New Chips arrive today.

The chips evar are arriving today. Can't wait to see them in person.

Poker has been quiet this month and last. Work has been keeping me extremely busy and I just haven't been able to devote any serious time to it. Tonight's the 7th (of 20) game of the WSOP qualifier on CT. I'm firmly in first with a 20 point pad. Based on the number of people we've had, another solid month guarantees one entry to a $1500 event with $750 for travel expenses next year. Just have to keep up the focus and nail this thing.

I find when there's something on the line, I play much better poker. I guess that's a no-brainer, but it really makes a difference for me. 15 games count towards your final, so there's still a ton of wiggle room. Enjoying myself though, it'd be awesome to freeroll(ish) the WSOP next year!

Twins

No, not like that you sickos.

My very good friend and his wife gave birth to twins a little over a year ago (forgive me if I'm way off - I'm not much of a kid guy) and he's been writing an excellent blog on the subject. Some very fun reads, and definitely worth checking out. Give it a read when you get a sec. It's in my link section, but here it is for you lazy types. 3dub4dub

Nothing of much interest on the poker front. Although, I am pretty sure that Pokerstars DOES indeed have a doomswitch.

Seneca

Tomorrow I'm off with a few buddies for the first time since the Spring for a roadtrip to Seneca for their deepstack 10am tournament. The structure isn't the best, but it's one of the only games in town, or rather, close to town. I've gone deep a few times, and actually cashed maybe four times out of 10. Not a horrible record. Very well run tournament, and the people are nice. The plan is to make our way over the border, play the tournament, and as people bust they'll make their way back over the border and back to the smelly hole that is Casino Niagara for the cash games.

Should be an interesting crew this time as well. Full report upon my return.

Holy Crap! An Update!

Wowsers.

Has it really been this long? Man oh man. I have been a busy bee. Poker has always been there, but sort of an afterthought. At least, online it has been. I've been bitten by the live play bug, and can't really shake it. There's so much more to be learned once you've gotten past the math.

I've taken a stab at improving my game from an implied odds perspective, and I think things have gotten tremendously better from me doing that. Rather than just play so straightforward, I'm willing to make some questionable post flop plays in order to hopefully get paid off. It's working (I think).

Online just doesn't seem to do it for me. I still play the weekly Wednesday games on CT, but that's about it. They're also running a WSOP league, and I think I'm 2nd overall after 4 of 20 games (15 count towards your final score). Some work to do, but consistency has always been my strong point. Also qualified for the WCOOP and the Bloggers WCOOP qualifier. Wish me luck, I'll probably play the PLO event with my ticket.

Work has been incredibly busy (what recession?) and I'm pretty sure I'm one of the top earners again for the company this fiscal year. Nice.

I've been designing a lot of chips for people lately, as one of the mainstays of custom home chips is shuttering on August 31st. Sucks, now that there's only one game in town. My latest design is for BCC, and is my own personal set. Big thanks to MR. YOUKNOWWHO.

4 days and counting...

Played an awesome WSOP warm-up style event over the weekend and took down 4th. The blinds were nice and long, and the structure was very deep. I played a slow, steady and deliberately tight game, just to see how that would work. Lots of post flop play which was nice. However, 5 handed, I think I tightened up too much and it ended up hurting my finish. Found myself folding a lot of medium strength hands that were probably winners. Oh well, $80 invested, and won $220, so can't complain too much.

I'm really looking forward to my trip, and have decided that satellites is a much better way to get into the WSOP this year. I'd much rather play a whole bunch of tournaments rather than blow it all on one longshot.

Been awhile...

Haven't played much poker as of late. Guess I'm saving myself for Vegas, which is fast approaching. I got to Step 4, then blew all three chances I had built up. Mostly coolers, so can't really feel bad about my play.

I've also firmly decided that I'm going to play ONE satellite at the RIO for the PLO tournament. If I win, super, I'll play the thing. If I lose, meh, I'll play all the tournaments I actually want (have some shot at) to play in Vegas and actually spend some time with my wife. My base of operations this year is the Venetian. Love that room, and it's reasonably close to my two other fave rooms, Wynn & Caesar's.

Played a little live tournament/small stakes cash recently with a new group of guys. While the conversation was fun and all the guys were nice, the game played extremely aggressive, and I'm going to need to step it up a little bit if I want to be more successful there. There were some sick hands where I knew I was in a good spot, and just got lucksacked out of some pots. Can't wait to go back though. I think that cash game is crushable.

Somebody hurry up and check out the blog...

The visit count is at 666.

Steps baby, Steps.

I'm once again this year making a run for an WSOP ticket through the Pokerstars Steps program.

I'm using the tried and true method of blowing all my FPP's on Step 1's, and moving up with a bank of Step 2's, rather than trying to go the whole way with one ticket at a time. Keep in mind, the whole idea for me is NOT to play the main event, but take the $12k in prize money that's deposited after a win at Step 6 and play a small event and pocket the rest.

I've heard that the sharks sit around in Step 6's waiting for donkeys like me to register, then proceed to destroy me and hoard tickets. Anybody have any experience with that?

Well that tears it.

I'm taking a break from Omaha altogether. Things just don't seem to be going my way as of late. I'm experiencing a pretty heavy downswing and can't seem to focus on turning that around. My reads are off, my luck is nil, and I can't seem to stop being a sheriff.

I'm even reconsidering playing in event #5 this year. I don't know if I can hack it, and considering that I've only spent say, 30K hands playing PLO, I might not be ready to actually play for teh bigz moniez. I'm going to reevaluate and look at it later.

The thing is, I know what constitutes good play in PLO. I know the starting hands, I know what plays well in a multi-way contested pot, I know how to count clean outs, I know pot-odds and implied odds, and I just can't seem to beat these jokers any more. I was literally crushing the micros a month ago, and now, it doesn't seem like I could win to save my life. It's frustrating.

For kicks I decided to play .50/1 PLO last weekend. I doubled the max buy-in within a 100 hands or so. The table broke, so I moved to a new one and was doing well, doubled it and then lost it all. Felt stupid. Logged off and didn't play until yesterday when I went back to the micros. The play was awful. Suckouts and random 4 cards winning everywhere. As tight as I was, I just couldn't believe that I was beat and still lost a buyin on the session.

Hence the break.

BTW, if you feel like following me on twitter, go right ahead!

TWEET!

Yayz. Back in Black.

Well, that was easy. I'm back on the road to riches and financial freedom. All it took was a little 600 hand session of multitabling last night to restore the bankroll. +5 buyins puts me right back where I started 23000 hands ago. LOL. If I hadn't taken that stab at .10/.25 I'd probably still be on the uptick, rather than in rebuilding mode. Oh well, live and learn!

While multi-ing 5 tables last night, I also played in Chiptalk's Monday Main Event, which was a HOSE mixed game. LHE, LO8, LS, and LS8. Pretty fun to mix it up a bit, and wonder of all wonders, I took it down. If it wasn't for the O8 portion, there's no way I would have won.

I said before, that 5 tables seems to be my max. What I liked about adding in a 6th table, specifically a tournament table, is the limited amount of time I have to make decisions. I find that if I don't have the nuts by the river and haven't invested a ton, it's pretty easy to get away from.

As I approach the 25k mark, I'd like to have someone review my stats. 1. Is there an easy way to present all the data without sending someone the entire database, and 2. Does anybody want to take a gander?

22K = -$45

Blurg. Cold Deck. Lost all my profits after moving up to PLO25. Time to start back at the bottom. Need to tighten up and focus more.

Also, to all the guys who complain about rake after a split pot where we get it all-in:

STOP YOUR WHINING, I'M NOT A MIND READER AND THE OBJECT IS TO GET YOUR STACK. I COULD CARE LESS ABOUT ANOTHER DIME WHEN THE POT IS $50 AND I'M HOPING TO WIN IT ALL.

/rant.

My rant on Starbucks

So, I go to the bank machine today, and it's only dispensing $50's. No big deal, I need some change for the subway, so this'll work out. I go to Starbucks to get my afternoon Tall London Fog and go to pay with my $50.

The girl goes "oooh, do you have anything smaller?" And I say no, because I don't, and she says that she doesn't have change. Not a big deal, I have some credits left on the Starbucks card.

I pay her, but at the same time I say "It's amazing that you don't have change for a $50 here!" half joking, and she says "Uh, we're a coffee shop sir." in a tone I don't find all that friendly.

So I retort, "Yeah! A coffee shop that sells six dollar coffees!"

She has no response. I call bullshit on not having change. After I got my coffee, I see her signing out as her shift is over. Not having 2 $20's and a $5 is ridiculous. Maybe it's some "don't take $50's or higher from nice people" rule.

I came in 10th in the CT game tonight, meh, and dropped $100 in the cash games - mostly at .10/.25 where I flop 2nd nuts and get stacked. STUPID.

Blurg. I'm taking a break for reals.

Just call me mister butter fingers. I've managed to let a large number of buyins slip through my fingers. No PLO for a while methinks. These micros are killing me.

Here's a fantastic Youtube musical mashup for you. It's all real, and amazing. As an editor, I can appreciate the sheer volume of work behind this. Well done, sir. Well done.

WSOP Event #5

Not sure if I mentioned it here or not, but I've decided to donk off $1500 by playing the PLO event at this year's WSOP. I'll likely be a fish out of water, but I've been thinking about making a run at one of these events for a few years now, and figured now was as good a time as any. PLO seems to be my best bet, as there's typically less people compared to the HE events. I'm hoping that my exploits at the micros are going to pay for it. If they do, super, if not, I've got the cash. I've also got a few thousand FPP's that I want to throw at satellite qualifiers for the big one. If they're run like they were last year, if you win, they make a $12k deposit in your account and I don't think you're obligated to enter the ME.

Looks like a nice structure:


They posted the structure recently, and one thing that kinda weirded me out was the fact that this was supposed to be a no re-buy/no add-on tournament, but at the bottom of the structure sheet, is says the following:

Players begin with $1,500 in Tournament Chips. Players may receive (2) additional Add-ons for $1,500 in tournament chips each, anytime during the first three levels. Any player that has not taken their add-ons by the end of the third level will automatically receive them.

Huh? Does this mean that I'm entitled to an additional $3k in chips for my initial $1500? Someone explain it to me.

The wife has agreed to join me under a few criteria. All of the following must be met:

Hotel must be nice, central, and have an awesome pool.
I must have dinner with her each night.
I must go to at least one show.
I must spend at least one day with her.

That last one might be tough...

Hrm, well... Uh. Wow.

Okay, seriously taking a break after dropping another 10 buyins yesterday. What a rollercoaster the last few days have been. NOT playing today, or in tonight's MMN on Chiptalk, nor playing tomorrow, or possibly even Wednesday.

After some quick analysis, I think that I was pushing too many hands on the flop or turn. Even though I was ahead, people were still calling their entire stacks on draws. Mostly flushes that made it, or flopped sets improving to boats on the river to beat my made straight or flush. Pretty sick to lose that many coinflips in a night. The poker Gods were clearly not with me. Time to watch some more videos on DC and hopefully the Gods will move on to some other shlub.

Something new (to me anyway) was the Pokerstars anti-bot defense. I had never seen it before, and it was a welcome bit of tech. Keep making it harder for those cheaters 'stars!

Also, tried my hand at PLO25. Let's just say that I'm not quite there yet. Got it all in on the flop with an overpair and a flush draw and missed against opponent's obvious Aces.

WOOOOOOOOOTTTTTTTT!!!!!!!!111111one

Went on an amazing run over the last two days.

Made back all 9 of those buyins and that many times over. It was some kinda crazy mojo. Went back down to four tabling and that seems to be the sweet spot for now. Crazy happy for the uptick.

Celebrating my buddy's birthday tonight, having a fun-ish tournament. No hopes of winning it, because there's a lot of non-poker players playing tonight.

OMG, 9 buyins gone. WTF?

13k hands, and things are bad. BAD.

Uh, I'm not sure what happened, but I just took a major downswing. I must be tired, or loose, or just plain unlucky. So many hands where I'm way ahead, only to be rivered, over and over and over again. Having great redraws and not hitting and being rivered, just sick stuff.

POKERSTARS GAME #25614940967: OMAHA POT LIMIT ($0.05/$0.10) - 2009/03/04 22:43:55 ET
Table 'Iduberga V' 6-max Seat #4 is the button
Seat 2: alexpower ($32.40 in chips)
Seat 3: mattythatguy ($10 in chips)
Seat 4: looneyroo ($9.45 in chips)
Seat 5: spotza ($19.05 in chips)
Seat 6: phillaak96 ($23.20 in chips)
spotza: posts small blind $0.05
phillaak96: posts big blind $0.10
mattythatguy: posts big blind $0.10
*** HOLE CARDS ***
Dealt to mattythatguy [Js 5c 2d Kd]
alexpower: calls $0.10
mattythatguy: checks
looneyroo: calls $0.10
spotza: calls $0.05
phillaak96: checks
*** FLOP *** [Ad 7d 4c]
spotza: bets $0.20
phillaak96: calls $0.20
alexpower: raises $1.10 to $1.30
mattythatguy: calls $1.30
looneyroo: folds
spotza: calls $1.10
phillaak96: calls $1.10
*** TURN *** [Ad 7d 4c] [3s]
spotza: checks
phillaak96: checks
alexpower: bets $5.45
mattythatguy: raises $3.15 to $8.60 and is all-in
spotza: calls $8.60
phillaak96: folds
alexpower: calls $3.15
*** RIVER *** [Ad 7d 4c 3s] [Jh]
spotza: checks
alexpower: bets $22.40 and is all-in
spotza: folds
Uncalled bet ($22.40) returned to alexpower
*** SHOW DOWN ***
alexpower: shows [7h 6d Jd 5s] (a straight, Three to Seven)
mattythatguy: mucks hand
alexpower collected $29.95 from pot
*** SUMMARY ***
Total pot $31.50 | Rake $1.55
Board [Ad 7d 4c 3s Jh]
Seat 2: alexpower showed [7h 6d Jd 5s] and won ($29.95) with a straight, Three to Seven
Seat 3: mattythatguy mucked [Js 5c 2d Kd]
Seat 4: looneyroo (button) folded on the Flop
Seat 5: spotza (small blind) folded on the River
Seat 6: phillaak96 (big blind) folded on the Turn


This was the sort of thing that was happening over and over again. I'm taking a break, clearly I'm sucking it.

Wheee! 10K down!

Here's the numbers over 10,000 hands of PLO10:

$248 won, 12.36BB/100 Hands

So far so good. I've stayed pretty tight, and if I recall correctly, my VPIP is around 38. The big thing I'm noticing is that most people I'm playing against have substantially higher VPIP's. In the 70-90 percentile, which sounds really, really high for a game as volatile as PLO.

Had an awesome weekend, playing HU battle after battle vs. a very good friend of mine. Also, first weekend in what must have been a month where I wasn't at work. Yays for me!

I'd love to hear what people think of my PLO exploits so far. I'm going to start posting more hands, so there's more to discuss. I have to wrap my head around how to do screenshots and such from WinXP. I'm such a goof with Windows.

I am so sick.

As in sick sick. I've contracted the mother of all colds and I'm feeling awful.

The wife and I made it out for Valentine's, but I've been feeling so terrible that there hasn't been much time for poker. I played roughly 1500 hands in the last week, mostly because of work, but this cold is going to keep me from the tables for a little while longer.

Work hasn't been this busy in ages either, talk about horrible timing. Not like there's ever a good time to get a cold.

History of teh Internetz!

Best video you'll see today, explaining in some detail how this whole "tubes" thing came to be.


Up over 6500 hands, still showing profit, still grinding away. The major difference I've been employing as of 1500 hands ago is much less preflop aggression, and much more passive play.

Uh, wow... Work happens.

It's been a whole week since I played any poker. Damn. I guess I actually do have a day job.

Speaking of the day job, I am loving it. I'm working on a huge project (7 day shoot, woot!) that has me spending a bit of time each day on set, cutting proof-of-concept snippets so my clients can see that it's coming together as planned. It's always cool to show up as they're shooting it and showing that things are going to rock. As far as I'm concerned, we've got all the best people involved and it's showing in the footage.

I plan on logging a thousand hands or so tonight, but we'll see how that goes. The MIL is in town as part of a junket that was supposed to include Boston, but that part got cancelled. She's been staying with us in the CatCondo (don't ask) for the past week. It's been great having her here though. She's been working in China for the last year and a bit, and the wife doesn't get to see her as often as before the move (obviously).

I've got to go in early tomorrow, (CUT MONKEY, CUT!!!!!) so getting 1000 hands in might be tough... Wish me luck!

EDIT: I signed up for Statcounter, and man oh man, it's so cool to know that people out there are actually READING this thing.

Sigh...

Well, back to the drawing board. Just under 5000 hands and I'm right back where I started. I wonder if any of it has to do with playing on the weekend. I don't think my play adjusted all that much, but it appears that no matter how much betting i do on the turn, people are calling with almost no odds and making their hands.

One thing I did notice, is that I'm finding it difficult to fold two pair on draw heavy boards. I is teh suck.

Is there anybody out there that can help me analyze my hand database?

2900 hands later...

And I'm still showing profit. Don't have the stats in front of me, but in the neighborhood of 13.5 BB/100 hands. Is that good? I'm not really sure. As long as my graphs are showing an uptick, I think I'm golden. I'll correct these numbers later if I'm way off.

Can I say again how much I love multitabling? It's easily the most important thing in my recent improvement. A Hud helps a lot too, but by keeping my attention focused on four tables at once, I'm dumping hands that I might have played if I were a single table noob.

I'm new to the Hud concept, but I've been finding some players that are playing nearly 80-90% of their hands (VPIP). These guys are the fish, right?

It's working!

Running PTO and Pokerace Hud. Through WinXP on Bootcamp. It's all very snappy and I'm not noticing any lag or slowdown. It's very helpful being able to look at my stats. I've only logged a meager 500 hands, but I'm finding multitabling to be extremely good for my game. I'm still dealing with the speed at which I have to make decisions, but it's so much easier to lay down junk-ish hands and awful draws.

So far so good, but it's way too early to say I'm teh expertz leet PLO'er.

A whole new world.

I've decided to take a break from tournaments. Despite some early success, I think I've opened up a little too much and have started playing too loose. I've also forgotten some golden rules and gotten a little sloppy. Might be time for me to focus on starting fresh with a different discipline. Consider it a New Year's Resolution.

I'm going to switch over to PLO cash for awhile and start near the bottom. I'm starting at PLO$10 with 20 buyins to see what I can do. Sadly, I think I'm going to need to do an install of XP in bootcamp (on my Mac) so I can start running Pokertracker. I'd do everything on the Mac side, but crossover and PT3 don't like each other. And I refuse to buy a PC. Just can't do it.

I'm going to be very strict in my approach. No more than an hour a day multitabling four tables at 10¢/25¢. $200 starting roll.

I've also started going back to the gym. It felt really good to hit the treadmill and weights again. I ran into my old personal trainer on Monday and the pangs of guilt were too strong to stay away. Oddly enough, after three solid months of not going, I set a new personal best for the mile. Weird. I use the Nike sport kit with my iPod and I absolutely love it. Very motivating to keep track of your runs, and to watch subtle improvements.

I also subscribed to Deucescracked. Let me just say that this is a terrible investment, and nobody looking to improve their game should do it. You will learn nothing from the pros and it's like throwing away your monies.

Okay, WTF?

So I just got busted in the strangest way in the nightly $30 PLO game. Check out this nonsense:

PokerStars Game #23680982663: Tournament #131676782, $30+$3 Omaha Pot Limit - Level IV (50/100) - 2009/01/07 23:28:55 ET
Table '131676782 11' 9-max Seat #7 is the button
Seat 1: rockbot (6325 in chips)
Seat 2: cabriboy (3215 in chips)
Seat 3: datEman (3710 in chips)
Seat 4: djg420 (5639 in chips)
Seat 5: MR CH0W (5290 in chips)
Seat 6: 121themac (2905 in chips)
Seat 7: mattythatguy (4176 in chips)
Seat 8: Joe_Banks (6090 in chips)
Joe_Banks: posts small blind 50
rockbot: posts big blind 100
*** HOLE CARDS ***
Dealt to mattythatguy [Js As 6d Ah]
cabriboy: raises 200 to 300
datEman: folds
djg420: calls 300
MR CH0W: calls 300
121themac: calls 300
mattythatguy: raises 1650 to 1950
Joe_Banks: raises 4140 to 6090 and is all-in
rockbot: folds
cabriboy: folds
djg420: folds
MR CH0W: folds
121themac: folds
mattythatguy: calls 2226 and is all-in
Uncalled bet (1914) returned to Joe_Banks
*** FLOP *** [4s 2h 5c]
*** TURN *** [4s 2h 5c] [8d]
*** RIVER *** [4s 2h 5c 8d] [Qs]
*** SHOW DOWN ***
Joe_Banks: shows [4d 5s 3d 2s] (two pair, Fives and Fours)
mattythatguy: shows [Js As 6d Ah] (a pair of Aces)
Joe_Banks collected 9652 from pot
*** SUMMARY ***
Total pot 9652 | Rake 0
Board [4s 2h 5c 8d Qs]
Seat 1: rockbot (big blind) folded before Flop
Seat 2: cabriboy folded before Flop
Seat 3: datEman folded before Flop (didn't bet)
Seat 4: djg420 folded before Flop
Seat 5: MR CH0W folded before Flop
Seat 6: 121themac folded before Flop
Seat 7: mattythatguy (button) showed [Js As 6d Ah] and lost with a pair of Aces
Seat 8: Joe_Banks (small blind) showed [4d 5s 3d 2s] and won (9652) with two pair, Fives and Fours

Afterwards he types, "thought there'd be a lot of dead money out there". Come on? Really?

I just checked this guy's stats, and they're through the roof.



What the dealie-o? Someone help me out here.