The Associated Press is reporting that NETeller co-founder Stephen Lawrence has pleaded guilty to a charge of criminal conspiracy. Lawrence acknowledged in federal court that NETeller's processing of financial transactions with online gambling sites was illegal under US law.
I'm not sure this bodes well for those of us expecting money from NETeller. On the one hand, it will probably help speed those transfers since a portion of the case has been resolved. On the other hand, I have to wonder how many individuals will be receiving subpoenas along with their NETeller checks.
The government has said it can't deport 12 million illegal immigrants. Let's hope they'll be similarly incapable of going after a few million poker players.
29 June 2007
Missed it by THAT much
I was really hoping to pick up in the Riverchasers last night the points I needed to make the BBT top 50. Alas, such was not to be the case.
I had a fairly early score when a SB special came through for me. Three limpers ahead, I completed with 94s. Yeah, it's a crap hand, but they were SOOTED! Seriously, I was getting 9:1 on my money. I'll call with any two getting those kinds of odds. The flop was 794. I was able to ride it to a pretty nice 1350 pot.
This gave me enough chips that I probably could have folded my way into the points. In retrospect, I should have clicked the "sit out" button just like I was thinking of doing. But, no, I couldn't do anything smart like that.
I pretty much moved sideways for quite a while and was maybe half a dozen eliminations from the points. Then I get QQ. I do a standard 3BB raise. TheWhisper78, who has been abusing the table with his big stack for quite some time, pushes all-in. There's 450 in the pot and he makes it 4655 to go. Slight overbet. I figure this is nothing but a steal so I make the call. I'm right as he shows KTs. I'm 2:1 to take this down, double up, and be in a good position to make the money, not just the points. Of course, the flop comes KK9 and I go home before the first break.
Anxious for more punishment, I jumped right into the $26k. I was doing so-so when I made the mistake of running a perfectly good bluff against what I can only assume was a calling station. Admittedly, I had nothing but a big card, but this fool calls my all-in for all but the last 500 of his chips with nothing but second pair and a mediocre kicker. He could have walked away with a few lumps, but still in decent shape. Instead he decides to risk most of his stack on second pair. While the board could have been better for my bluff, there's no way he could have reasonably figured me for bluffing here. There were far too many perfectly reasonable hands that had him in a world of hurt. I should have recognized from all his min-bets that he was the kind of player who wasn't smart enough to lay down a hand like that.
Still feeling the need for pain, I decided to jump into another Tier One ticket tourney. I tried something different this time. It's the first I've noticed the heads-up tournaments FT has. Four players, heads-up, winner take all. I won my first table. The second table we went back and forth for a while. I thought I was going to cash in when I caught pocket 9's and turned the set, but I slow played too long. I made my move on the river. Sadly, the river brought the third spade and the other guy had two little ones in his hand.
I need to re-learn the lesson of not being in too much of a hurry when heads-up. It was kind of fun, though, so I think I'll give it another shot. I used to be pretty good short-handed and heads up, but playing all these blogger tournaments and Tier One ticket things I find I'm not spending as much time in normal short-handed situations. The heads-up ticket tournament is cheap and looks like it might be a good way to keep in practice.
The final BBT event is Miami Don's Big Game on Sunday at 9:30 EDT. While I don't look forward to playing two big tournaments at once, I'm definitely hoping I'll still be playing the $500k when the Big Game starts.
I had a fairly early score when a SB special came through for me. Three limpers ahead, I completed with 94s. Yeah, it's a crap hand, but they were SOOTED! Seriously, I was getting 9:1 on my money. I'll call with any two getting those kinds of odds. The flop was 794. I was able to ride it to a pretty nice 1350 pot.
This gave me enough chips that I probably could have folded my way into the points. In retrospect, I should have clicked the "sit out" button just like I was thinking of doing. But, no, I couldn't do anything smart like that.
I pretty much moved sideways for quite a while and was maybe half a dozen eliminations from the points. Then I get QQ. I do a standard 3BB raise. TheWhisper78, who has been abusing the table with his big stack for quite some time, pushes all-in. There's 450 in the pot and he makes it 4655 to go. Slight overbet. I figure this is nothing but a steal so I make the call. I'm right as he shows KTs. I'm 2:1 to take this down, double up, and be in a good position to make the money, not just the points. Of course, the flop comes KK9 and I go home before the first break.
Anxious for more punishment, I jumped right into the $26k. I was doing so-so when I made the mistake of running a perfectly good bluff against what I can only assume was a calling station. Admittedly, I had nothing but a big card, but this fool calls my all-in for all but the last 500 of his chips with nothing but second pair and a mediocre kicker. He could have walked away with a few lumps, but still in decent shape. Instead he decides to risk most of his stack on second pair. While the board could have been better for my bluff, there's no way he could have reasonably figured me for bluffing here. There were far too many perfectly reasonable hands that had him in a world of hurt. I should have recognized from all his min-bets that he was the kind of player who wasn't smart enough to lay down a hand like that.
Still feeling the need for pain, I decided to jump into another Tier One ticket tourney. I tried something different this time. It's the first I've noticed the heads-up tournaments FT has. Four players, heads-up, winner take all. I won my first table. The second table we went back and forth for a while. I thought I was going to cash in when I caught pocket 9's and turned the set, but I slow played too long. I made my move on the river. Sadly, the river brought the third spade and the other guy had two little ones in his hand.
I need to re-learn the lesson of not being in too much of a hurry when heads-up. It was kind of fun, though, so I think I'll give it another shot. I used to be pretty good short-handed and heads up, but playing all these blogger tournaments and Tier One ticket things I find I'm not spending as much time in normal short-handed situations. The heads-up ticket tournament is cheap and looks like it might be a good way to keep in practice.
The final BBT event is Miami Don's Big Game on Sunday at 9:30 EDT. While I don't look forward to playing two big tournaments at once, I'm definitely hoping I'll still be playing the $500k when the Big Game starts.
28 June 2007
Closing on goal
The Mookie was last night. Decent turnout with 72 runners hitting the virtual felt. Not quite up to the level established last week, but quite impressive nonetheless.
My dearth of cards and skill at losing coin flips mostly continued. I keep trying to tell myself I'm making the right moves -- tossing another $600 into a $1800 pot when you're almost certain it's a coin flip is still the correct move, right? -- and therefore "winning" according to the Sklansky definition. I just haven't figured out why my chips keep ending up in someone else's stack after all these "wins".
I did have one hand where my all-in with KTs against 98o was victorious. And one major suckout when my all-in with 55 ran into QQ and I flopped another 5.
There was one hand in particular where I decided to pay attention to my spidey sense, but I have no idea if my judgment was correct or if irongirl01 bluffed my pants off. I raised to 3BB from UTG with AJo. Not something I would ordinarily do, but it was getting late and I needed to get something going. Irongirl01 called from MP, everyone else folded.
Flop is 42T rainbow. I c-bet 2/3 the pot, irongirl01 calls. The alarms really went off here. She was down to about M=9 before the hand started. What could she possibly be holding that would justify calling pre-flop and just calling a crap flop like this? To put 1000 in the pot with just 1000 left behind makes no sense unless she's got a monster or she's setting up a very dangerous post oak bluff. Or she's a calling station, but I know that's not the case. Irongirl01 is probably capable of the complicated bluff, but I'm not sure she knows me well enough to know if I'd read the suspicious behavior and react as desired to it. That kind of thing needs a stone cold, dead on balls accurate read. Kudos to her if that's what she did.
The turn was a blank. I decided I was done putting money in this pot. She put in a meager 500 bet -- half her remaining stack, but only 1/5 the pot -- and I let it go.
Should you happen to read this, irongirl01, I'd love to know what you were holding. Well played regardless of what you had.
Down to about M=7 and blinds going up in seconds, I pushed with 88. Somewhat to my dismay I got a call from sellthekids. To my great dismay, Maudie also called. My 88 vs sellthekids' 44 vs Maudie's TT. I turned my set, but Maudie re-sucked at the river, sending sellthekids to the rail and leaving me with crumbs. I was gone two hands later, finishing in 24th and getting me closer to my goal of top 50 on the BBT leaderboard.
Tonight is the last of the Riverchasers BBT events. See you there.
My dearth of cards and skill at losing coin flips mostly continued. I keep trying to tell myself I'm making the right moves -- tossing another $600 into a $1800 pot when you're almost certain it's a coin flip is still the correct move, right? -- and therefore "winning" according to the Sklansky definition. I just haven't figured out why my chips keep ending up in someone else's stack after all these "wins".
I did have one hand where my all-in with KTs against 98o was victorious. And one major suckout when my all-in with 55 ran into QQ and I flopped another 5.
There was one hand in particular where I decided to pay attention to my spidey sense, but I have no idea if my judgment was correct or if irongirl01 bluffed my pants off. I raised to 3BB from UTG with AJo. Not something I would ordinarily do, but it was getting late and I needed to get something going. Irongirl01 called from MP, everyone else folded.
Flop is 42T rainbow. I c-bet 2/3 the pot, irongirl01 calls. The alarms really went off here. She was down to about M=9 before the hand started. What could she possibly be holding that would justify calling pre-flop and just calling a crap flop like this? To put 1000 in the pot with just 1000 left behind makes no sense unless she's got a monster or she's setting up a very dangerous post oak bluff. Or she's a calling station, but I know that's not the case. Irongirl01 is probably capable of the complicated bluff, but I'm not sure she knows me well enough to know if I'd read the suspicious behavior and react as desired to it. That kind of thing needs a stone cold, dead on balls accurate read. Kudos to her if that's what she did.
The turn was a blank. I decided I was done putting money in this pot. She put in a meager 500 bet -- half her remaining stack, but only 1/5 the pot -- and I let it go.
Should you happen to read this, irongirl01, I'd love to know what you were holding. Well played regardless of what you had.
Down to about M=7 and blinds going up in seconds, I pushed with 88. Somewhat to my dismay I got a call from sellthekids. To my great dismay, Maudie also called. My 88 vs sellthekids' 44 vs Maudie's TT. I turned my set, but Maudie re-sucked at the river, sending sellthekids to the rail and leaving me with crumbs. I was gone two hands later, finishing in 24th and getting me closer to my goal of top 50 on the BBT leaderboard.
Tonight is the last of the Riverchasers BBT events. See you there.
26 June 2007
Dead, dead, and dead again
The MATH was last night. To warm up and expecting to cover my entry price cheaply, I played one of the Tier One SnGs. As I've written many times before, these are usually pretty easy, especially the turbo ones, since 5 out of 18 get the top prize. Playing for 4th or 5th is a lot easier than playing for 1st.
I might just as well have flushed my entry fee. I didn't get a single decent starting hand the whole tournament. And every time I got something marginal -- good enough to come in first, but not really good enough to call a raise -- someone ahead of me would have raised it. I did make the final table (about as tough as breathing), but didn't last long after that.
Figuring the dearth of decent cards couldn't continue, I immediately signed up for another Tier One SnG. Well, I was wrong. The dearth of cards could continue. I did manage to catch one great hand when a very speculative play came through and I slow played it successfully. But I lost it all back to the same guy a while later when I flopped a baby flush and he had two big cards of the same suit. I obviously knew it was a possibility, but it was only a 2.5% chance of him having two cards of that suit. Mine were small enough it was a virtual lock that his would be higher, but, still, it's 2.5%.
So I bust out of the second SnG having backed into a couple decent hands, one of which didn't have a favorable outcome. No good starters in two tourneys.
Along comes the MATH. I figure all the bad cards should be out of my system by now and I should get some great starters. Yeah, right. The only premium starter I got all night, I raise, everybody folds. Perfect.
I still managed to hang in to very near the points bubble, but I was very close to the cutoff and would certainly have felt more comfortable if my stack was just a bit bigger. So when it folds to me in the SB and I'm holding TT -- the second best starting hand I've seen all night -- I make a normal raise, half hoping the BB folds, half hoping he doesn't. He doesn't. The flop seems unlikely to have helped. The BB has been making plays at pots all night, and has a huge stack, so I figure I'll make my stand here by trying to entice him to make a play and then pushing in the rest. I check, he makes a suspiciously small bet (at least in retrospect I think it was suspicious), I push all-in and he insta-calls. When his chips beat mine into the pot, which is very tough to do online, I knew I was in trouble. He turns over AA and I hit the rail.
I'm normally very stoic about these things. I try to pattern myself after guys like Paul Darden and John Juanda rather than Hellmuth or Matusow. I didn't throw a temper tantrum or anything, but I felt like I'd been kicked in the gut. Instant deep depression.
I tried to get outside myself and think about why this hit me so hard. It wasn't losing three tournaments in a row. I've had far worse losing streaks. It wasn't missing the points for the BBT. There are more opportunities to get the points I need to make the freeroll.
I think I finally came up with the answer. It dawned on me that a big part of why this hit me so hard was that I don't often get slow played so effectively. The slow play with the flush earlier in the evening was effective, but in that case I was clearly aware of the possibility and simply discounted it due to the long odds. That it turned out that way I can simply chalk up to bad luck. This one completely blind-sided me. And that doesn't happen very often. I'm thinking that's a good thing. I don't know, maybe I'm just desperately searching for a silver lining in this dark cloud.
Tonight I'm planning to take a shot at the 50-50 I've been hearing everybody talk about. Wednesday is the Mookie. Thursday is Riverchasers. For sure this time. I checked the schedule. Sunday is the final BBT event, Miami Don's Big Game. I already have my ticket and am anxiously awaiting my chance to kick some Big Game butt.
I might just as well have flushed my entry fee. I didn't get a single decent starting hand the whole tournament. And every time I got something marginal -- good enough to come in first, but not really good enough to call a raise -- someone ahead of me would have raised it. I did make the final table (about as tough as breathing), but didn't last long after that.
Figuring the dearth of decent cards couldn't continue, I immediately signed up for another Tier One SnG. Well, I was wrong. The dearth of cards could continue. I did manage to catch one great hand when a very speculative play came through and I slow played it successfully. But I lost it all back to the same guy a while later when I flopped a baby flush and he had two big cards of the same suit. I obviously knew it was a possibility, but it was only a 2.5% chance of him having two cards of that suit. Mine were small enough it was a virtual lock that his would be higher, but, still, it's 2.5%.
So I bust out of the second SnG having backed into a couple decent hands, one of which didn't have a favorable outcome. No good starters in two tourneys.
Along comes the MATH. I figure all the bad cards should be out of my system by now and I should get some great starters. Yeah, right. The only premium starter I got all night, I raise, everybody folds. Perfect.
I still managed to hang in to very near the points bubble, but I was very close to the cutoff and would certainly have felt more comfortable if my stack was just a bit bigger. So when it folds to me in the SB and I'm holding TT -- the second best starting hand I've seen all night -- I make a normal raise, half hoping the BB folds, half hoping he doesn't. He doesn't. The flop seems unlikely to have helped. The BB has been making plays at pots all night, and has a huge stack, so I figure I'll make my stand here by trying to entice him to make a play and then pushing in the rest. I check, he makes a suspiciously small bet (at least in retrospect I think it was suspicious), I push all-in and he insta-calls. When his chips beat mine into the pot, which is very tough to do online, I knew I was in trouble. He turns over AA and I hit the rail.
I'm normally very stoic about these things. I try to pattern myself after guys like Paul Darden and John Juanda rather than Hellmuth or Matusow. I didn't throw a temper tantrum or anything, but I felt like I'd been kicked in the gut. Instant deep depression.
I tried to get outside myself and think about why this hit me so hard. It wasn't losing three tournaments in a row. I've had far worse losing streaks. It wasn't missing the points for the BBT. There are more opportunities to get the points I need to make the freeroll.
I think I finally came up with the answer. It dawned on me that a big part of why this hit me so hard was that I don't often get slow played so effectively. The slow play with the flush earlier in the evening was effective, but in that case I was clearly aware of the possibility and simply discounted it due to the long odds. That it turned out that way I can simply chalk up to bad luck. This one completely blind-sided me. And that doesn't happen very often. I'm thinking that's a good thing. I don't know, maybe I'm just desperately searching for a silver lining in this dark cloud.
Tonight I'm planning to take a shot at the 50-50 I've been hearing everybody talk about. Wednesday is the Mookie. Thursday is Riverchasers. For sure this time. I checked the schedule. Sunday is the final BBT event, Miami Don's Big Game. I already have my ticket and am anxiously awaiting my chance to kick some Big Game butt.
25 June 2007
You can lead a HORSE to the Riverchasers...
Sunday was the Riverchasers event #5, HORSE. My HORSE game is pretty decent when judged against the population at large. Against other poker fanatics, not so much.
I was doing quite well for a while, having taken a juicy Razz pot from bayne when he kept betting his 96 into my 84.
My masterful limp/raise apparently had the desired confusing effect on Al. I had a very strong starting hand, but there were a lot of little cards showing. The limp/re-raise was in the back of my mind right from the start, thinking it would do better to thin the herd than a simple completion. Al's completion and my raise had the desired effect. I got somewhat lucky that 4th street was kind to me and not so kind to Al and NightRanger. With four cards to a 6-high, I bet, they folded, and my limp/raise master plan looked brilliant -- at least to me. Al's comment leads me to believe he was somewhat less impressed with this tricky move.
I stupidly rode a very promising but ultimately unsatisfying hand to a near 2000 chip loss in Stud Hi. I knew it was stupid when I was doing it, but I just couldn't help myself. Three cards to a royal on the deal. 4th street brings me four cards to Broadway. Then I pair my king. It just looked so darn pretty. I knew from the betting that I was behind -- probably way behind -- but I couldn't let go. I really hate when that happens.
By now the limits had moved up to 300/600. With a stack of only 3k, any move at all can quickly become an effective all-in.
I made a bit of a comeback at Omaha when my pocket K's pulled through for me. A few hands later I gave it all back when my pocket K's didn't connect and I had the good sense to fold to a board that was screaming straight. I dropped another 2400 to Al at Razz when my very promising 764A couldn't pick up a fifth card. I got most of it back from him a few hands later, still at Razz when Al paired and was forced to fold to my displayed 832.
My big undoing was again at Razz. With me showing 68 and NightRanger showing 8Q, he somewhat inexplicably called my bet. Even with two good cards down, I think most players are going to lay it down here, especially when the other guy raised the flop. He took a chance and got very lucky, all of 5th, 6th and 7th streets giving him great cards. I was down to the felt. NightRanger finished the job a few hands later when his rivered 7642A beat my 76432.
I took 12th and at least picked up a few points, moving to 57th on the BBT leaderboard.
In far more exciting news, at least for me, I won my way into next Sunday's $500k at Full Tilt, besting 59 other runners to win the whole thing and take one of two available tickets.
This was a rather odd tournament for me. I was card dead for a great deal of the time and just sat and watched as play went on around me. I took down enough small pots to keep afloat. A surprising number of them were just blatant steals.
Maybe I've been playing blogger tournaments too often, but I was rather surprised by the extremely high attrition rate in this tourney. We'd lost half the field 40 minutes in and a full two-thirds of the field by the first break. And this was NOT a turbo. Okay, so it was only an $8 tournament, but I still expected somewhat better play.
After a few quick table changes at the beginning, I got to observe a few players for an extended period. One of the big weaknesses in my game is not closely following the action when I'm not involved in the hand and not developing much in the way of player profiles. Some of that is likely an offshoot of a couple years of four-tabling limit and depending on PokerTracker and PA Hud to do the dirty work for me. But those stats are not all that useful in tournament poker. For whatever reason, characteristics of some of the players became quite obvious to me last night and I was able to use these to my great advantage later in the game.
For instance, there was one guy who had clearly spent way too much time playing freerolls and very cheap tournaments with minimal payouts. Whenever he'd get a big hand he'd push all-in. Blinds at 25/50 and from UTG he pushes all-in for 1800. I was sure he had aces or kings. The first time he did this everyone folded. I bit my tongue against the urge to congratulate him on the huge pot he'd just scooped. He did the same thing later on and one even bigger idiot actually called him with QQ. Mr. I'm-all-in turned over KK and scooped a very nice pot. I don't know, maybe he isn't such an idiot after all. At least I knew to stay away from him if he pushed in a situation where it made little sense.
There was another guy who, at any sign of weakness, would pounce. I lost a few small pots to him early, but more than made up for it later, re-stealing two or three very large pots, and eventually using his extreme aggressiveness to get him pot committed on a hand where I knew I was way ahead. That hand eliminated him and got me my ticket.
Overall, this tournament was a bit strange. I was up a bit early, then the cards dried up and my stack kept moving in the wrong direction. Due to the incredibly high attrition rate I was able to simply sit there and wait for cards while I moved closer to the payout spots due to eliminations.
Eventually, with my stack at 800 and blinds at 80/160, I was forced to make a move. I doubled up with KQ vs K7, and doubled again the very next hand when the flop brought me a set of jacks.
From there I just kind of caught fire. I picked up a nice pot with a set of tens. Stole a few pots to keep my stack stable. Then I doubled against one of the big stacks when he had the misfortune to catch top pair and didn't want to believe I had him beat, despite having raised with my pocket kings before the flop. I eliminated the same guy a while later when he couldn't let go of second pair against my top pair.
Within what seemed like a rather short period of time I went from 800 to over 13,000; from life support to being clearly in contention for the prize. It was about this time that we collapsed to the final table. There were two shorties and everyone else packed in pretty close together.
The lead changed hands a number of times, with me holding it for a brief while. We eventually broke the "bubble". This tourney had a kind of odd payout structure. The top two got $216 tickets to Sunday's $500k. The next three spots paid out something like $14, $12, and $9.
We got down to three when someone stupidly took KTo up against AA. I did a lot of watching as all these eliminations took place. Two of us had stacks of about $20k with the third guy at $46k.
I took my first big pot from the aggressive guy I mentioned before. I turned a pair of kings and he just wouldn't stop making moves on the pot. My kings took down a $20k pot and I moved in to the lead by $10k.
From there things just kind of kept clicking. I was either catching the cards or applying pressure with my big stack.
I clearly got lucky in a few places as far as getting good cards when I desperately needed them. But I was also very patient, waiting for my spots to come along. All in all, one of my better performances. Certainly my best in a couple weeks.
I did find out that as far as FT's monthly leaderboard competition, actual finish position in these multi-ticket satellites really does matter. If you're trying to win something via that promotion you'll probably want to play these out rather than just push all-in like most people do once the ticket bubble has burst. You quite likely can be assured of 2nd by simply staying out of the fray until there's just one other left.
Tonight is the final MATH for the BBT. I need to move up a few more spots to make the freeroll, so I'm hoping to do well. See you there.
I was doing quite well for a while, having taken a juicy Razz pot from bayne when he kept betting his 96 into my 84.
My masterful limp/raise apparently had the desired confusing effect on Al. I had a very strong starting hand, but there were a lot of little cards showing. The limp/re-raise was in the back of my mind right from the start, thinking it would do better to thin the herd than a simple completion. Al's completion and my raise had the desired effect. I got somewhat lucky that 4th street was kind to me and not so kind to Al and NightRanger. With four cards to a 6-high, I bet, they folded, and my limp/raise master plan looked brilliant -- at least to me. Al's comment leads me to believe he was somewhat less impressed with this tricky move.
I stupidly rode a very promising but ultimately unsatisfying hand to a near 2000 chip loss in Stud Hi. I knew it was stupid when I was doing it, but I just couldn't help myself. Three cards to a royal on the deal. 4th street brings me four cards to Broadway. Then I pair my king. It just looked so darn pretty. I knew from the betting that I was behind -- probably way behind -- but I couldn't let go. I really hate when that happens.
By now the limits had moved up to 300/600. With a stack of only 3k, any move at all can quickly become an effective all-in.
I made a bit of a comeback at Omaha when my pocket K's pulled through for me. A few hands later I gave it all back when my pocket K's didn't connect and I had the good sense to fold to a board that was screaming straight. I dropped another 2400 to Al at Razz when my very promising 764A couldn't pick up a fifth card. I got most of it back from him a few hands later, still at Razz when Al paired and was forced to fold to my displayed 832.
My big undoing was again at Razz. With me showing 68 and NightRanger showing 8Q, he somewhat inexplicably called my bet. Even with two good cards down, I think most players are going to lay it down here, especially when the other guy raised the flop. He took a chance and got very lucky, all of 5th, 6th and 7th streets giving him great cards. I was down to the felt. NightRanger finished the job a few hands later when his rivered 7642A beat my 76432.
I took 12th and at least picked up a few points, moving to 57th on the BBT leaderboard.
In far more exciting news, at least for me, I won my way into next Sunday's $500k at Full Tilt, besting 59 other runners to win the whole thing and take one of two available tickets.
This was a rather odd tournament for me. I was card dead for a great deal of the time and just sat and watched as play went on around me. I took down enough small pots to keep afloat. A surprising number of them were just blatant steals.
Maybe I've been playing blogger tournaments too often, but I was rather surprised by the extremely high attrition rate in this tourney. We'd lost half the field 40 minutes in and a full two-thirds of the field by the first break. And this was NOT a turbo. Okay, so it was only an $8 tournament, but I still expected somewhat better play.
After a few quick table changes at the beginning, I got to observe a few players for an extended period. One of the big weaknesses in my game is not closely following the action when I'm not involved in the hand and not developing much in the way of player profiles. Some of that is likely an offshoot of a couple years of four-tabling limit and depending on PokerTracker and PA Hud to do the dirty work for me. But those stats are not all that useful in tournament poker. For whatever reason, characteristics of some of the players became quite obvious to me last night and I was able to use these to my great advantage later in the game.
For instance, there was one guy who had clearly spent way too much time playing freerolls and very cheap tournaments with minimal payouts. Whenever he'd get a big hand he'd push all-in. Blinds at 25/50 and from UTG he pushes all-in for 1800. I was sure he had aces or kings. The first time he did this everyone folded. I bit my tongue against the urge to congratulate him on the huge pot he'd just scooped. He did the same thing later on and one even bigger idiot actually called him with QQ. Mr. I'm-all-in turned over KK and scooped a very nice pot. I don't know, maybe he isn't such an idiot after all. At least I knew to stay away from him if he pushed in a situation where it made little sense.
There was another guy who, at any sign of weakness, would pounce. I lost a few small pots to him early, but more than made up for it later, re-stealing two or three very large pots, and eventually using his extreme aggressiveness to get him pot committed on a hand where I knew I was way ahead. That hand eliminated him and got me my ticket.
Overall, this tournament was a bit strange. I was up a bit early, then the cards dried up and my stack kept moving in the wrong direction. Due to the incredibly high attrition rate I was able to simply sit there and wait for cards while I moved closer to the payout spots due to eliminations.
Eventually, with my stack at 800 and blinds at 80/160, I was forced to make a move. I doubled up with KQ vs K7, and doubled again the very next hand when the flop brought me a set of jacks.
From there I just kind of caught fire. I picked up a nice pot with a set of tens. Stole a few pots to keep my stack stable. Then I doubled against one of the big stacks when he had the misfortune to catch top pair and didn't want to believe I had him beat, despite having raised with my pocket kings before the flop. I eliminated the same guy a while later when he couldn't let go of second pair against my top pair.
Within what seemed like a rather short period of time I went from 800 to over 13,000; from life support to being clearly in contention for the prize. It was about this time that we collapsed to the final table. There were two shorties and everyone else packed in pretty close together.
The lead changed hands a number of times, with me holding it for a brief while. We eventually broke the "bubble". This tourney had a kind of odd payout structure. The top two got $216 tickets to Sunday's $500k. The next three spots paid out something like $14, $12, and $9.
We got down to three when someone stupidly took KTo up against AA. I did a lot of watching as all these eliminations took place. Two of us had stacks of about $20k with the third guy at $46k.
I took my first big pot from the aggressive guy I mentioned before. I turned a pair of kings and he just wouldn't stop making moves on the pot. My kings took down a $20k pot and I moved in to the lead by $10k.
From there things just kind of kept clicking. I was either catching the cards or applying pressure with my big stack.
I clearly got lucky in a few places as far as getting good cards when I desperately needed them. But I was also very patient, waiting for my spots to come along. All in all, one of my better performances. Certainly my best in a couple weeks.
I did find out that as far as FT's monthly leaderboard competition, actual finish position in these multi-ticket satellites really does matter. If you're trying to win something via that promotion you'll probably want to play these out rather than just push all-in like most people do once the ticket bubble has burst. You quite likely can be assured of 2nd by simply staying out of the fray until there's just one other left.
Tonight is the final MATH for the BBT. I need to move up a few more spots to make the freeroll, so I'm hoping to do well. See you there.
21 June 2007
Thank you, sir, may I have another?
Somebody please pass the Vaseline. That's what I should have asked during the Mookie last night. I'd get something marginally worth playing, put in a pre-flop raise, miss the flop, c-bet, and, WHAM!, somebody's over the top, every...single...time. I might as well have been wearing a sign that said, "Please steal this pot from me." And, sadly, unless I wanted to risk the whole tournament very early, I was left with no option but folding.
As things turned out, I might as well have made a stand early. I had one decent hand where I managed to turn a nice profit with AA and got back to a point where I could grow my stack. But then I overplayed AK and was down to the felt. Busted out well short of the points bubble.
The high point of my night was early in the evening when I was screwing around at $0.25/$0.50 limit, just blowing off steam and playing even more like a donkey than I did in the Mookie. I managed to totally bluff some guy out of a giant $3.85 pot. Man, that felt good. Not easy to do at that level of limit either.
Since the pickings are rather slim on the poker front today, I'm going to launch into a rant I wanted to do on Tuesday. I'm through with Buddy Dank Radio. Buddy's music and chat fest is the darling of many of the bloggers, and I have to admit it's a pretty cool idea, at least in theory.
What's my problem with it? Well, and I know this is a generational thing, but I HATE rap. I'd rather have my fingernails torn out with a rusty pair of pliers than have to listen to that crap. So I put in my request and wait like an hour for it to come up, somehow managing to survive through countless piles of rap, only to have Buddy 86 my song before it starts because it's too long.
Buddy, my friend, if you don't want to play 11-minute songs, don't put them in the damn request list. And what the hell is the difference if you play one 11-minute song or three 4-minute steaming piles of rap back-to-back?
So I wait around for my next request to come up, again sitting through more piles of rap (and, admittedly, a few good tunes too), to have him cut it off halfway through to play -- I swear to god -- Huey Lewis. Huey.. Fucking... Lewis. He pulled down Phish to play Huey... Fucking... Lewis. That was the last straw. I 86'd Buddy Dank Radio and put up a nice Bob Seger play list. Vast improvement.
Buddy's got a fairly eclectic collection of tunes on the request list, but a large number of them are things I'm sure would never get played in their entirety based on my recent experience. If "Bouncing 'Round the Room" isn't upbeat enough, I'm guessing Harry Chapin's "Taxi" or any of the Henry Mancini tracks wouldn't make it very far. There are a lot of songs in the list that I personally like, including "Taxi", but they aren't exactly party tunes. I spent a lot of time looking through the list trying to find something agreeable to me and not objectionable to everyone else. Trust me, that's a thin line to walk. Apparently I failed to find the right balance.
What Buddy Dank Radio really needs is a few more songs about waffles. Played at least four times an hour. That will definitely improve things. And maybe a couple zippy Henry Mancini tunes. I wonder if he has any Herb Alpert? I haven't heard the Tijuana Brass in ages. Glen Campbell... A little "Wichita Lineman" should get things hopping.
Okay, so I'm just kidding. I'd rather get my fingernails AND toenails pulled out with rusty pliers than have to listen to rap.
Seriously, Buddy, I do wish you well with the streamcast. It's a cool idea. But I really won't be listening any more. I enjoy the commentary; it's just not worth sitting through a bunch of music I dislike for the occasional witty remark or major meltdown when somebody sucks out on you. I know I'm in a small minority on this so I doubt you'll notice a drop in listenership.
Tonight, I believe, is Riverchasers. If my ass isn't too sore from last night, I'll probably be there.
As things turned out, I might as well have made a stand early. I had one decent hand where I managed to turn a nice profit with AA and got back to a point where I could grow my stack. But then I overplayed AK and was down to the felt. Busted out well short of the points bubble.
The high point of my night was early in the evening when I was screwing around at $0.25/$0.50 limit, just blowing off steam and playing even more like a donkey than I did in the Mookie. I managed to totally bluff some guy out of a giant $3.85 pot. Man, that felt good. Not easy to do at that level of limit either.
Since the pickings are rather slim on the poker front today, I'm going to launch into a rant I wanted to do on Tuesday. I'm through with Buddy Dank Radio. Buddy's music and chat fest is the darling of many of the bloggers, and I have to admit it's a pretty cool idea, at least in theory.
What's my problem with it? Well, and I know this is a generational thing, but I HATE rap. I'd rather have my fingernails torn out with a rusty pair of pliers than have to listen to that crap. So I put in my request and wait like an hour for it to come up, somehow managing to survive through countless piles of rap, only to have Buddy 86 my song before it starts because it's too long.
Buddy, my friend, if you don't want to play 11-minute songs, don't put them in the damn request list. And what the hell is the difference if you play one 11-minute song or three 4-minute steaming piles of rap back-to-back?
So I wait around for my next request to come up, again sitting through more piles of rap (and, admittedly, a few good tunes too), to have him cut it off halfway through to play -- I swear to god -- Huey Lewis. Huey.. Fucking... Lewis. He pulled down Phish to play Huey... Fucking... Lewis. That was the last straw. I 86'd Buddy Dank Radio and put up a nice Bob Seger play list. Vast improvement.
Buddy's got a fairly eclectic collection of tunes on the request list, but a large number of them are things I'm sure would never get played in their entirety based on my recent experience. If "Bouncing 'Round the Room" isn't upbeat enough, I'm guessing Harry Chapin's "Taxi" or any of the Henry Mancini tracks wouldn't make it very far. There are a lot of songs in the list that I personally like, including "Taxi", but they aren't exactly party tunes. I spent a lot of time looking through the list trying to find something agreeable to me and not objectionable to everyone else. Trust me, that's a thin line to walk. Apparently I failed to find the right balance.
What Buddy Dank Radio really needs is a few more songs about waffles. Played at least four times an hour. That will definitely improve things. And maybe a couple zippy Henry Mancini tunes. I wonder if he has any Herb Alpert? I haven't heard the Tijuana Brass in ages. Glen Campbell... A little "Wichita Lineman" should get things hopping.
Okay, so I'm just kidding. I'd rather get my fingernails AND toenails pulled out with rusty pliers than have to listen to rap.
Seriously, Buddy, I do wish you well with the streamcast. It's a cool idea. But I really won't be listening any more. I enjoy the commentary; it's just not worth sitting through a bunch of music I dislike for the occasional witty remark or major meltdown when somebody sucks out on you. I know I'm in a small minority on this so I doubt you'll notice a drop in listenership.
Tonight, I believe, is Riverchasers. If my ass isn't too sore from last night, I'll probably be there.
19 June 2007
MATH sucks (out)
I'm torn between wanting to whine about the bad beat that sent me to the rails in last night's MATH and wanting to rise above it and just take it in stride. I see no middle ground between the two. Eh, we'll see how I feel when I get to that point in the story.
I got a nice bump early when my very speculative play of 45s came in with a well hidden straight on the turn and DDionysus couldn't get away from his top two pair. Still in level one and I was up 1000. Nice.
Sadly, I hovered at roughly that same spot for a very long time. Then I made a move in the wrong direction and hovered in that same spot for a long time too.
Apparently people have been getting more serious about the whole BBT thing. Even in deep stack events like the MATH, you frequently see a good portion of the field eliminated by the first break. Such was not the case last night.
Somewhere along in here while I was moving sideways, smokkee moved to our table and dropped about half his already too small stack. But he doubled when his KQs bested NewinNov's AQs when the flop brought a K. A short while later he doubled again when his AK filled to a full house against cemfredmd's QQ.
After a very long period of nothing worth reporting, I caught AA and managed to turn a small profit. This moved me far enough up that all I needed to do was survive to make the points. I'd been in serious danger of not doing so before this.
Finally, the points bubble burst and there were several quick eliminations.
Well, now we're to the bad beat. I guess it hurt more than usual because I set a trap, I got somebody to willingly walk into it, and they rivered their 6-outer to send me home rather than moving well into the top ten. Sometimes poker sucks. I guess I'll just leave it at that.
I finished something like 25th, which apparently gave me enough points to move up to 57th on the BBT leaderboard. Top 50 is my current goal. I missed too many events during my hiatus to have any reasonable hope of a much higher finish. I'll settle for making the freeroll at the end of the season. And if 13% shots stop sending me to the rails, I just might make it.
Earlier in the evening I played another of the Tier One tourneys trying to replace the ticket I used to play the MATH. This was THE tightest of these events I have ever played. Usually there are three or four eliminations in the first couple levels. A small hand full of chips had barely passed from one stack to another by that time in this one.
I was doing okay, having stolen a number of pots, when I get AQ in the BB. Somebody on the other side of the table raises it to 2BB. The alarm bells went off but I didn't listen. With some players this is an almost sure sign of AA. With others it's a sign of weakness. It's hard to know which until you've seen them do it and observed the results.
Instead of doing the smart thing and carefully observing the coiled snake in the middle of the trail, I decided to poke it with a stick. I re-raise to three times his bet. This was dumb from at least two perspectives. Aside from the AA alarms, if he called it left him pretty much pot committed and me forced to call his all-in due to the pot odds. Dumb, dumb, dumb.
He pushes. Getting 3-to-1 from the pot, I'm forced to call. Of course, he's got the rockets and the board doesn't fill the straight it gave me a shot at on the flop.
Later, down to about M=5, I push with some crap cards, hoping everybody will lay down and I'll buy another round to catch something decent. The same guy calls me and turns over, you guessed it, pocket rockets. What are the odds of getting into big hands twice with the same guy and both times he's got a monster like that? Sometimes poker sucks.
I got a nice bump early when my very speculative play of 45s came in with a well hidden straight on the turn and DDionysus couldn't get away from his top two pair. Still in level one and I was up 1000. Nice.
Sadly, I hovered at roughly that same spot for a very long time. Then I made a move in the wrong direction and hovered in that same spot for a long time too.
Apparently people have been getting more serious about the whole BBT thing. Even in deep stack events like the MATH, you frequently see a good portion of the field eliminated by the first break. Such was not the case last night.
Somewhere along in here while I was moving sideways, smokkee moved to our table and dropped about half his already too small stack. But he doubled when his KQs bested NewinNov's AQs when the flop brought a K. A short while later he doubled again when his AK filled to a full house against cemfredmd's QQ.
After a very long period of nothing worth reporting, I caught AA and managed to turn a small profit. This moved me far enough up that all I needed to do was survive to make the points. I'd been in serious danger of not doing so before this.
Finally, the points bubble burst and there were several quick eliminations.
Well, now we're to the bad beat. I guess it hurt more than usual because I set a trap, I got somebody to willingly walk into it, and they rivered their 6-outer to send me home rather than moving well into the top ten. Sometimes poker sucks. I guess I'll just leave it at that.
I finished something like 25th, which apparently gave me enough points to move up to 57th on the BBT leaderboard. Top 50 is my current goal. I missed too many events during my hiatus to have any reasonable hope of a much higher finish. I'll settle for making the freeroll at the end of the season. And if 13% shots stop sending me to the rails, I just might make it.
Earlier in the evening I played another of the Tier One tourneys trying to replace the ticket I used to play the MATH. This was THE tightest of these events I have ever played. Usually there are three or four eliminations in the first couple levels. A small hand full of chips had barely passed from one stack to another by that time in this one.
I was doing okay, having stolen a number of pots, when I get AQ in the BB. Somebody on the other side of the table raises it to 2BB. The alarm bells went off but I didn't listen. With some players this is an almost sure sign of AA. With others it's a sign of weakness. It's hard to know which until you've seen them do it and observed the results.
Instead of doing the smart thing and carefully observing the coiled snake in the middle of the trail, I decided to poke it with a stick. I re-raise to three times his bet. This was dumb from at least two perspectives. Aside from the AA alarms, if he called it left him pretty much pot committed and me forced to call his all-in due to the pot odds. Dumb, dumb, dumb.
He pushes. Getting 3-to-1 from the pot, I'm forced to call. Of course, he's got the rockets and the board doesn't fill the straight it gave me a shot at on the flop.
Later, down to about M=5, I push with some crap cards, hoping everybody will lay down and I'll buy another round to catch something decent. The same guy calls me and turns over, you guessed it, pocket rockets. What are the odds of getting into big hands twice with the same guy and both times he's got a monster like that? Sometimes poker sucks.
15 June 2007
My Most Memorable Hand
BuddyDank offered as his question for the winner of next week's Mookie -- what is the most memorable hand of poker you've ever played? Because I've never really come close to winning a Mookie and have a very high probability of continuing that particular record far beyond next week, and because I think it's a great question, I'm going to jump the gun a bit and provide my answer here. Remember, Buddy, imitation is the sincerest form of flattery.
A few hands come to mind here. I don't know that any of them demonstrate any special skill or cunning on my part, but they definitely were memorable.
Early in my online poker playing I spent most of my time at Pacific Poker. Pacific Poker, particularly back then, was an aquarium. They have a very large online casino operation through the associated 888.com. Lots of regular casino gamblers, who hadn't clue one of how to play proper poker, would wander into the poker room which was shared with Pacific Poker. Some of the worst play in the world occurred at Pacific Poker. If you could get past the bad beats, it was a great place to play.
I was playing 1/2 limit one night when the following happened. I'm in the BB with KTs. There are several limpers and I just check. The flop is 66Q, with two of them in my suit. It checks around to me. Having four cards to the second nut flush, I bet. Several people call. The turn brings a 9 in my suit, filling my flush. I was very happy to get the flush, but given the way my luck typically ran I was fully expecting the river to bring another of that suit and fill the flush for somebody who held just the A. It's been quite a while so I don't recall all the details, but there was some betting and three of us see the river.
The river is turned up and, just as I figured, it was another of my suit. No sooner did I say to myself, "Damn, I knew that was going to happen," than I noticed it was the J of that suit. I just filled a straight flush. Bells are going off in my head and it's all I can do to ponder the best approach to getting as much as I can into the pot. I was so happy that the guy on the button was cooperating by betting and re-raising that I never really stopped to think about what he might be holding. We hit the 3-raise limit and the cards were turned over, revealing his pocket 6's. He'd flopped four sixes. I was both laughing my ass off and feeling sorry for him at the same time.
The poor guy left the table almost immediately. A couple nights later I spot him at a table and take the seat right next to him. He left before the next hand was dealt. I guess he remembered me.
I'd have to call that my second most memorable hand. My most memorable happened in a tournament at Full Tilt. I didn't have all that much tournament experience at the time and entered this one spur of the moment. It must have been one of the regularly scheduled ones because there was a decent sized field.
We were a ways in -- past the first break -- when I get pocket rockets. I put in a small raise and am just hoping somebody will want to play. My dream, of course, is to get all my chips in the pot. Some guy on the other side of the table pushes all-in. I'm thinking, "Yee-hah! I got a fish on the line!" Then some guy after him also pushes all-in. Even better, though I'm starting to get a little concerned about two people having shots at out-drawing me. Of course I call.
The cards come up and both of the other guys are showing KK. KK vs KK vs AA. I've played hundreds of thousands of hands. I've seen tons of cooler hands dealt. But that is the only time I've ever seen KK vs KK vs AA. The flop is rainbow and I've got a lock on a triple up. That was sweet.
That tournament also ended up being one of my biggest cashes.
If you've got a memorable hand story and don't plan on winning the Mookie this week, leave a comment and tell us about it.
A few hands come to mind here. I don't know that any of them demonstrate any special skill or cunning on my part, but they definitely were memorable.
Early in my online poker playing I spent most of my time at Pacific Poker. Pacific Poker, particularly back then, was an aquarium. They have a very large online casino operation through the associated 888.com. Lots of regular casino gamblers, who hadn't clue one of how to play proper poker, would wander into the poker room which was shared with Pacific Poker. Some of the worst play in the world occurred at Pacific Poker. If you could get past the bad beats, it was a great place to play.
I was playing 1/2 limit one night when the following happened. I'm in the BB with KTs. There are several limpers and I just check. The flop is 66Q, with two of them in my suit. It checks around to me. Having four cards to the second nut flush, I bet. Several people call. The turn brings a 9 in my suit, filling my flush. I was very happy to get the flush, but given the way my luck typically ran I was fully expecting the river to bring another of that suit and fill the flush for somebody who held just the A. It's been quite a while so I don't recall all the details, but there was some betting and three of us see the river.
The river is turned up and, just as I figured, it was another of my suit. No sooner did I say to myself, "Damn, I knew that was going to happen," than I noticed it was the J of that suit. I just filled a straight flush. Bells are going off in my head and it's all I can do to ponder the best approach to getting as much as I can into the pot. I was so happy that the guy on the button was cooperating by betting and re-raising that I never really stopped to think about what he might be holding. We hit the 3-raise limit and the cards were turned over, revealing his pocket 6's. He'd flopped four sixes. I was both laughing my ass off and feeling sorry for him at the same time.
The poor guy left the table almost immediately. A couple nights later I spot him at a table and take the seat right next to him. He left before the next hand was dealt. I guess he remembered me.
I'd have to call that my second most memorable hand. My most memorable happened in a tournament at Full Tilt. I didn't have all that much tournament experience at the time and entered this one spur of the moment. It must have been one of the regularly scheduled ones because there was a decent sized field.
We were a ways in -- past the first break -- when I get pocket rockets. I put in a small raise and am just hoping somebody will want to play. My dream, of course, is to get all my chips in the pot. Some guy on the other side of the table pushes all-in. I'm thinking, "Yee-hah! I got a fish on the line!" Then some guy after him also pushes all-in. Even better, though I'm starting to get a little concerned about two people having shots at out-drawing me. Of course I call.
The cards come up and both of the other guys are showing KK. KK vs KK vs AA. I've played hundreds of thousands of hands. I've seen tons of cooler hands dealt. But that is the only time I've ever seen KK vs KK vs AA. The flop is rainbow and I've got a lock on a triple up. That was sweet.
That tournament also ended up being one of my biggest cashes.
If you've got a memorable hand story and don't plan on winning the Mookie this week, leave a comment and tell us about it.
River who?
Played the Riverchasers last night, though I might just as well have kept my $11. I lasted all of about 12 minutes. It's small consolation, I suppose, but at least I did get it all in with the better of it, JJ vs AKo, and I was the one who made the move, forcing the other guy to call my all-in with just a coin flip. He flopped an A and I went home very early.
At least I only dropped one spot on the BBT leaderboard.
I think I may take this weekend off from poker and catch up on some of the TV shows I've been stockpiling. Maybe even get out of the house and go somewhere.
Completely unrelated to poker, a news show I watched yesterday showed a YouTube clip from the show "Britain's Got Talent". I am about as far from a fan of this form of music as you can get, but this was amazing. The performance, the guy's backstory and the judges' reactions all make it well worth watching. Check it out.
At least I only dropped one spot on the BBT leaderboard.
I think I may take this weekend off from poker and catch up on some of the TV shows I've been stockpiling. Maybe even get out of the house and go somewhere.
Completely unrelated to poker, a news show I watched yesterday showed a YouTube clip from the show "Britain's Got Talent". I am about as far from a fan of this form of music as you can get, but this was amazing. The performance, the guy's backstory and the judges' reactions all make it well worth watching. Check it out.
14 June 2007
Mookie, Dookie, and things just kookie
I played the Mookie, the Dookie, and another FTP Tier One ticket tournament. Dinner, which was great, by the way -- Capital Grill, dry aged beef, yummmmmmmmm -- ended a bit earlier than I expected so I played the Tier One tournament while waiting for the Mookie to start. Oh, one more thing about dinner, they had the best calamari I've ever had. Very tender and served with sauteed chilis. There were what looked like sliced jalapenos and some of those round red chilis that are a bit spicy. The chilis and the calamari went together fabulously. Highly recommended.
I'm going to go in reverse order to get the less exciting items out of the way first. The Dookie was turbo razz last night. I have a love-hate relationship with razz. It can be the easiest game in the world if you're getting cards. Or it can be frustration cubed if you're not. I was actually doing okay toward the beginning. Stole a few pots, won a few the proper way. Then the cards dried up. I'd make a run at a pot, clearly in the lead, and cards would fall exactly wrong for me. The blinds had escalated so by the time this happened it was very expensive. I went from being in good shape to being in trouble very quickly. I can't find the hand history for my final hand, so I guess you're spared the gory details.
I was doing okay in the Mookie -- not great, but on track to make the points and possibly more -- until IslandBum1 hit his 7-outer at the river to beat my flopped two pair. I was happy with the way I played it, just not the outcome. I successfully enticed him to put it all in the middle when I was better than 2:1 to win. Hard to not like that situation.
I had IslandBum1 covered so I wasn't out of it, but I was hurting now. So when the flop comes 77T with me holding T6, I pushed it all in the middle. Unfortunately, NumbBono had TQ and the board did not provide me with a better kicker. I went out just before the break and missing the points by just a couple positions.
There's one hand from the Tier One tournament I'd like to mention. We were on the ticket bubble and I was in very good shape. I quite likely could have sat out and still got a ticket. The short stack, who was down to something like 1000 with blinds at 300/600, was to my immediate left. I get QQ. Ordinarily, in this situation, I'd fold.
Yes, you heard me right. I'm not looking to "win" this, I'm just looking not to lose. QQ is a hand that at this point is likely to win you a little or lose you a lot. I don't need the chips and I certainly don't want to lose a lot. But the shortie is clearly in push or fold territory and QQ is a hand I'd be willing to take up against his desperation all-in. So I just call. I'm only calling because the shortie acts after I do and I want to still be in the pot if he decides to push. Turns out he folds.
So it's NewinNov in the BB and me to the flop. It always strikes me as kind of odd accidentally bumping into someone I know from other tournaments -- the blogger events in this case -- in some other random tournament. And I'm never sure if I should say hello or if we should pretend we don't know each other just so the other players don't suspect some kind of collusion. I know, I'm being paranoid. Anyway, the flop brings a K. It actually didn't matter what the flop brought. Short of the other two Q's or maybe a straight flush, I'm not investing anything more in this pot anyway. I probably could have gotten some more chips on the river since NewinNov caught a pair of J's, but it seemed to better meet our mutual goal of eliminating the shortie to just check it all the way down.
Some might not agree with the way I played this, but I think I played it right given the situation and the goal of simply surviving one more elimination. Comments, of course, are welcome.
The next BBT event is Riverchasers, tonight, 9pm EDT, at Full Tilt. See you there.
I'm going to go in reverse order to get the less exciting items out of the way first. The Dookie was turbo razz last night. I have a love-hate relationship with razz. It can be the easiest game in the world if you're getting cards. Or it can be frustration cubed if you're not. I was actually doing okay toward the beginning. Stole a few pots, won a few the proper way. Then the cards dried up. I'd make a run at a pot, clearly in the lead, and cards would fall exactly wrong for me. The blinds had escalated so by the time this happened it was very expensive. I went from being in good shape to being in trouble very quickly. I can't find the hand history for my final hand, so I guess you're spared the gory details.
I was doing okay in the Mookie -- not great, but on track to make the points and possibly more -- until IslandBum1 hit his 7-outer at the river to beat my flopped two pair. I was happy with the way I played it, just not the outcome. I successfully enticed him to put it all in the middle when I was better than 2:1 to win. Hard to not like that situation.
I had IslandBum1 covered so I wasn't out of it, but I was hurting now. So when the flop comes 77T with me holding T6, I pushed it all in the middle. Unfortunately, NumbBono had TQ and the board did not provide me with a better kicker. I went out just before the break and missing the points by just a couple positions.
There's one hand from the Tier One tournament I'd like to mention. We were on the ticket bubble and I was in very good shape. I quite likely could have sat out and still got a ticket. The short stack, who was down to something like 1000 with blinds at 300/600, was to my immediate left. I get QQ. Ordinarily, in this situation, I'd fold.
Yes, you heard me right. I'm not looking to "win" this, I'm just looking not to lose. QQ is a hand that at this point is likely to win you a little or lose you a lot. I don't need the chips and I certainly don't want to lose a lot. But the shortie is clearly in push or fold territory and QQ is a hand I'd be willing to take up against his desperation all-in. So I just call. I'm only calling because the shortie acts after I do and I want to still be in the pot if he decides to push. Turns out he folds.
So it's NewinNov in the BB and me to the flop. It always strikes me as kind of odd accidentally bumping into someone I know from other tournaments -- the blogger events in this case -- in some other random tournament. And I'm never sure if I should say hello or if we should pretend we don't know each other just so the other players don't suspect some kind of collusion. I know, I'm being paranoid. Anyway, the flop brings a K. It actually didn't matter what the flop brought. Short of the other two Q's or maybe a straight flush, I'm not investing anything more in this pot anyway. I probably could have gotten some more chips on the river since NewinNov caught a pair of J's, but it seemed to better meet our mutual goal of eliminating the shortie to just check it all the way down.
Some might not agree with the way I played this, but I think I played it right given the situation and the goal of simply surviving one more elimination. Comments, of course, are welcome.
The next BBT event is Riverchasers, tonight, 9pm EDT, at Full Tilt. See you there.
12 June 2007
MATH and milestones
Played the MATH last night at Full Tilt. I and several others had the distinct misfortune of being at a table with a big stack commanded by someone who knew how to use it. Then I got transferred to a table where there were two big stacks to my immediate left. I couldn't do anything without one of them coming over the top. Sadly, I was not getting the cards generally required in such a situation. I never really got started, so I spent most of the time watching my stack shrink. I did make the BBT points, but just barely.
I did get to witness what has to be one of the biggest comebacks in history. Zeem at one point was down to just 87 chips -- about 1/30 the stack size of the next smallest stack at the table. He pushes all-in and quintuples up when his K6o caught a 6 on the flop and everyone else completely whiffed. Blinded down just a bit, a few hands later he doubles up to ~700. A few hands after that he doubles up again when he rivers an 8 to beat garthmeister's A high. A while later he doubles again when he rivers a 9 for two pair against Iggy's TPTK. A few hands later he doubles yet again when his AQo flops an A to defeat RecessRampage's KK. From 87 to 7300 in what turned out to be twelve minutes of table time.
The milestone mentioned in the title was actually achieved with my last post, the 100th in this blog. Thank you, thank you. You're really too kind. Monetary recognition of this milestone may be sent to my Party Poker account. Just kidding. I'd never add more money to my Part Poker account. Use my Full Tilt account.
No WWdN tonight. I've heard rumors of a replacement donkament if you're so inclined. The next BBT event is The Mookie on Wednesday. I'm not sure if I'm going to be able to make this one. Real life may get in the way.
I did get to witness what has to be one of the biggest comebacks in history. Zeem at one point was down to just 87 chips -- about 1/30 the stack size of the next smallest stack at the table. He pushes all-in and quintuples up when his K6o caught a 6 on the flop and everyone else completely whiffed. Blinded down just a bit, a few hands later he doubles up to ~700. A few hands after that he doubles up again when he rivers an 8 to beat garthmeister's A high. A while later he doubles again when he rivers a 9 for two pair against Iggy's TPTK. A few hands later he doubles yet again when his AQo flops an A to defeat RecessRampage's KK. From 87 to 7300 in what turned out to be twelve minutes of table time.
The milestone mentioned in the title was actually achieved with my last post, the 100th in this blog. Thank you, thank you. You're really too kind. Monetary recognition of this milestone may be sent to my Party Poker account. Just kidding. I'd never add more money to my Part Poker account. Use my Full Tilt account.
No WWdN tonight. I've heard rumors of a replacement donkament if you're so inclined. The next BBT event is The Mookie on Wednesday. I'm not sure if I'm going to be able to make this one. Real life may get in the way.
11 June 2007
Weekend poker
I played the blogger donkament at Full Tilt on Friday. Apparently it's been going on for a while but I just read of it this week. A $1+$1 rebuy with a $1500 add-on. I'm not a huge fan of rebuys, but this one had a few things going for it. It was cheap. It was clearly just for fun. It was cheap.
I set my options for maximum auto-rebuy and headed off to see how stupidly I could play. The answer, apparently, was very, very, very stupid. I recall briefly holding the chip lead, but donking it all away. Seven rebuys and an add-on, and I still couldn't get anywhere.
BuddyDank again provided tunes and commentary during the tournament. He even noticed my subtle request for some classic Thorogood. Thanks, Buddy. I look forward to your future 'casts.
Full Tilt has finally stopped spending money on cute new avatars and has made a few worthy program upgrades. They now offer a time bank like PokerStars and have a full two minutes of disconnect protection. The latter may or may not be a good thing, largely depending on your perspective. If you have a flakey connection like I did when living in the hotel, it should be a great feature, particularly if they also did something with the part of the software that detects the disconnect. That was always my issue. It took their software forever to recognize there had been a disconnection and to then reconnect. Fortunately, I now have a very reliable connection, especially since dumping that POS D-Link wireless router.
While waiting for the blogger donkament I played another of the turbo tier one ticket tournaments. If you have patience and don't get greedy, these things tend to be fairly easy. Playing for fourth or fifth is a lot simpler than playing for first. Highlights included a beautifully slow-played AA and me catching a set of fives against a slow-played TP aces, Q kicker.
I just don't get some people. I'm pretty sure my understanding of the game has not progressed to the point where I've completely lost touch with the beginning levels, but some play still mystifies me. One limp and it's to you in the SB with AQo. You call. Eh? I don't get it. AQo isn't strong enough to slow-play, but it's certainly strong enough to put in a decent raise here. I'm making it 4-5BB and hoping I can grab the BB and the limp. But he just calls.
The flop comes A72 with two spades. No spades in your hand. Top pair, strong kicker in a hand with all limpers. You're probably ahead here (you do have the mighty hammer to be concerned about, but there were no pre-flop raises so you're probably safe there), but there is a spade draw looming. So, what do you do? Bet the pot or a bit more and take it down right now, right? Nope, you slow-play your TP by just checking. Oh, yeah, this is always a good move.
The pre-flop limper bets 2/3 the pot. Okay, so your slow-play has paid off and it's time to make your move, right? Nope, you continue your slow-play, just calling. Huh? How do you not move in here? You're almost certainly ahead, but you're vulnerable. There's a flush draw and a straight draw staring you right in the face and you decide to continue the slow-play? This is a rather Hoy-esque move, but I don't think even the master would have just called at this point.
The turn brings a 5. It doesn't look like a scare card, though it does fill the straight for the 34 and it also brought a second flush draw. You continue the slow-play and check. Okay, I can't disagree with this one. The other guy bet the flop so there's no reason to think he won't bet the turn. If the plan is to move in now, the check makes sense. Might as well give him a chance to throw some more chips our way.
But, whoa, the other guy moves all-in. And he has us covered. If he had a 34 the five made his straight. Do we really want to risk the rest of our chips calling an all-in with just TP? Of course we do! What? Wait! We're calling an all-in with two flush draws and a potential made straight, and a possible OESD on the board? And all we've got is TP?
This guy had three bites at the apple before the turn and he passed up all three. Then, looking at a board with a ton of draw potential (none of it his) and an all-in from a player who's shown some strength already, he calls with TP for all the rest of his chips. I don't usually like to critique other people's play -- at least not publicly -- but this struck me as someone determined to make mistakes until he gave away all his chips. I don't think it would have been possible to play this particular hand worse than this. Folding the AQo rather than completing the SB would have been a lesser mistake.
So I almost double up and take a fairly commanding chip lead. If this was a normal tournament I would have pressured the hell out of my table, but in this one the top five all get the same prize. I should have just phoned it in from this point. Hell, I should have sat out. Unless it dragged out for a long time, there's no way I would have blinded out before we were down to the last five.
Instead I got aggressive/greedy with QQ and ran it into an AK that flopped an A. (We got it in pre-flop.) I had him covered by a wide margin so I was far from out of it, but I couldn't coast to victory. We had three serious shortstacks at the final table. After they were gone it was just a matter of not being the next eliminated. I succeeded in that at least. So I'm all set for the MATH tonight.
I continued my quest to clear my PokerStars bonus. $1/$2 limit hold'em was kind to me on Saturday, though I gave it all back on Sunday. I think it was about a wash. And I did clear the bonus. This may be the first bonus in ages I've cleared without losing two to three times the bonus amount in the process. Things are looking up!
I'm looking forward to besting my effort last week in the MATH tonight. Hope to see you there.
I set my options for maximum auto-rebuy and headed off to see how stupidly I could play. The answer, apparently, was very, very, very stupid. I recall briefly holding the chip lead, but donking it all away. Seven rebuys and an add-on, and I still couldn't get anywhere.
BuddyDank again provided tunes and commentary during the tournament. He even noticed my subtle request for some classic Thorogood. Thanks, Buddy. I look forward to your future 'casts.
Full Tilt has finally stopped spending money on cute new avatars and has made a few worthy program upgrades. They now offer a time bank like PokerStars and have a full two minutes of disconnect protection. The latter may or may not be a good thing, largely depending on your perspective. If you have a flakey connection like I did when living in the hotel, it should be a great feature, particularly if they also did something with the part of the software that detects the disconnect. That was always my issue. It took their software forever to recognize there had been a disconnection and to then reconnect. Fortunately, I now have a very reliable connection, especially since dumping that POS D-Link wireless router.
While waiting for the blogger donkament I played another of the turbo tier one ticket tournaments. If you have patience and don't get greedy, these things tend to be fairly easy. Playing for fourth or fifth is a lot simpler than playing for first. Highlights included a beautifully slow-played AA and me catching a set of fives against a slow-played TP aces, Q kicker.
I just don't get some people. I'm pretty sure my understanding of the game has not progressed to the point where I've completely lost touch with the beginning levels, but some play still mystifies me. One limp and it's to you in the SB with AQo. You call. Eh? I don't get it. AQo isn't strong enough to slow-play, but it's certainly strong enough to put in a decent raise here. I'm making it 4-5BB and hoping I can grab the BB and the limp. But he just calls.
The flop comes A72 with two spades. No spades in your hand. Top pair, strong kicker in a hand with all limpers. You're probably ahead here (you do have the mighty hammer to be concerned about, but there were no pre-flop raises so you're probably safe there), but there is a spade draw looming. So, what do you do? Bet the pot or a bit more and take it down right now, right? Nope, you slow-play your TP by just checking. Oh, yeah, this is always a good move.
The pre-flop limper bets 2/3 the pot. Okay, so your slow-play has paid off and it's time to make your move, right? Nope, you continue your slow-play, just calling. Huh? How do you not move in here? You're almost certainly ahead, but you're vulnerable. There's a flush draw and a straight draw staring you right in the face and you decide to continue the slow-play? This is a rather Hoy-esque move, but I don't think even the master would have just called at this point.
The turn brings a 5. It doesn't look like a scare card, though it does fill the straight for the 34 and it also brought a second flush draw. You continue the slow-play and check. Okay, I can't disagree with this one. The other guy bet the flop so there's no reason to think he won't bet the turn. If the plan is to move in now, the check makes sense. Might as well give him a chance to throw some more chips our way.
But, whoa, the other guy moves all-in. And he has us covered. If he had a 34 the five made his straight. Do we really want to risk the rest of our chips calling an all-in with just TP? Of course we do! What? Wait! We're calling an all-in with two flush draws and a potential made straight, and a possible OESD on the board? And all we've got is TP?
This guy had three bites at the apple before the turn and he passed up all three. Then, looking at a board with a ton of draw potential (none of it his) and an all-in from a player who's shown some strength already, he calls with TP for all the rest of his chips. I don't usually like to critique other people's play -- at least not publicly -- but this struck me as someone determined to make mistakes until he gave away all his chips. I don't think it would have been possible to play this particular hand worse than this. Folding the AQo rather than completing the SB would have been a lesser mistake.
So I almost double up and take a fairly commanding chip lead. If this was a normal tournament I would have pressured the hell out of my table, but in this one the top five all get the same prize. I should have just phoned it in from this point. Hell, I should have sat out. Unless it dragged out for a long time, there's no way I would have blinded out before we were down to the last five.
Instead I got aggressive/greedy with QQ and ran it into an AK that flopped an A. (We got it in pre-flop.) I had him covered by a wide margin so I was far from out of it, but I couldn't coast to victory. We had three serious shortstacks at the final table. After they were gone it was just a matter of not being the next eliminated. I succeeded in that at least. So I'm all set for the MATH tonight.
I continued my quest to clear my PokerStars bonus. $1/$2 limit hold'em was kind to me on Saturday, though I gave it all back on Sunday. I think it was about a wash. And I did clear the bonus. This may be the first bonus in ages I've cleared without losing two to three times the bonus amount in the process. Things are looking up!
I'm looking forward to besting my effort last week in the MATH tonight. Hope to see you there.
07 June 2007
The Mookie or my night of endless suckouts
I had a pretty good night at The Mookie, though it was far more through dumb luck than great poker skill. I finished 5th of 51. For those keeping score, that's a 4th and a 5th for me in blogger events this week. Apparently my time away from poker did me some good.
I'm going to try to be a bit more concise with the discussion of the hands this time. My first big hand came with the blinds at 25/50 and me in the BB with a very impressive 85o. Three of us see a flop of 898, two suited. I bet 100, BrLKoSTa420 raised to 200, SB folds, I make it 600, he pushes, I call. BrLKoSTa420 obviously didn't take me for having an 8 and I either made a fantastic read or was a fool. He shows A9, gets no help on the turn or river, and I double up to 2630.
The next big one was my first major suckout of the night. With the blinds at 50/100, boneyardxxx makes it 350 to go. I'm feeling frisky on the back of several smaller wins and decide my AQo is enough to put him to the test. He started the hand with 1110 so I put him almost all the way in. He thought a few seconds and then pushed in the rest. He shows AKo and I'm going, "Oooopppsss". But the flop brings a Q and I send him back to the boneyard. Sorry, dude.
The next big suckout was against smokkee. This needs a bit of back story. Smokkee had been nearing the danger zone for a while and had pushed all-in several times in the preceding hands. His chat also showed he was getting anxious. So when he pushed again from UTG+1, I figured there was a chance my 88 was ahead. It also cost me less than a third of my stack. Losing would have hurt, but I'd still have been in fairly decent shape. I was a bit surprised when he turned over JJ. The surprise continued when I rivered a third 8 and sent smokkee packing.
The next in my long line of suckouts came against katiemother. Blinds/antes at 120/240/25, she calls from the button, I complete from the SB with 86s, GCox25 checks. Flop is A66, two suited. Check, check, 920 from katiemother. The two suited thing bothered me just a bit so I decided to make my move here. I push. I had both of them covered by quite a lot so I was risking about half my stack. GCox25 folds, katiemother calls and shows Q6. I'm in trouble. I need the case 6, an A, a K, or an 8. Eight outs to a tie, three to a win. The river brings my 8. Apparently I've been saving up luck all this time I've been away from the tables.
I'm up to 15,660 now and am somewhere near the top of the leaderboard.
Finally comes a big pot that I won without a suckout. I wake up to AA in the cutoff. Since I'm by far the big stack at the table, I need to be a bit cagey to get some action. I just call. Real cagey, eh? SB completes, BB checks. Flop is Q53. (This brings back bad memories of the SnG I played earlier in the evening where I'd put in a big raise with AQ from the SB and got one caller from EP who'd limped. Same flop. I'm short so I push. He calls and shows 53s. The idiot called my 5BB raise with 53s. How do you defend against brilliant play like that? That's probably what my opponents have been saying about me up to this point.) I get lucky and NomeyMyHomey bets 600 into the 920 pot. I make it 1920 to go (must have been a slider special). Meanhappyguy folds, NomeyMyHomey calls. Turn brings an 8. Nomey, for some reason, pushes all-in for 3820. There's already about 4800 in the pot, so I'm not going away. He's got just an OESD, which the river does not fill.
The beginning of my demise came due to, you guessed it, a suckout. My 99 vs NumbersGame's 77. Flop brings a 7, eventually filling to a full house, and I drop over a third of my stack, leaving me 9k with blinds/antes at 250/500/50 and the final table down to the last six.
Willwonka was next to go when his AKo fell to drmindbendr's A7s when the river brought a 7.
I made my exit a few hands later when the flop paired my weak A and meanhappyguy had me outkicked. No suckout to the rescue this time. I finish 5th of 51.
Seems "concise" just isn't in my nature. Oh well...
Kudos to BuddyDank for streamcasting music and commentary during the whole tournament. Some of the commentary was very funny. Responding to the request for Hanson was funny and more than a bit scary. I hope that was a quick internet download and not a catalog selection. Can't say I was thrilled with the turn toward rap at the end. Also made me feel really old when I'm cringing having to listen to that crap and everyone else is obviously digging it.
The next BBT event is the MATH next Monday. Given my performances in the last two events I just may have to play.
I'm going to try to be a bit more concise with the discussion of the hands this time. My first big hand came with the blinds at 25/50 and me in the BB with a very impressive 85o. Three of us see a flop of 898, two suited. I bet 100, BrLKoSTa420 raised to 200, SB folds, I make it 600, he pushes, I call. BrLKoSTa420 obviously didn't take me for having an 8 and I either made a fantastic read or was a fool. He shows A9, gets no help on the turn or river, and I double up to 2630.
The next big one was my first major suckout of the night. With the blinds at 50/100, boneyardxxx makes it 350 to go. I'm feeling frisky on the back of several smaller wins and decide my AQo is enough to put him to the test. He started the hand with 1110 so I put him almost all the way in. He thought a few seconds and then pushed in the rest. He shows AKo and I'm going, "Oooopppsss". But the flop brings a Q and I send him back to the boneyard. Sorry, dude.
The next big suckout was against smokkee. This needs a bit of back story. Smokkee had been nearing the danger zone for a while and had pushed all-in several times in the preceding hands. His chat also showed he was getting anxious. So when he pushed again from UTG+1, I figured there was a chance my 88 was ahead. It also cost me less than a third of my stack. Losing would have hurt, but I'd still have been in fairly decent shape. I was a bit surprised when he turned over JJ. The surprise continued when I rivered a third 8 and sent smokkee packing.
The next in my long line of suckouts came against katiemother. Blinds/antes at 120/240/25, she calls from the button, I complete from the SB with 86s, GCox25 checks. Flop is A66, two suited. Check, check, 920 from katiemother. The two suited thing bothered me just a bit so I decided to make my move here. I push. I had both of them covered by quite a lot so I was risking about half my stack. GCox25 folds, katiemother calls and shows Q6. I'm in trouble. I need the case 6, an A, a K, or an 8. Eight outs to a tie, three to a win. The river brings my 8. Apparently I've been saving up luck all this time I've been away from the tables.
I'm up to 15,660 now and am somewhere near the top of the leaderboard.
Finally comes a big pot that I won without a suckout. I wake up to AA in the cutoff. Since I'm by far the big stack at the table, I need to be a bit cagey to get some action. I just call. Real cagey, eh? SB completes, BB checks. Flop is Q53. (This brings back bad memories of the SnG I played earlier in the evening where I'd put in a big raise with AQ from the SB and got one caller from EP who'd limped. Same flop. I'm short so I push. He calls and shows 53s. The idiot called my 5BB raise with 53s. How do you defend against brilliant play like that? That's probably what my opponents have been saying about me up to this point.) I get lucky and NomeyMyHomey bets 600 into the 920 pot. I make it 1920 to go (must have been a slider special). Meanhappyguy folds, NomeyMyHomey calls. Turn brings an 8. Nomey, for some reason, pushes all-in for 3820. There's already about 4800 in the pot, so I'm not going away. He's got just an OESD, which the river does not fill.
The beginning of my demise came due to, you guessed it, a suckout. My 99 vs NumbersGame's 77. Flop brings a 7, eventually filling to a full house, and I drop over a third of my stack, leaving me 9k with blinds/antes at 250/500/50 and the final table down to the last six.
Willwonka was next to go when his AKo fell to drmindbendr's A7s when the river brought a 7.
I made my exit a few hands later when the flop paired my weak A and meanhappyguy had me outkicked. No suckout to the rescue this time. I finish 5th of 51.
Seems "concise" just isn't in my nature. Oh well...
Kudos to BuddyDank for streamcasting music and commentary during the whole tournament. Some of the commentary was very funny. Responding to the request for Hanson was funny and more than a bit scary. I hope that was a quick internet download and not a catalog selection. Can't say I was thrilled with the turn toward rap at the end. Also made me feel really old when I'm cringing having to listen to that crap and everyone else is obviously digging it.
The next BBT event is the MATH next Monday. Given my performances in the last two events I just may have to play.
06 June 2007
RIP WWdN
It was with sadness and regret that I read of the demise of the progenitor of the blogger tournaments, the WWdN. I was most regretful that I hadn't read of this until this morning, after the final tournament was over.
The WWdN was the tournament that got me interested in playing tournaments, and certainly was what lead to me playing other blogger tournaments and eventually to starting this blog.
For a while there I made an effort to revive the Thursday West Coastie WWdN by hosting the WWdNot. But, alas, it never really caught on.
All things pass. Some are mourned more than others. I haven't been playing the WWdN in a while -- it eventually suffered somewhat from its own success -- but I'll still miss it.
Wil has mentioned there will be a couple memorial events in the coming weeks. Maybe the Tournament Of Champions will finally happen. I will definitely be keeping a closer watch on Wil's blog so I won't miss the memorials.
The WWdN was the tournament that got me interested in playing tournaments, and certainly was what lead to me playing other blogger tournaments and eventually to starting this blog.
For a while there I made an effort to revive the Thursday West Coastie WWdN by hosting the WWdNot. But, alas, it never really caught on.
All things pass. Some are mourned more than others. I haven't been playing the WWdN in a while -- it eventually suffered somewhat from its own success -- but I'll still miss it.
Wil has mentioned there will be a couple memorial events in the coming weeks. Maybe the Tournament Of Champions will finally happen. I will definitely be keeping a closer watch on Wil's blog so I won't miss the memorials.
05 June 2007
My MATH is improving
I played in the Mondays At The Hoy tournament last night for the first time in quite a while. Also for the first time in I don't remember how long, I did pretty well in a non-SnG, giving my FTP bankroll a very much needed boost. I finished 4th of 51 for $130-something.
Through much of the first half of the tournament I did little but fold. I kept my head above water by stealing the blinds when the situation was right.
My first big hand of the night came with the blinds at 40/80. I got AKs in the BB. Columbo, from UTG+1, raises to 200. In days of old I would have looked at AcKc, figured I had a monster, and pushed a bunch more chips in the pot. These days I tend to look at it more as nothing but a good drawing hand, so I just called Columbo's raise.
Flop is AK2 with two diamonds. Ordinarily I'd be doing cartwheels, but I was a bit concerned Columbo might have pocket aces. I play it cagey and check. Columbo bets 260 into a 440 pot. I come back with the dreaded min-raise. He calls.
The turn is a dream card, the Ks. If he doesn't have AA, I've got a lock. I bet 640, slightly less than half the pot. He calls.
The river is the 9c. Clearly no help to anyone. Here is where I thought I made a mistake. I want the rest of Columbo's chips and figure if I check he might take the whole hand as me trying to bluff my way through and finally giving up. I check, he checks. Damn! Turns out from looking at the hand history that he was on a diamond flush draw the whole time. There was no way he was going to put any more chips in the pot. Why couldn't it have been the 9d on the river? Oh well, shouldn't be greedy.
I mostly stole blinds for a while until my QQ held up against an all-in from Alceste with K9s. Bad timing on his part. That brought me up to 5660 with blinds at 80/160.
In here somewhere I had a few stretches where I was stealing the blinds with abandon. Three, four hands in a row I'd put in a normal 3BB raise and everyone would fold. Either many folks were playing to make the points (this was another of the BBT tournaments) or I got lucky that everybody was card dead. Mostly I was raising with decent hands, but after a while I started wondering if I shouldn't just keep raising every hand. You wouldn't think a bunch of bloggers would let somebody get away with that, but it sure looked like I could have.
The next big pot was a bit of a nail-biter. I had KK in the SB, blinds at 150/300 with 25 ante. Lester000 from the button raises to 600. I min-raise back, he calls. Flop is AJ7, rainbow. I'm thinking to myself, "It's never easy." I check, lester000 checks. Turn is a blank. Check, check. River is another A. I figure there's no way he checked an ace this long so I bet a bit less than half the pot. He calls. He didn't have an ace so I win. I'm up to 7225 now.
Somewhere along in this stretch I went card dead and my stack dwindled. I was down to 5170 with blinds at 400/800 ante 100. Definitely push or fold territory. I get 22 and decide it's now or never. AlCantHang has even fewer chips than I do and calls with KJs. My pair would have held, but just to add insult to injury, the remaining twos showed up on the board. Quack, quack, quack, quack. I get quads and Al goes home. Sorry, Al.
Then came the hand where I got kind of lucky. It was getting a bit late and my attention wandered. I was dealt 88 and figured I'd push if there was no action ahead of me. I started reading some web page and then it was action to me. I clicked "Max" and "Raise". Then I noticed mtnrider81 had put in a 3BB raise ahead of me. Crap. I'm not sure if I would have even called had I noticed the raise. I certainly wouldn't have pushed all-in behind it with just a mid pair. Mtnrider81 thought about it a while and made the call. He showed AQo. The board made it interesting, showing TK39 by the turn. He had ten outs on the river, but it paired the board and moved me from deep trouble to not so much trouble.
We moved to the final table and I hit another long stretch of crap cards. I'm down to M=5 and get KQo. Best cards I've seen in ages. Mtnrider81 raises to 3BB and I push all-in. (Maybe it was this hand where I had the lapse in attention. Or maybe I was just more desperate than I remember. They both look like pretty iffy plays in the light of day.) It folds around to mtnrider81 who again thinks for a long time and finally makes the call. He shows 66. The flop brings a K and a Q, so he's down to two outs. No luck for mtnrider81 and I move from in pretty big trouble to the chip leader in one hand.
Then the cards completely dried up. My stack got blinded and anted from 31,000 down to 13,000. In the meantime we moved down to the final five. An uncalled all-in stemmed the flow for an all too brief a time.
Finally, with the blinds at 1000/2000 ante 250, my stack at 9000 and only four of us left, I had no choice but to push with A2o. HighOnPoker called with A7s and filled his flush on the river. I finish in fourth.
Given my finish position, this was a tournament with comparatively little fireworks for me. A couple big hands, a couple coin tosses that went my way. I think the key was that, other than the lapse of attention or two, I didn't make any big mistakes. There were no big hands where I went to the showdown a loser, other than the last, of course. All in all, I was pretty happy with my play, especially considering I've not played all that much in the last couple months.
And just so this isn't all about me, I have to say I was very impressed with Hoyazo's play. Not so much that he pulled a bunch of clever stunts, but that he showed incredible patience and discipline. I don't know how many times I saw him make a move at a pot, get played back at, and give it up. For a good player, I think play like that takes a lot more guts than just pushing all-in in response to the re-raise. Very smart poker. Good luck in the WSOP, Hoy.
Also, congrats to VinNay on the win. Well played.
Sorry for this being so long and being mostly a boring play-by-play. I'm a bit rusty with this blogging thing too I guess.
The next BBT event is The Mookie on Wednesday. I guess tonight is the WWdN. Probably won't play that one. Maybe The Mookie.
Through much of the first half of the tournament I did little but fold. I kept my head above water by stealing the blinds when the situation was right.
My first big hand of the night came with the blinds at 40/80. I got AKs in the BB. Columbo, from UTG+1, raises to 200. In days of old I would have looked at AcKc, figured I had a monster, and pushed a bunch more chips in the pot. These days I tend to look at it more as nothing but a good drawing hand, so I just called Columbo's raise.
Flop is AK2 with two diamonds. Ordinarily I'd be doing cartwheels, but I was a bit concerned Columbo might have pocket aces. I play it cagey and check. Columbo bets 260 into a 440 pot. I come back with the dreaded min-raise. He calls.
The turn is a dream card, the Ks. If he doesn't have AA, I've got a lock. I bet 640, slightly less than half the pot. He calls.
The river is the 9c. Clearly no help to anyone. Here is where I thought I made a mistake. I want the rest of Columbo's chips and figure if I check he might take the whole hand as me trying to bluff my way through and finally giving up. I check, he checks. Damn! Turns out from looking at the hand history that he was on a diamond flush draw the whole time. There was no way he was going to put any more chips in the pot. Why couldn't it have been the 9d on the river? Oh well, shouldn't be greedy.
I mostly stole blinds for a while until my QQ held up against an all-in from Alceste with K9s. Bad timing on his part. That brought me up to 5660 with blinds at 80/160.
In here somewhere I had a few stretches where I was stealing the blinds with abandon. Three, four hands in a row I'd put in a normal 3BB raise and everyone would fold. Either many folks were playing to make the points (this was another of the BBT tournaments) or I got lucky that everybody was card dead. Mostly I was raising with decent hands, but after a while I started wondering if I shouldn't just keep raising every hand. You wouldn't think a bunch of bloggers would let somebody get away with that, but it sure looked like I could have.
The next big pot was a bit of a nail-biter. I had KK in the SB, blinds at 150/300 with 25 ante. Lester000 from the button raises to 600. I min-raise back, he calls. Flop is AJ7, rainbow. I'm thinking to myself, "It's never easy." I check, lester000 checks. Turn is a blank. Check, check. River is another A. I figure there's no way he checked an ace this long so I bet a bit less than half the pot. He calls. He didn't have an ace so I win. I'm up to 7225 now.
Somewhere along in this stretch I went card dead and my stack dwindled. I was down to 5170 with blinds at 400/800 ante 100. Definitely push or fold territory. I get 22 and decide it's now or never. AlCantHang has even fewer chips than I do and calls with KJs. My pair would have held, but just to add insult to injury, the remaining twos showed up on the board. Quack, quack, quack, quack. I get quads and Al goes home. Sorry, Al.
Then came the hand where I got kind of lucky. It was getting a bit late and my attention wandered. I was dealt 88 and figured I'd push if there was no action ahead of me. I started reading some web page and then it was action to me. I clicked "Max" and "Raise". Then I noticed mtnrider81 had put in a 3BB raise ahead of me. Crap. I'm not sure if I would have even called had I noticed the raise. I certainly wouldn't have pushed all-in behind it with just a mid pair. Mtnrider81 thought about it a while and made the call. He showed AQo. The board made it interesting, showing TK39 by the turn. He had ten outs on the river, but it paired the board and moved me from deep trouble to not so much trouble.
We moved to the final table and I hit another long stretch of crap cards. I'm down to M=5 and get KQo. Best cards I've seen in ages. Mtnrider81 raises to 3BB and I push all-in. (Maybe it was this hand where I had the lapse in attention. Or maybe I was just more desperate than I remember. They both look like pretty iffy plays in the light of day.) It folds around to mtnrider81 who again thinks for a long time and finally makes the call. He shows 66. The flop brings a K and a Q, so he's down to two outs. No luck for mtnrider81 and I move from in pretty big trouble to the chip leader in one hand.
Then the cards completely dried up. My stack got blinded and anted from 31,000 down to 13,000. In the meantime we moved down to the final five. An uncalled all-in stemmed the flow for an all too brief a time.
Finally, with the blinds at 1000/2000 ante 250, my stack at 9000 and only four of us left, I had no choice but to push with A2o. HighOnPoker called with A7s and filled his flush on the river. I finish in fourth.
Given my finish position, this was a tournament with comparatively little fireworks for me. A couple big hands, a couple coin tosses that went my way. I think the key was that, other than the lapse of attention or two, I didn't make any big mistakes. There were no big hands where I went to the showdown a loser, other than the last, of course. All in all, I was pretty happy with my play, especially considering I've not played all that much in the last couple months.
And just so this isn't all about me, I have to say I was very impressed with Hoyazo's play. Not so much that he pulled a bunch of clever stunts, but that he showed incredible patience and discipline. I don't know how many times I saw him make a move at a pot, get played back at, and give it up. For a good player, I think play like that takes a lot more guts than just pushing all-in in response to the re-raise. Very smart poker. Good luck in the WSOP, Hoy.
Also, congrats to VinNay on the win. Well played.
Sorry for this being so long and being mostly a boring play-by-play. I'm a bit rusty with this blogging thing too I guess.
The next BBT event is The Mookie on Wednesday. I guess tonight is the WWdN. Probably won't play that one. Maybe The Mookie.
01 June 2007
Riverchasers
I played in the Riverchasers/BBT event at FTP last night. Very lackluster performance. The cards weren't kind and tank-full-of-sharks events like this require huge brass ones to steal many pots. I took a few, but not enough. The best I could do was make it into the top half of the field to pick up a few points on the leaderboard. I went home when two overcards paired the flop against my all-in with a mid pocket pair. At least it was cheap.
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