God, this has been the worst year of poker ever. I'm down live and online. I've had the worst run of cards, it's practically made me sick at times. This past week has been the epitome of the year:
I'm 0 for 7 in my last 7 HU matches on PS. I'm 0 for 6 in my last FT SNGs. I've had opponents practically to the felt, and they've caught cards all the way to the point of beating me. I get my money in good constantly, only to get rivered. I mean, seriously, when playing PLO8 you can't get your money in better on the flop than the following situation:
http://twodimes.net/h/?z=7012231
He has only a backdoor straight draw, backdoor flush draw, a backdoor low draw, assuming I'm counterfitted, and 1 card for his set. Turn = 8c, his 1 outer for the set. At this point, I have 4 re-draws to scoop high, and 16 low cards for split pot. So half the deck for about 1/2 the pot. River = 6c, and he lives to see another hand. I get knocked a few hands later, when A37J meets A5KT, who flushes me out of the pot.
Pfft 2009, good riddance!
I'll post an official summary later.
Thursday, December 31, 2009
Wednesday, December 16, 2009
Up and down
First session of of the month resulted in a $200 loss, and that's was including the $100 I made for finally clearing the latest bonus I was working on. :( Since then, it's been a game of catch up to make that money back. I'm now up $65 on the month, but it's really annoying to keep digging these holes that I need to get myself out of.
My biggest problem was not cashing in any of the 3 $55+5 FT tourneys I played. It was ugly: 6th, 9th (????), and 5th. Nothing went right in those. But since then, thankfully, I finally cashed in the last 2 (3rd and 1st) to erase the losses from that day.
I've been playing 6max (6 players per table max) 50PLO8 a lot for some good profit and wondering how much more time I should be spending there. The players, in general, define themselves really clearly, and I'm able to adjust my style to theirs. I absolutely drive the tight players insane with the hands I beat them with. When they define their hand so early with a PF raise, I'll take a large variety of low quality, for PLO8 mind you, mid (89TJ) to high (QQ/KK w/ any other 2 cards) hands and when I flop 2 pair, strong draw or better, I push to get my money in, since a lot of the time I've got AA-baby-baby where I want them: chasing.
Here's the summary:
$11+0.5 HU SNG: 8/7 $3.50
$22+1 HU SNG: 2/7 ($119.00)
$30+1.5 HU SNG: 2/0 $57.00
$33+1.5 HU SNG: 4/3 $22.50
$50+2.5 HU SNG: 0/2 ($105.00)
$55+2.5 HU SNG: 8/6 $75.00
$110+5 HU SNG: 0/1 ($115.00)
$55+5 FT SNG: 0/0/0/2 ($13.50)
25PLO8: 2 sessions ($30.95)
50PLO8: 4 sessions $190.45
bonus: $100
Total: $65
My biggest problem was not cashing in any of the 3 $55+5 FT tourneys I played. It was ugly: 6th, 9th (????), and 5th. Nothing went right in those. But since then, thankfully, I finally cashed in the last 2 (3rd and 1st) to erase the losses from that day.
I've been playing 6max (6 players per table max) 50PLO8 a lot for some good profit and wondering how much more time I should be spending there. The players, in general, define themselves really clearly, and I'm able to adjust my style to theirs. I absolutely drive the tight players insane with the hands I beat them with. When they define their hand so early with a PF raise, I'll take a large variety of low quality, for PLO8 mind you, mid (89TJ) to high (QQ/KK w/ any other 2 cards) hands and when I flop 2 pair, strong draw or better, I push to get my money in, since a lot of the time I've got AA-baby-baby where I want them: chasing.
Here's the summary:
$11+0.5 HU SNG: 8/7 $3.50
$22+1 HU SNG: 2/7 ($119.00)
$30+1.5 HU SNG: 2/0 $57.00
$33+1.5 HU SNG: 4/3 $22.50
$50+2.5 HU SNG: 0/2 ($105.00)
$55+2.5 HU SNG: 8/6 $75.00
$110+5 HU SNG: 0/1 ($115.00)
$55+5 FT SNG: 0/0/0/2 ($13.50)
25PLO8: 2 sessions ($30.95)
50PLO8: 4 sessions $190.45
bonus: $100
Total: $65
Saturday, December 5, 2009
November recap
Aside from my regular PLO8 playing, I spent some time this month trying to win some special event tourneys at PokerStars and Party Poker.
First, was PokerStars' dream job Canada. First place won a poker contract worth $5000/mth + $40k in live even buy-ins, for a total package worth $100k. It was a $100+9 buy-in tourney which I won my entry in a $10+1 satellite. I lasted a grand total of 35 minutes before getting knocked out. I played not correctly. It wasn't quite poorly, but I didn't follow the correct strategy of playing cheap in early blind levels. I was raising too much, and since my good hands didn't actually pan out (AK but don't pair the flop, JJ and Q or K flops), and my opponents showed strength, it hurt my chip stack too much too soon. So, when I raised, first in, from the cut-off with A9 on my fatal hand, I didn't have much wiggle room. The button called as did the BB. Flop came 963 two clubs. BB leads out with a pot bet. I have to move all-in or fold, calling is not a good option. Given the way BB has played, I put him on the flush draw. The button had been pretty tight the whole time, so I did worry about him, but any pair greater than 9's, I thought he would have re-raised me PF, so I think I'm good and I pushed all in. The button calls :( and so does the BB. The turn is the 3c. BB moves all-in and Button calls. BB tables AcTc for the flush, but button tables 99 for the full house. I'm drawing dead. Of course the case 9 had to hit that flop to get me into trouble. Oh well, so goes NLHE tourneys...
The second tourney at Party Poker was a freeroll for Canadian's only with 1st place winning a $15k package including buy-in to the Aussie Millions tournament. 851 entrys, and I was doing pretty well throughout most of the tournament. I spend a good part in the top20 reaching as high as second place 1.5 hours in. The biggest problem was that the blinds were raising pretty fast. Even though I had a lot of chips, my ratio of chips to blinds (also known as M) was around 10. Worse is that my opponents' M values were much smaller, and they were reduced to all-in or fold. So, with 45 people left, I got aggressive to try and prey on the shorter stacks and distance myself, but a couple of untimely moves culminated in my KTc running into AA and losing my stack.
It was fun though. I'm going to try and play a few NLHE tourneys every so often simply because they are so much fun.
Also this month, I've been playing more live with friends, though that hasn't been going too well either. I won $30 the first session I played in a NLHE cash game. Then lost $60 playing a $20SNG followed by a cash game. I tilted pretty badly that night. In the 2 hours of the tournament, I didn't get a single pair. Then, in the cash game, when I got my first pair of the night, 44, I flop a set on a K94 board, only to run into KK losing my first $20 buy-in. The wheels subsequently fell off my game and I pissed away another $20 after rebuying. Finally, I played a 3rd cash game, where I ended up losing $20, but I was up to $35 when I lost it with A7 running into QT to a ATT board.
As for my online escapades, a pretty weak break even month:
$11+0.5 HU SNG: 1/0 $10.50
$22+1 HU SNG: 3/3 ($6.00)
$30+1.5 HU SNG: 1/1 ($3.00)
$33+1.5 HU SNG: 9/14 ($199.50)
$55+2.5 HU SNG: 9/6 $127.50
$35+3 FT SNG: 0/0/0/4 ($152.00)
$50+5 FT SNG: 0/0/1/0 $35.00
$55+5 FT SNG: 0/0/0/2 ($120.00)
$105+9 FT SNG: 0/1/0/0 $169.50
25PLO8: 8 sessions $136.55
50PLO8: 1 sessions $41.40
$10+1 Dream Job NLHE qualifier: ($11.00)
Total: $28.95
Most of those results came at the beginning of the month. Since the middle of the month, my wife has been staying up later and her and I have been spending more time together. I used play after she'd go to sleep, but now we're often going to bed together, so my table time is dropping.
I'm sitting just under 8k lifetime winnings. I'd love to get this above 8.4k before the end of the year, but unless I get better results from my play, it looks like I'll have my first ever losing year, though, being at break even now is good compared to the 1.7k hole I dug myself in the early part of the year.
First, was PokerStars' dream job Canada. First place won a poker contract worth $5000/mth + $40k in live even buy-ins, for a total package worth $100k. It was a $100+9 buy-in tourney which I won my entry in a $10+1 satellite. I lasted a grand total of 35 minutes before getting knocked out. I played not correctly. It wasn't quite poorly, but I didn't follow the correct strategy of playing cheap in early blind levels. I was raising too much, and since my good hands didn't actually pan out (AK but don't pair the flop, JJ and Q or K flops), and my opponents showed strength, it hurt my chip stack too much too soon. So, when I raised, first in, from the cut-off with A9 on my fatal hand, I didn't have much wiggle room. The button called as did the BB. Flop came 963 two clubs. BB leads out with a pot bet. I have to move all-in or fold, calling is not a good option. Given the way BB has played, I put him on the flush draw. The button had been pretty tight the whole time, so I did worry about him, but any pair greater than 9's, I thought he would have re-raised me PF, so I think I'm good and I pushed all in. The button calls :( and so does the BB. The turn is the 3c. BB moves all-in and Button calls. BB tables AcTc for the flush, but button tables 99 for the full house. I'm drawing dead. Of course the case 9 had to hit that flop to get me into trouble. Oh well, so goes NLHE tourneys...
The second tourney at Party Poker was a freeroll for Canadian's only with 1st place winning a $15k package including buy-in to the Aussie Millions tournament. 851 entrys, and I was doing pretty well throughout most of the tournament. I spend a good part in the top20 reaching as high as second place 1.5 hours in. The biggest problem was that the blinds were raising pretty fast. Even though I had a lot of chips, my ratio of chips to blinds (also known as M) was around 10. Worse is that my opponents' M values were much smaller, and they were reduced to all-in or fold. So, with 45 people left, I got aggressive to try and prey on the shorter stacks and distance myself, but a couple of untimely moves culminated in my KTc running into AA and losing my stack.
It was fun though. I'm going to try and play a few NLHE tourneys every so often simply because they are so much fun.
Also this month, I've been playing more live with friends, though that hasn't been going too well either. I won $30 the first session I played in a NLHE cash game. Then lost $60 playing a $20SNG followed by a cash game. I tilted pretty badly that night. In the 2 hours of the tournament, I didn't get a single pair. Then, in the cash game, when I got my first pair of the night, 44, I flop a set on a K94 board, only to run into KK losing my first $20 buy-in. The wheels subsequently fell off my game and I pissed away another $20 after rebuying. Finally, I played a 3rd cash game, where I ended up losing $20, but I was up to $35 when I lost it with A7 running into QT to a ATT board.
As for my online escapades, a pretty weak break even month:
$11+0.5 HU SNG: 1/0 $10.50
$22+1 HU SNG: 3/3 ($6.00)
$30+1.5 HU SNG: 1/1 ($3.00)
$33+1.5 HU SNG: 9/14 ($199.50)
$55+2.5 HU SNG: 9/6 $127.50
$35+3 FT SNG: 0/0/0/4 ($152.00)
$50+5 FT SNG: 0/0/1/0 $35.00
$55+5 FT SNG: 0/0/0/2 ($120.00)
$105+9 FT SNG: 0/1/0/0 $169.50
25PLO8: 8 sessions $136.55
50PLO8: 1 sessions $41.40
$10+1 Dream Job NLHE qualifier: ($11.00)
Total: $28.95
Most of those results came at the beginning of the month. Since the middle of the month, my wife has been staying up later and her and I have been spending more time together. I used play after she'd go to sleep, but now we're often going to bed together, so my table time is dropping.
I'm sitting just under 8k lifetime winnings. I'd love to get this above 8.4k before the end of the year, but unless I get better results from my play, it looks like I'll have my first ever losing year, though, being at break even now is good compared to the 1.7k hole I dug myself in the early part of the year.
Tuesday, November 17, 2009
Risks
What defines a bad risk? One that is unsuccessful, or one that will be unsuccessful in the long run?
I like risks. I have a lot more gamble in me than most of the people I play with live, more so than those online. I just struggle to determine when my risk taking is good or bad. Here's an example from last night.
I hadn't played any $35+3 FT SNGs in a while, so I decided to play a few and nothing was going right. I was getting counterfitted, or just plain sucked out on left-right-and-center in the 3 games I played. I didn't think I was playing poorly, but one can never tell at the time. So after 3 games where I finished 5th, 7th and 9th (a rarity I end up last), I took a break, came back and played a little cash (25PLO8 and then 50PLO8) before noticing that the $105+9 tourney was filling up.
I've never played at this level, though I had notes on a couple of the players from the lower levels (35+3, 55+5). I looked at my stats for the night, and if I played and lost, and lost the cash I still had at the 50PLO8 table, I would have been out $200 on the night. I (maybe rationalized that I) was going to be ok with that loss if I didn't place, so I registered.
So here are my thoughts for taking the risk:
1) In general, I place in 30-40% of the FT tables I play making any tourney I play +EV
2) I had been playing well in the previous tourneys, and just getting unlucky, and was playing well in the cash games.
3) I didn't think that, if I'm playing well, that I would not place in 4 tourneys in a row.
4) I was ok with playing and losing, thereby I was not playing with scared money.
Am I simply convincing myself that I didn't take a bad risk, or, did I really take a good risk?
In the end, I finished up $25 at the 25PLO8 table, up $41 at the 50PLO8 table, and placed 2nd in the $105+9, for an overall night of >$160 profit. I finally crossed the 8k barrier after flirting with it for a while, which is a little psychological milestone I happy to have passed. The question I still have lingering is: Was I stupid and was lucky to place inthe $105+9, or was that a smart decision that actually panned out?
I like risks. I have a lot more gamble in me than most of the people I play with live, more so than those online. I just struggle to determine when my risk taking is good or bad. Here's an example from last night.
I hadn't played any $35+3 FT SNGs in a while, so I decided to play a few and nothing was going right. I was getting counterfitted, or just plain sucked out on left-right-and-center in the 3 games I played. I didn't think I was playing poorly, but one can never tell at the time. So after 3 games where I finished 5th, 7th and 9th (a rarity I end up last), I took a break, came back and played a little cash (25PLO8 and then 50PLO8) before noticing that the $105+9 tourney was filling up.
I've never played at this level, though I had notes on a couple of the players from the lower levels (35+3, 55+5). I looked at my stats for the night, and if I played and lost, and lost the cash I still had at the 50PLO8 table, I would have been out $200 on the night. I (maybe rationalized that I) was going to be ok with that loss if I didn't place, so I registered.
So here are my thoughts for taking the risk:
1) In general, I place in 30-40% of the FT tables I play making any tourney I play +EV
2) I had been playing well in the previous tourneys, and just getting unlucky, and was playing well in the cash games.
3) I didn't think that, if I'm playing well, that I would not place in 4 tourneys in a row.
4) I was ok with playing and losing, thereby I was not playing with scared money.
Am I simply convincing myself that I didn't take a bad risk, or, did I really take a good risk?
In the end, I finished up $25 at the 25PLO8 table, up $41 at the 50PLO8 table, and placed 2nd in the $105+9, for an overall night of >$160 profit. I finally crossed the 8k barrier after flirting with it for a while, which is a little psychological milestone I happy to have passed. The question I still have lingering is: Was I stupid and was lucky to place inthe $105+9, or was that a smart decision that actually panned out?
Saturday, November 14, 2009
Cash games
I've been playing a lot more 25PLO8 lately, with 4 sessions thus far this month. I've been having difficulty finding players I want to play HU, so rather than play random players by signing up to a HU SNG first, I've been trying to play some 6max table games.
My goal was to play and if I make the max buy-in for the next level, I move up. So starting at 25PLO8, I would want to win $50 before moving to the 50PLO8 table. So far, I haven't moved up on any given night, though last night I came close. I made $45.55 in about an hour and a half, but had to lose my initial $25 buy-in first to do that. Normally I don't want to re-buy, I just want to shut it down. But the hand I lost was played just bad enough to give my opponents the impression that they would be able to take my money. Ironically, I was holding second nut high, and a decent low, when my opponent had nut high and second nut low for the scoop. Normally, I'm taking half the pot there, but that hand is proof that second nut does suck... But I was right, no one respected my bets anymore, and I played solid the rest of the way out and just collected the chips.
So half way in, here are my stats:
$33+1.5 HU SNG: 4/10 ($219.00)
$55+2.5 HU SNG: 7/4 $134.50
$50+5 FT SNG: 0/0/1/0 $35.00
25PLO8: 4 sessions $86.65
$10+1 Dream Job NLHE qualifier: ($11.00) -> Won entry to many tourney
Total: $29.15
Not the greatest, but I'm having fun, which is always good.
My goal was to play and if I make the max buy-in for the next level, I move up. So starting at 25PLO8, I would want to win $50 before moving to the 50PLO8 table. So far, I haven't moved up on any given night, though last night I came close. I made $45.55 in about an hour and a half, but had to lose my initial $25 buy-in first to do that. Normally I don't want to re-buy, I just want to shut it down. But the hand I lost was played just bad enough to give my opponents the impression that they would be able to take my money. Ironically, I was holding second nut high, and a decent low, when my opponent had nut high and second nut low for the scoop. Normally, I'm taking half the pot there, but that hand is proof that second nut does suck... But I was right, no one respected my bets anymore, and I played solid the rest of the way out and just collected the chips.
So half way in, here are my stats:
$33+1.5 HU SNG: 4/10 ($219.00)
$55+2.5 HU SNG: 7/4 $134.50
$50+5 FT SNG: 0/0/1/0 $35.00
25PLO8: 4 sessions $86.65
$10+1 Dream Job NLHE qualifier: ($11.00) -> Won entry to many tourney
Total: $29.15
Not the greatest, but I'm having fun, which is always good.
Thursday, November 12, 2009
PokerStars Dream Job Canada
PokerStars is running a $100+9 buy-in tourney on Nov29 @ 7PM EST where the winner is awarded a$100k contract with PokerStars. The breakdown of the contract is $5k/month for 12 months with $40k to be used for live tournement entries via the site. It also appears that places 2-11 will win $2.5k.
They are running various qualifiers to that tourney, some for cash buy-ins ($1+.10, $10+1) and some with player point buy-ins. I decided to play in one of the $10+1 qualifiers last night after exercising. PS offers late registration (15 minutes) to their tournaments. I don't normally register for a tournament late, because I feel that I will be at a slight disadvantage. Wasn't the case last night. The first half dozen hands were good to premium quality and I doubled my stack quickly. Now with a stack, and a fairly passive table, I would raise with a wide range of hands, and more often than not win PF or take it down with a bet on the turn(*). I was rolling quite smoothly until one player came from another table and figured out what I was doing as started to play back at me. Still, I was able to build up a top-10 stack and stay there as the number of people dropped from 106 to about 40ish.
(* side note) Checking the flop and betting the turn is turning out to be one of the best strategies that I have developed in my PLO8 game that's turning out to be quite profitable in NLHE as well. The concept is that a fish will call light on the flop and hope to catch good on the turn. And since many players will bluff at the flop and shut down on the turn, cause a bluff bet there will consume too much of their stack, the fish's call allows them to see the next two cards for that one call. It's a very advanced play that they make quite accidentally. By going PF bet, check flop, and betting the turn, I've done a couple things: 1) I've played it like I'm slow playing a monster, 2) I've been able to see my opponent's reaction to that flop twice, if in position, and once if out of position. Remember, I'm playing a fish who, even in position, isn't likely to bet at the PF raiser. So, my delayed continuation bet takes down many more pots than my flop continuation bet ever would. Of course, the occasional opponent catches up on the turn, or then calls me down with flopped middle pair, but I'm more than compensated by the hands that have been folded to me there when I've had nothing. Ok, back to the original discussion...
Things got tricky with about 40 players left. For one, the player who was playing back at me has accumulated a few more chips than me, so I'm putting myself at risk if I try to make plays PF, when he's still left to act behind me (two to my left at a 9 person table). Secondly, the blinds were getting high relative the the stack sizes. I may have been top-10, but my M was less than 20 (M=stack/(BB+SB+antes), M>20 means any PF approach is acceptable, less than that and certain plays, like set mining don't give the right ROI if you flop it and stack your opponent). Beyond just constraining my PF plays, my M issues mean that others with bottom tier stacks have worse M problems. That usually means that have only 1 PF play: all-in. So I had to tighten up and navigate those waters carefully.
Didn't work out too well initially. I lost 2 all-ins to smaller stacks to find myself with an M of 8 and forced to go all-in PF or fold. That's when I started to get lucky. I push from middle position with Td5d and get called by QQ. I flop a 5 and turn a T to win with 2 pair. 2 hands later, ironically to complete my knock out of the same QQ opponent, I move all-in PF with 33, and he called with AT. I flop a set and turn quads to finish him off. I'm now back in the top-10 and there are only 30 people left.
Shortly after, I finally get moved to a new table (27 left), and basically tread water the rest of the way to the payout bubble. Top 9 get entry to the $109 tourney, 10-16 get their entry fee refunded and 17th gets the $2 left over. I'm fortunate that there are 2 bigger stacks sitting out, so I try to steal their blinds when possible. By doing this once per round, I'm able to keep the same stack size. Occasionally I get a caller, and occasionally I get a hand and would win some more chips. But my plan was to stay away from big pots with the hugest stack, who happened to be 1 to my left, and take many small ones.
Hand-by-hand play went into effect from 20 players to 16, took about a half hour for a dozen hands, but was happy to get to 16th, since now I've broken even for the day. At 16, we're down to 2 tables, and most of the big chips stacks are sitting at my table. Sometimes this is a bad thing, cause if you get some greedy big stack raising every hand, then you can't just keep mucking or you'll get blinded out, but you have to put your tourney at risk any hand you decide to play. But I had smart table mates. We only had 1 short stack, so it was clear that everone's focus was to knock him out. When that was done, we effectively folded to the BB every time. This put the pressure on all the short stacks on the other table. We all stayed at roughly the same level, except for the one player, who was once chip leader but was sitting out. His blind got stolen by anyone who min raised PF.
After 40 minutes of that, I won my entry to the main tournament. Now I need to convince my wife to left me play starting at 7PM, which is usually when I'm giving my kids their baths and am putting them down to sleep.
They are running various qualifiers to that tourney, some for cash buy-ins ($1+.10, $10+1) and some with player point buy-ins. I decided to play in one of the $10+1 qualifiers last night after exercising. PS offers late registration (15 minutes) to their tournaments. I don't normally register for a tournament late, because I feel that I will be at a slight disadvantage. Wasn't the case last night. The first half dozen hands were good to premium quality and I doubled my stack quickly. Now with a stack, and a fairly passive table, I would raise with a wide range of hands, and more often than not win PF or take it down with a bet on the turn(*). I was rolling quite smoothly until one player came from another table and figured out what I was doing as started to play back at me. Still, I was able to build up a top-10 stack and stay there as the number of people dropped from 106 to about 40ish.
(* side note) Checking the flop and betting the turn is turning out to be one of the best strategies that I have developed in my PLO8 game that's turning out to be quite profitable in NLHE as well. The concept is that a fish will call light on the flop and hope to catch good on the turn. And since many players will bluff at the flop and shut down on the turn, cause a bluff bet there will consume too much of their stack, the fish's call allows them to see the next two cards for that one call. It's a very advanced play that they make quite accidentally. By going PF bet, check flop, and betting the turn, I've done a couple things: 1) I've played it like I'm slow playing a monster, 2) I've been able to see my opponent's reaction to that flop twice, if in position, and once if out of position. Remember, I'm playing a fish who, even in position, isn't likely to bet at the PF raiser. So, my delayed continuation bet takes down many more pots than my flop continuation bet ever would. Of course, the occasional opponent catches up on the turn, or then calls me down with flopped middle pair, but I'm more than compensated by the hands that have been folded to me there when I've had nothing. Ok, back to the original discussion...
Things got tricky with about 40 players left. For one, the player who was playing back at me has accumulated a few more chips than me, so I'm putting myself at risk if I try to make plays PF, when he's still left to act behind me (two to my left at a 9 person table). Secondly, the blinds were getting high relative the the stack sizes. I may have been top-10, but my M was less than 20 (M=stack/(BB+SB+antes), M>20 means any PF approach is acceptable, less than that and certain plays, like set mining don't give the right ROI if you flop it and stack your opponent). Beyond just constraining my PF plays, my M issues mean that others with bottom tier stacks have worse M problems. That usually means that have only 1 PF play: all-in. So I had to tighten up and navigate those waters carefully.
Didn't work out too well initially. I lost 2 all-ins to smaller stacks to find myself with an M of 8 and forced to go all-in PF or fold. That's when I started to get lucky. I push from middle position with Td5d and get called by QQ. I flop a 5 and turn a T to win with 2 pair. 2 hands later, ironically to complete my knock out of the same QQ opponent, I move all-in PF with 33, and he called with AT. I flop a set and turn quads to finish him off. I'm now back in the top-10 and there are only 30 people left.
Shortly after, I finally get moved to a new table (27 left), and basically tread water the rest of the way to the payout bubble. Top 9 get entry to the $109 tourney, 10-16 get their entry fee refunded and 17th gets the $2 left over. I'm fortunate that there are 2 bigger stacks sitting out, so I try to steal their blinds when possible. By doing this once per round, I'm able to keep the same stack size. Occasionally I get a caller, and occasionally I get a hand and would win some more chips. But my plan was to stay away from big pots with the hugest stack, who happened to be 1 to my left, and take many small ones.
Hand-by-hand play went into effect from 20 players to 16, took about a half hour for a dozen hands, but was happy to get to 16th, since now I've broken even for the day. At 16, we're down to 2 tables, and most of the big chips stacks are sitting at my table. Sometimes this is a bad thing, cause if you get some greedy big stack raising every hand, then you can't just keep mucking or you'll get blinded out, but you have to put your tourney at risk any hand you decide to play. But I had smart table mates. We only had 1 short stack, so it was clear that everone's focus was to knock him out. When that was done, we effectively folded to the BB every time. This put the pressure on all the short stacks on the other table. We all stayed at roughly the same level, except for the one player, who was once chip leader but was sitting out. His blind got stolen by anyone who min raised PF.
After 40 minutes of that, I won my entry to the main tournament. Now I need to convince my wife to left me play starting at 7PM, which is usually when I'm giving my kids their baths and am putting them down to sleep.
Sunday, November 1, 2009
October Roundup
I split my time between UB and PS this month. The UB experiment was basically break even, except for the PLO8 MTT, so I don't think I'll play there often, but I'll try and play that MTT a couple of times a month. It's just too much fun not to play, but takes too long to play too often.
Overall an ok month, but I didn't play very often. I have roughly 70 games played, but 15 of those were one day I was home from work and was given the day to myself to play (coincidentally, 100% of my profit was that day, the rest of the month was breakeven). Since the middle of the month, work has been quite hectic, and I just haven't been up to playing. That is kind of a good thing, since I lose when I try to force sessions in when I shouldn't.
The PS breakdown:
$22+1 HU: 1/1 ($2.00)
$30+1.5 HU: 1/0 $28.50
$33+1.5 HU: 6/10 ($156.00)
$50+2.5 HU: 4/0 $190.00
$55+2.5 HU: 11/10 $2.50
$35+3 FT: 1/0/0/0 $119.50
$55+5 FT: 1/0/1/3 $46.50
25PLO8: 2 session ($30.15)
The UB breakdown:
$10+0.5 PLO8 HU: 1/0 $9.50
$20+1 PLO8 HU: 7/6 $7.00
$20+1 PLO HU: 1/0 $19.00 (OOPS, signed in to the wrong tourney)
$50+2.5 PLO8 HU: 3/3 ($15.00)
$20+2 PLO8 FT: 0/0/0/1 ($22.00)
$10+1 PLO8 MTT: 3/116 $125.30
200PLO8: 1 session $9.50
It's another profitable month, $332.15, making it 2 in a row. The biggest obstacle now is getting past the 8k barrier. I've been close before only to drop big time. Don't know why there should be a problem around a round number, it is just one number, but I've seen myself struggle there at 7k, 8k, 9k, 10k, 11k (which was the worst since I never made it and free falled to 8k shortly there after).
Overall, I'm up $716.67. Averaging $179.17 which is 20% of where I wanted to be when I originally started tracking this, but not a bad number from historical perspectives.
I started this with the goal of playing FT tourneys, since I was averaging around $20 per, but I've become addicted to the HU SNGs. I feel like I can win more with the HU SNGs, but looking at the past 4 months, I'm only up $150 total on all HU SNGs. What does that mean? Should I force myself to play more FTs? I'll have to start thinking about that more in depth.
I do know that I used to go the the HU page only when the FT games didn't look like they'd fill up soon, but now I go directly there. Then again, I had such a bad run at the FTs to start, I did start to shy away from them. Decisions, decisions...
I think it's time I re-focus on the FTs. I need to mentally prep myself, because I've gotten used to the 20 minute HU matches. The FTs are minimum 45 minutes to cash, so I've got to play patiently.
It's time to have my best month yet!
Overall an ok month, but I didn't play very often. I have roughly 70 games played, but 15 of those were one day I was home from work and was given the day to myself to play (coincidentally, 100% of my profit was that day, the rest of the month was breakeven). Since the middle of the month, work has been quite hectic, and I just haven't been up to playing. That is kind of a good thing, since I lose when I try to force sessions in when I shouldn't.
The PS breakdown:
$22+1 HU: 1/1 ($2.00)
$30+1.5 HU: 1/0 $28.50
$33+1.5 HU: 6/10 ($156.00)
$50+2.5 HU: 4/0 $190.00
$55+2.5 HU: 11/10 $2.50
$35+3 FT: 1/0/0/0 $119.50
$55+5 FT: 1/0/1/3 $46.50
25PLO8: 2 session ($30.15)
The UB breakdown:
$10+0.5 PLO8 HU: 1/0 $9.50
$20+1 PLO8 HU: 7/6 $7.00
$20+1 PLO HU: 1/0 $19.00 (OOPS, signed in to the wrong tourney)
$50+2.5 PLO8 HU: 3/3 ($15.00)
$20+2 PLO8 FT: 0/0/0/1 ($22.00)
$10+1 PLO8 MTT: 3/116 $125.30
200PLO8: 1 session $9.50
It's another profitable month, $332.15, making it 2 in a row. The biggest obstacle now is getting past the 8k barrier. I've been close before only to drop big time. Don't know why there should be a problem around a round number, it is just one number, but I've seen myself struggle there at 7k, 8k, 9k, 10k, 11k (which was the worst since I never made it and free falled to 8k shortly there after).
Overall, I'm up $716.67. Averaging $179.17 which is 20% of where I wanted to be when I originally started tracking this, but not a bad number from historical perspectives.
I started this with the goal of playing FT tourneys, since I was averaging around $20 per, but I've become addicted to the HU SNGs. I feel like I can win more with the HU SNGs, but looking at the past 4 months, I'm only up $150 total on all HU SNGs. What does that mean? Should I force myself to play more FTs? I'll have to start thinking about that more in depth.
I do know that I used to go the the HU page only when the FT games didn't look like they'd fill up soon, but now I go directly there. Then again, I had such a bad run at the FTs to start, I did start to shy away from them. Decisions, decisions...
I think it's time I re-focus on the FTs. I need to mentally prep myself, because I've gotten used to the 20 minute HU matches. The FTs are minimum 45 minutes to cash, so I've got to play patiently.
It's time to have my best month yet!
Friday, October 30, 2009
PLO8 MTT
Played in a PLO8 MTT on UB last night. $10+1 with 116 entries. Started at 8:40 and I was playing until 12:40. Finished in 3rd. I could easily have been knocked out earlier or won the thing, so I'm pretty happy with the finish. Won $136.60.
I do regret playing the 2 $55+2.5 HU SNGs on PokerStars at the same time, since I lost both and only have ~$10 profit to show for my 4 hours of playing.
I really wish PokerStars had a few more of these. The only PLO8 MTTs are on the week-end during the day, which is a really bad time for me since I spend it with the family. But there are so many PLO8 players on PS that the payouts would be very sweet.
Oh well, I'll have to suffice with SNGs in the mean time.
I do regret playing the 2 $55+2.5 HU SNGs on PokerStars at the same time, since I lost both and only have ~$10 profit to show for my 4 hours of playing.
I really wish PokerStars had a few more of these. The only PLO8 MTTs are on the week-end during the day, which is a really bad time for me since I spend it with the family. But there are so many PLO8 players on PS that the payouts would be very sweet.
Oh well, I'll have to suffice with SNGs in the mean time.
Monday, October 19, 2009
PTO
That is the anagram of Poker Tracker Omaha. When I first got this tool for my cash games, my results changes drastically. My haphazard notes on players got refined and I started to really win big at the low levels (.10/.25, .25/.50). There were players whom I thought were good/profitable, but really were not, and once I know the hands that they were playing, I was able to then take advantage of it.
I mention this now because I hadn't updated my stats since I started this blog. The main reason was that the tool wasn't properly updating from the hand histories for my SNGs. I finally got in gear and went to the forums to pick up an update which fixed the issues and I analyzed the games of the two players whom I believe at the better HU players I've played against: tatta and vendo. It's funny, because originally, I thought vendo was a mark, but it was that my style of play was effective against his general style. I've moved him into the "good player" category because he's made the appropriate adjustments against me and had taken several games in a row.
The interesting thing that I found was that they were more selective from the SB, and that they both really opened up their check-raising range against me. Makes sense, since I raise PF 50% of the time, and cbet a good number of flops, seems like the right thing to do. So today, I found vendo at the $55+2.5 and I played against him with my new knowledge. My goal was to be less aggro PF, and fold the worst ~15% of hands from the SB (1 out of 6ish). Then try to limit my aggression post-flop in the early betting rounds.
Worked pretty well. We stayed pretty close to the starting stacks through the first few rounds. I was fortunate that I was able to show him a slow play of the nut flush across flop and turn, and only value bet the river in position. He called down with 2 pair. I don't think he's ever seen me do that.
In the end, I found that he didn't check-raise me as much as he normally did, and I was able to make many value bets on the river, which were called. In the later blind rounds, I was able to then bluff a few turns, because I had shown so little aggression up to that point that he respected my bets again.
I eventually won the match, but I was more happy that I was able to implement a strategy, and see my opponent begin to behave in a way that help me make decisions. I would like to have a few more matches against him to see if I can continue to adjust appropriately. I'd also like to try tatta again and see if I can figure out a successful strategy against him.
I mention this now because I hadn't updated my stats since I started this blog. The main reason was that the tool wasn't properly updating from the hand histories for my SNGs. I finally got in gear and went to the forums to pick up an update which fixed the issues and I analyzed the games of the two players whom I believe at the better HU players I've played against: tatta and vendo. It's funny, because originally, I thought vendo was a mark, but it was that my style of play was effective against his general style. I've moved him into the "good player" category because he's made the appropriate adjustments against me and had taken several games in a row.
The interesting thing that I found was that they were more selective from the SB, and that they both really opened up their check-raising range against me. Makes sense, since I raise PF 50% of the time, and cbet a good number of flops, seems like the right thing to do. So today, I found vendo at the $55+2.5 and I played against him with my new knowledge. My goal was to be less aggro PF, and fold the worst ~15% of hands from the SB (1 out of 6ish). Then try to limit my aggression post-flop in the early betting rounds.
Worked pretty well. We stayed pretty close to the starting stacks through the first few rounds. I was fortunate that I was able to show him a slow play of the nut flush across flop and turn, and only value bet the river in position. He called down with 2 pair. I don't think he's ever seen me do that.
In the end, I found that he didn't check-raise me as much as he normally did, and I was able to make many value bets on the river, which were called. In the later blind rounds, I was able to then bluff a few turns, because I had shown so little aggression up to that point that he respected my bets again.
I eventually won the match, but I was more happy that I was able to implement a strategy, and see my opponent begin to behave in a way that help me make decisions. I would like to have a few more matches against him to see if I can continue to adjust appropriately. I'd also like to try tatta again and see if I can figure out a successful strategy against him.
Thursday, October 15, 2009
Spinning my wheels
Win one, lose one, win one, lose one. So goes my UB $20+1 HU matches. Of course, I shouldn't have been playing while on the work conference call, but I'm needed for like 5 minutes in a 2 hour call, so I might as well entertain myself.
I was trying to get to $100 overall on UB before moving back to PS, but it just isn't working. I'm 5/4 in the $20+1 HU thus far for a grand profit of $7. Take away the entry fee for the $20+2 FT, and I'm ($15). So, for my last game of the night, I found a player I used to play a lot against, XUE????2002, sitting at the $50+2.5. Took a while, mostly because I was making donkey calls of re-raises despite my note saying "all re-raises mean the nuts". Eventually, I caught him calling down with enough weak hands to get back my chips and win the match. That gave me a net profit of $47.50, and I'm +$32.50 for my UB experience over the past 3 days. Not exactly tearing it up. I'll extend the experiment for a bit, but it I keep spinning my wheels like this, I'll be leaving soon.
I was trying to get to $100 overall on UB before moving back to PS, but it just isn't working. I'm 5/4 in the $20+1 HU thus far for a grand profit of $7. Take away the entry fee for the $20+2 FT, and I'm ($15). So, for my last game of the night, I found a player I used to play a lot against, XUE????2002, sitting at the $50+2.5. Took a while, mostly because I was making donkey calls of re-raises despite my note saying "all re-raises mean the nuts". Eventually, I caught him calling down with enough weak hands to get back my chips and win the match. That gave me a net profit of $47.50, and I'm +$32.50 for my UB experience over the past 3 days. Not exactly tearing it up. I'll extend the experiment for a bit, but it I keep spinning my wheels like this, I'll be leaving soon.
Wednesday, October 14, 2009
Crappy UI
In my overjoyed state of winning $35 last night on UltimateBet, I forgot to mention how crappy the user interface (UI) is. UltimateBet was the first site I played, and the interface from 5 years ago was much better than it is now.
First of all, the "mini table" was AWESOME. I don't care for avatars and animation when I play. Cards+chips=perfect. The mini table was a small horizontal strip which showed your 9 opponents, your hole cards (mini table not available for stud games). and everyone's chip count. I could fit a dozen of those tables on the screen. Now, to do so, would require magnifying glasses to see my cards.
Secondly, the hand history interface just totally blows. It used to be a simple text box, with everything nice and spaced out. Very readable. Now, it's garbage. I try and review my opponents hands after they have past, and it's so not very easy to do.
Ever since they merged with Absolute Poker, it sucks. I think that's one of the reasons I decided to play other sites (lack of good bonuses pushed me away too). I'm playing there again tonight to see how much I can make just playing HU matches. However, I see my little UB jaunt coming to an end soon. Too few players, just not worth the hassle.
First of all, the "mini table" was AWESOME. I don't care for avatars and animation when I play. Cards+chips=perfect. The mini table was a small horizontal strip which showed your 9 opponents, your hole cards (mini table not available for stud games). and everyone's chip count. I could fit a dozen of those tables on the screen. Now, to do so, would require magnifying glasses to see my cards.
Secondly, the hand history interface just totally blows. It used to be a simple text box, with everything nice and spaced out. Very readable. Now, it's garbage. I try and review my opponents hands after they have past, and it's so not very easy to do.
Ever since they merged with Absolute Poker, it sucks. I think that's one of the reasons I decided to play other sites (lack of good bonuses pushed me away too). I'm playing there again tonight to see how much I can make just playing HU matches. However, I see my little UB jaunt coming to an end soon. Too few players, just not worth the hassle.
Tuesday, October 13, 2009
New/old site
I haven't played UltimateBet in 7 months, but given the fact that PokerStars has turned the doom switch to the ON position, I figured it was time for a change.
I played in a PLO8 $20+2 FT and 3x PLO8 $20+1 HU SNGs. I finished 5th in the FT, but won all 3 HU games for a profit of $35. Not bad for an hour+ of my time. The FT game was slow. The blinds didn't rise as fast as at PS, and I ended up pushing too hard too soon, though A357 in the SB running into AA4K in the BB 5 handed is a little bit of a cooler.
The HU games were jokes. I almost won the first game on the 1st hand. I flopped a set of 2s with a flush draw, with the board showing 2cTdJd (I had 2d6d2?5?). The betting, with me leading, was b(pot)/r(pot)/rr(pot)/c. Turn was a 7 I believe, I bet pot, he called. Kd on the river and I bet all-in, and he mucked after a long pause. I totally expected him to call with nut flush. He could have had a higher set, but I doubt it since he didn't move all-in on the turn. My guess was two pair after he mucked.
I find it interesting that I play PLO8 with no fear of my opponents hitting the nuts on various streets. It's interesting because with the extra 2 hole cards compared to hold'em, you've think your opponent would get there more often. I'm sure they do, but I'm getting to the point where I know when they do. Almost all flop calls mean something in PLO8, and all turn calls practically define my opponents hands, at least in tournament settings.
When I play hold'em with my friends, we still have players who will call down with any over cards, and a variety of shitty draws (like chasing runner-runner flushes on purpose), which makes it very difficult to know where you're at. Extracting value from top-pair weak kicker, or middle pair is almost impossible. You either get a fold or a massive re-raise. I guess I'm just bitter that I haven't been placing in our mini tourneys and looking for an excuse... I do wonder though if I played enough NLHE tourneys, if I'd ever get to the same point of confidence I have in PLO8.
I played in a PLO8 $20+2 FT and 3x PLO8 $20+1 HU SNGs. I finished 5th in the FT, but won all 3 HU games for a profit of $35. Not bad for an hour+ of my time. The FT game was slow. The blinds didn't rise as fast as at PS, and I ended up pushing too hard too soon, though A357 in the SB running into AA4K in the BB 5 handed is a little bit of a cooler.
The HU games were jokes. I almost won the first game on the 1st hand. I flopped a set of 2s with a flush draw, with the board showing 2cTdJd (I had 2d6d2?5?). The betting, with me leading, was b(pot)/r(pot)/rr(pot)/c. Turn was a 7 I believe, I bet pot, he called. Kd on the river and I bet all-in, and he mucked after a long pause. I totally expected him to call with nut flush. He could have had a higher set, but I doubt it since he didn't move all-in on the turn. My guess was two pair after he mucked.
I find it interesting that I play PLO8 with no fear of my opponents hitting the nuts on various streets. It's interesting because with the extra 2 hole cards compared to hold'em, you've think your opponent would get there more often. I'm sure they do, but I'm getting to the point where I know when they do. Almost all flop calls mean something in PLO8, and all turn calls practically define my opponents hands, at least in tournament settings.
When I play hold'em with my friends, we still have players who will call down with any over cards, and a variety of shitty draws (like chasing runner-runner flushes on purpose), which makes it very difficult to know where you're at. Extracting value from top-pair weak kicker, or middle pair is almost impossible. You either get a fold or a massive re-raise. I guess I'm just bitter that I haven't been placing in our mini tourneys and looking for an excuse... I do wonder though if I played enough NLHE tourneys, if I'd ever get to the same point of confidence I have in PLO8.
Monday, October 12, 2009
The curse of the withdrawal
I promised myself that, after I pass the $2500 mark on PokerStars, I'd withdraw some of my cash to my e-wallet account. I had deposited $1400 at various times to take advantage of bonuses, but I wanted to reclaim some of my deposit money ($800) for future deposit bonuses.
It never fails: As soon as I withdraw money from a site, all shit breaks loose and I go on a crazy losing streak. I've lost my last 5 HU SNGs (3x$33+1.5, 2x$55+2.5), and each time I've had my opponent up against the ropes, and 2 savior (for him anyway) rivers later I'm eliminated. Thankfully I'm not playing cash games. When I used to play cash, I'd lose close to the amount I had withdrawn, if not more. For now, it's only been ($223.65), so I've got time to stop the bleeding and get back on track.
I'm still positive for the month +$117.35, thanks to my free play day:
$22+1 HU: 0/1 ($23.00)
$30+1.5 HU: 1/0 $28.50
$33+1.5 HU: 2/6 ($144)
$50+2.5 HU: 3/0 $142.50
$55+2.5 HU: 5/6 ($82.50)
$35+3 FT: 1/0/0/0 $119.50
$55+5 FT: 1/0/1/2 $106.50
25PLO8: 2 ($30.15)
It never fails: As soon as I withdraw money from a site, all shit breaks loose and I go on a crazy losing streak. I've lost my last 5 HU SNGs (3x$33+1.5, 2x$55+2.5), and each time I've had my opponent up against the ropes, and 2 savior (for him anyway) rivers later I'm eliminated. Thankfully I'm not playing cash games. When I used to play cash, I'd lose close to the amount I had withdrawn, if not more. For now, it's only been ($223.65), so I've got time to stop the bleeding and get back on track.
I'm still positive for the month +$117.35, thanks to my free play day:
$22+1 HU: 0/1 ($23.00)
$30+1.5 HU: 1/0 $28.50
$33+1.5 HU: 2/6 ($144)
$50+2.5 HU: 3/0 $142.50
$55+2.5 HU: 5/6 ($82.50)
$35+3 FT: 1/0/0/0 $119.50
$55+5 FT: 1/0/1/2 $106.50
25PLO8: 2 ($30.15)
Sunday, October 4, 2009
Free play
I was home on Friday due to a doctor visit. I was able to spend the day playing poker and give myself an idea of what I could do if given 8 hours of time to play as if it were a job. The results were mixed.
On the day, I won $322.50. However, I only won $135 in about 6 hours of playing time during the day. Then I played a single $55+5 FT at night, and finished 1st for $187.50 in .75hours of play. If taken on the whole, $322.50 over 6.75 hours is excellent($47/hr), but I think the $135/6 ($22/hr) is more representative of an achievable hourly rate if I try to play a sustained amount.
The breakdown for the whole day is:
$22+1 HU: 0/1 ($23.00)
$30+1.5 HU: 1/0 $28.50
$33+1.5 HU: 1/2 ($37.50)
$50+2.5 HU: 3/0 $142.50
$55+2.5 HU: 2/2 ($10.00)
$35+3 FT: 1/0/0/0 $119.50
$55+5 FT: 1/0/0/1 $127.50
25PLO8: 1 ($25.00)
The PLO8 cash game was a double or nothing attempt. Start at a low amount, play aggressive and try to double up. If successful, take profits and move to the next level up. Attempt to go from 25 PLO8 to 200 PLO8. I had AA67 run into a K with a KK9 flop, and wasn't able to recover. Such is expected when you are playing fast.
Suffice it to say, I'm gonna keep my day job, and keep playing as a hobby. I love the challenge, and I couldn't quite imaging playing with money which I knew I would need to support my family.
On the day, I won $322.50. However, I only won $135 in about 6 hours of playing time during the day. Then I played a single $55+5 FT at night, and finished 1st for $187.50 in .75hours of play. If taken on the whole, $322.50 over 6.75 hours is excellent($47/hr), but I think the $135/6 ($22/hr) is more representative of an achievable hourly rate if I try to play a sustained amount.
The breakdown for the whole day is:
$22+1 HU: 0/1 ($23.00)
$30+1.5 HU: 1/0 $28.50
$33+1.5 HU: 1/2 ($37.50)
$50+2.5 HU: 3/0 $142.50
$55+2.5 HU: 2/2 ($10.00)
$35+3 FT: 1/0/0/0 $119.50
$55+5 FT: 1/0/0/1 $127.50
25PLO8: 1 ($25.00)
The PLO8 cash game was a double or nothing attempt. Start at a low amount, play aggressive and try to double up. If successful, take profits and move to the next level up. Attempt to go from 25 PLO8 to 200 PLO8. I had AA67 run into a K with a KK9 flop, and wasn't able to recover. Such is expected when you are playing fast.
Suffice it to say, I'm gonna keep my day job, and keep playing as a hobby. I love the challenge, and I couldn't quite imaging playing with money which I knew I would need to support my family.
Friday, October 2, 2009
NLHE tournies
I'm considering adding a NLHE tourney to my set of games. PS has 2 that run nightly which offer the potential of a big score: The 70k nightly ($50+5) and the 100k nightly ($150+12). I'm trying to figure out a strategy of entering them. For example, if I made >$200 on the night before, play the 100k, >$60, play the 70k or something like that. The 70k rarely breaks the 70k mark, but I've seen the 100k have prize pools around 150k.
I've had big chunks of my poker winnings come from a couple NLHE trnys, so maybe it is worth it. If you look at Wacky's comment to my "September Roundup" post, you can see that if I really still want to reach 10k in 12 months, I've got a big uphill climb to get there. Actually, I have admitted to myself that I don't think I can reach my 10k goal, but by changing my focus from 10k to strong play every night, I have seen my results improve. I want to build on that, and if I get to 10k with that approach, that would be cool, but I'm realistic. 5k seems like the most likely end result, and I'm ok with that, since it would be the best 12 month stretch ever anyway.
I've had big chunks of my poker winnings come from a couple NLHE trnys, so maybe it is worth it. If you look at Wacky's comment to my "September Roundup" post, you can see that if I really still want to reach 10k in 12 months, I've got a big uphill climb to get there. Actually, I have admitted to myself that I don't think I can reach my 10k goal, but by changing my focus from 10k to strong play every night, I have seen my results improve. I want to build on that, and if I get to 10k with that approach, that would be cool, but I'm realistic. 5k seems like the most likely end result, and I'm ok with that, since it would be the best 12 month stretch ever anyway.
Wednesday, September 30, 2009
September roundup
Ok, first off, I've been slacking on the posts. I've had 6 sessions since my last post for ($286.50). My strong run ground to a halt. But there is a little light at the end of that tunnel. Month #3 has been profitable for a good clip: $476.45 (would've been spectacular if not for that slip up!). Here's the breakdown:
$22+1 HU: 2/0 $42.00
$30+1.5 HU: 1/1 ($3.00)
$33+1.5 HU: 11/9 $36.00
$55+2.5 HU: 12/8 $170.00
$110+5 HU: 1/1 ($10.00)
$25+2 FT: 0/1/0/0 $40.50
$35+3 FT: 0/0/0/1 ($38.00)
$55+5 FT: 0/2/0/0 $177.00
100PLO8: 1 session $61.95
I think the irony of this is that this month contains the least amount of games played (July=74, August=90, September=51). Just goes to show, when I push to play, I play poorly; when I play because I have the time, I play better.
Overall, I'm up $384.52 since I began. I'll take it! Profit is good. October started 2 hours ago, so I really need to get to bed!
$22+1 HU: 2/0 $42.00
$30+1.5 HU: 1/1 ($3.00)
$33+1.5 HU: 11/9 $36.00
$55+2.5 HU: 12/8 $170.00
$110+5 HU: 1/1 ($10.00)
$25+2 FT: 0/1/0/0 $40.50
$35+3 FT: 0/0/0/1 ($38.00)
$55+5 FT: 0/2/0/0 $177.00
100PLO8: 1 session $61.95
I think the irony of this is that this month contains the least amount of games played (July=74, August=90, September=51). Just goes to show, when I push to play, I play poorly; when I play because I have the time, I play better.
Overall, I'm up $384.52 since I began. I'll take it! Profit is good. October started 2 hours ago, so I really need to get to bed!
Saturday, September 19, 2009
Hiatus over!
Finally got in some poker this week. Thursday night after my baseball game, I found talisain51 looking for an opponent at the $55+2.5 HU table, and I was happy to oblige! I quit after winning that game.
Played again this afternoon while the kids were sleeping. Split a pair of games against a new opponent. I had him on the ropes in the second game, he clawed back, got me on the ropes, then I clawed back. We were even stacked when he ended up with QQ35 in the SB, and I had KQJ5ss in the BB. He raised PF, and I called. I like calling with this type of hand because when I flop good, I can usually get a lot of chips out of my opponents, especially those with AA or AK[baby]. When the flop comes with any 2 cards from 9 to K, I've got a very strong hand and/or drawing hand, especially if there end up being 2 cards of my suit. Well, I didn't expect a QQ35 raise from my opponent. He had been pretty conservative, so I figured him more for and A[Face][Baby] type hand. In this case, the flop came QT3, and the money when in on the flop. OOPS! I hit my 9 on the turn, for my straight, but a river 9 gave him the win.
I didn't feel like playing another SNG, so I went to the cash tables and found someone sitting alone with $88 at the 100PLO8 tables (.5/1 blinds). I figured, what the heck, it's been a while. Put up $100 and see if you can make $50. Made $61.95 and left. The hand I made most of my chips was AQJJ in the SB, I limped and he checked. Flop came QT5. My opponent came out betting ($2). I was a little surprised, but I called wondering if my hand was good or not. I hit my K on the turn. Check / Check. River 7. He checks, I bet $4 (25% of the pot) to try and get a call, and he re-raises to $20. I re-raise to $45, and he calls. He turned the second nuts with QJ98, and I could have likely got him for his stack if I pot bet the river instead. Oh well, can't really complain. I played him for a grand total of 5 minutes.
Finished off my session with another $55+2.5 HU, this time against lolgui. I've found a new mark. I've played him 9 times and, with the victory today, I'm up 6/3 against him. I've got a feel for his play, with the one thing that saves me the most money being that he *always* value bets the turn with a monster. A pot bet is not strong, but a 1/2 pot bet on the turn is DANGER. With this in mind, I'm able to save a lot of chips in those situations.
Summary:
$55+2.5 HU: 3/1 $100
100PLO8: $61.95
Played again this afternoon while the kids were sleeping. Split a pair of games against a new opponent. I had him on the ropes in the second game, he clawed back, got me on the ropes, then I clawed back. We were even stacked when he ended up with QQ35 in the SB, and I had KQJ5ss in the BB. He raised PF, and I called. I like calling with this type of hand because when I flop good, I can usually get a lot of chips out of my opponents, especially those with AA or AK[baby]. When the flop comes with any 2 cards from 9 to K, I've got a very strong hand and/or drawing hand, especially if there end up being 2 cards of my suit. Well, I didn't expect a QQ35 raise from my opponent. He had been pretty conservative, so I figured him more for and A[Face][Baby] type hand. In this case, the flop came QT3, and the money when in on the flop. OOPS! I hit my 9 on the turn, for my straight, but a river 9 gave him the win.
I didn't feel like playing another SNG, so I went to the cash tables and found someone sitting alone with $88 at the 100PLO8 tables (.5/1 blinds). I figured, what the heck, it's been a while. Put up $100 and see if you can make $50. Made $61.95 and left. The hand I made most of my chips was AQJJ in the SB, I limped and he checked. Flop came QT5. My opponent came out betting ($2). I was a little surprised, but I called wondering if my hand was good or not. I hit my K on the turn. Check / Check. River 7. He checks, I bet $4 (25% of the pot) to try and get a call, and he re-raises to $20. I re-raise to $45, and he calls. He turned the second nuts with QJ98, and I could have likely got him for his stack if I pot bet the river instead. Oh well, can't really complain. I played him for a grand total of 5 minutes.
Finished off my session with another $55+2.5 HU, this time against lolgui. I've found a new mark. I've played him 9 times and, with the victory today, I'm up 6/3 against him. I've got a feel for his play, with the one thing that saves me the most money being that he *always* value bets the turn with a monster. A pot bet is not strong, but a 1/2 pot bet on the turn is DANGER. With this in mind, I'm able to save a lot of chips in those situations.
Summary:
$55+2.5 HU: 3/1 $100
100PLO8: $61.95
Monday, September 14, 2009
Where have I been?
Clearly not at the tables. For the first time in a long time, I went a week without poker and it had nothing to do with a losing streak.
Last post I mentioned that we hired some new engineers in California. Well, the end result of that is that after I put the kids to sleep, the time when I normally start to play, I end up doing work, mostly email communication w/ the San Mateo office. That trend looks like it will continue into the near future.
I do hope, however, to spend some time tomorrow night watching some of the play in the WCOOP $300+20 PLO8 event. I'd like to see what the play is like. I'm pretty sure I could do very well in that tourney, but definitely don't have the time to try it out this year.
Last post I mentioned that we hired some new engineers in California. Well, the end result of that is that after I put the kids to sleep, the time when I normally start to play, I end up doing work, mostly email communication w/ the San Mateo office. That trend looks like it will continue into the near future.
I do hope, however, to spend some time tomorrow night watching some of the play in the WCOOP $300+20 PLO8 event. I'd like to see what the play is like. I'm pretty sure I could do very well in that tourney, but definitely don't have the time to try it out this year.
Monday, September 7, 2009
Long week
It's been an interesting 8 days since my last post. Since then:
1) My daughter started kindergarten (she loves it)
2) My son started his pre-school (he loves it)
3) There were 6 people layed off from my office at work (several co-workers didn't like that)
4) We hired 6 new engineers at the office in San Mateo (co-workers liked that even less)
5) Work told me on Monday that I had to train the San Mateo engineers, and so I was on a plane on Wednesday (my wife didn't like that) and worked 10-12 hour days on Thursday and Friday.
6) Caught up on my own work on Saturday
7) Flew back home on the Saturday night/Sunday morning.
8) Played baseball tonight.
In all of that chaos, I managed to get quite a bit of poker in. Played 29 games, and placed in 21. That's an awesome ratio if I can keep it up. Most of the games were HU, and if I keep a 2/1 place in those, I'll be very happy.
One thing I did in this stretch was play more $33+1.5. I've come to the realization that tatta has my number, and rather than force myself to get even with him since he's always sitting there waiting for the next comer at $55+2.5, I'm better off playing random $33+1.5 players instead.
So here is the summary for the past 8 days:
$22+1 HU: 2/0 $42.00
$33+1.5 HU: 9/4 $141.50
$55+2.5 HU: 6/3 $142.50
$110+5 HU: 1/0 $105.00
$25+2 FT: 0/1/0/0 $40.50
$35+3 FT: 0/0/0/1 ($38)
$55+5 FT: 0/2/0/0 $177.00
Total: $614.50
I made back two thirds of my hell week. I'm really surprised by that. I never thought I could re-center and perform better, so soon after such a bad stretch. I just need to keep it level, and continue my balanced play.
I don't know if you noticed, but I took a gamble one day and challenged a played at $100+5. That's my second time at that level, but the first time was against vendo and I knew I could beat him. Here, it was simply a shot. I had been playing well, after having 3 profitable sessions in a row, so the first game of the next session I saw him there. There appeared to be few people playing, so my choices were him or nothing. I actually spent some time deciding between not playing and taking my shot. When I was convinced I could close it down if I lost, I played. It was a tough game. I don't remember the details, since it was the day before my trip, but I recall going to late blind rounds, definitely later than usual.
I don't expect to play that level often, though I've been fortunate to win both times. I need to have the right set of circumstances. I felt fresh and composed, which was the real key. I wanted to make sure I could walk away with a loss.
Now I have to go back to work tomorrow, and I'm not looking forward to it.
1) My daughter started kindergarten (she loves it)
2) My son started his pre-school (he loves it)
3) There were 6 people layed off from my office at work (several co-workers didn't like that)
4) We hired 6 new engineers at the office in San Mateo (co-workers liked that even less)
5) Work told me on Monday that I had to train the San Mateo engineers, and so I was on a plane on Wednesday (my wife didn't like that) and worked 10-12 hour days on Thursday and Friday.
6) Caught up on my own work on Saturday
7) Flew back home on the Saturday night/Sunday morning.
8) Played baseball tonight.
In all of that chaos, I managed to get quite a bit of poker in. Played 29 games, and placed in 21. That's an awesome ratio if I can keep it up. Most of the games were HU, and if I keep a 2/1 place in those, I'll be very happy.
One thing I did in this stretch was play more $33+1.5. I've come to the realization that tatta has my number, and rather than force myself to get even with him since he's always sitting there waiting for the next comer at $55+2.5, I'm better off playing random $33+1.5 players instead.
So here is the summary for the past 8 days:
$22+1 HU: 2/0 $42.00
$33+1.5 HU: 9/4 $141.50
$55+2.5 HU: 6/3 $142.50
$110+5 HU: 1/0 $105.00
$25+2 FT: 0/1/0/0 $40.50
$35+3 FT: 0/0/0/1 ($38)
$55+5 FT: 0/2/0/0 $177.00
Total: $614.50
I made back two thirds of my hell week. I'm really surprised by that. I never thought I could re-center and perform better, so soon after such a bad stretch. I just need to keep it level, and continue my balanced play.
I don't know if you noticed, but I took a gamble one day and challenged a played at $100+5. That's my second time at that level, but the first time was against vendo and I knew I could beat him. Here, it was simply a shot. I had been playing well, after having 3 profitable sessions in a row, so the first game of the next session I saw him there. There appeared to be few people playing, so my choices were him or nothing. I actually spent some time deciding between not playing and taking my shot. When I was convinced I could close it down if I lost, I played. It was a tough game. I don't remember the details, since it was the day before my trip, but I recall going to late blind rounds, definitely later than usual.
I don't expect to play that level often, though I've been fortunate to win both times. I need to have the right set of circumstances. I felt fresh and composed, which was the real key. I wanted to make sure I could walk away with a loss.
Now I have to go back to work tomorrow, and I'm not looking forward to it.
Sunday, August 30, 2009
Summaries
I owe you all a summary from the night of hell a week ago. I played an afternoon session while the kids were asleep, and then the evening session. Here it is:
afternoon:
$33+1.5 HU: 1/3 ($72)
evening/early morning:
$35+3 FT: 0/0/0/1 ($38)
$55+5 FT: 0/0/1/6 ($321)
$30+1.5 HU: 0/1 ($31.50)
$33+1.5 HU: 1/2 ($37.50)
$50+2.5 HU: 0/1 ($105)
$55+2.5 HU: 3/3 ($15)
bonus: $120
Total loss that day ($500)
I took a break until Thursday. Before I started, I resolved one thing: Limit my sessions. 4 games max per night except if I cash in the 4. In that case, I may continue playing until I do not cash. I'm on the fence with regards to HU re-matches, which I didn't consider until game 4 was a rematch (I lost the first), then won the second. I accepted the third game (second rematch) for a total of 5 games played. I probably should not allow it in the future, and am trying to convince myself about that right now. There's no reason for me to be playing more than that on any given night unless things are rolling very well.
I booked a small loss Thursday of ($52), but felt much more in control.
$55+2.5 HU: 0/1 ($57.50)
$22+1 HU: 0/1 ($23)
$33+1.5 HU : 2/1 $28.50
Friday I came back, played a single $55+5 FT and won for a $187.50 win.
Saturday night I was supposed to play some live with friends, after a corn roast, but the weather here was crap, the corn roast was canceled and the poker game fell through. So I played online instead:
$22+1 HU: 1/0 $21
$25+2 FT: 0/0/1/0 $18
$35+3 FT: 1/0/0/0 $119.50
$55+2.5 HU: 0/1 ($57.50)
I played those in that sequence as well. Had I won the fourth, I would've played another. So I recovered from my week of hell, with an above average week by my standards of a profit of $236.50.
I'm taking tonight off, mainly to release this post. Gonna play some video games, and get to bed early.
Good night all.
afternoon:
$33+1.5 HU: 1/3 ($72)
evening/early morning:
$35+3 FT: 0/0/0/1 ($38)
$55+5 FT: 0/0/1/6 ($321)
$30+1.5 HU: 0/1 ($31.50)
$33+1.5 HU: 1/2 ($37.50)
$50+2.5 HU: 0/1 ($105)
$55+2.5 HU: 3/3 ($15)
bonus: $120
Total loss that day ($500)
I took a break until Thursday. Before I started, I resolved one thing: Limit my sessions. 4 games max per night except if I cash in the 4. In that case, I may continue playing until I do not cash. I'm on the fence with regards to HU re-matches, which I didn't consider until game 4 was a rematch (I lost the first), then won the second. I accepted the third game (second rematch) for a total of 5 games played. I probably should not allow it in the future, and am trying to convince myself about that right now. There's no reason for me to be playing more than that on any given night unless things are rolling very well.
I booked a small loss Thursday of ($52), but felt much more in control.
$55+2.5 HU: 0/1 ($57.50)
$22+1 HU: 0/1 ($23)
$33+1.5 HU : 2/1 $28.50
Friday I came back, played a single $55+5 FT and won for a $187.50 win.
Saturday night I was supposed to play some live with friends, after a corn roast, but the weather here was crap, the corn roast was canceled and the poker game fell through. So I played online instead:
$22+1 HU: 1/0 $21
$25+2 FT: 0/0/1/0 $18
$35+3 FT: 1/0/0/0 $119.50
$55+2.5 HU: 0/1 ($57.50)
I played those in that sequence as well. Had I won the fourth, I would've played another. So I recovered from my week of hell, with an above average week by my standards of a profit of $236.50.
I'm taking tonight off, mainly to release this post. Gonna play some video games, and get to bed early.
Good night all.
Monday, August 24, 2009
Abandonning the race
After last night's session, I am officially pulling myself out of the race to 10k, because last night, I lost control.
Poker is a volatile game, there will be good nights amd there will be bad nights. Last night was really bad, and rather than book a small loss and move on, I got stuck and continued to play and play and play losing $448. That gave me a $933 loss on the week. The whole point of playing the SNGs was that it was supposed to help me eliminate those sessions from my game. In a cash game, if a bad river hits, you can get stuck rebuying over and over again. If the cards continue to go against you, you can drop a lot. Apparently, I can still let that happen for SNGs too. I played 20 games, over 4 to 5 hours, either FT or HU and placed only 5 times. I came in 4th or 5th 5 times in FT games, usually bubbling out because of a bad card. I'd be in the lead, or about to split and the river would hit and either save my opponent or cripple me. It got to me and I kept forcing.
And to put in perspective how bad it was, I was able to play 7 of those matched HU against opponents I wanted in vendo and talisain51, and went 2/5 against them. It was sick how bad the cards went against me. After losing on a variety of suck outs, I then let my game degrade to the point I was pushing with randomness even in positions I knew I was probably beat.
I'll post the full summary of the matches another day. For now, I needed to clear my mind, get it out, and get ready for the week. I'll break from poker of a few days and re-group. When I come back, it'll be for the love of the game, no longer to achieve some specific monetary target.
Poker is a volatile game, there will be good nights amd there will be bad nights. Last night was really bad, and rather than book a small loss and move on, I got stuck and continued to play and play and play losing $448. That gave me a $933 loss on the week. The whole point of playing the SNGs was that it was supposed to help me eliminate those sessions from my game. In a cash game, if a bad river hits, you can get stuck rebuying over and over again. If the cards continue to go against you, you can drop a lot. Apparently, I can still let that happen for SNGs too. I played 20 games, over 4 to 5 hours, either FT or HU and placed only 5 times. I came in 4th or 5th 5 times in FT games, usually bubbling out because of a bad card. I'd be in the lead, or about to split and the river would hit and either save my opponent or cripple me. It got to me and I kept forcing.
And to put in perspective how bad it was, I was able to play 7 of those matched HU against opponents I wanted in vendo and talisain51, and went 2/5 against them. It was sick how bad the cards went against me. After losing on a variety of suck outs, I then let my game degrade to the point I was pushing with randomness even in positions I knew I was probably beat.
I'll post the full summary of the matches another day. For now, I needed to clear my mind, get it out, and get ready for the week. I'll break from poker of a few days and re-group. When I come back, it'll be for the love of the game, no longer to achieve some specific monetary target.
Saturday, August 22, 2009
Stuck to the plan, but...
Still lost $167. I'm only posting now since I played for 3 hours on Thursday night, was too tired to post, then had to work late on Friday. The summary is: I tried too hard to beat tatta.
I think he's beatable, but I think I call too many re-raises loose in the hopes of trapping him with a big hand. It will work, but my range might be too wide, so I'm folding the flop too often cause I haven't hit. Tighten up that range a little, and I think I can get from -EV to +EV, or maybe I'm just deluding myself. Maybe he's that good of a player. We aren't too far off. I've played him HU 28 times and I think I'm 13/15 . I really need to focus on people I can beat consistently. The problem is, I haven't seen vendo in weeks, and talisain51 is there less often and got crazy lucky the last 2 times I played him (not that that should matter, but it makes me bitter). That leaves me to play random players by sitting at the HU table first. I'm 3/5 in the last 3 sessions with that approach. What I fear with doing that is if I find someone I can beat, they ain't going to sit at my table anymore.
Ok, here's the official summary of Thursday:
$33+1.5 HU: 0/1 ($34.50)
$55+2.5 HU: 3/4 ($72.50)
$55+5 FT: 0/0/0/1 ($60)
Total: ($167)
Tonight, things were less bad luck, but I couldn't string together any wins. L/W/L/W/L.
$33+1.5 HU: 1/0 $31.50
$55+2.5 HU: 3/4 ($62.50)
$35+3 FT: 0/0/0/1 ($38)
Total: ($69)
One thing I find weird about Saturday nights is that it seems like the tables are more dead. I'm always surprised how few tables are running.
Oh well... Time for bed. If I sleep well tonight, I'll play again tomorrow.
I think he's beatable, but I think I call too many re-raises loose in the hopes of trapping him with a big hand. It will work, but my range might be too wide, so I'm folding the flop too often cause I haven't hit. Tighten up that range a little, and I think I can get from -EV to +EV, or maybe I'm just deluding myself. Maybe he's that good of a player. We aren't too far off. I've played him HU 28 times and I think I'm 13/15 . I really need to focus on people I can beat consistently. The problem is, I haven't seen vendo in weeks, and talisain51 is there less often and got crazy lucky the last 2 times I played him (not that that should matter, but it makes me bitter). That leaves me to play random players by sitting at the HU table first. I'm 3/5 in the last 3 sessions with that approach. What I fear with doing that is if I find someone I can beat, they ain't going to sit at my table anymore.
Ok, here's the official summary of Thursday:
$33+1.5 HU: 0/1 ($34.50)
$55+2.5 HU: 3/4 ($72.50)
$55+5 FT: 0/0/0/1 ($60)
Total: ($167)
Tonight, things were less bad luck, but I couldn't string together any wins. L/W/L/W/L.
$33+1.5 HU: 1/0 $31.50
$55+2.5 HU: 3/4 ($62.50)
$35+3 FT: 0/0/0/1 ($38)
Total: ($69)
One thing I find weird about Saturday nights is that it seems like the tables are more dead. I'm always surprised how few tables are running.
Oh well... Time for bed. If I sleep well tonight, I'll play again tomorrow.
Tuesday, August 18, 2009
The curse of the gloat
I lost $335.50 tonight after my nice gloat post last night. I worry about losing when I'm winning, but I sure don't worry about losing when I'm already losing. Fuck!
The worst is that I lost 2 $55+2.5 sessions to talisain51 on sick rivers that stole the pots from me. Damn I'm pissed. 2 4th place finishes in the $55+5FT tournies too. ARGH!! The first one of those, I had a good chance to place, the second one I really shouldn't have gotten that far, but after getting lucky a few times, I had another river kill me on the bubble.
$33+3 FT: 0/1/0/0 $56.50
$55+5FT: 0/0/0/3 ($180)
$33+1.5: 0/1 ($34.50)
$55+2.5: 1/4 ($177.50)
Regroup tomorrow, and play on Thursday. That's the plan, let's see if I can stick to it.
The worst is that I lost 2 $55+2.5 sessions to talisain51 on sick rivers that stole the pots from me. Damn I'm pissed. 2 4th place finishes in the $55+5FT tournies too. ARGH!! The first one of those, I had a good chance to place, the second one I really shouldn't have gotten that far, but after getting lucky a few times, I had another river kill me on the bubble.
$33+3 FT: 0/1/0/0 $56.50
$55+5FT: 0/0/0/3 ($180)
$33+1.5: 0/1 ($34.50)
$55+2.5: 1/4 ($177.50)
Regroup tomorrow, and play on Thursday. That's the plan, let's see if I can stick to it.
Monday, August 17, 2009
3 for 3
3 $55+2.5 HU matches, 3/0 for $157.50. I've had a few 2 for 2 sessions, but no 3 for 3 before, so that feels good.
The problem I have is, once I start getting on a streak like that, I get distracted and wonder when I should quit rather than focus on playing well and allowing my play to dictate when to quit. It's that feeling of "Just book the win" that I need to suppress.
Last week kicked ass. Booked a $382 win in 4 sessions (Really 3 1/2 since the last session was only 1 HU match that I won). What was neat is that every day I booked a win. I now have a 7 session +ve streak going.
Summary of last week:
$33+5 FT: 1/0/1/0 $144.50
$55+5 FT: 2/0/0/1 $315.00
$33+1.5 HU: 0/1 ($34.50)
$55+2.5 HU: 2/4 ($125.00)
Remember at the end of July when I was contemplating reducing my FT games to focus on HU if my FT results didn't improve, well I think it's clear I have been able to improve the results, and they are starting to average back to where I thought they would be. I just need to keep playing well and avoiding large downswing sessions. One will come if I'm not careful.
The problem I have is, once I start getting on a streak like that, I get distracted and wonder when I should quit rather than focus on playing well and allowing my play to dictate when to quit. It's that feeling of "Just book the win" that I need to suppress.
Last week kicked ass. Booked a $382 win in 4 sessions (Really 3 1/2 since the last session was only 1 HU match that I won). What was neat is that every day I booked a win. I now have a 7 session +ve streak going.
Summary of last week:
$33+5 FT: 1/0/1/0 $144.50
$55+5 FT: 2/0/0/1 $315.00
$33+1.5 HU: 0/1 ($34.50)
$55+2.5 HU: 2/4 ($125.00)
Remember at the end of July when I was contemplating reducing my FT games to focus on HU if my FT results didn't improve, well I think it's clear I have been able to improve the results, and they are starting to average back to where I thought they would be. I just need to keep playing well and avoiding large downswing sessions. One will come if I'm not careful.
Saturday, August 15, 2009
Sabotage
I think I sabotaged myself tonight. $20 home game SNG, 15 players, got knocked out in 13th place. Tomorrow, I have a shit load of things to do, and to be honest, was not looking forward to doing them on 2 hours of sleep.
I had a ton of playable hands, suited connectors and suited 1 gappers, with a bunch of passive players, thereby giving me the right odds to limp and see flops. But I misplayed my flops being too passive or too aggressive depending on my opponent. Then, my only good hand of the night was KK, re-raised PF to isolate, but the flop was AJJ, check/check, turn 7, and I bet and was check-raised, I'm pretty sure I'm beat. I may not have been as my opponent has been known to overplay hands, but I can't call there as I'm sure my EV is -ve.
Good luck to the eventual winner. On a side note, I played another $55+2.5 last night and beat tatta. We are even over 22 games, but I've beat him 2/1 on the $33+1.5 and 9/10 on the $55+2.5, so I'm down against him, but I think he's also down against me, since the fees are eating us up as we play so close. At least I can rationalize those fees are going towards the bonus.
Now it's time for 5.5 hours of sleep. GN all.
I had a ton of playable hands, suited connectors and suited 1 gappers, with a bunch of passive players, thereby giving me the right odds to limp and see flops. But I misplayed my flops being too passive or too aggressive depending on my opponent. Then, my only good hand of the night was KK, re-raised PF to isolate, but the flop was AJJ, check/check, turn 7, and I bet and was check-raised, I'm pretty sure I'm beat. I may not have been as my opponent has been known to overplay hands, but I can't call there as I'm sure my EV is -ve.
Good luck to the eventual winner. On a side note, I played another $55+2.5 last night and beat tatta. We are even over 22 games, but I've beat him 2/1 on the $33+1.5 and 9/10 on the $55+2.5, so I'm down against him, but I think he's also down against me, since the fees are eating us up as we play so close. At least I can rationalize those fees are going towards the bonus.
Now it's time for 5.5 hours of sleep. GN all.
Thursday, August 13, 2009
So much for waiting until Friday
So I played tonight after baseball. We lost the game 6-4, and I went 0/2, with a walk. IOW, a pretty shitty game. After doing some chores, I played some poker.
Started out on the $55+2.5 tables, and lost 2 games to tatta. A very decent player, with whom I'm break even with in general, but am now down 2 games too, after an 0/2 session against him. Since there were no others waiting for HU matches, I saw a $55+5 FT almost full, so I signed up and decided to sign up for the next $35+3 tourney as well, hoping it would start 10 minutes after the first. Turns out, it started something like 2 minutes after the first.
Most of the time, I'd prefer not to have 2 FT tables running simultaneously around the same blind levels. The rationale being that when it gets shorthanded (SH), I like/need to focus on whether the players can be run over or not. That's the critical time, as you can accumulate a ton of chips by raising incessantly to someone who won't call without a solid quality hand. If you can have 2 of those opponents to your left, you are in SNG heaven.
As it was, I played pretty good, except for a backfired bluff early in the $55+5 game. I recovered quickly with a double up to return to my starting stack. It was odd today in that both games had 7+ people in the late blind rounds. This made for a lot of short stack (SS) pushing as many chips into the middle pre-flop. I had managed to get some chips on both tables early in the rounds so I didn't have to get involved unless necessary.
I caught some cards at the end, which is a must HU with the blinds excessively high, and won both tourney's. That's the first double 1st I've made thus far. Came close a week ago when I went 1st and 3rd.
We'll see about tomorrow, since it's pretty late and I'm bound to be exhausted. However, the pull of the game is always strong, so hopefully I have enough control to say no if I'm too tired.
$55+2.5 HU: 0/2 ($115.00)
$35+3 FT: 1/0/0/0
$55+5 FT: 1/0/0/0
Started out on the $55+2.5 tables, and lost 2 games to tatta. A very decent player, with whom I'm break even with in general, but am now down 2 games too, after an 0/2 session against him. Since there were no others waiting for HU matches, I saw a $55+5 FT almost full, so I signed up and decided to sign up for the next $35+3 tourney as well, hoping it would start 10 minutes after the first. Turns out, it started something like 2 minutes after the first.
Most of the time, I'd prefer not to have 2 FT tables running simultaneously around the same blind levels. The rationale being that when it gets shorthanded (SH), I like/need to focus on whether the players can be run over or not. That's the critical time, as you can accumulate a ton of chips by raising incessantly to someone who won't call without a solid quality hand. If you can have 2 of those opponents to your left, you are in SNG heaven.
As it was, I played pretty good, except for a backfired bluff early in the $55+5 game. I recovered quickly with a double up to return to my starting stack. It was odd today in that both games had 7+ people in the late blind rounds. This made for a lot of short stack (SS) pushing as many chips into the middle pre-flop. I had managed to get some chips on both tables early in the rounds so I didn't have to get involved unless necessary.
I caught some cards at the end, which is a must HU with the blinds excessively high, and won both tourney's. That's the first double 1st I've made thus far. Came close a week ago when I went 1st and 3rd.
We'll see about tomorrow, since it's pretty late and I'm bound to be exhausted. However, the pull of the game is always strong, so hopefully I have enough control to say no if I'm too tired.
$55+2.5 HU: 0/2 ($115.00)
$35+3 FT: 1/0/0/0
$55+5 FT: 1/0/0/0
Tuesday, August 11, 2009
I'm pushing it
Was quite tired from last night's session, yet I pushed tonight and played anyway. I'm toeing the line between confidence in my abilities vs going against common sense and playing in a weakened mental state.
Started out like crap tonight, but finished with a bang to book a nice win.
$33+1.5 HU: 0/1 ($34.50)
$55+2.5 HU: 2/2 ($10.00)
$35+3 FT: 0/0/1/0 $25.00
$55+5 FT: 1/0/0/1 $127.50
Total: $108.00
If I feel good tomorrow, I'll play, otherwise, looks like I'm off until Friday night, as I have baseball on Thursday night.
Started out like crap tonight, but finished with a bang to book a nice win.
$33+1.5 HU: 0/1 ($34.50)
$55+2.5 HU: 2/2 ($10.00)
$35+3 FT: 0/0/1/0 $25.00
$55+5 FT: 1/0/0/1 $127.50
Total: $108.00
If I feel good tomorrow, I'll play, otherwise, looks like I'm off until Friday night, as I have baseball on Thursday night.
Monday, August 10, 2009
Short night
I seem to have a problem with the $22+1 HU game. The players are idiots, but yet they beat me. I think I'm also affected because they actually chat, and complain about my play (donkey, moron, idiot, etc). I don't know what else it could be. I'll play the same way in a $22+1 HU as I do in the $55+2.5, like tonight, and I lose the low stakes one, and win the high stakes one.
Maybe I get too emotional, maybe I'm not considering the fact that they are more liberal with their calling, and thus I should bluff raise less. Whatever it is, I do need to improve there or plain stop playing.
So for tonight,
$22+1 HU: 0/1 ($23.00)
$55+2.5 HU: 1/0 $52.50
Total: $29.50.
Maybe I get too emotional, maybe I'm not considering the fact that they are more liberal with their calling, and thus I should bluff raise less. Whatever it is, I do need to improve there or plain stop playing.
So for tonight,
$22+1 HU: 0/1 ($23.00)
$55+2.5 HU: 1/0 $52.50
Total: $29.50.
Sunday, August 9, 2009
August Week 1 summary
Not bad! I've continued my streak from last week over to this week though tonight's session after driving 5 hours from my sister's wasn't the greatest, I found people I could beat and kept playing until I was up (can you say stuck!). Anyway, tonight I was 2/1 in the $33+1.5 HU, and 2/2 in the $55+2.5 HU for a total of +$18.50. For the week:
$35+1.5 HU: 2/1 $28.50
$55+2.5 HU: 4/7 $37.50
$35+5 FT: 1/0/0/0 $119.50
$55+5 FT: 0/0/1/1 ($21.00)
Total: $164.50
Not quite the $200/wk of my initial goal, but better than the first 3 weeks. Must continue solid play and slowly bring that number up.
$35+1.5 HU: 2/1 $28.50
$55+2.5 HU: 4/7 $37.50
$35+5 FT: 1/0/0/0 $119.50
$55+5 FT: 0/0/1/1 ($21.00)
Total: $164.50
Not quite the $200/wk of my initial goal, but better than the first 3 weeks. Must continue solid play and slowly bring that number up.
Thursday, August 6, 2009
Sweet!!
Went 4 for 4 at baseball tonight with 2 doubles, and 2 singles. Came home, did my chores, and rather than shower and get a good night's sleep before heading on a 5 hour drive with the family tomorrow, I played 2 SNG full-table tourney's instead. I placed in both. 3rd in the $55+5 and 1st in the $35+3. Now that's what I call getting prepared for the week-end! Probably won't play while I'm there, but I'm considering bringing my laptop, so we'll see.
As I came to post this blog I saw that I was supposed to look into the WCOOP blind levels. Fuck me. 20 minute blinds with a 5 minute break every hour, and a 15 minute break every 6 hours. That's a lot of poker. I'm hesitant now. I'll revisit in a month, and decide then. It might be moot, if I don't do too well at the tables, so that's probably the safest course of action.
As I came to post this blog I saw that I was supposed to look into the WCOOP blind levels. Fuck me. 20 minute blinds with a 5 minute break every hour, and a 15 minute break every 6 hours. That's a lot of poker. I'm hesitant now. I'll revisit in a month, and decide then. It might be moot, if I don't do too well at the tables, so that's probably the safest course of action.
WCOOP
So I got the newsletter from Poker Stars regarding their WCOOP series of tournaments. WCOOP = World Championship Of Online Poker. They will be running a $300+20 PLO8 tourney and my interest was immediately piqued! Then I went and looked at the date/time and last year's running time, and things don't look so good anymore.
First, Wednesday September 16th at 4:30PM EST is when I'm actually supposed to be working. While I have no problem playing poker during the day instead of working, my wife would. She would worry that I'd like to make a habit out of it, and wouldn't like the fact I'd force her to have to feed the kids supper and bathe them by herself (which is completely understandable).
Secondly, we could be in baseball playoffs at that time, so there may be a game scheduled that night. Even if I could get around those two issues (wife ok's the playing, no game that night), the third is a pretty big obstacle: Last year's tourney played for 18 hours! Holy fuck...
It started at 2:30 PM and ran until almost 8 AM the next morning. I have serious doubts that I'll be able to play online poker, starting at 4:30 in the afternoon and playing straight until the next day. I've had sessions where I played from 10PM through to 4AM. Unfortunately, those are usually some really bad sessions, where the only reason I'm playing is because I've tilted and can't leave. That's still only 1/3 of the amount of time I'd be playing poker for. Now, I could work around some of those issues, like going over to a friend's house to play, so that I have someone to talk with and keep me focused, but even still...
So right now, I'm on the fence. I'm not even going to broach the subject with my wife until I feel comfortable playing it. Tonight, after baseball, I'll look at the registration for the tourney and see what the blind levels are, and the general schedule, and let it sink in this week-end while I'm at my sister's place, and re-visit the idea next week.
First, Wednesday September 16th at 4:30PM EST is when I'm actually supposed to be working. While I have no problem playing poker during the day instead of working, my wife would. She would worry that I'd like to make a habit out of it, and wouldn't like the fact I'd force her to have to feed the kids supper and bathe them by herself (which is completely understandable).
Secondly, we could be in baseball playoffs at that time, so there may be a game scheduled that night. Even if I could get around those two issues (wife ok's the playing, no game that night), the third is a pretty big obstacle: Last year's tourney played for 18 hours! Holy fuck...
It started at 2:30 PM and ran until almost 8 AM the next morning. I have serious doubts that I'll be able to play online poker, starting at 4:30 in the afternoon and playing straight until the next day. I've had sessions where I played from 10PM through to 4AM. Unfortunately, those are usually some really bad sessions, where the only reason I'm playing is because I've tilted and can't leave. That's still only 1/3 of the amount of time I'd be playing poker for. Now, I could work around some of those issues, like going over to a friend's house to play, so that I have someone to talk with and keep me focused, but even still...
So right now, I'm on the fence. I'm not even going to broach the subject with my wife until I feel comfortable playing it. Tonight, after baseball, I'll look at the registration for the tourney and see what the blind levels are, and the general schedule, and let it sink in this week-end while I'm at my sister's place, and re-visit the idea next week.
Monday, August 3, 2009
4 weeks in
Ok, so it has been 4 weeks since I've started this, it's time to see where I'm at. I'll normally try do this on Sunday nights, to line up with my spreadsheet, but as it is, I'll do it today and include today's session.
Another failure (8/9) at my "bread-and-butter" $35+3 game. This time, I ran into a calling station who took 90% of my chips, though to his credit, I played the last hand against him poorly, and he deserved those chips because of my stupidity. However, I ran into talisain51 at the $55+2.5 and beat him again. By far, he has been my most profitable mark. So I made $14.50 tonight, glad I booked a win in a little less than 1/2 hour of play.
As for the monthly totals:
$11+0.5 HU: 0/1 ($11.50)
$22+1 HU: 2/6 ($96.00)
$33+1.5 HU: 7/4 $42.00
$55+2.5 HU: 13/8 $275
$110+5 HU: 1/0 $105
$35+3: 2/2/2/21 ($396)
$55+5: 1/0/0/3 $7.50
cash: $41.07
Total: $7.57
LMFAO! So much for thinking I could average $833/month to make 10k in a year! To my credit, had I actually played the $35+3 the way I had been playing, and averaged a $10 win/game (I had actually been averaging $20), then I wouldn't be too far off, since it would change the numbers by roughly +$675. Problem is, I'm, *clearly* not playing that game properly anymore.
Do I regroup and focus on the HU games, which I'm clearly getting better, and have found opponents I can beat consistently, or do I trudge through more full table games? I think I am going to give the full tables another full month. If I don't post a profit in those games for the month of August, then so be it, they will not get much of my attention anymore.
Another failure (8/9) at my "bread-and-butter" $35+3 game. This time, I ran into a calling station who took 90% of my chips, though to his credit, I played the last hand against him poorly, and he deserved those chips because of my stupidity. However, I ran into talisain51 at the $55+2.5 and beat him again. By far, he has been my most profitable mark. So I made $14.50 tonight, glad I booked a win in a little less than 1/2 hour of play.
As for the monthly totals:
$11+0.5 HU: 0/1 ($11.50)
$22+1 HU: 2/6 ($96.00)
$33+1.5 HU: 7/4 $42.00
$55+2.5 HU: 13/8 $275
$110+5 HU: 1/0 $105
$35+3: 2/2/2/21 ($396)
$55+5: 1/0/0/3 $7.50
cash: $41.07
Total: $7.57
LMFAO! So much for thinking I could average $833/month to make 10k in a year! To my credit, had I actually played the $35+3 the way I had been playing, and averaged a $10 win/game (I had actually been averaging $20), then I wouldn't be too far off, since it would change the numbers by roughly +$675. Problem is, I'm, *clearly* not playing that game properly anymore.
Do I regroup and focus on the HU games, which I'm clearly getting better, and have found opponents I can beat consistently, or do I trudge through more full table games? I think I am going to give the full tables another full month. If I don't post a profit in those games for the month of August, then so be it, they will not get much of my attention anymore.
Sunday, August 2, 2009
Slow live game
So I played live with some friends last night. $20 NLHE SNG. 2 of the 8 haven't really played with us before, so we didn't know what to expect. Overall, it was really tight with a couple of walks in the first couple of blinds rounds, which is really weird. Normally, there's at least 1 caller or raiser, and even with 1 raiser there is usually a caller. It's not uncommon to have 4-5 or 8 in a pot when we play that size. Wasn't the case last night.
The major problem with last night was that they were calling for smoke breaks every 2 blind levels, which was ridiculous. Half the table smoked and the other half didn't , and most of the time smoke breaks are accommodated, but they were too frequent and then each one was too long. Our blind levels are 15 minutes and yet after 2 hours, I think we'd only played like 6 blind levels.
One of the guys who doesn't smoke, Eric a.k.a Mon Oncle, had a rough night. First, it took him 2 hours to get there since there was construction traffic on the highway, then everything he did at the table backfired, and finally, he had to endure all the wasted smoke break time. When he got knocked out, I've never seen him so upset. He launched his chips at Mark, who had knocked him out, and then he left for his trek back home. Hopefuly he gets over it. We've got another game in a couple of weeks.
As for the game, the blind levels jumped faster than our usual schedule, and I didn't change my game accordingly. Put that in with the general tightness of the table, and I should've bet more often with less. I had position on the two unknowns, so I didn't have to worry about them. I just felt like my cards were not quite strong enough. I'll open with 97o late, but not with 75o. I'll open with QXs, but not JXs,(where X doen't spread to a str8) and so my cards didn't give me enough to pull the trigger. Then when I did, with a mediocre Ah7h, unknown 1, who had limped PF, calls with JJ. Turns out, that was their M.O: Never raise PF, only limp or re-raise. I saw him pull the limp/re-raise play with AA. Oh yeah, he won the tourney, but it helps that he either doubled up or knocked a decent stack out with the aforementionned AA, and JJ, as well as knocking Kenny out with KK.
So, it wasn't as fun as it could've been, and a little sour with the way Eric went out. I'm exhausted today. Was supposed to take the kids our to our towns' "Family Day" with inflatables and the like, but it's raining and sapping my energy by the second.
The major problem with last night was that they were calling for smoke breaks every 2 blind levels, which was ridiculous. Half the table smoked and the other half didn't , and most of the time smoke breaks are accommodated, but they were too frequent and then each one was too long. Our blind levels are 15 minutes and yet after 2 hours, I think we'd only played like 6 blind levels.
One of the guys who doesn't smoke, Eric a.k.a Mon Oncle, had a rough night. First, it took him 2 hours to get there since there was construction traffic on the highway, then everything he did at the table backfired, and finally, he had to endure all the wasted smoke break time. When he got knocked out, I've never seen him so upset. He launched his chips at Mark, who had knocked him out, and then he left for his trek back home. Hopefuly he gets over it. We've got another game in a couple of weeks.
As for the game, the blind levels jumped faster than our usual schedule, and I didn't change my game accordingly. Put that in with the general tightness of the table, and I should've bet more often with less. I had position on the two unknowns, so I didn't have to worry about them. I just felt like my cards were not quite strong enough. I'll open with 97o late, but not with 75o. I'll open with QXs, but not JXs,(where X doen't spread to a str8) and so my cards didn't give me enough to pull the trigger. Then when I did, with a mediocre Ah7h, unknown 1, who had limped PF, calls with JJ. Turns out, that was their M.O: Never raise PF, only limp or re-raise. I saw him pull the limp/re-raise play with AA. Oh yeah, he won the tourney, but it helps that he either doubled up or knocked a decent stack out with the aforementionned AA, and JJ, as well as knocking Kenny out with KK.
So, it wasn't as fun as it could've been, and a little sour with the way Eric went out. I'm exhausted today. Was supposed to take the kids our to our towns' "Family Day" with inflatables and the like, but it's raining and sapping my energy by the second.
Thursday, July 30, 2009
Finally!
Let me preface this by saying I shouldn't have played tonight as I was very tired. I'll take tomorrow off, and play live on Saturday and resume on Sunday (hopefully). Anyways...
The cards finally went my way in a full table SNG!!! Played 2 $55+5 PLO8 SNGs and came in 5th in the first one, but felt like I played ok, though maybe that was me rationalizing so that I play a second one. Whatever the case, I finally strung together some good play with cards at opportune times to win the f'n thing. So far this has been an excellent week. Good enough to get me back to close to even for the month. While I didn't expect to have weeks like this, +348 thus far, it's good to get them to remind myself to stay focused to minimize losses when thigs aren't going well.
$55+5: 1/0/0/1, $127.50
The cards finally went my way in a full table SNG!!! Played 2 $55+5 PLO8 SNGs and came in 5th in the first one, but felt like I played ok, though maybe that was me rationalizing so that I play a second one. Whatever the case, I finally strung together some good play with cards at opportune times to win the f'n thing. So far this has been an excellent week. Good enough to get me back to close to even for the month. While I didn't expect to have weeks like this, +348 thus far, it's good to get them to remind myself to stay focused to minimize losses when thigs aren't going well.
$55+5: 1/0/0/1, $127.50
Wednesday, July 29, 2009
Slacking
I've been slacking on the posts, mainly cause I had a bad session on Saturday night, and didn't feel like writing about it, then I had 2 quick evening sessions, one on Monday and one tonight. I'm going to summarize fast:
Saturday, got in a $22+1 war against ChairmanBd and got my ass handed to me. He we crazy aggro and I couldn't find the right strategy against him. I went 2/5 against him. Thankfully I ran into talisain51 and went 2/0 in the $55+2.5 to finish the night with a minimal loss:
$22+1: 2/5 ($73.00)
$55+2.5: 3/2 $42.50
Net: ($30.50)
Monday, I played the first available game. It was a $33+1.5 against guesswest. Decent player, don't remember the details but I won and do recall feeling good after. That's important, cause when I finished I saw vendo sitting at the $110+5 table. Now I had no intention of ever playing that level, but I was 2/1 against him at the $55+2.5 tables, and I knew him to be tight (=beatable). So I gambled with my winnings, and while it took long than normal (I restained my blind aggression a little), I came away with a victory. It was nerve racking, but I have come to the conclusion that if I see a player I know I can beat, I have to play him, even at the higher buy-ins.
$33+1.5: 1/0 $31.50
$110+5: 1/0 $105.00
Net: $136.50
Tonight, I again grabbed the first game I saw, a $33+1.5 against Ricky1730. Decent player. I've played him once before in a HU game and won, but also played him several times in the full table SNG. He likes to bluff, which is different than my blind aggression. He'll check and then bet at times that don't make sense, whereas I will just continuously fire at the pot until I know my opponent won't lay down his hand. Ok, so I'm rationalizing my aggression, big deal! :D Anyways... We play another and he get me pretty low, around $500 chips, and I worked my way back up to win. Then I found talisain51 again at the $55+2.5 tables and took another game from him. He was much more aggressive this time around, and I found myself folding a lot more than I would've liked, but I think he plays like I used to: Overplay the low draw + hands. Top-pair + low draw is an example. I broke him when he had A2Q8 to a 337Q turn, when I had the 3. River came a K and his low draw left him out to dry.
$33+1.5: 1/0 $31.50
$55+2.5: 1/0 $52.50
Totals right now are:
$11+0.5: 0/1 ($11.50)
$22+1: 2/6 ($96.00)
$33+1.5: 7/4 $42.00
$55+2.5: 13/8 $222.50
$110+5: 1/0 $105
$35+3: 2/2/2/20 ($358)
$55+5: 0/0/0/2 ($120)
cash: $41.07
Total: ($134.43)
I think I'm getting a groove back, so I'm going to start playing more full table SNGs to see if I can improve those numbers. If not, then it is clear that I should focus on the HU tables against the players I know I can beat consistently.
Saturday, got in a $22+1 war against ChairmanBd and got my ass handed to me. He we crazy aggro and I couldn't find the right strategy against him. I went 2/5 against him. Thankfully I ran into talisain51 and went 2/0 in the $55+2.5 to finish the night with a minimal loss:
$22+1: 2/5 ($73.00)
$55+2.5: 3/2 $42.50
Net: ($30.50)
Monday, I played the first available game. It was a $33+1.5 against guesswest. Decent player, don't remember the details but I won and do recall feeling good after. That's important, cause when I finished I saw vendo sitting at the $110+5 table. Now I had no intention of ever playing that level, but I was 2/1 against him at the $55+2.5 tables, and I knew him to be tight (=beatable). So I gambled with my winnings, and while it took long than normal (I restained my blind aggression a little), I came away with a victory. It was nerve racking, but I have come to the conclusion that if I see a player I know I can beat, I have to play him, even at the higher buy-ins.
$33+1.5: 1/0 $31.50
$110+5: 1/0 $105.00
Net: $136.50
Tonight, I again grabbed the first game I saw, a $33+1.5 against Ricky1730. Decent player. I've played him once before in a HU game and won, but also played him several times in the full table SNG. He likes to bluff, which is different than my blind aggression. He'll check and then bet at times that don't make sense, whereas I will just continuously fire at the pot until I know my opponent won't lay down his hand. Ok, so I'm rationalizing my aggression, big deal! :D Anyways... We play another and he get me pretty low, around $500 chips, and I worked my way back up to win. Then I found talisain51 again at the $55+2.5 tables and took another game from him. He was much more aggressive this time around, and I found myself folding a lot more than I would've liked, but I think he plays like I used to: Overplay the low draw + hands. Top-pair + low draw is an example. I broke him when he had A2Q8 to a 337Q turn, when I had the 3. River came a K and his low draw left him out to dry.
$33+1.5: 1/0 $31.50
$55+2.5: 1/0 $52.50
Totals right now are:
$11+0.5: 0/1 ($11.50)
$22+1: 2/6 ($96.00)
$33+1.5: 7/4 $42.00
$55+2.5: 13/8 $222.50
$110+5: 1/0 $105
$35+3: 2/2/2/20 ($358)
$55+5: 0/0/0/2 ($120)
cash: $41.07
Total: ($134.43)
I think I'm getting a groove back, so I'm going to start playing more full table SNGs to see if I can improve those numbers. If not, then it is clear that I should focus on the HU tables against the players I know I can beat consistently.
Thursday, July 23, 2009
2 steps forward, 1 step back
Decided to play a long session after baseball tonight. Probably not a good idea in retrospect.
$55+2.5 HU: 2/2 ($10)
$33+1.5 HU: 1/1 ($3)
$11+0.5 HU: 0/1 ($11.50)
$55+5: 0/0/0/1 ($60)
$35+3: 0/0/0/1 ($38)
Total ($122.50).
Net week so far: $12. :(
Time for sleep. No games tomorrow, unless I'm stupid.
$55+2.5 HU: 2/2 ($10)
$33+1.5 HU: 1/1 ($3)
$11+0.5 HU: 0/1 ($11.50)
$55+5: 0/0/0/1 ($60)
$35+3: 0/0/0/1 ($38)
Total ($122.50).
Net week so far: $12. :(
Time for sleep. No games tomorrow, unless I'm stupid.
Wednesday, July 22, 2009
Movie night
My wife and I just watched Bad Boys (Will Smith and Martin Lawrence). Just a nice way to spend a little "quality time" together. (You've got to have watched Bad Boys to understand that reference). Anyway, she just went to bed, and I decided to play some poker before I do the same.
Hopped into the first HU SNG I could find. I got lucky to find "tatta" sitting at the $55+2.5 table. He's great. His raise percentage from the SB/button PF is as big as his fold percentage. So not only does he make the mistake of giving me too many free chips when he folds, his raises mean he's got a decent hand that works together. Even better is that he never raises from the BB without AAbaby or AK2X, which is usually where I break him.
Outside of that, he calls weak, so I limit my naked bluffing against him, and value bet like crazy and he pays off constantly. If he calls a bet on the turn, he's either got a hand, or the draw is pretty apparent from the board. Therefore I can play the river accordingly. I said I limit my bluffing, but when I know (ok, have a good feeling) that he's missed, I will naked bluff the river.
In game 1, the first critical hand, I called on the button and he raised PF from the SB. I called with my random 4 cards. Not a +EV play in general, but since I get so many free blinds from him, and I have good implied odds, I'll make it. That's the beauty of a tourney. You make your -EV plays cost you little and your +EV plays pay a lot. Anyway, flop comes QJ5 rainbow, and I flop top and bottom pair. He checks, which I expect, even with AA since there is no associated low draw. I bet, and get the call that I'm looking for. I turn my full house, when a 5 hits. He checks, and I check back. The check here is that I need to keep him in the hand. I think, for the most part, he believes that I bet with something. So if I bet there, I must have the 5. Can't have him think that. He needs to think I only have a Q, so that his Aces-Up looks good. River is a T which makes a possible straight, and he checks again. This time I bet 2/3 of the pot, and he takes his time, but does call.
The hand I won the tourney, I did gamble on the flop. The flop was 5s6sKc, I had 3s4sAc6c, I bet, and he effectively raised all in. I would've had about 500-600 chips left if I lost (10-20 blind level), so with my knowledge, I felt like I could grind out from there. I called and he tabled AA68. He pushed his AA and lost again. $52.50 in all of 10 minutes.
After that game, I took a break, checked work email, and then came back to get lucky again and find him waiting for a game. I was so happy to oblige! This time, he started raising more frequently and I played defensively. I always wonder how much my opponents actually adjust to me. One of the toughest things to figure out is what an opponent's motivation is. Do they just play, and their current skill is the skill they win or lose with, or are they constantly trying to improve. I fall into the former more than the latter, though I'm trying to use this blog to think about my game after the fact to see if I can spot problems sooner.
I figure he's the type of player whose game is set: his VIP ranking at PS is pretty high, and he multi-tables HU games. The latter is the overriding factor. You can't really play a unique style in 2 or more different HU games. You basically have to play the same, or else you're likely to get confused.
Anyway, game #2 lasted longer, and he had me down for a bit, but I was able to take a couple critical hands away, and secure a second victory. Obviously I'm tired, since I don't really remember the details of the hands, and normally those things embed themselves automatically in my mind.
I'll take another winning night and try to continue the streak.
$55+2.5: 2/0 $105.00
Hopped into the first HU SNG I could find. I got lucky to find "tatta" sitting at the $55+2.5 table. He's great. His raise percentage from the SB/button PF is as big as his fold percentage. So not only does he make the mistake of giving me too many free chips when he folds, his raises mean he's got a decent hand that works together. Even better is that he never raises from the BB without AAbaby or AK2X, which is usually where I break him.
Outside of that, he calls weak, so I limit my naked bluffing against him, and value bet like crazy and he pays off constantly. If he calls a bet on the turn, he's either got a hand, or the draw is pretty apparent from the board. Therefore I can play the river accordingly. I said I limit my bluffing, but when I know (ok, have a good feeling) that he's missed, I will naked bluff the river.
In game 1, the first critical hand, I called on the button and he raised PF from the SB. I called with my random 4 cards. Not a +EV play in general, but since I get so many free blinds from him, and I have good implied odds, I'll make it. That's the beauty of a tourney. You make your -EV plays cost you little and your +EV plays pay a lot. Anyway, flop comes QJ5 rainbow, and I flop top and bottom pair. He checks, which I expect, even with AA since there is no associated low draw. I bet, and get the call that I'm looking for. I turn my full house, when a 5 hits. He checks, and I check back. The check here is that I need to keep him in the hand. I think, for the most part, he believes that I bet with something. So if I bet there, I must have the 5. Can't have him think that. He needs to think I only have a Q, so that his Aces-Up looks good. River is a T which makes a possible straight, and he checks again. This time I bet 2/3 of the pot, and he takes his time, but does call.
The hand I won the tourney, I did gamble on the flop. The flop was 5s6sKc, I had 3s4sAc6c, I bet, and he effectively raised all in. I would've had about 500-600 chips left if I lost (10-20 blind level), so with my knowledge, I felt like I could grind out from there. I called and he tabled AA68. He pushed his AA and lost again. $52.50 in all of 10 minutes.
After that game, I took a break, checked work email, and then came back to get lucky again and find him waiting for a game. I was so happy to oblige! This time, he started raising more frequently and I played defensively. I always wonder how much my opponents actually adjust to me. One of the toughest things to figure out is what an opponent's motivation is. Do they just play, and their current skill is the skill they win or lose with, or are they constantly trying to improve. I fall into the former more than the latter, though I'm trying to use this blog to think about my game after the fact to see if I can spot problems sooner.
I figure he's the type of player whose game is set: his VIP ranking at PS is pretty high, and he multi-tables HU games. The latter is the overriding factor. You can't really play a unique style in 2 or more different HU games. You basically have to play the same, or else you're likely to get confused.
Anyway, game #2 lasted longer, and he had me down for a bit, but I was able to take a couple critical hands away, and secure a second victory. Obviously I'm tired, since I don't really remember the details of the hands, and normally those things embed themselves automatically in my mind.
I'll take another winning night and try to continue the streak.
$55+2.5: 2/0 $105.00
Monday, July 20, 2009
Quickie
Waxed the car tonight, so I had some energy, but knew I didn't have a lot in me. So I played 2 quick games, though it would've been only one had I lost the first
$55+2.5: 1/0, $52.50
$22+1: 0/1 ($23.00)
Total: $29.50
A win is a win, and I go to bed profitable. I have a couple more nights like this, I'll forget about last night!
$55+2.5: 1/0, $52.50
$22+1: 0/1 ($23.00)
Total: $29.50
A win is a win, and I go to bed profitable. I have a couple more nights like this, I'll forget about last night!
Sunday, July 19, 2009
Barf!
Worst session ever, epitomized by Ten's full of 5's running into quad 5's. In my 2 HU losses, both times I was up 2:1 in chips and could not capitalize...
$55+2.5: 1/2 ($62.50)
$35+3: 0/0/0/4 ($152.00) (4,4,5,7)
$55+5: 0/0/0/1 ($60.00) (5)
Cash: $21.45
Total ($253.05)
Two week total is not pretty. I'm losing the amount that I'm supposed to be winning. :(
Summary:
$35+3.00: 2/2/2/18 ($320)
$33+1.50: 4/3 $22.50
$55+2.50: 4/4 ($20.00)
Cash: $38.36
Total: ($339.14)
Time to go to bed and try and think about tonight's session. Did I play poorly, or did I play unlucky. I had to have played poorly, the results just don't like.
$55+2.5: 1/2 ($62.50)
$35+3: 0/0/0/4 ($152.00) (4,4,5,7)
$55+5: 0/0/0/1 ($60.00) (5)
Cash: $21.45
Total ($253.05)
Two week total is not pretty. I'm losing the amount that I'm supposed to be winning. :(
Summary:
$35+3.00: 2/2/2/18 ($320)
$33+1.50: 4/3 $22.50
$55+2.50: 4/4 ($20.00)
Cash: $38.36
Total: ($339.14)
Time to go to bed and try and think about tonight's session. Did I play poorly, or did I play unlucky. I had to have played poorly, the results just don't like.
Friday, July 17, 2009
Home game!
Played in a $20 home game tourney at a Neil's place while his wife was up north with the kids. 3 usual suspects (Neil, Eric and Mark), and 3 unknowns (friends of Neil's: Pat, Yan, Guy) though I was given a little bit of information on them from Neil and Mark. 7 players, first paid $100, and second $40, with $5 bounties for everyone.
I should have been knocked out in 6th place, but ended up in 2nd. Blind level was 600/1200, I had about 7200 in chips left (12k starting stack). I'm in the cut-off with K8o and push all-in to steal the blinds. Yan (tight) calls. Oh oh.. Pat (loose) calls. Not so bad any more. I figure I'm now up against an underpair (Yan) and random (Pat) which I might beat. I figure I'm now around 25-30% favorite to win the pot which is now 21.6k. Flop comes Q64 rainbow. :( Damn, I missed that completely. Yan bets, Pat moves all-in and Yan calls. Yan had JJ for an underpair. Pat flips over Q4c for two pair. Over the course of the night I learned that Pat *really* loves his suited cards! I need runner runner. K on the turn, 8 on the river, and I'm back in the game!
Later, 4 handed, Pat's short stack in the BB, I'm on the button with AQo. I put him all in, he calls with A6d. 6 on the river. Now I'm blanking on the details, but later when we were 3 handed, he moved all in PF from the button, and I called with Ax, he flipped over 2 spades and I was in front, then he flopped one spade, and turned and rivered the other two to cripple my stack.
I fold the next hand from the button, and Guy in the SB raises, Pat moves all in and Guy calls. KQ for Guy, K3d for Pat. Flop contains 2 diamonds, to make Guy sweat, but finally a hand holds up against Pat and he's knocked out and I back door into a $20 win (Guy let me keep my $5 bounty.)
What a night. Now, hopefully, I can get a little sleep and not be too messed up for tomorrow.
I should have been knocked out in 6th place, but ended up in 2nd. Blind level was 600/1200, I had about 7200 in chips left (12k starting stack). I'm in the cut-off with K8o and push all-in to steal the blinds. Yan (tight) calls. Oh oh.. Pat (loose) calls. Not so bad any more. I figure I'm now up against an underpair (Yan) and random (Pat) which I might beat. I figure I'm now around 25-30% favorite to win the pot which is now 21.6k. Flop comes Q64 rainbow. :( Damn, I missed that completely. Yan bets, Pat moves all-in and Yan calls. Yan had JJ for an underpair. Pat flips over Q4c for two pair. Over the course of the night I learned that Pat *really* loves his suited cards! I need runner runner. K on the turn, 8 on the river, and I'm back in the game!
Later, 4 handed, Pat's short stack in the BB, I'm on the button with AQo. I put him all in, he calls with A6d. 6 on the river. Now I'm blanking on the details, but later when we were 3 handed, he moved all in PF from the button, and I called with Ax, he flipped over 2 spades and I was in front, then he flopped one spade, and turned and rivered the other two to cripple my stack.
I fold the next hand from the button, and Guy in the SB raises, Pat moves all in and Guy calls. KQ for Guy, K3d for Pat. Flop contains 2 diamonds, to make Guy sweat, but finally a hand holds up against Pat and he's knocked out and I back door into a $20 win (Guy let me keep my $5 bounty.)
What a night. Now, hopefully, I can get a little sleep and not be too messed up for tomorrow.
Wednesday, July 15, 2009
It's about time!
Finally playing up to my potential. Other than one suck out against, the cards were not my enemy tonight. I finally reigned in my aggression on the bubble in the second tourney and it paid off with a first place finish. Hopefully I can get a good night's sleep, so that I can play again tomorrow. Gonna play live on Friday with friends, which means no online play Friday or Saturday, unless I want to lose some money.
Granted, after further thought, I probably shouldn't have played tonight considering how tired I felt, but I have to thank jeff85257 for giving me confidence, since I was playing him heads up during my full ring games and knew I could beat him, even in this state. I'll take my 2/1 against him and be happy about the winning session.
$33+1.5: 2/2 ($6.00)
$35+3: 1/0/0/1 $81.50
Total: $75.50
Summary:
$35+3.00: 2/2/2/14 ($168)
$33+1.50: 4/3 $22.50
$55+2.50: 3/2 $42.50
Cash: $16.91
Total: ($86.09)
Granted, after further thought, I probably shouldn't have played tonight considering how tired I felt, but I have to thank jeff85257 for giving me confidence, since I was playing him heads up during my full ring games and knew I could beat him, even in this state. I'll take my 2/1 against him and be happy about the winning session.
$33+1.5: 2/2 ($6.00)
$35+3: 1/0/0/1 $81.50
Total: $75.50
Summary:
$35+3.00: 2/2/2/14 ($168)
$33+1.50: 4/3 $22.50
$55+2.50: 3/2 $42.50
Cash: $16.91
Total: ($86.09)
Tuesday, July 14, 2009
King bubble-boy
Something's not right with my play. I must be too aggressive, or at least more so than when I was placing well. I'm getting donked out in 4-5-6 WAY too often. Today was 2-4-6-6, and I got hurt at some inopportune times. Even the 2nd place finish was no good since I should have won, but hands would not hold up.
At least I played some HU SNGs. The $55+2.5 saved me and helped me book just my second win
$55+2.5: 3/1 $100
$33+1.5: 0/1 ($34.50)
$35+3: 0/1/0/3 ($57.50)
Total: $8.00
Summary:
$35+3.00: 1/2/2/14 ($249.50)
$33+1.50: 2/1 $28.50
$55+2.50: 3/2 $42.50
Cash: $16.91
Total: ($161.59)
At least I played some HU SNGs. The $55+2.5 saved me and helped me book just my second win
$55+2.5: 3/1 $100
$33+1.5: 0/1 ($34.50)
$35+3: 0/1/0/3 ($57.50)
Total: $8.00
Summary:
$35+3.00: 1/2/2/14 ($249.50)
$33+1.50: 2/1 $28.50
$55+2.50: 3/2 $42.50
Cash: $16.91
Total: ($161.59)
Sunday, July 12, 2009
It just ain't working
One week in, and I'm doubting myself. Today, I decided that maybe my rule for not playing H/U SNGs simultaneously with my full table SNGs was a bad idea. The premise being that the H/U games tend to draw my focus, which is good during the initial stages of the full table SNGs where one of my flaws is to play too many hands early.
So today I played 3 H/U SNGs, during 5 full table tourneys. I went 2/0 in the $33+1.5, but 0/1 in the $55+2.5, while going 0/1/0/3 in the 4 tourneys that were running against them (the 5th one is running as I write this). It worked out better than my play for the past week, in that I felt like I got deeper, although, as you can see, not really changing my results. Though I will say this, today, I got rivered bad on the bubble of 2 of the tourneys, and the river saved my opponent twice in the H/U SNG that I lost. I got knocked out in 4th and 5th when as my usually bubble aggressive self pushed and pushed. I had two players on the ropes, only to see them not only survive on the river, but scoop me, and crippling me in the process.
I have to take that as a sign that I'm about to break though this slump and get back to something more like my previous play.
I also played a little 25PLO8 while the kids slept at naptime for an ok win.
The final tourney of the day just finished, and this last hand summed up my day, with all the money going in on the turn:
Total for the day:
$35+3.00: 0/1/0/4
$33+1.50: 2/0
$55+2.50: 0/1
Cash: $20.47
Total for the week:
$35+3.00: 1/1/2/11 ($192)
$33+1.50: 2/0 $63
$55+2.50: 0/1 ($57.50)
Cash: $16.91
Total: ($169.59)
If I were to count a first place as 5pts, second as 3pts and third as 2pts, then for 15 tourneys, I was expecting to have 30pts by now. Instead, I have 12pts. I need to bring that average up to a respectable amount!!!
So today I played 3 H/U SNGs, during 5 full table tourneys. I went 2/0 in the $33+1.5, but 0/1 in the $55+2.5, while going 0/1/0/3 in the 4 tourneys that were running against them (the 5th one is running as I write this). It worked out better than my play for the past week, in that I felt like I got deeper, although, as you can see, not really changing my results. Though I will say this, today, I got rivered bad on the bubble of 2 of the tourneys, and the river saved my opponent twice in the H/U SNG that I lost. I got knocked out in 4th and 5th when as my usually bubble aggressive self pushed and pushed. I had two players on the ropes, only to see them not only survive on the river, but scoop me, and crippling me in the process.
I have to take that as a sign that I'm about to break though this slump and get back to something more like my previous play.
I also played a little 25PLO8 while the kids slept at naptime for an ok win.
The final tourney of the day just finished, and this last hand summed up my day, with all the money going in on the turn:
http://twodimes.net/h/?z=6516783I flop top-two, with nut low draw. Bet 60% of the pot on the flop. 2 Callers, I move in on the turn, with the gut chasing nut flush with A6 (weak) low. :(
Total for the day:
$35+3.00: 0/1/0/4
$33+1.50: 2/0
$55+2.50: 0/1
Cash: $20.47
Total for the week:
$35+3.00: 1/1/2/11 ($192)
$33+1.50: 2/0 $63
$55+2.50: 0/1 ($57.50)
Cash: $16.91
Total: ($169.59)
If I were to count a first place as 5pts, second as 3pts and third as 2pts, then for 15 tourneys, I was expecting to have 30pts by now. Instead, I have 12pts. I need to bring that average up to a respectable amount!!!
Friday, July 10, 2009
Why don't I go to sleep?
I have a bad habit of playing on nights I'm tired. The nights where I should just go to bed at 10PM, get a good night sleep, so that the next night I can have a killer session. Instead, I donkey around and piss off chips with poor play. Not only that, I tend to violate my cash game rule because I need to have lots of things going on, otherwise I get bored. Problem is, I just end up too distracted.
Tonight: 0/0/1/3 tonight
Total: 1/0/2/7
Count: ($96.50)
I need to be placing 1st every 3rd time, not just placing every 3rd time. I had some bad beats tonight though at critical stages, which I always wonder if it's karma reminding me that I shouldn't have been playing....
Tonight: 0/0/1/3 tonight
Total: 1/0/2/7
Count: ($96.50)
I need to be placing 1st every 3rd time, not just placing every 3rd time. I had some bad beats tonight though at critical stages, which I always wonder if it's karma reminding me that I shouldn't have been playing....
Wednesday, July 8, 2009
Day 2: Better, but still not playing right
I was profitable today, but made some stupid mistakes. Overly aggressive too early in the tournaments costing me some chips.
Daily tally: 1/0/0/2 (6th and 7th)
Profit: $43.50
Total: 1/0/1/4 ($7.50)
I really need to get my rhythm back. Doesn't help I'm still tired from Monday night, and found a leak in the wall which is why the basement smelled all moldy. Got baseball tomorrow, so not likely going to play.
I may write something tomorrow, I may not...
Time for some Wii Fit yoga, shower and sleep.
Daily tally: 1/0/0/2 (6th and 7th)
Profit: $43.50
Total: 1/0/1/4 ($7.50)
I really need to get my rhythm back. Doesn't help I'm still tired from Monday night, and found a leak in the wall which is why the basement smelled all moldy. Got baseball tomorrow, so not likely going to play.
I may write something tomorrow, I may not...
Time for some Wii Fit yoga, shower and sleep.
Tuesday, July 7, 2009
Nervous
So I played my first session tonight, and it didn't go very well. First off, rather than the normal 3 tables running, with the next one filling up fast, there were none and only 2 people in the waiting list for the next one. So I went to Hollywood and Tower to play some low stakes 10PLO8 (.10 blinds) and 25PLO8 (.25 blinds).
About 20 minutes later, the PS tourney table finally opened, and on the first night, I violated my rule of focusing on the tourney. I continued to play the cash games until the second tourney opened up.
In the end, I finished 8th, 3rd, and 7th. In the game I finished 3rd, I began to feel nervous around the bubble. All of a sudden, cashing became more important than winning. I'm gonna have to work through that. Normally, I don't care if I end up 4th, because if I continuously attack and raise when there are 4 or 5 players left, I end up stealing a lot of blinds and giving myself a huge advantage to finishing first. That's the key to success here, finishing 1st every third tourney like I've done thus far (7 out of 22).
Night #1: 0/0/1/2 -> ($51)
Cash: -> $10.04
Total: -> ($40.96)
About 20 minutes later, the PS tourney table finally opened, and on the first night, I violated my rule of focusing on the tourney. I continued to play the cash games until the second tourney opened up.
In the end, I finished 8th, 3rd, and 7th. In the game I finished 3rd, I began to feel nervous around the bubble. All of a sudden, cashing became more important than winning. I'm gonna have to work through that. Normally, I don't care if I end up 4th, because if I continuously attack and raise when there are 4 or 5 players left, I end up stealing a lot of blinds and giving myself a huge advantage to finishing first. That's the key to success here, finishing 1st every third tourney like I've done thus far (7 out of 22).
Night #1: 0/0/1/2 -> ($51)
Cash: -> $10.04
Total: -> ($40.96)
Monday, July 6, 2009
And it begins...
My name is Eddie, and I play poker. Mostly recreationally, but I did use it to supplement my income for a brief time while I was between jobs. From that time, it's clear that this will never be my sole source of income, but it's nice to make a little cash on the side doing something challenging and fun.
I've been playing since around 2004. I'd like to say that I'm a 2nd degree "Moneymaker Effect" player. I didn't start playing because of his 2003 WSOP victory, but really starting playing because I begin watching the WPT, which I think made the air thanks in part to his victory.
I started playing live games with friends, and playing online at Ultimate Bet. Back then, the structure was different and you would earn Ultimate Points(UPs), which are UB's player reward points, just for time at the tables, including free tables. Even better was that you could play tournaments with your UPs, both sit-n-gos(SNGs) and multi-table tournaments (MTTs). My big break came when I won 500o UPs for finishing first in a no-limit hold'em (NLHE) MTT, which gave me enough points to enter cash tournaments using my UPs. I would buy into $5 and $10 tourneys with my points and I eventually won $30.
I started trying out the NLHE cash game tables, but wasn't very successful. I felt that I was behind my opponents, so I looked for something different. That's when I found pot-limit Omaha 8 or better (PLO8). I started at the .01/.02 tables (SB=Small Blind=$0.01, BB=Big Blind=$0.02) and worked my way up. One day, I ran into a player (tek) at the 0.05/0.10 level who normally plays higher levels, but came down to try and take my money before going back. I gave him a good run for his money. Enough so that gave me an offer: Let him refer me to Party Poker, and he'll split the referral bonus with me. At first I was hesitant. I had made my money without having to deposit anything, but this sign up was going to require a deposit. In the end, I made the deposit, and played enough to credit tek, and he did pay me. At the same time, I made more through the deposit bonus than I did at the 0.10/0.25 PLO8 tables. As so officially began my "bonus whore" days.
A "bonus whore" is a player who's sole purpose is to exploit the various bonus that the sites offer. Back in 2004, Party offered the easiest bonuses to clear. Deposit $X, make $X after playing 5*X rakes hands. Which meant if I deposited $100, I would make $100 after I played 500 raked hands. A raked hand is simply a hand in which there was a flop, and the table took a portion of the pot, called the rake. The key to this bonus was that it didn't matter how much rake was taken, so playing the lowest stakes which had a good % of the hands raked was the key. 0.10/0.25 PLO8 was perfect because there was almost always a flop, and always enough players seeing the flop to create a raked hand. All I had to do is way for high quality hands, play them meekly, and make sure I didn't lose a lot of money. Add to that multi-tables of up to 7 at a time, and I would clear the bonus in a couple of days. I built my bankroll through Party, Empire, Noble, BoDog, Hollywood and Superior Poker bonuses and PLO8. Going from nothing in 2004 to just over 4k in 2006. That sounds great, but by mid-way through 2006 I was at 5k, and then when on a 6 month losing streak where I lost 1k.
That was my first sustained losing streak. Not surpisingly it coincided with a lot of changes in my life: 2nd kid, new job, cross-country move. Clearly, I was not focused. I ended up taking a good 3-4 month break from playing, cause it was no longer fun. When I returned, I went back to my roots: Freerolls. Hollywood was offering a set of multi-stage freerolls (which still run today). The first level is a classic freeroll. Top 20 win tickets to a .25 tourney. Top 20 in the .25 tourney win a ticket to a .50 tourney. Top 20 in the .50 tourney win a ticket to the $1 tourney. In the $1 tourney, the top 25 are paid, and also get a ticket to a monthly $1000 added freeroll. While this seems like a lot of work, it actually wasn't. If 21 people entered a tourney, 20 people would still get tickets. Therefore, a lot of the time, it just paid to register, but not even play. Even the $1 tourney, I could sit out and occasionally end up in the top 10 earning a couple bucks. The hardest part was winning the first couple of .25 tickets, since there were usually about 200 people registered in the first level Freeroll. After I had made a few bucks, I simply paid .25 to enter the .25 tourney, and would sit out. I could register ahead of time, and the tourneys would be played while I was at work. I would make anywhere from $0.50 to $2.00 a day just by registering for these tourneys. So even though I had 4k, it was these little positive gains which started to rebuild my game, and give me more confidence.
The latter half of 2007 picked up and I started playing a lot more. I finished up 2.6k for a total of 7k. The beginning of 2008 was great. I started playing some feeder tournaments. My ultimate goal had been to qualify for OnGame's $1000 month-end tournament, but that never quite happened, but I did end up playing a variety of lower entry tournaments, including a $50 buy-in tourney. I played it 3 times, and won the 3rd one, besting 180 players, for a $2.2k win. My biggest single day win ever. That win got my roll close to 9k. I managed to work my bankroll up to $10.9k by August, not counting 2k I won while unemployed from May-June. Since then, well...
Oh lordy.... it's been bad. I think the largest contributor has been the changes in bonus available from the sites. They've become more difficult to clear, and so I had to move up in levels. As I moved up in levels, the PLO8 games where not availble as much, so I started to shift to PLO. Clearly I was not ready. I had some really great sessions, and some really putrid sessions. For every up week, I ended up having 2 down weeks. Then, I'd try and force long sessions to clear the bonuses, and my play would deteriorate and I'd lose more than the bonus was worth. Many times, TILTED would describe my play to a tee! So now I find myself back to where I was at the beginning of 2008: 7k.
Which brings us to the purpose of this blog. My goal is to make 10k in the next 12 months. Seems quite ambitious for someone who has just lost 4k in the 11 months, but I've got a plan. I've been playing Poker Stars (PS) since the end of February. I hadn't played there for the longest time because the bonuses were some of the worst in the industry. Since the quality of the bonuses in the rest of the industry has deteriorated, I figured it was worth the leap. Boy, was I a moron for wasting my time elsewhere! PS has the perfect set of games for me. They offer 9 player single table PLO8 SNGs. I have been playing the $35+3 tourney (9*$35=$315 prize pool, 1st-157.5, 2nd-94.5, 3rd-63, with 9*$3 going to PS's pockets) and have been placing at an incredible clip. I'm 7/2/3/10 for an average win of $29 per tourney played. If I can maintain that, or even $20 per tourney played, then I need to play 350-500 of these over the next year to acheive my goal. Add to that the occasional bonus, which I should be able to clear through tourney play, I think it is reasonable. The tourney's take only 40 minutes to play, and I have been playing them overlapping. Playing 2-3 per night will only take an hour to an hour and a half.
Staying focused and not playing any HU SNGs or cash games is going to be the toughest part. I like to multi-task, but if I am to stay true to my goal, I can't play anything other than the single table SNGs.
My July goal is 2-3 tourney's per night, 5 nights per week. Check back on Sunday night's to see my progress summary.
I've been playing since around 2004. I'd like to say that I'm a 2nd degree "Moneymaker Effect" player. I didn't start playing because of his 2003 WSOP victory, but really starting playing because I begin watching the WPT, which I think made the air thanks in part to his victory.
I started playing live games with friends, and playing online at Ultimate Bet. Back then, the structure was different and you would earn Ultimate Points(UPs), which are UB's player reward points, just for time at the tables, including free tables. Even better was that you could play tournaments with your UPs, both sit-n-gos(SNGs) and multi-table tournaments (MTTs). My big break came when I won 500o UPs for finishing first in a no-limit hold'em (NLHE) MTT, which gave me enough points to enter cash tournaments using my UPs. I would buy into $5 and $10 tourneys with my points and I eventually won $30.
I started trying out the NLHE cash game tables, but wasn't very successful. I felt that I was behind my opponents, so I looked for something different. That's when I found pot-limit Omaha 8 or better (PLO8). I started at the .01/.02 tables (SB=Small Blind=$0.01, BB=Big Blind=$0.02) and worked my way up. One day, I ran into a player (tek) at the 0.05/0.10 level who normally plays higher levels, but came down to try and take my money before going back. I gave him a good run for his money. Enough so that gave me an offer: Let him refer me to Party Poker, and he'll split the referral bonus with me. At first I was hesitant. I had made my money without having to deposit anything, but this sign up was going to require a deposit. In the end, I made the deposit, and played enough to credit tek, and he did pay me. At the same time, I made more through the deposit bonus than I did at the 0.10/0.25 PLO8 tables. As so officially began my "bonus whore" days.
A "bonus whore" is a player who's sole purpose is to exploit the various bonus that the sites offer. Back in 2004, Party offered the easiest bonuses to clear. Deposit $X, make $X after playing 5*X rakes hands. Which meant if I deposited $100, I would make $100 after I played 500 raked hands. A raked hand is simply a hand in which there was a flop, and the table took a portion of the pot, called the rake. The key to this bonus was that it didn't matter how much rake was taken, so playing the lowest stakes which had a good % of the hands raked was the key. 0.10/0.25 PLO8 was perfect because there was almost always a flop, and always enough players seeing the flop to create a raked hand. All I had to do is way for high quality hands, play them meekly, and make sure I didn't lose a lot of money. Add to that multi-tables of up to 7 at a time, and I would clear the bonus in a couple of days. I built my bankroll through Party, Empire, Noble, BoDog, Hollywood and Superior Poker bonuses and PLO8. Going from nothing in 2004 to just over 4k in 2006. That sounds great, but by mid-way through 2006 I was at 5k, and then when on a 6 month losing streak where I lost 1k.
That was my first sustained losing streak. Not surpisingly it coincided with a lot of changes in my life: 2nd kid, new job, cross-country move. Clearly, I was not focused. I ended up taking a good 3-4 month break from playing, cause it was no longer fun. When I returned, I went back to my roots: Freerolls. Hollywood was offering a set of multi-stage freerolls (which still run today). The first level is a classic freeroll. Top 20 win tickets to a .25 tourney. Top 20 in the .25 tourney win a ticket to a .50 tourney. Top 20 in the .50 tourney win a ticket to the $1 tourney. In the $1 tourney, the top 25 are paid, and also get a ticket to a monthly $1000 added freeroll. While this seems like a lot of work, it actually wasn't. If 21 people entered a tourney, 20 people would still get tickets. Therefore, a lot of the time, it just paid to register, but not even play. Even the $1 tourney, I could sit out and occasionally end up in the top 10 earning a couple bucks. The hardest part was winning the first couple of .25 tickets, since there were usually about 200 people registered in the first level Freeroll. After I had made a few bucks, I simply paid .25 to enter the .25 tourney, and would sit out. I could register ahead of time, and the tourneys would be played while I was at work. I would make anywhere from $0.50 to $2.00 a day just by registering for these tourneys. So even though I had 4k, it was these little positive gains which started to rebuild my game, and give me more confidence.
The latter half of 2007 picked up and I started playing a lot more. I finished up 2.6k for a total of 7k. The beginning of 2008 was great. I started playing some feeder tournaments. My ultimate goal had been to qualify for OnGame's $1000 month-end tournament, but that never quite happened, but I did end up playing a variety of lower entry tournaments, including a $50 buy-in tourney. I played it 3 times, and won the 3rd one, besting 180 players, for a $2.2k win. My biggest single day win ever. That win got my roll close to 9k. I managed to work my bankroll up to $10.9k by August, not counting 2k I won while unemployed from May-June. Since then, well...
Oh lordy.... it's been bad. I think the largest contributor has been the changes in bonus available from the sites. They've become more difficult to clear, and so I had to move up in levels. As I moved up in levels, the PLO8 games where not availble as much, so I started to shift to PLO. Clearly I was not ready. I had some really great sessions, and some really putrid sessions. For every up week, I ended up having 2 down weeks. Then, I'd try and force long sessions to clear the bonuses, and my play would deteriorate and I'd lose more than the bonus was worth. Many times, TILTED would describe my play to a tee! So now I find myself back to where I was at the beginning of 2008: 7k.
Which brings us to the purpose of this blog. My goal is to make 10k in the next 12 months. Seems quite ambitious for someone who has just lost 4k in the 11 months, but I've got a plan. I've been playing Poker Stars (PS) since the end of February. I hadn't played there for the longest time because the bonuses were some of the worst in the industry. Since the quality of the bonuses in the rest of the industry has deteriorated, I figured it was worth the leap. Boy, was I a moron for wasting my time elsewhere! PS has the perfect set of games for me. They offer 9 player single table PLO8 SNGs. I have been playing the $35+3 tourney (9*$35=$315 prize pool, 1st-157.5, 2nd-94.5, 3rd-63, with 9*$3 going to PS's pockets) and have been placing at an incredible clip. I'm 7/2/3/10 for an average win of $29 per tourney played. If I can maintain that, or even $20 per tourney played, then I need to play 350-500 of these over the next year to acheive my goal. Add to that the occasional bonus, which I should be able to clear through tourney play, I think it is reasonable. The tourney's take only 40 minutes to play, and I have been playing them overlapping. Playing 2-3 per night will only take an hour to an hour and a half.
Staying focused and not playing any HU SNGs or cash games is going to be the toughest part. I like to multi-task, but if I am to stay true to my goal, I can't play anything other than the single table SNGs.
My July goal is 2-3 tourney's per night, 5 nights per week. Check back on Sunday night's to see my progress summary.
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