StudioGlyphic

I had more than my share of good luck on Sunday in the PokerStars 2nd Annual World Blogger Championship of Online Poker.

Lucky Break #1

I was seated at a table where 6 of the 9 players were sitting out and never showed up to play. Not only did that mean all the blinds one could steal, but also a lot of short-handed pressure play. Once I knocked out the player to my left (AQ vs AT, A high flop), it was heads-up play with a 2:1 chip advantage and a positional advantage (seat 9 vs 6).

Lucky Break #2

While heads-up with seat 6, I called a min-raise with a suited Q. The flop came K high, all in my suit. Check, check. The turn put a non-threatening card on the board. Another check from the raiser and I put out a normal sized bet. He called. The river pairs the board and seat 6 wakes up with a sizable bet. I raised a few times the size of his bet and he re-raised. I thought about it, discounted the possibility of the boat or the higher flush, and put him all in. He had a suited J for the 3rd nut flush and I was sitting on a lot of chips.

Lucky Break #3

At level 13, with blinds/antes at 1000/2000/100, I found myself getting short (m of 5.6). I steal-raised to 4xBB from the button with a suited K, but laid it down to an all-in re-steal. In desperate shape, I re-raised the short stack's all-in with a pair of sixes. Unfortunately, Columbo quickly called all-in with his pair of queens. The short stack had AK and the flop came down Ah As 2s, leaving me with 2 outs twice or running spades to win. Then the beat: a 6h on the turn. This was probably not as bad as the beat I handed out last December, but it was pretty bad. I apologized in the PokerStars chat and on IRC, but I'm not sure if anyone bought it. With that CJ-esque suckout, my stack was back in the playable range.

The Rest

Honestly I don't remember the rest too well. I do remember not wanting to win a Letterman jacket. I've got one of those. :) The iPod mini would have been nice, and I would have preferred it over the $215 seat in the Sunday Million or even the $370 seat in the WSOP Satellite. Once it got down to the 10th place bubble, I took a few opportunities to steal some blinds/antes, but probably not as many as I should have.

At the final table, I made some bold moves, knowing that 9th place would pay just as well as 2nd, and bold moves were needed to come in 1st. Unfortunately, trying to push someone off a hand by re-raising all-in in response to his re-raise of your raise doesn't always work. Especially if you have 99 and he has a pair of kings. Strangely enough, I survived that hand with a few chips, survived the next with a crazy 7 high straight, and finally went out in 6th place.

Once again, a big thank you to all the people who cheered me on and gave me encouragement. These things are always more fun with friends watching.

I guess Stars is guaranteeing that I go to Vegas this summer. For 6 hours of play, I get a seat in a $1500 WSOP tournament. Thanks to everyone who railbirded. That was great. See you all there.

You got this, right?

All except Wil Wheaton.

Knocking him out gets you a hat, shirt, and fleece, inscribed with the words "I knocked Wil Wheaton out of the BCOPB and all I got was this lousy t-shirt." That's right, it's not even customized for the particular article of clothing it's on.

Strange things are afoot at Stars HQ.

...and that might just be good enough to get me in this thing:

I have registered to play in the PokerStars World Blogger Championship of Online Poker!

This Online Poker Tournament is a No Limit Texas Holdem event exclusive to Bloggers.

Registration code: 2623727

I hope I do better than last time. Hell, I hope I remember to play!

...even if you have to play 10x the bonus amount in raked hands. Another Party affiliate bites the dust:

A momentary lapse of clear thinking...

Sunday, March 19. 9pm EST
Paradise Poker
$30 NL
password: email Iggy at allimcbeal_69 - yahoo.com

First place is an entry into a WSOP $1500 event of your choice. The satellite starts just six hours from now, and we're just four people away from getting the requisite 55 entries. Go sign up.

...you better fold.

This is me winning a huge pot, giving me nearly a 2:1 chip advantage against a loose overplayer while heads-up in a 5-table SNG at Full Tilt.

This is also me before Adelphia completely crapped out, leaving me in second place for my troubles.

I've had a lot of issues with Adelphia, but I've been hesitant to get locked into a year long agreement with a DSL provider or pay the $100 startup cost for a month-to-month plan. But as smarter people around me have pointed out, I lost that much tonight just by not having a reliable internet connection.

The other night a player sat down and immediately started to play a lot of hands. Let's call him VPIP79. This is one of several hands I played against him:

Then again, maybe he was bored.

When I'm bored, I prefer raising, and I prefer connectors:

I guess that hand made an impression, since someone cold-called a later raise with A2o. The SB from the hand above saved me some money by 3-betting with his flopped boat (he had T7s in EP) after A2o raised. I mucked and the two players went to war. A2o busted and left the table.

Phil Gordon went to a charity event for the Cancer Research and Prevention Foundation and did a little gambling:

Read more at his MySpace blog.

In case you are wondering, I raised to steal the blinds, flopped a boat, bet the flop, called the check-raise, raised the turn, and bet the river. He had 55.

Sometimes I read a poker blog and I feel myself going on tilt. I won't name names, but I encourage you to let loose and blog about the poker blogger who most puts you on tilt. Because I need something to chuckle about.

Okay, fine, I'll name names. The blogger who most puts me on tilt is SirFWALGMan! Deep down inside I think his online mania isn't a wholly accurate reflection of the man, but damn, sometimes I feel like pissing away half my bankroll just for having read one of his posts. Don't worry, man, we still love you.

From his MySpace blog:

Another night of bad results at Commerce Casino. I dropped 15.5BB at 9/18 for an hourly of -4.4BB/hr. My play was good, the players were bad, and my cards were worse.

"Yeah, yeah," you're thinking, "Bloggers always blame the cards." But honestly I think it was a good table.

F-Train sat in the 5 seat and suffered a few moderate beats and still came out ahead. Two of those losses were to the same guy--the first time the enemy jammed on the flop with no pair and the third nut flush draw, the second time he led on the flop with bottom pair and backdoor flush draw. There was also a guy at our table that liked to limp re-raise pre-flop and another guy who liked to raise on the flop with any piece of it.

I did make a couple mistakes, though. I missed out on at least 1-2BB when I flopped trip aces. Somewhere in my mind I knew we were going to hit the jackpot and I didn't want to miss out on that. As it turns out, I should have check-raised them on the turn. They'd stay in for the jackpot, right?

This week is kicking my ass, and probably yours, too. But I'd say it's pretty likely you didn't get a tear in your colon and a heap of medical bills besides.

Help BG per Dr. Pauly's instructions by transferring $20 to one of these two online accounts:

Full Tilt: GamblingBlues
Stars: HeyKidsItsBG

Thanks.

The s.o. had a dream last Tuesday that I had a hole in my pants. This was interpreted Wednesday to mean that I'd lose money in gambling in the month of February.

The s.o. joined in the fun at HDouble's home game. She took 3rd in the tourney. She caught a 2-outer against me in the cash game to give me a net loss for the evening. As it turned out, one of the other players had actually folded one of those two outs, so... yep.

One other notable hand occurred when I limped with 77. Absinthe limped along, and RW raised the pot. For some reason, no one folds in this game. I certainly didn't, and figured Absinthe would go along for the ride. Flop comes AA7 and I check to Absinthe who moves in for the rest of his chips. RW calls all-in and I call as well. I show my sevens and RW shows his AK. Absinthe hangs onto his cards. The case ace falls on the turn and quad aces takes down the main pot. I take the side pot from Absinthe with aces full and... end up not having lost any money in the hand. Crazy shit.

Went back to Commerce Saturday night for more 20/40. Missed a couple draws, missed a few flops, only took the blinds with AA, went card dead off and on, and ended up trickling away 10BB, for an hourly of -2BB/hr. Not great, but then again, I'd been stuck 20BB until a mini-rush in one orbit cut that in half. The nature of these games is that you can often hover around being two good pots away from even, and that keeps me in the game.

That is, until I call the s.o. on the cell phone three times, don't reach her, and then go wandering around the Crowne Ballroom looking for her among the 2/4 tables. She was down 38BB or so and looking a little worn out. We waited out her orbit, cashed in her chips, then went to collect mine.

I felt okay about the loss and had intended to head back Sunday to whack away at the 9/18 game, but ultimately decided that the Superbowl was going to put a damper on a lot of the action and stayed home instead.

There's something about losing a buy-in in online poker that's more demoralizing than losing a larger dollar value in a live game. Maybe it's the pace of the action or something, but yeah, if I were really tiltable I'd be sitting in that Party BBJ 15/30 game right now. I won't, but I almost feel bad enough to make some grand declarations to my reading public about how I'm going to do this or that and swear off online limit games and only play WPBT tourneys, but that'd be pretty silly. I should just be a better player.

Absinthe is down to the final 29 in the LA Poker Classic Event #12. Play resumes tonight at 7PM Pacific. Send him some mojo.

Despite all the planning, I never made it out to Commerce both days for weekend #2, instead earning favors with the s.o. by spending Lunar New Year's Eve at home putting up curtains and shoe storage bins and... yeah, boring stuff.

Made it out on Sunday for a few hours, but a lack of cards and some missed value bets brought in just barely over a BB for the session. As MT says, I got paid to play poker, but I could just as well have taken the day off. The 20/40 game was decent, but I have a feeling that 9/18 is where the real action is. Then again, Mr. Tournament swore up and down that the single table satellites were excellent opportunities for making some cash. Maybe I'll give 'em a shot.

A little drunk. Drinking some whiskey after winning a $20 SNG. The girlfriend took first in her $5 SNG. Plus I have a few minutes left of my birthday. Wee...

While I had nowhere near the results that Absinthe had this weekend, Commerce was still good to me.

Saturday:

20/40: +17.5BB (3.5BB/hr)

Sunday

20/40 -4.5BB (-1.8BB/hr)
9/18 +17.5BB (10BB/hr)

Judging from the action at the limit tables, I think getting there around 6, getting a bite to eat, and then hitting the tables for 4-5 hours is probably optimal. Catch you there next weekend. Good luck to all our players this week.

Absinthe took down first place at Event 1 of the LA Poker Classic. Look for details at his blog, CardPlayer, and Poker Pages. He's a machine. He's my hero.

It's 1:20AM, and Absinthe is into his 10th hour of poker at the first event of the LA Poker Classic. So far he's managed to outlast 1102 people. Better still, he's been live-blogging the tourney. 2 more spots until the money. I can't sleep.

Update:

Absinthe's Troubles: Final 18

Good luck to Absinthe and Change100 at the $330 NLHE today. Make us proud.

It went to the bankroll, of course.

Immediately after the blogger tourney, Absinthe remarked, "Well I think you can sit 5/10 any time you want now." And that's more or less what I've been doing since Vegas. While I've taken shots at the higher limit before, I had no idea how great the psychological difference between being well-funded and under-funded would be.

The swings can be quite dramatic. A few sessions ago I found myself going from an 18BB deficit to a 10BB profit in the span of two orbits while playing three BBJ tables (sure wish I'd been at that table that hit half a mil). Clawing your way out of a hole is tough; save a bet here, extract value there, repeat. Even after I'd made it, I felt like I was still in that hole. The other night I dropped 24BB when my big pairs got cracked, my draws never came, and my big hands never connected.

Fortunately I've also had some monster sessions where everything fell into place, more than balancing out the tough and the losing sessions. Tonight reaped 49BB to the good, with a big chunk of it due to a monster 4-way pot where my top pair top kicker stood up against the fish and the maniacs. The betting was capped preflop and on the flop. After that kind of action, would you recommend betting and raising TPTK for value against three loose players on the turn? How about when the board pairs up one of the flop cards on the river?

Most poker sites don't support the Macintosh. If you use a Mac, you already know this. But Full Tilt Poker has decided to go after that market segment and give them an alternative to PokerRoom. Good for them.

Okay. Go download the new Mac client.

Put bugs in the comments of these blogs:

The Cards Speak

Chicks Dig Poker Geeks

Bill's Blog

fhwrdh.net

They really like snarky comments about Macintosh client bugs.

Just kidding. Email macbugs@fulltiltpoker.com.

Take crazy LA poker players, inject a lot of cash and a WPT event, and you may just have the best low and middle limit cash games anywhere. The LA Poker Classic runs between January 19 and February 23 at Commerce Casino, about ten miles east of downtown LA.

For you out-of-towners, this is almost certainly a poker trip. The City of Commerce doesn't offer very much in the way of entertainment outside of outlet shopping and the casino. The casino itself has some diluted California card games, but no craps, roulette, or slots. But it does boast the country's largest poker room, and the tourney schedule is full of hold 'em events, for those of you who like to play that game. I'm sure we'll see HDouble and Joe Speaker out there. And since us LA folk have to drive home, there's not likely to be much heavy drinking, except for Bill, who just can't help himself. Okay, Joe Speaker, too.

Anyway, last year I made the mistake of not being there as much as humanly possible, so I'll make more of an effort this time around. See you there.

I wasn't kidding when I said I'd be more likely to play the tourney only because PokerStars had kicked in an extra 2 grand. I hate tourneys. I just can't stand busting out with nothing to show for it. Plus, I figured I'd be nursing a hangover Saturday afternoon. But the injection of cash put a decent overlay on the tourney, more than making up for the juice, and I remember reading on some blog that you should always get in on a tourney with overlay, and I always do what some blogger tells me. Not to mention the fact that this was my first WPBT event, having missed the last two events due to conflicts with grad school, and really, I should just try to have fun in the main event of the weekend.

107 bloggers play for $7350

Over 100 of us paid $65 in exchange for T$2500 in chips and drew seats randomly out of a wireframe barrel. My first draw was for Table 1, Seat 11. After discovering that there was no Seat 11, I redrew for Table 5, Seat 9. I'm afraid that due to my terrible skills as a blogger, I can only point out a few of the guys who shared that table with me. Poker Prof took the 3 seat across from me and F Train took the 7 seat two to my right. I was less than thrilled to see Joe Speaker take the 5 seat. Having sweated a number of his tournaments on Stars, I knew the guy could very well leave me sitting on the rail. We'd tangled before at HDouble's home game (a.k.a. the Infamous Home Game, Murderer's Row, Suckout Circle) where Joe had made a couple of good stands against my aggression, first doubling through and then knocking me out. Luckily, his weren't the blinds I'd be after.

Shuffle up and deal. Wee....

The early levels

I got good cards. I was aggressive. I stole blinds from time to time. I folded my tens when Joe Speaker raised to 3xBB and F Train reraised to 8xBB (with the hammer and pocket jacks, respectively). I limp-reraised Joe Speaker from UTG with pocket Kings. I stole the Poker Prof's big blind with the Jackhammer, but no one cheered. Grubby got moved to our table and got knocked out when his Jacks lost to cowboys. The Prof eventually busted and fhwrdh took his place. I slowly built up a stack and by the third break I found I was at or near the chip lead with T$31.5k. fhwrdh had T$29k. At this point, it occurred to me that I had a good chance to finish well, and more than that, two of the LA scene had a shot at the top.

Moving up

Level 10 started with T$1000/2000 blinds. At some point, I more than doubled up someone whom I believe was Otis' brother when I called his short-stacked all-in raise with a dominated ATo. On at least one other occasion against another player, he managed to have the goods even while raising short-stacked. I stayed out of his way with some of my weaker holdings. But it was around this time that I really understood what Doyle said about building up a stack; he was going to need those chips for when he went into a hand as a big dog. Surviving that kind of confrontation relies not only on your actions at that moment, but your actions up to it. Of course, it could also get you busted early.

I also stayed away from fhwrdh, concentrating mostly on pressuring the short-stacks, particularly when we were getting closer to the money. I had a decent stack, but I knew I was racing the blinds more than anything else and couldn't afford to sit pretty. My stack dwindled a bit, and then I got really lucky twice. I was holding eights when there was an early position raise to 3xBB. I spent some time thinking it over, put him on a big ace, then pushed. It was folded around to the raiser, who spent just as much time thinking it over, then decided to call. Great call. My eights were dead to his tens until an eight appeared on the turn, saving me from being crippled and putting me back into the table chip lead.

When the blinds were T$2000/4000, I found A4s in the CO and raised fhwrdh's big blind. We both had between T$25k-30k and I thought I'd widen the gap a little. Unfortunately he woke up with kings and raised all-in. I knew he had a good hand, but I was getting 3:1 for my call, a shot at a dominating chip lead, and, er, they were sooted. An ace on the flop knocked out the 2:1 favorite, sending fhwrdh literally roaring over to the bar for booze. I think I owe Kong a drink at the next home game.

The bubble gave me an opportunity to keep building the stack, and when we made the final table, I had T$72k, or 27% of the tournament chips. Even so, I tried to downplay my expectations, telling myself I could get at least sixth place, but planning to play for first. I've played in a few tournaments where I've pissed away a large stack due to end-game or near-bubble impatience, so I didn't want to get too excited.

Final Table

When we got to the final table, I laid low for a while. There were a few short-stacks at the table, and now that we were in the money, they'd be more willing to gamble it up for a shot at advancing a couple places. Plus my at the bubble, short-handed raising hands were generally full-ring folding hands. I got lucky once more when I raised with AJo ("It's gold, I tell ya!" --Joe Speaker) and cracked -EV's kings with a flopped ace. I also made a badly-timed steal attempt at Gracie's short-stack with J8s when her queens helped her double up against me. This was followed by Gracie knocking out much of the table, with an incredible run of cards.

Gracie was pretty cool to observe. There's nothing more disarming than hearing her say to the small blind to her right, "How much do you have there? Because I'm going to put you all-in." Especially if you're the small blind and the action's on you. When it got down to 3 and she and I were close to even, Gracie kept stating that she just didn't know how to play the big stack. I chided her once when she folded her small blind to the big blind. She repeated the comment about not knowing how to play the big stack. Then, as soon as she knocked out the third place finisher with pocket rockets (again!), she looked at me and said, "You know, I may not know how to play the big stack, but I play heads-up matches almost exclusively." I need to work on my psychological banter.

Somewhere in the background, HDouble told me to remember that Q7 was the cutoff.

We had started discussing a deal when we were four-handed, but the action continued faster than we could work it out, and once the stacks became disproportionately uneven, the deal talk petered out. I brought it up again once we were heads-up, willing to go either way, but Gracie had a 5:3 advantage and said, "Those guys wouldn't let me do it," waving to the railbirds calling her name. I accepted and continued to play.

A couple hands later, I had AQ in the small blind and raised to T$40k (T$4000/8000 blinds). Gracie raised me all-in and I called. Her small/medium ace didn't hold up and I doubled up to T$200k. Gracie asked ironically, "Still want to make a deal?" I'm not sure if I answered or not, but with everything going on around me and on the table, I may have mumbled something that trailed off.

It might have been another couple hands when I got K7 in the small blind. I consciously thought, "Hey, that's better than Q7," and raised to T$40k. Gracie raised all-in another T$20k with JT. No help for Gracie and the river brought a 7 to give me a pair.

"Aren't you glad we didn't make a deal?!"

It's over

Wow. I had outlasted 106 bloggers and their friends to defend LA's title in the WPBT. Appropriately enough, first prize was $2572. Offsuit.

I was drained, in disbelief, and ecstatic.

Bloggers came up to me to congratulate me and introduce themselves. "You're Mean Gene?" "Hey, Poker Nerd! How are you? What's your real name again?!" (I never said I wasn't occasionally socially awkward). Hey, Alan! And all the while I had no time to really talk to anyone in the flurry of it all.

So once again, thanks to all the bloggers for making my first trip so memorable.

And I'm still sorry I sucked out on you. But maybe not that sorry.

Unfortunately I don't have any good photos of the final table or the winning hand. If anyone out there has a few, I'd really love to get copies via email.

You were probably there, or you've read it on someone else's blog, but here it is again anyway:

I won the blogger tourney.

I'm going to hold off on the full report until later, but I wanted to take the time to acknowledge some people here who made this all possible.

Bill Rini. He did a stellar job organizing the entire event, and we should all thank him for stepping up and undertaking this task. All I had to do was show up.

Bob Cohen and the Imperial Palace. They get a big hand for welcoming the WPBT with open arms and giving poker bloggers the recognition they deserve for promoting the game. Any of you who are still there, give 'em some play.

Otis, Wil Wheaton, and the rest of the PokerStars crew. Stars kicked in another 2k into the prize pool and brought prizes and swag galore. Their continued support for players and bloggers puts them in position to knock PartyPoker off its perch as top poker site.

Hdouble. For reminding me that Q7 was the favorite. K7 seemed like it might do just as well.

All the bloggers. Friendliest bunch of random people I ever met on the Internet. Thanks for all your kind words and giving me some tough decisions to make during the game. Again, I'm sorry for sucking out on you. You rock.

See you this afternoon.

Got another email from Empire this morning:

Full Tilt Poker gave me a warm welcome back:

It's also nice to see that the latest versions of PokerTracker and GameTimePlus work with FTP. I think I'll go for that 50% reload bonus and splash around to keep some of the local boys fat and happy.

I get knocked out in 285th. See if you can guess the other guy's hand.

It's a good thing Pokerstars emailed me about this afternoon's blogger tourney, or I might have slept right through it. Pretty much in the same way that I slept through the fact that Stars has a blog dedicated to this tourney; they've been naming names and prizing prizes to various blogs out there, including SoCal's very own Geek and Proud. Alan should get props just for having created the terror alert box, not to mention the poker content. Belated congratulations!

In other news, Studioglyphic Blog has sold out to the fastest growing poker site on the net, Full Tilt Poker. The only poker site designed by the world's best players. While some of the staff members here at SG Central have protested this new move, grousing about outdated ideals such as journalistic integrity and bias-free blogging, I for one welcome our new corporate overlords, and look forward to seeing a FullTilt banner on every page (Hey, if Myspace can survive a NEW$Corp acquisition, I think this little blog will do just fine).

See you at the tourney.

I don't even know if I count as a poker blog reader anymore.

I have registered to play in the
Online Poker Blogger Championship!

This event is powered by PokerStars.

Registration code: 1672101

Still, thanks to Absinthe for the tip-off. I wouldn't mind getting my glyphy hands on any one of those things (it's a shame I can't say "grubby" anymore).

Absinthe and I will be shacking up at the Imperial Palace come December. Now that school isn't going to interfere with attending one of these things, I'll finally be able to put some names to faces. Of course, the irony is that attending school is what allowed me to have enough free time to play poker and blog about it. Designing new features and chasing down bugs for the largest social networking site on the planet doesn't lend itself to a lot of free time on my end. That, and the fact that I'm a drunken donkey when I finally do log on doesn't help on the content end.

Anyway, this is what I look like:

See you in December.

First I ran them into Geek's aces, then this:

Hank calls me the master of great calls, but I'd like to be lucky once in a while.

While overseas, I took the opportunity of using my cousin's clean computer to sign up for a new Party Poker account. My old account had been closed for "inappropriate chat" at the blogger NL tables; the same thing happened to Bonus Code Iggy, but somehow he got it all squared away. This time I decided to sign up through PokerSourceOnline. Unfortunately, their rake rebate program no longer has Party as an option. Still, by signing up through PSO I got 6000 PSO points, 5000 of which I promptly traded in for a $50 Amazon Gift Card.

One of the three poker books I picked up was The Professor, the Banker, and the Suicide King. Once I started reading the first few pages, I was hooked. I can't even tell you why I found the book as interesting as it did.

Michael Craig pieces together what happened when wealthy Texas banker Andy Beal went to Vegas to play the biggest cash game players for stakes that no one had ever played before. We're talking limit hold'em for millions of dollars, blinds of 50,000-100,000. One of the LA bloggers once asked us how much money it would take for us to be able to go off and do whatever we wanted for the rest of our lives. For these players, it was just one big pot.

I take back what I said earlier.

This is what makes the Professor, the Banker, and the Suicide King so interesting:

1. Most of us have wondered if we could go after the biggest players, provided we had the bankroll. Andy Beal had that bankroll.

2. Two of the hardest things to really learn as a player is separating bets from their dollar values and accepting fluctuations in results (and bankroll) as normal variance. When the stakes got large enough, the best poker veterans in the world re-faced those same struggles.

I personally have no ambitions to face off against great players. Hell, I play so little poker these days I feel guilty. But I'm glad Andy Beal took a shot at the best, and I hope he keeps at it.

The latest version of PokerTracker is 2.07.03. If you haven't updated PokerTracker in the last month, check out the new support for PostgreSQL as well as the latest bug fixes. For those of us with largish hand history databases, this new feature is almost more welcome than hand histories at Full Tilt. Maybe I'm smoking crack, but I swear that auto-rating players and exporting notes is faster this way.

You'll need to update your version of GameTimePlus to use with the PostgreSQL database.

Eh? What am I talking about? You slack monkeys who haven't picked up the PokerTrackerGuide ought to do yourselves a favor and buy it today.

BG organized a poker tournament this Sunday in memory of Jason's friend Charlie.

Details:

PokerStars
WPBT "Charlie" Tournament
No Limit Hold'Em

Tournament 9680072
Sunday, July 17th
18:00 ET
$20 buy-in

You'll find it under Tourney --> Private. The buy-in will go to Charlie's family to do with as they like. So we'll be playing purely for bragging rights.

Update: July 14, 2005. I'm happy to report that 46 players are now signed up for the tournament. That's $920 raised through the blogs, $20 at a time. Let's push it over a grand. Sign up now, even if you don't think you'll be able to play.

In case you haven't heard, I've returned to the US. I jumped right into the gambling frame of mind with the start of the month, playing Blackjack with bonus money at Will Hill and Intercasino (see ScurvyDog for the affiliate links), O8 and NLHE at the LA Blogger Home Game, and 2/4 HE at the Bad Beat Jackpot tables on Party Poker. Yep. I finally got a new Party account after getting myself banned last January for "inappropriate chat." I still don't know what the hell that means, but whatever.

There are some excellent tables to be found under that BBJ tab. I happened to catch -EV 4-tabling a few of them, but I opted to play elsewhere. No need to sit down with a known tight-aggressive player who reminds you everytime he sees you about that $50NL session where he took two buy-ins off of you (5 months ago!). Anyway, with several players playing in excess of 35-55% of all their hands, my BBJ sessions evoked fond memories of playing in the LA and Vegas casinos.

Coincidentally, I'll be heading out to Vegas in the morning to bake in 105 degree sunshine and immerse myself in the madness that is the WSOP. No, I won't be playing in any of the events--I don't have the skills or the bankroll for that--but I do intend to sit myself down next to some poker-crazed tourists and try to dodge bad beats while building a mountain of chips. There will be no blackjack or roulette on this trip; then again, Grubby's a persuasive guy.

I didn't know Jason's friend Charlie Tuttle. He answered his cell phone before handing it off to Jason so I could tell him I wasn't going to make it out to Vegas last March. But I gotta give him credit for the way he chose to live out his last days: gambling it up in Vegas and Atlantic City in good company. When my time comes, I want to be out there having a blast, getting my chips in while I'm ahead.

Just in case you've been hiding under a rock or overseas on a trip to Asia, you should know that this year's World Series of Poker is being live-blogged by the hardest working blogger in Vegas, Dr. Pauly. Go check out Tao of Poker for the latest from the floor.

World Series of Poker Live blog

World Series of Poker

World Series of Poker News

World Series of Poker Podcast

This post brought to you by the PokerTrackerGuide.

Two hands I won last night on Empire's 3/6 tables with stuff I remembered from Hank:

Still, I'm on thin ice on this one. There are two flush cards out there, and it's easy to go broke drawing to the sucker end of a straight, especially if someone out there has already made the better straight. The better play here might have been to check-raise the turn.

It's a thin line between relying on implied odds and being a fish. :) The beauty, though, is that showing down garbage hands like this, even in the blinds, helped me get action for my big pairs and better draws later on.

And now, a word from our sponsor:

You've gotta love big short-term results. My flight leaves in less than 24 hours, but I'm happy to report a 70BB profit for the last poker I'll play on American soil for a while. I caught some big pairs that held up, flopped well, made a number of draws, and got paid off. Which reminds me... I should take a deck of cards with me to China. I've never bet in yuan before.

You see some of the worst poker at the casino sometimes.

Insanity is...

There was the woman who raised with pocket queens in EP who checked when the flop came AT9. One of the many cold-callers bet at the flop and she called. The turn came a rag and she checked again. The flop bettor reached for his chips and the woman announced, "I know you have an ace. So go ahead and bet." The river came with no help and she called once again. The bettor flipped over AT for top two and the woman flipped over her queens and said "I knew you had an ace." She turns to the player in seat 2 and complains, "It's just my luck, I get queens and an ace comes." She knew she was drawing to 2 outs, didn't get lucky, and still paid the guy off. Wow.

What's his tell?

A man replaced the woman in the 2 seat and won a hand at showdown when he called down the preflop raiser with KK on a board full of rags. At no point during that hand did he raise. Amazing.

The same man cold-called my UTG raise a little later. The flop came 884. I bet with my queens and he called, while everyone else folded. The turn brought an ace. I bet and he called. Now I was a little worried. The river brought a king and with two overcards on the board, I figure I'll check and see what happens. He bets, and remembering how passive he was with the kings, I opted not to pay him off. I asked him later if he had an ace or a king. "No, I had a flush." Really? "Yeah, I had 57 suited. I knew you had a big pocket pair, and was going to fold, but they were suited, and then the flop was 84 so I could get the straight." He probably had odds to call that flop bet, by the way. Especially with that backdoor flush. But I bet he didn't know it!

Every rebuy is a little death

God bless the woman who paid off my quad aces with sixes when the board came A253A. There's no way her hand is good against any legitimate hand, but hey, it was her last six chips. Now she can rebuy for another 5BB. It's just too bad Hollywood Park doesn't have the high hand jackpots you see at the Aladdin and other Vegas casinos. Those jackpots can be good for $500 or more.

That same woman paid off my QQ earlier as well. I'd seen her go to the showdown with a wide range of hands, so I put in a value bet despite the 3-flush on the river.

The worst mistake I made at that table was not raising with KQ in MP. The board ended up being KJ9Tx and I chopped a pot with the woman who paid off my aces and queens when she hit her gutshot with Q5s. The raise would have knocked her out preflop or added another 3BB to the pot. Either way, not raising was anywhere from a minor to a major mistake.

Blogger table

When that table broke, I got up with my 12.5BB profit (hourly of 2BB/hour including smoke and beer breaks) and wandered around, alternately sweating HDouble at his table and Absinthe and Bill at their table. Absinthe and Bill had a great table. One and a half maniacs, two calling stations, a fish, etc. After a while, HDouble sat and I figured I'd sit as well and gamble with my profits.

Unfortunately for Bill and Absinthe, HDouble replaced a calling station (the same woman who paid off my aces and queens--she's everywhere!) and I replaced the table maniac (he got up with a couple hundred dollars). Still, the guy in the 1 seat seemed pretty fast and loose with his chips and the guy in the 5 seat was the mother of all calling stations (MCS, not to be confused with MC5).

Oh really now?

MCS won a pot with a decent hand at one point--a hand which he actually bet on the turn. As he stacked up his chips, he announced, "See? I don't put money in unless I have something." Let me offer a definition, which some of the other hands he showed elucidated:

Main Entry: ¹some thing
Pronunciation: 's&m(p)-thi[ng], esp in rapid speech or for 2 's&m-p&m
Function: pronoun
1 : runner-runner straight draw
2 : low second pair, weak kicker
3 : pair draw

Color commentary

HDouble's a good guy to have at the table at 4 in the morning:

HDouble rakes a pot after he bets the turn on a T2xx board: "Super/System."

I raise pre-flop with JJ after mucking most of my trash hands: "Woah! Who's this guy?"

HDouble raises in EP: "Okay, I've got a good hand this time. Everybody call."

I win after capping the flop with second pair, ace kicker and the nut flush draw: "That was straight out of Abdul!"

Fun stuff.

5AM rolled around and I was up an additional BB. Time to call it a night.

A few weeks ago I said "[Facty's] not really a poker blogger, but she's an amusing read, and that's almost as good, and sometimes better."

Well I should have kept my trap shut:

ScurvyDog's guide to casino whoring is helping me offset my poker losses. Thanks Scurvy! I'm such a degenerate. Ask Absinthe, he can tell you:

This happened last year, too.

Generally speaking, I'm making fewer mistakes than my opponents, but the mistakes I do make still rankle.

I'm not sure what my plan for dealing with the slide is going to be. I'll probably still keep playing, but throw in more PokerStars MTTs to fill up the time. Those guys are nuts!

Grubby tells us he's enjoyed his week of theater and workshops and had a decent session at Hustler:

Not sure if my half-joking arguments had any effect, but...

$20+2 SNG with 6 minute levels on FTP. 3 places pay.

Blinds 40/80

I'm in the SB with JJ.

SB: T1600 - StudioGlyphic
BB: T1600 - Probably my weakest opponent
UTG: T2800 - Solid player who is capable of stealing
Button: T7500 - Solid player who's caught some cards

UTG minimum raises to T160. Button folds.

What should I do?

Here's what I did:
SB raises to T500. BB folds. UTG calls T340.

Flop: A-x-x. Pot is T1080.

What should I do?

Here's what I did:
SB bets T300. UTG calls T300.

Turn: x. Pot is T1680.

SB checks. UTG bets T800. SB folds.

Ugh. This puts me in a bad situation. Fortunately I stay alive with some all-in steals and double up when the big stack takes a stand with QT against my KT (his gutshot straight started to worry me, though). Eventually the other short stack goes out and I make the money. I get no traction and go down with second pair to the big stack's top set.

But clearly the hand above is the point at which I blew my chances of finishing higher. What I believe I should have done on the bubble with 20xBB left, bad position against the raiser, and a hand that stands to be the favorite 4-handed, is re-raise all-in and make UTG decide whether he wants to take his chances in a coin-flip.

The question is... if I missed the opportunity of pushing preflop, should I have pushed on the flop, or check-folded on the flop?

...I'd have known it was National River Week.

I took a shot at a 1/2 $200 NL game on Full Tilt and found myself seated with three aggro players. Standard m.o. was to raise the pot pre-flop and bet the pot post-flop. Finally I called with a pocket pair, saw the ragged flop, and put the aggro to the test with a check-raise (not a minimum raise, either). He min-raised me, and I considered my options. It was possible that he had a bigger pocket pair, but unlikely. I called. The turn was another rag, and I put him all-in. He called, getting perhaps 3:1 from the pot. He flipped up overcards and was drawing to six outs, one of which came on ....

So that makes three $300 pots I've lost this week to river beats. Which should make me the poster child for something.

Bankroll management dictates I step down in limits (it's boring down here) and that goes for live play, too. Which is too bad, because the 1/2 NLHE game seemed a hell of a lot more interesting than the .50/1 and .25/.50 NLHE games. But I just can't afford those swings.

We met up with Wil Wheaton briefly after the show.

At my first table last night, the guy in the 9 seat was on his second or third buy-in since I sat down. He raised to $15 in late position preflop and got a couple callers, including the big guy who'd river'd his gutshot straight against me (Mr. Bad Beat). The flop came up all rags. It was checked to the 9 seat and he immediately moved all-in. It folded around to Mr. Bad Beat in seat 5, who was sitting behind $500 or more and was trying to decide what to do. The 9 seat looked straight at Mr. Bad Beat and pleaded, "Please. No more bad beats. Just fold."

Mr. Bad Beat folded and the 9 seat flipped up his pocket queens for the win.

When you've got what is most likely to be the winning hand against a loose caller who can double you up and you're begging him to fold, you should get up from the table.

Well I just lost two buy-ins at the $100 NLHE tables at Hollywood Park. But the funny thing is that I feel pretty good about it. I got my chips in with the best hand and lost 'em on the river.

I call with 6c 7c in middle to late position (seat 6) when it's raised behind me to $15 (5xBB). Three people call in front of me, making the pot approximately $63. I figure getting better than 5:1 is good odds and call. The flop comes 367 with two suited cards. The 4 seat bets $25 and seat 5 calls. The pot is now $125 and I have $85 left. I raise all-in, there are two folds, and seats 4 and 5 call. Uh oh. Seat 4 shows T7 for top pair, no kicker, drawing to 3 outs + the runner-runner straight and backdoor flush, and seat 5 shows 65 for second pair and the gutshot, drawing to 4 outs + running fives. Turn doesn't improve anyone's hand and the river's a 4.

Rebuy!

I follow HDouble to Grubby's table with $85 after an orbit or two and sit down in the big blind. I'm dealt Q3 and get to see the flop for free. Flop comes down Q32 and I bet the pot--$10. HDouble calls in seat 8 and Grubby makes Baby Jesus weep in seat 5. I raise to $40 and HDouble folds. Grubby calls. Turn comes a K and I bet $20. Grubby makes some comment about my stupid two pair in the big blind and folds with a grin. I turn over my cards and take the pot.

I get dealt JJ in late position and raise to $15. Seat 2 calls, as does Grubby. Damn it, Grubby, stop calling my bets! It's checked to me on the Q high flop, I bet $30, and everyone folds. Now I'm sitting on $170 or so, and feeling pretty good.

I'm down to $150 when I get dealt two black aces on the button. Sweet. A few limpers come in and the cutoff raises to $14. I smooth-call the $14 (the table had appeared to be somewhat tight), but HDouble and two others call, making me a little worried. The flop comes 89J and I'm wondering how much I need to raise to chase any tens out of the pot. The pot is about $70 and the preflop raiser bets $50. Once again, I smooth-call, figuring $50 is too pricey for anyone to call (odds be damned). The rest of the table folds. The turn brings a 10 and all of a sudden I'm thinking I might have slowplayed my aces to death. My opponent bets $50 again, I think for a while, and figure I'm probably still ahead and raise all-in for $86. He calls with KJ, and is drawing to 9 outs. The river brings a K and I'm out another buy-in.

No rebuy this time. I wonder a little if I could have chased him out on the flop, but I don't think so. He was new to the table, but few people at these casinos make good laydowns.

But like I said, I feel good about my play, which is a lot better than how I've been feeling for the past week or so. If my hands had held up, I'd have over six times my initial buy-in. It's just too bad live poker is rigged.

By the way, if you want to hear Hank grousing all night, sit at a low-limit NL table with him with a bad blind structure. :)