Puck Foker

This post was originally started on August 22nd, and I just never got around to finishing it. Well its now October 10th, and I'm finally gonna finish it, but just be aware that although things haven't improved vastly, this post is outdated. But there's still some good stuff for posterity. Then I'll try and post soon and get things updated. Although its pretty much more of the same...

So according to Blogger, I haven't posted in just a day short of a month. And, you guys remember what I said recently about not being able to blog when I'm running bad, right? Well do a little simple math there, and you'll be able to deduce the reasoning for my lack of posts.

I run SOOOOOOOOO bad.

I'm just gonna hit some hilights and then get outta here. Really, I just want some of this documented for posterity.

A few weeks ago I actually happened into an "extra" token, so for a few days I looked to get into the 7 PM central deepstack token tourney. 24k guarantee I think.

Anyway, one random Wednesday night I got into the tourney with over 1000 of my closest friends and things were going just swimmingly. After an early hit on some bad play on my part, I quickly found myself back ahead of the average, and just kept playing as aggressively as I could to stay there. I managed to stay ahead of the average with a nice stack all the way toward the end of the 2nd hour. I was bouncing around between 80th and 100th place and playing well. With a 10.5k stack and blinds at 100/200 or something, I have AJ in the BB. The button shorty (like 2400) makes like a 3x stealy raise, SB folds, and I decide AJ is probably ahead of his range and if he's gonna see his flop he's going to have to commit his chips. I jam, he calls, and rolls A5. Five on the river, and that's that. Fair enough. About an orbit later I pick up AA UTG+2. I make a standard 3x raise to 1200, and another 2400 shorty jams immediately behind me. It folds back around to me, and I make the easy call. He shows KQo and makes a straight by the turn. An ace on the river twists the knife. Ok, so now I'm sitting on a 5k stack and quite irritated. Five hands later I was out. I'm sitting on the button and it folds around to me. I make a relatively easy jam w/K6 vs. the blinds, the SB re-jams (this is the guy that sucked out on my AA w/KQ), and the BB folds. SB has KK, and I'm cold-decked again and out in something like 483rd.

So I really had a feeling that that was going to be the tourney that helped me turn the corner there for a while. I was making really strong plays to keep and grow my stack and stay in the ITM spots and while I showed down some winners, a lot of it was keeping ahead of the average by stabbing at pots to pick up blinds. Then I just got beat to shit by the deck and all of the sudden it was over in <15 hands and I wasn't exactly sure what hit me.

One of my favorite beats as of recent was in a $5 SNG when this crazy LAG raised UTG+1, and sitting on a short stack, I jammed without much thought w/AKs in the big blind. LAG didn't even think before calling and showing his AJs, the obvious nuts. The flop naturally comes J88, but there's two diamonds. Turn is another J giving him a full house, which, of course has me drawing dead, but in my mind I'm still calling for a diamond cuz its so fast I don't really realize it. Diamond on the river gives me the nut flush and I feel vindicated...until the chips slide his way and realize what just happened. So sick.

I also had a fun one at our monthly game where I found AKs in late position (cutoff or button), and raised it up to 3 or 4x, and got a caller from my buddy's boss, a complete donk, in the big blind. Flop comes 5,7,9, two spades. Ok, so I'm probably still ahead and I'm drawing huge. He checks, I make a reasonable, enticing bet. He raises all-in, and even though I know I'm beat...somehow...I make the call for all my chips. He rolls 86o and I'm drawing thinner than I expected, but I've got my trusty spades. Turn A, River A, and the deck gets the last laugh again.

I have felt a little better lately because I've played some with my brother-in-law and he's seen what's happening to me, and with my buddy and he's seen what's happening to me, and over at another buddy's place as he watched over my shoulder and watched this stuff happen to me. So I'm not crazy. I am just running so bad and there's nothing I can do about it but keep trying to play and not go broke.

So after all the online torture as of late, in a perhaps ill-advised move, I decided to mix it up a little bit and throw $100 down to play some 1/2 NL live at the local casino last Friday. And that...was an experience.

I got sat at a table that consisted of several familiar faces from when I've been out there before. So while I was hoping for some frat boys drinking it up and donking it off, I was set to deal with regulars, which is fine because although they may not give away their money in true donkey form, just because they're regulars doesn't mean they're good. I soon settled into the table and had pinpointed some targets, some seats to avoid tangoing with, and seeing who would show up next in the seats that would fill and empty. Eventually I was feeling pretty comfortable and happy to be tossing chips and squeezing two cards up off the felt as opposed to clicking buttons.

Prolly 45 mins or so in I pick up AA under the gun. Not being fully adjusted to my surroundings yet, I bump it to $8, and get, like, 6 callers. I forgot that any raise under $10 seems to actually *encourage* callers. So much for thinning the field. So I'm thinking to myself "flop an ace...flop an ace...flop an ace" or I may have to get away from it. Flop? QAx, two diamonds. I bet right out at it for $15, got one caller to my left, and it folded around to this old codger regular who I've seen play plenty of times and definitely has some solid game, but can be conquered. Codger raises to $35, and I put him on AQ, QQ, Ax or a flush draw, with flush draw being the likliest. I'm going all-in for my last $15 or something on top of the $35, but I play it up a little bit, hoping to get the other caller, a true donk with a stack that had steadily decreased since he sat down, to come along. When I finally push, the dude mucks, and codger obviously calls and rolls...52 of diamonds. Awesome. Thanks for that, puney little $8 raise. Diamond on the turn. Even more awesome. Q on the river. Awesomest of awesome. Suck/Resucks are probably one of my favorite things in poker. Whether I'm just watching or am actually involved, I just really get a kick out of them. I was halfway out of my chair after the diamond on the turn thinking "standard", so needless to say it was nice to see the board pair on the river and I drag a pot that will allow me to play a little.

So I almost busted about 45 mins into my session after flopping a set of aces in a $160 pot. After the beat that actually did send me packing, though, I'd have taken the 37%er any day of the week just for peace of mind's sake.

Its a little under 2 hours into my session and my $160 stack had been bled down to about $130 after blinds and losing $15 on a hand where I made middle pair on the flop and bet the whole way against an obvious flush draw, only for Flushy McFlusherson to hit an overpair on the river. Standard. Otherwise, I was just contributing blinds as I swear when I looked down 7 times out of 10 my first card was a 4. The other three times, the 2nd card was a 4. But I digress...

I look down and find KK either UTG or UTG+1. Hoping to thin the field at least a little more than last time, but being willing to let it go if I don't love the flop, I bump to $10. I get a caller over in the corner of the table, and this suckbox idiot in the SB bumps to $25. This guy couldn't keep himself out of a pot if he tried, and I have watched him dip into pots all night, and he was about as bad as it gets. He'd have a big hand in small pots and a small hand in big pots, but was still managing to keep his head above water by sucking out with shitty two pair and 4-straights like it was his job. He should've been busted about 4 times, and I was just *waiting* for a chance to take his chips. If we were heads up already I'd probably have flat-called the $25 and assuming a harmless enough board, chipped away at him street by street because I was almost positive he didn't have AA, but I couldn't have this other tagalong in the hand and for that reason and some insurance against the probability of his rockets, I bump it to $50. Tagalong folds and moron, looking all constipated, hems and haws for a while before he calls. Flop comes J-high, two hearts. He checks with zero strength whatsoever, and I jam my last $82, ready to take it down here or make him commit his stack to try and win (he actually only had $2 more than me, as we'll find out shortly). He goes into the tank for probably 3-4 minutes, and finally says, "I think I'm beat...I think I'm beat REALLY bad.", thinks for another 15-20 seconds or so and says "I call". Great decision, buddy. He flips two queens and I flip my kings. He has the Q of hearts, but I have the K of hearts, so runner runner flush is not an option. He's dead to 2 outs twice. A 10% shot. I'm in the 10 seat to the right of the dealer, so I can *sorta* see the cards before everyone else. The queenish looking paint card that comes off on the turn makes me feel a little sick, but the reaction from the table when the card hits the felt wasn't horrible, and c'mon...it can't be a Queen, right?? But the dealer pulls his hand away, and there lies a Queen. I take a quick look at suckbox and he's just looking at the queen with this stupid looking ecstatic but shameful look on his face, and I can just tell everyone else at the table is looking at me like I just saw my dog get hit by a car. I sweat the last card also hoping for the miracle of all suck/resucks, but I see the two hearts on the face of that card, and I swear I was out of the room before that deuce even hit the felt.

I probably could've rebought and made money at that table. Most of them were in pots where they had no business being, and a tight guy like me could just wait for my monster and get paid off. But, you know? After running bad for 3 2/3 months now, if I can't sweat 2 outs in the deck, I might've exposed myself as an even bigger putting another $100 on the table than the suckbox moron was for calling with those queens. So $100 was my stop-loss. Its one thing to lose to a <5 outer in a $2.25 or $5.50 SNG online, but I can't really afford to be losing a hundred bones getting my money in as a 90% favorite.

So, I had an absolute f-bombing blast playing some live poker while it lasted, but I walked out of there having taken not only my worst live beat, but very likely my most expensive bad beat ever, and there's nothing worse than walking out of a casino with a couple of milestones like that hanging over your head.

The next day I played 3 SNGs and bombed out of those with boat under boat, cold-deck, and cold-deck. I haven't had the desire to play since. Granted, its only been 3 days, but the whole thing is just really starting to wear on me. I've been reading again trying to get my mind straight, and like I said before, have an attitude of perseverance as opposed to "woe is me". I wanna beat this thing. But at this point even if I can pull out of the slump, I've still got a long ways to go to get myself back to even from my 2005 losses that I'm still trying to make up for, and I don't know if I have time to put together the sort of bankroll I'd like to have for February's Circuit Event in Council Bluffs. But at this point I've gotta take it one step at a time and just start trying to win as a favorite.

Good times.

Latest Update

For my latest update, please click here, and skip to the bottom where I spoke in general terms about how my game is going. Only take out the parts about any glimmer of hope.

This weekend saw me go from $73 to as low as $.80. I spent about $30 trying to win tokens so I could play in a $26 tourney Saturday night, and after bombing on my 1st two $8.70 or whatever turbos and getting severely tilted, not only did I score a toke on my next SNG, but I also picked one up in a Token Frenzy, so after a rough start, that was a real bright spot for $52 on my $30 investment.

The rest was piss poor. I got into like a $24k Guarantee on Saturday night and when it started and I realized it wasn't a deep stack I was upset (push monkeys love to spew chips in deep stack tourneys and I've always had pretty good luck in steadily building a stack), but was still prepared to go deep. And by go deep, I obviously mean bust on the 3rd hand when I flopped 2 pair w/A3 (in the BB), got all my chips in the middle by the turn against what I absolutely knew was a big ace, but what I was not expecting was the flush draw. With one card to come, of course, he got home.

That may be one of those situations where maybe I shouldn't be 100% eager to get all my chips in with 2 pair that early in a tournament, and possibly could've avoided busting. But I was absolutely certain he had a strong ace, I just did not anticipate a flush draw. So who knows, maybe thats a spot where I can get away from it in an effort to minimize my exposure to variance. But at the same time, I got in as at least a 70% favorite, and if I'm chucking a hand as a 70% favorite, something's gotta be wrong with me, right?? Any input would be welcome.

Aside from that, after what was a non-cashing streak of at least 10 SNGs, yesterday afternoon I bought into a $2.25 SNG that left me a worthless $.80 behind, so needless to say, I was nervous. I managed to win that SNG, fortunately, and then took 2nd in two more after that. After a couple more suckouts and cold decks, currently my bankroll stands somewhere north of $9, which leaves me with four more shots. I also have that other $26 token, which I kinda wish right now was actually $26, because although a deep stack token tourney will be fun, lets face it, I've never had a performance in one that makes me a sure fire bet to cash. And the way I'm running just makes it worse.

Some noteworthy beats yesterday were AA vs JJ all-in preflop and QQ vs 1010 all-in preflop. Other than that I saw several 70/30 suckouts, an inability to win 60/40s and 50/50s, big hands not being able to get paid off, and cold-decks that just make you wanna cry.

And its all that much worse in $2.25 SNGs where any two cards bigger than 9 are worthy of calling off a stack with.

In the interest of not sounding like the ultimate whiner (although that ship has probably sailed at this point), I also find myself playing really weakly from time-to-time (but also made a handfull of really strong plays), and sometimes I wonder if I'm getting big money into 60/40s and 50/50s at inappropriate times. All I know is it feels like I'm getting my money in flipping coins in big spots (and losing), but that makes me wonder if they're almost *too* big. It feels right when I jam w/99 on a shorty who obviously wants to take a pot down uncontested preflop, but then when my pair doesn't hold up and I'm 1/3 of a stack lighter I wonder if it was the right play.

So the battle continues...

The Only Thing I Can Say at a Poker Table

In reference to the title, the only thing it seems I can say at a poker table these days is "UNREAL". Generally the syllables are split with one world famous "f word", but the idea is the same.

Here are four occurances where all I could think was "unreal" in one single 90 player SNG.

After nearly doubling up early when my QQ held against AK when we got all-in after a 545 flop, I played some big stack poker, made a few hands, and had worked my stack up to 7-8k. Then these hands happen.

1. Small Potatoes. I might have played this hand a little passively on the flop, but with his raise I like the potential of getting paid off at the end of this hand if the river is anything else. Of course the river *isn't* anything else, and I can't see any way my kings full are any good there.

2. Come on Now. This hand was pretty early on, but I thought I played it about as well as I could. What a ridiculous suckout. After the flop he needs one of the two kings left or a runner runner pair to win, or a runner runner straight to split. Of course that's *way* too many outs for me to dodge. The donkey proceeds to go damn near broke on the next hand and then donk off the rest of his chips the hand after. Way to use that double-up.

After these hands I was still sitting in good shape, but I got involved in a 3-way pot where I was committed to the end w/2nd pair 10s, top kicker with 2 Jacks on the board. One player had a J and I was back down to 4k.

I didn't have to wait too long before I doubled through a total LAG when I actually won ANOTHER coin flip w/my JJ vs. his AK. I don't think I'd have doubled me up there for over 1/3 of my stack, but I'm certainly happy he did.

3. And Then There Was This. I actually thought I was getting my money in relatively far behind here but had some very live draws to big hands and felt like it was a good spot to go big or go home. I was open-ended with the 2nd nut flush draw and possibly a live king, and this guy was flinging chips like he was protecting a 9 or an overpair. I was getting a little less than 2:1 and had to be a coin flip if not a favorite, so I called his all-in, and it turns out he was bluffing out his ass and I had him crushed and for once there were some outs I *didn't* want to hit because we shared them. Of course that's when the open-ender comes right on home for both and we split the pot... This is a spot where you could make an argument that I should've never been in the hand w/K10o to a preflop raise, but it was a pretty paltry price to pay in the big blind with a big stack and in the end I found myself in good shape and got hideously unlucky...again.

Then not too long after this I managed to find myself on an even bigger stack when I flopped the nut flush and stacked someone who liked his QQ.

I sat on this 14-15k stack as it bounced between 4th place and 9th place as we played down from 27 to 21. I think I was in about 7th when this hand went down.

4. The Ultimate Dagger. Preflop, this hand couldn't have gone more perfectly. I smooth called the initial short stack raise in hopes of other calls or a re-raise to isolate, and I got everything I could've ever hoped for. Of course, given our holdings its only natural. Of course the shorty is gonna get all his chips in w/QQ, and of course the donkey w/KK can't see my obvious aces and let it go. I really think right there I could have laid my KK down to the third re-raise. We were on the bubble and he had *plenty* of chips to get to the money. But instead he puts his tourney life on the line with 2 outs, hits his way to the chip lead, and I'm sent packing one off the bubble in 20th less than an orbit after this hand. Incidentally, I got it in against Mr. KK w/my 3s vs his AK and he turned an Ace. Of course he did. Even if the QQ guy flops a set there I still net 10k on the hand. But no, its gotta be the kings.

So. FCKING. Sick. I really felt good about finally winning one of these 10 table SNGs. I actually won in a couple of big spots, only to lose when I *really* shouldn't have to worry about losing.

And just to note, this isn't the first time this has happened to me. Way back when I got involved in a cash game hand w/AA vs. KK vs. QQ vs. JJ and the jacks come out ahead w/a set on the flop. I know that the more pocket pairs you have in a hand, the more likely it is that someone flops a set, but come on...where's the donks w/AK or AQ here every now and then??

Despite all this, I can't really complain. I probably had my best monthly homegame ever on Friday, taking 2nd, 1st, and 1st and profiting $60 on these $5 tourneys. I have to admit I had a couple of crucial 70/30 or worse suckouts in crucial spots, but you know what? I'm OK with that. And despite the utter fcking heartbreak in this 90 player SNG I did win a regular old 9 player SNG so tonights session will show a profit. Otherwise, the only online playing I've been doing is at PokerCS.com trying to put together a bankroll from their play money step SNGs where if you win a 6, 6, and 10 player SNG, you get $1. It was some nice, no pressure poker over the past 3-4 days. I've collected some step 2 tickets and will continue down that path over the next few days.

I did play in a $500 freeroll over there that I got a ticket to for my shilling in my last post, and it went about as I could expect from the last 2 months results. AK no good against QJ w/TPTK vs 2 pair, AK no good against A8 w/a 4-flush to the 8, and JJ no good against 99 flopping a set. A good opportunity to make some money with only 45 players and a nice 2500 chip starting stack, but I went out in 42nd I believe. C'est la vie.

So signs of turning this around are persisting, and while I actually won a couple of coin flips tonight in big spots, little could I expect to lose w/AA all-in preflop in the biggest possible spot. Guess I've still got a little ways to go...

Coming out of my Hole to Shill and B*tch

I just got a welcome email from PokerCS.com (aka CarbonPoker), probably still my favorite poker room on the web even though I'm broke there, talking about their Summer Champs series. They politely asked me to post on my blog about the series to spread the word, and since I love the site so much I'm happy to oblige.

If you've never played at this site, I suggest you do. Their software is fast and absolutely loaded with cool features like fold & show, rabbit hunting, all-in percentages, player accolades (to show off your poker prowess), great graphical player notes features, hide your cards (if you like an added challenge), chat bubbles from each player, smilies the ability to have multiple windows or your games tiled in a single window, and I know there's more that I just can't remember. Their software is absolutely top notch.

So anyway, to oblige the good people at PokerCS.com, I just wanted to get that in there.

Now...what can I say about the last month and change since I've posted? More of the same...

Playing the local casino's live tourney on 6/10 actually went pretty well. I never had an above average stack, but managed to make it down to the final 2 tables just picking up big hands to double up with when I needed to. I was seeing visions of an under the radar miraculous win/cash when I went against my gut and pushed my 4xBB in EP with K10 (which had been the bain of my existance over this run I've been experiencing), only to run into the BBs AK. I'd already used my 70/30 suckout earlier in the tourney w/A5 vs AJ, so this hand sealed the deal and I bust in 14th out of 116 or so, w/the top 10 paying. It was a HUGE disappointment, but I think I've gotta make that push there every time and hope for the best. I won $50 at the 3/6 table after busting out of the tourney, so the final tally for the day was a mere -$10.

That day would be the exception, however, and NOT the norm. Some bloggers can bring themselves to post when they're running bad, but I am not one of them. The bad beats just kept coming, including at the homegame I last talked about where I had to rebuy after the very first hand after flopping the nuts (I held KJ on a flop of 9 Q 10) against my buddy's set of Qs and him filling up on the river. I took another >70% beat a few levels later but was left with chips, and then finally got something going when disaster struck again. We were on the bubble with 5 left, and I was 3rd in chips, but only with about 4-5xBB due to the structure, I open pushed UTG w/QQ and the SB who had me covered by <10% hemmed and hawed and eventually called w/A10s. The BB thought about it briefly before folding an Ace face up. So I've only got 2 aces to dodge at least. Not only did he flop his flush draw, but the turn was an Ace, and I was sent packing. So sick.

But when I say packing, I mean I was literally packing my bags, to head to Las Vegas on 6/22. I couldn't mention it in the blog because I'm not sure if my brother in law reads this consistently or not, but it was a secret to him. He thought we were going to Florida, and *he* was getting surprised with a trip to Vegas on 6/23, and then we were going to surprise him by being out there when he arrived on 6/25. All that went off without a hitch, and it was a blast. I spent only about 6 hours at 3/6 tables at Caesars while in town, but that was about enough. The first night my buddy and I were seated at the fishiest 3/6 table I've ever had the pleasure of being seated at. And I shot straight out of the gate running my stack up +$80 within the first hour. When I exchanged some texts with my wife seeing what her and our friends were up to, and she asked me how I was doing, instead of writing back "killing this table of donkeys", I modestly replied "playing successful poker". But that still must have angered the gods and I went on a 2 hour drought not winning a hand and having my AA, KK, QQ, and a host of other solid hands not hold up. The AA was the most noteable as this total donk local went with me the whole way w/KK, and caught a K on the river to scoop the huge pot. Just sick. I mean, I guess in limit poker when you have an overpair to the board you've gotta plan on dedicating $45 to the hand, but like an a-hole donk at the end of the hand he goes "I know you have aces de whole time." Well if that's really true, then save yourself some money! But no...he spikes the 2-outer instead. I saw my stack down to as low as $20 from my $100 starting stack, so over the course of the next 2 hours I just struggled to get back to even. Eventually the donkey table broke and I was moved to another table that was a little more solid, so I just tried to bide my time and look for good hands. It was basically torture. This drunk moron to my left didn't fold for about an hour and couldn't lose and eventually cashed out for over $400. He got me once with 2 pair w/his Q2 against my TPTK w/AK, but I kept that pot small and didn't lose much. I kept folding to stay out of his way, and I think I eventually did take a decent pot or two off him just before he left. Finally it got to be about 3 AM on Monday morning, my new table was 6-handed and a new card rack had sat down to my left. After playing as many hands as I could short-handed, I finally won a couple of pots, my stack was at $97, and I got outta there. What a nightmare.

I played one more time before leaving town. 6/26 was my brother-in-law's actual 30th bithday, so we got together with our friend who lives out there again and hit the Caesar's poker room one more time. In the end I might have actually waited longer for my seat than I actually sat in it. It was really just a blip on the radar for me. There was nothing to the session. Plain and simple, I wasn't winning. I saw a lot of average hands...middle pairs, KQ, suited connectors. The kind of hands you just like to try and limp with or raise in position. But it seems like every time I got one of those hands there would be a raise and/or a re-raise in front of me, so maybe I should've been chucking them, but instead I was playing them for too much money. And whiffing flops like it was my job. I got involved in one hand where I flopped an open-ender with a K-high flush draw, and couldn't get it home. Lost a lot of chips on that hand. But mostly I just bled paying $6 to see flops with hands that needed help and never got it. My bustout hand came at the hands of my brother-in-law who was a total card rack the whole session. With only like $15 in front of me I limped w/J10s on the button. BIL completed in the small and my other buddy checked the big. I can't recall if anyone else was in the hand or not. Anyway, the flop came 8 J Q, BIL bet, and it folded around to me. I threw in a raise hoping to just scoop at this point, but BIL called. So I've confirmed he's got the queen, and I'm pretty much done with this hand. The turn was a pleasantly unexpected 9. BIL bet, I threw in the last of my chips, and made the mistake of feeling very comfortable w/my straight against his Q9. The thought of living to see another day quickly vanished when another 9 hit the river and the pot was shipped one seat to my left. When my brother-in-law busted me by spiking his 4-outer on the river a calm came over me and I knew that was my sign to go sleep for 3 hours before we got up to leave town. The last of my chips went to a worthy enough cause, and any more money on the table would be a waste. If anyone else had busted me I probably would've reloaded and played until it was time to go to the airport, but getting busted by BIL with a pretty major suckout kinda put me at peace, so that was...interesting. As a side note, BIL continued to be a card rack after I left for a while longer, and walked away with about $140 profit. I was really really happy for him. It was his birthday, and he was playing live poker in a casino for the first time ever...in Vegas. Its a dream scenario to walk away a big winner, and I'm glad the dream unfolded for him.

Vegas saw the drying up of my measly cash roll and then some, so I'm officially cash broke and have to start the cash roll over. I'm still running pretty piss poor in general (7/5 marked 2 months of this garbage...easily the longest streak of negative variance since I started playing in 2004), and could wear the keyboard out with bad beat stories just from the past 4 sessions online. Friday offered a glimmer of hope with the bankroll approaching $70, but then Sunday I was ready to chuck my computer against the wall as I saw my roll depleated to as low as $12. Signs of stabilization are showing as intermixed with some of the sick, sick beats are me crushing every 3rd or 4th SNG, and my FT balance currently stands at $61. *knocks furiously on wood* So I'm seeing signs of things turning around, but just when I start to feel like I'm standing on solid ground, the floor drops out from under me again. While I feel like in general I'm playing strong, but careful, I have realized myself playing weak/scared a couple times and have done my best to keep the aggression high even though it seems like whenever I get my money in way good preflop or on the flop, it all falls apart when the rest of the cards come. I simply cannot outlast remaining cards to come.

But I'm having fun. Its very challenging to fight negative variance, but since your running so badly it helps you focus on getting your money in as good as possible, and I'm getting a LOT of practice doing that. So assuming I can start getting my big hands to hold up, hitting a consistent number of draws, and winning my fair share of coin flips, that will start paying off and then bigger chip stacks will allow me to take more chances. For now I've switched back to the 9-max SNGs, sticking in some 18s, 45s, and 90s here and there because I get more hands for my money and it gives me a little more wiggle room to get to the cash. While the percentage of players that cash is the same, I feel like the 9 and up SNGs have more pure dead money in them than a 6-max, where generally players are playing the 6-max for a reason. But maybe I'm just making that up...

If and when I ever can get any sort of consistency back in my game, I really would like to start honing in my online MTT game. I've been dabbling in some of the $26 token deep stack tourneys and the 90-max deep stack SNGs and have really been having fun and some success trying to go deep. Inevitably I always end up running KK into QQ flopping a set, KK running into 33 flopping a set, JJ running into 88 making a straight, or 10s vs 9s that make a straight (all of these are real hands from my last 4 sessions) and busting, but I feel like after 3 years of toiling my big score is out there somewhere. So we'll see. First I have to put together a bankroll that gives me a little wiggle room...

So that's about that. There's some real sick beats and serious cold decks to talk about, but they all kind of run together at this point. I'm trying to focus on looking ahead, and taking solice in the facts that I'm getting my money in WAY good more often than not, and that bankroll management has prevented me from going broke.

Sorry for the huge post, but if you made it this far you're a champ. Maybe the next post will be sooner and bring some better news.

Oh and PS, while I was in Vegas I visited Day 2 and Day 4 of the 50k HORSE event. I'm a total celebrity dork, so seeing all the pros I've watched for hours on end on TV (not to mention Dr. Pauly) was an unbelievable experience. I have some pretty good pictures from Day 2 where you can just go around the tables and play "Name the Pros", so if anyone is interested in seeing them, shoot me an email. I was around for the 2004 Final Table when they played the last full WSOP at Binion's and saw the ushering out of that legacy, but this was my first visit to The Rio for the WSOP. Man, what a spectacle.

More of the Same...

Well, I took 6 days off from playing. Partly because I could take the variance anymore, partly to stave off the tilt, and partly because, quite frankly, I was scared. Every time I got into a showdown situation I envisioned the worst, and it just plain wasn't fun.

So I got the itch to play again tonight, and I started out real strong, making just some really great plays on both tables and building stacks that I could be aggressive with. A lot of it I did without a hand and with coordinated betting strategy, but I also showed down big when I needed to. Anyway, we get down to the bubble in both SNGs. In the first one sitting on the 2nd place stack I flopped open-ended with a gapper hand in the BB and made my straight on the river. Alas, my opponent on the button had turned a full house holding A7o and showed no strength at any point in the hand until he shoved over the top of me on the river. My first instinct was to fold due to the way I'd been running but I thought to myself "is a straight *really* no good here?", and decided I had to make the call 3-handed and couldn't let my variance dictate my play. Just sick. Can anyone get away from that hand there on a paired board w/an A on it? I feel like I should've been able to, but I just couldn't find a fold with a very well disguised straight 3-handed. On the 2nd table I was the short stack and flopped top pair 7s in the BB, and the SB min-bet the flop and the turn, and I shoved over the top on the turn. He called with 9s...unraised PF. My read was total weakness with the big stack trying to push the shorty off his BB hand w/overs or something. With top pair still on the turn, I felt like I had to get my money in and make him pay to draw to a hand that beats me. I don't know how I get away from that under any circumstances.

So...this f'n blows. I'm pretty much completely hopeless. I feel like I'm doing a whole lot right not only play wise, but also in order to subdue the tilt, but I'm just getting NO help from the cards.

I probably won't blog until sometime next week unless I happen to stumble upon some free time, in what has been and will continue to be the busiest week in recent memory. I'm playing live tomorrow night at a home game that is supposed to be pretty soft, and I'm playing live again on Sunday at the local casino's tourney. I'm *really* looking forward to both opportunities to play live, but I'd be lying if I didn't admit that I don't know how I feel about putting "real" money up to play poker right now the way I'm running. Its one thing to get brow-beaten in $2 and $5 SNGs, but it'll be a little harder to take in a $20 rebuy game and a $60 tourney. I'm just gonna play my best and hope the cards don't continue to spit in my face. I'm grasping at the concept that Saturday is my birthday and *maybe* I'll be within the window of some "birthday luck" starting tomorrow. So we'll see how that works out.

BTW, I owe TripJax a plug because he actually tagged me for that 7 things meme, which I didn't see until after I had actually posted it. That makes 5 whole bloggers who know I exist. I'm getting pretty big time, but I promise I'll try and remain humble.

Check ya later.

Wearing Me Down

Sorry for the lack of posts lately. Not only have I been trying to catch up on my reading (and have pretty much done so), but I have been running so pee poor its gut wrenching. We all know how it goes when someone's running badly. I don't wanna talk about it, and you don't wanna hear it. But lemme tell you...the hand histories...oh, the hand histories that I could post...! Incidentally, for an insight into some of the beats I've been taking, you could go read some of smokkee's most recent posts. Our fates seem to be nearly identical lately, although the beats he's taking are certainly at a much more significant level than my micro limit piddling.

Its been almost a month at this point. Ever since I got back from my long weekend in TX on May 6th I have just been getting my ass kicked at the tables. Plenty of one-outers and two-outers, a lot of 5 & 6-outers, and enough 70/30 and 80/20 losses to make a mathemetician rethink the philosopies of probability. Forget 60/40s and coin flips. My typical 60/40 ends in my opponent flopping two pair, whether they're 60 or 40, and then filling up on the river. And in the 50/50s they either flop a set against my overs and drawing dead on the flop, or flop an ace against my pocket pair. I can also just go ahead and forget about flopping sets or filling up flushes. The cold-decks have been relentless. I've had one KK vs. AA encounter, not to mention several short-handed occurances where someone behind me has no business waking up with a better hand. But man, they sure have been. And of course there's the donkeys. Calling my big raises with rags and outflopping me. Outflopping me is the easy part, though. I am *maybe* hitting 10% of the flops I'm seeing (and by "hitting", I mean "usually 2nd pair or worse")...nowhere near the 35% Dan Harrington tells me I should be hitting. In the end, it all is coming together to really test my resiliance, and its getting very tiring.

I really feel like I'm playing well. There have been a couple times where I have caught myself reaching and trying to create something that wasn't there, but I've been quick to whip myself right back into shape when I see it occuring. I'm making strong plays when I should be and just not getting there. And I'm making great folds when I need to. If there's one thing that gets better about your game when you're running badly, its getting a real sense of when you're beat. It often comes when you know you shouldn't be beat, but you are. And you learn to get away from it and hope to find another spot. So maybe I can bring that back with me if and when things turn around. Anyway, in the end, no matter how well I'm playing, I just can't seem to show down a winner when it really counts.

If there's one positive thing out of all of it, its that I haven't gone broke. I guarantee you two years ago at this time I'd have been broke and reloaded 3-5 times by now. I'd have moved up in stakes to chase my losses and "get it back quicker". I'd have moved away from my winning style and been chasing any glimmer of a potential big hand, and I'd have been tilting out of my mind. At this point I'm actually prematurely moving *down* in limits to weather the storm. I feel like I'm sticking to my game and making plays I need to make to be successful. And aside from one Saturday afternoon where I wanted to chuck my laptop across the basement, I have managed to keep my tilt level at a minimum, and am trying to take solice in the fact that I'm making the right plays and/or getting my money in good and just getting wrecked as a 50-80% favorite.

All that said, the cards can go ahead and turn anytime, because its really wearing me down.

Anyway, just wanted to check in and let my 6 faithful readers know that I'm not dead, but my game certainly seems to be. Sorry for all the whining. Hopefully the next post will allow me the opportunity for a little different tone.

Until then, I'll check ya later.

Ok, so maybe not...

I guess I didn't realize the 400k started at 5:00 CST. I figured it was more like 8:00. So being gone from 12:30-4 probably was pretty poor planning if I really wanted to try and get in.

I'm still running horribly. Such sick stuff I've been seeing. So....so sick.

All or Nothing

Despite of (or perhaps because of) the fact that I am running *absolutely* piss poor (seriously...you wouldn't believe it), I woke up this morning and decided to try and play my first 400k.

My satelliting restrictions are pretty strict, so its rather likely almost certain I won't get there. But regardless, I'm gonna try, so look for me when the time comes.

Checkin' In & my 7 Facts

Man, I can't believe I haven't posted at all this month. I can't say a whole lot terribly interesting has happened, although there have been some post-worthy hands here and there. That said, they won't be posted because they've come and gone.

I managed to work my way up to $330 or so before we went to TX the first weekend in May. (BTW, any of you TX bloggers familiar with Wimberley? That's where my cousin's wedding was.) I also placed an order for my latest and greatest poker tool before we left for Texas, and had received it by May 8th. That's right, I'm no longer chained to my desk while playing, but I have some mixed emotions about it. When I'd play at the desk, tucked away in the corner, it would require me to turn all the way around to look at a TV, which I didn't often do. So at worst, I was generally just listening to a TV, if not paying no attention to it at all. Now that I can play and watch TV at the same time, I don't feel like I'm getting as immersed in a table as I used to and I think I'm suffering because of that. I've had a LOT of bubble finishes over the past couple weeks, and I think the difference between that bubble finish and a cash is probably a crucial read here or there. So I'm trying to work the kinks out of mobile poker playing. But regardless, my MacBook RULES. Full Tilt has fully functional software on the Mac OS, but if I feel the need to play at another site, I just boot natively into XP.

You all should go get a Mac like me and this guy.

As far as the poker goes, my BR currently stands at $172, down from that recent high point of $330. I just brought it up last night from the low point of $154 to where it currently stands. Its fair, I guess, as I had been running pretty hot there for a while, and definitely have had a downswing over the past couple weeks. Not only am I running cold and getting cold decked like crazy, but like I said, the adjustment to playing poker on the laptop in front of the TV is also causing a downswing in results. But I'm confident I'll find a happy medium in short order. I've been losing a lot of 70/30s and 80/20s lately, not to mention coin flips, and when I suckout its usually generally not in a very big spot, ie all-in on a short stack or calling a raise with odds. Pretty typical negative variance that my game is prone to. I get my money in as a big favorite in big spots, and get my money in as a dog either with odds or in a push or fold situation where doubling up is just the first step to recovery. I'm finally seeing some signs of this most recent streak turning around, however, as I've had some luck go my way the past couple of nights. I did lose a buyin at .10/.25 Monday in an KK vs. AA cold deck, but I also won and placed in two SNGs, then last night managed to squeeze a couple buyins out of .05/.10, although I made a huge laydown that cost me another couple buyins on top. You guys have gotta hear this, then I'll move on to the real reason I'm here.

I pick up 66 in LP and limp, along with 3 others. Flop comes Q67 rainbow, and we either check the flop or all call a small bet from EP. The turn is a 4, and things just get out of hand. SB bets out, BB raises, and MP re-raises all-in. I mull over it for a while, and eventually come to the decision that I'm scared to death that the BB has 35 or 58 and has stumbled onto the mother of all BB specials. I'm also beat by 77, which is a possibility, and QQ, which seems much less likely. There were no PF raises, so it'd be hard to see AQ or KQ, so the whole thing just smelled fishy to me, and with the way I'd been running, I decided to make the laydown. When the SB called the all-in, along w/the BB I felt pretty good about my great play here...until the cards were rolled. Q9 in the SB, Q6 in the big, and Q9 in MP. I would've had them drawing dead to the last two 9s. I guess when I was mulling my play over I forgot to take into account the single most important factor...that this was .05/.10 NL Hold Em. Fack.

Anyway, the real reason I'm here today is because I was tagged in four spots for this "7 Things" meme that went around. I said I'd be here to do it when I got caught up on my reading, but I'm still only to 5/17 and probably with 200 or more posts to go, so who knows if I'll ever get caught up. Either I subscribe to too many blogs or you people post too much. Anyway, I was humbled by the pure fact that four people even knew who I was, so before they give up on me I want to get this thing in. So away we go. I give you, 7 Things You Didn't Know About Me:

1. I used to be legitimately smart. My birthday is in early June, which is an awkward time to decide when to put your kid in school. Well, my parents held me back a year, but early in my kindergarten year I was reading like a badass and it was obvious kindergarten was child's play for me, so they transitioned me to 1st grade by the middle of the year.

2. The mountain climber on The Price is Right used to make me cry. Its true, when I was a wee one spending my days at home with mom and watching TPIR, I would run screaming from the TV whenever the mountain climber game came on. The music scared me and I didn't want the poor little fella to fall off the cliff.

3. My wife and I went to HS and were aware of each other, but didn't meet until college. I went to a relatively small high school (around 100 per class) where I knew the names of pretty much everyone three years in front of me and three years behind me. I even played b-ball before gym class with my future wife's older brother when I was a freshman and he was a senior. My wife was only a year behind me and was a flutist in the band and we even had some common friends, but our paths just never crossed in HS. Then finally her freshman and my sophomore year at Iowa State our circles of friends overlapped, and the rest is history. It may not sound like that big of a deal, but I had some sort of interaction with *almost* everyone 3 years above and 3 years below me, especially the ones in band, but Linz and I never spoke a word to each other.

4. I'm 6'6". This one's kinda lame because if I actually would man up and go to a blogger event you guys would see this, but for now you pretty much don't know anything about me, so I'm gonna have some softballs here. I'm 6'6" and have very little natural athletic ability. My dad played college BB at a small college in Iowa, and my little brother (6'5", 315 in his prime) got a scholarship to play college FB at ISU. I always rode the pine in basketball with some decent ability but a lack of basketball instinct. As for football, I was a pretty badass tight end in middle school, but they wanted to move me to lineman in HS, so I didn't play. And I'm an average to slightly less than average golfer. I tried little league for a couple of years, too, but it wasn't until like middle school age, and I think I just started too late and...wasn't all that good. I'm not uncoordinated or clumsy or anything like that, but I ended up pretty much just average at any sport I took up.

5. I'm in IT management. I have a computer science degree and was a programmer (Lotus Notes database developer) as an intern and for the first 4 years, and took a promotion to "Lead" at the beginning of this year. Early in 2005 I decided that I didn't wanna bang code all my life, so I got on a development track toward management, and hope to keep moving on up from here.

6. I've only ever driven pickup trucks. The same one, really. My first vehicle was a 1988 Chevy S-10 Sport 4x4, then I upgraded to a 1994 S-10 4x4, and in 2004 I bought my first new vehicle, a Chevy Colorado Z71 4x4. They were all extended cabs, should I have the absolute necessity to carry and extra person or two around. I'm not sure when I became a truck guy, but it has suited me very well. Being as tall as I am, getting in and out of cars, especially behind the wheel, is a nightmare. Midsize trucks are cheaper than SUVs, are fun enough to drive, get decent enough gas mileage, and have that cargo space, so I guess I've just stuck to what works. And I'm not a "gets me from point A to point B guy", either. I take a lot of pride in the vehicle I drive and look at it as an extension/representation of my personality, so all three of them have had some character. I've gotten to the point where I'd like to have a passenger vehicle/have to start thinking about family, so I'm hoping to look at H3s next spring. It will be WIERD not having a pickup.

7. I built and sold poker tables for 2 years. While playing what amounted to play money poker at a local establishment on a regular basis a couple times a week in 2004, a buddy and I saw a custom built table, and being a man's man, my buddy tried to duplicate the effort. Well, he did, and before he knew it, he was taking requests to have some built and making a deal to have them sold at the establishment, and thinking about other potential. So he brought on me and another guy to build, had one of his buddies put together a website, we got my buddy in PR involved, and before we knew it we had a feature story in the Des Moines Register, color photos and all, an article in a national Better Homes & Gardens publication, as well as some other media appearances, and orders were flying in. We were even scheduled to shoot features for the three local TV stations that all fell through. At any rate, we built steadily throughout the year, and during the 2005 Christmas season we built 6 a week for 3-4 weeks. We sent tables as far as Michigan, Washington, Texas, and Canada. In spring 2006 my buddy took a new job that changed his schedule pretty drastically, then shortly after built a new house that saw him with basement projects and stuff, and the business kind of faded away. We'll still build for friends and family and ourselves, but I think other than that we're pretty much done for. But it was a blast while it lasted. Check out our website.

Since I was a slacker and didn't get to this, I'll throw in a couple of bonus facts. One for each week I put off doing this.

Bonus Fact 1. I know Corey Taylor of Slipknot/Stone Sour fame. I live in Des Moines, where both bands are from, and back in 2002/2003 when Corey brought together his old band, Stone Sour, as a "side project" from Slipknot, I hooked up with a guy from Amsterdam and we put together StoneSourNews.com and StoneSourBoard.com and got ourselves out there as the first source for Stone Sour information. He had the capabilities to build the site, and I had the local connections. Before long we had friends and family of the previous incarnation of the band as well as the new incarnation, as well as the band members themselves participating on the messageboard. Then all of the sudden I'm invited over to Corey's house to hang out, and continued to remain in that circle throughout the first album cycle, including VIP and photo passes to shows, etc. The site and board got huge, with over 10,000 members, and the whole thing was a wild ride. I talked to him sparadically throughout Slipknot's album cycle and missed an opportunity to get together with him when Stone Sour started up again to hear the album, and its actually been almost exactly a year since we were last in contact, but I heard from a mutual friend that he mentioned getting in touch with me sometime soon. He is an amazing human being. Just incredibly kind, intelligent, and resilient. Its an honor to call him a friend.

Bonus Fact 2. I proposed to my wife in Vegas, at the Bellagio. Yeah, how many thousands of people has this probably happened to, but for a couple of simpletons from Iowa, it was a pretty big deal. In 2004, my company sent me to Vegas for a conference. We made arrangements for my girlfriend at the time to come along, and to stay through the next weekend after the conference. I had gotten the idea to propose a couple months previous, picked out a ring, and had my co-worker bring it out to Vegas for me so that nothing suspicious would happen. I had plans to do it at The Bellagio (it was pretty much all we knew of Vegas, being our first time in town and loving the movie Ocean's Eleven), but didn't really know how it was all going to come together, and like an idiot, didn't call until the morning of to get dinner reservations. We ended up at Jasmine, the chinese restaurant, which was the only place we could get into. Strike one, I thought, cuz Linz doesn't like chinese. We showed up for our reservation and they made us wait momentarily while they got us a table by the windows (they knew of my intentions, but Linz just thought they were being nice). We had a nice dinner that she actually ended up loving (and has since discovered that chinese food is, in fact, awesome), including the cheapest bottle of wine on the list ($30 at Bellagio, $12 at the grocery store), and just as I'm waiting for the fountains to start in order to propose, the waiter comes with a dessert that we hadn't ordered. He leaves it with us and says "compliments of the house" and at this point Linz knows something is up but can't quite figure out what, so I bust ass down to my knee and propose. She accepts through tears, and the table of asian guys next to us goes wild. I kid you not, one of him introduces himself to me as "Charlie", and insists we have a glass of his wine. Mission accomplished, and Linz and I have vowed to return to Vegas at least once a year from here on out.

Well I've managed to work my post to one of epic proportions yet again, so I will bid you adieu. Thanks to the four of you who tagged me for this, but I will not be tagging because I think pretty much everyone I read has done it. Such is the way it goes when you're a week behind in your reading.

I still hope to catch up on my reading, and then I can get back to blogging with a little more regularity as well.

Check ya later.

Blogger Bracelet Busto

Well, the Blogger Bracelet Race actually went about how I expected. I made it through the first hour basically losing my blinds. Saw a few flops, but never hit anything hard. As a result of all my folding, my preflop raises were respected, which was fine with me. I even raised on the cutoff and folded to a button resteal by BobRespert (who is apparently Bobby Bracelet? I'm new here). I was setting up my table image as tight, and was about to start putting that to use and mixing it up a little. The first step was when I showed down my very first blogger HAMMER with a 4xBB raise, showing people that I was willing to mix it up. Well, a combination of a cold deck and a little overzealousness by me didn't give me a chance to carry out my plan, as the very first flop I hit was hit much harder by columbo.

I was burned so many times by two pair as I learned this game, I finally learned that its by no means a monster and I need to be aggressive with them on the flop...esepecially on a 2-suit flop. We managed to limp around with myself, columbo, and the blinds in the hand. When this flop fell, I knew I was going to try my best to get all my chips in before the turn (which was certainly my biggest mistake...checking out right here) because I figured I had to have the best hand. I knew it wouldn't check around after everyone limped preflop, so I checked my option when it came to me. Sure enough, columbo bet out, the blinds fold, I min-raised him, he jams, and I quickly call. I couldn't put him on AA or 88, because I would expect a raise. I couldn't put him on 66, because c'mon...the other 2 are out there. The only hand I was really afraid of was A8, and if he had that, so be it. What I really thought was that he was just putting pressure on me because he had seen that I was a tight player and willing to fold under pressure. Regardless, I had to pick my jaw up off the floor when I saw the two sixes. No miracle ace for me, and 45th it is!

Anyway, like I said, it went about how I expected, because I couldn't buy any luck yesterday. I played two $20 SNGs and won one hand in each. I couldn't even steal the blinds because I had LAG-donks at both tables that would play about any two, so there was no value in steal attempts. I also played two $10 SNGs, bubbling one in a mediocre attempt, and managing a win in the other after an epic heads up battle that saw the chips swing 7k to 2k back and forth 4 times before I finally managed to strike the dagger.

It was over 80 degrees in my house as my wife and I had ignorantly decided to "tough it out", so my nuts were stuck to the desk chair and I wasn't even having much fun playing. So with that win under my belt and the bankroll back over $200, I decided to call it quits and hit the couch for some TV.

I should have some good opportunities to play this week as our TV shows are winding down, plus I think I'll be at home Thursday morning before we fly to Texas for the weekend, so hopefully I'll run better than I did yesterday and can make some progress.

100th Post

This is my 100th post, and the irony of it is that I have no intention of posting anything significant. Of course, some might say they wonder if my previous 99 posts contained anything significant either. To those people I would say...you pose a great question.

I'm posting because I'm bored. Its Friday, just before 10 AM, and thanks to some due dilligence over the past couple of weeks I am CAUGHT UP on my reading, so I have nothing to do besides work...and I'm sure as hell not doing that. Seriously, though... I haven't been caught up in Google Reader since at least December. It may have been before that. But thanks to my day-to-day duties being somewhat in limbo for the past 2-3 weeks, I've managed to get through all the old posts and have ZERO items in my list left to read. I wondered if it would ever happen and if maybe I needed to cut down my subscription list if I ever hoped to be caught up. But I'm good for now, and I realized that I don't need to read every word of every post, and have the option of skipping and skimming if I want to, to stay caught up.

I played a little last night. Even though I had my little chip spewing session on Tuesday and my BR was at about $200 even, I hopped into a $20 SNG and proceeded to win it with little to no effort, and NO help from coin flips or 70% odds on the bubble. I finally got heads up and won after just a few hands when my smooth operating opponent slow played his aces and I flopped trips. I also played a $10 SNG with my buddy. We were on the bubble and my buddy had gone from shorty to chip lead, me in 2nd. The shorty raised from the button, and I raised him for all his chips w/QQ in the BB. He called w/7s, and rivered a flush on me. This sent me into a rage like I haven't experienced in months, and I proceeded to give up my chips a short time later with an open-ender. Obviously the gods had no intentions of letting my buddy and I get HU, so I just ended it and quit wasting my time. I hate to give up, but sometimes things happen that make me so enraged I just don't even care.

I got to thinking after that tourney of my luck as of late. I don't think I'm running hot. I think if I were running hot I'd at least be winning when I'm supposed to be winning, and winning at least...*gasp*...half of my coin flips. I think my ITM % would be higher. I think at this point I have a strategy that is at least 3x superior to my 5 opponents that I sit down with at every table, and even though I find myself often losing coin flips, and as a 70 and 80% favorite much too often, I am a more profitable SNG player than ever. I've preached patience over and over, and I cannot stress it enough. Most people lose 1/3-1/2 of their stack early and give up. Or on the bubble they'll keep calling and calling and calling until their stack is nothing and they can get called by almost ATC. But but if I fall below 1k early in a tournament, even though my chip stack is a 3 digit number and that can mess with you mentally, I've still got over 20xBB in a lot of cases, which is plenty of chips to shout with. And if my stack gets to about 10xBB I'm all-in or fold. And I almost always push with a hand that is >50% against a random hand. In addition, hardly any of these players have any bubble strategy. I was in one SNG the other day where we were pretty much even at 3k apiece and blinds were 120/240 and up, and I was playing for my whole stack if I was playing, meanwhile these other two were piddling around with calls and min-raises. In the end stages of a SNG you shouldn't be playing anything unless you're willing to call the shortest stack's all-in with it. It really irritates me when we're 3-4 handed and guys are limp-folding to a shorty's all-in, letting him pick up precious blinds. All of this is just basic strategy to me now. I think back about how I used to be one of those guys with a losing SNG strategy, and its the one place I can see significant growth. For christ sake, bubbling is named after me at our home game because I'd make it to the bubble and then piddle out. Now I'm the guy pushing around the short stacks, putting people to a decision (be it for all their chips or to double me up), and bouncing people on the bubble. When I lose, generally I lose knowing I made the right play, so losing isn't always a bad thing anymore. It ends up being more disappointment than tilt, at least.

Of course, yesterday's SNG w/Joe was both a good example and a bad example. X minutes in I found the blinds at 50/100, my stack at just over 1k, and the flip switched to "push or fold" mode. I had played and won 1 hand so far, and I don't think I had raised a single time because my cards were just plain ugly, and the table was loose. After finally seeing a couple push-worthy hands and picking up the blinds, I jammed, got called, and doubled up to the chip lead. After having showed down 1 hand and having the patience to get to a point where I could employ superior SNG strategy, I went from the outhouse straight to the penthouse, and if it weren't for a 20% suckout, I was headed directly to a cash. Of course, the rest is history as we found ourselves on the bubble, Joe and I holding down the top 2 spots, and all the shorty's chips in w/pair under pair. After he beat me, I went on complete tilt and gave up, eventually putting in my four figure stack w/an open-ender when I knew I was behind. This guy was a losing player and chances are with a little patience I could've gotten my money in better, but I was tired of fighting both the player and the cards and gave up. I was immediately pissed at myself...but sometimes you just get fed up. I had lost two coin flips and split as a 70% fav. on the bubble at the table I WON, now to get it in QQ vs 77 and lose, just pushed me over the edge.

But at least I won the $20 and bubbled the $10, and I'm now back to $245 and right back on my way to new heights.

Ok, so I guess I did have some poker related content.

To finish up, I think you should head over to TripJax blog and follow his 12 simple steps to signing up for the Blogger Bracelet Race. We're about 40-45 players short of getting the prize pool to the WSOP buy-in with 2 days to go, so get yourself signed up!

Everyone have a great weekend!

Bloggers Rule, I'm a Fool, Time for School

Hello and welcome to another boring edition of Windbreaker's Blog.

I have to start things off today by thanking the shit out of Hoy and Lucko, two of my favorite bloggers, who at my humble (and likely annoying) personal request, both devoted several paragraphs in their blogs to note taking. Each post on their own are an immense help, but combined they are downright profound and exactly what I was looking for. It says a whole lot about them and their devotion to blogging and the blogging community for them to take this request, take an interest, and post about it within a week. As a result, the note taking thing clicked right away for me, and I was a note taking fiend last night at the tables. You guys rule.

Also, thanks to oossuuu754 for his tidbits on turbo token SNG strategy yesterday. It wasn't a lot, but it answered some of the very sad basic questions I need answered. Plus, how cool is it to have a 2007 Main Event participant posting comments to your blog??

Thus concludes the "Bloggers Rule" portion of our post.

Moving on to "I'm a Fool", while tooling around the lobby of Full Tilt on Monday night I came to realize that the $8.80 18-person turbos are by no means the only way to win a token. I also had seen talk of the heads up matches, but I wasn't interested in investing $13 when I'm not terribly thrilled about my heads up game as of late. But when I spied the 9 player and even a 6-max non-turbo SNG, alarms started going off in my head. For the low, low price of $6.60, I could sit at one of my precious 6-max SNGs and have my shot at a token, or at the very worst, a small profit for 2nd place. Which works for me. The cost is less, the payout odds are the same, and when all is said and done they're both gonna take about the same amount of time. Its a no-brainer for this 6-max afficianado. So I ran one Monday. Grow a big stack, suckout, cold deck, rail. That'll happen. But I ran one last night, and with the typical little to no effort, I had my (virtual) grasp on my first ever token. I don't think they have a 6-max option for the $75 tokens, but I think they have a 9-max. I'll cross that bridge when I get there. But the good news is that it doesn't look like I'll have to stress over the turbos and can settle in where I find myself a little more comfortable. I still want to improve my turbo game, but its one of those things I can put on the back burner until I have a little more wiggle room in my bankroll.

So this brings us to "Time for School". With my shiny token, I bought into the Blogger Bracelet Race.



That's right, folks. Barring the end of the world before 6 PM CST on Sunday, I will be playing my first mainstream blogger event. Look at the company I'm already in in that image. Pretty daunting. It will be a schooling, but at least I'll have finally played a big blogger tournament, AND had a shot at the WSOP within my grasp. My only chance is the fact that I was the 12th player to sign up. That's a lucky number of mine. So look out, cuz I could luckbox my way to the top of the heap with the support of trusty number 12. See you on Sunday.

I did play last night, but we're not gonna talk about it. I went on a strange, unprovoked tilt and donked away 1/3 of my bankroll, but I'm not letting it bother me. Sure, I hate myself a little bit, but I'll get it back. I'd been playing so well and concentrating so hard, it was fun to gamble a little and take some chances in a short 4 table cash game session. Now its back to grinding it out at SNGs and back to new heights before long, I have no doubt.

Happy To Report a Good Weekend

By weekend, I pretty much mean Sunday. I didn't get a chance to play Friday or Saturday, but I saddled up for about 5 hours yesterday and racked up $105. IMO, that's not a horrible hourly rate for $10 and $20 SNGs. This also means quite a bit in general as it sees me breaking the $300 threshold online ($338) for the first time since January, and also bringing the overall bankroll back up above $500 for the first time since January. This is encouraging, but I'd like to find a way to get to $1k by mid-June or so.

I pretty much mixed $10s and $20s yesterday, but I did end the session playing two $20 SNGs instead of the mix, and felt comfortable. Truth be told, sometimes I wonder if the $20s are softer than the $10s. I see some absolutely horrific play in the $20s, while the $10s tends to just be your average, run of the mill bad play. You'll see 1 or 2 guys stack-off early w/TP and some junk kicker in the $20s, while in the $10s people will just make a lot of average -EV play and find themselves on the outside looking in when the cash is dealt. I'm not sure why that is, but I'm more than OK with it. I may continue to mix the $10s and $20s for the time being until I can start to see what kind of results I'm getting in the $20s and really feel comfortable putting that much on the line at a time, but I can't be messing around for too long and hopefully will be solidly in the $20s and maximizing my profit potential sooner rather than later.

I was pretty happy with how I played throughout the course of the session. Aggression is starting to come more naturally to me, and I find that my feel for when I can take down a pot with the right bet vs. when it I've been pushing too much and someone might look me up is getting stronger. I also saw myself getting all my chips in the middle earlier than usual when a big bet would reek of "please don't call me" and I'd shove in with a decent sized pocket pair as a 70% favorite. Finally, I took notice of a lot more of the marginal situations like the one I blogged about Friday and tended to err on the side of aggression and generally was rewarded for it. I can't really explain it beyond that, but I do know for a fact that its all the hand histories, tournament recaps, and strategy posts I read on blogs that have single-handedly gotten me from experimenting with aggression to actually employing an at least semi-aggressive strategy within the span of about 8 weeks. So thanks to all of YOU for that.

One thing that is *really* plaguing me at the moment is the ability to get a token. I played 3 of the $8.70 token races yesterday, and have continued to go 0-fer. If you do the simple math here, you'll find that I spent just short of the $26 I was trying to win, which is just enough to REALLY piss a guy off. I'm now 0-fer somewhere in the neighborhood of 8 of these, plus one of the token frenzies. Meanwhile everyone else is out there talking about how soft these are, so I'm pretty much feeling like a total donkey.

Could someone point me in the direction of some good turbo satellite strategy at all? One thing that is obvious to me is that I'm playing WAY too tight. That said, I'm not sure just how loose I need to be. I find myself in situations where someone has jammed and I'm sitting here in MP, 2-4 players left to act behind me w/KJ, A7, 66, etc. These hands are COMPLETELY average and if I'm in a "real" tournament or SNG, there's no way in hell I wanna be calling an all-in with a hand like that with people left to act behind me. The next problem is even when I do manage to double up during one of these things, its nowhere near enough chips to sit on. Generally, I'm used to being able to sit on a double up for a while. Here, I've still gotta be finding spots to try and stack people to make sure I remain ITM. Its tough for me. A third major problem I have is WHEN to get my money in. Its almost as if you need to try and get all your chips in early to put together a stack that you can be aggressive with. But I've found that people aren't apt to mix it up *too* early in these things, and then by 100/200 there's an all-in every hand. I've found that I'll be sitting around waiting for a hand, when I finally get one to push with someone pushes in front of me and its not an all-in calling hand, and the blinds just keep going up. Before you know it there's at least one all-in every hand, and I don't know what I'm looking for, but I guess I'm never finding it.

These things have me more mixed up at a poker table than any other format I've played. I need help. Even just some guidelines. I need some VERY basic questions answered. Questions like what ranges can I be playing and trying to get my money in with, and what ranges can I be calling all-ins with? Do I want to get my money in ASAP, or wait and find a spot to get it in when the thing is just an all-in free for all? Is there any room for any kind of play within a hand, or do I need to just be trying to get all my chips in with the best of it? I'm doing something MAJORLY wrong, and I'm just pissing money down my leg. I truly am one of the donkeys that successful turbo satellite players prey on to get their tokens. I don't want to have to just buy in to $26 events, but right now I've pissed away at least 2-3 $26 buyins just trying to satellite, and that, my friends, makes zero fiscal sense.

Besides my...ahem...skill gap in these things, I get so cold-decked its sickening. Yesterday I ran QQ into KK, 99 into JJ, and lost as an 80% favorite twice in the span of 3 hands. And I've reported on other cold-decks in these sats in the past. So the absolutely shitty cards certainly doesn't help at all when I'm already "strategically challenged".

Anyway, I don't really know what to do at this point. I suppose after going 0-3 satelliting yesterday I'm "back to even" as far as trying to get a token for Sunday's Blogger Bracelet Race, so I'll be trying to win my token again this week. But maybe I'll hold off a couple days and see if I get any feedback before I jump back in the bull ring. Don't forget, I'm also looking for feedback on the few remaining payment processors for US players. Its likely I'll need to liquefy some of my online funds sometime this summer, so I'm hoping I can find a way to do that relatively quickly and painlessly.

So that's it for me. I'll get to play a little extra tonight as the wife won't be home until 8:30 and then we'll watch Heroes, finally back after a several week abscence, on a tape delay. Poker and I are in a really good place right now, so with my head on straighter than its ever been, hopefully I can continue to build momentum and finally find myself solidly in the black as a player. Thanks for stopping by, and I'll be back with more updates as necessary!

A SNG End Game Big Stack Faceoff Hand

A post by Mookie and my subsequent comment (please note that I had it wrong in his comment until I came home and reviewed the hand history) made me decide to post about a hand that happened to me Wednesday night. I knew at the time that this was an intriguing hand, but as I stepped through it in my comment to Mookie, it compelled me to post about it here and see if anyone had any thoughts.

We're in the end game stages of a 6-max, blinds at 120/240. There's 4 players left, but two of them are holding on for dear life. With stacks of <2BBs and just over 6BB, their fate is at the hands of the poker gods. Push and pray, baby. We all know that anything can happen, but for all intents and purposes, the money is decided and its just a matter of busting some shorties. At least...that's what I thought.

I was a small chip lead (with 3.7k) and had JQo on the button. 3rd place folds UTG, I raise to 750, hoping to entice the SB to commit his stack (500ish) and tell the 2nd place big blind (3.4k) "I got this". But my plan backfired. Small blind folds, and the 2nd place stack calls in the big.

I'm not thrilled about the call for a couple reasons...
1) I have the kind of hand that I would like with the opportunity to bust a shorty, but not the type of hand I would like to have against a 2nd place chip stack that apparently feels compelled to butt heads.
2) Dude...c'mon...fold! In 10 hands or less we'll probably be heads up.

Flop comes J-high rainbow, which immediately, I don't hate...until he bets out 960 into the 1620 pot. IMO, its a damn decent bet. It could be a value bet or a stab at the pot on a disgustingly raggy flop. You could easily argue both ways. It also basically commits him to the pot, at this point having put more in than he has remaining in his stack. That's a scary prospect that indicates he's ready to go to battle right here, right now. Furthermore, if its a bluff, it couldn't be a worse bluff, because its hard to find a way for him to fold at this point. While I admittedly didn't take all of this into consideration in the moment, I really think for a while about if he could really be ahead here and finally, based on pre and post-flop feel/timing reads, plus my general feeling for his play at this table to this point, I just can't put him on a set (ridiculous cold deck) or JK/AJ (more likely holdings, IMO), and I push. After a little bit of thought, he calls, shows AQ, I dodge his 3-outer, and he's sent packing. After the new 2nd place stack takes out the micro stack, I take the thing down after a short heads up battle.

Now correct me if I'm wrong, but this guy had no business going broke here, right? I understand its hard to lay down AQ there, and its probably not right to lay down AQ there. He was getting about 2 to 1 on his call (I don't have PokerStove right in front of me, but AQ has to be 2 to 1 against a random hand), so you have two choices...call and see a flop, prepared to get away from it if you miss, or push (which I'm certain is the favorite choice among bloggers). At this point in the evolution of my game, I would also call and get to a flop, but this close to the money I wouldn't be dicking around betting this flop if I've missed. I'd check-fold and still be sitting solidy in 2nd place. I also wouldn't push my AQ preflop because I see no reason to get all my chips in the middle here unless I'm in a dominating position. On the off chance that I'm against AA, KK, QQ, AK, or any coin flip situation, I just can't find a reason for putting my chips at risk when I'm virtually guaranteed money. A fold would be REALLY hard, but maybe a damn decent argument as well. In fact, I really do think I could fold AQo here. But I digress...the question here is, is there any way to justify the way he played his hand, given my range of hands here, and the fact that he's all but guaranteed money? Because I certainly can't find one. The only hand he beats is A10! He's behind AK, AJ, any other J, and also any pocket pair. He certainly couldn't have been betting or calling for value. The only thing he could've done different is take a stab at the pot with a smaller bet that wouldn't commit him, and fold to my raise. But I really think, if he felt compelled to call preflop, he needed to check-fold to me.

Now...my play. I still like my button raise to get all of the SB's chips all day, every day. I don't think I need to explain that. I feel like my flop play was marginal. Usually I avoid big stack bubble confrontations like this at all costs, and that was my first instinct here as well. But the more I thought about it, I just couldn't see a way he's got KJ, AJ, a set, or an overpair. While I could give reasoning against each hand, I have to admit, my decision was predominately based on a timing read. The way the hand unfolded, it just didn't *feel* like he was ahead. So I saw no reason to give him any more cheap cards, got it all in the middle, and the rest is history. I must note, however, that if I have the same hand and the flop comes down Q-high rainbow, I'm folding. Because I could much more easily see him having KQ or AQ. I think that's worth noting, and would welcome any input on that fact as well.

A couple other things to consider...First, if I put him all in there and he wakes up w/a hand that beats me, am *I* the idiot that shouldn't have been playing back at the other big stack? Did I just get lucky to not be wearing the idiot badge here? I guess I had a read and I went with it, and everything that happens after that is out of my hands, so maybe that's a question not even worth discussing. Secondly, is my attitude in general, to be keeping it pretty close to the vest against the other big stacks when we're virtually guaranteed money, the right attitude to have? I know most pros and/or bloggers are of the "wins, not cashes" attitude, but I find that trying to develop myself as a strong tight-aggressive player, I tend to default to more of a "get to the money and go from there" attitude. However, I don't know if this is a product of the player I'm trying to develop myself as, or if its the circumstance of trying to build a bankroll, and thus theoretically playing outside of my roll every day for the time being to try and get there.

Anyway, it was an interesting hand that saw me step outside of my comfort zone and manage to benefit, and will certainly stick with me. I went from hoping that everything fell into place on the bubble and getting to heads up probably close to 50/50, to getting there in less than 3 hands with a 3.5 to 1 advantage and forcing my way to a pretty easy victory. It was a HUGE swing hand, and I'm happy it went my way.

Everyone have a great weekend, and good luck on the felt!

All's Well that Ends Well

With the happenings of that last post eating away at me, after a nice dinner and walk with the lady Windbreaker, I just had to go back at it and see what kind of legs this whole variance streak had.

Well, turns out it was just little midget legs. I got back to some pretty strong play, pretty normal cards, and some really terrible players finding themselves on the rail where they belong instead of throwing down suckouts like that's how you play poker. I capped off the night with a couple of wins in a couple of $10 SNGs, and found myself a paltry $22 down and firmly back above the $200 mark, which felt like a win after that ugly 0-5 streak.

So if you wanna read about *real* variance, pay a visit to Fuel or Dragonystic, because my little run is like one bad river compared to what they're going through. Hope that gets turned around for them ASAP.

So I know in this day and age it is not easy, nor necessarily recommended, to be moving money in and out of poker sites, but lets just say I may end up with a need for some of my online bankroll to be liquefied at a certain point this summer, and incase I'm not able to turn my cash roll into something useable (although I'll be trying), I'm wondering what my best method of moving money at this point is going to be. I haven't moved any money since January, which is pre-Neteller desertion, and since then I've only heard random non-specific rumblings about the remaining processors. Could anyone give me some good advice on who they might recommend, or a place I can go to read reviews and/or experiences with who's left? Obviously I'd like it to be as painless and fee-free as possible, but it doesn't sound like there's any real standout remaining.

Also I've really been thinking a lot lately on a blog topic I would LOVE to see. I look at some of your more prominent, hardcore poker bloggers and players like Hoy or LUCKO, and whenever I see a screenshot, they've always got player notes on most of the table. From time to time when a player makes the occasional horrendous or outstanding play that I notice, I'll make note of it. Or when a player is making the same type of play over and over, its obvious that it would be good to note that. But in the end, I usually only end up with notes on 2 or maybe 3 players max in any given SNG I play, but usually not any, and even more rarely in a cash game. Just because nothing ever jumps out at me enough to note. And I haven't even begun to start using the various colors to my advantage. But I'm sure I'm either 1) not looking closely enough, or 2) looking to make too general of a note when I could be just noting individual plays and letting those add up to come together for a good read. Maybe this has been done before, and if so point me in the right direction, but I would LOVE to see a post on player notes and what some of your more prominent bloggers (ie the ones that play and post a lot) note on their opponents. I would love it if I could sit down at a $10 or $20 SNG and have a note on a player I've played with before because every time I play a SNG I get notes on all 5 or 8 of my opponents. Also, the more I'm noting, the more it means I'm paying attention to the players at the table, which also never hurts. Anyway, I know that I could probably start taking down little things here and there and form my own style of note taking, but I am also extremely interested in what others are looking for to note. I'll probably send emails to a couple of bloggers and see if they're at all interested, but if you, my 4 readers, had any particular passion to write about this and maybe we could start some sort of ripple effect on posting on noting strategy, I think it would be one of those things that could really have a strong impact on the blogging community. Its one of those things that I think a lot of people use, but they don't really think or talk about because its just inherent in their game, and for someone like me who is continually looking to improve not only my abilities as a player, but also my reading abilities, and looking for that advantage at a table before a hand is even dealt, a good post or 5 on note-taking would mean worlds to my game.

Anyway, I'm gonna chase down a couple of bloggers and see if they're interested. Hopefully they are, because while I'm thinking about this for my own benefit, I also think it would be a massive benefit to all of us.

Look at that. I did it again. Took a little blog post and turned it into a novel. I guess its just who I am.

I'm outta here. Check ya later.

Blindsided by the Variance Express

Much like Fuel and Dragonystic, I am currently getting THROTTLED at the tables.

$20 SNG #1 - First hand busto. I wasn't about to let AK go in the big blind to a PF raise, but I am *not* an AK re-raiser. I prefer to get to a flop with it. The flop was pretty dreamy and I can't put anybody on an 8, so I call off all my chips fairly quickly hoping to be in a dominating position or against a flush draw. In a dominating position I was, and proceed to get bitch-slapped on the turn. Turns out the flush draw would've gotten home, too, so I was probably destined to lose this hand.

$20 SNG #2 - Sixth hand I try and push my 2 pair hard, I'm pretty certain I flopped the best hand, but I can't find any way I'm ahead on the river, let alone the turn. After a couple orbits and some failed blind steals we find ourselves on hand 21. I check my option in the big blind, turn an ugly little 2 pair that is undoubtedly the best hand at the time, get my money in good, and his draw gets home. I didn't realize until just now that he was open-ended w/the pair, so its not *as* brutal as it originally felt, but it still stings plenty.

At this point, I realize that luck is NOT on my side and make a smart decision to drop down.

$10 SNG #1 - Here's a fun one. Admittedly, I probably played this terribly, but hey...I'm a pocket pair limper. This could've happened either way, and the fact remains that I'm an 80% favorite preflop against his hand. UTG w/10s, I limp, as do 4 others. Flop comes 9-high. SB bets out, I raise it up, player goes all-in behind me, and I make a relatively easy call, expecting to see A9. No such luck. I go home on hand number 9, when a standard coin flip turns into me getting backdoored. Turns the straight, and twists the knife with the river flush.

$10 SNG #2 - After systematically dorking away a few chips raising and missing and calling a bet w/2nd pair, we find ourselves at hand 18, where I can't get a monster draw home. At this point I tread water through bad cards and increasing blinds, until push monkey time, where after some thought, I decide to push all-in, in a spot where I really felt like I was going to be a 40% dog and/or didn't have much of a choice. I was exactly right, and my heart flip-flopped a little when I flopped my Q, but then the poker gods returned us to our regularly scheduled programming when he turned another 9 to end the suspense. Fantastic.

$10 SNG #3 - This game was actually pretty average...assuming by "average" you mean "never getting above your starting stack". I showed a little bit of promise in some spots, actually making a hand or two, but like I said, nothing is too terribly impressive if you never get above your starting stack. In the end I proved I couldn't win as a favorite, a slight dog, or dead even, and this saga is complete.

Now I know I didn't play some of these hands top notch, and others are pretty average beats, but it just goes to show that when variance hits, variance hits hard.

I'm actually not terribly disheartened with the whole matter. I'd been running pretty damn decent, and I didn't stick to the $20s like a moron. I'm at $177, down about $80 in an hour and 45 mins or so, which is just an atrocious amount of time to burn through 5 SNGs. Next time I play, be that tonight, tomorrow, or whenever, I'm gonna try 2 more $10s, and if I'm still getting b-slapped, I'll drop down to the fivers. I'm not about to let this skid break me, that much I know.

Anyway, just a rare little afternoon/quickie post for me because I felt like I just had to share. Especially the 1st hand 3-outer massacre.

Off to real life for me. Enough of this crap.

100% + 33% = 133%

Well, while I didn't technically hit my goal of reaching $300 online on Friday, by the time my poker weekend was over, I had improved my bankroll 33% to bring it back up over $400 for the first time since the WSOP Circuit Event in January.

I don't have many specifics to report from my day off on Friday. It was just a whirlwind of SNGs. That's one thing I can be majorly proud of is that I didn't play outside my roll, I stuck to the SNGs (my bread and butter), and didn't take shots messing around in MTTs, token races, or anything like that. How many times have I harped on this in the past?? Friday was purely about strong play and strong discipline. FINALLY. Unfortunately, Friday was also about losing coin flips like it was my job. For the first part of the day I'd play my sets of 2 SNGs, blank in one, and take 2nd in the other, netting $-1. I couldn't win heads up to save my life, either losing a coin flip for all my chips, or pushing my little ace into a bigger ace. Finally later in the day I managed to put together some profitability, and when all was said and done I was a $40 winner. The hourly rate was by no means impressive, but it got me to the highest point in my online bankroll since January, and I felt like I did it with less than average luck.

The real interesting part Friday was that I was looking around in the MTTs seeing if there were any cheap 6-max to play and there happened to be a freeroll kicking off. Without even seeing what it was, I went ahead and registered, because a little freeroll action never hurt anyone. I managed to figure out it was a Main Event qualifier of some sort, but wasn't too concerned beyond that. Until after the first hand. In the BB I find A3h, and it checks around to me with 5 limpers. The flop comes down with 2 hearts. SB checks, I go ahead and bet, I get re-raised all-in, and it calls all the way around to the SB who folds. I make the obvious call, miss the turn, but spike the nuts on the river and all of the sudden I've got 7500 chips and am in 7th out of 300. I manage to continue to hit cards early and run my stack up another 1500 or so, and I'm playing probably the 2nd deepest I ever have in any MTT (I seem to recall chipping up to about 10k early in a Poker.com tourney once). I'm gonna be honest, I continued to concentrate on my SNGs and don't know what the hell even happened, but I put in my best ABC poker effort on the thing and managed to hang around and hang around and hang around. I never really dropped out of the top 20 until we got in the neighborhood of 3-4 tables, then it was 27th out of 35, 13th out of 27, 8th out of 15, and then I found myself at the final table on the short stack, still waiting for my exit. Only 1st place paid a seat to the 2nd Round freeroll, so it was all or nothing. While I was waiting for a hand to push with 9th place fell, then 8th, then 7th, and even 6th. I managed to steal a couple blinds, but was still nursing a 10BB stack. But with only 5 left now I'm thinking if I find a way to double up I've got as good of a shot as anyone. I finally do manage to find A10, but someone has me dominated w/AJ, and I go home in 5th out of 315. It really was a blip on the radar, but even in a turbo freeroll 5th out of 315 is a confidence booster. That freeroll paid one seat to Level 2, which paid 9 seats to Level 3, which had a guaranteed 2 seats to the Main Event. Well, someone's gonna win those seats, so I figured why not me? Anyway, it was a fun little run, and whenever I've told any of my friends I start it off with "Man I got so close to winning a seat in the Main Event"...haha...

Friday was also my monthly home game, which saw our biggest turnout ever. First tourney had 20 runners, the 2nd had 24, and the third had 14 players and a prize pool of 17 after rebuys. I managed to work my way to 4th place and a micro cash in the first. I was a short stack before we even got to the final table and I managed to flop trip queens in the BB on an attractive board. We checked the flop and the turn brought a 9, which promped one of our LAGs to bet. It was called in a couple places, as well as by me. The river was another gorgeous 9, UTG bet again, another caller or two, I got it all in, and tripled or quadrupled up w/Qs full vs. 9s full vs junk. That got me to the final table with a decent stack, but the blinds eventually got so big it was a crap shoot and I couldn't find any cards. That paid for my buyin and my beer money to the house. So I was even. The 2nd tournament, which I *really* wanted to score in due to the 11x buyin 1st place prize, was a HUGE disappointment. Early on in the big blind I flopped a medium flush draw on a paired board. I wanted to get to the turn cheaply and it checked around. The turn brought my flush, but I still checked it since it was just a baby. A player in MP bets 100 (25/50 blinds, 1500 starting stacks, 15 minute levels, blinds double every level), so to see where I'm at I raise it to 400. He labors over it for a while and smooth calls. The river falls blank, I check to him again, he bets 500 this time, and even though it looks like an ugly situation I feel compelled to call. I flip my baby flush and he rolls two fours for flopped quads. I wanted to be sick. Shortly after that I got my last 600ish in with 22 on a 10 10 7 board. Two callers, one with a 10, and I'm done in 21st place. I was SO tilted by that quads hand, called the wife, went and ate some food, licked my wounds, and waited for the cash game. We play a little .25/.50 on the side until the tourneys are over, and finally the tourney combined to two tables and we fired up a cash game. I bought in for $10, and for a couple of orbits I didn't see any cards, while chips were all headed to one guy and I was afraid the action would dry up. I finally won like a $4 pot and got up above my buyin, but then gave it back relatively quickly trying to bluff at pots. Back down below my original buy-in, the tournament finally wraps up. I declare it will be our last hand, and I look down to find QQ in the SB. I couldn't have loved it more. At the 7-handed table, there are 3 callers around to me. I make it $2.50 to go for a couple of reasons. First, if I take down this pot right now, I'm about even and I'm just fine with that. Second, there is one major LAG at a table and I don't think he'd folded to a raise the entire time, so I do NOT want to slow play and not at least make him pay to suckout on me. It also didn't hurt that the BB was a shorty and $2.50 would definitely commit him. Well I got calls in 3 spots and down came the flop. The only thing I loved more than the two queens was the flop...a 9-high rainbow. I bet $3, the BB called off the rest of his chips, whatever they were, the LAG raised all-in, and the next seat called him. The last two callers were basically playing because it was the last hand. I may not have gotten this action any other time. Anyway, I declared all-in, and the late position player called that. We see some cards. BB has junk, LAG has A9, and I don't even remember what the other LP player had. J8 or something. I manage to hold up and scoop a big pot somewhere north of $30, more than tripling my buyin, and taking me from the megaist of tilt to the highest of highs. We played one more tourney with rebuys and I just dicked around for at least the first 30 mins with rebuys in effect. After my brother-in-law snapped me off when I was betting a hand blind and forced me to fold on the turn forfeiting about 600 chips, I found myself on a short stack with less than 15 mins to the end of the rebuy period. Needing a rebuy, I didn't raise with AJ and got it all-in against a flopped pair of Qs, and with about 5 mins left until rebuys were over I had mine and it was time to get down to business. I managed to make the final table as the short stack and again found that while I maybe should have gone out these other stacks kept dropping. On the bubble, I managed to double up off another short stack when I flopped top pair in the BB and he flopped 2nd in the small. Then after that I eventually found a real hand, and before I knew it, I was a contender. I managed to work my way to heads up against my brother-in-law at a massive disadvantage, and after trying to fight for a few hands I finally gave up and pushed w/J9 when I knew I was beat as it was late and people were looking to get home. I'd be more than happy with $30 profit on the night considering some good luck I had in the 1st and 3rd tourneys and the cash game, and the bad luck I had in the 2nd tourney. So that makes me a pretty decent winner for several months in a row now, and capped off another fun as hell poker night.

Its getting out of hand here, so I'll try and be quick with my Saturday update. My wife was crazy hungover, so while she rested I hit the tables. With $237 in the account and feeling pretty strong, I went ahead and played a $22 SNG. This thing was a major roller coaster and was dominated by one very strong player getting very strong cards, but I managed to back my way into 2nd and felt good about cashing for the first time ever in a $20 SNG (I'd taken some other shots back in the day while employing poor bankroll management and pretty much gotten throttled). I say I backed my way into the money because with 3 left I was the shorty, but then 2nd place went AFK and the big stack and I pretty well cleaned him out before he got back and ended up pushing into a dominated situation with the leader. But that'll happen, and I still feel like I was strong enough to outlast that player anyway...but we'll never know. I'm just happy to cash, regardless. The bad news is that while I was playing 1 $22 SNG, I also played 2 $11 SNG and went 0-fer in those. I remember them as being ridiculous and irritating the shit out of me. I think maybe in one I might have majorly screwed up and in the other I got majorly screwed, but I dunno. So at that point I was down $2. I didn't have time for any more SNGs as it was about time to go see Lewis Black, so I decided to fire up some .10/.25 NL and give it a go. I think I found my happy place with cash games. IMO, the key to being successful at cash games online is to find the perfect balance for your skills at a certain level, coupled with the number of tables that allows you to both not get bored and play good poker. While I normally suck at multitabling and hate having more than 2 tourneys open at a time, I was on cruise control with 4 tables open. It was just the right amount of action to keep hands coming so that I wasn't dicking around chasing marginal hands and trying to make plays because I'm bored, but I was also able to play strong ABC poker and maximize my profitability against these donkeys. So I think I've got it figured out...tourneys + multitabling = bad...cash + multitabling = good. You just have to find the right balance of number of tables to play based on the level you're playing at. The lower the level and the greater advantage you have over the table, the more tables you can play because its pretty much ABC poker and reads don't mean a lot. But I can certainly see as you move up in levels and your advantage over the competition gets lesser and reads become more important, you don't wanna get too out of hand with multitabling. I know, I know...welcome to 2004...but hey...I've proven that the basics in profitable poker have a way of evading my grasp. Anyway, four seemed to be the magic number for me at .10/.25 as I felt like I was keeping busy, in a zone, and playing profitable poker. It got a little dicey when I'd make hands at 3 or even 4 tables at the same time, but I find it hard to complain if something like that is gonna be happening. I think I had a nice run of above average luck and hands, but winning is winning, and I won about $20 in 40 mins or so. I even let $20 slip through my fingers when I folded 99 to a raise and a re-raise and would've flopped quads and stacked a guy, but that'll happen from time to time. It was a good fold. I was gonna pay $1.10 to see a flop, but not $3. That got me to $255, and I'll be playing at least 2 more $20 SNGs without any fear of severe bankroll depletion.

So that about sums it up. Great weekend for me, and hopefully I can continue the slow and steady approach and keep this thing headed in the right direction.

Its coming up on my 100th post and a year since I started blogging, and as I become more engrained in this community, it amazes me how close-knit it is. While I've yet to play one of the regular weekly blogger tournaments, I hope to soon, but something I definitely want to get involved in is the Blogger Bracelet Races that Al has put together. There's one strictly for bloggers where you have to email for the password, and then he's put together another with a non-secret password under his Riverchasers moniker. Click on the link above to get the details on both. Plus, there's the Blogger Poker Challenge that Al, Mook, and I believe Hoy all were involved in conceiving. Plus, its sponsored by Poker On A Mac, which is run by an awesome guy and is a cause close to my Apple loving heart. Anyway, I know all of this is old news, but I feel like I should pimp because with any luck, as the TV schedule begins to wind down and I start spending more of my nights playing poker and less of them watching TV, and, (poker) god(s) willing, my bankroll continues to grow, maybe I can get my foot in the door among some of these big name bloggers. I'll never have as good of a blog as any of them, but what the community has done for my game in the last 9 months is immesurable.

Anyway, this post has gotten ridiculously long at this point, so I'm gonna let it go. I'll be back when the time is right.