to just pick a spot to play and not have him take me off my hand. But I never found that spot to play. I saw some flops and dropped down to about $70. I was on the button with QJ and I decided to make a raise. I didnt notice the UTG limper only had $19 and was looking to play for it all. I made it $14 and the luck box calling station old crazy ass Bob called and UTG puts in his $17 more. The flop is K,10,rag and Bob bets out $10 into the $57 pot. I dont wanna just call here. I figure Bob can fold his pair for $41 more so I shove. Bob sitting there with 10,9 makes a crying call. He thought he had sucked out when the 9 hit the river. Yatzee. A while later Bob raises a limped pot from one of the blinds to $12 and everyone calls including me with 3's. Flop is 9,8,3 with two clubs. Bob leads out for $30 into like a $90 pot. All fold up to me and I pull out my $30 and sorta look like Im thinking about just calling or raising and I just shove. I think I had maybe $95 more. Bob calls. He claimed two pair but I never saw his cards. My set held up and now Im sitting with around $350ish. I dont think I played another significant pot the rest of the night. I never had a raising hand again. Actually I never had a raising hand period. I may have drug a little pot or two but I dont recall. The most memorable hand of the night was when Cowboy Billy goaded Bob into playing for like $300 against Billy's KK and Bob's 99. Bob got up and told Billy that he was a little man with a sad life and that he was happy for him because he needs the money and was a thousandaire who could piss on $300 and he would take on all comers. All the while Billy is laughing his ass off. Some english guy (like he was from England) remarked that he thought it was a friendly game. I said friendly means no firearms at the table but maybe a few in the trucks. When I left I was up $200 in the cash game. Doesnt cover my last loss but Im starting the new year fresh. Im 1-0 in 2010 and I split the college bowl pickem I was in. Im going to Biloxi this weekend and playing in the Saturday 12pm No Limit tournament. Hopefully I will not get to play the nightly for $200 because Im still live in the nooner. I hope the roads arent to f'd up Saturday morning. Look out Mississippi, the Sofa King has some funds to dump in your establishment. I love Biloxi. I could say something to jinx myself here but I wont.

2 Days Left in This Stupid Year

2009-12-30T07:29:00.001-08:00

Played the Monday night tournament. Same ole shit. I see a couple flops and hit nothing. Then I get QQ with no raises in front of me. I limp and instantly ask myself why am I doing that. 5 to the flop and its 8,6,3 with two clubs. We all check to the button who bets big. He bets 600 into a 500 pot. This guy is very aggro and I figure he isnt that strong. So I raise to 2500 and I got 1000 left. He knows he is beat. He thinks for a while. I think he just decided he didnt care. So he called. The turn is another 8. I put my 1000 in and he calls. He had 8,5. No draw. Just a naked 8. Im sure I could say that he shouldnt have been in there because I shoulda raised preflop but fuck that. I was supposed to win a 7000 pot there. Actually I was supposed to win an 1100 chip pot cause he was supposed to fold to the raise. But preflop I had two hyper aggressive people behind me who coulda raised just to try and steal the limps so it was worth it for me to try and limp reraise. Anyway I said screw the cash game and left. Short night. Im still waiting on 2010. I need 2010 to get here. I need something to help me put this last year to bed.

Ive been swingin wildly online this week. I started by winning 8 out of 10 $20 Heads Up SnGs. Then I played some .50/1.00 full ring games. I went up another $150 and have come back down $160. Most of the come back down was from my only 2 all in preflops where I lost to AK suited both times by them hitting a flush. I had KK and QQ. I win just one of those and its a $100 swing. The shitty part is Im playing wild and loose so when I have monster hands I get action. My preflop stats are like 40% VIP and 20% raise. I know I cant win like that. I should just grind heads up SnGs. But lately Ive been liking ring games. So after all that Im up to $310 from last report of $210 and down from my high point yesterday of $455. Im going to be at $1000 by the end of January. Im sick of this piddling around shit.

Wanna Play Higher

2009-12-22T11:38:00.001-08:00

I gotta do something different online. I keep going up and dropping down but its all in the little stakes games. My win rate goes up so much the higher I play. I get bored and cocky and have little regard for money in the .25/.50 game. I lost a full $50 buyin in two hands last night because of this. I had 8,5 on the button and a few limpers so I call. Flop is A,K,5. Small blind guy leads out. I figure he has an Ace. Someone calls and I call. Thats the problem. I called hoping to hi a 5 or an 8 because the money wasnt significant enough. Well the turn is an 8. He bets again. I didnt really like the bet. Now Im wondering if he has pocket 5s. But I call. The river is another 8. Yatzeee. And it makes the flush. He bets into me again. Now I can beat those pocket 5s or Ace,5 or a flush draw with a pair. I push in hoping he has the flush. He calls. A8. I lose. How fucking brutal. My own fucking fault. I should never seen the turn. Then I get pissed and buy into a $50 Head Up SnG. I dominate the guy but never kill him. The blinds get high and the pots get big and he runs good and I dont. Out. So I lost $80 total because I was playing .50/1.00 and up $30 and decided to play lower for shits before I had to go. ANYWAY.

My point is this. I want to play the $1/2 game. Historically Ive done well I that game. When my backer cashed out. I dropped down in stakes and started doing poorly so I cashed out. I couldnt bear the thought of him making money and me not. I left $80 bucks on and have run that up and down between having my last $20 in a SnG all the way up to over $700. Im at $210 right now. Im want to put $2000 on and just play higher. My hesitations are the current state of legality in terms of cashing out and that $2000 is a lot for me and I will be bummed if I lose it. Also Im worried that I might become to focused on playing and neglect my life if I invest a lot into it. Maybe I should just quit my job and uber nit multi-tables and be a rake back pro. I dunno. Stupid laws. Stupid time management.

Mutha F'in Mondays

2009-12-04T13:25:00.000-08:00

So I played Monday night before last. Played the tournament and pretty much broke myself the first big pot. I raised big in late position and the big blind called. I had AQ and an Ace hit (along with 2 deuces) and he bet into me. So at this point I have to fold my AQ and give him credit for AK or AA or I push because my all in raise is only 1.5 times his bet. I push. He calls with AK. Im out. I played cash and did ok.

I played this Monday too. Nothing but crap cards and a steal attempt that ran into QQ. I played cash. Miserably card dead all night. I had AK about 3 times and JJ a coupla times and that was it for 5 hours. I did however win some pots with two pair to stop bleeding. I never had better than 2 pair until my last hand. My last hand I had AK and I raised large and only got one caller. The flop comes K55. He checks. I decided to check. This kid is aggressive some I thought I would maybe get a turn bet from him. An 8 hits the turn and I saw him react on his face like he liked it. He bet $40 and I just called. The river is another 5 and he checks. I think he may have been fishing with a medium pair on the turn. I without thinkng very hard bet about half the pot. He ista shoves. Now I gotta figure out if he has a K and just doesnt want to split or if he has 88 or a 5 or even AA. I think forever and I had everything I needed to fold. I saw the tell on the turn but couldnt believe he checked the river to me. While I was deciding he asked i I had Aces and I said yeah something like Aces and he grimaced and I knew if he was bluffing he wouldnt engage me or act like Aces scared him there. He threw me a few reverse tells while I was lookin at him. Since I raised preflop he didnt have a 5. So I Put him on 88 or a dry King and I had sick feeling it was 88. Why did I have to bet the damn river. I coulda saved $275 because I dont lose the $50 value bet and I endedup saying fuck it and called the river. He had 88. What a fucking check. That check made me think my turn read wasnt very good. For $220 more I found out it was. Broke. Lost $460 in the cash game. Fuck 2009. I shouldnt have been playing on sinus medicine anyway. FML.

F 2009

2009-12-01T09:40:00.000-08:00

Dammit I had written this long ass blog post and the power went out and I was writting on a simple text editor where no auto backups were happening. Im gonna write it all again. Im sure it wont be as detailed because I frickin hate redoin shit.

Two Saturdays ago I went to Harrahs. I have been running pretty bad. I havent been getting coolered as much as just not getting cards and everytime I stick my neck out I get whacked. As tight as I play I should have a pretty good percentage on bluffs. I only played two hands that were memorable. In about the third orbit I pick up 10's in middle position with no limpers so I raise it to $15. I get a call from the small blind. Of course he called. Its only 7.5 times the big blind and he did have a half a blind in there and his implied odds are great cause Im a short stack. The flop is 223 and I overbet the pot and he called. Spade flush draw. I know if the turn isnt a spade or an Ace I have to push. My stack is about pot size. Its a red Queen. He checks. I push. He calls. He wins. Q6 of spades. First buyin gone. My other big hand I straddle and 8 people call and I make it $45 to go with AJ and get 5 calls. I dont hit and dont put anymore in. Later I played 3/6 limit with $80 and drag zero pots. I go sit with my friend and wait on another friend to cash out. I stick $5 in $1 slot and lose. I decided to play that machine instead of the one right next to it because the one I didnt play had 777 on the bottom row and all blanks on the pay line. Too symerical. After I lose my $5 an asian guy plays the machine with the 777 and his second pull wins $1000. My friend is laughing at me while the machine keeps ringing and three asians yell and scream and jump around right behind me. FML. We did hang out at the Masqueade some and I saw a guy I went to Vegas with last year in there totally coke or crystaled out and he was basically making an ass of himself by dancing in front of the psuedo strippers like they were the only people in the room. Then he eventually sat down in front of the dancer and stared at her through a triangle he was making with his fingers. Kooky. I decided not to play again until 2010. Ive already broken that pre New Years resolution.

Wow Two Long Session in 3 days

2009-11-18T11:57:00.000-08:00

Well I finally played a coupla long stretches of poker. I went to the Love Shack Saturday night about 11pm and left about 4am. Lost my first stack with QQ against a flopped set. I bet my over pair on the flop and got 2 callers. Well I guess I shoulda realized there werent many draws out there but hell these guys stack of with top/top all the time. In fact when I shoved allin on the turn which was about a pot sized bet it wasnt the tight one who called it was the other guy. So I rebuy and lose that down some and put another hundred on that. I was playing too many pots but I was picking up quite a few and probably breaking even on marginal hands. Then I hit 2 sets against the same dude and got back even. The one I remember was when I smooth called behind a raise and a few callers with QQ and hit it. I didnt feel like pushing my QQ there like I normally would. It worked out. He bet the flop and I smooth called. Then he insta checked the turn and I said "so I guess you're done" and bet $40 and he pushed in behind me and said "good read". I call and dont say nothing because he was just being funny not an asshole. So I got even and then eventually the game broke and I was down $65. I would return on Monday night.

I show up at the Monday night game about 11pm. They were running 2 tables. I sat at the must move and it was prety nitty. I dont remeber what happened but I lost. I do remember re-raising preflop with JJ against the only loose guy and getting called. The flop came 8 high but he checked to me in a way I didnt like. Seemed to animated like he wanted me to think he missed. I checked. He checked again and I bet the turn and he moved in for like 100 more. I mucked my pair which was still higher than the board. He showed me QQ. Phew. Coulda went bad quick. After I moved to the main table I tightened up a little. I remember going broke when I called $7 with a Ace 2 suited and the flop was Ace,2,3 all spades. UTG bets $6 into this $30 pot and the crazy guy who gets lucky goes all in for $60. I think crazy guy has a spade and Im worried about the UTG but I call. UTG goes all in. Im beat I guess but I call another $100. UTG has the flopped flush. Crazy has King of spades. I dont hit and crazy guy wins when the spade hits the river. UTG got my extra which probably mad him $30 net. It was a fun game. A guy who won an ESPN televised circuit main event showed up to play. I had never knowing played with him but he looked familiar. Of course I had seen the televised tournament though. All of a sudden every pot was big and he was usually in it somehow and he didnt wn any of them. I think he was stuck like 1200 in a half hour. But he wasnt the only one losing. People were calling $200 river shoves with a pair. Also I think we saw about 6 four of a kinds that nite. I had KK once and woulda lost a lot to a guy who flopped a set and river quads but the Ace hit the window and the turn and I didnt bet any street or call his value river bet. I gave him credit for a nine. Just one though. Most of my pots were me winning preflop with a raise or reraise or me winning with a continuation bet. I won a decent pot when I hit a set once. Actually I called with 4,2 after limping to a straddle and hit two deuces on the flop. I check called the flop and check raised the turn. There were 2 flush draws so I figured I better push the turn. He didnt have either draw or he woulda called. I had a lucky hand where I raised with 87 and hit a 7 on the flop and my bet got called but I hit a 7 on the turn too and got called. Unfortunately another Jack hit the river and I decided to check call but he never bet his top pair of Kings. My last hand I limped with Aces and a guy raised it to $12 and 3 callers and I made it $45. He called plus two more. I hated it. I bet $85 on the flop and they all surrendered after putting me through some stalling torture. That put me up about $15 and the way these pots were going that was one hand. I decided to leave since I had no profit on the table and way more than I wanted to risk. Plus it was 4am and I had to work in 3 hours. I had fun. I gambled a little and made some tricky plays. Feels good to be playing again.

Bad Combos

2009-11-04T11:37:00.000-08:00

Well crap. I basically bubbled out of the Monday night tournament. I got short stacked and went into all in mode and of course Im pushin all-in with 5 big blinds on the button with no limpers and holding Q2 suited. Of course I get called by Q10. Q10 was my demise earlier to when I raised from the small blind with KQ and Johnny Chan pushed all-in from the big blind. I folded and he shows me Q10. FML. Then I played cash. I have nothing to say about that. Basically folded or limped or called a bet and never hit a flop. Was brutally boring. Thank God the Saints game was on. Had 10s once and took down the limps. I was in the middle of my only shennanigans raise with 10,8 suited when my used to be wife started texting me and like an idiot I read them and forgot how to play poker. I went broke flopping top pair against a set. I shoulda only lost $40 and not $120 but when a very solid player reraised me as I was texting I just through my remaining $75 in. I blame the texting. Whatever. I was also starving because the fucking cook was still in the tournament and I was about to pass out from hunger. So then i start the drive home and I dont even care about the poker Im just all fucked about the girl. Death, broken marriages and poker is a bad combo. And sucking at poker in general aint all that profitable either.

Distractions Needed

2009-11-02T11:57:00.000-08:00

I played in a tournament last Monday. The only hand I remember that was sick was I got QQ in late position and there was a tight UTG limper so I was a little worried about getting reraised but I raised it up pretty good and he just called along with a couple more. The flop was jack high and uncoordinated. Everyone checked to me and I made a healthy bet. I got called by the UTG limper. What would he just call with? A set? A draw? 10s? The turn was a K. He goes all in. This guy is usually the bet it when you have it type but apparently he is trying some new shit because after I folded he showed an outside straight draw that didnt hit. I was thinking that had I had either of the other two hands I couldve had I probably would have called him. He gives me the "I thought you had AJ and could call after the King hit". Right. I wouldnt have played it so strong preflop had I had AJ knowing I was going to get 3 or 4 callers anyway and with a tight UTG limper in there. Any way I was steamed up after that but I didnt get jiggy with any pots. I did pull a lot of preflop All-in steals to stay alive. I went out because I raised from the small blind with K8 suited into a big blind whose chips are always there for the stealing. But he pushed back at me and i had to lay it down. He had AA. I thought it was Queens or better for sure. I went out the next hand going all in with 44 and running into a big blind with 99. I wish I would have just sat on my chips and waited for the chop. Got fifth place and as soon as I went out they chopped it even. I got my entry fee back. It was nice to play for a long time though. The Sofa King needs some distractions. My Dad had passed the Friday before that and it was good to go get away from it. No one knew. I was going to skip tonight but damn I need another distraction so bad. Wife shit going on. Looking forward to the Saints game tonight too. Been playing some online. I won an 18 person $10 SnG and I have been doing well at $20 head up. Im back up close to $400. Im sure I will run like a pinto before long and lose my mind and drop back down to $100. I made a comeback from a 2800 to 200 chip deficit yesterday. To get that low I ran a bluff early in the game on the flop with a check raise and I bet the river big and the guy called me with 66 when 3 big cards were on the board. I was floored. We were still in the first level of blinds so I was able to give up the trash hands and managed to double up a couple times. Once I had chips I was able to play his tendencies. He had some really bad bet sizing tells and as you can tell he was a calling station too. So I just kept the pots small so I could hit hands and get him to call me down. So anyway I hope to have good news about tonight. Maybe I will even play some cash game even though I am about a month away from actually having any cash on hand. Sometimes you just gotta gamble for your sanity's sake.

There is No Karma

2009-10-14T13:10:00.000-07:00

Ok still out of action but I have been playing some HU SnGs online. I lost two games in a row last night that made me very upset with God. I was playing the first one and I made a move that didnt work out so I was down to a 2000 to 1000 chip deficit. I had Q9 and flopped open ended str8 draw. The guy bet 120 into me. Im never folding here. I can call and peel one of and fold the turn but thats so weak. He had raised preflop but he had done that with a wide range of hands so I cant really put him on a big hand. So far its just a standard continuation bet. So I raise. I figure I have a good amount of fold equity and if he shoves I have a decent amount of outs. Well I make it 400 more and he shoves and I call another 500ish. Pretty standard heads up stuff I think. Well I hit my draw. Happens. Well I get the fucking crying pussy routine from the other guy where he wants to talk about how terrible I am and how if Im gonna shove with when Im 30% to win I should just shove preflop every hand and blah blah blah. So just proceed to call him a crying pussy and tell him to stop sucking his Moms tits etc... Then the suckouts start. Every time after that i get him allin he is dominated and he wins. And every time he talks about how its justice. He wins that game because he makes a flush against my KK after all the money went in preflop. I end up playing him again. I make the right moves and he gets down to 300 in chips. Then he doubles up with A10 vs my AJ, then again with QJ vs my AK. He hits everything he needs and beats me again. I wouldnt even have noticed if he hadnt been yapping the whole time. Its not the odds or the suckouts that pissed me off. That shit happens all the time. But how could the powers that control the universe allow such a whiney bitch to be lucky. Seriously. It makes me feel sorry for those saps who believe in Karma because obviously there is no such thing. Anyway the dude name is LawManAA on full tilt and he is a whiney ass Phil Helmuth type who is pretty passive and stupid. If you play him and he gets lucky on you too then just assume he is sucking some ones dick at Full Tilt and has been awarded the boom switch and move on to the next player.

Still in Gambling Limbo

2009-09-28T07:20:00.000-07:00

Still in action purgatory. No recreation. I have played a coupla random SnGs and even an hour of 3/6 limit at Harrahs but nothing interesting to speak of. My mind is mush from life stress anyway. I do remeber one hand where I had AQ in the big blind and flop comes Ace, 7, 4 and I check called $3 with about 5 people still in the hand and then a 3 hits and I check fold. Then they start the raising and reraising and it becomes the biggest pot of the night with a 3 way show down. The river had come a Queen which woulda gave me two pair which was ver obviously no good. Anyway the hands that went the distance were a set of 4s, 65 for the nuts and ....drum roll.....AQ. I didnt tell the guy that I spent $6 total on that hand while he dumped another $50 in the pot but it woulda been fun to. Obviously i didnt win if my best hand to speak of was a fold after $6 invested. I wish I had a few hundred to get in a No Limit game with just because I know I would be able to shut the world out for a little while. I wonder if that sounds healthy or sick. Dont most people use hobbies to do that? I guess people do drugs for the same reason though. Maybe its just the destructive vs. not destructive. If I were to play when I couldnt afford it just to zone out then I guess thats unhealthy. Of coarse I could do it knowing that it was dumb but that wouldnt mean I didnt have a choice. I guess thats the biggest problem. People who cant make a choice to quit until they are under the jail and really have no choice. I have won 2 outta 4 weeks in my office college football pickem pool. Im still not in the overall lead though cause my bad weeks are too bad. My fantasy leagues are above average but I think its gonna go south soon. I dont have anyone who is killing it this year and I havent played the strong teams yet. Oh well thats the update. I know it sucks but I dont want to just shut my blog down. I do plan on playing poker regularly again soon.

Russian Poker Bride

2009-09-15T08:24:00.000-07:00

Lemme see I went to the Belle on last last Friday night and played 4/8 limit. Thats right. I decided to let $100 bucks ride on the donkey olympics. I wont be able to do that very often for now until I get my finances back to manageable. The best part about it was the hot Russian girl in the half shirt with her nice chesticles on display. She was very flirty and winning so she was having a good time. Her boyfriend was there to start with but when he left she decided to take a cab later. Being the cynical bastard I decided she was a mail order bride and really didnt give a shit about her dopey ass boyfriend. I was losing but I told Terry that I had sat and lost at tables full of people I downright despised so why would ever think of getting up just because I was losing at limit holdem. The Russian girl flirted some tourist into sitting next to her and playing even though he didnt know how to play. Well up to that point she was running like Ivan Drago before Rocky came to Russia but guess who had some beginners luck and was hitting on her to her annoyance. She got what she deserved. I went broke and headed home. I dont know when I will be able to play cash again. I dont even think I can justify playing in the $40 tournament tonight. I probably will play but I still cant justify it. I played last week but I was not really focused. I played loose passive and eventually my stack shrank to the all-in point and I moved in for 8 big blinds with AK and got called by QJ. I knew I couldnt fade two live cards.

Life Tilt and Staking People Who Cant Read the Board

2009-09-08T13:29:00.000-07:00

So its been a long time. Who cares. I have been on life tilt. The Sofa King is single for the first time in 17 years. I know you probably think its because Im a degenerate poker player and thats ok if you think that. I will not be explaining it here. Why no poker tales? I havent been playing because the finances are in the red because I just lost an income and bills wont even go down $100. I have been playing a little online but Im sure you dont want to hear about every single little $10 SnG I play. I have been winning though. Im not playing a lot though. I did enter a 45 person $10 tournament last week. It paid 6. I busted out 7th. Typical. My last hand I pushed with 55 and got called by J f'ing 10. I was the chip leader with 16 players left and then I went dead. I flopped a flush draw that I put some money in with that never got there. I stole some blinds but it didnt make up for the times when I raised the blinds and got defended.

Anyway I returned to the Monday night game last night but only to play the tournament. It was only 9 players because of the holiday and players being in Biloxi for the big WPT dealio. I seriously dont have the funds to play cash or $200 dollar tournaments. I burned through my remaining $400 of poker money in the last 2 weeks. Even putting $40 up for poker was a dumb move but screw it. In the first coupla levels I got KK in the big blind 3 times and won everytime. I raised the first two times because there were multiple limpers. I got called by 2 players the first time and got all in against a flush draw on the flop and doubled up. I took the pot preflop the second time. I smooth called once when it was going to be heads up. It was almost a min raise. The flop comes Jack high and I check. I expected him to bet. He checked. The turn is another Jack. I bet now and get raised. I dont think he has a Jack but I think he may have a set and thats why no flop bet. I also think that I havent shown any real strength and he is probably putting me on representing the Jack. I decide to call. The river pairs a 7 and I check. He bets but its a total value bet. Its confusing. Im scared of AA but why wouldnt he bet the flop? If he had bottom set then he may have just gotten counterfetted. If he back doored a flush would he bet a double paired board? The only thing I was thinking was he decided to play AA tricky and doesnt put me on the J or the 7. Maybe he puts me on 99s. I would. I call and he was bluffing. If he had bet more I probably would have mucked. Thats why the old value bet bluff sometimes sucks I guess. Anyway the rest of the hands were mostly preflop raise and take it down. I did flop top top and got all in against an open ended str8 flush draw and held up.

Oh I did play some 3/6 at Harrahs this weekend. I was in New Orleans for a party and I told a friend of mine I would stake her up to $60 for PaiGau. But the table was full so she wanted to play poker. So I played first to show her what to do. I thought she knew what hands were what etc.. Well when she was ready I took my moster $10 profit and "sold" her $60 in chips and took a seat behind her. Talk about a wild ride. She folded mostly but then she went to the river with Queen high once and called the river with no pair. ???? Uh oh. Then she hit a gutshot straight on the river and folded to one bet. When the hand was over I in my best Richard Pryor pitched voice "What the fuck you folded a straight woman?!!!?!?!?!?" I dont really remember how but we made it through 3 dealers with $60 bucks just folding a lot. It got down to 4 players because it was like 6 am by now. How could you leave that table ever??? She decided to play 10,9 suited and I was happy. I wanted her to hurry up and go broke. We talked about cashing out and playing PaiGau at $30 but she apparently caught the poker bug. At one point she says how cool she feels and I look around at the 3 fat old dudes she is playing poker with and start laughing my ass off. Any way she flops top two and smooth calls the flop. Lets just say that she probably woulda folded at some point during this hand even after she caught the second nut boat on the river but something made her realize she could fold this hand. I cant say what. Just something. She didnt even raise the river. So sad. She coulda won a huge pot against another full house. I convinced her to cash out and play something she knew how to play. She made $6 bucks. I let her keep it. I even gave her the $10 in chips I had forgot to cash out since she had paid $50 total for parking because she thought the valet was free to players. She didnt play anything else. Phew.

No Foldem Holdem

2009-09-02T08:06:00.000-07:00

Im thinking about playing low limit for a while. My life and finances are fuct and I do have fun playing no foldem holdem. Plus my mental focus doesnt have to be particularly great. I cant make that big a mistake. I will just enjoy a $100 buyin at the $4/8 table until its gone or Im done. The last time I played $4/8 I won a lot but I know I was on a rush. I think I have a good advantage over the people who call everything and chase gutshots when the flush and the full house are already there. Maybe I can save 4 bets an hour that the majority of the table doesnt (just by folding non-suited 3 gappers). I may need to be more agressive on the turn and river for value. I often give up on betting and start check calling when the board gets a little scary. Obviously I cant bet a set on the river when the flush made it and there are still 4 people in the hand but there have been a lot of times in heads up or against just 2 people that I check the river and they are sitting with top pair only and never folding for the last bet.

Begrudging Update

2009-08-31T07:25:00.000-07:00

I know its been a long while. Sorry. Life has gone south. I havent been playing much poker. Im in the process of taking a big and sustained financial hit so poker money has shrunk up and disappeared. The last time I played live was like 9 days ago. .25/.50 at my house. I lost. Like $40. Who cares. The worst players won. One decent player hit 'n ran. The only hand I can remember very well I raised with A2 on the button and got heads up with a tight limper. The flop is J34 and he checks. I continuation bet and he calls. The turn is a 5 giving me the wheel. He checks, I bet and he makes an obvious crying call. I put him on a pair of fives right there. 65 or 75. The turn is a deuce. Fuck me. He bets into me. He is capable of doing this with an Ace since no way he put me on any type of 6. But I did put him about 65% on the 6,5 already. I am just pissed and know I've been screw as is typical lately. He basically made a nice size value bet on the river and I paid him off. Fuckin 65. Typical. Also typical is my lack of big pairs to start. By the time my big pairs start rolling in I will be playing the nickel/dime game with my 13 yo and his friends. As far as online goes I have stop bleeding. I had donked down to $100 and started back to $5 and $10 HU SnGs. I am up to $175. Yippee. I may not have much exciting news about poker. I have major life problems going on which effect my finances and well as my mental faculties. I played golf yesterday and shot like 105 with 20 mulligans. Evidence of my ability to concentrate right now. If you do happen to see me at a game I suggest you have me covered and wait for me to lose my shit.

Little of This and a Little of That

2009-08-20T12:15:00.000-07:00

I had a winning night online. I think I won $8. I won a $10 SnG and split 2 $5 SnGs. So after the fees probably $8 bucks. Before that I was like 2 for 22 in HU SnGs which is pretty hard to do since alot of them just come down to big coin flips. Im trying to have the attitude that Im just playing the chips in whatever tournament Im in and not letting the fact that its only $5 effect my play. Let my bankroll determine the stakes. Sounds good in theory but we all have seen what I do when I get pissed about bad luck. Whatever. I shall finish the game Doc. I think I will eventually put $600 together and deposit to a new site and get the 100% bonus. Seems like a no brainer. Just never go broke. I havent gone broke yet. Ive never deposited more than once except for like 5 years ago when I got strung out on Ultimate Bets 3/6 limit game. Pain that will last forever there.

I think Im gonna get a little deeper into football wagering this year. I might pick 3 or 4 games a week and put $10 or $20 bucks on each. There are so many good people rooting for both teams that my cursed luck couldnt possibly effect the outcome of a college football game right? I got a friend who every time I have used his picks in my college pickem pool I have pwned my office. I'd like to start putting some money in stocks too. Seems like it would be fun. Seems like you would need a lot to invest to actually see anything quick and meaningful unless you just get super lucky. Im gonna get my golf game crankin again too. Right now Im about a 18 handicap (I think thats bogey golf right?). I got basketball league coming up and Im playing soccer too which is going to be so brutal I cant even imagine the amount of pain it will cause. My boss wanted me to play so I did. Time is going to be hard to manage pretty soon what with sports and poker and doing homework all the frickin time with my kid. I better make sure I throw the wife a few dates too. Jeez. Keeping myself entertained is a full time job.

Circling the Drain

2009-08-19T11:47:00.000-07:00

I dont even want to begin to write this. I had one of my biggest losses ever. $850. Half of it I lost playing holdem and like a genius I decided to play Omaha which Im not nearly comfortable enough to play. It really didnt matter though. I never hit a hand really. The one hand I would hit that I got raised out of woulda probably pulled me even for the whole night. I had AQJ9 and the flop is A,10,8. Basically by the time it was raised and reraised to me I realized I would be playing for the whole $400 I had in front of me. I folded. I figure I was somewhere around 40% to win against 2 players but I didnt have any money invested. Actually I was about 60% to win having just put it into an odds calculator. I didnt see all the outs like the Ks and 7s. I woulda won. Whatever. Thats why I shoulda never played Omaha. I woulda turned the straight and woulda boated the river. Oh well. Then I went about donking off the rest chasing shit in a sleep deprived haze. As for the holdem I started out by playing one hand of the tournament and turning a set and getting it all in with a guy who had turned a straight. I coulda got away from it having only lost 700 of my 4000 chip stack. Oh well.

The best hand of the night I wasnt in. A guy raises and the dude on the button goes all-in and says he hadnt looked at his cards. It gets around to the original raiser and he goes in the tank. Then he turns his KK over and still doesnt call. We are all trying to figure out why he hasnt called yet. He is worried that the dude has AA which he would never ever ever ever ever have in that spot. Well I take that back. He is more likely to have Aces since he hadnt looked at his cards because had he looked he would most certainly not ever ever ever ever have AA there. We all think the guy with KK is cruely torturing the guy. And then he mucks KK. WTF. The guy on the button turns his hand over to see 10,4 off suit. Mr.KK was sorta in a stupidity trance and said something about not "ridischooling" him. So pots come and go but at least we have a new word in our home game. Ridischool. Apparently it means not ridiculing a person who has done something beyond the 100th level of stupid. Something so stupid that to ridicule it would simply lower your IQ. To analyse that hand in any true and meaningful sense would make you dumber and subject to future ridischooling.

Anyway so what happened to me? Every time I raised a pot with my good ace I would miss and since the other person would flop the absolute nuts every time my continuation bets werent very effective. I did have KK once. There was $45 in the pot so I just made it $120 and took it down. I surprised I didnt get 3 calls. I had QQ once and reraised the UTG raiser and he just called. I shoulda figured AK but when the flop comes K high I still continuation bet and get check raised. Maybe the biggest hand of my night was when I straddled and a bunch of callers and I make it $45 to go with KQ. I get one call. The flop is AKsomething with 2 hearts. I continue bet $65 and the guy goes all-in. This guy could have anything. To break it down Im think he could have an Ace about 30% of the time, a pair of something else 20%, a set 10%, a flush draw 30%, and total air 10%. He is really unpredictable. I saw something which he did before he pushed which was either serious frustration or way over acting. It really didnt help my decision. I just decided Id rather call and be beat than fold and be wrong. He had a flush draw that never came. He only had about $220 to start so it was only about $120 I had to call. Whatever. All my big hands lately are gut wrenching decisions. I havent been able to trap anyone in a month. Most of the time Ive had to call with a pocket pair not as high as the highest card on board. Ive been right every time I can remember.

So my bankroll is decimated. My online one too. I played 4 SnGs last night. Lost all 4. As is typical they just hit every card they needed. I just laugh now. Im starting to really believe that God wants me to focus on something else. The run Im having can not be explained by odds. Yes Ive played bad too but everyone plays bad eventually when they run this bad. Snowball effect. So many just like me lose it all steaming and playing bad over a rotten extended run of terrible cards. I know so many people who work all week just to pay back their poker debts so they can borrow some more once they get square. I sure I will join their ranks pretty soon. At least it will throttle my loses. I know in the last month this has become a cliche way to end a poker post but I dont care. Superbad is one of the best movies ever and thats where its from. FML.

Been Beachin

2009-08-15T13:17:00.000-07:00

bout to be home. Didnt wanna alert the media that I was not home ya know. I know too many degenerates in debt to let em know I was goin to da beach. I will be in actio Monday and blogging again Tuesday. Peace.

Expecting the Worst

2009-08-12T06:04:00.001-07:00

Im thinking there are no laws of reality. Only traditions of reality. The world is an abstract construction. God's ever mutating piece of art. The laws of probability exist but our own expectations can change them. Since there are an equal number of optimists and pessimists, the overall probabilities are upheld. But individually we can change our luck. Im talking about expecting the worst possible card to come increasing that likelihood. Lets say I run bad for a while but within the laws of probability. Since Im the pessimistic type Im likely to get discouraged quicker and start to believe the cards are against me. There are several new age spiritual books that talk about being able to manifest things through thought. Maybe the most well known is The Secret. Many theorize that fear of something increases its probability of happening. Maybe its a built in punishment for lack of faith. I believe this stuff but I cant seem to do anything with it. I forget to be positive. TJ Cloutier talked about people changing their games but that its very rarely truly successfully changed because people tend to revert back to playing how they are naturally programmed. Thats why few people are naturally Tight and Aggressive players. Because these are conflicting natures (I think that's a Sklansky observation). Naturally tight people tend to be conservative. Naturally aggressive people tend to be risk takers. Logically interweaving these is a conscious choice usually caused by many sessions of losing poker and learning some very hard lessons. So back to my point. Its hard to change my nature from pessimist to optimist. In the book Conversations with God, God basically tells the guy he can have anything he wants by deciding it and then believing it will happen. The problem is that we rarely ever believe something can happen in that way or we choose a path to what we want and quickly get distracted. The trick is to keep choosing and re-choosing it with every fiber of our being and keep trying to believe it and trying to remove all doubt that it will happen. The faith of a mustard seed can move a mountain but its hard to truly have faith that the mountain will actually move. I bet a mustard seed of doubt is all it takes too. Why am I droning on about this? I keep playing people who are just terrible at heads up poker. I have them green tagged as players I want to play. Yet they are winning. They seem to catch every card they need and/or win all the coolers. I said "they seem" which is just to say they win way more than their fair share. I had this feeling before I moved from full ring to headup. Maybe switching games gave me a boost of optimism and I felt the benefits of that and when the laws of variance swung low I moved back to my natural way of thinking and now Im experiencing the consequences of that. The three games in a row I lost last night force me to step back and figure this shit out. Obviously from a poker theory all I can do is get my chips in ahead. But if thats not working I have to believe there is a deeper reason for what is going on. Im going to give this some serious thought and I will come up with a plan of action other than just trying to think positively. Im sure there are some daily drills which can keep my mind right for the long haul. Im sure the problem is that its hard ot stay positive when you are pissed off at the 2 outers you get crushed by on the river. Ok thats enough philosophy. Oh and I also have another conspiracy theory that once I green flag someone Full Tilt has it written in their program keep them in the action. Yeah I know that is very far fetched but its just how my mind works.

Hit or Miss

2009-08-11T08:29:00.000-07:00

So last night was my regular Monday night game. Lotsa new faces for the $40 tournament. One guy who busted out and left made the cardinal sin of driving through the grass. Not only did he drive through Dave's grass but he drove through the wettest part of the yard leaving a giant rut and the neighbors lawn too. And he ran over a landscape light. It was quite the topic for pretty much the rest of the night. As far as the tournament went, I played very few hands but at least I played them poorly. My first significant hand I raised with 76off which is pretty unusual for me but I got 4 callers so when I blanked the board I didnt try to take the pot. I turned an open ended str8 draw and bet it. I got called. Then I check folded the river and was shown the 2,3 for an even lower missed str8 draw. I went out by getting moved to a new table and the first hand raising with AK utg and calling all my chips to a reraise from KK. Once again my blog was an occasional topic of discussion. In fact I had one friend on the phone with a guy who runs a different game explaining to him who the fuck I was. No big deal or anything they just wanted to know who was writing it. Kooky.

The cash game was pretty tame. There was a guy who was new who bought in for basically a double stack which propted our local self-made-thousandaire to buy up to equal his stack and say something about needing to have the biggest dick on the table. My first real hand Im on the button with AQ and Mr. New Guy Double Stack limps UTG and it folds around to me. I make it $12ish and he calls. The flop is AKQ so I continuation bet $20ish. He calls. Im thinking he has a worse Ace or maybe a King and a gutshot. The turn is another King. He checks, I check. If I bet he can take me off the hand so easy but by checking Im just begging to be tested. I can call a reasonable bet on the end with the current size of the pot. The river bricks and he bets out the pot. I dont like it because I dont know him at all. Generally when people check big hands to me hoping that I will bet for them and I just check behind they like to over bet the river just because they are pissed the pot isnt as big as it could be and they want to get a few extra bucks for their monster. I tanked and looked at him and finally decided that since he bought in for double stack he may have been planning on slinging the chips around. I knew he could make that bet with a naked Ace which we would be chopping. He looked comfortable. He was shuffling his checks with no problem. I guess if he was strong he may have tried to give me a weak tell and look very uncomfortable. I finally make a crying call and he mucks pure air. He got himself a lot more action after that and a couple hours later left way down. I never got to participate in the feeding frenzy. I didnt pick up any hands. In fact I should just stop because the rest of the night was pretty boring. Mostly I would call and miss or I would raise and hit my Ace and win it on the flop. I limped and folded to a raise quit a bit. Rarely regretted it. I limped once and flopped open ended str8 flush draw. I bet $15 (about the pot) and got 1 caller. The turn paired the high card on board. I wanted to bet enough to get a competing flush draw out. If I get raised I would just have to decide if I wanted to gamble. So I bet the pot which was about $40. I get a call but it seemed like an over pair type call or a second pair. Well the river pairs the second highest card. I have 7 high out of position. I give up. Fucker has a flush draw (and bottom pair). I played that hand the way I would normally play a big made hand like a set against a bunch of limpers. If I just have the flush draw or just the str8 draw I dont play it like that. Oh well.

I so decided to cash out and leave on time. I was only up $60 in the cash game. I figured if I stayed and hit big I would feel too guilty to leave and I also didnt want to limp and call away $50 trying to hit a flop before I went home. I got a big family week coming up so I would rather not have a fresh bad memory of me pushing my Jacks into Kings.

Oh yeah and RDG aka LoveShack apparently made a coupla final tables in Tunica. I saw one 10th place. I see where Chris Moneymaker and Chad Brown are 1 and 2 going into the final table today. I wonder if its easier being a celeb. Maybe you dont get put to the test quite as much because people are scared you are going to pick them off or put them back to the test.

Poker is Hell

2009-08-09T20:28:00.000-07:00

Cooler. Cooler. Cooler. Cooler. Cooler. Cooler. Cooler. Cooler. Cooler. Cooler. Cooler. Cooler. Cooler. Cooler. Cooler. Cooler. Cooler. Cooler. Cooler. Cooler. Cooler. Cooler. Cooler. Cooler. Cooler. Cooler. Cooler. Cooler. Cooler. Cooler. Cooler. Cooler. Cooler. Cooler. Cooler. Cooler. Cooler. Cooler. Cooler. Cooler. Cooler. Cooler. Cooler. Cooler. Cooler. Cooler. Cooler. Cooler. Cooler. Cooler. Cooler. Cooler. Cooler. Cooler. Cooler. Fuck me. I dont wanna talk about it. Im down to fucking $198. I was at $750+ a pretty short time ago (a week to the day actually). A month of playing blown to fuck because I run bad and move up anyway. It's hard out here for a degenerate. I just lost $200 on a 1/2 full ring game. I laughed pretty hard when I went broke. Typical. I had my whole online account amount on 2 tables. So fucking stupid. Now Im back to the $10 level. I dont really want to grind $10 SnGs. Maybe I should just move down to $5 SnGs and make a 30 buyin rule for myself. Self torture as punishment.

Probably Should Back Off Internet Poker for a Few

2009-08-07T12:27:00.000-07:00

I guess Im gonna take a break from online for a few days. I played last night and lost 3 outta 4. One I lost by getting all in with JJ vs KK. My bad. The other two as usual I had them in bad shape most of the time and couldnt win a coin flip or just plain got sucked out on. I lost two allin hands with AA in the same game and I was ahead both times when the money went in. My last game I went all in with JJ after the flop and got called by K7 with no pair. I guess since the pot was big from my 3 bet preflop he decided he couldn't fold with 500 left. I had him covered but after he rivered me I only had like 300. I then put it in with A rag and got called by 10,7 and lost. I looked at my stats and I have only won one match in the last 11. I could have a better win rate if I just went all in preflop every time. I swear in probably 8 out of 10 of those matches Im feeling very comfortable most of the time and getting it in good. Because they wont die all these games are getting to the 25/50 levels. A couple got to the 40/80 level. Im down to $500 now. I got soccer and basketball seasons coming up so maybe I should just concentrate on exercising for a while. I doubt I will be able to leave it alone. My computer will certainly be calling me. Im afraid if I keep playing Im just gonna stick it all on one game.

Decided to Moderate Comments

2009-08-06T15:16:00.001-07:00

OK I guess Im gonna start moderating comments. I didnt want to but Im a little hesitant to let openly hostile people have their say on my site. They may not be as respectful for leaving out names and places that may not want to be named in a public forum. A good example is the bar room that was named by a commenter with no tack. I dont really care if anyone thinks its because I am upset that this guy is calling me a liar and that I need to censor him because he is right. He's not but its really irrelevant. If anyone cares if I were to lie then you care too much. It would be pretty pathetic of me but obviously there are pathetic people in the world so think what you will. I just dont like having to keep on top of what is said here so much because Im nervous someone is going to say the wrong thing. I also dont want people showing up at games just because I say I play there. So please leave your comments if you have them and I promise they will be posted shortly unless of coarse I find them inappropriate. I will still post your insults and criticisms to a degree but not if you just keep saying the same stupid shit over and over. Thanks to all for reading. BTW I wouldn't mind having actual relevant posts to playing poker.

Poker Purgatory

2009-08-06T12:15:00.000-07:00

Shit Im nose diving again on SnGs. I went from $775 to $600 in one session. Mostly from just two players who I like to play. They are very weak. They barely ever raise their button. I get them to put their money in bad a few times every game when they are low on chips and they just keep suckin out. I mean I have little green flags next to these people because I want to sit them. Now Im in poker purgatory. Thinking about where I was and how I got where Im at. Not quite hell but one more session like that and it will be bad. To quote the movie Rounders as my favorite reader has requested I do more of, " I can hardly remember how I built my bankroll, but I can't stop thinking of how I lost it." Thats poker hell. Of coarse he was talking about $30k and Im playin the kiddie games. I dont think Im gonna go crazy and play higher this time though. I think Im just gonna keep playin. Fuck it. Its not like I was cashing out anytime soon anyway. I can remember a month ago whenI was happy that I was over $200. Hell I started with $50. I can see clearly that its not me. That Im getting the best of it most of the time. I could tell you about all the coin flips I havent won and all the turn cards that have killed me but its not relevant. Some times cards run bad. Ok well I cringe to think what boring ass negative comments my stalker has for us this time. I thought it was good for the blog at first but now its just embarrassing how lame the dude is. The price of free speech I guess. Actually this post is pretty boring just on its own. I guess that ok. Its just a log of my poker play. Thats what a blog is. Short for web log. In case you didnt know that.

Played Well, Ran Good, No Complaints (except for the poots)

2009-08-04T06:03:00.000-07:00

Finally they updated the results for the Tunica tournament at Bluff Mag (still not anything at PokerPages)

Skipped the Monday night tourney to go see a skateboard demo under the Mississippi Riv Bridge. It was fun. Food, old friends, and some sick skating. I did make it to the after tourney game though. I wonder if I have a better mind set when I skip the tournament because I dont feel like Im already 40 down.

So lets recap the action. Caught nothing for a couple of rounds except the whiff of these stanky ass farting muther fuckers which prompted me to get the floor fan out. Then I limped dark 3 times in a row and had AQ and won and KK and won and then AQ and lost. I think I tried it again a few hands later only to have 10,2 so I stopped the dark limp run.

One hand I called a small raise from a tight player and I had the A of clubs (and a 10) on an all club 10 high flop. I raised the tight preflop raiser who was continuation betting 20 and he quickly folded what surely was AK. I usually overplay AK there so Im glad he isnt me.

Once I made it 20 on button with AJ and got two callers who had limped for $2. Flop K,Q,rag and I get two checks so I bet 40 and get two calls and give up on that hand when a 10 or A doesnt come on the turn.

There was an interesting topic being discussed about how can you just limp and then call a massive over raise. I personally dont do it very often. If I limp for $2 and you make it $22 to go, Im usually either folding or raising. Unless 5 people have called and I have a hand that if it hits will be very good like a set or an Ace high flush I will usually muck (unless Im steaming). Now the guy making this observation seems baffled by the callers but he's the worst on of them all. I think they were ragging him for getting $200 in preflop with 8 high last week. Of coarse he won that hand. I also talked in a past blog about him calling my raise to $50 preflop with K7 and winning vs my QQ but I digress.

Later I pick up QQ and reraise from 12 to 60 and get put all in by the UTG limper who is the same guy from last week who did it with 99. This time its 77 and he doesnt hit a set. I woulda went full Hellmuth I think. Then I call 6 in SB with AK against the whole table and flop AAQ and make about 60 more by check raising the same guy who this hand had a Q and a short stack from the QQ vs 77 debacle. I say I check raised him but he went all-in and so did I to shut out the flush draw (which got there).

One hand I have AQ and raised to 26 from the SB to limpers (including the same guy who couldnt understand calling the over raise after you limp) and get 6 calls (he was the second caller). Flop Q87 and I check. Im not betting into 6 people with one pair. All check and a 3 hits turn so I bet 45 and get a call from the luckbox who also loves to move people like me of our winning hands. There really isnt a draw out there. I think the board was rainbow even. River is K and I check and guy chickened out of his bet because he thought I had AK and hit the riv. I probably woulda called given his willingness to bluff there in the past. He put me on AK because I checked and then put out a weak bet on the turn. I was just trying to get to the showdown cheaply and without getting trapped by someone with 87 suited or pocket 3s.

I made a straight flush and was scared I was behind. Playing 76diamonds outta position I flop a flush with 6 people in the pot. I dont want to get trapped by a bigger flush so I check and call the bet of the last guy to act. Everyone else folds. I dont want to see a diamond on the turn but it comes. 9 of diamonds on a 810Q of diamonds board. Jack of diamonds is the nuts. I check and button checks. I bet pot on the river and he folds. I played it very conservatively but I was winning at the time and I dont mind playing conservative against a loose aggresive table.

Another hand I called the flop bet in position and I made a flush when the top pair on the board paired on the turn. I was calling for my kicker to hit and then when the second Q (of my needed suit) hit I said that'll work. I got checked to. I bet half the pot and get called. The player is tight so Im sure she has a pretty good hand but not a boat yet. She checks the river and I put out a 35%ish value bet. Had she hit her kicker on the river and check raised me I coulda folded. I think she woulda bet out if that had happened though just because she wouldnt have wanted me to just check the river with a baby flush.

Well thats all the significant hands I can remember. I won more than I lost the week before which was sweet. That means I dont have to rethink the direction of my life this week. I hope I can keep this up and have a good roll going into the September Biloxi event. Weeeeeeee.

Im Broke, I Just Dont Know It Yet

2009-08-02T02:38:00.001-07:00

Holy Hell what a day. I start out at $730 and proceed to lose 6 or 7 $20 HU SnGs to the same sad ass nit. This guy never bluffed but he never missed either. I couldn't figure out how I was losing. Then when he finally got his $ in bad he shit out. I'd still play him for any amount anytime he wants. Actually I think before that I played .10/.25 full ring no limit and lost 3 buy-ins. Anyway I went into full steam mode. My BR was at $588 and I was on monkey tilt. (added later: I remember now that I had to go take my kid somewhere but I bought in for $200 at the 1/2 table and hit it for $49 in 3 hands to sit at $630ish). When I came back I opened up 4 tables of .50/1.00 and went to work. I bought in for $60 on each table. I cant tell you exactly what happened because that was like 8 hours ago but I came all the way back and got up to $780. My favorite was when I called ridiculous all-in bet on the turn with a gut shot straight flush draw only to see I was up against the nut flush draw. My 74 of hearts vs AJ of hearts. Yeah I spiked a 4 on the river for like a $130 pot. Shit it good. I suck/rule. I was playing one tournament and 2 cash games then and then I went plummeting down again. I bubble out of my tournaments. In the cash games I caught the endless string of turn suckouts. I went down like a sweet muffin all the way to $450. DOWN $330!!!! Now Im in "must get it all back now" mode. I buy into a $100 HU SnG. Wasnt so tough. I won. I didnt want to press that so I bought into a 1/2 NL Full Ring Game for $200. Played about 7 rounds. Stayed around $200. Bought some blinds. Had AA once. My high point was $219 aftter my AA. Well then it happened. I raise in MP with 77. I get 4 callers. Flop is 7,4,2 with 2 clubs. I bet $20 into the $23 pot. I get raised. Im loving it but I know whats coming. I go all-in and get snap called. KQ of clubs. I just look away. I cant watch. I hear the cards coming One, Two, I peek back to see the pot shipping its way down to me. Weeeeeeee. Insta leave. Phew. Back to $750. Seriously. Maybe I could play Magic. Do they bet on Magic?

P is for Pain

2009-07-29T22:10:00.000-07:00

Monday was one of those nights where you run so bad and watch the A.T.C. fuckers run so good that it makes you question the metaphysical properties of the universe. I makes you question good and evil. It certainly makes me wonder if I should just take my bankroll to the store and buy a freakin LCD TV. In that state of mind why did I go to the Belle for the first time in a year tonight? It's like William Bonnie said: "I shall finish the game Doc". I'll get back to that Belle of BR trip. First I wanna talk about the state of Monday night poker. Luckbox in early position open raises to $15 (in a 1/2 game), mid position calling station calls. Im in the Small blind with KK. I make it $50. My buddy in the BB who I love but want to choke (and sometimes I want to tackle him before he can put so many bad chips in the middle) goes All-In. Everyone folds, I call. I ask him does he have Aces and as smoothly as the flop comes out he says "No but I have a set of nines now". Holy fucking shit. Felted by a degenerate dream chaser again. Later I would make it $15 to go UTG. I got 5 callers. I have the absolute bottom of my range there: AK. The flop comes like its been coming for me all night when i have AK and I raise, 8 high. This time all hearts. Luckbox #1 flopped the nuts. Thats really the most exciting hands I played. I sat there and watched luckbox #1 and #2 catch every flush and straight they went for. They've been doing it every week. So so so sick. I remember continuation betting once when I missed my 20th flop. That was fun. I got raised and then someone smooth called the raise. I was livid by the time I left. I cashed out my last $100 because I was about to stick it in before the cards came. So livid that I got sick and slept til 3:40pm the next day (works starts at 7:30am). I was like a zombie the next day. Numb from the neck up. I started to use my bankroll to pay bills. Of coarse I couldnt do it. Instead I ran to the Belle and got on the $2/$5 list. I heart pain. I shall finish the game Doc. Some of the usual suspects were there. Some guy named after a utensil. My friend with pocket 9s was runnin the room. I noticed after about 2 hour of playing they had a Bad Beat Jackpot. It was $15kish. The dealer said it hits often. Its Aces full of tens beat by quads or better. Well the NL list was a mile long so I got on the 4/8 limit list and sat quickly. Flopped the nuts the first hand and made a flush on the turn which I had to check but I got to bet the river. Drug about $100 pot. I wouldnt win another hand until I was down $10. Then I went on a steady tear and quit when I was up $245. Had I not given these poker dregs too much credit I woulda made another hundred. The suckiest hand of the night was when I had it capped preflop between 3 players and the board makes a straight to a Jack. I was actually glad we chopped but I see I was up against 3,5 and AJ. So brutal. By the time I left the crazies were busto and the table was bad. Now Im at home writing this blog and dumping in a 6 handed .5/.10 game and talking much smack just for fun. Actually Im down almost $17 and getting pissed. Oh wait. i just got it all in with J6 preflop. Im up against AJ. I win. Now only down $9. Weeeeeee. If poker has an acronym the first word has got to be pain. Good night.

Internet Dink Smackdown Weekend

2009-07-27T06:45:00.000-07:00

I didnt play any live poker this weekend which is unusual. I stayed home mostly and watch movies and did yard work. Very domesticated. I did however give me a little more time to play online. Aside from my $20 HUSNGs I played a $6 18 person SNG which I busted out of very quickly and a 90 person knockout SNG which I got 4th and made $50($50 payout plus $6 for knockouts minus $6 buyin). When we made the final table I was second in chips but I got stuck with the monster chip leader on my left and he was being very aggressive. I played fairly aggressive when I could. I stole some pots with the old all-in from the BB to a bunch of limpers. I gotta say it was painfully boring (until the final table) playing full ring tournaments. Playing HU has spoiled me on constant action. I guess I could go back to multi tabling cash games which is pretty constant but I just hate always having to play against premium hand having nits. Sure I can steal a lot but that only makes you so much and then when they actually play back at me Im always behind. In live games I usually play premium hands but thats because a standard raise will insure that you are playing against 6 people so you have to over raise. You need premium hands to win over raising or calling or reraising the other over raisers. You have to punish people for playing out of line. My HU sessions went ok this weekend. My roll is up to $701. Not bad for being down to $22 a coupla months ago. I played a 6 handed cash game .10/.25 and I bought in for $25. It was pretty live and people were slinging chips. I remember calling a raise from the BB. The raiser was early and one guy called and I called. The flop was Ace, 8, 2 and I had 8,7. I checked and the original raiser bets 70% of the pot. The other guy folds. I would typically fold but I decided to try something since it was low stakes. I repopped it pretty large. The guy starts chating about how I suck and I limped in with 88 or Ax and blah blah blah. I quickly turned off my auto muck and when he folded I showed him my hand. Then he called me fish and called him nit. It was entertaining. I dont think he was really upset. I told him to take a valium. He told me he had a gutshot. I love when online idiots talk uber extreme trash. Thats something online offers that live doesnt. There's nothing like being able to tell someone what you really want to. I dont bash bad play but I dont mind bashing people who do. I love calling them little internet pussy geeks who still sleep with their mothers and actually think about their moms when spanking it because their moms are the only girls they've ever talked to. I love telling them if they dont calm down all their pimples are going to simultaneously pop all over their quad monitors. I rarely ever hit the chat box but its fun sometimes.

Played Higher to Recoop Again. Pure Genius.

2009-07-23T07:35:00.000-07:00

Went on full cursing, throwing shit tilt last night playing $20 HU SnGs. Especially when we play a raised pot and I have K6 and flop is J66 and get it in against fking A6. I played this one Brazilian who was so aggressive just raising every time preflop and potting the flop and I didnt catch any good starting hands and couldnt hit anything. All I could do was reraise with air every now and then and hope that this wasnt the time he had something. I was wrong quite a few times. The funny thing was he got disconnected and I went into min raise mode trying to get as many hand in before he got back and I saw so many good hands in that stretch. When he finally reconnected his stack had gone from 1900 to 400 (we start with 1500 each). He immediately doubles up to 900 because I have A9 and had raised it into his QQ. I remember having QQ like 3 times during his absence. I ended up winning that one. I played him some more hoping he would lose his connection again. He didnt but I think I ended up winning 1 or two games total over him. They were mostly back and forth long games. I ended up up for the night and decided to goof off and play PLO. I lost $10 and it made me wanna play just one more SNG. Stupid. I ended up losing $50 before I went crazy and bought into an $80 game. Shortly into the $80 game I found myself at the river having overplayed a flush draw and looking at a 1400 chip pot and only having 500 left. I donk it in and HE FOLDS!!!!! whew. CHIP LEADER!!!!! I eventually won after a very long game of cat and mouse but never relinquishing the chip lead. So I ended up being rewarded for a bad decision. Probably the worst possible thing that could happen to a degenerate chaser like me. The old BR is at $524. Weeeeeeeee.

Winner Winner Chicken Dinner

2009-07-21T06:41:00.000-07:00

Wild night at the Shack. First we got to hear about RDG's main event and who he played with and how he bluffed Phil Ivey all-in with 5 high. The best story of the night was about RB who was going to fly to Vegas to root for RDG but was so drunk he got tossed off the plane so he went to Harrahs where he has no recollection of running over the table and getting up a few thousand only to lose big since he was wasted and in every pot bluffing. A guy who was there told us about how he was about to actually win a pot but before the guy actually folded RB turned over an 8 high and said "ship it". BUT the best part of the story is about when he went to the bathroom and his table hit the $250,000 dollar bad beat jackpot. Now thats frikin funny. Of coarse they wouldnt have hit it had he not gone to the bathroom and he did get a decent amount of consolation chips from the players but its still pretty brutal.

The tournament started out great as I was chipping up with good cards and big bets but would go south later when I would bluff a river in which a guy hit two pair on. I had turned an open ended straight flush draw and play so good that I didnt bet it in position against 2 guys checking to me but I bet half my chips on the frikin river. I donk it off a hand or two later to Elvis. Oh btw Elvis when you made the super star laydown of the monster A10, I had AK.

The cash game was wild. There was a serious lack of regard for chips. The best hand of the night was when G and J were betting back and forth and J ended up moving in on the River and G after deliberating called him down and they both turned over second pair with a 10 kicker. It was about a $500 pot they chopped. I was up most of the night because I dodged a flush draw and doubled up early but I dwindled over the night. I really never had hands that I could stick $20 in the middle with and thats what it was going to cost. I had a GCP blogger on my left who liked to play big pots. I did make a bad laydown that turned out to be great. UTG limped and in second position I make it $15 with QQ. I think a couple of people call and it gets to Scary on the button. Scary pops it to $50 or makes it $50 more and starts talkin. Scary is a smart player with some gamble. Well before it can get back to me he gets 2 callers. One maniac and one rock. I contemplate the possibility that they all have AK. The maniac who smooth called fifty did the same thing when I had QQ a month ago and won all my chips with K7. So the 2 callers probably have an over or two each. I put Scary on a big big hand. The absolute bottom of his range is JJ. I muck my QQ. Well they get it in on the flop and Scary had JJ but he hit a set so I didnt feel to bad. I actually still think it was the right play 7 out of 10 times. Scary was on fucking fire. I bet he was up $2000 when I left. The biggest hand of the night for me happened a few mintues before my announced cash out and go home time. I raise to $12 with JJ in early position and luckily only the button and G the maniac in the small blind call. The button is a good player who makes moves but I have to respect his moves becaus ehe probably has either outs or a good read or the best hand when he makes those moves. The SB will go crazy with air. The flop comes 10, 10, 7. I hate it. Sb checks I bet 50ish and the button fold thank God. BUT the SB maniac smooth calls. Now Im depressed. He knows I have a big hand. The turn is a Queen which I hate and now SB bets into me and it smells so much like value. $65. Sick. SB has been losing about $200 per pot all night and has been caught bluffing sooooo much. I decided I had to make at least one call. The river is a blank 5. G bets $90. So value. I think I would have felt better had he bet $120. I go in the tank. There's no figuring this hand out. Do I want to be the only guy who didnt call G and let him bluff a pot or do I want to be the only guy who G bet a pot all night. Tough call. Ive got $130 in the pot already. I take a look at him and I cant tell anything. I has a scowl on his face. Whatever. I put my head in my arms and make the crying call. Apparently G didnt seem too happy because the GCP blooger to my left says he thinks I made a good call. PHEW!!!!!! He floated me with AJ just to try and take it away from me. He coulda been doing the same thing with KQ and I woulda have another fucking G story like my buddy to my right who made it $100 preflop with AA and got two caller including G who had 8 high and the board comes 88J. Ouch. I so anyway I book a win finally. Scary reads this blog and called me Sofa King during the game. I wonder if thats inevitable.

Bleeding but not Profusely

2009-07-20T06:29:00.000-07:00

Poker, poker, poker aka kiss me poker. Friday night I went to the .25/.50 game at my friends house. Its a very relaxed home game. I lost $70. Most of it in a pot I had no reason to be in which is typical of this home game. The stakes are low and the goofing off is high. I called a raise to $3 with 86 suited. A guy behind me called and then a short stack went all-in for $10. Why the original raiser didnt reraise us degenerates out of the pot is beyond me. We all call. Thats 5 people going to the flop out of 8 players for 20 times the big blind. Flop is 876. I put in a $23 bet and the guy behind me goes all in for $28. I call and lose to his 54. Then I berate the original raiser for not shutting us both out of the pot which he wouldve won had he done so.

Saturday night I went to Harrahs. I sit down next to a guy who I have played with at Baton Rouge home games and he generously gives me the scoop on everyone at the table. We had a good time chatting the rest of the night. He raised it to $4 once in early position and I said he must have J10suited which was funny after he won the hand cause he did. He ran really bad and went bust eventually. I fold a shit ton for a while then I get JJ but the tightwad UTG guy raised and there were a few callers so I just call. The flop is 10 high all clubs. everyoine checks to me and I look to see my Jack of clubs and bet about 70% of the pot. Im very relieved when UTG folds. This crazy old dude who was very abrasive to the table pushes all in but its not that much more. I call. He had a gut shot straight flush draw and an Ace of hearts. Thank you mister nut ball. I feel real smart until a few hands later I raise with 10s and flop a set against a made str8 and the money goes in on the flop and I dont improve. FELTED. The guy that felted me had sat down 15 minutes earlier to my delight. I basically said to my buddy he looked like a good addition to the game. Old, well dressed guy with a flowery print shirt on. Looked very tourist. He played on pot where he called all three streets with Ace 10 on a 10 high board. I told my buddy during the hand he had A10 and was going to be a stubborn old man. Total drooler. Well the drooler busted me. I rebuy for $260 and lose $80 before I even get my chips. I get AQ and raise. The flop is KJbrick so I cont bet. I get minraised by a guy who then has 11 bucks left. I know Im behind but Im not folding to a min raise. He could have Q10. Well the turn is a 9 so I cant beat anything now. He waites till the river to bet the $11 and I throw it in the pot anyway. Fuck it. I get AQ the next hand and raise and lose too. So I rebuy up to $260 which is what i was down. a couple hands later still sitting with a $100 bill on the table i get K10spades. I call a raise on the button and flop broadway. I flat call the flop and turn bet. I cant believe the guy still bets into me on the river. I ship it in after a little hesitation act and get called. He has an unfoldable 1 pair. A pair of Kings with an Ace kicker. Thank you mister nutball #2. How can he not at least check call the river. How can you think one pair is godd after I flat the turn. Just another espn fan that cant fold AK. So I get even for the night. The rest of the night was lame. I lost $120 buck overall. I missplayed a hand so bad one time because I didnt see a guy in the pot and I thought I was heads up. Terrible. Maybe I dont bet the flush draw out on the turn but to let him get there for free is just donkey. I let the flush hit the river after I had turned the straight. At least I folded. The flower print shirt drooler I thought I was trapping called to see the flush. Had we been heads up he wouldve definitely kept betting behind me but the guy who I didnt see in the pot was an uber rock so drooler was rightly worried. I bluffed a river once which was pretty exciting. The guy had his chips in his hand and said "well they're just chips right" and I said "thats true" and he backed off and eventually folded. I realized I was in that stare at the board and dont breathe position once it looked like he was seriously considering calling so I sat up and took a sip of water which was funny because I didnt have any water. Just some random bottled water. Trying to look comfortable. It may have even been his water. I wonder if he woulda noticed me drinking his water would he have called. He finally mucked QQ but the was an Ace, a King, and a flush on the board. I called his first bet with a pair hoping to improve but when he checked the Ace behind me on the turn I figured I would have to bet the river especially if a heart hit. Soon after I left because my buddy I rode with was flat busted and my table wasnt that great. Driving back at 1am was strangely early. I usually dont leave till sun up.

Online is going well. I over $500 now. I think Im going to stick to my $20 SnGs though and not move up. I just have a feeling there arent near as many players or suckers at the $40 to $50 range. I will play a few higher games but Im going to keep the $20 as my main stay for now.

On the golf front I won 15 out of 17 holes in a wolf game in which we all shot exactly the same total score. I made some big putts on the back nine. I made a 25 footer on 18 to half the hole. I havent played in 6 months and really average about 4 rounds a year. I only played because it was the only mild day all summer with temps never going over 91. I shot an 87 which I thought was pretty good considering I showed up 5 minutes before tee off. I did get to hit a few drives on the range but that was it. No puts and no irons. I think I could get back to shooting in the low 80s pretty quickly. My buddy gave me some clubs about a year ago and the irons hit great. The driver is a big bertha and its so light compared to the walmart club I've been hitting for 10 years. I switched to my old driver after the very first hole and drove pretty well all day.

I hope the Monday night tournament is on for tonight. I wanna hear all about the main event and Vegas adventures.

Trying to Go Broke

2009-07-16T08:36:00.000-07:00

I was at $375 online bankroll. Ive been hovering around $400. Ive been as high as $475. Anyway last night I started playing $20 HU SnGs and ran pretty good. Went up to $450ish. Then I lost a few in aggravating fashion. Then the evil gambling monster called Gamblore showed up. I moved up to a $50 HU SnG and lost. Then I went to a $100 HU SnG and lost. That one really sucked. I had two pair on the turn when the money went in and he showed AA. The the river was an Ace. That left me with about 50 chips and I went out the next hand. So now my bankroll is at $220. Full Steam Ahead!!!!!! I decided to put basically my whole roll on a 1/2 NL full ring game. I sucked out on a short stack to be up $50 quickly. Then I lost down a bit calling with small pairs and not hitting. I did have a pair of 4's onetime out of position after the flop but I checked the flop and the preflop raiser checked behind which was weird. AK and missed or he flopped really big. I check called the turn and he pussied out on the river. Weeeeeeee. The hands I raised with I generally won. I had to buy one pot with AQ. I raised in late position and got called by a guy who had limped in front of me. The board came 9 high and I bet out about 80% pot. Call. I guess he has a pair of 8s or something. The turn was a King so I bet again. $32 into a $48 pot. He thought for a really long time. Im begging him to fold and when he finally does I start chatting "Hercules, Hercules, Hercules". So I won my bankroll back up to $350. Pretty much where I started but we all know that its only a matter of time before I do some more dumbshit like that and lose my whole roll. Fuckin degenerate.

Stumbled into a Goofy Little SnG with Rebuys

2009-07-14T14:35:00.000-07:00

Played in a game I'd never been to last night. It was in the back of a bar that used to be not a bar and where I used to spend many a days gamblin. I went there cause my normal Monday game was canceled this week because our fearless leader was busting out of the main even out 119th place and someone told me about this "tournament". Well it wasnt quite what I imagined. There were only 9 of us (and I brought a guy sooooo). $20 each with one $20 rebuy before the break and one $20 addon at the break. I had played with everyone before except maybe this one girl. Dinky town. The game had 3 absolutely terribad players (well they played bad that night at least). All but one busted out before the first break having put two buyins in the game. Another guy went out pre add-on who seemed like he could play but was too aggressive with so many bad calling stations and the rest tight players waiting for hands. I guess he was not a great player but compared to the other three he was Stu Ungar. As for my significant hands I won a coin flip with 10's vs AQ. The guy raised to $800 after my raise to $60 so I just decided he really didnt want to see a flop and the only hand he could have that crushed me was JJ so I went all in. I also more than doubled up with 10's again when 5 players saw the flop for $250ish when blinds were 20/40 and it came 577. The first to act guy who in the past was Phil Helmuth jr. but seemed chill last night led out for $600. How could I fold? How could I call? I went all in. Fuck it I could rebuy. My all in caused the QQ behind me to fold (I wouldnt have folded that but yippee for me) and then the original better trys to read me and I look like Im ready to rebuy so he makes a hero call with 22. Whoops. I win. I also won a small pot HU with QQ and a 7 high flop. Standard raise, cont bet and fold. At the break we had 6 players left and everyone bought $1500 in chips for $20 buck EXCEPT ME. I had $4500 and figured I wouldnt need them. I was maybe a little below average after the add-on. Well to get to the not very important point, once it was down to 3 of us I was the shortest stack but still only a 2 to 1 dog. I proposed a chop (which I shouldve waited more than 1.3 seconds to propose after the 4th busted out cause he seemed to take offense to it). My buddy decided since he had more money invested and double my stack that he didnt wanna. The other guy did. So we played. I went all-in on them a couple of times and suddenly the chop was accepted. I took $20 less for being the shortest and since they both had $20 more (maybe $40 more) invested. I made $70 after giving the dealer $10. She thought it was the sweetest thing and is apparently used to getting nothing for her time and effort. Then we played some pool. Not the best poker night in the world but my alternative was to go to a game that might swallow my meager bankroll whcih I was contemplating.

Loveshack places 119th

2009-07-13T16:51:00.000-07:00

Oh well. The dream of going to Vegas to root on the Loveshack in the November 9 is over. He finished 119th. Good run. Nice cash. RDG is a tourney beast.

Loveshack has 600k with 150 players left

2009-07-13T14:26:00.000-07:00

The next money bump is around 100 players so there should be some short stacks gambling it up right now.

Loveshack has 800k with 180 players left

2009-07-12T20:35:00.000-07:00

The blinds are at 8/16k so RDG has some chips to work with. Bring it home boy!!!!

Update

2009-07-12T16:48:00.000-07:00

Loveshack has 900k with 200 left. Go RDG!!!!!!!!

Loveshack is in the Money

2009-07-11T16:39:00.000-07:00

Loveshack made the money!!! He has 337k with 650 left.

LoveShack at 331K / 800 left (thats 188 position)

2009-07-11T14:12:00.000-07:00

Last I heard was at 2:45am and Loveshack was at 331K in 188 position with 800 left