Due to import issues and to save time in transferring this blog to its new home, I am resorting to creating seperate pages for my original posts.

I’m going to be a bit more selective in the importation of posts.

Bill Fillmaff Rules – 5/17/2006

Bill Fillmaff has taught me to win virtual millions with his proven method… Secret system! Thanks to Bill and his instructional videos I now have a whole closet of “virtual sock rolls.” If Fred McGriff were endorsing poker videos, this is the one he’d choose!

The ten most important things Bill Fillmaff and Secret System have taught me:

10. I owe him a royalty when I win a tournament with his signature hand (KJoffsuit). He has it copywritten.

9. I’ve been pronouncing Bellagio wrong for all these years.

8. Without Secret System, we’re all donkeys.

7. Reading his book is positive EV.

6. Not reading his book is negative EV.

5. Multi-tabling was invented by Bill Fillmaff and is possible not just online, but also live, with the help of a picture of yourself, placed on the back of your head.

4. Proper sock roll management is of paramount importance.

3. Pointing out how amateur someone’s play is while at the table is positive EV.

2. The value call with the nuts is perhaps the most powerful move in poker.

1. Bill Fillmaff is the greatest, all others are tied for last.

In fact, Bill’s Secret System set of instructional videos are so great, I can’t limit the top ten list to just ten lessons!

Additional thing Bill Fillmaff’s Secret System has taught me:

a. Telling people what I just folded when it hits the board is plus EV.

b. Pocket kings are not a good hand to defend vs. an All-in move. Waiting for a better spot is advised.

c. Its extremely important to tell the dealer that I refuse to accept bad beats.

Thanks Bill for sharing your knowledge!

Live Game notes – 5/24/06

My Internet connection recently has been a royal flush pain in the ass recently, which explains my absence. In any event, I am back and have live poker play to talk about from the “monthly game.”

Early on, I did not have a favorable draw. To my immediate left sat the infamous Transylvanian Terror. He is one of perhaps three people that I need to make a significant adjustment to my game when he has position on me. Also present at the table was SuperDonk. SuperDonk actually called me on Sunday (usually I am calling the group to insure they are awake and moving in time for the live game). A new player to our “monthly game” series who we’ll refer to as “the bartender” was at my table. Eggs, the Blind Defender, “Mitch,” “T,” and “new guy” had a seat with me as well. Finally, the person we will refer to as “Monica Gellar-Bing” (MGB for short) sat to my immediate right.

The first two rounds featured many pots going to the flop six handed and slightly raised. The Transylvanian Terror would raise if he felt like playing and limpers were in front of him. It was hard for me to get into the multi-way pots un-raised, as I could count on him raising behind me. Thus, in the early rounds, my strategy was to raise my standards slightly regarding my starting hands. Last month, I had got into many pots early on that were not raised. This month, I wanted to do the same; however, I also wanted to be sure I was comfortable playing them to a slight raise if the Terror pushed in a given hand.

For these reasons, I did not have much of a presence early on in the tournament. In fact, I appeared to “wake up” when blinds moved to 4-8 and I was dealt QQ under the gun. I raised 5x blinds and this was the first hand I personally raised preflop. I had three callers, which were the Transylvanian Terror and The Blind Defender, who was apparently defending his button, and MGB, who was in the big blind. The Defender’s call suggested a pocket pair, two cards in the paint, or Axs, Kxs, and from a starting hand standpoint, he was the only person I was “worried about.” Four handed, the flop comes K-10-3. Knowing the Terror was most likely planning to throw out a pot sized continuation bet, and suspecting that if I bet out, the only callers will be those who have me beat. I believed the terror would call cleanly if he had me beat, however, if on a draw he would reraise me. The defender “could” make a play at me even if I had him beat, but would be unlikely to do so this early in the tournament. MGB could theoretically call me to the river with or without anything, so a continuation bet seemed the best route.

I bet out roughly 50% of the pot after MGB checks it to me. The terror folds, and the blind defender pushes all-in. MGB folds, I think for a second and fold, wishing to pick a better spot.

Blinds are now 5-10 and I am dealt pocket 8’s. The terror limps under the gun, which for some people would set off warning sirens (note: if I limp utg, run like hell!), two more limpers, in addition to MGB in the SB, and action is to me. I can either check this and see the flop 5 handed, or I can raise it up and try to cut down the opposition. I figure I can get four handed if I raise, so I put in a 3x blinds raise. As predicted, one person folds, Terror, Defender, MGB and I see the flop of K-3-8. I push out a small bet, roughly 30% of the pot, which the defender once again raises. The Transylvanian Terror folded prior to the Defender’s raise. MGB calls his raise cleanly, as do I. The turn card is a jack, which is suited to the eight on the previously rainbow flop. From a starting hand standpoint, I am only really “worried” about the draw on the board, specifically the Q-10, as any ace or nine plays to beat my set. Defender “could” have KJ, K10, or even AK, of which he would call me if I bet hard on the turn, appearing to buy the pot. Once again, I believe MGB would call if she hit the board up high at all. Thus, I push all-in, hoping for a taker. The defender tries to talk through it, gets nowhere with me and folds. MGB folds as well and I take the pot down uncontested.

Still at 5-10, action folds to MGB, who limps on the button. It should be noted that with the terror previously being active with his raising, and now my willingness to play ball has appeared to tighten the table up quite a bit. I peak down and see K-9 of clubs. I think for a moment and put in a 3x raise, wanting to isolate and/or steal. The terror folds his BB and MGB calls cleanly. She also seems frustrated with my raising behind her. The flop comes K-Q-9. In what I now believe was a bone-headed move, I tried to play on her frustrations and pushed all-in with my two pair. She makes a quick call without an ounce of thought and flips over Kq offsuit. She takes the pot down with the higher two pair, and takes out about ¾ of my stack to my disappointment. As stated, it “seemed” the right play at the moment, however, when we take into consideration that ¾ of my stack was at risk (I grossly underestimated her chip count), and how she’d be somewhat likely to call with top pair or AK or KJ, but would DEFINITELY call with hands I was a huge underdog to (J-10, KQ). In hindsight, I think I was -EV to push like that, though I would have probably lost just as many chips spread out to the river, as she would call, call, and call.

Now the Beer Guy is the short stack at the table, which coincides with the blinds going up to 10-20. I am in all-in or fold mode, which lasts for a while until I push all-in with A-K. Having me covered, and thinking I am on the steal, the Transylvanian Terror makes the call with A-7. He spikes a seven on the flop and leaves me dead in the water. I make my final stand with 4-6 suited, as blinds will hit me next and break me. Neither my four nor six play in the six handed, checked pot and I am sent to the rail.

“Mitch” and MGB would go on to the final table, where they ended up in a back and forth heads up battle. Eventually, they agree to a split, though the final hand gave “Mitch” the “title of Champion. I never really got it going. Mitch played some good poker, and MGB was catching like a madwoman the whole way through the tournament.

As always, the monthly game was a lot of fun and thanks goes out to both the host and the hostess (note: hostess had to work and thus did not play, unfortunately). Bar none, they put on the best game in the city and I always look forward to the game.

Tomorrow, we will be back on our regular posting schedule, so until then…

Turning 21 again – 5/26/06

Well, its that time of year again. Sometime throughout this long weekend, the Beer Guy turns 21 yet again. Yes indeed, we’re in the middle of “Birthday Week.” So today, we’re in for a history lesson on the legends of the infamous Birthday Week as well as what is the deal with the whole “turning 21” thing.

For starters, I started doing this whole “Birthday Week” thing with my friends, as there were always one or two people who were “preoccupied” for the birthday celebration of a given group member. This seemed to be the case with every birthday celebration within the group. Someone, for one reason or another had something else going on, be it work, school, family, significant others, etc. So, we decided that if we made the actual celebration a week long gig, we’d be able to fit everyone in. For the most part, this worked out and was, by my own admission “in character” with everything we did. Any group that ran with me seemed to have a knack for “over-doing” things (read: we enjoyed beating a dead horse long after everyone else stopped). So, initially birthdays were celebrated as a one week event.

Over time, we noticed a steep increase in “goods and services.” Inflation was taking its toll on the price of things such as cigarettes, beer, gas (no kidding?), food, etc. So, it was decided that in the spirit of beating a dead horse and respecting the reality of inflation, we needed to expand birthday week to keep it real. In 1998, birthday week expanded to a two week celebration. This was the case until 2004, when the birthday week’s equivalent of the Federal Reserve Board of Directors met to discuss the state of Birthday Week. We collectively met to study birthday week and decided that in an attempt to “control inflation,” and to help “stimulate the economy” (not to mention bring balance to the whole birthday week concept), we unanimously voted to increase the duration of birthday week to three weeks. Celebration would commence one week prior to the actual birthday, pick up pace the week of, and cool off the week after.

As an added bonus, this pretty much ensured that we’d have some sort of “birthday week” going on every week of the calendar year. In fact, the logistics of a new member’s birthday week coming into the group is more important, perhaps, than the actual character of said applicant. We would often meet new people just trying to fill the calendar up when noticing an “opening.”

Now, my “birthday week” is a bit different than anyone else’s in the group. This comes as no surprise, given the conversation we had at one of the post-game watering holes about how I am the exception, not the rule in most everything we do. It should be noted that this is not because I am breaking the “rules of the group,” but instead because I seem to influence and enforce policy. A comparison was made to “The Godfather” of the group, as no one enters the circle without my blessing, nor do they “act out” without risking consequences set forth by yours truly. So, given that I am the policy maker, its only fair that I decide what we are celebrating when it comes to my birthday. I decided we were going to celebrate my “turning 21” every year. And yes, there is a reason for such a decision.

I did not get to celebrate my 21st birthday in the fashion most of “the other kids” got to celebrate theirs. Most peeps got to do the whole bar tour, 21 shots, etc. Not me, though I am surely not complaining. I turned 21 on the beaches of Palma, Spain. Turning 21 over there was not a big deal, as it was “legal” to drink prior to the 21 mark. Of course, we made a big deal of it. We hit the beach nice and early and made ourselves a nice “home base” which was roughly 25 yards from this place called the Daiquiri Palace. We had a waitress bringing us a different flavor of daiquiri every half hour. Water accompanied the daiquiri at the top of every hour. The “palace” was to the daiquiri world what Baskin Robins is to the world of ice cream. It was nice.

Well, correction… It was nice until we noticed the severe blistering from being in the sun entirely too long. Apparantly, its not the best of ideas for a bunch of peeps pulling duty on an Aircraft Carrier rarely seeing the light of day to hit the beach and soak up some rayz for more than 1 hour tops. Needless to say, we headed for lower ground (preferably to find shade of some sort) after receiving our 21st Daiquiri, thus hitting for the cycle. Everyone, less myself and Jason bailed, due to blistering in the sun. Jason was a trooper though. He and I purchased some aloe, and some replica football jerseys. Jason purchased a Scotland national team jersey for some ungodly reason, while I grabbed myself an FC Porto jersey. For some stranger reason, football jerseys feel a bit better on the burned skin than regular shirts do. Anyways, the Scotland jersey would come into play later in the evening. We hit a club called BCM. Jason and I were buzzing drunk 2-7’d (read: hammered). One of us was holding up a bit better than the other though, I suspect.

Across the room, we see these two babes, who I overheard mention something about Scotland. I “radio” Jason telling him to get into formation and stressed the importance of my wing man following my lead and not breaking formation under any circumstances. I introduce myself to the ladies and as I suspected, they immediately comment on Jason’s Football Jersey, asking if he’s from Scotland. Being both a man of principle and of honor, I tell them he is in fact from Scotland. Edinburgh, to be exact. He catches on and decides to play the role of a drunken Irishman meets hammered Canadian and slurs to them “you’re damn well bloody right I’m from Scotland, ey?” Its revealed at this point (I’m laughing too hard at his response) that I’m not from Scotland, but instead I am an American and Jason was my foreign exchange student. We’re “on holiday” tearing it up in Europe, and its my birthday. They “seem” to buy the story, at least initially and are thankful we’re not one of those “dirty sailors” that are ruining their vacation. It should be fairly noted that there were 2 U.S. Ships and a British ship in port at this time frame, so they could have been referring to either one when they dropped the “them people“ bomb.

Anyways, they bought me a birthday shot. Jason reciprocated buying them drinks. We danced it up for a while, talking and dancing, dancing and talking. My wing man was doing me well. I admit he did go a bit overboard when he began speaking in what he believed was a foreign language. We almost lost him there, however I righted the course and said he was doing his impression of a drunken friend that he met when he was my exchange student.

Jason excused himself to the “W.C.” In his absence I was working on arranging the closing of the deal. I received the green light for landing, as we were planning to take off and go back to their hotel, as it was a bit “too loud” in the club. I radioed the wing man telling him we were ready to land. Instead of putting the landing gear down, Jason breaks formation. We start our final approach heading outside and towards their hotel. Its at that point I hear the last words I wanted to hear. Jason slurs (hick-ups included) “Mike, we have to go back to the boat. I think I’m going to die.” I try to cover for him, but that’s so not happening.

He breaks formation and clips my wing in the process. We’re going down, mayday mayday! We crashed and burned. The girls flipped and were not nearly as understanding as I thought. I enacted the one standard deviation rule, citing he has ancestry traceable to Scotland, and each of us hosted an exchange student at one point in time and we did not consider ourselves one of “those people.” No such luck. Crash and burn, live and learn, nice hand good game, total suck out, etc.

Anyways, that event combined with the absence of a “traditional” celebration in the U.S. led me to make up for it by turning 21 every year. We just celebrate my 21st all over again in traditional U.S. fashion. Really, until retirement age, there’s no meaningful birthday, so why not celebrate the anniversary of the 21st in the interim? Besides, there’s no better way to honor the memory of the survivors of the crash than to memorialize it forever in celebratory fashion. To keep score, I just add yet another roman numeral to the end of my stated age “21” and I’m within my one standard deviation rule.

Tonight, birthday week continues with SuperDonk’s “band” playing at one of the local clubs. This is sure to be an amusing event, as the thought of their “band” cracks me up. Monday, the group will be sitting outside overlooking the lake sipping on 50 cent drafts watching the sunset with the Beer Guy reflecting on life XIII years ago.

Poker Game Reflections – 5/29/06

With today being part of my “birthday week,” combined with a post I read by my bud “Reel” on the Shark Forum, I have been inspired to reflect on the differences in my poker game over the past year. Actually, evolution of my game is more like it, as my game has more so “evolved” as opposed to simply “changed.” Be warned, I am going to most likely overuse the word “I,” so if you do not wish to like hearing “I this, I that” now is a good time to click on a blog from the links to your left. Additionally, the post will most likely be “all over the place,” so if you like structured posts once again, stage left. If you do not mind the above, feel free to keep reading.

For starters, I read two David Sklansky books (“Theory of Poker” and “Hold’em for Advanced Players”). As a Birthday Present to myself (from myself), I purchased “Small Stakes Hold’em” by Ed Miller. I was convinced these books were all I “needed.” In fact, I believed these books could carry me in the ring or in tournaments.

As for game selection, I played short-handed NL Ring games. I was killing the .10/.25 NL games, sometimes even two tabling and had no desire to move up. My goal was to make $150 per day. There were days where I would lose or break even. I capped my losses at $75, so if I was having a “bad day” and got stuck $75, my stop loss would trigger and I would “hit the showers.” If I went up $150, I would also hit the showers. Only once did I break my rule, as I went up $150 in less than an hour. I called it a day, went to lunch and came back for a second session. I found myself enacting the “stop loss” about four hours later, when I donated the $150 back, plus an additional $75. And yes, I was pissed. Oh, did I mention I had no concept of “table selection?”

I played poker tournaments, but really had no clear concept of overlays and tournament strategy. I was a slightly unprofitable tournament player at this time. I often went deep in tournaments, but usually bounced off or barely penetrated the bubble.

At this stage of my “hobby”, I was not yet aware there were poker blogs. In fact, I believed a blog was something that “attention seeking” people posted things such as:

“Yea, so I really like this girl, but she doesn’t know it. What should I do?” and then makes it a point to put the link to his blog in his AIM or YIM!, or MSN profile.

Followed by…

“I’m sick of it! 90% of the people in this world are… (insert crying commentary here when said girl “pretends” she did not click the link and/or had no idea who you were talking about and ends up dating the tool shed next door.)

So, a year ago, I did not have a blog and I did not read any blogs, other than with my friend Kellyn (miss ya, partner in crime o’ mine) to have a good laugh, usually at someone else’s expense.

I did not regularly read a forum of any sort, nor did I post to any either. I visited the two plus two website monthly, but found their forum to be confusing and difficult to follow, a complicated eyesore at best. Surely, I would have been one of “those people” who would have pointed this out to the forum admin, stopping “just short” of demanding that they make it easier to follow, and just a bit pleasant to MY eye. Felicia would have surely loved me for that post alone. Instead, I just steered clear of their forum, and instead ventured to the monthly “internet magazine” they put out.

I did not play private tournaments (I.e.: Shark Tour events), though I was a member of the Shark Poker Tour. I was also a member to three other online tours, however, instead of playing, I would watch the games unfold, figuring I could secretly become a better tournament player by watching these people in action. After all, donkeys do not play in private freerolls, do they? I watched only the freerolls, because the buy-ins did not have “as large of a field to fight through” so in my mind, the freeroll tournaments would “OBVIOUSLY” feature better play.

I knew of this program called pokertracker. I believed it to be a program that “displayed” all of my hands that were mucked (even if the poker room did not publish what the mucked hand was in the hand history). For this reason, in addition to donking out in VH1 Behind the Music fashion (read: crash and burn, hit rock bottom after being “on top of the world” for my lucky two week streak – I was a one hit wonder, I suspect), I avoided playing on any site that pokertracker could “get to.”

Damn, I was clueless… In addition, I did not have a live hand logged as of yet (one year ago today). I discovered poker via the television and began doing something that may or may not have resembled “playing” poker online. When I finally made my live play debut, I had no chip skills what so ever (I still do not, actually). SuperDonk informed me last night that I am the most unskilled player in the chip department he has ever seen. This included all the morons (both at the casino and in private home games) we have ever sat with. According to SD, I am the only person he knows who can announce a raise amount, and consistently grabs a number of chips that regardless of the chip combination could never ever equal the raise amount I have stated.

An example: blinds are 2/4, we have T1, T5, T25, and T100 chips in front of us. I grab two chips and decide I am raising it to T20 and then sit there as if nothing is wrong. I do not just do this occasionally, I consistently do it. If we are at the same table, he makes it a point to inform everyone not to believe the chip count, but instead take my spoken word for the raise. It has been theorized that I do this purposely, because no one could possibly screw this up as consistently as I do. The conspiracy theorists put forth the probability that I am sending subliminal messages speaking a strong raise, yet putting forth a stack that is not appearing as strong in an attempt to “suck them in,” or just the opposite, speaking a strong raise and sliding out a monstrous stack, none of which match up. They think I under push chips, relative to my words, with a monster, and when I am weaker (pocket fives), I push the larger stack out in hopes of just winning without seeing a flop.

This sounds like something that “could” be true. However, I can assure you first hand, I am just not good with handling chips. When playing live, I miss the slide bar for my raises. I miss the instant display of the pot size. I often screw up when counting the pot. If I count my stack four times, I come up with three different numbers. I often rely on other people to tell me how many chips I have, by pushing all-in and when I am asked “how much u got?” I tell them to count them if they would like to know. I do take their word for it when this happens, as the table counts with the player before they fold.

I think it is reasonably safe to assume that I was better off playing online and never having logged a live hand. My first live tourney would not come until July or August of last year (I believe), where I won my first live tournament. I am not sure, but I think this was part of the M.S.O.P., but could have perhaps been a “warm-up” to the event or the “Mitch Invitational.” Mitch, can you help me out with this one? I left that tournament with some bad habits. For starters, the “almost string bet.” At the final table, I noticed a “tell” to the player on my left, who we will call “Randy.” The jugular would jump when my raises reached a level he was not comfortable calling. When I wanted to raise (seemed like every hand), I’d announce raise and begin sliding stacks of chips sideways (to my left) looking like I am organizing and counting, when really I was looking for the vein jump. When I saw that, I knew I had my number and would slide the chips out. If the vein did not jump, I would know to make a smaller raise because he probably had a monster.

Also, for some reason, I came out of that tournament thinking that hands such as Jack-three “same suit,” and King-seven “not suited” were good hands at full tournament tables. I was very impressionable having never played live and somehow thought it was different. I did not realize these were signature hands, not necessarily quality starting hands, even though the seven-ten offsuit was my signature hand as well.

Rewind to a year ago. In summary, I think I was your average hobby level online player. I knew enough to be “dangerous,” but definitely not deadly. I was winning more than losing, content with not moving up. Having some desire to improve my game, but would not commit to improving if it required much effort. I did not read much, in that I would read a book once and blow right through it. I would not “study” the book. I did not post in forums, nor did I read conversation threads or blogs. I avoided pokertracker like the plague and watched freerolls to improve my game.

I will continue tomorrow (be warned).

Then vs Now continued – 5/31/06

After badly beaten by the 2-7offsuit early position in public (read: I was hammered for birthday week, starting early, drinking often), I am back to writing poker. Today’s post will be a continuation bet post of the poker reflections post from a few days ago, where I discussed how my poker game has come along. Today I will be tying in my thoughts, my “game” and my approach today to how it was one year ago.

As mentioned, one year ago, I was donking (donk-ing, not Don King) out on the .10/.25 no limit tables. To continue with the boxing analogy, I was more Tyson-like on the tables, a brawler looking to land the “Irish Tommy Conklin” overhand right, as seen in the classic movie “The Great White Hype.” I would mindlessly wait and wait all day for “my flop” and throw the knockout punch.

Today, I am primarily a limit poker player, more of a boxer as opposed to a brawler. Don’t get me wrong, I still throw the overhand right (actually, I am a southpaw, but I am keeping true to both the movie and the boxing theme), however, I do not rely on delivering one successful knock out blow. I guess as a brawler ages, if he does not possess the foot skills and a fundamentally sound artillery, he is more likely to bow out earlier than if he can mix it up, stick and move. Sharky helped me to realize such a thing. I recently adjusted my game further, as I had been playing strictly shorthanded limit. I recently moved to a full table and still adjusting a bit.

I slightly suspect that the game I play will be more effective at a full table than at the short tables, despite having more opposition. Time will tell, however. I can say that on a full table, I am not seeing nearly as many flops as on the short table; however, my hand selection tends to hold up better at full tables than it does at short tables for some reason.

Additionally, I will not sit at just any table. I do not care if I have all my bankroll at one poker room, if the table is not to my liking and within my bankroll, I will not sit down period. If the table is too aggressive preflop, I am not inclined to sit down. If the saw flop percentage is higher than I am comfortable with, I will not take a seat. If there is a known monster (as defined by my pokertracker database), I am “off like a prom dress.” I have a list of things I like to see at a poker table. If not all of the criteria are present, I will not sit. Additionally, if I am being outplayed I am not ashamed to admit it and will simply seek out new “tablage.”

As for poker tournaments, I still play tourneys somewhat regularly. My knowledge base on tournament play has increased exponentially thanks to the Harrington series. I find myself selective as to in which online poker tournaments I will participate. I DO NOT, repeat… I DO NOT play in “open to the public” freerolls. The only thing that can make one’s game worse than playing these public freerolls is to play for play chips. I am trying to make my game better, as opposed to worse. That being said, I steer clear of freerolls.

Closed community freeroll poker tournaments, such as through the Blogger Poker Tour, CheckRayz Poker Tour, and the Shark Poker Tour are ok and I will play them. However, I prefer to play in the poker tournaments where people on the poker tables have something vested in their play. CheckRayz, Shark Tour, and BPT (to an extent) do. Sure, some people out there are in it merely for the free ride, trying to milk all things free dry. But many of the peeps (at CheckRayz) play for the Leaderboard points, or to get the global invitational invite via the shark tour. The BPT peeps are playing with their virtual reputations on the line, as we are all able to find out a little something about each and every one of the players participating via their blogs. Thus, there is a slight increase in the level of play, and an in general increase in hand selection, strategy and the like.

When not playing private tournaments, I generally seek out the overlay (more $$$ in the prize pool than entries). I want the smallest field possible and more money in the pot to win. I occasionally dabble in multi-table sit n gos, but only to change things up.

My “tournament game” is simple, though not transparent. If you read Harrington’s books, you know exactly how I play. I am not a cheap date, I smartly pick my spots and move as the table, blinds and chip stack dictates. I do not play to cash, I play to win. I would rather bust out on the bubble than to finish just in the money because I played weak. Do not expect me to be one of “those people” who will lay down 10-10 because he is afraid of being called/reraise on the bubble. I am trying to win this thing. $28.50 in 60th place does nothing for me. $1600 and first place, however, does. That is what I am playing for. If you are playing for the same prize, you might stand a chance. If you are playing just to cash, I am going to walk all over you when I switch to endgame mode.

I have more live game experience. As stated, I did not play my first live tournament until July-ish of last year. I won, though in donk-like fashion. I still have no chip skills, though I am aware that I can no longer pull the semi-string bet tactic. I still have issues counting the pot, counting my chips, and making my spoken raises match the amount of chips I am pushing out. I routinely attempt to count the pot, guest mate the stacks of everyone left to act, and calculate my own M, all before looking at my cards. People are aware of these counting difficulties (the people I play with regularly) and will often move to chap my ass by raising an odd number (2.3 times the blinds for example). Sometimes I have a decent hand, but my mind “disconnects” because its not computing and I will fold out of frustration, even though a call or reraise is most likely correct. I am working on these issues by trying to slow my mind down. I suspect that my mind races, and thus I become careless. Not only does it race, but also I have historically processed multiple things at once, which deems the age old question, “Mike honey, what are you thinking about?” pretty much invalid. I could spend all days elaborating on the THINGS I am thinking on. Rarely, if ever, is it one thing. Obviously, I lack the ability to focus.

Speaking of focus, I generally engage in “controlled distractions” such as talking poker strategy with a friend on messenger while playing. This at least keeps me on topic. If I do not “seek out” a controlled distraction, I end up reading about what happened on Raw Monday night or the transfer speculation from the British Tabloids. When playing poker, I need to concentrate solely on poker, as I am doing now (playing a $10 45 person sit n go on stars while writing this entry).

Obviously, my outlook on what a blog is has changed significantly. I (obviously) keep a blog of my own, avoiding the “90% of the time” and the “poor me” commentary. I attempt to communicate my thoughts, share stories and bring value to my readers. I read other people’s blogs who offer quality content of value along the same lines. I “rarely” drift off topic (poker) unless it somehow will tie in with the poker world as I see and experience it.

I no longer avoid “pokertracker compliant” poker rooms, and instead pretty much only play in rooms where I may utilize the features of pokertracker to help me in my game. I believe in the statistics and welcome the help the program has to offer.

I do not whine about “bad beats.” Thanks to Felicia, I no longer believe in the concept of bad beats and my play is not affected when someone draws on me. I believe in bad play, and will sometimes become frustrated with myself when said donk outdraws and I played it incorrectly. Instead of bitching and whining though, I try to learn from every one of my mistakes. Such a mindset makes me stronger.

I know far more about the game of poker today than I did one year ago. However, I also know that I do not know all there is to know about the game. I am constantly attempting to understand, to better myself and to share my insight with friends along the way.

Getting from A to B – 6/1/06

Over the past few days, I have discussed where my poker game was last year versus where my poker game is today. How did I get to where I am today? I attribute my evolution to many factors, of which education, belief, drive and practical application are by far the largest factors in which has driven me to become a better poker player.

I do not know about you. But as for me, if I have a “hobby,” a “profession,” or even a “passion” for something, its kind of important to me that I am both enjoying it and good at what I am doing. I am passionate about writing, for example. I think I am good at it. I drive myself to write daily. This is something that always has been on my “to do” list, but various things prevented me from doing so. I hold myself accountable to post my thoughts daily… or close to daily at the Poker Pub. My writing helps me to focus, understand, and yes, even vent. In addition to that, I am working on improving my writing (the sudden, unexplained use of spelling and grammar check being one small improvement). I am trying to write on the things I know, or wish to know that are of interest to me. I stick to a style of writing that is somewhat conversational while telling a story all at the same time. I feel that style of writing is my strongest. I drive myself to do this early and often.

When working to improve my poker game, once again something I feel that I am good at and thoroughly enjoy, I push myself to play better. I work daily to add at least one new “thing” to my game. I push myself to read. Speaking of reading, I have never been much of a reader. Historically, I have not “allowed” myself to enjoy what some people would refer to as “a good book.” Five pages and I am snoring. So, reading books does not come natural to me. I still cannot force myself to read books such as Harry Potter or (insert next book turned into movie here). I have been able to manage to read any books Philosophical in nature, relating to Poker, or relating to the technical side of investing. I guess I am not a fan of reading for leisure, and that is acceptable. What is not acceptable is if I would not be willing, driven to read books that will assist me in improving something in my life. I hold myself accountable in that I shall always have a book in front of me that will help me out in some way. I drive myself to read daily. I find my game and my life improving daily by reading daily.

I drive myself to implement the skills and concepts I have read into my game or my life. Obviously, this requires that I have done the due diligence necessary to allow me to “believe” what I have read. I am a straight up skeptic by nature, so rest assured I will not read that in which I do not believe, unless it is to gather “the other” point of view. Harrington’s book, for example, tells me to push with all hands ranked about the ten-eight offsuit when my M is low and I am first to open the pot. For someone not used to doing such seemingly outrageous things, this is quite scary. It requires belief, faith even. It requires me to step well outside my comfort zone. No one ever said poker was a comfortable game, by the way. It stands to reason that I just might be required to face some scary, not so comfortable situations from time to time. I believed, I stepped out on a limb, and I pushed. Now, I am all about “drinking the kool-aid” that Action Dan serves in his literary works.

I choose my “experts” carefully and avoid “false profits.” What do I mean by false profits? Ever been to school, college perhaps… or even a seminar at work. The subject matter expert is speaking, however there’s “that guy” sitting in the front and on the right of the boardroom/class room who usually seems to summarize what the speaker says. He does not do this to gain further understanding; but instead, he does this to show everyone else what he “knows.” If allowed, he dominates the conversation of the class in a disruptive manner (to the speaker) and tries to position himself as the subject matter expert, as opposed to letting the speaker continue to speak. After class or the seminar lets out, he attempts to “herd his flock” and if allowed, he installs himself as the expert, offering half-assed, out of context advice. Some people actually follow this person, which could be scary. They figure he knew enough to hang in conversation, he must know what the hell he is talking about. My contention is that I am unlikely to follow someone blindly unless they have “been there and done that.” This does not mean I will not consider what “that guy” has to say. However, there will be no installation as expert, nor will there be blind following from “this guy.” People such as Harrington have in fact been there. They have done that. I will follow them, still striving to understand what I am following and why I am following it, of course.

Once again, tying into the skeptic in me, I must know what I believe AND why I believe it. I have great difficulty accepting things as fact when I cannot make sense of them. I run the “logical equation” in my head and it must balance when I encounter a potential belief. If the equation does not balance, or seems incomplete, I cannot accept it. I look to disprove it, investigate further, or not even waste my time pondering such things. Pure and simple, I think for myself. I know enough to know I do not know everything. I know enough to know that it is not wise to accept blindly. If I cannot answer the basic questions, “what do I believe” and “why do I believe the way I do,” we do not have a balanced equation.

Finally, we have practical application. If I believe (generally speaking) it is correct to push with ten-eight offsuit at a tight table while close to the bubble and a low M, I must implement this belief when it is appropriate, right? What good is a belief if I am not willing to apply it? Additionally, I believe I am a good poker player. I believe my game needs constant attention; improving, reflecting upon, and studying it to become a better poker player. I believe I am capable both physically and mentally of making such improvements. I believe that bankroll willing, I can move up the ranks. I believe in myself, I believe in that which I choose to read. And I believe in what I write in my poker blog.

Finally, I believe that one year from today, I will look back at this entry and think to myself, “Wow, relatively speaking, I had no clue what I was doing back then, did I?” I guess that is part of the evolution of a poker player though.

Whoring for Bonus – 6/4/06

My goal for the month of June is to go back to bonus whoring, to some extent. Going through and looking at my respective poker accounts last week, I cannot help but notice several bonuses still pending in my accounts. It occurs to me that when I first began playing (outside of my little world known as poker.com), bonus whoring was a significant portion of my game. My goal for the week was to complete all outstanding bonuses that were worth obtaining (read: I am not going to sit on the .10/.20 cent tables to play through for a bonus. Bonus and games willing, I’ll do it, but I am not dropping down to play a ridiculous game just to achieve said bonus.

So off I went, working off my bonuses at the various poker sites I frequent. As I may or may not have mentioned, I made the switch to playing full table limit now, as opposed to the short-handed limit. It occurs to me that the semi-loose aggressive player is ideal for shorthanded play. That… is not me. I “can” play semi-loose, but really, I am more of a tight aggressive player. When I loosen up my play in ring games, I find myself outside of my comfort zone. Thus, it makes sense that I play at a table that is ideal for my style of play. After all, I preach table selection, right? Might as well go a step further and go with game selection as well.

Anyways… off to Sun Poker I go to clear my free $40 (shout out to Sharky for sending me to the donk-infested beaches of Sun Poker). $40 cleared in no time at all. Sun will be my first stop every month. Fast forwarding to the point of my writing today, PokerStars. This is my “online poker birthplace.” I got my start here, and frankly, I played as if I was a newborn when I first started playing online. Actually, a newborn could have beaten me, now that I think of it.

I had a decent size reload bonus I needed to work off, so I fire up a few tables, varying in limits and once again full table limit Hold’em being the game of choice. I couldn’t help but notice the presence of “Mr. 63%” on one of the tables. Usually, his hand looked as follows:

Pre-flop raise, continuation bet/call the reraise, turn bet/call the reraise, fold…

unless he hit, then it was

Pre-flop raise, continuation bet/re-reraise; turn bet/call, bet/re-reraise…

As his bankroll seems to dwindle down into non-existence, I suspect the table full of nine other players who are seeing less than 30% of the flop and all but two profitable will quickly break up. Just like clockwork, player busts out, fails to reload and the table begins breaking up. I have no desire to play at a cash poker table among players who are seeing 20-25% of the flops, raising 10%, post-flop aggression factors above 2. So, smartly I depart, looking for a “better” game. Fortunately, I kept “Mr. 63%” marked, so I tracked him down to a $1/$2 NL table. This could be fun, I thought. I was showing profit and close to working my bonus off, so I shut down the remaining two limit tables, in favor of playing against “Mr.63%.” Moreover, I was “outside of my world” here. Unfortunately for me, he left quickly. However, the game was somewhat donk infested, so I decided to stay, but only until I achieved my bonus play-through requirements.

I sat down with twice table minimum in this game, which was less than the max, of course. My goal was to take a shot, but to do so smartly. The table was not very aggressive pre-flop and people only seemed to bet when they hit their hands. In short, it was a non-hostile, mostly transparent poker table. Two players in particular I had noticed playing hands like Queen-two suited, or Jack-eight “not suited” under the gun and to a limp. Usually three to four players would see the flop per hand. Players seemed to raise A-x and large pocket pairs preflop, but avoided raising other hands, even in position.

It was on my final hand, that I had my donk-like moment. Keeping in mind that I know the very next hand in which the rake becomes “enough“ my bonus is released. The hand plays out as follows:

Two players are sitting out. I limp after two folds and a call. The player to my left (one of the out of position donks) raises, making it 4x BB. The small blind folds and big blind calls, because that is what the BB does. Player sitting to my right calls, so I too cleanly call. I have the pot odds to call and see a flop with my hand. I’m thinking raiser has Ax, with X most likely 9-Q. In the event he had a large pocket pair, he would have tipped us off with a larger than 4x raise, I suspect. If the blinds have a large pocket pair, or AK-A10, they reraise here. My preliminary suspicion is that one of the two acting before me has Ax (x=small) and the other is suited somehow or might even have an ace, who knows. I am rather certain, however, that at least two of my three opponents are spending at least one of the other’s outs.

The flop comes Ah, 2h, 7d. I nearly forgot to mention that I am holding 6h-7h. The BB checks, player to my right checks, as do I. Original raiser pushes out a “bet pot” move. I suspect if he bets the pot, he is not trying to extract value or suck anyone in. I believe he has a pair, but not a set, nor is he on a flush draw. BB calls. The ace scares him off if he does not have one of his own. Player to my right folds. Thinking this one over for a bit, I count my outs. I’m on a flush draw (potentially 9 outs), I have middle pair (2 potential outs) and my other card may or may not have outs (I’ll call it ½ of an out). Obviously, no one has the hearted ace, as it’s on the board. I have neither of them on Ace-King or two pair, as the hand would have been re-raised before getting back to me, I suspect. Additionally, the bettor would not have pushed out a pot-sized bet, in my opinion, based on how the table has played out previously. He would want to suck value from his two pair, even if it were ace-two, while at the same time, not giving the odds to draw to the flush or the better two pair.

Considering all, I throw out the all-in re-raise, which offers about 2.5:1 odds to the original raiser, I am certain he is going to be a taker. The blind may or may not join in, but I am not very worried about him, as his stack was small, relatively speaking and he‘d not cover my all-in bet. Did I mention this was my last hand of the evening, win or lose? Pot is full and split. Turn comes off 5 of spades, and the river brings the king of hearts (told you no one was playing A-K, or at least A-K with the king being hearted).

My flush, ace high shows down, muck from opponent number 1 (ace-queen not suited though queen was hearted), pot slides to me. Second opponent mucks (Ac-8c). Main pot also slides to me.

Once again, this was somewhat donk-like of a play for me, and a bit out of character. However, (here comes the justification), my bonus was replacing my loss if I lost the hand (and then some). I was confident that if one of my nine flush outs came my way, I was good. I was confident that I had more outs clean than my opposition did. It was my last hand of the evening, and I was close to a “Freeroll” situation, given the above. Had this hand played out earlier in the day, or without the bonus riding on the line, I would have likely folded.

I knew calling this hand after the raise/call was incorrect, even though I had the pot odds and raising was “more correct.” Folding was an option, but “just was not going to happen,” given all of the above.

More from the felt tomorrow.

Why min-raises are (generally) -EV 6/16/06

Judith, this one’s for you while you are recovering from your eye surgery. May the first page you read when you are “back” be this article.

I am not very sure why anyone (Judith) would make a “min-raise” when playing Holdem in a tournament or a ring game. We raise pre-flop for the following primary reasons:

1. For value – We are confident we have the best hand and wish to charge our opponents for the right to draw on us.

2. For isolation – Our hands stand up best against few opponents, we want to narrow the field down to 1-2 players.

3. To steal the blinds – We wish to take the pot uncontested without seeing a flop.

4. As a semi-bluff – We are not sure we have the best hand, but we have a decent hand, so let’s raise and see if we can knock players who have already entered out (in addition to the blinds).

5. As a total bluff and/or to deceive – Usually later position, with suited connectors or “the hammer”

6. To manipulate pot size – To try to build a bigger pot that will psychologically commit players to the pot upon the flop.

I propose that a standard raise of between 3-5 times the blinds can “usually” accomplish raising for value, isolation, stealing, bluffing or semi-bluffing, and pot building. Specifically, a “standard raise” usually charges players “too much” for the right to draw, as they are not getting the proper pot odds to “play garbage.” At the same time, it is also typically allowing for only those hands who will make suitable “second best” hands will be playing (Axs, pocket pairs, etc). For this reason, you get a read on the probable hand range you are up against.

As a hypothetical, you are under the gun and are holding AK suited. Making it simple, blinds are 10-20, everyone has a stack of 1000. You put in a raise of 80 (or 4 times the big blinds). You are raising because you feel you have the best hand pre-flop and wish to charge others for the right to draw on you. Now the pot is 110, it is costing 80 for anyone to play (70 for the small blind, and 60 for the big blind) – assuming there’s not a re-raise. What hands can “correctly” call with those pot odds? Can the guy on the button with king-three suited who would “really love to see a flop with this” call you correctly? How about the small blind with Queen Jack “not suited?” Are they making a mistake by calling with those hands? Do we want to force our opposition to make mistakes, even if they are unaware of the fact that they are making said mistake?

Now, let us replay this scenario, and we will just put in the min raise. Blinds 10-20, everyone stacking 1000. UTG, you are dealt AK suited. You place the minimum raise out there of 40. Now the pot contains 70, it costs 40 to stay, which is close to 2:1. Suddenly, QJ “not suited” from the small blind is playable for 30 (even though the field is getting 2:1, keep in mind, the blinds get in cheaper because they’re already partially involved), and the big blind is now justified in calling with his pocket twos, as he’s getting nearly 3:1. In fact, if he had the hammer, and the small blind called, he would be correct in calling. Furthermore, you have not made the blinds define their hands. They could be playing with any two cards. Later positions and button “could” be as well.

This means that on the flop, we are going to have to bet out to figure out what we should have began to determine pre-flop. The min-raise neither defines our hand, nor helps us to determine a hand range our opposition is playing. This of course, means that we have no idea where we are at in the hand. Supposing we have four to five callers in the min raise scenario, and a pot of 200, how much do you think it will cost us to find out where we are at under the gun? It might be relatively simple if the flop comes AK2 to know where we are at, but what about a color coordinated flop away from us, where we have top pair (A-J-10 all of clubs).

If we bet ½ the pot, we are risking an additional 100 chips MINIMUM (a bit more than 10% of our stack) to find out if we have the best hand. With four players, we can pretty much count on anyone who has the K or Q of clubs to stay. We can count on any Kings or queens to most likely stay, especially if there are already players calling your ½ pot bet. Furthermore, how about any ace now, specifically AJ or A10? My guess is that for ½ the pot, even the big blind with pocket twos also stays, especially if he has a club. We are no longer truly ahead on this board, and we did not charge proper odds for anyone to have the right to catch up to us. Additionally, we have no “cheap” way of determining whether we are truly ahead in the hand. A pot size bet or an over bet would tell us, but then the problem becomes that five handed, we are most likely beat, so there is really little to nothing that is +EV for us to do. Check is -EV and tells us nothing, any size bet tells us nothing, an over bet is called only when we are beat. See the dilemma here?

If we throw out a standard raise, we get one or two opponents. We have a pot size of roughly 200. Same flop comes A-J-10 all of clubs). This time, we have 1-2 players to bet into instead of four or five. We throw out a continuation bet of half the pot. We remain confident that this flop is scary to the one or two opposing players and we will only be called by hands that contain the king of clubs, the queen of clubs. Odds are Ax will fold, unless x is clubbed, at which time, they will call. A set will likely re-raise here, fearing the fourth club. With this continuation bet, we know better where we stand and stand a better chance (due to bigger raise, fewer opponents, and same pot size).

More on this in the next few days. I am confident that I didn’t go through everything as thoroughly as I would have liked. I am of course blaming this on the quitting smoking gig, which is making me more scatter brained than normal. My point though, Judith, min raise is not good. Hope you do well with your surgery today.

Who was Slowplaying Whom? – 6/21/06

I have two poker stories from last night. One of which is an actual poker story, the other is an “it’s not about poker, but really, it is all about poker” story.

I played in a weekly event at one of the local taverns last night. For reasons unrelated to this post and story, I will not be playing there for quite a long time due to the piss-pour way the event is run. Nuff said there. That’s not to say that the play was not interesting. One hand in particular was a “double slow play” of sorts.

I am sitting on the button, action folds to me and I see queens. Blinds are T500/1000 at this time. The small blind has my roughly 8500 chips covered, and the big blind has 2500 on top of his posted big blind. I limp, hoping for a raise from the BB, that doesn‘t come. Flop comes J-10-3. Small blind checks, big blind pushes all-in. I think for a while, going through the motions of counting my outs, hoping that the older gentleman would reraise me when I weakly called, as he was an aggressive player. He calls cleanly. Turn gives me my set of queens. He checks, I bet slightly, as I want to drag him into the pot. He comes over top of me pushing all-in. I’m smelling a semi-bluff, as I found it possible, but unlikely he was holding a straight, specifically ace king, he could be holding 9-8, maybe K-10, but more than likely he is playing either a pair or two pair, though he could be “betting the ace.” Either way, I am calling, and have chance to redraw on the river IF I am behind.

He proudly flips over AK suited from the small blind. And such a brilliant slow play it was. I too flip over my slow play attempt, showing QQ. He laughs and tells me I am drawing dead. I remind him the queen of hearts has not been seen yet, and I have three outs each with jacks, tens and threes, so I am not dead, nor as bad off as he may believe, but I am in fact behind significantly (77%-22%, underdog to be exact). My three hits on the river. I was dead but not buried. We laugh about slow playing each other and found it rather amusing.

That was amusing to me, but not nearly as amusing as the events that unfolded later in the evening. I head to the “local” watering hole (read: stumbling distance from my house). I was not ready to call it an evening, so I walk literally a block to said establishment. Its there I run into “bartender” who is doing what his Poker Pub nickname suggests.

“Bartender” points me to a gentleman at the other end of the bar, who he says will make a great addition to our weekly game. He suggests we go over there and he gives me an introduction. So, I go over and say hello. We “talk shop” for a little bit, regarding this weekly tournament when this rather intoxicated older gentleman “seems” to interrupt. I say, “Seemed” because things were not exactly how they appeared to be.

This older guy was immediately “familiar” to me. The minute he opened his mouth, I knew who he “was.” I did not know his name, though I did not really care to know it either. But I do recall the name I “gave” him once upon a time when last our paths crossed.

Official Poker Pub Flashback:

“I see what he’s doing. He comes here thinking he can buy it. I don’t think he realizes that the reason IIIIIIII play limit is so that I CAN’T be bluffed out of pots.” He re-raises, we end up capped seven deep. Flop (A-5-7) cap, turn cap (2), river (K comes) cap. My AQ loses out to K2 — shit you not. Despite my showing the AQ down, with top pair mind ya, he tells the entire table, “I told ya this bum was trying to steal. He’s not gonna steal shit from me.” – “Waldorf” tells the entire table when proudly showing down his King two, which he runner runnered against my “bluffing” hand of ace queen.

I now also recall the man seated on the other side of the dealer from him, which was directly across from me (during the poker pub flashback). I was introduced by “bartender” to this person initially. As I said, things were not how they seemed.

“Waldorf” comes up to me, and “interrupts,” calling me “shit talker” (apparently in reference to my invite I extended to his friend to what I believe will be the biggest and best tournament in my town). He continues, asking me if I want to “gamble.” I tell Waldorf I have no interest in gambling. He throws two dollar bills on the table and tells me he will bet me $200 that the serial numbers on his right hand beat the ones on his left hand. I politely decline. He makes some racist remarks to me, attempting to challenge my ego. No dice. The person I am talking to suggests to him that he mind his own business and “go back to where he came from.” The guy is trying to act as if he is on my side.

Twenty ego-insulting attempts later, Waldorf challenges me, telling me that he is sure that he’s gambled more money in the last year than I have in my entire lifetime. I tell him that I am sure he has, and asks him if he saved his receipts from his losses for his accountant. He makes some more attempts at insulting my ego and me (still I do not think he remembers me from the casino), and tries to get me to bet with him. Of course, I carry little if any cash on me, so even if I wanted to gamble, I would not be able to.

Waldorf goes on to inform me of how a man is defined by how much cash he carries. The other person starts in asking me how much I have in the bank. I’m still not giving a straight answer, and doing the little pamper Waldorf’s ego trick while at the same time slapping him in the back of the head with the same commentary. He goes totally nuts when he tells me the conversation is over once I said that I carry no cash. It is obvious that he is a gambler and I am not. I inform him that I could never “out gamble” a man of his status and that even an idiot with a stated bankroll similar to his could very easily become fortunate over an apparently broke, “non gambler” such as myself. Then I shut my mouth, because according to him, the conversation was over when I stated I was “cash broke.”

He went absolutely nuts. I knew he would though. He needed for everyone in that bar to know he was “a gambler.” He had the uncontrollable urge to show ME he was. I did not feel I needed to show him anything. I was and perhaps still am slow playing the hell out of him though.
Turns out, he is one of the bigger homebuilders in my town. He built my parent’s home, as a matter of fact. He is a “whale” from a bankroll standpoint. Combined with his need to show people “who he is “ it stands to reason he probably did lose more money last year gambling than I’ve played for in my lifetime. That was a bet however; that I was not confident he would be able to prove one way or the other anyways. Besides, it did not really matter to me anyways how much he has won or lost for his career.

What does matter is that this person may make it down to our weekly game. Eventually, he and I will end up going to the casino at the same time, because he will not be able to resist. And what will matter at that time is how much money he loses to me then. He will not have any of his buddies helping him on that table when the time comes. He has a far deeper bankroll than I do, and money means less to him than it does to me. The difference is though, my ego is not the least bit engaged. I do not need to prove anything to anyone. He does…
2am Ugly – Monthly game recap – 6/26/06

The “Monthly Game” for June is in the history books. I drew the “table of champions.” More specifically, everyone who ever won this monthly game drew the same table, thus the table of champions. Last month’s champion Mitch was seated here, fully equipped with his money (dollar sign) necklace, which was his good luck charm, specifically purchased to counteract the luck of “The shirt.” Yes, “The Shirt” was there, seated at our table. He brought his nephew, who we’ll refer to as “The Telephone,” as he was often spotted talking on the phone during the breaks (yea right). And of course, yours truly was at the table, sporting his lucky poker.com bracelet, to counteract the luck of the necklace, which was counteracting the luck of the shirt. Additionally, we had “The actor,” “Son of Fred (Sanford),” Roger, SuperDonk, “OMG, you killed Kenny,” and “T” at our table.

I think I caught the card flu, as the first hour and a half, I saw two hands, exactly two hands that did not contain 2’s. Surprisingly, I did not catch the hammer once during said time frame, and only saw pocket twos once. The times I didn’t have twos, I had Ace Jack, and pocket sixes. But seriously, 2-3o, 2-6o, 2-5o, 2-Js, 2-8s, 2-10o… you get the point… The actor took a “not nice feeling beat” during my period of “carddeaddom.” He had his aces cracked by Roger’s two pair from the flop (QJ). Roger pushed out a 500-chip bet, which the actor called. Roger thought it put him all-in, so he flipped over his cards. However, the actor had about 95 chips or so left, but betting was pretty much dead; the actor does not improve, and is left with 95. He folds next hand, and then moves all-in. Taking down three callers, he shows his pocket aces (second time in three hands) and quadruples up.

I continued my run of horrible cards, and then it happened. Blinds at 25/50, stack around 370 or so and in the cutoff, with “OMG, you killed Kenny” having min raised UTG, I peak down and see my cards. I knew exactly what to do, so I push it all-in. Button and blinds fold her up. Kenny thinks for a while, looks up and says, “I know you have a great hand, I respect your bet, I fold.” Little does he know, my hand indeed was the most powerful hand in poker, and I felt it important to show. I proudly turn over… the hammer! 2-7 “not suited” sitting there in its glory mid table as I am raking in chips. Pulling off this move is the equivalent of Hogan “hulking up” during a match. I just knew that despite my low chip count and lack of starting hands, I was winning this tournament.

Players begin eliminating themselves, blinds are 25-50 ante of five, we‘re now five seated. Other table has six, so next one out makes the final table. Mitch, being first or second to act and short stacked, pushes all-in preflop with ace nine. Peeking down I see pocket tens, so I reraise to all-in (I have 55 chips more than Mitch). SuperDonk, sitting in the blind, had roughly thirty-five more than Mitch did. He too calls with ace five. The flop accommodates Mitch with a nine, but misses us every other way. My tens hold up, I mow down last month’s champion and SuperDonk with one “plus EV” move.

Final table forms with me, “The telephone,” “The Realtor” (a girl who is new to the monthly game, but rest assured, a total monster on the table – great player who makes some phenomenal reads). Roger is also present on the final table, as is Fred Sanford’s baby boy, the host, “OMG, u killed Kenny,” and “The shirt.”

I kinda minded my business for the most part on the final table, pretty much either stealing preflop or terminating the hand on the flop. I entered the final table with an M of roughly nine, and had the average stack. My goal for this final table was to maintain average stack until the bubble. I accomplished exactly that.

Down to five players and on the bubble, the telephone, the host and I are in a UTG-SB-BB classic battle. The pot was not raised preflop. The flop comes down two, King, Queen (K and Q both of spades). Check from the host, check from yours truly, and the telephone min bets. Host calls, as do I for some unknown reason (I am not going to even publish what hand I had here). On the turn, a ten of spades falls. At the same time, the blind clock buzzes. I laugh, look at the host and say to him “I know what that means” as I prepare to muck my cards. The host loves to make moves at the buzzer when blinds are this high. I feel bad now, as I surely jinxed him. He moves at the pot, the tele does what he does best and calls. Out of harm’s way, another spade hits the board. The host bets a lil bit, the telephone says “I’ll put you all in.” The host quickly calls, displaying the Jack of spades (he had jack ten, not suited). The telephone shows his ace of spades, conveniently matched up with his seven of hearts from under the gun. The host bubbles as a result of this phone call gone bad.

I felt dirty having made it into the money. Card dead for nearly two hours, calling the buzzer… Oh, forgot to add, I made an all-in push on the final table. I was asked how much was there. I do not ever answer that question. I took the liberty of pointing out my chips are neatly stacked in logical piles, feel free to count. I said it with quite the dick tone. I was joking of course, but I am not sure it came off that way. My whole not smoking gig sometimes makes me feel as if I come off differently than intended (read: cranky, sounding like a prick).

Play continues bubble behind us; “The Telephone” is in the chip lead. Sitting to his left is “the Realtor.” I sit between the telephone (left) and Roger (right). The Transylvanian Terror is seated right behind me, as he and I had been sweating one another from afar early on in the tournament. It sounded as if he was nearly as card dead as I was during the early portion of the tournament. Roughly 50-60% of the chips were sitting with the telephone, while I had almost 20%. The remaining 20% sat with Roger and the Realtor. I still maintained I was winning the tournament. Even told peeps I would call them back after I won. I was slightly more timid on this final table than normal. I raised my “Calling standards” when the pot was opened. To me, if roger limped, or the realtor limped, (even if they raised) hands such as ace nine lost their value at this particular table. Roger would move first, doubling through the Realtor, knocking her out of the match. I cannot remember the exact hand, though she was the only player who remained that I was not 100% confident I could outplay.

Action down to three peeps, I am now last in chips. I could tell the telephone was getting frustrated, as he was often being run over when he was trying to just see a flop. I push all in with the Fillmaff (King Jack “not suited”). He calls from his UTG limp with Jack three, also not suited. 3 hits the flop, king on the turn, river blank. I double through him, but still in third place. Roger made his move a few hands prior and was a convincing second.

Chip counts now roughly 25% to me 40% to Roger 35% to the telephone. I make a couple of steal moves, boost my stack, and Roger eliminates the Telephone, when his pocket pair holds up vs. the telephone’s ace-X.

Roger and I are heads up and he has a 3:1 lead. We color up. As we do, I try to “do Roger a favor” (Read: I am being a dick yet again). I tell Roger that being behind 3:1, and in an obvious position of power, I am willing to split the money with him 50/50 and “let” him assume the spot of champion. He tells me to “get lost” (read: go “F” yourself Mike). He does kindly counter though with taking a bit more and still getting the picture. I act insulted and pull a Happy Gilmore and say, “No, I think I’ll beat you now.” We start heads up play. I am dealt pocket sixes, and I raise 1.25 the blinds, as I am rather confident that he will call that no matter what. Additionally, it is such a small raise that I am also rather confident that with one over card, he will push all-in, two over cards he will simply re-raise me. He push all-in. King five suited vs. 6-6. I double through him.

Again, I offer a deal. This time, 50-50 with the photo shoot now going to me. He is tilting, because he “was beat with f’ing sixes.” Given the tilt, he does not split. I push out a steal raise with 7-9 not suited. He moves all in. I have him covered pretty well at this point. If I lose, we are back to three-one. If I fold, we are 50-50. I can recover from 3:1. Additionally, I had folded two hands earlier to a re-raise, though when I did, I only raised 1.25 the blinds. He could have been “making a move.” I call. He has Ace ten “not suited,” I flip over seven-nine “not suited.” Flop comes 8-8-6. Turn delivers a blank, though there are now three cards to the flush, of which my nine is suited to. So now, going into the river, any card to complete my straight on either side works, as does any seven, any nine, and now additionally, any diamond. River is a five, however, and I complete my straight and take down the second “monthly game” in three months.

Final scorecard reads “Necklace trumps shirt, bracelet trumps shirt, bracelet trumps necklace, hammer trumps all.” As always, thanks to the host and hostess for putting on the event. The time and effort that goes into the monthly game are always appreciated here at the Poker Pub.

Too beautiful for words – 6/29/06

PokerStars No-Limit Hold’em, $1.00 BB (9 handed) Hand History Converter Tool from FlopTurnRiver (Format: HTML)

MP2 =#A500AF(Unfortunate Soul #2)/ ($54.10)

Beer 3:16 ($100)

CO ($93.10)

Button ($26.95)

SB ($109.85)

BB ($143.95)

UTG ($22)

UTG+1 =#A500AF(Unfortunate Soul #1)/ ($103.50)

MP1 ($228.20)

Preflop: Beer 3:16 is MP3 with Ks, Kc. Beer 3:16 posts a blind of $1.

1 fold, UTG+1 =#A500AF(Unfortunate Soul #1)/ calls $1, 1 fold, MP2 =#A500AF(Unfortunate Soul #2)/ raises to $4, MPC (poster) raises to $10, 4 folds, UTG+1 =#A500AF(Unfortunate Soul #1)/ calls $9, MP2 =#A500AF(Unfortunate Soul #2)/ calls $6.

Flop: ($31.50) Qc, Kd, 2c (3 players)

Unfortunate Soul #1 bets $20, Unfortunate Soul #2 raises to $44.1, MPC raises to $45.9, Unfortunate Soul #1 calls $70.

Turn: ($211.50) 7s (3 players)

River: ($211.50) 7d (3 players)

Final Pot: $211.50

Results below:

Unfortunate Soul #1 has 2s 2h (full house, twos full of sevens).

Unfortunate Soul #2 has Qs Qd (full house, queens full of sevens).

Beer 3:16 has Ks Kc (full house, kings full of sevens).

Outcome: Beer 3:16 wins $211.50.