Things have been a bit hectic as of late... not as much time for poker and/or poker posts. So I'm going to try to throw a bunch of newsworthy things into one giant post here.
Newsworthy thing #1: Played $10 SNG #25 last Friday and managed to tack on another win. It was quite a crazy one though, as I went from 6-handed short-stack to big stack in a hand or two, the first involving a triple-up with the button (AJo) and SB (QQ)... I was in the BB with KK and managed to dodge some bullets. Got KK twice later on, including the last hand, and really dodged some more bullets, once against AKs with a flush draw on the flop, and lastly against J9s with an open-ended straight and flush draw on the turn. Had some serious clutch river cards for once.
I know this is far from a significant sample size, but I figured I'd post some updated stats, including... for the first time ever on TPTM... A PICTURE!!!
... of a graph. Yeah... it's a line illustrating my $10 SNG profit. But it's a step in a new and exciting direction, eh? Check it out...
$10 SNG stats:
Total Games: 25
1st: 7
2nd: 2
3rd: 6
4th: 1
5th: 2
6th: 4
7th: 3
8th: 0
9th: 0
Cashes: 15/25
ITM%: 60%
Amount Invested: $250 + $25 (fees) = $275.00
Amount Returned: ($45 x 7) + ($27 x 2) + ($18 x 6) = $477.00
Profit: $477.00 - $275.00 = $202.00
ROI%: $202.00/$275.00 = 73.45%
Not a shabby start at all, though I realize the ROI will likely decrease and eventually level out. Just as long as the total profit continues to increase.
Newsworthy thing #2: ESPN coverage of the 2008 WSOP begins tonight at 8:00 PM. I forget which event they're airing first but it should be good. I mean... it beats 99% of everything else on TV right?
Newsworthy thing #3: I bought some new Copag cards the other day. They're the Black and Gold ones seen here: http://copagcards.com/products.php?categoryid=5. Haven't played with them yet but they definitely seem a lot nicer than the crappy ones I've been using.
Newsworthy thing #4: I hate Facebook. But even more I've found that I hate people that play Facebook poker and brag about their millions of Facebook dollars. Something needs to be done about this.
Speaking of hatred, one more thing I can't stand is people online who don't understand push/fold poker with low M's. For example, I'm blinding away in an MTT last night with a stack of about 1700 in the 120/240 level. With an M of less than 5 I'm pretty much towards the high end of the red zone, and seeing as how I'm at a passive table I go ahead and push AJs in middle position. Some obvious bracelet winner types "nice bet... way to get paid there." Okay? Funny thing is it loosened him up a little and soon after I crippled his stack and he busted out on the next hand :-)
Alright I think that's about it for now. Might go play a game or two and see if I can keep the roll in it's upward trajectory.
Best of luck ya'll. - B
Doing a little spectating tonight... watching the first 10 minutes or so of a $5,500+$100 heads-up match on FTP between David Benefield (SB) and "yo dont taze me" (BB). They were just kind of chipping away back and forth a little and then out of nowhere this mess happened:
Full Tilt Poker, $5,500 + $100 NL Hold'em Sit n' Go, 25/50 Blinds, 2 Players
LeggoPoker.com - Hand History ConverterSB: 1,575
BB: 1,425
Pre-Flop: (75)
SB raises to 125, BB raises to 1,425 and is All-In, SB calls 1,300
Flop: (2,850) 7c Qh Ks (2 Players - 1 is All-In)
Turn: (2,850) 2d (2 Players - 1 is All-In)
River: (2,850) 9s (2 Players - 1 is All-In)
Results: 2,850 Pot
SB showed Tc Ah (Ace King high) and LOST (-1,425 NET)
BB showed As 2s (a pair of Twos) and WON 2,850 (+1,425 NET)
Obviously the push is a bit ridiculous, but calling off your stack with ATo when you'd still have 25+ BB's to play with against an opponent who is most likely a lot worse than you and already seems to be showing that he'll pay you off when you really hit? Granted it was the correct call in this situation, but hey zeus that's quite a way to blow $5,600.
Also, somewhat interesting that SharkScope.com has Benefield listed as a -15% ROI player with a loss of about $50k over 103 games. Yipes man... that hurts. But on the other hand, dude has to be amassing a ton of FTP points with all those $100 fees!
Just a few off the top of my head...1) Gas prices2) SUV's3) Houses4) Basically the entire U.S. economy5) Britney Spears6) ESPN Poker television ratings7) My girlfriend8) The future of humanity9) Polar bears10) This blog
Lately I've been finding myself in these high-blind, 4-6 handed push fests where post-flop play is virtually nonexistent and you're pretty much in a race to get cards and win a coinflip. Not that this is unusual in SNG's, but usually after the first hour you're at least in the money. Being on the bubble makes things a little more interesting when you're trying to decide if you should call off most of your stack with A5s in the BB, or 66 on the button with two bigger stacks behind you. Lots of tough spots for sure, and here is one that still has me racking my brain. I've already posted it on 2+2, and got a mix of opinions, so I'm interested to hear what anyone here would have to say as well...
2+2 Link: http://forumserver.twoplustwo.com/showthread.php?t=251489
Both players here had been pretty tight/solid during the game, and hadn't even seemed to loosen up much even with the increasing blinds.
Full Tilt Poker, $10 + $1 NL Hold'em Sit n' Go, 150/300 Blinds, 4 Players
LeggoPoker.com - Hand History Converter
Hero (BB): 3,800
UTG: 4,794
BTN: 2,001
SB: 2,905
Pre-Flop: (450) Js Jd dealt to Hero (BB)
UTG folds, BTN raises to 2,001 and is All-In, SB calls 1,851, Hero???
Judging by the 2+2 opinions, the suggestions seem to be something along the lines of: fold >= push > call and push low flop > call and check down. I'm still kind of undecided though. I ended up folding, the button had 99 and the SB had AQs. Neither improved so the button doubled up and we were still 4-handed. So in hindsight I felt like I should have called, but it's still a tough spot. At the time I was kind of happy to let the short stacks battle it out and not risk most of my stack, though I was really looking forward to snap-calling the button push up until the SB got involved.
Any thoughts?
Hey Zeus what a day. Had some good online pokering, got some fun hands to post out of it, and I just heard that Phil Hellmuth busted out of the WSOP main event. Not that coming in 45th out of over 6,000 entrants is anything to poke fun of him for, but if he would've made it to the final table I think 90% of poker pros would have turned away from the game forever just to avoid the ghost of his ego haunting them at every table in every casino. I guess it's obvious that I'm not a big fan. I am however kind of hoping that Mike "The Mouth" makes it to the final table for the sake of good television and a potentially epic blow-up, while this Tiffany Michelle chick also seems to be doing fairly well, and it'd be nice to have some female representation in the last 10.
Moving right along to some micro-stakes headlines. First I have to say it's kind of ironic I typed up that whole mess about 3rd place finishes yesterday, since that's where I happened to find myself again today... only this time it was in a $5 90-seater, so it was a bronze medal I didn't feel too disgruntled about. I was pissed about my bustout since I played the final hand terribly, but in retrospect I really probably should've been done a whole lot earlier in the tournament. Nothing great happened for the first 2 hours or so (both tables I was seated at were nitty as the dickens), at one point I was down to about 1,200 chips with 200/400 blinds right after losing an AQ vs. JJ flip... very next hand I picked up AA, doubled up, and somehow managed to scrap my way back into the money. Then went on a mini-tear to go into the final table in 5th, got up to 2nd at one point, but there was a monster stack at the table that just started crushing it, and it pretty much turned into a race for 2nd for me and the other short stack. Gotta say I got a fair amount of luck in getting that deep... once pushed JTs into KQo and turned a full house, later on pushed A7s into 99 and turned the nut flush. Yeah, things definitely worked in my favor a few times... but it's nice knowing that I can still get lucky.
After that 3-hour romp I took another $10 STT down, the 6th win out of 19 if anyone's still counting. Still sporting an unrealistic ROI of about 85%, and feeling good that my bankroll is at a new all-time high with the $75 or so I added today. The STT actually provided some fairly entertaining hands... particularly in the form of some slowplays gone wrong (hence the title, in case you were wondering). Here are two fun ones...
Full Tilt Poker, $10 + $1 NL Hold'em Sit n' Go, 50/100 Blinds, 6 Players
LeggoPoker.com - Hand History Converter
Hero (BTN): 2,415
SB: 4,610
BB: 1,220
UTG: 1,305
MP: 1,530
CO: 2,420
Pre-Flop: (150) 6d 3c dealt to Hero (BTN)
2 folds, CO calls 100, 2 folds, BB checks
Flop: (250) 5c 2d Ks (2 Players)
BB checks, CO checks
Turn: (250) Th (2 Players)
BB checks, CO checks
River: (250) 6s (2 Players)
BB bets 370, CO raises to 740, BB raises to 1,120 and is All-In, CO calls 380
Results: 2,490 Pot
BB showed 3h 4d (a straight, Six high) and WON 2,490 (+1,270 NET)
CO mucked Kc Kd (three of a kind, Kings) and LOST (-1,220 NET)
OUCH! I don't know why he didn't raise preflop, as none of the remaining players had been overly aggressive or attempting limper steals from the blinds. Then I think you gotta at least bet the turn to build the pot. Final result is just too flippin hilarious though. Guy had to be thinking "okay, only hand I'm behind is 4-3... $%@$!!!" Anyways, here's an equally amusing last hand of the tourney...
Full Tilt Poker, $10 + $1 NL Hold'em Sit n' Go, 120/240 Blinds, 2 Players
LeggoPoker.com - Hand History ConverterHero (BB): 10,120
SB: 3,380
Pre-Flop: (360) Ks As dealt to Hero (BB)
SB calls 120, Hero raises to 720, SB calls 480
Flop: (1,440) 9s Kh Qc (2 Players)
Hero checks, SB checks
Turn: (1,440) Kd (2 Players)
Hero checks, SB checks
River: (1,440) Ah (2 Players)
Hero checks, SB bets 1,440, Hero raises to 2,880, SB calls 1,220 and is All-In
Results: 6,760 Pot
Hero showed Ks As (a full house, Kings full of Aces) and WON 6,760 (+3,380 NET)
SB showed Tc Js (a straight, Ace high) and LOST (-3,380 NET)
With the stacks as they are there's really no way I'm not calling if he bets at any point in the hand here. Heads-up there's just no point at which I think you can afford to fold here without a super read. Little did I know that my hand needed to improve, but luckily for me it did just that, giving me the lock by the time he was ready to take a stab at it, as opposed to getting it in as a 7% favorite on the flop. Always fun ending it with a runner-runner.
Alright that's all I got for now. Have a happy Monday ya'll.
Although 3rd place SNG finishes aren't as bad as finishing in 4th, it's been scientifically proven that they only suck a little bit less... basically they still suck. It's like how Jerry Seinfeld put it - silver medalists are the first losers - and from that we can assume that finishing in 3rd would make you not even good enough to beat said loser.
I've been having a rash of 3rd place finishes lately - 5 in the past 11 to be exact. Granted it's slightly better than losing money, it's still not exactly taking my bankroll to new heights. What's worse is that in a lot of these, particularly the one I just finished up, I get stuck with odd players that typically go from being super tight-passive to mega push-happy as soon as they realize I'm stealing their blinds quite easily. It seems to take much longer to play through to the end, and there are usually a few anti-climatic all-in coinflip situations in which no one gets knocked out, the chips just move around a little.
This past 3-handed session seriously lasted 114 hands with the blinds going from 60/120 to 250/500. It was fairly close for the most part, but at one time I did hold a fairly good chip lead, then things chilled out for a bit and we were all about back to even. Ended up pushing my 4.5k or so from the SB with A7o, getting called by the BB who was about even in chips (obviously a little more), and he took me out with his pocket 5's. Just sucks going through all that to have it end in such a ho-hum manner.
This one hand from earlier in the game was pretty fun to watch though...
Full Tilt Poker, $10 + $1 NL Hold'em Sit n' Go, 50/100 Blinds, 6 Players
LeggoPoker.com - Hand History Converter
MP: 2,485
CO: 1,215
BTN: 2,475
Hero (SB): 2,650
BB: 3,525
UTG: 1,150
Pre-Flop: (150) 2s 4d dealt to Hero (SB)
UTG folds, MP calls 100, CO folds, BTN calls 100, Hero folds, BB checks
Flop: (350) 3d 6h 3c (3 Players)
BB checks, MP bets 350, BTN calls 350, BB raises to 900, MP raises to 2,385 and is All-In, BTN calls 2,025 and is All-In, BB calls 1,485
Turn: (7,495) Kd (3 Players - 1 is All-In)
River: (7,495) Jc (3 Players - 1 is All-In)
Results: 7,495 Pot
MP showed 9c 9d (two pair, Nines and Threes) and LOST (-2,485 NET)
BTN showed 6d 6c (a full house, Sixes full of Threes) and WON 7,475 (+5,000 NET)
BB showed 3s Ad (three of a kind, Threes) and WON 20 (-2,465 NET)
Ah, the downfalls of slowplaying pocket 9's... not really, but 6-handed I think you gotta pop it up. Button was so tight he probably would've folded and BB might have gotten out of the way too. Here's another gem with the same passive-ass button player from above...
Full Tilt Poker, $10 + $1 NL Hold'em Sit n' Go, 60/120 Blinds, 5 Players
LeggoPoker.com - Hand History ConverterBTN: 1,155
SB: 7,355
Hero (BB): 2,600
UTG: 1,180
CO: 1,210
Pre-Flop: (180) Td 7c dealt to Hero (BB)
UTG folds, CO raises to 360, BTN folds, SB calls 300, Hero folds
Flop: (840) 9s 6d Kh (2 Players)
SB checks, CO checks
Turn: (840) 3s (2 Players)
SB checks, CO checks
River: (840) 7d (2 Players)
SB checks, CO checks
Results: 840 Pot
SB showed Qc Qd (a pair of Queens) and WON 840 (+480 NET)
CO showed 5s 5c (a pair of Fives) and LOST (-360 NET)
Kid seriously needs to contact FTP support and have someone tell him where his bet and raise buttons are. Of course he ended up winning, with me busting in 3rd as usual... ain't that a slice of life. Time to hit the hay. Peace.
Still going for some sort of medium-sized MTT win, casually folding my way through a craptacular $5 267-seater tonight, and it happens yet again (it's been happening quite a bit lately)...
Full Tilt Poker, NL Hold'em Tournament, 40/80 Blinds, 8 Players
LeggoPoker.com - Hand History Converter
SB: 2,170
BB: 470
UTG: 13,645
UTG+1: 10,735
MP1: 1,940
Hero (MP2): 1,720
CO: 4,535
BTN: 3,125
Pre-Flop: (120) Qc Qd dealt to Hero (MP2)
3 folds, Hero raises to 240, CO raises to 400, 3 folds, Hero raises to 1,720 and is All-In, CO calls 1,320
Flop: (3,560) 9d 3h Kc (2 Players - 1 is All-In)
Turn: (3,560) 3s (2 Players - 1 is All-In)
River: (3,560) Js (2 Players - 1 is All-In)
Results: 3,560 Pot
Hero showed Qc Qd (two pair, Queens and Threes) and LOST (-1,720 NET)
CO showed Jd Jc (a full house, Jacks full of Threes) and WON 3,560 (+1,840 NET)
It's never fun when it comes on the flop, but damn it's a dagger when it comes on the river. I had the gent out-suited too. I must admit the small reraise from him was interesting here. I figured there was a decent chance he had AA and was just building the pot a bit, but this was really the only hand I'd seen for the whole tournament and my stack was about half the average, so I had to get moving or get out.
In other daily poker news, I had a few spots today that made me do a bit of thinking. Here's two of them...
#1 - BB has been fairly tight/sneaky, limping a lot when in my SB with solid hands, limp-reraising or check-raising, etc. Had not seen him do anything like this yet...
Full Tilt Poker, $10 + $1 NL Hold'em Sit n' Go, 40/80 Blinds, 6 Players
LeggoPoker.com - Hand History Converter
Hero (UTG): 1,920
MP: 4,875
CO: 1,775
BTN: 1,405
SB: 900
BB: 2,625
Pre-Flop: (120) Td Tc dealt to Hero (UTG)
Hero raises to 240, 4 folds, BB raises to 2,625 and is All-In, Hero...
#2 - SB had been super-tight/passive the whole game, until recently after doubling up and getting back into it, at which point he had started stealing more blinds and pretty much flipping the switch to major aggressiveness...
Full Tilt Poker, $10 + $1 NL Hold'em Sit n' Go, 100/200 Blinds, 4 Players
LeggoPoker.com - Hand History ConverterHero (UTG): 3,380
BTN: 5,745
SB: 2,100
BB: 2,275
Pre-Flop: (300) Qd Ac dealt to Hero (UTG)
Hero raises to 500, BTN folds, SB raises to 2,100 and is All-In, BB folds, Hero...I know the suspense must be killing you, so I'll go ahead and say what happened... Hand #1 it really smelled like AK to me... seen a lot of quick pushes like that with good old big slick... but it could've also reasonably been JJ or QQ... most likely not AA or KK given the BB's sneakiness. But yeah, I laid it down and tried to find a better spot.Hand #2 I thought for a bit, and given the SB's recent rampage I thought that there's a good chance he's doing this with a medium pair, up to TT, JJ, and the like. QQ was a possibility, but obviously less likely. And as always AK was perfectly possible... and in this case... was what I ran up against, and subsequently lost most of my stack to. Probably should've folded here and waited for a better spot with a healthier stack. I at least managed to eek out a 3rd place finish in this one, which is better than the three 7th place finishes I've had previous to that. Here's an update in case you're wondering...$10 SNG's - 17 Total1sts - 52nds - 13rds - 45ths - 16ths - 37ths - 3
Profit - $137ROI - 73.26%Some of those 6th and 7th places were seriously after a solid hour of wasting away with crap starters and watching a bunch of loose-passive players peck away at little pots. Nothing more exciting than that my friends.Ah well... the hot streak had to end sometime.
So yeah, this one hurt...
Full Tilt Poker, $10 + $1 NL Hold'em Sit n' Go, 60/120 Blinds, 6 Players
LeggoPoker.com - Hand History Converter
CO: 2,035
BTN: 1,275
Hero (SB): 1,840
BB: 1,470
UTG: 3,935
MP: 2,945
Pre-Flop: (180) Ad Kd dealt to Hero (SB)
3 folds, BTN raises to 1,275 and is All-In, Hero raises to 1,840 and is All-In, BB folds
Flop: (2,670) 5d Jc Td (2 Players - 1 is All-In)
Turn: (2,670) Kh (2 Players - 1 is All-In)
River: (2,670) Th (2 Players - 1 is All-In)
Results: 2,670 Pot
BTN showed Ts Ac (three of a kind, Tens) and WON 2,670 (+1,395 NET)
Hero showed Ad Kd (two pair, Kings and Tens) and LOST (-1,275 NET)
Just one of those days...
Played another two today, one lousy 3rd that I probably should've won since I had a nice lead going into 3-handed play, and one miserable 5th place, thanks to this gem, the official WTF Hand of the Night...
Full Tilt Poker, $10 + $1 NL Hold'em Sit n' Go, 80/160 Blinds, 5 Players
LeggoPoker.com - Hand History ConverterBB: 2,640
Hero (UTG): 2,150
CO: 1,375
BTN: 6,075
SB: 1,260
Pre-Flop: (240) Jd Jc dealt to Hero (UTG)
Hero raises to 2,150 and is All-In, CO calls 1,375 and is All-In, 3 folds
Flop: (2,990) Ad 2d 9h (2 Players - 1 is All-In)
Turn: (2,990) 2s (2 Players - 1 is All-In)
River: (2,990) Kd (2 Players - 1 is All-In)
Results: 2,990 Pot
Hero showed Jd Jc (two pair, Jacks and Twos) and LOST (-1,375 NET)
CO showed 4s As (two pair, Aces and Twos) and WON 2,990 (+1,615 NET)
Really? In what realm of the universe is your suited Ace-rag ahead of my range? I'd been playing my usual tight game and had only open shoved like that 2-3 hands within the past few stages. It was an incredibly weak-tight game, with lots of 5-handed min-raising and min-betting going on... it was sick to me... no aggression at all, ugghh.
I'm starting to find that these $10 games usually have 1 or 2 loose-aggressive wackos that tend to go out within the first 3 stages and then things get tight and boring. Either that or they get lucky and amass an early lead, and then all of a sudden they turn into really tight-passive players along with everyone else. I did play the FTP 7:20 $5 MTT two nights ago and found that to be full of the usual donks. I'd like to mix in more MTT's over the summer with my abundance of free time, and taking a medium or big one down is on my poker to-do list.Anyways, I'm going to call it a night and try to relax a bit. Probably spending the rest of the weekend with the lady friend, so going to lay off the cards for a little while and come back next week with a fresh mindset.Have a fun and safe 4th of July. - B
Well first of all, it looks like 6 out of 7 wasn't meant to be. I did manage to come in 2nd in the latest SNG, but it was a real tough one to work through with a lot of coinflip situations towards the end, and the final blow coming in an epic AJs vs. 33 preflop push-call. I hit two pair but he hit a set and I was done. If I win that hand I'm looking at reversing the 2-1 lead and hopefully taking it down, but ah well. I certainly can't be sour about these recent stats...
$10 SNG's - First 7 Games
1. - 1st
2. - 1st
3. - 6th
4. - 1st
5. - 1st
6. - 1st
7. - 2nd
This nice little win-gasm has got me thinking more about the mentality involved in player poker, primarily the balance between optimism, pessimism, and realism and how you approach each game and even each hand. In SNG's you certainly see the pessimism kick in whenever a wild player loses a fair amount of their stack and pushes the rest of their chips in immediately on the next hand. They could still be in a not-so-desperate situation as well, like with 750 left with the blinds at 30/60.
In my case, the mental transition between my streak of winlessness and mediocre 2nd and 3rd places in $5 games, to my current hot run at the $10 level, has been huge. I didn't really notice it until I finished 2nd in this past one though. Instead of thinking "alright, a 2nd place finish not bad, moving that bankroll up another notch," I was thinking "oh man, 2nd place, I really wanted to win that one." I had gotten so used to winning $10 SNG's that I was fully focused on that #1 spot from the first hand to the last in each game, and I played as solid as I could in aggressively but patiently going after it.
Back in my $5 mini-slump I kind of approached each game with a little pessimistic voice in the back of my head telling me I probably wasn't going to win, and each time I nailed down another close-but-no-cigar 2nd or 3rd place finish I would just shrug and think "yup, it figures, oh well." That's the worst thing about a streak, although it can also be the best thing, depending on whether the run is hot or cold. This crazy run of wins was exactly what I needed to kick some confidence back into me and get me going into each game with a positive mindset rather than a so-so attitude about winning. Hopefully this'll remind some of you that may be slumping to keep your head up and just take it one hand at a time.
Best of luck. - B
