It's like prison rape today.... get it in behind and come out on top!

Man was this a tough day to watch poker. I only played 2 tourneys but by god I can't tell you how many times AQ lost to Q9, or AJ losing to KJ.

This was the best .... AJ vs 1010 vs J10 all in preflop. no suited cards. My man flops the wheels off a cadillac, KQ9.

Later in the tourney the J10 guy calls a fella lucky after winning AQ vs 77... HAHAHAH.

This was the last hand I saw before I closed this window... 19 players left from a 320 player tourney - A5 minraises UTG to 2400, folds all around to the BB who insta shoves all in 9k on top and the A5 snap calls off 1/3 of his stack. Air on the board until the river 5 makes him a genius.

Oh boy i can't wait to be 3 outted to go bust!

beepbeep.

Cruelty To Old Men Everywhere....

Drummer Hero?

The new Guitar Hero World Tour came out. They re-stole their idea back and added a drum set and microphone. The microphone is allbut useless to me and my friends (although the 5 year old loves to scream "Beat It" from MJ). The only reason I got GH instead of RockBand2, is because they added the drums to GH. After reading lots of previews (especially the youtube link below), I made the pre-order.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZGL0BHUlPfE

This is the first Guitar Hero or RockBand game that I own, and until Metallica comes out in 09, it'll probably be the last one I pay for. Not because it sucks, but because there are already 4 other games out there that have hundreds of songs on them, and all I have to do is borrow them from friends.

The drum set is tough to catch on to. First of all, because I can carry a beat in the car dashboard, but not on a drum set. Add in the footpedal and my arms are like 2 fighting octopi.

I'll put an average of an hour a day on the game to clear my mind of daily stress. The rules are up though, no playing it while I can be spending time with the woman. (Except for the first night, of course, but that's a given... if it wasn't... someone text her and apologize for the male of the species)

Speaking of... she's asleep. I should be playing.

beepbeep.

Why I love HockeyTowns...

Only if I had the originality, or the balls... I'd do this at a Phantoms Game.

running Lava

"When you run fucking lava, how do you keep your cool?"

Running hot is the greatest feeling... you can do no wrong. Suited connectors flop nut straights, position playing ATC and flopping trips, and simply, having KK hold up against ... hell... anything.

But when you run fucking lava, you are running so hot it burns. AA cracked 3 times by pp's when the money is in PostFlop. 3 outted by hands that should normally triple you up. You, and your opponent have no choice... the money is going in, you are ahead.. DOMINATING... and you can't win to save your life. I'm not talking about losing races, or every now and then you get plucked by a thin draw... but over and over and over and over 90/10 or better, and you can't hold up.

When you run lava... how do you stay cool? There's only so many times I can chalk it up to variance, unluck, or "that's poker".

beepbeep

Deposit Bitches

This has nothing to do with gender. I love the children that play online poker and B I T C H about losing a hand. I'm sure this has been covered thousands of times from others. I don't mind using aggressive tactics to tilt a player in a ring table, that's part of the game. If you are in a tournament, that's a different story. If you lose a hand.. GROW THE FUCK UP. Don't sit there and berate a player for winning the hand, regardless of how they did it.

Know your role.

One recent example comes to mind. Monkey gets sucked out on and begins the berating. I, for fun, sharkscope him. He has played 100 games and is down $400. God do I love this kid. It's obvious he borrowed his mom's credit card to deposit money, and it's obvious he's been a deposit bitch since he started.

So, with that, if you hear someone calling you a "DeBit"... it's 2 fold... one, you are an ATM, secondly, you're a bitch.

Hope you aren't a DeBit.

beepbeep

I got 99 problems but...Doctors might be 100.

Doctor... is there a Doctor in the house? Or at least one with a brain?

So my girl has been sick over the past week and it's unlike anything I've ever been witness too. What started as a simple UTI (with no UTI symptons) turned into a kidney infection. Ok, shit happens. It was an uncomfortable 2 days before she went to her Dr... we've all been there. So she gets to her Dr and goes thru all the tests for urine and blood. Her doc says the blood results will take a few days and the urine showed nothing, so she just prescribed some general antibiotics to fight whatever she had (1st good call... prescribe something for the placebo effect).

We cant even get to the pharmacy before we had to go to the emergency room. We drop off her 5 yr old at school at 9am and went directly to the hospital. After all the same tests based on her symptons (lower back pain, neck pain, lower left stomach pain, painful breathing) the ER nurse came right back and said her urine sample lit up light an xmas tree. UTI. Simple, right? No. The ER doc was concerned about the stiff neck and painful breathing and wanted to do a spinal tap to rule out meningitis (2nd good call... this was AFTER the results came back for a positive UTI and explained ALL the symptons). Not quite sure why you test for meningitis considering it's been 4 days since the onset of any symptoms, and in 2 days, she would have been dead. But Ok... you're the Dr. You understand.

So they do the Spinal Tap. Wasn't as painful as she thought it would be, but still, it wasn't ice cream either.

Now we have a new prescription for really really strong antibiotics. 7 days of 1-a-days and all the problems go away. Right... we wish.

So the ER was Thursday. Friday comes and goes with just general pain from the kidney infection. Saturday comes and the fun begins.

Migraines. Nausea. Vomiting.

Vomiting from the Nausea. Nausea from the Migraines. Migraines are a side effect of the antibiotics. Awesomeness on so many levels. I call the ER doc to go over these new symptoms and they ask if the vomiting is immediately after the taking of the antibiotics... we say "no, it's about 3 hours after". They then say, "ok, then she is getting the antibiotics so that isn't what is giving her the migraines, just give it 2 more days and everything should take care of itself." (3rd good call... if the antibiotics AREN'T causing the migraines, nausea, and vomiting, then what is?.. they should have thought of that the moment they say that it's not the antibiotics).

All the other tests came back negative.

Shall I continue? I shall.

So, we suffer. Symptoms of UTI and kidney infection are going away but the migraines are 10x worse than the pain of the infections ever were. Monday comes and goes and as she has rested this whole weekend, she feels that she can return to work. The migraines have subsided. So, she goes back to work on Tuesday. I do what every guy should to in this case... schedule a golf round.

Her 45 minute train ride in, and then 1 hour into work brings an abrupt end of her work day. The migraines are back and are worse, the nausea is back, as is the vomiting. Joyous. I get the phone call and offer to pick her up but she decides it would be quicker to take the train home and I would pick her up from the train and head right to the ER.

We do that. We go to the ER and once we are in our room, almost immediately they come in and give us an explination of why she has the migraines. "Spinal Headaches." 20% of spinal tap patients get them and they are caused by two scenarios, 1) lack of reproduction of the spinal fluid; 2) the hole in her spine hasn't closed and is leaking spinal fluid.

It explains it all. Laying on her back stops the migraines because she is using her own body to plug the hole. But once she gets up and moves around... she becomes Leaky Mcspinal-Fluid and voila, migraine.

So they have 2 ways to cure it, 1) heavy doses of caffeine which speed up metabolism and regenerate her bodily fluids faster to hopefully fill the gap, or 2) a "blood patch" where they draw blood from her arm and squeeze it into the hole in her spine so the blood coagulates and closes the gap. They try #1 and it offers a temporary relief (all while jumpstarting her heart to the point of scary heart palpatations). It doesn't work.

So, we go for #2, our last hope. 9:30am appointment this morning. The quote of the week is "Once she gets the blood patch, she'll notice that the migraines will go away with 2 hours and you'll be all set."

Boy, was that Dr right. The blood patch was more painful than the spinal tap, and it wasn't even the injection, it was the removal of the giant tube of blood from her arm... understand she is 5foot3in and 100 lbs (understating the lbs a tiny bit so I don't get hit with a shoe once she gets better). So, once the painful procedure was over, within an hour and a half the migraines were finally gone.

Excellent. It's finally over. We were told during the post-op that she should lift anything over 20lbs or do anything strenuous over the next 3 days, and after that she'll be back to normal. If she does do something strenuous, she might slip the clot out and they'd have to do the whole procedure again.

So we come home, and now, 14 hours after the procedure, she still can't get herself off the couch. Her lower back feels like a 500lb person is sitting on her and movement causes pain. We call the Surgery Center and talk to the Dr on staff and he says..(here it comes, the last good call) "Oh yeah, you'll be like that for about a week, but the stiffness won't go away for about 6 weeks."

WHAT THE FUCKK?????????? Where was that during the pre-op conversation, the during-op conversation, and the post-op recap. No one said she'd be incapacitated with lower back pain for a week and have discomfort for up to 6 weeks.

ALL this came from the fact that Dr Genius wanted to do a spinal tap for precautionary reasons, even though everything pointed away from that fact. Thanks doc.

Beep Beep. See ya'll at the tables.

Grab a beer, I'm bored.

Live action, final table of a satellite tournament. 80 players started, down to 7. The top 3 players all get the same satellite prize package. I'm dealing the final table.

Two shorter stacks at the table, none of which are in the pot, blinds 2000/4000, average stack is maybe 55000.

All folds to the small blind (mid stack) who limps, big blind (mid/smaller stack) checks. Flop AQ7, check check, Turn K, check check, River 8, SB checks... big blind says... You gotta have me... and mucks his hand (to a Check).

As the dealer, I actually hesitated to muck his hand, but it was thrown forward and into the center of the table... I had this look of shock on my face as I looked over to seat #8 (not in the hand, but I knew he was probably the best player at the table) and he had the same look that I did. Small blind shows 56 suited... plays the board, and takes down the 6000 chips.

I moved the pot over to the Small Blind as he was the only one left with cards... the Big Blind sighs deep and says... "ugh... I'm an idiot."

He said he had 5,3 and just assumed that by limping in, the SB had better than 7 high.

You are at the final table of a tournament and you just gave up 3000 chips for being absent minded at the time. Is there a punishment for this? Or, is the feeling of complete idiopidity (thats my word, idiotic/stupidity, it should be in m-w.com soon) enough punishment of it's own?

--------------------------------------

So, I'm pretty sure that my NL days for the near future are over. I haven't sat at a NL cash game in just under a year (except a few months ago at The Borgata when there were no seats at my 5-10 or 3-6 limit tables and I had to sit somewhere... so I sat for an hour, folded all but one hand, made my blinds back and broke even). I have stuck to my strong points and it has been paying off. Limit Hold'em. I was playing stud when I was 18 at Turning Stone, NY, and I was playing Stud at the Taj when I turned 21. When Yahoo!Games started their free games section long before my days at Turning Stone, I played Hearts and 2/4 Limit Hold'em online. Talk about being confused. Took me a while to learn the basic strategies of Hold'em, but I learned them the best way you can... by seeing every hand to the river until I was out of free play money on Yahoo and had to reload. The best part was my friends and I had Dealer-Calls change games once a month and I actually realized that my free Yahoo limit hold'em play gave me an edge over my friends. Yay free lessons.

The Borgata opened up, I concentrated on Limit Hold'em. Realizing that 2-4 was a great way to get my feet wet, I sat for about 6 months... just learning, sometimes up, sometimes down. Moved up to 3-6, more ups than downs. Went to Foxwoods just after Moneymaker won the WSOP and saw him getting sloshed playing with bricks of cash at the NL table 2 tables away from my 6-12 Kill Pot.

I didn't know what a Kill Pot was until Foxwoods... MAN what a great game. I still can't understand why they can't do it at The Borgata.

So NL hold'em became the cat's meow and we all started playing it with reckless abandon. Our home games turned from $5 buy ins to $40 buy ins. I didn't have to go to the ATM for beer money for over a year because there was 2 of us (out of about 10) that were constantly winning while the other 8 traded off who would be the other big winner of the night. Over time, as the buyins and pots grew, friendships started to get in the way. It took a good friend of mine from out of town to say that if we were playing for more that $10, he was out.

This was a lawyer in NYC. Money wasn't an object. His outfit cost more than my laptop. And HE was the one saying he didn't want to play for more than $10. He knew that friendships would be put in the middle if the money kept escalating, and he was right. We maxed the buy in at $10, and had some of the best nights of cards we have had since we all brought $4 in silver to the tables in glass jars.

So, my constant source of boozemoney was cut off. But that was Ok. It was, after all, my friends money. So, if their money was off limits... let's go back to AC. I hit the NL tables for the next few years and I really wasn't seeing a constant win. I wasn't losing every time, but more often that I'd like... I was shaking my head walking away from the 3 outter that just took my stack.

So, last year, I decided to start protecting my bankroll by going back to Limit hold'em. Yes, I was made fun of by those who have never played Limit Hold'em before, but it's not about the laughs, it's about the money.

It has paid off. Over the last year, I have seen a steady increase in my "walking away satisfied" column. Just recently, I have made about 6 trips to The Borgata for work and was able to play 4 of those times. I'm paying for my new tires and alignment for my truck, my -lucktruck-, off of my AC winnings this past month. Off topic... Fuck those tires are expensive... $125 each... I used to wrap my Ford Escort with new tires for $125 installed... back to topic.

Now, this is much different that my online play. I was playing a lot of single table sit and go's online, and when I was keeping track of my stats, and taking the time to play when I should be playing, I turned 100 into about 1200 playing $10 and $20 single tables. I sold off 1000 of it and then went cold. Cashed in 1 out of 20 tournaments and went broke... well... not broke.. but online broke...

So, no more online play...except the occasional blogger or RPT tourney when I'm at home and free of distractions. So I'm concentrating on my strengths and dodging my weaknesses (terrible luck in NL). Let's see how the 2nd half of 2008 treats my "walking away satisfied" column.

Cheers.

Beepbeep.

30th Bday and Event#1 at the Borgata Summer Poker Open

535 players, including myself. 45 min levels, 8k starting stack, breaks every 2 levels.

For the first 3 hours at my table, it was pretty much small pot poker. Nobody getting monsters vs eachother, and nobody very aggressive. Played perfect into my style. After the first break I was up to around 11K. Very few showdowns, but when I was involved, I knew I had the best of it and was getting paid off. No monsters, but two pairs, low flushes with multiple players in the hand, etc.

In the 3rd level, before the second break, I was around 18+k when I was involved with this hand. Blinds 100/200, no ante. 2 limpers in early position and a raise up to 1600 from the 10 seat (my nemesis). I look down at JJ and reraise to 4000. All folds back to the 10 seat, a quick look at her chips and she counts out the call, states "All-in", pushes in the call, and then moves all her chips in. At this point, her and I were 1 and 2 in chip count, respectively, at the table. The hand prior to this, she had KK and won a decent pot. I ran thru her possible hands. The 1600 raise from her could have easily been a steal. She had the chip lead and was definitely capable of the move. I tanked and every possible situation showed me either dominated by overpair or racing for my tourney life with her facecards. I decided to let it go, showed the JJ. She smiles and said nice laydown, and turns over KK again.

I steal a few more blinds during the 4th level and get back to 17k before the 2nd break.

We finally started getting some chip movements as the low stacks started to make their pushes. I think only one of the short stack pushes actually doubled up. We opened up some seats and they were getting filled immediately as other tables were breaking. A quick look at the board showed that of the 54 tables that started, there were about 35 left. Long way to go.

With the new players, came new styles. Gone was the standard 3x raise, now it was 5x and 6x, and open shoves with the newest shortstacks. A lot of chip ping-pong at this point for all of us. Another costly hand comes too. The same position 10 limps in early, I raise with my AK, get the little blind to call (his first hand at the table), and get the 10 seat to call. Flop comes Q 65 rainbow. Little blind checks, position 10 leads out 5000 into the 7500 pot, and give her the once over and let my AK go. If it was heads up, I may make my stand here and hope she also has AK or a lower PP that didn't set-up on the flop and she can get away from both of them, but with the unknown behind me, I lick my wound and fold away. Little blind folds, she turns over JJ and states that she had me on AK or a lower pp and was calling my reraise. Good read for her, missed flop for me, another 2500 loss for me, but cheap considering the alternative. (Of course, I have the 6 outs twice if I shove and she calls... but... don't like 3:1 dogs)

Not too long later, I have AJ of clubs early on. I 4x raise, all folds to the little blind who is getting shorter stacked as well. He flat calls. Flop K rag rag. Check, Check. Turn Q, Check Check. River J, Check, Check. No way I bet here knowing that he had paint. Any PP and he would have shoved preflop. I was right. He shows AQ, but I get off cheap again.

I'm down to about 12k getting through the end of round 5 and into round 6, the last round before the dinner break. Blinds are up to 600/1200 with 200 ante. I watch as others make moves around me, and I neither have the position or the cards to make my stand. I get down to 10k and I am second to act. It was now or never. As obvious, I wasn't going to let myself be blinded out until I finally found a premium hand. I get J8 of diamonds and after the UTG folds, I take about 8 seconds to count my chips, look at the pot, and move all-in. All folds around to the cutoff and he states "Call". Man am I hoping for AK there. But no luck, he turns over KK and I am pretty set on my diamond draw to be my savior. .... and then the heartpounder starts...

Flop was... 8 (YES!)..... 8 (YESSSSSSSSS!)..... K (NOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO).

I mean, come on. That's just not right. The player in the 1 seat says to me... sorry boss, I tossed the case 8. I glance at the turn and river but can't recall them, as I knew I was drawing dead. I say my goodgames and walk off. I glance again at the board and they were down to 20 tables... so 200 players, give or take.

I played my game, ran into some big cards and got away cheap. But I couldn't string together any big hands my way to give me comfort in my chip stack. Maybe I shove my AK and I get lucky. Maybe I play that JT into the raise when I would have flopped broadway and got paid off. Maybe I play that 66 into an 3000 UTG raise with an 6500 all in behind me.. .flop was 622... only 2 big hands that I missed, but I still fold those given the circumstances.

Alas... I decided to play some ring games before I left. I was waiting for my 5-10 limit game to start, but not enough interest. So I sat at 3-6 for a spell, made some money and walked away. I'll be back down there this Saturday for work related reasons, but I should be able to sit for a little bit at the 5-10 or 3-6...whatever is open.

Happy 30th to me and better luck next time... just have to stay out of the cooler.

chocolate and peanut butter.

A) Christmas
B) Spring Break
C) Playoffs!!

The answer... C) Playoffs.... Hockey playoffs to be specific.

The question was "What's your favorite time of the year?"

At least two games a night for the first two rounds. Back to back games, players fighting for their playoff lives, goalies standing on their head to make saves... just... good times all around.

ahem.. .go Detroit...

Add the BBT3... and you have chocolate and peanut butter. My nights have been busy in April and my cards have been cold for '08 so I haven't seen many tournaments in the BBT3 yet.. but the ones I have seen I have played well but I just can't seem to win a race for the life of me. Not that I'm counting, but I am... 0 and 6 in my last 6 coin flips. Yes... variance, yo comprendo. But it is so 'effin frustrating. I made the mistake of selling off the majority of my bankroll because I was running well at the end of 07, and the turn of the year has turned the tables. I'm now buying back some of what I sold off (luckily I have people who owe me money, so it's no out-of-pocket cash, but its money I'm buying back nonetheless).

I am hoping tonite is when FTP changes their decks... shuffles once more before dealing the cards... whatever they need to do to give me the 3 out of 6 coinflips that I should be winning.

Oh, here's another one that astonishes me... I have played maybe 150 hands up to this point in the tourney, of which 18 of them were Big Blinds... I go 17 of them with no cards and all raises ahead of me... then on the 18th I got the b!tches (QQ) and i get an 'effin WALK!!?!?!?!

Ok... so I just won a flip... for no money. My A8 vs lowstacks 33. 1 for 7 now... I'm still owed the next 5 in a row... I hope FTP is keeping count like I am... if so, I have a shot to win this biznatch.

I'll be back later after the tourney is over to update my final hand/status.

Good show on BuddyDankRadio again.. best of luck to them at The Borgata and their live broadcast... I'll be listening. Congrats to Waffles for his April Top Pt Earner and his $2K WSOP buy-in. I'll be reloading and hopefully making my push in May.

See ya'll out there.

BeepBeep

----------------------------

Update

Won another race prior to the break, lost one following the break... sitting at 5k and shortstack at the table, blinds 250/500 with ante 50. I wasn't going to fold my way out of the tourney...

99 UTG just after a big hand between two other players, I figure I won't get any action with a raise... so I raise half my stack... get reraised and I click the "Call" button when it's my turn... they table AK off, flop A.. gg me.

Finished 21 out of 105... top 18 make money, top 4 make real money... 7th and 21st really feel the same to me... such is the life on the coinflip.

I might make that my next post... "Life on the Coin"...
Beep Beep

Never say your sorry...

But sometimes... it's ok to feel it.




and sadly I would never have done this if it wasn't a blogger tournament.

So this was the 2nd hand of the Mookie on Wednesday nite... not a bad way to double up early on. I spent the next hour missing the board like my dishwasher misses the dried lasagna so I began setting up the new Wii with Super Smash Brothers Brawl (I'm not 30 yet... leave me and my video game problem alone).

For those of you who haven't seen a commercial in the past 2 years because of DVR's and TiVo... this basically takes all of the characters that Nintendo has ever made video games for and pits them into a battle royale. It's fantastic on so many levels that I can't describe it in words.

At this point I'm just praying for the break so I can fire up the Wii.

If you haven't had a chance yet... but again, I'm sure if you're reading this I don't have to tell you about it... but check out the Buddy Dank Radio show broadcasting whenever the hell he wants, but specifically during The Mookie.

If you don't know.. now you know.

Until I come back and have to apologize again later...

Beep Beep.

-----------------------------------------

Not sorry... this was just a rough hand... this happened in the middle of the situation I'm about to explain.

So here's the bitch of this... I get moved to a new table and 4x raise 4 different times in mid-to-late position.. each time I get shoved on by a pretty much equal stack... It wasn't desperation time, we were all in the mid stack of the tourney... but if I felt like gambling I'd be playing roulette and not playing poker. Yes.. you gotta win some races.. but you don't always have to get involved in them.. THEY ARE ONLY RACES ... and I'm living proof that when you suck at racing you have to avoid it like ... like.. .like shit you just wanna fucking avoid.

- Mookie was all in prior to me and I laid down.


I 4x raise, dyers shoves... I fold. He says AK

. I 4x again... dyers shoves.. .he says AK again.

I 4x again... PokerFool shoves.. I call (I had him covered) We chop.

Next orbit same positions... I 3x, PokerFool shoves and I lay down.

All in from Martyr and I lay down (1/3 of my stack to call)


Two hands later, all folds to me, I just go away as I'm disgusted by having all these 2nd best hands.


on_thg pushes, Martyr calls, I go away preflop.

If there's anything I hate more than getting my aces cracked by bad play it's having so many playable hands and having to go away because I have lost so much fucking money because I have to raise... limping is no option, shoving is no option, and folding with no action ahead of me is simply idiotic.

I couldn't screencap my last hand as the table broke, but I ran my AK into QQ... no love for Dr. Jones. Speaking of Dr Jones... I'm avioding 100% of the previews for the new Indiana Jones movie as I do with all movies that I really want to see. We'll see how it unfolds.

Beep Beep.

No Skillz to pay the Billz

Alright... can we quit it with the BOOOOOM every 4 hands. Once a tourney... maybe... but jesus it should be used like the Macarena now -you're only allowed to do it if you are a female, 16 years old, and at a wedding.

I blame myself mostly for it... it was my friends and I that did it in our heated battles over Super Mario Kart and 4-player Tetris…and I brought it to poker and to someone who can sell ice to an Eskimo... all facts.

I have no shot at the Skillz series tonite on FullTilt in the BBT3. If you are reading my post, I have no need to describe it in further detail or link to it. My goal was to start playing every event in April with the hopes of grinding out points to backdoor my ass into one of the 2k WSOP seats for having the most points. Hopefully, somewhere along the way I'll fall ass backwards into a win as well... but it ain't easy being me.

The RNG hates me already, and now you add a game where no matter how much I put someone up against the wall... they can 4 out themselves to win half my pot. I'm not naming names here... but when you get 3 bet preflop and you are holding KK77... and you miss the flop and the turn and you are still just holding KK in H/L... go the F away. Are you seriously praying for a 4 outter for HALF THE POT? SAVE YOUR BET. sheesh. I guess they don't teach FOLDING when you are dominated as part of a Skill.

At the first break I'm just over even but if it wasn't for a 4 and 8 outter I'd be near 6k... so be it. Blinds are up so now I can just get all my bets in good and get 2 outted for all my loot... standard operating procedure for me.

I've played a good handful of blogger events, mostly in the BBT2, and there are less than a finger full who can say that when the money went in that I was dead to rights... unless of course the obvious of being extremely short stacked and have to push a.t.c.

Sadly, it's not the bloggers that get me... it's the Riverchasers (tm) players... none of them ever believe I have a hand yet when I get their backs to the wall... I'm the one who ends up with the swirly.

I got halfway thru the Skillz tonite ... pretty much blinded out before the 2nd break. I wasn't going to sit on 3k and see how long it'd last me. I made a push with a suited midPP with a min-wrap. Flopped top pair and still had my overpair…ran into a good drawing hand and was outdrawn. So be it. If you have nothing else to do but rail my table and cheer on the opponents after I go busto, then you need to find a life... one w/o possible jail time for fraud and grand larceny. Just remember, I have nothing to hide.

But on a better note, I think I’m going to start stealing another blogger’s idea… forgive me as I can’t seem to recall who was doing it… but I just picked up a Wii and I think I’m going to be playing it during the breaks. I’m obviously not doing much wrong with the poker.. money is going in good but the hands just aren’t holding. So I figure I’ll just keep my mind busy with other things to distract me from what would normally end up as a horrible chain of events à get 2 outted, tossing the laptop, removing it from the wall and cleaning up the LCD screen from the floor, patching the hole in the wall and repainting, replacing the LCD once it’s shipped from DELL. Oh yeah… add in the part where I pray that my laptop turns back on.. yeah.. that’s a lot of Hail Mary’s.

Things to remember: Say no to Boom. Don’t steal. Folding is a skill. There’s no prayer in poker, God doesn’t want you to win the hand more than your opponent.

Beep beep.

bent over by the RNG....

Blogger Big Game... first step towards 7 WSOP Seats for the Battle of the Bloggers 3.

I sit a little above the original starting stack going into the break... nothing special happening. I decide to move from my comfy couch to my more comfy bed and play until I won the tourney.

HAHAHAHA....

fooled me.

I gather my Molson, laptop, power plug, phone.... set it all back down to run into the kitchen to grab the bag of peanut butter MnM's... (if anyones thinking of any last minute gift ideas... I have one!)

Pick up the rest of the periphenalia and head upstairs and I'm sure the 5 minutes is now down to 1 and counting....

I set everything down, open the laptop back up and see the cards being dealt but I don't see my hand just yet. I pop an MnM, make sure the Molson is within reach and sit my ass down on my bed. I glance at the screen to see the countdown in the Red and my heart jumps when I see KK. I quickly check the action behind me and see a raise up to 360, the clock is about to fold my hand so I just quickly hit the Raise button and min-raise...

All I was thinking about was I can't believe that I almost dumped KK preflop. Heaven forbid I don't take these blessings in disguise and just run with them.

Folds all around to the original raiser... he tanks then calls the raise.

Flop TT3 rainbow. He checks, I bet 875 into the 1300 pot. He tanks and pushes all in.

The tanking is what almost got me to fold the hand. If he immediately reshoves, I insta-call. He tanked preflop before calling my raise and then check-tank-reraised all in. I had him covered by about 700, so ... we were pretty much even.

I run through the list of hands he could have... or more over... the list of hands he has me on and thinks he can make a move on me...

I can beat AK, all pp's except AA and 33, and I can't beat T/blank. Obviously.. we chop if we both got the KK. I flip the switch to what he thinks I may have... AK is the predominant thought.. I reraise preflop the C-bet the flop... smells AceyKingy to me...and possibly mid pp's with only the min-raise. The min-raise I already feel is coming back to haunt me. I think he has me on a foldable mid PP... I still tank.

I clock myself down to almost zero and with all the thoughts in my head that this is a bad call... I still make it. Only two hands I will give him credit for having is AA and AT. He shows T8 of spades. well played.






I'm down to 640 I think just waiting for the right money to push any two cards or the right cards to push all the money... they both fall into place as PokerFool makes it 3x and NOAIR cold calls... it's half my stack and I figure if I get any piece or a nice draw, I got position as first to act to push the rest of it and will still get action because it's a 5:1 call to see the last 2 cards.

I get exactly what I wish for....

Flop T73, with 2 hearts. I could do w/o the hearts as I'm sure anyone calling my all in will surely have them.

I push the last of it, PokerFool makes the call and NOAIR tanks and then makes the call. I can understand PokerFools call.. but NOAIR must believe he is WAY behind at least one of us with two overcards out there and the original raiser still giving action.

They check it down, not only does two overcards hit the board, but they are both hearts... putting 4 hearts on the board. So now, anyone who called me with paint has me beat and any heart in the hand has me beat... PokerFool shows his 55 no heart and he goes away, NOAIR shows his 66 with the heart and I go away. GG me.






The money isn't right, the hand isn't right, the board isn't right... why put chips in the pot knowing you have to beat TWO other players and most likely you'll need to pull a 2 outter to do it.

Well.. .it's no 2-outer... but runner runner is just as sexy.

Time to regroup and get ready for this week's line-up of BB3 tourneys.

Til next time..

beepbeep.

Not poker related (Thank heaven!)

I thought I'd share a great blog from somewhere in the the delta quadrant of the internet (yes, a star trek reference...deal with it..)

Unforgivable Grammy Snubs

I'm not a Grammy fan, but this read was fucking dead-on.

Giddyup.

Back in the Saddle

I sat down at my first blogger event since the Aussie Millions Final Tournament. I took a little break from MTT play and stuck with sit and go's to rebuild my bankroll after x-fering most of my loot to other players throughout the holidays. Apparently the holiday tables were not good to the players that I x-fered to. I can't tell people enough to stop playing with their whole roll. I always refer to the Ferguson challenge when I talk about bankroll management.... he's the living proof that brains prevail over poker skill.

The Mookie kicked off with 65 players and I played nothing for about 45 minutes. I got dealt the hammer and decided to have some fun considering nothing else was entertaining me. I raise up 4x in 2nd position and get 1 call from the SB. Flop 862. I pair up and can't imagine that the SB would have hit the 6 or 8. He leads out with a pot bet and I try a steal with a 2.5 raise... representing an overpair (or better than top pair at least). He calls the raise and 9 hits the turn. He checks and I put half of my remaining stack in, about 1100. He pushes all in.
---- I think about it. I'm open ended for the straight and have bottom pair. If I consider all my outs live, I'm looking at 8 for the straight and 5 for 2 pair... gives me 13... 26%... yet I am getting 4.5 to 1 for my all in. ---- normally, I'm not one to count my outs vs my odds in a tourney, considering that having right odds and losing means gg japan. I consider how the tourney went so far and figure that I'm not going to build my empire with 1k.. I just didn't have the patience tonite to do that. I call, I hit the straight, double up and go from there. I wanted to at least get yelled at for the play but the table broke immediately after the hand... I'm sure I am getting yelled at in a blog right now anyway.

Sit around the 6 k most of the mid parts of the tourney.

Got another all in double up when the flop comes KJ7... and I was holding KJ... player continuation bets and I push all in and he calls with A9... I didn't see the call coming with something like that considering how few few few hands I was playing.

I get another almost double up when I limp in the SB with QQ, I get reraised preflop by the BB up to 1800ish... i re-pot up to 56ooish and get flat called... yet he only had 8k total. He left himself with 2600 after the call. Flop comes 9 hi, I push all in and he folds.

Interesting.

Very interesting.

So I scoop 5600 w/o having to show the ladies.

The rest is kind of up and down without much to talk about... throughout the tourney I had AA and JJ twice with no action preflop. I got walked with AA once... just sick... nobody even attempted to steal THAT blind, yet they wanted all my other ones.

I am sitting 4/12 and 5/12 for a while when play stalls down as we get near the bubble. Top 8 get paid... time to watch the pushers push and the folders fold. I'll do my fair share to make sure I don't get chip-raped during the all-in or fold period.

We get to hand for hand it action slows down... I get involved in one hand all in... I'm in the BB with Ad7d and flop comes AKsomething.. all spades... I push, he calls with the Klan... nh.

I buy some hands with an ace here and an ace there, but just do my part to not run into a monster. We get to final table and a few hands in we lose the bubble. Into the money we go and I get A9 and AJ a few hands off eachother, A9 gets no action on an all in and I raise up my AJ, get pushed on and call and wwonka has A9. No luck for him, I double up.

So, we push and pull our way. We get down to 4 handed and I was short stack with 22K vs 57/59/60k... they were playing super tight to not lose position, so I pushed. With 6K up for grabs for the steal, I figure if I can get 2 in a row, that'll get me closer to them and unless they wake up huge, I get away scott-free.

I steal the 2 in a row and wake up to AK hearts on the 3rd hand. I get a raiser in front and I push again to make it look weak with 3 pushes in a row. He laid down. I didn't want that.

We move around some more and I gather more chips and within moments we go from 4 to 2.

Heads up, myself vs Cmitch, he is to my left and we are even in chips, both close to 95k. I get the upper hand early with a few Aces. About 5 or 6 hands in to heads-up, I get in with J7o. Flop was 5h7h9x. Cmitch bets, I raise, he pushes all in, and I make the call and have him covered. He turns over 10h6h. Gutshot str8 draw, flush draw, 1over card. He's a 55:45 favorite here.

10x hits the turn and I blank the river.

I go down huge but get right back in it with a monster flop of quad 7s. I check it to his two pair. he turns a str8 draw and pushes and I make the call with the nuts.

We get back to even and do it again. I get up early with some face card steals and we get into another big hand. I have J6 when the flop comes 10s10s4s. I check, he bets, I call. At this point I put him on the 4. I turn my 6 and it kills me. We get all the money in and he shows his trip 10s. Well played. He bet the big hand and I got an unlucky turn when I paired my card.

He goes up big again and the very next hand I have KK and he pushes all in on the SB. I immediately call and he shows J6. Flop A810. He needs runnerrunner to get there.

He gets there.

J turn, J river.

BOOOOM

I'll take it... 2nd place after I lost the flip with his drawing hand.

gg Cmitch

Beep Beep.