I had a solid, productive day at the tables today. The short version is after 13 hours I made it to day 2 of WSOP event #18 $2,000 buy in limit with 16,300 chips. We have 109 players left, 45 spots pay, the average stack is around 25,000 and we get back to it tomorrow at 2:30.
The long version is much more interesting, but since it's 1:30 I'm going to save the details for tomorrow morning.
Thursday, June 10, 2010
Tuesday, June 08, 2010
Twitter News and WSOP Event #18 Preview
I've discovered that the poker players I follow on twitter who are playing in WSOP event #17 have all been including #WSOP17 in their posts. Then when I clicked on that notation it brought me to all the tweets that included #WSOP17.
So tomorrow I'll be including #WSOP18 in all of my tweets. If you click on that you can read the tweets of all the other players who are tweeting about WSOP event #18 and of course anyone who is following those other players will be able to read my tweets. If you want other news and updates I'd encourage you to check out pokernews.com, pokerpages.com or cardplayer.com (probably in that order). It's doubtful that there will be anything about me on there (unless I tangle with someone famous or end up with the chip lead), but you'll be able to check out stuff about the tournament in general.
On to the Event #18 Preview! This tournament is $2,000 limit hold'em. I've spend the past almost 3 years of my career playing limit hold'em day after day. If I get anything between an OK and a good run of cards I should make the money and if I get a great run of cards, the sky is the limit. I have no doubt that I could win this tournament.
Last year there were 446 entrants and 45 spots paid with anything at the final table paying over $20,000 and 1st place being $190,000.
We're starting with 6,000 chips, stakes of 50/100, and 60 minute levels. Every two hours we get a 20 minute break and after 6 hours of play we get a 90 minute dinner break. If I make it through 10 levels (by then the stakes will be 800/1,600) I'll be on to day 2 which will start Thursday at 2:30.
Look for twitter updates and send me all the mojo you can muster!
So tomorrow I'll be including #WSOP18 in all of my tweets. If you click on that you can read the tweets of all the other players who are tweeting about WSOP event #18 and of course anyone who is following those other players will be able to read my tweets. If you want other news and updates I'd encourage you to check out pokernews.com, pokerpages.com or cardplayer.com (probably in that order). It's doubtful that there will be anything about me on there (unless I tangle with someone famous or end up with the chip lead), but you'll be able to check out stuff about the tournament in general.
On to the Event #18 Preview! This tournament is $2,000 limit hold'em. I've spend the past almost 3 years of my career playing limit hold'em day after day. If I get anything between an OK and a good run of cards I should make the money and if I get a great run of cards, the sky is the limit. I have no doubt that I could win this tournament.
Last year there were 446 entrants and 45 spots paid with anything at the final table paying over $20,000 and 1st place being $190,000.
We're starting with 6,000 chips, stakes of 50/100, and 60 minute levels. Every two hours we get a 20 minute break and after 6 hours of play we get a 90 minute dinner break. If I make it through 10 levels (by then the stakes will be 800/1,600) I'll be on to day 2 which will start Thursday at 2:30.
Look for twitter updates and send me all the mojo you can muster!
News From Vegas
Ok, not really news per se, but more an update of what I've been doing and how I've been feeling. Nothing and shitty! Good night!
Just kidding. My flight in was a smooth as can be without the normal terror producing turbulence that you get flying into Vegas in the summertime. My cab driver saw my Ipod and spent the whole ride grilling me for tech support about how to get video onto his ipod. I was smart enough to get a room in the part of the Rio that is slightly closer to the convention area.
I had Chinese for dinner which was interesting for two reasons. First the Chinese place here is right next to the sports book and game 3 of the NBA finals was going on at the time. If you want to hear people cheer with conviction, and groan with true pain you should watch a major sporting event in a sports book.
Secondly I got a great fortune in my fortune cookie. It read "Listen attentively. You will come out ahead in the coming week." If a verbal tell leads to me doing something in one of these tournaments I'm framing that fortune!
After dinner I made my way down to the tournament area. The first year I came to the WSOP in 2005 everything was packed into the Amazon Room. The main tournaments, cash games, satellites, other nightly tournaments, tournament registration, the cashier, and the televised feature table were all packed into that one room. It's a huge ass room (40,000 square feet), but it was still crowded.
Now everything has it's own room and the main tournaments go off in the TWO biggest rooms in the massive Rio convention area. It's pretty amazing.
Noon to 5 is when there is the most hustle and bustle down there, but there was still some electricity in the air at 9 pm when I went down to register for tomorrow's tournament.
Phil Helmuth was sitting at table that was on the corner of the playing area and about 75 people were gathered around watching him in the $5,000 no limit hold'em event. No doubt they were wondering if he's the same in person as he is on TV. He is. I've played with him 3 times and he is always talking and always talking about himself.
In other goings on the final table of Event #16 $10,000 7 card stud hi-lo was going on with Jennifer Harmon, John Junada, Dario Minieri, and Steve Zolotow in the action. I didn't recognize anyone else at first glance, but you can bet that no one who sucks is playing that game for that cash.
The final two tables of event #13, $1,500 no limit were in action and the final 50 or so players in the $1,500 6 handed were also fighting it out.
The ten minutes I spent walking around checking what was going on really made me want to play! I'm ready!
Just kidding. My flight in was a smooth as can be without the normal terror producing turbulence that you get flying into Vegas in the summertime. My cab driver saw my Ipod and spent the whole ride grilling me for tech support about how to get video onto his ipod. I was smart enough to get a room in the part of the Rio that is slightly closer to the convention area.
I had Chinese for dinner which was interesting for two reasons. First the Chinese place here is right next to the sports book and game 3 of the NBA finals was going on at the time. If you want to hear people cheer with conviction, and groan with true pain you should watch a major sporting event in a sports book.
Secondly I got a great fortune in my fortune cookie. It read "Listen attentively. You will come out ahead in the coming week." If a verbal tell leads to me doing something in one of these tournaments I'm framing that fortune!
After dinner I made my way down to the tournament area. The first year I came to the WSOP in 2005 everything was packed into the Amazon Room. The main tournaments, cash games, satellites, other nightly tournaments, tournament registration, the cashier, and the televised feature table were all packed into that one room. It's a huge ass room (40,000 square feet), but it was still crowded.
Now everything has it's own room and the main tournaments go off in the TWO biggest rooms in the massive Rio convention area. It's pretty amazing.
Noon to 5 is when there is the most hustle and bustle down there, but there was still some electricity in the air at 9 pm when I went down to register for tomorrow's tournament.
Phil Helmuth was sitting at table that was on the corner of the playing area and about 75 people were gathered around watching him in the $5,000 no limit hold'em event. No doubt they were wondering if he's the same in person as he is on TV. He is. I've played with him 3 times and he is always talking and always talking about himself.
In other goings on the final table of Event #16 $10,000 7 card stud hi-lo was going on with Jennifer Harmon, John Junada, Dario Minieri, and Steve Zolotow in the action. I didn't recognize anyone else at first glance, but you can bet that no one who sucks is playing that game for that cash.
The final two tables of event #13, $1,500 no limit were in action and the final 50 or so players in the $1,500 6 handed were also fighting it out.
The ten minutes I spent walking around checking what was going on really made me want to play! I'm ready!
It's Go Time!
I'm off to the airport in a few minutes to head to Vegas for the WSOP! I'm fired up!
In Huff WSOP tradition my wife Jen took some pictures of our son Peyton holding and playing with the $13,000 I'm rolling into Vegas with. They should be up soon.
In Huff WSOP tradition my wife Jen took some pictures of our son Peyton holding and playing with the $13,000 I'm rolling into Vegas with. They should be up soon.
Sunday, June 06, 2010
$550 Lucky Chances Tournament Recap
I wanted to get in a tournament or two of in person play before I headed off to the WSOP and sure enough Lucky Chances in Colma is running a series of tournaments this week.
Sunday's event was a $550 10 handed NL hold'em event that drew just over 200 players. I played against about 30 different players in this one and 25 of them couldn't carry a bag of shit if it said poker on the side. I feel like I've never had higher positive expected value in a $500+ tournament in my entire career.
I played well and ran my starting stack of 6,000 up to 10,000 without ever making a real hand or ever having to show my cards. Everyone was so transparent that I just waited until I was confident no one hand anything and then fired at the pot.
About 2 hours in I got one of my legs cut out from under me. The blinds were 100/200 and I was in the cutoff with pocket tens. The player to my right made it 700 to go and I made it 2,100. He thought for a long time and he was not the type of player who would do this as an act. After a solid 60 seconds he moved all in for 5,000. Getting 7 to 3 on my money with only half my stack at risk I couldn't see folding to an opponent who honestly seemed unsure. When I called he acted like he was dead, but then he flipped up JJ and happily took the pot when no tens showed up.
I bounced around a little bit, but eventually went down the tubes almost 4 hours in when my JJ lost to AT. I finished about 100th. I played great all day and got my money in with way the best of it. I can't ask much more of myself than that.
Tomorrow I expect to face a lot of the same players in a $330 NL tournament with the same structure and then Tuesday it's off to Vegas!
Sunday's event was a $550 10 handed NL hold'em event that drew just over 200 players. I played against about 30 different players in this one and 25 of them couldn't carry a bag of shit if it said poker on the side. I feel like I've never had higher positive expected value in a $500+ tournament in my entire career.
I played well and ran my starting stack of 6,000 up to 10,000 without ever making a real hand or ever having to show my cards. Everyone was so transparent that I just waited until I was confident no one hand anything and then fired at the pot.
About 2 hours in I got one of my legs cut out from under me. The blinds were 100/200 and I was in the cutoff with pocket tens. The player to my right made it 700 to go and I made it 2,100. He thought for a long time and he was not the type of player who would do this as an act. After a solid 60 seconds he moved all in for 5,000. Getting 7 to 3 on my money with only half my stack at risk I couldn't see folding to an opponent who honestly seemed unsure. When I called he acted like he was dead, but then he flipped up JJ and happily took the pot when no tens showed up.
I bounced around a little bit, but eventually went down the tubes almost 4 hours in when my JJ lost to AT. I finished about 100th. I played great all day and got my money in with way the best of it. I can't ask much more of myself than that.
Tomorrow I expect to face a lot of the same players in a $330 NL tournament with the same structure and then Tuesday it's off to Vegas!
Thursday, June 03, 2010
Angry Dealings with Carbon Poker
I miss pokerstars. Their customer service is better than any customer service in any industry I've ever encountered in my life. I've e-mailed their support a few dozen times over the years and without fail I've gotten a response within the hour (sometimes in less than 10 minutes) written by a human, who knows how to read, and addressing my precise problem.
Little in the world makes me more aggravated than waiting 48 hours for a response and getting a form letter that barely has anything to do with my problem. I want to write back "What's wrong with you fucking morons? Didn't you read my e-mail?"
I could write pokerstars an e-mail right now that says "Hey Ass lickers! I think you should go hump a turtle! What do you think of that?" In 20 minutes they'd write me back with something like this:
Dear AceSedai:
Thanks for your e-mail! We are thrilled that you've noticed our ass licking! We here at pokerstars want to be the best at everything, from tournaments to cash games to ass licking!
As far as humping turtles goes, at this time we don't have access to any live turtles, but we are currently humping a stuffed turtle. To compensate you for any inconvenience this turtle substitution may have caused we are going to credit your account with $100.
Furthermore we have added both live and stuffed turtles with a variety of feed and clothing options to the Pokerstars FPP store.
Don't hesitate to contact us in the future with any other ass licking or turtle humping concerns! Good luck at the tables!
Chris Moneymaker
I bring this up because Carbon poker is making me angry. After finishing the last level of "The Race" promotion I went to make a cashout. When I did, $200 I earned as part of that promotion disappeared from my account. "Whoops!" I thought as I do when I make a mistake. Looking back on the terms and conditions of that promotion (no surprise that it was in fine print) I saw that I have to wait 7 days after the end of the promotion before I can cashout.
Luckily there is a happy little button that allows me to cancel a pending cashout. So that's what I did, maybe 10 minutes later. Of course my $200 was still gone, but I figured a short e-mail to support would fix the problem. WRONG!
37 hours later (literally) I got a response telling me that my $200 was gone because I had cashed out. What's wrong with you fucking morons? Didn't you read my e-mail? I never actually cashed out!
I'm tempted to write them an e-mail that says "Hey Ass lickers! I think you should go hump a turtle! What do you think of that?"
I'm sure 3 days later I'd get a response that said:
Dear Player
We are directing your e-mail to the appropriate department. Expect a response in 15 business days. We have charged your account a $100 processing fee for this e-mail. Marginal luck at the tables!
Support
I bet they do have a turtle humping department at Carbon poker. Ass lickers!
Little in the world makes me more aggravated than waiting 48 hours for a response and getting a form letter that barely has anything to do with my problem. I want to write back "What's wrong with you fucking morons? Didn't you read my e-mail?"
I could write pokerstars an e-mail right now that says "Hey Ass lickers! I think you should go hump a turtle! What do you think of that?" In 20 minutes they'd write me back with something like this:
Dear AceSedai:
Thanks for your e-mail! We are thrilled that you've noticed our ass licking! We here at pokerstars want to be the best at everything, from tournaments to cash games to ass licking!
As far as humping turtles goes, at this time we don't have access to any live turtles, but we are currently humping a stuffed turtle. To compensate you for any inconvenience this turtle substitution may have caused we are going to credit your account with $100.
Furthermore we have added both live and stuffed turtles with a variety of feed and clothing options to the Pokerstars FPP store.
Don't hesitate to contact us in the future with any other ass licking or turtle humping concerns! Good luck at the tables!
Chris Moneymaker
I bring this up because Carbon poker is making me angry. After finishing the last level of "The Race" promotion I went to make a cashout. When I did, $200 I earned as part of that promotion disappeared from my account. "Whoops!" I thought as I do when I make a mistake. Looking back on the terms and conditions of that promotion (no surprise that it was in fine print) I saw that I have to wait 7 days after the end of the promotion before I can cashout.
Luckily there is a happy little button that allows me to cancel a pending cashout. So that's what I did, maybe 10 minutes later. Of course my $200 was still gone, but I figured a short e-mail to support would fix the problem. WRONG!
37 hours later (literally) I got a response telling me that my $200 was gone because I had cashed out. What's wrong with you fucking morons? Didn't you read my e-mail? I never actually cashed out!
I'm tempted to write them an e-mail that says "Hey Ass lickers! I think you should go hump a turtle! What do you think of that?"
I'm sure 3 days later I'd get a response that said:
Dear Player
We are directing your e-mail to the appropriate department. Expect a response in 15 business days. We have charged your account a $100 processing fee for this e-mail. Marginal luck at the tables!
Support
I bet they do have a turtle humping department at Carbon poker. Ass lickers!
The Race - Conclusion
When I first looked at Carbon poker's "The Race" promotion I was sure it was going to be a slam dunk pile of cash for me. It was on the border of too good to be true at first glance, but the deeper I dug the worse and worse the promotion got.
Why did I believe that this was going to be such a big deal? The reason is poker sites need players. The more players they have the more than can expect to get. If I know there are going to be games going on a site at the stakes I'm interested in I'll keep money on that site and check it often. If they don't have the players once or twice I might never look back.
For the casual player it's hard to find a reason to NOT play on pokerstars. If you want to play $5/$10 limit poker on Carbon you'll probably find one game going. It might be 2 on the weekend or zero on a weekday morning. If there is one game you might have to wait 15 minutes to get into it. That's not long at a card room, but it's forever sitting in front of your computer. On the other hand pokerstars will have somewhere between 10 and 40 games going 24 hours a day. Right now (11 am on a Thursday) there is one $5/$10 game on Carbon and 20 on pokerstars.
What about no limit? Let's look at a popular level like $1/$2 blinds NL. On carbon poker they have eight 6 handed games going (4 of them actually have 5 or less players) and zero 9 handed games. Not bad right. Well pokerstars has 75 6-max games and 60 9 handed games going.
It's hard to compete with that huge load of games. Never longer than 30 seconds to get into a game and if you don't like the players, pick a new game!
The only way to lure players away from pokerstars to other sites is promotions. I thought The Race was carbon making a huge push to lure players away. I thought they might be willing to lose money in the short term to bring in new players and fill up their tables. I was wrong.
After my last post about The Race I realized when I put all of the promotions together I was making about 68% rakeback. I get a flat 75% on cake and on Absolute if you pile up the rakeback, rake races, deposit bonuses, and absolute points it's over 70%. Plus the games are better on AP.
So I bailed on the race. I completed 9 levels and made about $500.
Why did I believe that this was going to be such a big deal? The reason is poker sites need players. The more players they have the more than can expect to get. If I know there are going to be games going on a site at the stakes I'm interested in I'll keep money on that site and check it often. If they don't have the players once or twice I might never look back.
For the casual player it's hard to find a reason to NOT play on pokerstars. If you want to play $5/$10 limit poker on Carbon you'll probably find one game going. It might be 2 on the weekend or zero on a weekday morning. If there is one game you might have to wait 15 minutes to get into it. That's not long at a card room, but it's forever sitting in front of your computer. On the other hand pokerstars will have somewhere between 10 and 40 games going 24 hours a day. Right now (11 am on a Thursday) there is one $5/$10 game on Carbon and 20 on pokerstars.
What about no limit? Let's look at a popular level like $1/$2 blinds NL. On carbon poker they have eight 6 handed games going (4 of them actually have 5 or less players) and zero 9 handed games. Not bad right. Well pokerstars has 75 6-max games and 60 9 handed games going.
It's hard to compete with that huge load of games. Never longer than 30 seconds to get into a game and if you don't like the players, pick a new game!
The only way to lure players away from pokerstars to other sites is promotions. I thought The Race was carbon making a huge push to lure players away. I thought they might be willing to lose money in the short term to bring in new players and fill up their tables. I was wrong.
After my last post about The Race I realized when I put all of the promotions together I was making about 68% rakeback. I get a flat 75% on cake and on Absolute if you pile up the rakeback, rake races, deposit bonuses, and absolute points it's over 70%. Plus the games are better on AP.
So I bailed on the race. I completed 9 levels and made about $500.
Wednesday, June 02, 2010
WSOP Warm Up
I've been playing a few multitables here and there in an effort to get ready for the WSOP. Yesterday I finished 2nd of 137 in a $55 NL hold'em tournament which paid $1,200. That's not off the charts money by any means, and the field wasn't exactly loaded with pros, but it was still good for some momentum heading into the series.
Also in an effort to warm up for the WSOP, I'll be playing two tournaments in person just before I head out to Vegas. Both tournaments are taking place at Lucky Chances in Colma, CA. The first is on Sunday and features a $550 buy in and a guaranteed 1st place prize of $40,000. The second is on Monday, has a $330 buy in and a $20,000 1st place guarantee.
My guess is that each tournament will have about 200 entrants and feature the regular bay area tournament players. Hopefully I can book a nice cash and go into the WSOP feeling sharp. I'll let you know how it goes.
Also in an effort to warm up for the WSOP, I'll be playing two tournaments in person just before I head out to Vegas. Both tournaments are taking place at Lucky Chances in Colma, CA. The first is on Sunday and features a $550 buy in and a guaranteed 1st place prize of $40,000. The second is on Monday, has a $330 buy in and a $20,000 1st place guarantee.
My guess is that each tournament will have about 200 entrants and feature the regular bay area tournament players. Hopefully I can book a nice cash and go into the WSOP feeling sharp. I'll let you know how it goes.
Thursday, May 27, 2010
WSOP 2010 Starts Tomorrow
While I won't be in Vegas until June 8th, the 2010 World Series of Poker kicks off tomorrow with 57 bracelet events with buy ins ranging from $1,000 to $50,000.
I spent an hour this morning sitting at Starbucks reading Bluff Magazine and it feels like just about every article in the June issue is about the WSOP. Reading about how many of the big name pros are getting excited about the series makes me excited to get there and start playing!
I have a very positive feeling about this year which will be my 6th at the WSOP. I have more experience under my belt and compared to many of the players I'll be an old veteran.
But there are other things working in my favor as well. For one I've lost 20 pounds since last summer (Almost 30 since January of 2009). Playing from noon until 2 in the morning takes it's toll on everyone and I'm hoping that my improved physical fitness will help me deal with the long hours.
Another advantage I'll have over many of my opponents is I'm totally Vegased out. When I was 21 and even when I was 25 (I'm 30 now) I wanted to go out and get rip roaring drunk and gamble it up non stop! Hit me! Yo eleven! More Whisky! Clackity clack!
I've spent over 100 days in Vegas over the past 10 years (Plus a few dozen in Tahoe, Reno, Atlantic City, etc.)and I've had my fill. I still have fun playing negative EV games with my friends, but I no longer feel like spending time in my hotel room is wasting precious Vegas moments. While many of my opponents will be getting shit faced, trying to get laid, going to clubs, getting lap dances and playing craps long into the night, I'll be asleep.
Also working for me is, I've done this all before. I know where the bathrooms are and that I have to leave the table 20 seconds before the breaks start (have you ever seen 2,000 people get up to go to the bathroom at the same time?). I know where I like to eat at the Rio on dinner break and to not eat too much and cause a food coma. I know that I need to bring a snack to get me from the noon start time to the dinner break. I know that if you drink a red bull and a coffee you're going to miss two hands while you go take a piss. I'm not star struck by any of the players (Phil Helmuth? Yeah I've played against him 3 times, busted him once and saw him almost eat a graham cracker he found on the floor - REALLY!). I'm extremely good looking which distracts all of my opponents and lulls them into submission. I know it takes about 16 minutes to get from a room in the Masquerade tower at the Rio to the Amazon room. Did I mention the bathrooms, because that really is a big deal?
It really is exciting. There is nothing like the feel of a fat roll of hundred dollar bills in your pocket and peeling off 20 or 30 of them like it's nothing to buy into one of these tournaments. Or even better having so many that you need to carry around $1,000 chips instead because the roll of hundreds is so bulky that it won't fit in your pocket comfortably anymore.
More on the WSOP soon. I really feel like this is going to be my year!
I spent an hour this morning sitting at Starbucks reading Bluff Magazine and it feels like just about every article in the June issue is about the WSOP. Reading about how many of the big name pros are getting excited about the series makes me excited to get there and start playing!
I have a very positive feeling about this year which will be my 6th at the WSOP. I have more experience under my belt and compared to many of the players I'll be an old veteran.
But there are other things working in my favor as well. For one I've lost 20 pounds since last summer (Almost 30 since January of 2009). Playing from noon until 2 in the morning takes it's toll on everyone and I'm hoping that my improved physical fitness will help me deal with the long hours.
Another advantage I'll have over many of my opponents is I'm totally Vegased out. When I was 21 and even when I was 25 (I'm 30 now) I wanted to go out and get rip roaring drunk and gamble it up non stop! Hit me! Yo eleven! More Whisky! Clackity clack!
I've spent over 100 days in Vegas over the past 10 years (Plus a few dozen in Tahoe, Reno, Atlantic City, etc.)and I've had my fill. I still have fun playing negative EV games with my friends, but I no longer feel like spending time in my hotel room is wasting precious Vegas moments. While many of my opponents will be getting shit faced, trying to get laid, going to clubs, getting lap dances and playing craps long into the night, I'll be asleep.
Also working for me is, I've done this all before. I know where the bathrooms are and that I have to leave the table 20 seconds before the breaks start (have you ever seen 2,000 people get up to go to the bathroom at the same time?). I know where I like to eat at the Rio on dinner break and to not eat too much and cause a food coma. I know that I need to bring a snack to get me from the noon start time to the dinner break. I know that if you drink a red bull and a coffee you're going to miss two hands while you go take a piss. I'm not star struck by any of the players (Phil Helmuth? Yeah I've played against him 3 times, busted him once and saw him almost eat a graham cracker he found on the floor - REALLY!). I'm extremely good looking which distracts all of my opponents and lulls them into submission. I know it takes about 16 minutes to get from a room in the Masquerade tower at the Rio to the Amazon room. Did I mention the bathrooms, because that really is a big deal?
It really is exciting. There is nothing like the feel of a fat roll of hundred dollar bills in your pocket and peeling off 20 or 30 of them like it's nothing to buy into one of these tournaments. Or even better having so many that you need to carry around $1,000 chips instead because the roll of hundreds is so bulky that it won't fit in your pocket comfortably anymore.
More on the WSOP soon. I really feel like this is going to be my year!
Monday, May 17, 2010
SCOOP Recap
When you add it all up I lost $3,314 in the FTOPS and SCOOP combined. I played a total of 28 tournaments and had 4 money finishes. Under these conditions I'm shooting for something cloer to 25% in the money rather than 1 in 7.
Of course I had my opponent all in more than once with a chance to make the money if I won one of those confrontations in the both the triple shootout and the first heads up matches event. I easily could have (and probably should have) had 6 cashes instead of 4.
Looking ahead, I'm really excited about the WSOP this year. I feel like I've found the perfect mix of tournaments to play and I'm coming into the series more focused than ever. This will be my sixth year at the WSOP, I'm playing 6 tournaments, so I'm going to go on the record and predict a finish of 6th place or better on one of these events!
The action kicks off at the Rio the last few days in May, but my 2010 WOSP will start June 9th.
Of course I had my opponent all in more than once with a chance to make the money if I won one of those confrontations in the both the triple shootout and the first heads up matches event. I easily could have (and probably should have) had 6 cashes instead of 4.
Looking ahead, I'm really excited about the WSOP this year. I feel like I've found the perfect mix of tournaments to play and I'm coming into the series more focused than ever. This will be my sixth year at the WSOP, I'm playing 6 tournaments, so I'm going to go on the record and predict a finish of 6th place or better on one of these events!
The action kicks off at the Rio the last few days in May, but my 2010 WOSP will start June 9th.
Saturday, May 15, 2010
The Race Days 5-14
When I first saw the race promotion I thought "holy shit, they are giving me $25,000." At first glance it looked like all I needed to do was earn 100,000 points or pay $10,000 in rake to hit all of the race prizes. But then I saw that the list of point milestones were not cumulative targets, but rather 15 individual promotions that had to be hit independent of one another. At that point it looked like I'd need to pay over $30,000 in rake to hit them all.
In an equally disappointing moment I learned that because of my 35% rakeback deal I would only be earning points at 65% the rate of normal players. It makes sense, but I didn't know about it. Factoring that in I'd need to pay an insane $46,000 in rake in one month to hit all the levels.
Also I was expecting (foolishly) that rake back nation would be having their normal rake race for Carbon, which was canceled. That's another $1,000 I thought I'd get.
Also I learned that since I have a rakeback deal I'm not eligible for other parts of the Carbon VIP program.
Add all of this up and instead of making enough from this promotion to buy a car, it looks more like flat screen TV kind of money. I'm not going to look a gift few grand in the mouth, but it's not as earth shattering as I'd hoped.
So far I've earned about 20,000 points which has allowed me to hit the first 8 milestones and pick up a whopping $302.50. I expect to finish the month with about 50,000 which will mean I'll end up making an extra $1,502 from the race.
To get there I will have ended up paying $7,693 in rake. Factoring in the money from the race, the value of the actual points, my 35% rakeback, and clearing of two deposit bonuses, I'll be getting back $5,282 or 68% of my rake. Not too bad at all. Not the 100% I was hoping for at the start, but still solid.
In an equally disappointing moment I learned that because of my 35% rakeback deal I would only be earning points at 65% the rate of normal players. It makes sense, but I didn't know about it. Factoring that in I'd need to pay an insane $46,000 in rake in one month to hit all the levels.
Also I was expecting (foolishly) that rake back nation would be having their normal rake race for Carbon, which was canceled. That's another $1,000 I thought I'd get.
Also I learned that since I have a rakeback deal I'm not eligible for other parts of the Carbon VIP program.
Add all of this up and instead of making enough from this promotion to buy a car, it looks more like flat screen TV kind of money. I'm not going to look a gift few grand in the mouth, but it's not as earth shattering as I'd hoped.
So far I've earned about 20,000 points which has allowed me to hit the first 8 milestones and pick up a whopping $302.50. I expect to finish the month with about 50,000 which will mean I'll end up making an extra $1,502 from the race.
To get there I will have ended up paying $7,693 in rake. Factoring in the money from the race, the value of the actual points, my 35% rakeback, and clearing of two deposit bonuses, I'll be getting back $5,282 or 68% of my rake. Not too bad at all. Not the 100% I was hoping for at the start, but still solid.
Friday, May 14, 2010
More SCOOP Bad News
I came up short in the $33 and $320 8-game as well as the $55 and $530.
This is a major disappointment, not so much because of the money, but because these should be the tournaments in which I have the highest expected value and I didn't even sniff the money. Frustrating to say the least.
5 tournaments left in the SCOOP: $270 heads up matches, $215 HORSE, $215 NL hold'em, $109 NL hold'em (the low stakes main event - $1,000,000 guaranteed prize pool), and $1,050 NL hold'em (the medium stakes main event - $3,000,000 guaranteed prize pool). The go off in that order starting Saturday morning.
Even in the worst case scenario if I blank in all of these I'll have about $3,000 of my $7,500 FTOPS/SCOOP bankroll left.
Of course the best case scenario is a mid six figure pay day, which is why we play. Let's hope I finish out the 2010 SCOOP with a bang!
This is a major disappointment, not so much because of the money, but because these should be the tournaments in which I have the highest expected value and I didn't even sniff the money. Frustrating to say the least.
5 tournaments left in the SCOOP: $270 heads up matches, $215 HORSE, $215 NL hold'em, $109 NL hold'em (the low stakes main event - $1,000,000 guaranteed prize pool), and $1,050 NL hold'em (the medium stakes main event - $3,000,000 guaranteed prize pool). The go off in that order starting Saturday morning.
Even in the worst case scenario if I blank in all of these I'll have about $3,000 of my $7,500 FTOPS/SCOOP bankroll left.
Of course the best case scenario is a mid six figure pay day, which is why we play. Let's hope I finish out the 2010 SCOOP with a bang!
Thursday, May 13, 2010
Thursday's Action.
$33 and $320 8 game mixed games today starting right now. I'm going to late register. I always like my chances when we're playing more than one game.
SCOOP Event #28 ($109 w rebuys) Recap.
We started this tournament with 2,066 entrants all shooting for the $103,856 first place prize or at least the $551 for 270th. At the end of the rebuy period I had about 11,000 chips which was what I got for my buy in, one rebuy and the add on. About 4 hours into the tournament I was all the way up to 15K. What a boring 4 hours!
At that point an interesting hand came up. The blinds were 150/300 and the under the gun player made it 750 to go. He got called by a player a few spots to his left and I made it 3,000 to go with TT. The UTG player who had about 60,000 chips called. The other guy thought for about 30 seconds and then went all in for about 18K.
This seemed very suspicious. I thought maybe the all in player thought I was putting on a squeeze play and decided to "resqueeze." I couldn't rule out AA or AK, but looking back a hand like 77 or 88 makes the most sense. In the end I folded, because I was worried I might get called by both players and TT plays like shit against two hands. The UTG player folded so I have no idea what they both had.
I finally caught a break when I got dealt AA. A player in early position raised to 1,200 with KJ and I just called (the blinds were 250/500 by that point). The flop came down J T 8. He bet, I moved all in and he called.
One or two hands later I got dealt KQs. A player in middle position made it something like 1,100 to go and I just called. The flop came down J T 2 giving me two overs and a straight draw. My opponent bet about half the pot on the flop and again I opted to just call thinking I could hit or if he missed I'd likely be able to steal the pot with a bet on the turn.
The turn was a brick and my opponent checked. I bet 6K into the 7K pot and he called. Yikes! The river was another blank, he checked and without hesitation I moved all in for 20K. Scary! He thought for 10 seconds and folded leaving me with a stack of 41K when average was about 30K.
A little while later I got a big boost and then a big screw job. On the first one I reraised a guy all in who had about 20K. I had AQs and he had KK. I made a flush and was up to 60k. Then I got a cheap look in the big blinds with 89. The flop came with an 8 and a 9 making me two pair. But I was against 88 who flopped a set! ACK! After those two hands I was at 20K.
With about 450 players left I had 14K and average was 53K. I caught a huge break when I got it all in and flopped a Q with AQ vs AK! I caught another break when I folded 77 after being very close to raising it. It turns out I would have been against 88 and the flop came with a 7 and an 8! That would have been curtains for sure.
I won several small pots and one moderate one to take my stack to 60K when we made the money.
On my final hand I had JJ. The blinds were up to 1K/2K with a 250 ante and a player opened for something like 6K. I had a little over 50K and I thought about making it 15K to go, but I decided I should just get it all in there and pick up the 11,000 that was lingering out there in the pot. I got called by AK and he hit an ace. That's usually how a tournament ends.
I finished 185th which paid $681. Again not a ton of money, but it always feels good to cash.
At that point an interesting hand came up. The blinds were 150/300 and the under the gun player made it 750 to go. He got called by a player a few spots to his left and I made it 3,000 to go with TT. The UTG player who had about 60,000 chips called. The other guy thought for about 30 seconds and then went all in for about 18K.
This seemed very suspicious. I thought maybe the all in player thought I was putting on a squeeze play and decided to "resqueeze." I couldn't rule out AA or AK, but looking back a hand like 77 or 88 makes the most sense. In the end I folded, because I was worried I might get called by both players and TT plays like shit against two hands. The UTG player folded so I have no idea what they both had.
I finally caught a break when I got dealt AA. A player in early position raised to 1,200 with KJ and I just called (the blinds were 250/500 by that point). The flop came down J T 8. He bet, I moved all in and he called.
One or two hands later I got dealt KQs. A player in middle position made it something like 1,100 to go and I just called. The flop came down J T 2 giving me two overs and a straight draw. My opponent bet about half the pot on the flop and again I opted to just call thinking I could hit or if he missed I'd likely be able to steal the pot with a bet on the turn.
The turn was a brick and my opponent checked. I bet 6K into the 7K pot and he called. Yikes! The river was another blank, he checked and without hesitation I moved all in for 20K. Scary! He thought for 10 seconds and folded leaving me with a stack of 41K when average was about 30K.
A little while later I got a big boost and then a big screw job. On the first one I reraised a guy all in who had about 20K. I had AQs and he had KK. I made a flush and was up to 60k. Then I got a cheap look in the big blinds with 89. The flop came with an 8 and a 9 making me two pair. But I was against 88 who flopped a set! ACK! After those two hands I was at 20K.
With about 450 players left I had 14K and average was 53K. I caught a huge break when I got it all in and flopped a Q with AQ vs AK! I caught another break when I folded 77 after being very close to raising it. It turns out I would have been against 88 and the flop came with a 7 and an 8! That would have been curtains for sure.
I won several small pots and one moderate one to take my stack to 60K when we made the money.
On my final hand I had JJ. The blinds were up to 1K/2K with a 250 ante and a player opened for something like 6K. I had a little over 50K and I thought about making it 15K to go, but I decided I should just get it all in there and pick up the 11,000 that was lingering out there in the pot. I got called by AK and he hit an ace. That's usually how a tournament ends.
I finished 185th which paid $681. Again not a ton of money, but it always feels good to cash.
Wednesday, May 12, 2010
SCOOP Event #28 Underway.
After a day off yesterday I'm back in SCOOP action today with $109 with rebuys 9 handed no limit hold'em. You get 3,000 chips for the buy in, 3,000 chips for a rebuy (you can only rebuy if you have 3,000 chips or less) and 5,000 for the add on at the end of the first hour. So I should have at least 11,000 chips at the end of the first hour when the blinds go from 30/60 to 40/80.
That's right. 140 or so big blinds at the end of the first hour. That is deep stack poker! This one is going to take FOREVER! Probably 7 hours to make the money. Luckily I feel rested and ready. Look for twitter updates.
That's right. 140 or so big blinds at the end of the first hour. That is deep stack poker! This one is going to take FOREVER! Probably 7 hours to make the money. Luckily I feel rested and ready. Look for twitter updates.
Tuesday, May 11, 2010
SCOOP Update
Since my last post I've played 4 (well three and a half) SCOOP tournaments and come up short in them all.
The biggest disappointment came in the $215 triple shootout. Starting at a table of 10 players and needing to beat all of them to make the money I made it down to 1 opponent. And I was much better than him. And at one point I had a 33,000 to 17,000 chip lead.
He beat me because I did exactly what I shouldn't have done; I played big pots. If you have the skill advantage you want to play small pots and let your edge kick in over time. If you just throw your chips in there who knows what might happen. I can't remember the last time I felt so frustrated about a tournament result. I totally blew it! I won $1,700 in the cash games that day and still felt super pissed at the end of my work day.
The other 3 tournaments were two turbo limit tournaments ($22 and $215) that ended very quickly without much fanfare and a $162 half pot limit hold'em, half pot limit Omaha. In that one I got dealt AA on the button, raised, got reraised and I raised again (I considered calling, but decided to be aggressive). The flop came down jack high garbage and my opponent check raised me all in. I called and he showed me JJ! BOO!
I'm losing $1,689 for the SCOOP, and my $7,500 FTOPS/SCOOP bankroll sits at $5,248.
Nothing today, but $109 with rebuys tomorrow at 2 PT and $320 8 game at 11 on Thursday.
The biggest disappointment came in the $215 triple shootout. Starting at a table of 10 players and needing to beat all of them to make the money I made it down to 1 opponent. And I was much better than him. And at one point I had a 33,000 to 17,000 chip lead.
He beat me because I did exactly what I shouldn't have done; I played big pots. If you have the skill advantage you want to play small pots and let your edge kick in over time. If you just throw your chips in there who knows what might happen. I can't remember the last time I felt so frustrated about a tournament result. I totally blew it! I won $1,700 in the cash games that day and still felt super pissed at the end of my work day.
The other 3 tournaments were two turbo limit tournaments ($22 and $215) that ended very quickly without much fanfare and a $162 half pot limit hold'em, half pot limit Omaha. In that one I got dealt AA on the button, raised, got reraised and I raised again (I considered calling, but decided to be aggressive). The flop came down jack high garbage and my opponent check raised me all in. I called and he showed me JJ! BOO!
I'm losing $1,689 for the SCOOP, and my $7,500 FTOPS/SCOOP bankroll sits at $5,248.
Nothing today, but $109 with rebuys tomorrow at 2 PT and $320 8 game at 11 on Thursday.
Saturday, May 08, 2010
SCOOP Event #13 $162 "Ante Up" Recap
This tournament had a very interesting format. I thought it was just going to be antes from hand #1, but it turns out it was increasing antes with blinds of 5/5 the whole way through. After the first few levels there were effectively no blinds.
My opponents clearly had no idea how to adjust to this format. I'd say about 2/3 of the pots were being raised preflop. That means 1/3 of the time you could see a flop for 5 chips. We started with 5,000. I can see when the antes are 10 chips a player, or even 25, folding might be an option. But when the antes are 100 and there's 900 in the pot and 1/3 of the time you get to see a flop with a shot of hitting big and winning that 900, folding for 5 chips is crazy.
But EVERY SINGLE HAND 2, 3 or 4 players would fold preflop with no raise. Even when the antes got up to 500 a player and there was 4,500 in the pot before anyone had done anything and these guys had 50,000 chips they were STILL not putting in those 5 chips to see the flop. It's flabbergasting! What are you worried about someone popping it and losing .01% of your stack? PUSSIES!
I committed to playing every hand for 5 chips early on as did some of my thinking opponents. I think the fact that I play limit all day and am used to seeing flop after flop in spots where my opponents could have a wide range of hands and playing pots on the turn and river helped me a lot.
Early on I was on the button and a few people had called the 5 chips. The ante was 50 a player so there was close to 500 in the pot. Confused by the format everyone was playing really tight and passive. I decided I was going to just start shooting at the pots with air for a while until I got some resistance. So I made it 400 to go with T2.
I got called by one player in the field and the flop came down Q 9 8. My opponent checked to me and I bet out 600 still on a bluff. He called me and the turn came down a jack. BINGO! My total bluff turned into a straight! My opponent checked and I checked behind him hoping to convince him that I didn't have a ten in my hand.
The river was a brick and my opponent moved all in! HA! I had about 4,000 left in my stack and snap called him. He had QJ and I was up to 11,000.
At this point he went ballistic going on about how I was a moron and how could I play T2 and how he was rich because of players like me. For 30 minutes every time I'd lose a pot he'd call me an ATM or a donk or my favorite a "Donk ATM." Clearly he was rattled big time (he raised to 900 on the very next had with only 450 in the pot)and this hand helped me later on.
I flopped a straight vs a set and busted a short stack who had AJ vs my AK and found myself with 18K. We started with 2,007 players, at that point there were 575 left and I had a dead average stack.
I was up to 25K when I got into it with Mr. Donk ATM again. We were 4+ hours into the tournament and we were still at the same table which was a little surprising. The antes were 200 a player at this point and I made it 1,200 to go with AK. Mr. Donk called me and the flop came down A 8 2 rainbow.
I knew he was thinking about the hand with the T2. He'd mentioned it hours after it happened. I was sure he'd call me with anything at all if I bet the flop and there was no way he'd have me on AK. So I bet and he called. The turn was a blank and I checked hoping he'd bet, but he checked behind. The river was another blank and I decided to overbet the pot to make it look like a bluff. There was about 6,000 in the pot and I bet 7,000. He insta called me with QQ. He was down to 5K and I was up to 35K. SUCK IT JERK!
I still had about 35K which was average when we made the money with 288 players left.
I caught a nice break beating JJ with AQ which took me up to 62K and had me in great shape. At that point I was in 60th of 219 remaining players.
I'd faded down to less than 40K when the following hand came up. I had J9s and I made it to the flop cheap (for more than 5, but not a ton). The antes were about 500 at this point and the flop came down K T 8 with two spades. My lone opponent bet out 10,000 into the pot of about 10,000 and I decided to go for it. So I moved all in for something like 35K. He called me with AT of spades! Whoops! The turn was an ace, but the river was a queen and I was up to 77K!
At that point I started dreaming big, but I was done in soon after by a hand I might have misplayed or at the very least could have played differently.
I had about 60K, got 88 and made it about 4K to go. I got reraised to 10K and I called. The flop came down 2 3 4, I checked, my opponent bet 15K and I went all in. He thought for a little bit and called me with 99. No miracles and that was it. When I got reraised preflop it felt like a big pair and I feel like maybe I could have check folded the flop. Of course if he has 77 I feel like a genius so who knows.
I finished 153rd which paid $376. Not off the charts by any means, but it felt good to make the money.
My opponents clearly had no idea how to adjust to this format. I'd say about 2/3 of the pots were being raised preflop. That means 1/3 of the time you could see a flop for 5 chips. We started with 5,000. I can see when the antes are 10 chips a player, or even 25, folding might be an option. But when the antes are 100 and there's 900 in the pot and 1/3 of the time you get to see a flop with a shot of hitting big and winning that 900, folding for 5 chips is crazy.
But EVERY SINGLE HAND 2, 3 or 4 players would fold preflop with no raise. Even when the antes got up to 500 a player and there was 4,500 in the pot before anyone had done anything and these guys had 50,000 chips they were STILL not putting in those 5 chips to see the flop. It's flabbergasting! What are you worried about someone popping it and losing .01% of your stack? PUSSIES!
I committed to playing every hand for 5 chips early on as did some of my thinking opponents. I think the fact that I play limit all day and am used to seeing flop after flop in spots where my opponents could have a wide range of hands and playing pots on the turn and river helped me a lot.
Early on I was on the button and a few people had called the 5 chips. The ante was 50 a player so there was close to 500 in the pot. Confused by the format everyone was playing really tight and passive. I decided I was going to just start shooting at the pots with air for a while until I got some resistance. So I made it 400 to go with T2.
I got called by one player in the field and the flop came down Q 9 8. My opponent checked to me and I bet out 600 still on a bluff. He called me and the turn came down a jack. BINGO! My total bluff turned into a straight! My opponent checked and I checked behind him hoping to convince him that I didn't have a ten in my hand.
The river was a brick and my opponent moved all in! HA! I had about 4,000 left in my stack and snap called him. He had QJ and I was up to 11,000.
At this point he went ballistic going on about how I was a moron and how could I play T2 and how he was rich because of players like me. For 30 minutes every time I'd lose a pot he'd call me an ATM or a donk or my favorite a "Donk ATM." Clearly he was rattled big time (he raised to 900 on the very next had with only 450 in the pot)and this hand helped me later on.
I flopped a straight vs a set and busted a short stack who had AJ vs my AK and found myself with 18K. We started with 2,007 players, at that point there were 575 left and I had a dead average stack.
I was up to 25K when I got into it with Mr. Donk ATM again. We were 4+ hours into the tournament and we were still at the same table which was a little surprising. The antes were 200 a player at this point and I made it 1,200 to go with AK. Mr. Donk called me and the flop came down A 8 2 rainbow.
I knew he was thinking about the hand with the T2. He'd mentioned it hours after it happened. I was sure he'd call me with anything at all if I bet the flop and there was no way he'd have me on AK. So I bet and he called. The turn was a blank and I checked hoping he'd bet, but he checked behind. The river was another blank and I decided to overbet the pot to make it look like a bluff. There was about 6,000 in the pot and I bet 7,000. He insta called me with QQ. He was down to 5K and I was up to 35K. SUCK IT JERK!
I still had about 35K which was average when we made the money with 288 players left.
I caught a nice break beating JJ with AQ which took me up to 62K and had me in great shape. At that point I was in 60th of 219 remaining players.
I'd faded down to less than 40K when the following hand came up. I had J9s and I made it to the flop cheap (for more than 5, but not a ton). The antes were about 500 at this point and the flop came down K T 8 with two spades. My lone opponent bet out 10,000 into the pot of about 10,000 and I decided to go for it. So I moved all in for something like 35K. He called me with AT of spades! Whoops! The turn was an ace, but the river was a queen and I was up to 77K!
At that point I started dreaming big, but I was done in soon after by a hand I might have misplayed or at the very least could have played differently.
I had about 60K, got 88 and made it about 4K to go. I got reraised to 10K and I called. The flop came down 2 3 4, I checked, my opponent bet 15K and I went all in. He thought for a little bit and called me with 99. No miracles and that was it. When I got reraised preflop it felt like a big pair and I feel like maybe I could have check folded the flop. Of course if he has 77 I feel like a genius so who knows.
I finished 153rd which paid $376. Not off the charts by any means, but it felt good to make the money.
Friday, May 07, 2010
A Big 4 days of SCOOP Action
Brick city in the Mixed hold'em and the 7-card stud. Not much to tell. If you want a little more detail you can look back at my twitter updates.
At 11 PT Friday I have $162 NLH with antes from the start and I might play $55 limit Omaha 8 at 3.
On Saturday I have $215 triple shootout in the morning and then $22 and $215 limit turbo (5-minute limits) at 5 PT.
On Sunday we're back with $215 NLH "big antes" (not sure exactly what that means) in the morning and $215 NLH in the afternoon
Monday is $162 PL hold'em/PLO at 11 am, and maybe $11 and $109 with rebuys turbo at 5 pm.
Tuesday is going to be an off day with 5 days of SCOOP after that.
It only takes one good one to make this whole thing a big success.
At 11 PT Friday I have $162 NLH with antes from the start and I might play $55 limit Omaha 8 at 3.
On Saturday I have $215 triple shootout in the morning and then $22 and $215 limit turbo (5-minute limits) at 5 PT.
On Sunday we're back with $215 NLH "big antes" (not sure exactly what that means) in the morning and $215 NLH in the afternoon
Monday is $162 PL hold'em/PLO at 11 am, and maybe $11 and $109 with rebuys turbo at 5 pm.
Tuesday is going to be an off day with 5 days of SCOOP after that.
It only takes one good one to make this whole thing a big success.
Wednesday, May 05, 2010
Wednesday's Action
Today I have $215 half Limit hold'em, half NL hold'em which is underway, with about 900 entrants. The action is 6 handed, so this one is right in my wheelhouse (whatever that means).
At 3 PT I have $320 Stud. I've actually played a fair amount of Stud (50 times more than your typical online poker pro) so I like my chances in that one too.
I'm ready for a SCOOP victory!
At 3 PT I have $320 Stud. I've actually played a fair amount of Stud (50 times more than your typical online poker pro) so I like my chances in that one too.
I'm ready for a SCOOP victory!
The Race - Days 3,4
These Carbon Poker games are making me crazy! For some reason I'm not playing well in them. Many times at the end of a hand I ask myself "why the hell did I do that?"
I have played in all kind of limit poker games. After a couple million hands I feel like I've played just about every type of opponent you could face. But some weak players are easier for me to beat than others. The players easiest to beat are the ones who play too tight and are predictable. That's not how the games play on Carbon.
The Carbon games are really loose with lots of multiway action and frequent raising and reraising. The players are much more showdown bound than their AP counterparts and while in the long run I know I'm going to crush them (because they suck!), I can't just go on autopilot and use my standard plays. I have to do things like check when I miss the flop (gasp!) or check when I miss the turn (double gasp!).
My default when I raise preflop and am only facing one opponent is to fire the flop and the turn (and often the river too) whether I have it or I don't. It makes it tough for my opponents to put me on a hand and if we both miss the flop (which is the most likely thing to happen) then I usually win. You might think that players would catch on to this and start coming after me with nothing, but it takes balls to bluff hard enough to be effective and of course some of the time I have a good hand. After you crash face first into a real hand with a total bluff it's really hard to summon the courage to try another one right away.
Anyway, these fuckers on Carbon Poker seem to be calling me down left and right no matter what they have so I need to change my tactics a little bit. It's not hard, I just need to be explicitly conscious of what I'm doing.
With all that bitching you'd think I was getting killed, when I'm actually just about even. I just feel like I should be winning more.
As far as the race itself I've earned 9,000 points in 4 days. In order to make it through level 13 of the race and pick up $5,000 in prizes I need to make it to 75,250. I think that's my target right now, since I'm way behind pace to make it to the next level which is 125,000. Actually I need to step it up a little to just make it to the 75K mark, but I think I have it in me.
In other news, I'm still beating the shit out of the players on Absolute Poker. I'm +$3,000 or so this month on AP in 2,000 hands of action.
I have played in all kind of limit poker games. After a couple million hands I feel like I've played just about every type of opponent you could face. But some weak players are easier for me to beat than others. The players easiest to beat are the ones who play too tight and are predictable. That's not how the games play on Carbon.
The Carbon games are really loose with lots of multiway action and frequent raising and reraising. The players are much more showdown bound than their AP counterparts and while in the long run I know I'm going to crush them (because they suck!), I can't just go on autopilot and use my standard plays. I have to do things like check when I miss the flop (gasp!) or check when I miss the turn (double gasp!).
My default when I raise preflop and am only facing one opponent is to fire the flop and the turn (and often the river too) whether I have it or I don't. It makes it tough for my opponents to put me on a hand and if we both miss the flop (which is the most likely thing to happen) then I usually win. You might think that players would catch on to this and start coming after me with nothing, but it takes balls to bluff hard enough to be effective and of course some of the time I have a good hand. After you crash face first into a real hand with a total bluff it's really hard to summon the courage to try another one right away.
Anyway, these fuckers on Carbon Poker seem to be calling me down left and right no matter what they have so I need to change my tactics a little bit. It's not hard, I just need to be explicitly conscious of what I'm doing.
With all that bitching you'd think I was getting killed, when I'm actually just about even. I just feel like I should be winning more.
As far as the race itself I've earned 9,000 points in 4 days. In order to make it through level 13 of the race and pick up $5,000 in prizes I need to make it to 75,250. I think that's my target right now, since I'm way behind pace to make it to the next level which is 125,000. Actually I need to step it up a little to just make it to the 75K mark, but I think I have it in me.
In other news, I'm still beating the shit out of the players on Absolute Poker. I'm +$3,000 or so this month on AP in 2,000 hands of action.
SCOOP Badugi and Heads Up Matches Recap
The Badugi tournament was interesting, but not profitable.
One of the things that is frustrating about badugi is that your hand doesn't often improve that often. In hold'em the best hand you can start with is one pair, and you only have two of the seven cards that go into making a showdown hand.
In Badugi if you have a playable hand it means you have 3/4 of or your entire showdown hand already. If you have A23 (the best possible draw) - let's say it's one club, one diamond, one heart - then the only cards that improve your hand are the 4-K of spades. That's only 10 cards out of the remaining 49 in the deck. Clearly starting out with a made 4 card hand is a huge advantage.
In the end I played for about 4 hours, but never got my starting stack of 5K over 7K. $162 out the window in that one.
I got much closer in the heads up matches. We started that tournament with 2,048 players. It takes 3 match wins to make the money and 11 to win the tournament. Somehow it seems like it shouldn't be that hard to only beat 11 guys.
In my first match my opponent was not great. I'd say under these conditions I could beat him 7 or 8 times out of 10. We went back and forth for a long time and while I was ahead almost the whole time it took 120 hands for me to finish him off. In the end he got his money in good with JJ against my 77, but I hit a 7 on the river to win the match.
In match #2 my opponent was much better. I'd say we were very evenly matched. After 82 hands we got it all in (I had him significantly covered) with a small pair for him and A9 for me. A nine came on the river and I was on to match #3.
Match #3 came to an end much quicker. About 10 hands in I got dealt AKs. He raised, I reraised, he popped it again and I put him all in. He called me with 88 and I missed. I still had 1,000 chips to his 9,000 and actually got it back to 2,500 when I got it all in with AJ vs 55. If I win that pot we are back to even. Instead I was out the door, just short of the money.
After 13 tournaments in the FTOPS and SCOOP my $7,500 bankroll is at $6,183.
One of the things that is frustrating about badugi is that your hand doesn't often improve that often. In hold'em the best hand you can start with is one pair, and you only have two of the seven cards that go into making a showdown hand.
In Badugi if you have a playable hand it means you have 3/4 of or your entire showdown hand already. If you have A23 (the best possible draw) - let's say it's one club, one diamond, one heart - then the only cards that improve your hand are the 4-K of spades. That's only 10 cards out of the remaining 49 in the deck. Clearly starting out with a made 4 card hand is a huge advantage.
In the end I played for about 4 hours, but never got my starting stack of 5K over 7K. $162 out the window in that one.
I got much closer in the heads up matches. We started that tournament with 2,048 players. It takes 3 match wins to make the money and 11 to win the tournament. Somehow it seems like it shouldn't be that hard to only beat 11 guys.
In my first match my opponent was not great. I'd say under these conditions I could beat him 7 or 8 times out of 10. We went back and forth for a long time and while I was ahead almost the whole time it took 120 hands for me to finish him off. In the end he got his money in good with JJ against my 77, but I hit a 7 on the river to win the match.
In match #2 my opponent was much better. I'd say we were very evenly matched. After 82 hands we got it all in (I had him significantly covered) with a small pair for him and A9 for me. A nine came on the river and I was on to match #3.
Match #3 came to an end much quicker. About 10 hands in I got dealt AKs. He raised, I reraised, he popped it again and I put him all in. He called me with 88 and I missed. I still had 1,000 chips to his 9,000 and actually got it back to 2,500 when I got it all in with AJ vs 55. If I win that pot we are back to even. Instead I was out the door, just short of the money.
After 13 tournaments in the FTOPS and SCOOP my $7,500 bankroll is at $6,183.
Monday, May 03, 2010
The Race - Day 2
I was mostly focused on tournament on race day 2, but I did manage 2,100 points, which was enough to finish the 2,000 point milestone 4 and get most of the way through the 2,500 point milestone 5.
Once I get through milestone 5 I will have made $67.50 from the race which is of course total bullshit. But significant prizes are right around the corner.
As far as the game play goes these Carbon poker players are making me crazy! On AP I know everybody and have notes on them all. I don't have a feel for the field on Carbon yet. I'm getting a handle on it, but it's taking longer than I'd hoped.
The thing that's throwing me off is some of the players are pretty good and the rest are incredibly bad but in a very aggressive way. I'm taking a lot of weird bad beats which I know is a good thing in the long run, but tough in the short run.
I hope today is a good one!
Once I get through milestone 5 I will have made $67.50 from the race which is of course total bullshit. But significant prizes are right around the corner.
As far as the game play goes these Carbon poker players are making me crazy! On AP I know everybody and have notes on them all. I don't have a feel for the field on Carbon yet. I'm getting a handle on it, but it's taking longer than I'd hoped.
The thing that's throwing me off is some of the players are pretty good and the rest are incredibly bad but in a very aggressive way. I'm taking a lot of weird bad beats which I know is a good thing in the long run, but tough in the short run.
I hope today is a good one!
Sunday, May 02, 2010
Monday SCOOP Plan
Tomorrow in the morning is 6 max NLH with rebuys. The medium stakes is $55 with rebuys which is nothing special and the high stakes is $530 with rebuys and is a little too steep. 1% chance of my playing either of those.
At 2 PT is limit badugi which I'm about 85% to play. For those of you who don't know what badugi is, let me give you a quick run down. The way it works is you get 4 cards and then there is a round of betting with blinds just like in hold'em. Instead of a flop there is a draw where you can throw away cards from your hand and get new ones. Instead of a turn there is another draw, and instead of a river there is another draw.
The goal of the game is to get the four lowest cards you can with all four suits represented. A 2 3 4 with four different suits is the best possible hand. If you make a pair or if you have two cards that are the same suit then you can only use three of your cards to make your hand. Any four card hand (ie one with four different ranks and suits) beats any three card hand.
Of course if you're comparing 3 card hands to each other the lowest one wins (IE 5677 beats 3389).
Sometime you'll only be able to use two cards to make a hand if you have for example two hearts and two spades in you hand or two pair or three spades and a club. Any three card hand beats any two card hand. Similarly any 1 card hand loses to everything.
A little confusing, but not once you get the hang of it! We'll see what I can do.
At 2 PT is limit badugi which I'm about 85% to play. For those of you who don't know what badugi is, let me give you a quick run down. The way it works is you get 4 cards and then there is a round of betting with blinds just like in hold'em. Instead of a flop there is a draw where you can throw away cards from your hand and get new ones. Instead of a turn there is another draw, and instead of a river there is another draw.
The goal of the game is to get the four lowest cards you can with all four suits represented. A 2 3 4 with four different suits is the best possible hand. If you make a pair or if you have two cards that are the same suit then you can only use three of your cards to make your hand. Any four card hand (ie one with four different ranks and suits) beats any three card hand.
Of course if you're comparing 3 card hands to each other the lowest one wins (IE 5677 beats 3389).
Sometime you'll only be able to use two cards to make a hand if you have for example two hearts and two spades in you hand or two pair or three spades and a club. Any three card hand beats any two card hand. Similarly any 1 card hand loses to everything.
A little confusing, but not once you get the hang of it! We'll see what I can do.
Sunday, Shitty Sunday.
I won't leave you in suspense. 4 tournaments, 4 bricks.
In the first event which was SCOOP #1 I went down the tubes with AA. At one point I had my starting stack of 10K up to 15K, but was back down to 10k when the following hand came up.
The blinds were 150/300 and my opponent made it 600 under the gun. I reraised to 1,500 and he called. The flop came down 8 3 2 all clubs and I had the ace of clubs. He checked I bet 1,800 and he put me all in with 44 (with the 4 of clubs). 4 on the turn, no club, ace or 5 on the river and that was it. That was a very frustrating hand.
The second tournament was the FTOPS knockout. I did bust two players and picked up $80 in bounties. I don't know if I played this hand poorly, but I would have won a huge pot if I played it differently. We started that one with 5,000 chips and I was up to almost 15K when I got dealt QQ. I made it 600 to go and got called by the button and the small blind. The flop came down 9 high with two spades. I bet the pot which was 2,000, the button who had about 10K left called and the small blind moved all in for about 8K.
When the button smooth called me preflop I was thinking it could easily be AA or KK, and after he called my bet on the flop I couldn't think of what he could have that I could beat. Add in the other player raising us both and I thought it was time to bail out. It turns out the button had TT (he called the raise) and the other player had 87 of spades. The turn was a red ten and the river was a red queen. ACK!
I got it all the way up to 22K before coming back to earth. I drizzled away about 6K. Then with blinds of 250/500 the small blind raised to 1,500 and I put him all in for 10,000 with A9s. He called with AQ and I was down to 6,500.
On my final hand I had about 8,000 and went all in vs a raise to 1,500. I had KQs (which was a little thin given my opponents position) and he called me with AJ. The flop came with an A and a J. While the turn gave me a flush draw and some hope, the river was a blank.
That tournament felt like a wasted opportunity.
In SCOOP #2 I got KK twice, was able to reraise twice, but had to fold on A high flops after getting resistance twice. On my final hand I had about 5,500 and got dealt AQ in the small blind. I raised to 600 and got called. THe flop came down 6 7 3 and I bet out 1,200. My opponent put me all in. Given his stack size, my stack size and the flop texture I felt like his raise was total bullshit. I called and he showed me 89 which was more than I gave him credit for. The river came a 9 and that was it.
The FTOPS main event was also a wasted opportunity. Early on I made a straight on the turn when a player with KK got cute before the flop and then checked a set of kings on the flop. When I made my straight on the turn he bet I raised and he called. On the river he just blew all in, I called and took him out. I had my starting stack of 7,500 up to 16,000 after that one.
Later I won a few small pots, and then took out a short stack who went all in with AK vs my 55. I made a successful bluff at a big pot and found myself with 35,000 chips and in the top 100 of the 3,000 remaining players (we started with about 4,500).
Even after a few miscues I was in 429th of 2,300. Then I let someone double through me when I overplayed 99 and they had JJ. After that one I had 7k left and by that time the blinds were 250/500. I never recovered.
In the first event which was SCOOP #1 I went down the tubes with AA. At one point I had my starting stack of 10K up to 15K, but was back down to 10k when the following hand came up.
The blinds were 150/300 and my opponent made it 600 under the gun. I reraised to 1,500 and he called. The flop came down 8 3 2 all clubs and I had the ace of clubs. He checked I bet 1,800 and he put me all in with 44 (with the 4 of clubs). 4 on the turn, no club, ace or 5 on the river and that was it. That was a very frustrating hand.
The second tournament was the FTOPS knockout. I did bust two players and picked up $80 in bounties. I don't know if I played this hand poorly, but I would have won a huge pot if I played it differently. We started that one with 5,000 chips and I was up to almost 15K when I got dealt QQ. I made it 600 to go and got called by the button and the small blind. The flop came down 9 high with two spades. I bet the pot which was 2,000, the button who had about 10K left called and the small blind moved all in for about 8K.
When the button smooth called me preflop I was thinking it could easily be AA or KK, and after he called my bet on the flop I couldn't think of what he could have that I could beat. Add in the other player raising us both and I thought it was time to bail out. It turns out the button had TT (he called the raise) and the other player had 87 of spades. The turn was a red ten and the river was a red queen. ACK!
I got it all the way up to 22K before coming back to earth. I drizzled away about 6K. Then with blinds of 250/500 the small blind raised to 1,500 and I put him all in for 10,000 with A9s. He called with AQ and I was down to 6,500.
On my final hand I had about 8,000 and went all in vs a raise to 1,500. I had KQs (which was a little thin given my opponents position) and he called me with AJ. The flop came with an A and a J. While the turn gave me a flush draw and some hope, the river was a blank.
That tournament felt like a wasted opportunity.
In SCOOP #2 I got KK twice, was able to reraise twice, but had to fold on A high flops after getting resistance twice. On my final hand I had about 5,500 and got dealt AQ in the small blind. I raised to 600 and got called. THe flop came down 6 7 3 and I bet out 1,200. My opponent put me all in. Given his stack size, my stack size and the flop texture I felt like his raise was total bullshit. I called and he showed me 89 which was more than I gave him credit for. The river came a 9 and that was it.
The FTOPS main event was also a wasted opportunity. Early on I made a straight on the turn when a player with KK got cute before the flop and then checked a set of kings on the flop. When I made my straight on the turn he bet I raised and he called. On the river he just blew all in, I called and took him out. I had my starting stack of 7,500 up to 16,000 after that one.
Later I won a few small pots, and then took out a short stack who went all in with AK vs my 55. I made a successful bluff at a big pot and found myself with 35,000 chips and in the top 100 of the 3,000 remaining players (we started with about 4,500).
Even after a few miscues I was in 429th of 2,300. Then I let someone double through me when I overplayed 99 and they had JJ. After that one I had 7k left and by that time the blinds were 250/500. I never recovered.
The Race - Day 1
I ended up earning about 2,800 points on Day 1 of my quest to beat the shit out of Carbon poker's Race promotion. Coupled with day 0's 700 points I knocked out out the 250, 500, and 1,000 point milestones and got most of the way to the 2,000.
I found out a little bit of bad news about carbon poker in general. I thought I'd paid $350 in rake to get my 3,500 points, but because of my 35% rakeback deal I only generate points at 65% of the normal pace. I guess the good news is I paid over $500 in rake so when I got my daily rakeback payment I got close to $200 which was 35% more than I expected.
I didn't have a great day in the games losing $700 or so after being up $500 early, but there were two $10/$20s and two $5/$10's at one point which is promising.
The Race isn't going to be a huge as I thought, but it's still worth thousands of dollars and will be great motivations to get me working hard.
I found out a little bit of bad news about carbon poker in general. I thought I'd paid $350 in rake to get my 3,500 points, but because of my 35% rakeback deal I only generate points at 65% of the normal pace. I guess the good news is I paid over $500 in rake so when I got my daily rakeback payment I got close to $200 which was 35% more than I expected.
I didn't have a great day in the games losing $700 or so after being up $500 early, but there were two $10/$20s and two $5/$10's at one point which is promising.
The Race isn't going to be a huge as I thought, but it's still worth thousands of dollars and will be great motivations to get me working hard.
Big Sunday Action!
The FTOPS winds down today with $256 knockout, and the $640 main event while the SCOOP kicks off with $216 no limit 6-max and a standard $215 no limit hold'em.
SCOOP #1 is underway and looking at the structure this thing is going to take forever! 10,000 chips to start, 20 minute levels and blinds starting at 25/50, then 30/60, then 40/80, then 50/100 and so on. I'm thinking 6 or 7 hours to make the money and maybe 15-18 to win.
I registered late so I've only played 15 hands, but the tournament is an hour underway and I'm up to 13,830 after taking out someone who way overplayed a hand. I had about 9k and raised to 240 with TT. He moved all in for 4,000 which was clearly not a big hand. I snap called him, he showed me A9 and I managed to dodge an ace.
6,783 players to start, with a 1st place prize of $203,493 and the edge of the money at 1,020th place which pays $310.
Starting now (11 PT) is the Knockout on fulltilt. The FTOPS main event goes off at 3 PT and SCOOP #2 starts at 2.
SCOOP #1 is underway and looking at the structure this thing is going to take forever! 10,000 chips to start, 20 minute levels and blinds starting at 25/50, then 30/60, then 40/80, then 50/100 and so on. I'm thinking 6 or 7 hours to make the money and maybe 15-18 to win.
I registered late so I've only played 15 hands, but the tournament is an hour underway and I'm up to 13,830 after taking out someone who way overplayed a hand. I had about 9k and raised to 240 with TT. He moved all in for 4,000 which was clearly not a big hand. I snap called him, he showed me A9 and I managed to dodge an ace.
6,783 players to start, with a 1st place prize of $203,493 and the edge of the money at 1,020th place which pays $310.
Starting now (11 PT) is the Knockout on fulltilt. The FTOPS main event goes off at 3 PT and SCOOP #2 starts at 2.
Friday, April 30, 2010
The Race - Day 0
I took advantage of the fact that I'm on the west coast and played a little bit tonight on Carbon poker after the day changed over and it became May on Carbon time. Inexplicably, Carbon is on Central time! WTF is that about! When I logged on at 9 pacific ready to go I found out that I'd have to wait another hour to get started.
The good news is I played a few hundred hands and the games were fantastic. Granted it's Friday night, but all the regulars are there on Pokerstars and AP so I'm guess I'll see some of these jokers again.
I got off to a terrible start and my $1,700 Carbon roll was down to $700 at one point. But with a little luck and after I figured out that these clowns are all a bunch of whackjobs (think raising 24 or capping Q9s vs 2 players out of position), I got back to even before calling it a night.
I picked up 700 points which isn't a ton, but it's a start. Tomorrow I'm really going to put the heat on and see what I can do.
The good news is I played a few hundred hands and the games were fantastic. Granted it's Friday night, but all the regulars are there on Pokerstars and AP so I'm guess I'll see some of these jokers again.
I got off to a terrible start and my $1,700 Carbon roll was down to $700 at one point. But with a little luck and after I figured out that these clowns are all a bunch of whackjobs (think raising 24 or capping Q9s vs 2 players out of position), I got back to even before calling it a night.
I picked up 700 points which isn't a ton, but it's a start. Tomorrow I'm really going to put the heat on and see what I can do.
"The Race" Big Bucks for Me?
Carbon Poker (Carbon Poker? - yes Carbon Poker - not surprised you haven't heard of it) is running a promotion in May called "The Race." It is going to be a big deal for me.
I heard about Carbon Poker through the website that does my rakeback (rakebacknation.com) and I opened an account there in January with the hopes of getting some unqualified people to play head up against me. At the time there were very few if any limit games going on the site. But in April Carbon joined up with a bunch of poker rooms that were being run by various sports betting websites and now they have some actual traffic (those of you who read my tweets will know that I took $1,000 off two $10/$20 games there yesterday).
So what is this race all about? Well, like all poker websites carbon has a points system (and a VIP system with levels like pokerstars). The way it works is for every dollar you pay in rake you get 10 points. Pay $100 in rake, get 1,000 points.
The race is essentially 15 point milestones that each come with a cash prize. The lowest is 250 points and pays $2.50. As soon as you earn 250 points (or in other words pay $25 in rake) you get $2.50 in your account. The next level is 500. After you earn ANOTHER 500 points you get $5. Another 1,000 and you get $10 more dollars. There are actually 15 levels with the top level being 100,000 points which pays an insane $15,000.
They call it the race, because there are only a certain number of prizes at each level. The first level has 1,500, $2.50 prizes. The next level has 1,250 $5 prizes and so on.
Here is a chart with all of the levels (sorry this chart looks like shit! It didn't past very well!).
Level Points Prize Total Prizes
1 250 $2.50 1,500
2 500 $5 1,250
3 1,000 $10 1,000
4 2,000 $20 700
5 2,500 $30 600
6 3,000 $40 500
7 3,500 $70 400
8 5,000 $125 300
9 7,500 $200 200
10 10,000 $250 125
11 15,000 $750 75
12 25,000 $1,000 50
13 50,000 $2,500 25
14 75,000 $5,000 10
15 100,000 $15,000 5
So what are my chances of hitting all 15 levels? I'd say less than 1%. If you add it all up I'd have to pay $30,000 in rake to hit the top level. I've actually done that much in a month before. In fact in December 2008 on my way to Supernova Elite I paid about $45,000 in rake. But that was on pokerstars playing 6 $10/$20 games, many hours a day, 30 of 31 days that month (I lost over $10,000 that month). There just aren't that many games on Carbon poker and I don't want to torture myself like that again.
Last month I raked about $11,000 on AP and Cake combined without working too hard at it. That's kind of my baseline. I know I'm going to have to play $5/$10 games and even $3/$6 games which is going to be boring, but it should be worth it.
If I can rake $12,500 I'll pick up $5,002 in bonus money from this promotion alone. I'll also get a $1,000 bonus from rakeback nation when for raking more than $5,000 in a month and I'll get back 35% of whatever rake I pay as part of my rakeback deal. Add that up and it's $10,377!
But wait! There's more! If that wasn't enough Carbon poker has a ridiculously complex VIP system with various levels and rewards! A quick set of dirty calculations has me picking up an extra $2,000 by cashing in the points I earn and hitting other goofy ass milestones and parameters that they've set up.
So I'm going to pay $12,500 in rake and get back 99% of it. That's my plan.
If I go buck nuts and make it to $20,000 in rake which would be enough to hit level 14 of "The Race" I'll get about $23,000 in bonuses which is 115% rakeback!
Three things are going to hold me back and make it tough to do as much as I want. First and foremost is a potential lack of games. Right now there is one $10/$20 and three $3/$6 games. Nothing bigger or in between. If that line up was available 24/7 I think I could do it. Typically there has been at least one $10/$20 and one $5/$10 going the past few days with smattering of lower games. I'm hoping that I'll be able to help start more games since I'm willing to play heads up.
The second thing that's going to hold me back is money. Right now I have $1,700 in Carbon Poker and it's going to take me a few days to get more in. The only way for me to get money in there is through ewalletexpress.com. I can send money to ewallet from my bank, but I have to pay them 8.8% of whatever I deposit. Not a great option. The other way is to cashout from AP or Cake to ewallet and then send it over to carbon. I've started the process, but it's going to take a few days. So if I run bad at the start I could blow though my $1,700 and have to wait a day or two to resume play. Working for me in this regard is Carbon pays rakeback every day and I'll get the race prizes as soon as I earn them.
Third, the SCOOP. I might trim down my SCOOP schedule, but I'm still going to be playing one or two tournaments a day for two weeks.
Actually there is a 4th concern which is minute, but still there. And that it that I could have some competition for the prizes. I don't see anyway for 25 people to rake $12,500 on Carbon poker. There are hundreds who do that on pokerstars and fulltilt, but not on Carbon. I'm going to log on at minute 1 and start play to make sure I don't get jacked out of the first few prizes which I'm sure will be hit by the limiting number of players pretty quickly.
May is going to be a looooooong month, but I'm hoping it's a profitable one! Let's hope I have the mental fortitude to make this happen!
I heard about Carbon Poker through the website that does my rakeback (rakebacknation.com) and I opened an account there in January with the hopes of getting some unqualified people to play head up against me. At the time there were very few if any limit games going on the site. But in April Carbon joined up with a bunch of poker rooms that were being run by various sports betting websites and now they have some actual traffic (those of you who read my tweets will know that I took $1,000 off two $10/$20 games there yesterday).
So what is this race all about? Well, like all poker websites carbon has a points system (and a VIP system with levels like pokerstars). The way it works is for every dollar you pay in rake you get 10 points. Pay $100 in rake, get 1,000 points.
The race is essentially 15 point milestones that each come with a cash prize. The lowest is 250 points and pays $2.50. As soon as you earn 250 points (or in other words pay $25 in rake) you get $2.50 in your account. The next level is 500. After you earn ANOTHER 500 points you get $5. Another 1,000 and you get $10 more dollars. There are actually 15 levels with the top level being 100,000 points which pays an insane $15,000.
They call it the race, because there are only a certain number of prizes at each level. The first level has 1,500, $2.50 prizes. The next level has 1,250 $5 prizes and so on.
Here is a chart with all of the levels (sorry this chart looks like shit! It didn't past very well!).
Level Points Prize Total Prizes
1 250 $2.50 1,500
2 500 $5 1,250
3 1,000 $10 1,000
4 2,000 $20 700
5 2,500 $30 600
6 3,000 $40 500
7 3,500 $70 400
8 5,000 $125 300
9 7,500 $200 200
10 10,000 $250 125
11 15,000 $750 75
12 25,000 $1,000 50
13 50,000 $2,500 25
14 75,000 $5,000 10
15 100,000 $15,000 5
So what are my chances of hitting all 15 levels? I'd say less than 1%. If you add it all up I'd have to pay $30,000 in rake to hit the top level. I've actually done that much in a month before. In fact in December 2008 on my way to Supernova Elite I paid about $45,000 in rake. But that was on pokerstars playing 6 $10/$20 games, many hours a day, 30 of 31 days that month (I lost over $10,000 that month). There just aren't that many games on Carbon poker and I don't want to torture myself like that again.
Last month I raked about $11,000 on AP and Cake combined without working too hard at it. That's kind of my baseline. I know I'm going to have to play $5/$10 games and even $3/$6 games which is going to be boring, but it should be worth it.
If I can rake $12,500 I'll pick up $5,002 in bonus money from this promotion alone. I'll also get a $1,000 bonus from rakeback nation when for raking more than $5,000 in a month and I'll get back 35% of whatever rake I pay as part of my rakeback deal. Add that up and it's $10,377!
But wait! There's more! If that wasn't enough Carbon poker has a ridiculously complex VIP system with various levels and rewards! A quick set of dirty calculations has me picking up an extra $2,000 by cashing in the points I earn and hitting other goofy ass milestones and parameters that they've set up.
So I'm going to pay $12,500 in rake and get back 99% of it. That's my plan.
If I go buck nuts and make it to $20,000 in rake which would be enough to hit level 14 of "The Race" I'll get about $23,000 in bonuses which is 115% rakeback!
Three things are going to hold me back and make it tough to do as much as I want. First and foremost is a potential lack of games. Right now there is one $10/$20 and three $3/$6 games. Nothing bigger or in between. If that line up was available 24/7 I think I could do it. Typically there has been at least one $10/$20 and one $5/$10 going the past few days with smattering of lower games. I'm hoping that I'll be able to help start more games since I'm willing to play heads up.
The second thing that's going to hold me back is money. Right now I have $1,700 in Carbon Poker and it's going to take me a few days to get more in. The only way for me to get money in there is through ewalletexpress.com. I can send money to ewallet from my bank, but I have to pay them 8.8% of whatever I deposit. Not a great option. The other way is to cashout from AP or Cake to ewallet and then send it over to carbon. I've started the process, but it's going to take a few days. So if I run bad at the start I could blow though my $1,700 and have to wait a day or two to resume play. Working for me in this regard is Carbon pays rakeback every day and I'll get the race prizes as soon as I earn them.
Third, the SCOOP. I might trim down my SCOOP schedule, but I'm still going to be playing one or two tournaments a day for two weeks.
Actually there is a 4th concern which is minute, but still there. And that it that I could have some competition for the prizes. I don't see anyway for 25 people to rake $12,500 on Carbon poker. There are hundreds who do that on pokerstars and fulltilt, but not on Carbon. I'm going to log on at minute 1 and start play to make sure I don't get jacked out of the first few prizes which I'm sure will be hit by the limiting number of players pretty quickly.
May is going to be a looooooong month, but I'm hoping it's a profitable one! Let's hope I have the mental fortitude to make this happen!
Thursday, April 29, 2010
Early SCOOP Schedule
I bricked in the cashout FTOPS without winning a single pot. My last hand was QQ vs AA. BOO!
After 7 tournaments my FTOPS/SCOOP Bankroll is up to $7753 from $7,500. Not great but as they say, better than a kick in the nuts!
I'm taking today off with plans of playing little if at all on Friday and Saturday so I can rest up for playing 15 days is a row.
Here the first week of my SCOOP schedule (I might add or subtract one or two tournaments). Man it looks like a lot! I copy and pasted from the web so all of the times are eastern.
May 2 13:00 NL Hold’em [6-max]$215
May 2 17:00 NL Hold’em [2-day] $215
May 3 14:00 NL Hold’em [6-Max, Rebuys] $55
May 3 17:00 FL Badugi $162
May 3 20:00 PL Omaha [Turbo, 1R1A] Low: $11 Med: $109
May 4 14:00 PL 5-Card Draw $109
May 4 17:00 NL Hold’em [Heads-Up Match Play] $162
May 5 14:00 Mixed Hold’em [6-Max] Low: $22 Med: $215
May 6 17:00 NL Hold’em [Knockout] $265
May 7 14:00 NL Hold’em [Ante Up!] $162
May 7 17:00 FL Omaha Hi-Lo $55
May 7 20:00 NL Hold’em [2X Chance, Turbo] Low: $16.50 Med: $162
May 8 14:00 NL NL Hold’em - Triple Shootout $215
May 8 17:00 PL Omaha [6-Max, Rebuys] $16.50
May 8 20:00 FL Hold’em [Turbo] Low: $22 Med: $215
Sunday is going to be a big day. On top of the two SCOOP events I've also decided to fire in FTOPS event #28 $256 NLH knockout 6-max and the $640 FTOPS main event ($3,000,000 guaranteed prize pool for that one - 1st should be over $500,000!!). Cancel all of your plans and start your laptops charging now!
After 7 tournaments my FTOPS/SCOOP Bankroll is up to $7753 from $7,500. Not great but as they say, better than a kick in the nuts!
I'm taking today off with plans of playing little if at all on Friday and Saturday so I can rest up for playing 15 days is a row.
Here the first week of my SCOOP schedule (I might add or subtract one or two tournaments). Man it looks like a lot! I copy and pasted from the web so all of the times are eastern.
May 2 13:00 NL Hold’em [6-max]$215
May 2 17:00 NL Hold’em [2-day] $215
May 3 14:00 NL Hold’em [6-Max, Rebuys] $55
May 3 17:00 FL Badugi $162
May 3 20:00 PL Omaha [Turbo, 1R1A] Low: $11 Med: $109
May 4 14:00 PL 5-Card Draw $109
May 4 17:00 NL Hold’em [Heads-Up Match Play] $162
May 5 14:00 Mixed Hold’em [6-Max] Low: $22 Med: $215
May 6 17:00 NL Hold’em [Knockout] $265
May 7 14:00 NL Hold’em [Ante Up!] $162
May 7 17:00 FL Omaha Hi-Lo $55
May 7 20:00 NL Hold’em [2X Chance, Turbo] Low: $16.50 Med: $162
May 8 14:00 NL NL Hold’em - Triple Shootout $215
May 8 17:00 PL Omaha [6-Max, Rebuys] $16.50
May 8 20:00 FL Hold’em [Turbo] Low: $22 Med: $215
Sunday is going to be a big day. On top of the two SCOOP events I've also decided to fire in FTOPS event #28 $256 NLH knockout 6-max and the $640 FTOPS main event ($3,000,000 guaranteed prize pool for that one - 1st should be over $500,000!!). Cancel all of your plans and start your laptops charging now!
Wednesday, April 28, 2010
$50/$100 Beat Down
First of all thanks to whoever posted the comment on the Cashout tournament strategy. That makes perfect sense. Not sure I'll be able to resist the temptation to cashout, but I'll hold out as long as I can.
While I was playing the HORSE tournament I was also playing cash games. Normally, I find myself in the $10/$20 and $15/$30 limit games on absolute poker, but from time to time I will sometimes venture higher if conditions are right.
Yesterday I looked at a $50/$100 6-max game that had 5 players sitting at it. 3 were average, $15/$30 players who are pretty much break even, one was a solid $30/$60+ regular and the other was a total fish who I've played before and just dumps money at any limit. The seat open was to the left of the fish and I have visions of his stack pouring into mine.
On the other hand $50/$100 is a terrifying limit. It's not hard to drop 5 grand if you lose your composure and it is 5 times my normal limit. But I've been playing great lately so I decided to give it a shot. Here is a recap of a session was very short but went perfectly (the highlight was hand #14).
On hand #1 I got dealt KQ suited in the big blind. The under the gun player raised, I called and the flop came Q high. I check raised him and he three bet me. The turn was an ace and we both checked. I bet the river and he folded. A very normal pot. +$272 so far.
On hand #2 I got dealt AJ in the small blind. I three bet the cutoff, flopped an ace and won with a bet. +$469.
Hand #3 94o.
Hand #4 I raised pocket jacks and everyone folded. I avoided the temptation to say "Aw man!" and instead thought "hey I just made $75 in 2 seconds!"
Hand #5 T5o.
Hand #6 Q8o.
Hand #7 62s in the big blind. folded to a raise
Hand #8 I three bet a button raise with 77 and won with a bet on a Q high flop. +$691 for the session.
Hand #9 T5o
Hand#10 J8o
Hand #11 A7o (almost raised this one but opted to fold)
Hand #12 53o
Hand #13 62o
In hand #14 the cutoff raised and I called in the small blind with QT of hearts. The big blind came along too and the flop was 7 6 3 with one heart. The big blind and I both called a bet of $50 on the flop and the turn came down the ace of hearts giving me a flush draw. I decided to go for the check raise semibluff thinking that if my opponent bet, but didn't have an ace I could win with a checkraise. And even if I did get called I could still hit my flush. Like clock work the cutoff bet $100, I made it $200 and the big blind folded.
Not like clockwork my opponent called and the river came the 3 of diamonds. YUCK! But in a moment of sheer bravado I fired another $100 into the pot. My opponent thought and thought for what seemed like an hour and I couldn't help but explicitly think "Holy shit there's $947 out there! I have a god damn thousand bucks riding on this guy calling or folding. I'd have to be nuts playing in this game. What in the world am I doing!?"
And then he folded. "I am the king of all who play poker! Of course he was going to fold. No one would ever put me on a check raise semi bluff!" +$1,138 for the session at that point.
Hand #15 I raised with AJ and got called by the fishy player that I'd been targeting in the first place who was in the big blind. The flop came down 8 5 4 and he called my continuation bet. The turn was an ace (DING!) and he bet into me (DING DING!) I raised him and he called. The rive paired the 5 and he folded when I bet. +$1,510.
In hand #16 I raised A8o and got called by the big blind. The flop came down KK2 and he folded when I fired out $50. +$1,632.
Hand #17 J3.
Hand #18 K3.
And that was it. Maybe I should have kept going, but I'm not above a hit and run every now and then.
I have been on a killer run lately. I've had 6 winning days in a row and the worst of those was +$800. I hope I can keep it up!
While I was playing the HORSE tournament I was also playing cash games. Normally, I find myself in the $10/$20 and $15/$30 limit games on absolute poker, but from time to time I will sometimes venture higher if conditions are right.
Yesterday I looked at a $50/$100 6-max game that had 5 players sitting at it. 3 were average, $15/$30 players who are pretty much break even, one was a solid $30/$60+ regular and the other was a total fish who I've played before and just dumps money at any limit. The seat open was to the left of the fish and I have visions of his stack pouring into mine.
On the other hand $50/$100 is a terrifying limit. It's not hard to drop 5 grand if you lose your composure and it is 5 times my normal limit. But I've been playing great lately so I decided to give it a shot. Here is a recap of a session was very short but went perfectly (the highlight was hand #14).
On hand #1 I got dealt KQ suited in the big blind. The under the gun player raised, I called and the flop came Q high. I check raised him and he three bet me. The turn was an ace and we both checked. I bet the river and he folded. A very normal pot. +$272 so far.
On hand #2 I got dealt AJ in the small blind. I three bet the cutoff, flopped an ace and won with a bet. +$469.
Hand #3 94o.
Hand #4 I raised pocket jacks and everyone folded. I avoided the temptation to say "Aw man!" and instead thought "hey I just made $75 in 2 seconds!"
Hand #5 T5o.
Hand #6 Q8o.
Hand #7 62s in the big blind. folded to a raise
Hand #8 I three bet a button raise with 77 and won with a bet on a Q high flop. +$691 for the session.
Hand #9 T5o
Hand#10 J8o
Hand #11 A7o (almost raised this one but opted to fold)
Hand #12 53o
Hand #13 62o
In hand #14 the cutoff raised and I called in the small blind with QT of hearts. The big blind came along too and the flop was 7 6 3 with one heart. The big blind and I both called a bet of $50 on the flop and the turn came down the ace of hearts giving me a flush draw. I decided to go for the check raise semibluff thinking that if my opponent bet, but didn't have an ace I could win with a checkraise. And even if I did get called I could still hit my flush. Like clock work the cutoff bet $100, I made it $200 and the big blind folded.
Not like clockwork my opponent called and the river came the 3 of diamonds. YUCK! But in a moment of sheer bravado I fired another $100 into the pot. My opponent thought and thought for what seemed like an hour and I couldn't help but explicitly think "Holy shit there's $947 out there! I have a god damn thousand bucks riding on this guy calling or folding. I'd have to be nuts playing in this game. What in the world am I doing!?"
And then he folded. "I am the king of all who play poker! Of course he was going to fold. No one would ever put me on a check raise semi bluff!" +$1,138 for the session at that point.
Hand #15 I raised with AJ and got called by the fishy player that I'd been targeting in the first place who was in the big blind. The flop came down 8 5 4 and he called my continuation bet. The turn was an ace (DING!) and he bet into me (DING DING!) I raised him and he called. The rive paired the 5 and he folded when I bet. +$1,510.
In hand #16 I raised A8o and got called by the big blind. The flop came down KK2 and he folded when I fired out $50. +$1,632.
Hand #17 J3.
Hand #18 K3.
And that was it. Maybe I should have kept going, but I'm not above a hit and run every now and then.
I have been on a killer run lately. I've had 6 winning days in a row and the worst of those was +$800. I hope I can keep it up!
Two Tournaments Today
Event #16 $216 7-game mixed games is underway. This is a mix of all the HORSE games plus NL hold'em and PLO.
At 3 I have $216 "cashout." I've never played a cashout tournament before, but here is how I understand that it works. Of my buy in $16 goes to the house, $100 goes to the main prize pool and $100 goes to the cashout prize pool. At any time, but only one time, during the tournament you can "cashout" half of your chips and get paid for their value. For example. If you start the tournament with 5,000 chips on hand 1 you could sell off 2,500 chips for $100 and be left with 2,500 chips. Or if you had 20,000 you could sell off half for $400 and be left with 10,000. I'm not sure what the optimal strategy is, but I hope I'll know the time to cashout when I see it.
At 3 I have $216 "cashout." I've never played a cashout tournament before, but here is how I understand that it works. Of my buy in $16 goes to the house, $100 goes to the main prize pool and $100 goes to the cashout prize pool. At any time, but only one time, during the tournament you can "cashout" half of your chips and get paid for their value. For example. If you start the tournament with 5,000 chips on hand 1 you could sell off 2,500 chips for $100 and be left with 2,500 chips. Or if you had 20,000 you could sell off half for $400 and be left with 10,000. I'm not sure what the optimal strategy is, but I hope I'll know the time to cashout when I see it.
FTOPS Event #15 ($535 HORSE) Recap
I liked the structure that full tilt set up for this tournament. Often times you start with so many chips and such small stakes that the first few rounds feel like a major waste of time. Of course when I'm putting up five hundred bucks for one tournament I want some play, but better to start with the stakes a little higher and make the blind increases a little more gradual. I think this tournament had the right balance.
We got 442 entrants which was 58 short of what full tilt needed to meet the $250,000 prize pool guarantee that they'd posted. In the end they had to add just over $13,000 to the prize pool creating a $30 per player overlay.
I got off to a good start. We began with 4,000 chips and my first big pot came up playing Stud. I stared the hand with three big clubs and there was heavy action on 3rd street. I bricked on 4th street, but caught another club on 5th. At this point my opponents went nuts going 3 bets one with only a pair of jacks and the other with I don't know what. I made my flush on 6th street and check raised the pair of jacks. Both players called. On the river I bet, one player folded and the other called me with bare jacks. That took me to 5,500.
I got half of a big Omaha pot a few minutes later when I made the nut low and was up to 6,400. But that was my peak.
I got totally blown up in razz. I had two hands back to back where I was ahead on 5th street (not way ahead, but ahead), got heavy action and caught two bricks.
A little while later in the Stud hi-lo I had a hand where I started with A63 and caught another ace and another 6. My opponent who made a low on 6th street also made a flush on the river and scooped me.
My final demise came in hold'em. I raised with QT of hearts and got 3 bet. The flop came down ace high with two hearts and I check called. The turn was a queen and I check raised. My opponent three bet me all in with AK, and I didn't hit. I finished 295th of 442.
We got 442 entrants which was 58 short of what full tilt needed to meet the $250,000 prize pool guarantee that they'd posted. In the end they had to add just over $13,000 to the prize pool creating a $30 per player overlay.
I got off to a good start. We began with 4,000 chips and my first big pot came up playing Stud. I stared the hand with three big clubs and there was heavy action on 3rd street. I bricked on 4th street, but caught another club on 5th. At this point my opponents went nuts going 3 bets one with only a pair of jacks and the other with I don't know what. I made my flush on 6th street and check raised the pair of jacks. Both players called. On the river I bet, one player folded and the other called me with bare jacks. That took me to 5,500.
I got half of a big Omaha pot a few minutes later when I made the nut low and was up to 6,400. But that was my peak.
I got totally blown up in razz. I had two hands back to back where I was ahead on 5th street (not way ahead, but ahead), got heavy action and caught two bricks.
A little while later in the Stud hi-lo I had a hand where I started with A63 and caught another ace and another 6. My opponent who made a low on 6th street also made a flush on the river and scooped me.
My final demise came in hold'em. I raised with QT of hearts and got 3 bet. The flop came down ace high with two hearts and I check called. The turn was a queen and I check raised. My opponent three bet me all in with AK, and I didn't hit. I finished 295th of 442.
Tuesday, April 27, 2010
My 2010 WSOP Schedule is Set!
I was worried that I might have to pass on this years WSOP because of cost. But happily I have been on a tear in the limit cash games. While I've had a few $1,500+ losing days this month, I had one day that was +$4,400, and a half dozen that were in the +$2,000 range.
What gives me the most confidence is I made a few significant changes to my tactics after taking a massive beating. I took a day to really look at some of the plays I'd been making and since I've made those changes I've been killing.
If I get my doors blown off in the SCOOP AND I back up a little in the cash games it might be a little tight playing all the WSOP events that I want to play. But I booked my hotel rooms so if I can make it work I'm going to.
Here is my plan! I'm getting to town on June 8th and staying at the Rio for 5 nights. Then I move over to Aria for 4 nights. I got 3 nights free at each hotel and the other 3 nights were $100 each. Not bad for RIO during the WSOP and the newest casino is Vegas!
Here is the schedule of tournaments!
June 9th - $2,000 limit hold'em
June 10th - $1,500 7-card stud
June 11th - $2,500 limit hold'em 6 handed
June 12th - $1,000 no limit hold'em
June 13th - Rest/Party with the wife!
June 14th - $2,500 No Limit Hold'em 6 handed
June 15th - Rest
June 16th - $1,500 HORSE
Total Cost: $11,000.
This is a great schedule for me and I'm pumped that these tournaments lined up the way they did. I like my chances playing limit hold'em and REALLY like my chances playing 6 handed limit. Also working to my advantage is the 6 max limit event is the only tournament that day. In year's past it's gone off at 5 pm on a day when there is a no limit tournament at noon which draws off a lot of the players. This year if you want to play something that day you're playing limit. Hopefully I can nail some of the NL players who think they can play limit.
The 7 card stud tournament is sure to be populated with old times, codgers and your grandpa. I played this event last year and was shocked by the level of play. If I can get a little help for the deck, I'll do great in this one.
Last year they had one $1,000 no limit tournament and it got 6,000 entrants! So this year they have one every weekend. They are sure to be populated with first time WSOP players and fish.
One of my WSOP cashes was $2,500 6 max no limit so I'm going to go for another one.
And of course, HORSE! Last year I finished 28th of 450 in the $3,000 HORSE against the toughest field you're ever seen. I always like my chances at HORSE.
Lastly there is a $10,000 limit event on the 15th. If I make a final table or have a solid five figure cash of some kind I'll probably play that baby as well.
I'll be looking to sell off about half my action. Of course I'l be in touch with my usual backers, but if you haven't backed me before and you want a piece, let me know.
More on the WSOP as the time gets closer. I'm getting fired up already!
What gives me the most confidence is I made a few significant changes to my tactics after taking a massive beating. I took a day to really look at some of the plays I'd been making and since I've made those changes I've been killing.
If I get my doors blown off in the SCOOP AND I back up a little in the cash games it might be a little tight playing all the WSOP events that I want to play. But I booked my hotel rooms so if I can make it work I'm going to.
Here is my plan! I'm getting to town on June 8th and staying at the Rio for 5 nights. Then I move over to Aria for 4 nights. I got 3 nights free at each hotel and the other 3 nights were $100 each. Not bad for RIO during the WSOP and the newest casino is Vegas!
Here is the schedule of tournaments!
June 9th - $2,000 limit hold'em
June 10th - $1,500 7-card stud
June 11th - $2,500 limit hold'em 6 handed
June 12th - $1,000 no limit hold'em
June 13th - Rest/Party with the wife!
June 14th - $2,500 No Limit Hold'em 6 handed
June 15th - Rest
June 16th - $1,500 HORSE
Total Cost: $11,000.
This is a great schedule for me and I'm pumped that these tournaments lined up the way they did. I like my chances playing limit hold'em and REALLY like my chances playing 6 handed limit. Also working to my advantage is the 6 max limit event is the only tournament that day. In year's past it's gone off at 5 pm on a day when there is a no limit tournament at noon which draws off a lot of the players. This year if you want to play something that day you're playing limit. Hopefully I can nail some of the NL players who think they can play limit.
The 7 card stud tournament is sure to be populated with old times, codgers and your grandpa. I played this event last year and was shocked by the level of play. If I can get a little help for the deck, I'll do great in this one.
Last year they had one $1,000 no limit tournament and it got 6,000 entrants! So this year they have one every weekend. They are sure to be populated with first time WSOP players and fish.
One of my WSOP cashes was $2,500 6 max no limit so I'm going to go for another one.
And of course, HORSE! Last year I finished 28th of 450 in the $3,000 HORSE against the toughest field you're ever seen. I always like my chances at HORSE.
Lastly there is a $10,000 limit event on the 15th. If I make a final table or have a solid five figure cash of some kind I'll probably play that baby as well.
I'll be looking to sell off about half my action. Of course I'l be in touch with my usual backers, but if you haven't backed me before and you want a piece, let me know.
More on the WSOP as the time gets closer. I'm getting fired up already!
Giddy Up!
$535 HORSE tonight at 6 pm PT! I'm taking this one to the house! The HORSE house! To the Barn! Look for updates on twitter.
Sunday Tournament Recap
On Sunday I played 4 tournaments and made the money in 3 of them. The first was $129 Knockout FTOPS, and I went broke right away.
The second was a $55 tournament on pokerstars that started with over 8,000 players and a first place prize of $44,000! I finished about 500th.
The third tournament was a special tournament on pokerstars called the "turbo takedown." This tournament goes off once a month, the buy in is 3,000 FPPs and it has a prize pool of $1,000,000 regardless of the number of entrants. In this case we had 18,000 entrants. I went on a monster tear like I can't ever remember having. It started with beating AA with AK when the flop came with TWO kings. After that I took out 4 players in about 10 minutes! When we were down to 6,000 or so players I was in first place with a stack that was 7 times average! I fizzeled a little down the stretch, but finished around 700th which paid $170.
Lastly there was the pokerstars Sunday Million. I want to keep this post short so let's just say that I finished 783rd out of 8776 and got paid $421.
I planned to play the $322 NLH FTOPS event #9, but after 5 or 6 hours of steady play I didn't think I had it in me to stay focused long enough to go deep.
The knockout and Sunday Million were part of my FTOPS/SCOOP package. My backers will be happy to hear that I'm ahead $1,220 after four tournaments.
The second was a $55 tournament on pokerstars that started with over 8,000 players and a first place prize of $44,000! I finished about 500th.
The third tournament was a special tournament on pokerstars called the "turbo takedown." This tournament goes off once a month, the buy in is 3,000 FPPs and it has a prize pool of $1,000,000 regardless of the number of entrants. In this case we had 18,000 entrants. I went on a monster tear like I can't ever remember having. It started with beating AA with AK when the flop came with TWO kings. After that I took out 4 players in about 10 minutes! When we were down to 6,000 or so players I was in first place with a stack that was 7 times average! I fizzeled a little down the stretch, but finished around 700th which paid $170.
Lastly there was the pokerstars Sunday Million. I want to keep this post short so let's just say that I finished 783rd out of 8776 and got paid $421.
I planned to play the $322 NLH FTOPS event #9, but after 5 or 6 hours of steady play I didn't think I had it in me to stay focused long enough to go deep.
The knockout and Sunday Million were part of my FTOPS/SCOOP package. My backers will be happy to hear that I'm ahead $1,220 after four tournaments.
Sunday, April 25, 2010
My Near Future Schedule (With Times!)
Since I did so well in Event #1 I'm adding a few more FTOPS tournaments to the schedule. My original plan was to play 3 FTOPS tournaments as a warm up for the SCOOP. But instead of 3 it looks like it's going to be more like 5 or 6.
Today I'm going to play three tournaments:
1) $129 NL hold'em Knock out which is event #7. For every player I bust I get $20. Start Time - 11 PT.
2) $322 No Limit Hold'em which is Event #9. Start Time - 3 PT.
3) $215 Pokerstars Sunday Milion. Start Time - 1:30 (Backers you're in for this one too. I'm adding it to the FTOPS/SCOOP package).
I'll probably register late for all of these and skip the first few mind numbing levels.
Here are other events and the percentage that I'll be playing them:
1) $535 HORSE at 6 PT on Tuesday (99%)
2)$216 7-game mixed games at 11 PT on Wednesday (99%)
3)$216 NL hold'em "cashout" at 3 PT on Wednesday (50%)
4)$216 NL hold'em 6-max at 11 PT on Friday ((35%)
5)$256 NL knockout 6 max at 11 PT on Sunday May 2nd (50%)
6 $640 NL hold'em "Main Event" on Sunday May 2nd (30%)
The SCOOP starts May 2nd. More on my precice SCOOP schedule later.
Today I'm going to play three tournaments:
1) $129 NL hold'em Knock out which is event #7. For every player I bust I get $20. Start Time - 11 PT.
2) $322 No Limit Hold'em which is Event #9. Start Time - 3 PT.
3) $215 Pokerstars Sunday Milion. Start Time - 1:30 (Backers you're in for this one too. I'm adding it to the FTOPS/SCOOP package).
I'll probably register late for all of these and skip the first few mind numbing levels.
Here are other events and the percentage that I'll be playing them:
1) $535 HORSE at 6 PT on Tuesday (99%)
2)$216 7-game mixed games at 11 PT on Wednesday (99%)
3)$216 NL hold'em "cashout" at 3 PT on Wednesday (50%)
4)$216 NL hold'em 6-max at 11 PT on Friday ((35%)
5)$256 NL knockout 6 max at 11 PT on Sunday May 2nd (50%)
6 $640 NL hold'em "Main Event" on Sunday May 2nd (30%)
The SCOOP starts May 2nd. More on my precice SCOOP schedule later.
FTOPS Event #6 ($216 Rush Poker) Recap
This tournament was a ton of fun. Due to the format where you can look at a hand, fold it, and instantly get a new one I played 122 hands in about 23 minutes. Compare that to the 500 hands in 8 hours I played the day before in event #1 and I was getting 318 hands per hour playing rush, vs 63 an hour with the standard format.
There were roughly 1,900 entrants and although I only lasted 23 minutes I beat 1,000 of them. In the end I had my starting stack of 2,000 up to 2,500 with blinds in the range of 100/200. The button made a standard raise, I moved all in with 99 from the small blind, he called me with JJ and I didn't hit.
There were roughly 1,900 entrants and although I only lasted 23 minutes I beat 1,000 of them. In the end I had my starting stack of 2,000 up to 2,500 with blinds in the range of 100/200. The button made a standard raise, I moved all in with 99 from the small blind, he called me with JJ and I didn't hit.
Saturday, April 24, 2010
Rush Poker
As I mentioned in my last post FTOPS event #6 is Rush Poker. This is new thing so let me explain it to those of you who don't know about it.
I've never played a rush poker tournament, but I have played a little bit of the cash games. The way it works is you join a large pool of players (something like 100-500) all playing the same game and stakes. When you start you get plopped down at a table and dealt a hand. If you choose to "quick fold" you instantly get sent to a new table and get dealt a new hand. To the other players at the first table you appear to still be there waiting to act. If you get crappy cards you can just fold, fold, fold and instantly get more hands at new tables.
Of course you're facing a different lineup of players each hand so there isn't much playing the player going on unless you get to know the regulars.
In this FTOPS tournament there will probably be a couple thousand players to start and it's a turbo tournament. That means 2,000 chips to start and 3 minute levels. While the blinds start at 15/30, 30 minutes into the tournament they'll be at 150/300. The whole tournament will be over in a couple hours.
I'm definitely going to play and will tweet updates when I can. I should be interesing if nothing else.
I've never played a rush poker tournament, but I have played a little bit of the cash games. The way it works is you join a large pool of players (something like 100-500) all playing the same game and stakes. When you start you get plopped down at a table and dealt a hand. If you choose to "quick fold" you instantly get sent to a new table and get dealt a new hand. To the other players at the first table you appear to still be there waiting to act. If you get crappy cards you can just fold, fold, fold and instantly get more hands at new tables.
Of course you're facing a different lineup of players each hand so there isn't much playing the player going on unless you get to know the regulars.
In this FTOPS tournament there will probably be a couple thousand players to start and it's a turbo tournament. That means 2,000 chips to start and 3 minute levels. While the blinds start at 15/30, 30 minutes into the tournament they'll be at 150/300. The whole tournament will be over in a couple hours.
I'm definitely going to play and will tweet updates when I can. I should be interesing if nothing else.
FTOPS Event #5 and #6
Event #5 is NLH $109 with rebuys, and event #6 is $216 "Rush" poker turbo. The first one is at 1 PT and the second is at 3 PT. Right now I'm not sure if I'm going to play neither, one or both, but I wanted to give my backers and my fan(s) a heads up.
FTOPS XVI Event #1 ($216 NLH) Recap
I got the schedule a little mixed up and wasn't expecting to start the FTOPS for another day, but when I woke up I decided to see what was going on. When I saw that event #1 was a standard $216 NLH tournament I decided to log on and give it a shot.
We started with 3,673 players with 5,000 chips each. I won a few pots early and had 8K or 9K when the following hand came up. The blinds were something like 40/80 and my opponent raised to 250 from early position. I was on the button with TT and I made it 900 to go.
The raiser called and the flop came down Q 9 5 with two spades. He checked and I bet 900 which was about half the pot and instantly my opponent went all in for 3,500. I had about 7K left in my stack so I wouldn't be out altogether if I called and lost, but the most likely hand for him to have there is a queen. In the end I made what looking back was a terrible call, but it turned out my opponent had AK of spades, missed, and I was up to 13K chips.
The next big hand came up a good while later, although my stack was still around 13K. The blinds were up to 250/500 and I made it 1,500 to go from the button with AJ off. The big blind who had 25K chips instantly pushed all in. I knew this was total bullshit and snapped called. He had QT off, I flopped an ace, and was up to 29K.
At that point there were 950 players left, 540 spots paid, and the average stack was around 20K.
I worked my way up to 45K with pure aggression and that's how much I had when we made the money. 540th paid $300.
After taking it up to 53K, I'd fallen back to 30K when the next big hand came up. The blinds were 1K/2K and the under the gun player limped in which was very suspicious. I figured it was likely AA. I had Q9 in the small blind and fired in another 1,000 hoping to hit the flop big and double up.
I didn't really hit the flop big, but I got some of it. The flop was 6 7 8 giving me an open ended straight draw. I checked, the big blind checked and the limper bet 3,000. At this point I talked myself out of my original read. "It doesn't have to be aces" I thought somewhat foolishly. Restraint has never been one of my strengths and I decided to be bold and move all in. My opponent didn't have pocket aces...he had pocked kings! ACK! Happily I hit a 5 on the turn making my straight and taking my stack to 62K.
I drifted up and down a little and the caught a break busting a player who had 55 when I had 88. That took me to 77K.
That's when I smashed face first into AA with JJ. I was down to about 5K when the big blind was 4K and the ante was 500 a hand. I was in last place about as broke as you could be without actually being on empty. I folded three hands and had 3,100 left when I got dealt A5. I got it all in and won. And then got the next hand all in and won. All of a sudden I was back to 30K with some hope.
Two hands later someone short moved all in with 56s and I called with A9. They missed and I was up to 67K! I'd increased my stack by 20 times in 4 hands!
One round later I got AK suited and was able to reraise all in vs AQ. Now I had 117K. What a comeback! But that wasn't the end.
I got ground down to 70K when I got dealt JTs in the big blind. It got folded around to the small blind who had 250K. He moved all in, but I thought he might move all in with just about anything here given that the blinds were 5K/10K with a 1K ante (there was 25K in the pot already) and I had the perfect size stack to attack. So I called. He showed me A3 which was more than I expected. I bricked the flop and the turn, but hit a ten on the river putting my back to 140K.
Then I got REALLY lucky. I had a little over 100K and a player made it 25K or so to go from late position. I had A8 suited and decided to shove. He called me with A9. Whoops!
The flop came down 6 7 9 giving him a pair and me a straight draw. Sadly the turn was an 8 taking me from 8 outs to win to 8 outs to chop and 2 outs to win. But the river was another 8! HA! I was up to 225K.
But this is where the story ends. I wish I could say the insanity that took me from 3,100 to 225,000 kept up. Instead I got ground down and the blinds went up and I ended up moving in from the button with 66 and got called by the big blind's AA.
I finished 38th out of 3,673 which paid $1,575. First place was $134,000 and I wasn't that far away from the final table, but this result was not bad for a tournament I almost didn't play. If I'd gone broke when I had 3,100 chips I would have gotten paid $525.
We started with 3,673 players with 5,000 chips each. I won a few pots early and had 8K or 9K when the following hand came up. The blinds were something like 40/80 and my opponent raised to 250 from early position. I was on the button with TT and I made it 900 to go.
The raiser called and the flop came down Q 9 5 with two spades. He checked and I bet 900 which was about half the pot and instantly my opponent went all in for 3,500. I had about 7K left in my stack so I wouldn't be out altogether if I called and lost, but the most likely hand for him to have there is a queen. In the end I made what looking back was a terrible call, but it turned out my opponent had AK of spades, missed, and I was up to 13K chips.
The next big hand came up a good while later, although my stack was still around 13K. The blinds were up to 250/500 and I made it 1,500 to go from the button with AJ off. The big blind who had 25K chips instantly pushed all in. I knew this was total bullshit and snapped called. He had QT off, I flopped an ace, and was up to 29K.
At that point there were 950 players left, 540 spots paid, and the average stack was around 20K.
I worked my way up to 45K with pure aggression and that's how much I had when we made the money. 540th paid $300.
After taking it up to 53K, I'd fallen back to 30K when the next big hand came up. The blinds were 1K/2K and the under the gun player limped in which was very suspicious. I figured it was likely AA. I had Q9 in the small blind and fired in another 1,000 hoping to hit the flop big and double up.
I didn't really hit the flop big, but I got some of it. The flop was 6 7 8 giving me an open ended straight draw. I checked, the big blind checked and the limper bet 3,000. At this point I talked myself out of my original read. "It doesn't have to be aces" I thought somewhat foolishly. Restraint has never been one of my strengths and I decided to be bold and move all in. My opponent didn't have pocket aces...he had pocked kings! ACK! Happily I hit a 5 on the turn making my straight and taking my stack to 62K.
I drifted up and down a little and the caught a break busting a player who had 55 when I had 88. That took me to 77K.
That's when I smashed face first into AA with JJ. I was down to about 5K when the big blind was 4K and the ante was 500 a hand. I was in last place about as broke as you could be without actually being on empty. I folded three hands and had 3,100 left when I got dealt A5. I got it all in and won. And then got the next hand all in and won. All of a sudden I was back to 30K with some hope.
Two hands later someone short moved all in with 56s and I called with A9. They missed and I was up to 67K! I'd increased my stack by 20 times in 4 hands!
One round later I got AK suited and was able to reraise all in vs AQ. Now I had 117K. What a comeback! But that wasn't the end.
I got ground down to 70K when I got dealt JTs in the big blind. It got folded around to the small blind who had 250K. He moved all in, but I thought he might move all in with just about anything here given that the blinds were 5K/10K with a 1K ante (there was 25K in the pot already) and I had the perfect size stack to attack. So I called. He showed me A3 which was more than I expected. I bricked the flop and the turn, but hit a ten on the river putting my back to 140K.
Then I got REALLY lucky. I had a little over 100K and a player made it 25K or so to go from late position. I had A8 suited and decided to shove. He called me with A9. Whoops!
The flop came down 6 7 9 giving him a pair and me a straight draw. Sadly the turn was an 8 taking me from 8 outs to win to 8 outs to chop and 2 outs to win. But the river was another 8! HA! I was up to 225K.
But this is where the story ends. I wish I could say the insanity that took me from 3,100 to 225,000 kept up. Instead I got ground down and the blinds went up and I ended up moving in from the button with 66 and got called by the big blind's AA.
I finished 38th out of 3,673 which paid $1,575. First place was $134,000 and I wasn't that far away from the final table, but this result was not bad for a tournament I almost didn't play. If I'd gone broke when I had 3,100 chips I would have gotten paid $525.
Friday, April 23, 2010
It's Go Time!
FTOPS starts today. $216 NLH. I'll be posting updates via twitter which will show up on the right ride of the blog. Full details will come later.
Tuesday, April 06, 2010
SCOOP 2010!
The Spring Championship of Online Poker (SCOOP) starts May 2nd. It seems like much more than a year ago that I was cashing for $37,500 after finishing 4th in a $1,000 HORSE tournament with 444 entrants. Ahhhh the good old days.
The cool thing about the SCOOP is while there are 38 events there are actually three times that many tournaments since each event comes with a low, medium and high stakes variant. For example event #1 which stars at 13:00 ET and is 6 max NLH has a $22 buy in tournament, a $215 buy in tournament and a $2,100 buy in tournament all starting at the same time. If you want to check it out here is the full schedule.
Last year there were 22 or 23 events and I think I played all of the low stakes, and maybe 15 of the medium stakes, and 4 of the high stakes tournaments. This year since there are many more tournaments, I'm not coming in with the $15,000 SCOOP bankroll, and I probably won't have a mid five figure cash I don't expect to hit everything so hard.
Instead I'm going to put about $5,000 into play and my goal is to get that up to about $10,000 which will be enough to play the 5 or 6 WSOP events that I'd like to hit this summer.
After a quick glance at the schedule I see 17 low stakes tournaments that I plan to play (with buy ins totalling $685) and 14 mid stakes tournaments (with buy ins totalling $3,429). Of course if I do well I'll add in more of the medium stakes events. And if I do really well I'll play the $2,100 HORSE, the $3,150 8-game mixed event, and maybe the $5,200 6-max limit event.
The latest iteration of the FTOPS is going off just before the SCOOP. While I'm not going to play many of those tournaments I am going to play the $216 6-max limit, $535 HORSE and $216 7-game mixed games tournaments.
I feel like I'm due for a big win. I'll keep you posted.
The cool thing about the SCOOP is while there are 38 events there are actually three times that many tournaments since each event comes with a low, medium and high stakes variant. For example event #1 which stars at 13:00 ET and is 6 max NLH has a $22 buy in tournament, a $215 buy in tournament and a $2,100 buy in tournament all starting at the same time. If you want to check it out here is the full schedule.
Last year there were 22 or 23 events and I think I played all of the low stakes, and maybe 15 of the medium stakes, and 4 of the high stakes tournaments. This year since there are many more tournaments, I'm not coming in with the $15,000 SCOOP bankroll, and I probably won't have a mid five figure cash I don't expect to hit everything so hard.
Instead I'm going to put about $5,000 into play and my goal is to get that up to about $10,000 which will be enough to play the 5 or 6 WSOP events that I'd like to hit this summer.
After a quick glance at the schedule I see 17 low stakes tournaments that I plan to play (with buy ins totalling $685) and 14 mid stakes tournaments (with buy ins totalling $3,429). Of course if I do well I'll add in more of the medium stakes events. And if I do really well I'll play the $2,100 HORSE, the $3,150 8-game mixed event, and maybe the $5,200 6-max limit event.
The latest iteration of the FTOPS is going off just before the SCOOP. While I'm not going to play many of those tournaments I am going to play the $216 6-max limit, $535 HORSE and $216 7-game mixed games tournaments.
I feel like I'm due for a big win. I'll keep you posted.
Tuesday, March 30, 2010
Not Broke, Not Dead
One of my regular comment posters asked yesterday if I was "broke, dead or both." I'm happy to say that I'm still breathing and playing poker every day.
The main reason for the lack of posts in the last month in a half is I've been trying to play as much as I can and at the end of the day more time in front of the computer to write a post hasn't fit into my time budget. I guess I didn't realize it had been a month and a half since my last post either.
I wish I could say that things have been going well, but they haven't. Actually it's more of a good news bad news situation. The bad news is I was ahead about $8,000 for the year in the middle of march (a VERY week number for 2+ months for me) and then I lost $7,000 over 5 days. Clearly that's bad news.
The good news is I've made some significant changes to my standard tactics and I think I'm back on track.
I knew I needed to change something, so I finally spent the time to download Pokertracker (the easy part) and get it working (the hard part). Pokertracker is a piece of software that records every hand you play and allows you to look at how much you've won and lost with different hands in different situations. If you want to know how many dollars per hand you won with A6 off suit in the cutoff (or any other hand in any other position) it will tell you.
Happily the websites save hand histories to your hard drive if you have a certain setting enabled. They don't save forever (there's another setting for how long they save), but when I got Pokertracker running it found about 125,000 hands from pokerstars and 20,000 hands from Absolute poker. That gave me a solid group of hands to look at and a few things stood out.
There were a few spots where I noticed that I was making more money with a lesser hand in the same situation. For example I'd be winning more with A8 off than with A8 suited or more with 88 than 99. Of course some of that could be sample size aberration, but more likely is I was misplaying those hands stronger. Specifically I know I was three betting (to thin) with A8s in spots where I'd just fold A8 off. Similarly with 88 I was treating it more like a small pair and playing 99 like a big pair (ie capping it vs two opponents or three betting it out of the big blind vs an early position raise).
In fact I was getting into the habit of calling or three betting KTs, KJs, JTs, QJs, and QTs against a solid player's raise. The games I play in are very aggressive and players have a wide range of starting hands that they are capable of raising, but I was taking it too far. These hands were costing me a fortune and since I've been MUCH more apt to just dump them I've felt much more in control and my results have been great.
Another thing I started doing is looking up all of my regular opponents on www.pokertableratings.com. While the database for this site is certainly not comprehensive (they've been tracking hands for about 2 years and I don't think they're catching them all), and I'm sure it's not 100% accurate it will give you an idea if the player you're up against is a winner, a loser or a break even player and since you can see how many hands they've tracked you can find out if you're up against a rookie or a regular. The best news about it is it's free.
I've gotten into the habit of looking up everyone who I've seen more than once and then making a note with their vital stats so I don't have to look them up again. In fact pokertableratings has a "PTR" score for every player. It's a 1 to 100 number that would be easy to put in a note. It doesn't seem that precise to me. Most people seem to fall in the 30's or 40's and they have Tom "Durrrr" Dwan as an 83 even though he's probably the best online cash game player in the world and is up $7,000,000 over 250,000 hands. But still use full.
The last bit of good news is that I have been working really hard in march so I should be getting a nice fat load of about $4,000 in rakeback on the 15th of April.
Looking a little farther into the future the Spring Championship of Online Poker (SCOOP) comes back on May 2nd. More on that in a post coming soon.
The main reason for the lack of posts in the last month in a half is I've been trying to play as much as I can and at the end of the day more time in front of the computer to write a post hasn't fit into my time budget. I guess I didn't realize it had been a month and a half since my last post either.
I wish I could say that things have been going well, but they haven't. Actually it's more of a good news bad news situation. The bad news is I was ahead about $8,000 for the year in the middle of march (a VERY week number for 2+ months for me) and then I lost $7,000 over 5 days. Clearly that's bad news.
The good news is I've made some significant changes to my standard tactics and I think I'm back on track.
I knew I needed to change something, so I finally spent the time to download Pokertracker (the easy part) and get it working (the hard part). Pokertracker is a piece of software that records every hand you play and allows you to look at how much you've won and lost with different hands in different situations. If you want to know how many dollars per hand you won with A6 off suit in the cutoff (or any other hand in any other position) it will tell you.
Happily the websites save hand histories to your hard drive if you have a certain setting enabled. They don't save forever (there's another setting for how long they save), but when I got Pokertracker running it found about 125,000 hands from pokerstars and 20,000 hands from Absolute poker. That gave me a solid group of hands to look at and a few things stood out.
There were a few spots where I noticed that I was making more money with a lesser hand in the same situation. For example I'd be winning more with A8 off than with A8 suited or more with 88 than 99. Of course some of that could be sample size aberration, but more likely is I was misplaying those hands stronger. Specifically I know I was three betting (to thin) with A8s in spots where I'd just fold A8 off. Similarly with 88 I was treating it more like a small pair and playing 99 like a big pair (ie capping it vs two opponents or three betting it out of the big blind vs an early position raise).
In fact I was getting into the habit of calling or three betting KTs, KJs, JTs, QJs, and QTs against a solid player's raise. The games I play in are very aggressive and players have a wide range of starting hands that they are capable of raising, but I was taking it too far. These hands were costing me a fortune and since I've been MUCH more apt to just dump them I've felt much more in control and my results have been great.
Another thing I started doing is looking up all of my regular opponents on www.pokertableratings.com. While the database for this site is certainly not comprehensive (they've been tracking hands for about 2 years and I don't think they're catching them all), and I'm sure it's not 100% accurate it will give you an idea if the player you're up against is a winner, a loser or a break even player and since you can see how many hands they've tracked you can find out if you're up against a rookie or a regular. The best news about it is it's free.
I've gotten into the habit of looking up everyone who I've seen more than once and then making a note with their vital stats so I don't have to look them up again. In fact pokertableratings has a "PTR" score for every player. It's a 1 to 100 number that would be easy to put in a note. It doesn't seem that precise to me. Most people seem to fall in the 30's or 40's and they have Tom "Durrrr" Dwan as an 83 even though he's probably the best online cash game player in the world and is up $7,000,000 over 250,000 hands. But still use full.
The last bit of good news is that I have been working really hard in march so I should be getting a nice fat load of about $4,000 in rakeback on the 15th of April.
Looking a little farther into the future the Spring Championship of Online Poker (SCOOP) comes back on May 2nd. More on that in a post coming soon.
Wednesday, February 17, 2010
Pounding Mr. Terrible
Yesterday I ran into a fellow who was off the charts bad. The thing about players like that is they usually buy in short and when the go broke they give up. This guy bought in for $200, but reloaded 4 or 5 times before finally bailing out (He went through $1,000+ in less than half an hour playing limit $10/$20).
Anyone who plays poker can tell you about a time they played someone really terrible and thought with dollar signs in their eyes, "If I can get any kind of cards at all I'm going to kill this person!" Sometimes it's really frustrating playing against a terrible player. If you're against some joker who is going to call you down every time no matter what, the only way to beat them is to make the best hand. Of course if you make a few hands you'll destroy them, but if they get lucky a few times you'll want to pull your hair out.
Happily I got a fabulous run of cards against Mr. Terrible. I kicked his ass left and right and in one span of 8 hands I flopped two sets, got dealt AA, and made a flush. One of the sets was in a 4 way capped pot preflop as were the pocket aces and I won all of those pots at showdown with heavy action from Mr. terrible.
The hand with the flush was amazing. Look at how the hand played out.
Stage #1911311267: Holdem Normal $10/$20 - 2010-02-17 13:59:04.009 (ET) [ 2010-02-17 13:59:04 ]
Table: BELUGA Dr (Real Money) Seat #5 is the dealer
Seat 5 - KAON STRANGE ($205.50 in chips)
Seat 1 - BUCKEYE_BOB ($369 in chips)
Seat 2 - ACESSEDAI ($525.50 in chips)
Seat 3 - LIUHAMPTON ($506 in chips)
Seat 4 - BONSAIHUGGER ($442 in chips)
BUCKEYE_BOB - Posts small blind $5
ACESSEDAI - Posts big blind $10
*** POCKET CARDS ***
Dealt to ACESSEDAI [Ks 7s]
LIUHAMPTON - Folds
BONSAIHUGGER - Folds
KAON STRANGE - Raises $20 to $20
BUCKEYE_BOB - Folds
ACESSEDAI - Calls $10
*** FLOP *** [5s 6d 6s]
ACESSEDAI - Checks
KAON STRANGE - Bets $10
ACESSEDAI - Raises $20 to $20
KAON STRANGE - Raises $20 to $30
ACESSEDAI - Calls $10
*** TURN *** [5s 6d 6s] [9s]
ACESSEDAI - Checks
KAON STRANGE - Bets $20
ACESSEDAI - Raises $40 to $40
KAON STRANGE - Calls $20
*** RIVER *** [5s 6d 6s 9s] [10c]
ACESSEDAI - Bets $20
KAON STRANGE - Calls $20
*** SHOW DOWN ***
ACESSEDAI - Shows [Ks 7s] (Flush, king high)
KAON STRANGE - Mucks
ACESSEDAI Collects $222 from main pot
*** SUMMARY ***
Total Pot($225) | Rake ($3)
Board [5s 6d 6s 9s 10c]
Seat 1: BUCKEYE_BOB (small blind) Folded on the POCKET CARDS
Seat 2: ACESSEDAI (big blind) collected Total ($222) HI:($222) with Flush, king high [Ks 7s - P:Ks,B:9s,P:7s,B:6s,B:5s]
Seat 3: LIUHAMPTON Folded on the POCKET CARDS
Seat 4: BONSAIHUGGER Folded on the POCKET CARDS
Seat 5: KAON STRANGE (dealer) HI: [Mucked] [4h 3d]
Do you see the call on the end! He called me with 4 high! If I have 23, 24, or 34 we split the pot. If I have any of the other 166 combinations of two cards I win. He just gave me $20 to see my cards. Amazing.
I went on to book a $1,300 win yesterday, put another $400 on it today and brought my streak of winning days to 5 in a row. Everything seems to be back on track.
Anyone who plays poker can tell you about a time they played someone really terrible and thought with dollar signs in their eyes, "If I can get any kind of cards at all I'm going to kill this person!" Sometimes it's really frustrating playing against a terrible player. If you're against some joker who is going to call you down every time no matter what, the only way to beat them is to make the best hand. Of course if you make a few hands you'll destroy them, but if they get lucky a few times you'll want to pull your hair out.
Happily I got a fabulous run of cards against Mr. Terrible. I kicked his ass left and right and in one span of 8 hands I flopped two sets, got dealt AA, and made a flush. One of the sets was in a 4 way capped pot preflop as were the pocket aces and I won all of those pots at showdown with heavy action from Mr. terrible.
The hand with the flush was amazing. Look at how the hand played out.
Stage #1911311267: Holdem Normal $10/$20 - 2010-02-17 13:59:04.009 (ET) [ 2010-02-17 13:59:04 ]
Table: BELUGA Dr (Real Money) Seat #5 is the dealer
Seat 5 - KAON STRANGE ($205.50 in chips)
Seat 1 - BUCKEYE_BOB ($369 in chips)
Seat 2 - ACESSEDAI ($525.50 in chips)
Seat 3 - LIUHAMPTON ($506 in chips)
Seat 4 - BONSAIHUGGER ($442 in chips)
BUCKEYE_BOB - Posts small blind $5
ACESSEDAI - Posts big blind $10
*** POCKET CARDS ***
Dealt to ACESSEDAI [Ks 7s]
LIUHAMPTON - Folds
BONSAIHUGGER - Folds
KAON STRANGE - Raises $20 to $20
BUCKEYE_BOB - Folds
ACESSEDAI - Calls $10
*** FLOP *** [5s 6d 6s]
ACESSEDAI - Checks
KAON STRANGE - Bets $10
ACESSEDAI - Raises $20 to $20
KAON STRANGE - Raises $20 to $30
ACESSEDAI - Calls $10
*** TURN *** [5s 6d 6s] [9s]
ACESSEDAI - Checks
KAON STRANGE - Bets $20
ACESSEDAI - Raises $40 to $40
KAON STRANGE - Calls $20
*** RIVER *** [5s 6d 6s 9s] [10c]
ACESSEDAI - Bets $20
KAON STRANGE - Calls $20
*** SHOW DOWN ***
ACESSEDAI - Shows [Ks 7s] (Flush, king high)
KAON STRANGE - Mucks
ACESSEDAI Collects $222 from main pot
*** SUMMARY ***
Total Pot($225) | Rake ($3)
Board [5s 6d 6s 9s 10c]
Seat 1: BUCKEYE_BOB (small blind) Folded on the POCKET CARDS
Seat 2: ACESSEDAI (big blind) collected Total ($222) HI:($222) with Flush, king high [Ks 7s - P:Ks,B:9s,P:7s,B:6s,B:5s]
Seat 3: LIUHAMPTON Folded on the POCKET CARDS
Seat 4: BONSAIHUGGER Folded on the POCKET CARDS
Seat 5: KAON STRANGE (dealer) HI: [Mucked] [4h 3d]
Do you see the call on the end! He called me with 4 high! If I have 23, 24, or 34 we split the pot. If I have any of the other 166 combinations of two cards I win. He just gave me $20 to see my cards. Amazing.
I went on to book a $1,300 win yesterday, put another $400 on it today and brought my streak of winning days to 5 in a row. Everything seems to be back on track.
Sunday, February 14, 2010
Avoiding Total Doom!
I took another big step away from poker doom today winning $800 over the course of 2,000 hands of moderate stakes limit hold'em. I matched wits with certified geniuses that go by the names: Clowntastic, King_of_Farts, and Boner_me. Somehow I managed to come out on top.
In other good news I'll be picking up all the rakeback I earned last month on AP in one big load tomorrow. It's in the $1,500 range and I'll also be picking up about $500 in rakeback on Cake. Put that together with two modest but significant winning days and all of a sudden I feel like I have enough money to play again. Don't get me wrong, I'm still playing short money, but I feel confident that if I put in enough hours I'll be able to turn this thing all the way around in no time.
Of course there are a few awesome things on the horizon that are going to put a hurting on my productivity. I'm turning 30 on Tuesday so I'm not going to be playing at all that day. Then on Thursday my wife and I are going to eat at the Ritz dining room in San Francisco (think jacket required, 9 course chefs tasting menu with wine pairing) and are going to spend the night at a hotel in the city. Then later this month 16 of us are headed to a 7 bedroom 5,000 square foot cabin in Lake Tahoe for 4 days.
Hopefully tomorrow I can book another win and go into my birthday with a positive feeling.
In other good news I'll be picking up all the rakeback I earned last month on AP in one big load tomorrow. It's in the $1,500 range and I'll also be picking up about $500 in rakeback on Cake. Put that together with two modest but significant winning days and all of a sudden I feel like I have enough money to play again. Don't get me wrong, I'm still playing short money, but I feel confident that if I put in enough hours I'll be able to turn this thing all the way around in no time.
Of course there are a few awesome things on the horizon that are going to put a hurting on my productivity. I'm turning 30 on Tuesday so I'm not going to be playing at all that day. Then on Thursday my wife and I are going to eat at the Ritz dining room in San Francisco (think jacket required, 9 course chefs tasting menu with wine pairing) and are going to spend the night at a hotel in the city. Then later this month 16 of us are headed to a 7 bedroom 5,000 square foot cabin in Lake Tahoe for 4 days.
Hopefully tomorrow I can book another win and go into my birthday with a positive feeling.
Saturday, February 13, 2010
The Streak is Over!
After losing 10 days in a row, I won $500 today. It feels more like $5,000. The only (and I mean the only) positive of getting my ass kicked for so long is winning is greatly appreciated. It's nice to get pumped about winning pots that are fairly standard.
Hopefully I can keep this new winning streak alive tomorrow!
Hopefully I can keep this new winning streak alive tomorrow!
Friday, February 12, 2010
My Worst Run Ever?
I am in the midst of a staggering, mind numbingly awful run. My last winning day was February 1st which was $800 and came the day after a $3,000 loss. Since then I've played every day but Superbowl Sunday and lost every single day. Some big losses, some small, but any way you look at it, it's 10 losing days in a row.
It's been over 20 tournaments since the last time I made the money let alone a significant cash.
I know I've had worse runs in terms of dollars, but they were all following major booms where I was flush and playing big stakes. This time I've lost 85% of my bankroll.
In December I had a run of 11 winning days in a row and 6 $1,000 plus days in a row. I can't think of what I'm doing differently. I have a hard time thinking that all of the same players have just figured me out and have gone from total suckers to blowing my doors off.
It's making me crazy! Every day I sit down and think that the bad beats have to stop at some point. Eventually I'll get a fair run of cards. But day after day I keep losing and losing. It sucks!
It's been over 20 tournaments since the last time I made the money let alone a significant cash.
I know I've had worse runs in terms of dollars, but they were all following major booms where I was flush and playing big stakes. This time I've lost 85% of my bankroll.
In December I had a run of 11 winning days in a row and 6 $1,000 plus days in a row. I can't think of what I'm doing differently. I have a hard time thinking that all of the same players have just figured me out and have gone from total suckers to blowing my doors off.
It's making me crazy! Every day I sit down and think that the bad beats have to stop at some point. Eventually I'll get a fair run of cards. But day after day I keep losing and losing. It sucks!
Monday, January 25, 2010
UBOC Update!
I am getting killed in the fucking UBOC! Since my last post I came up short in $130 NLH, $215 NLH, $109 6 handed limit (it makes me sick that I can't ever seem to do anything in these 6-max limit tournaments!), and $320 PLH/PLO/PLO8 mixed. I'm 0 for 6! Fuck!
Tomorrow I have $215 HORSE which might be my last event if I put up another brick.
Tomorrow I have $215 HORSE which might be my last event if I put up another brick.
Friday, January 22, 2010
WBCOOP
I have registered to play in the WBCOOP PokerStars World Blogger Championship of Online Poker! You too can Play Poker Online at PokerStars.com and take part in the WBCOOP which is open to all Bloggers by registering on WBCOOP to play.
Registration code: 081711
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My WSOP 2023 Plans and Missions
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