...............

I haven't been playing much lately. It's not that I don't feel like playing though, just haven't seemed to have the free time. I've managed to play a few SNGs the past week and have done decently in them, but haven't run into any profoundly exciting situations. Hopefully this week I'll manage to get in some more play time.

I have done one thing different (for me) this past week, and that's play a few PLO8 SNGs. The play in these is really, really, atrociously bad. I think I obviously need to tinker my bubble strategy in them a bit because hand values are much closer in that than in hold'em so it's probably almost never correct to call all in while on the bubble. If I actually do the work, I'll of course post what I find out.

I think I'm starting to get sick. I visited Arielle this weekend and she's getting sick as well.

Congrats to Mag and ZaiGezunt/ThatsTheGame, who finished 1st and 2nd in the FTP $75. Very, very sick stuff by both of them. Zai has just been crushing lately-- every time I look up the guy is final tabling something

Indy and Politics

Before I go into my past weekend at the +1 meet in Indiana, I wanna bring up what Massachusetts Senator Barney Frank is doing in Washington. He has announced that he's proposing a bill that would lift the ban on online poker. If you sign up here, there is an automated message that you can send to your Senators, along with any personal comments you'd like to add. It only takes a couple minutes to sign up for the page, so this isn't something that should be put off.

Anyways, on to Indy.

I drove from Akron to Eminence in a little over five hours-- cutting the trip time by a half hour, even including the one rest stop I allowed myself. I walked into the basement and the game had already started. I sat down and we played some shorthanded HOSE, and I ran like god and managed to win about $100 in a .25/.50 game.

The rest of that night mainly consisted of drinking, eating, and playing a ton of poker. I lost a decent amount of my profit from the HOSE game back when I kept trying to bluff a very inebriated sucko. I switched gears a little and cut out any continuation bets when I was in heads up pots against him, and managed to take down a couple big pots before crashing on the floor.

The next couple days are a bit of a blur. A few highlights from the trip, though:

• Mark(Flipfish), Ty(Drome) and Sucko laid me 2-1 on a bounty in a tourney we played Friday night. Sucko was also propping against Drome for $20 on whether the flop would bring a majority of red or black cards. Because of this, on one hand he limped the button with 9s5s just to ensure that he could see the flop and hopefully hit 2 red cards to beat Ty. I checked the BB with T9 and flopped T97. I lead out and sucko called. A 9 rolled off on the turn, I bet again, he jammed and I busted him, earning the bounty from him and knocking him out of contention from the tourney (10+10) and two or three last longers. He still managed to profit in that tourney because of his prop bets with Drome. It's sick how good he runs.
• I got roped into playing Screw Your Neighbor again, but only played twice this year. The second time I was let in for a 40% discount (while at the same time playing stud hilo at another table) and managed to still lose. Live multitabling is really hard, by the way.
• I lost a $400 pot playing a .25/.25 pot limit game of hold'em with draws. The game works like this: preflop is like regular hold'em. The flop comes, you bet, and then you have the option of trading a card or staying pat. This happens again on the turn. There's no trade on the river. Anyways, very first hand I limp-- as does everyone else-- with JTo. The flop comes AK8 and someone bets a dollar. Everyone calls, as do I. Most people trade, but I and another person (cbal, I think) stay pat. The turn miraculously comes with a Q. Someone leads out and there is a caller or two in between. I raise the pot and sucko comes over the top. At this point, there probably wasn't enough to get all in, but we just shove all the chips in anyway. I was assuming that he'd made the same hand as me, but then he asked "do you have JT?" I thought it was pretty obvious. He traded the flop to draw QQ. Meanwhile, Chris says he folded a Q and Mark folded A8. The river comes an 8 and I managed to have a -80,000bb/100 hand "win" rate. What an awesome game.
• Ty has the worst pants ever made.

I'm sure I'll think of lots more to add later.

+1 Indy Meet Tomorrow

Driving out to Indiana tomorrow to go to the +1 Indy meet. I had an awesome time last year and in AC last Fall, so it should prove to be an awesome time.

Everyone thinks they're going to be the one to bust me on this trip. Hopefully karma will be an awesomely cruel bitch and I'll end up a big winner.

Tales of degeneracy to come in the next week.

Hypothetical Poker

It's important to keep in mind that no single hand should dramatically affect your poker results over your lifetime. Going one step further (or backwards, or sideways, as the case may be), it's also important to remember that once the money is all in, the actual outcome is effectively only negligibly significant. What is important is whether or not the correct (most profitable) play was made.

You can use this knowledge to console yourself in light of a bad beat. Remember, when your aces get all in preflop versus someone's sixes and they river a straight, you're still rich in Sklansky dollars. Go ahead and console yourself with this. It's okay. Just remmeber that whenyour hand holds up against those same sixes, you now owe the metaphorical Sklansky a moderate sum.

Sklansky dollars is a term (derived from the 2+2 forums, I believe) with a meaning synonymous to EV. But much like Sklansky's Fundamental Theorem of Poker which has been shown to be slightly too results oriented by certain game theory models*, simply looking at your EV in a single hand doesn't quite go far enough. This article which was linked to on +1 gives an awesome overview of a lot of concepts that a lot of people (including myself) overlook far too often. The article is a little heavy, but it's definitely worth the read.

*Most notably (at least in my opinion), the Jam or Fold game. Ex: jamming 10BB with T8o from the SB and then folding the T9o in the BB are both optimal plays, although FTOP makes folding look atrocious, even though it isn't

As a side note, because the link is on ESPN's website, I kind of assumed before reading it that the author of it was some Michael Craig or Steve Rosenbloomtype; the kind of guy who knows a little bit about poker and writes well, but isn't necessarily someone reliable in regards to poker theory. After reading it and still not recognizing the author's name, I was frustrated that some ESPN journalist can think about the game in such a complex yet lucid way while I barely even attempt to put this kind of work into my game.

I felt a little better when I checked the article again and learned that Phil Galfond is high stakes no limit cash player OMGClayAiken (which also has to be one of the best online handles).

And briefly, I wanna mention to all Cardrunners members that this weekend, the Brians Hastings and Townsend (I went to HS with a kid named Brian Hastings, but I doubt it's the same guy) played each other heads up at 5/10 pot limit omaha. I watched Townsend's first, and then watched Hastings' while streaming Townsend's so I could see both players' hole cards. These are two amazing videos, so definitely check them out, even if you don't play omaha.

Clearly an exaggeration, but...

...I can't help but laugh at this and wonder if this is the road we're going down. Like Prohibition and drug laws, the restrictions on online poker are bound to fail in the face of those who are truly dedicated to continue indulging (even if it does result in a big pain in the ass).

It has sound, if you happen to be watching this at work...

Didn't play much today. I get off of the night schedule after 7am on Monday, so then I should start to readjust, and hopefully stop feeling so lethargic day in and day out. Indy is in a week and a half, so I'll probably try to get in 5k hands or so by then. I know I'm going to get roped into some sick games with some tough players, so I want to make some money before I go and plug as many leaks as possible. If I can run like I did last year, the trip should be moderately profitable.

What Is And What Should Never Be

When I started playing poker online, even before I played no-limit, my general MO would be something like this-- have a good session, have a good session, decent session, great session, and then blow almost all of it at once.

It's good to see things haven't changed.

I shudder to think how much bigger my bankroll would be if I could just purge a few days from existence.

I think I've been playing really well the past couple weeks for the most part. I've been employing a much more consistent raise-or-fold strategy (for the most part, at least) which I think has picked up a ton of small pots that I probably didn't deserve to win. Specifically, I've been taking a lot more pots away from people who donk bet into my preflop raises on the flop. I've been fighting back against that move much more aggressively and liberally as of late and it seems to be paying off pretty well.

Still, though, I keep making stupid mistakes that aren't even necessarily strategy related. Like working a 10-hour night shift, getting home at 8 in the morning, and then deciding that now would probably be the best time to attempt 6-tabling for the first time.

I know. I'm a moron. I've since made up for that slightly costly debacle, but it never should've happened.

I've been watching a ton of Cardrunners videos the past few days. I've watched all of Brain's videos twice, and I've gone through about a dozen of Taylor's videos. It's disgusting how smart these guys are. This, like Poker Tracker, PAHUD, and playing poker in general (both live & online) is something I wish I would've gotten into earlier, because I feel like I've robbed myself of a lot of potential knowledge.

Indy is in less than two weeks. Should be fun, especially if I don't lose/play SYN.

random thoughts at 7:30 a.m.

It's unclear if this is particularly good news, but it certainly can't be bad news that the WTO ruled against the U.S. regarding the online poker ban. I doubt it means much of anything, but hopes are high.

I've been on the night-shift schedule since Tuesday. I'm working Sunday, Monday, and Tuesday night, and then again next Sunday. I hate admitting it, but it's definitely having some effect on me. Timewise, it's roughly early evening for me right now, but I'm exhausted right now. I've also had little to no social interaction the past few nights. It's a little sad.

Anyways, tomorrow night I'm working for 12 hours, but from about 11 til 6, everyone will be asleep, so I plan on spending that time watching copious amounts of cardrunners videos.

I haven't played any long sessions the past week or so, which is atypical for me. I've also only played SNG's the last two nights. I've actually done very well in them, although I've run really well, too. I played four tonight, taking down three of them. Not too shabby.

I feel like I'm playing much better in SNGs after having watched a couple Green Plastic videos. I've slowed down a lot short-handed, not trying to steal so often. That's something that I think has cost me a lot in the past. Clearly, it still has to be in the arsenal, but I've slowed down a lot. In the past, I had a tendency to either build up really high, or bust out relatively early in the SNG. These past few days, though, I've played much more solid (which is the direction that my game's been evolving towards, strangely, when you compare to how LAGgy I used to play) and chipping away at the smaller pots when possible.

Of course, the biggest factor was just running lucky, or more specifically, not getting UNlucky. Almost all of my all-in confrontations held up today, and even if I'm getting it in as a dominating favorite, it feels good to see the chips pushed in my direction instead of my opponent's after the river hits the board.

Okay, that's all for now.

HU SNG

I downloaded Camtasia's free trial and messed around with it a bit yesterday morning. I recorded myself play a $6 heads up turbo on Full Tilt.

I feel like I played pretty well in it. The hand where I made 2nd pair with the Q5o was a little strangely played, and I don't think I really described it well in the audio (when I recorded it, it was about 10 a.m. and hadn't yet gone to bed).

Anyways, my opponent was playing really aggressively. If I bet out with the hand on the flop, it's very unlikely for him to call me without a hand. He does, however, bet here with air a decent amount of the time I would think.

At first I thought the turn check was a little more borderline, but the more I think about it, the less I think it is. I'm almost positive my hand is good here. He probably raises with a king preflop, and it's even more likely he bets it on the flop. I'm also pretty sure he bets any pair here on the flop, so unless that six hit his hand, he probably has absolutely nothing.

So my immediate options are as follows:
1) Bet out. By doing this, I gain some value from a six, but that's about it. I don't give him credit for a K, Q or 4, and I think a flush draw bets the flop. Of course, this six puts a couple draws out there: the spade draw and the straight draw. Even though I don't want to give a free card to a draw, my opponent's aggro tendencies make me think that he'll bet a draw. This leads me to the 2nd option
2) Check. A check loses value those times that he has either a six or a draw and opts not to bet it. However, I feel like that's incredibly rare. And since I feel that he's very likely to bet a draw here, especially since he's seen me show weakness preflop and then again on the flop and turn, he's going to bet a draw a ton. Checking also obviously allows him to bluff at the pot with air, where betting out would result in him just folding. Like I said, I've shown a lot of weakness in the hand and he's played very aggressively.

This line of reasoning is similar to the reasoning I had when I played the A2o against him, calling on the turn with just ace high. I think I maybe should've just raised him on the turn in that spot, since I was relatively sure I had the best hand and since he'd seen me try to induce bluffs out of him on multiple streets within a hand before. I think that if I think he'll fire again a large % of the time on the river, the flat-call isn't terrible. In retrospect, I think I should've raised though.

Basically, my intentions playing against this guy, once I figured out that he was going to be playing very aggressively, was to trap him when I could and picking up a few other little pots when I could while waiting for a hand big enough for me to be willing to put in my whole stack.

I'm definitely still working on my heads up game, and I think that I probably go too far with fancy plays sometimes heads up, and the A2 and Q5 hands might be functions of that (although I do still like my line with the Q5).

Part 1:


Part 2:

The Degenerate Corner

This is a sick game.

From Jerrod's livejournal:

Received this hilarious email today from someone else who knows Matt Hawrilenko (who has just arrived in Paris):

Matt: paris is AMAZING
i thought it could be nothing but a disappointment
but it's gorgeous
so many old buildings. so many creperies.
(he just got in today)
[...]
10 minutes later....
[...]
Hoss_TBF: posts small blind $100

I can imagine the dialogue between the poker addict and the girlfriend they're traveling with...

GF: Hey, let's go see the Eiffel Tower!
PA: In a little bit, there's a juicy game on Stars.

[two hours later]

GF: Ready to go?
PA: Not now, I'm stuck. We'll go tomorrow.

From aba's blog on CR:
I am on the biggest downswing of my life that reached 1.2 million dollars today. Most of the losses have come at PLO and just in the past week.

This is gross for a few reasons.
1) In a 300/600 PLO game, this is a 20 buy-in downswing. And it's unlikely this was limited to a game that high.
2) This is coming from what is possibly, and very likely, the best online player in the wold.
3) It's 1.2 million fucking dollars. To put that into perspective, that's the same amount of money that Sam Farha won in the 2003 World Series.

Gross.

Speaking of the 2003 WSOP Main Event, I think it's funny how often you'll hear people refer to it and say that Farha deserved the Main Event win, that Chris Moneymaker was lucky/an idiot and that Farha was such a superior player. Watch it again. I'll give you a clue: Farha didn't play as well as most people remember, and honestly Moneymaker played much better than he's given credit for.

And speaking of Sam Farha and degeneracy, I remember a story lucko told sometime last summer about the 2005 WSOP (sorry if I butcher the details). Farha and another player he didn't recognize (lucko said he's pretty sure it was Sean Sheikhan) were betting on something, probably playing props during the tournament. Farha was down $12.5K to Sean. When they were quitting the bets, they decided to flip a coin for the difference. Sammy called it, lost, and flipped a 25k chip to Sean.

I just realized how strangely I went off on various tangents here. Sorry if that was distracting. It's 8 a.m., and I'm about to go to bed.

Oh, a couple other things:

Full Tilt finally updated to have re-sizable tables. I'll probably be doing some more cash play on there in the near future. PAHUD was giving me some problems since the update, but apparently using the beta version circumvents this problem if you turn on Flicker Free Drawing. I have no idea what this means, but it sounds simple enough. I'm about to DL the beta version now.

I finally broke 500 in a non-computer Scrabble game. I ended up getting 515 against Justin, but had to draw sickly good (all 4 power letters, both blanks, and THEN bingoing twice) to pull it off.

Okay, that's all for now.

Cardrunners, goals

Finally signed up for cardrunners a couple days ago. Doylefish commented on an old post that he wouldn't recommend it, but by that time it was too late. Anyway, I think I've heard enough good feedback about it (from lucko, mag and urbluffingme) to want to check it out anyway.

So far I've watched a couple SNG videos by actionjeff and stinger which were both decent. I was surprised at how tight actionjeff was playing in it early on. I always thought I played tight in them, but his play made mine look LAGtardesque. I'm definitely gonna check out a few more of these videos. I think that my early round play is decent and my bubble play is solid enough (at least, compared to my competition) but I definitely have to put some more work into situations where it's 5-6 handed with pretty high blinds.

I played a few a couple days ago and didn't run too well. I took a couple sick beats, but overall I definitely could've made some better decisions. I have to do some more $-equity analysis for the marginal situations when there are still 5 or 6 players left but my effective stack dictates I jam or fold. It can be difficult, though, because it's hard to give players accurate ranges when they keep shifting their opening ranges (correctly or not) as the blinds increase and players drop out. This is accentuated because I have been playing the turbos on FT a lot which have really fast levels, so the readjustments at a certain point in the tournaments are occurring very often. I should probably switch back to the regular SNGs, but the sick action junky in me wants to play turbos for some reason.

Back to cardrunners, I've watched 3 of sbrugbys 4 videos so far. This guy is a genius. One thing he's mentioned a lot so far is that if you keep continuing to fire (on flop, sometimes on turn) with your hands like AK/AQ/etc. that whiff on the flop, it protects your big pairs from opponents who are trying to set mine against them. It's a really great concept and something I definitely need to put more thought into. I think that's basically the idea behind an old cbal post that in turn referenced an old 2+2 post. I'm not entirely sure it's the same thing, because the 2+2 thread was pretty damn confusing. If it is saying the same thing, Townsend dumbed it down enough for a dolt like me to understand.

His PLO video was really interesting too. It made me feel like I need to pick up that game again. I know that I've played a little bit of HA games (half PLHE, half PLO) on Full Tilt, and they've been really juicy.

So, goals for the near future:
1) Improve my NL cash game. This has been a constant goal of mine for a while. I have a few leaks I definitely have to work on, but easily my biggest is playing too long when losing and too short when winning.
2) Work out all of the kinks in my SNG game. This is gonna take a while and a lot of work. I was thinking about this last night, and I believe that the top tier of SNG players have put in more hard, solid analysis into their games than any other form of specialist, particularly mathematical analysis.
3) Start playing PLO a little more regularly again. People in the lowest limits (maybe higher, but I'm not really qualified to be the judge of that) seem to play the game pretty atrociously, so as long as I can tackle the variance of the game and put in a little more study, I'm not too worried about beating the low limits.

On a non-poker related note, my friend Justin, an English major at Kent, got a typewriter the other day. Every time someone has come over to his place to hang out, he's coerced them into writing a haiku on it. His blog so far has been dedicated to writing acrostics using a word of the day calendar, but we just started a new one to throw haikus on. I'm sure this is painfully interesting for anyone reading my blog for poker content.

Alright, that's about all for now. Arielle is going back to school tomorrow night, so I will probably be playing about 10x more hands per week soon than I have the past two weeks.

Food For Thought

A couple snippets from sbrugby/aba20's well post:

I love when players switch from limit to NL at high stakes because they are usually huge calling stations. I think in NL you dont' need a hand as much as in limit. In limit you are constantly going to showdown where in NL you are hardly ever making it to showdown. I always tell my self I either need zero hands in NL or one hand to bust an opponent. If opponets don't call enough then I keep bluffing and widdling them down, and if they call to much I just need to make one hand against them to stack them. I wasn't very good at NL at first and I had to learn the game.

I see comments all the time from respected posters like "don't go broke with one pair". Usually blanket statments like these are wrong and each hand needs to be analysed individually.

Good stuff.

If you haven't seen this and aren't convinced that an internet player you may not have heard of is a worthy source, maybe this will change you mind:



More to come later.

Variance Is A Harsh Mistress

Wow. Today was... well... fun. I messed around in some .05/.10 with fishstickkittie and urbluffingme. I basically sat down just to talk mad shit to some guy at the table basically out of boredom.

Early in the session, fish doubled me up when I flopped a set vs. his straight draw and turned pair. A little bit later, UrBluffingMe/xxisleroxx and I played a pretty big (stake-wise) hand:

Blinds: $0.05./$0.10.
UTG: $18.80
UTG+1: $5.23
MP1: $10.29
MP2: $3.78
CO: $4.81
Button: $1.88
SB: $21.71
Hero: $17.06

Pre-flop: Hero is BB with Qh Ah
UTG raises to $0.4, 4 folds, Button calls, SB folds, Hero calls.


Flop: 8h 7h Tc ($1.25, 3 players)
Hero checks, UTG bets $1.25, Button folds, Hero raises to $5, UTG raises all-in $18.4, Hero calls all-in $16.66.

Turn: 8s ($24.65, 0 player + 2 all-in - Main pot: $38.05)

River: Jc ($24.65, 0 player + 2 all-in - Main pot: $38.05)


Results:
Final pot: $24.65
UTG shows Kh 9h
Hero shows Qh Ah


We talked briefly about it and I came to the conclusion that the preflop play was a little off (loose raise by him UTG, I should have reraised him) but postflop, I don't see it playing any other way.

So I find some juicy .5/1 tables and sit down at a few of them. I got lucky to avoid a chop in a $200 pot by making my 6 high straight into an 8 high straight vs. my opponents 6 high straight.

Then from there, things went awful. In the next 400 hands, I didn't pick up aces or kings once. Every time I reraised preflop (AK/AQ hands) I would get called, miss the flop entirely, and either lay down the worst hand or get outplayed severely.

Another guy had repeatedly check-raised me in any hand I played with him. I finally trapped him... only to run into his top set. I went from being up a buy in to down one and a half very quickly.

Then something happened. I think a player at one of my tables must have gone on reverse tilt, because he went from being a very loose, moderately aggro player to someone who was literally (for a small time) playing every single pot, and betting the pot every single time it was checked to him. By this time, he was sitting with 4 buy ins behind.

The beginning of his super-maniacal play began with a hand in which I got all in with a gutshot and a flush draw from the blind with J3 of clubs on a KT9 board. He put in the fourth bet with K6. After this was when he began to really gamble.

At this point, another thing he also did was he almost never raised preflop. I had position on him often, so it was usually him limping to me, so I limped behind him with a large percentage of my hands. Pretty much any connected cards, suited aces, and obviously any baby pair were easy limps behind. Fortunately, the rest of the table seemed to understand that if you could get to the flop, you could trap him for a lot of money, so most pots went unraised. At this point, the poker game went from 4 people playing against one another to 3 players racing to outflop one maniac.

I got the first big crack at him.

Stack sizes:
UTG: $464.50
Button: $120
Hero: $114.20
BB: $261.55

Pre-flop: (4 players) Hero is SB with T♠ 8♣

UTG calls, Button folds, Hero calls, BB checks

Flop: 3♣ 4♠ 8♥ ($3, 3 players)

Hero checks, BB checks, UTG bets $7.5, Hero raises to $25.5, BB folds, UTG calls.

Turn: 2d ($54, 2 players)Hero bets $54, UTG raises to $216, Hero calls all-in $87.7.

Uncalled bets: $74.3 returned to UTG.

River: 6♠ ($337.4, 1 player + 1 all-in - Main pot: $337.4)Results:Final pot: $337.4

UTG shows Q♣J♣.

Hero destroys him with a meager pair of 8's.

That hand felt awesome. My confidence came back with that. I've been having a rough streak the past couple months, but the last time I played I felt like I was playing really, really well despite having only a marginally profitable session. Being stuck earlier was frustrating as hell, but I don't think I was making many atrocious mistakes. Obviously I could've played better, but I definitely feel like I was playing better than my opposition. This hand was one of those situations that vindicated my play and all the hard work I've put into this game. It's really rare that I get my entire stack in without a monster. It feels good to know that I'm not just all brains and no balls.

I got unstuck (and busted this guy) when my pocket queens held up against his 98 on a 975 board. He went from 5 buy ins to broke in less than a half hour.

I ended the day a very small winner. In a week I'll have time to play more. In the meantime, I'll be studying HH's (mine and those on +1/CP), maybe a few SNGs and maybe (finally) sign up for cardrunners.

Defending Your Raise: Redux

In this post, I talked about why you can't lay down too often when someone re-pops you preflop.

Evidently, a couple of my calcs were wrong. These are snippets of a PM between Chipp and I regarding the comments he left on that page.

C (blog comment):"What this means is that even if when you call you automatically win the pot, [button] is still profiting [immediately] if you fold over 30% of the time." (edited for clarity)

...is off- c y?

N: Is this right?

Fold: -$3f
Call: +$12(1-f)
0 = -3f + 12 - 12f
15f = 12
f = .8 = 80% folding is breakeven....
...And if we only win half of the pot...

0 = -3f + 12((1-f)/2) - 10.5 ((1-f/2)

f =
.2 = 20% folding is breakeven? Is that right?

C: Yeah, that works.... I think we need to be looking at the bigger picture here. This guy is raising us with some distribution- if he's raising atc we clearly have > 1/2 the pot when we take a flop [blogger's note: this is re the assumption made that we're entitled to 50% of the pot when calling]. If he's folding some hands, we "buy the button" and face two random blinds w/ our (here) 3otb distribution. There's lots of possibilities, but my point is that if he's not raising atc, we need to consider the value gained from these other poss in determining whether we're being exploited. And again, if he is raising atc we should def have more than half the pot, despite being oop.

So like the more hands he raises, the more our showdown equity increases when we call, and conversely the fewer hands he raises the more often we "profit immediately" (in this case the "profit" being a shot at the blinds otb w/ your 3otb distribution). In theory we want to construct some distribution balanced such that he can't increase his equity by shifting his strategy towards either of these extremes.... Anyway, to my point w/ the c y- opp doesn't necessarily profit immediately there cuz there's still two opps behind that can wake up and pick him off.

Obviously, the last part I left off for simplicity sake, but it's definitely something that still needs to be taken into account. Additionally, another way your preflop raises can be exploited is if someone is smooth-calling often behind you so that they have position on you PoF (Gavin Smith has mentioned this a lot in old Circuit episodes).

I might try to do more with this in the future, but Christ, I make enough minor mistakes with my math (no formal math training in +3 years, nor past Calc I, plus I usually do this shit really late at night) that I don't know if I'll be able to approach any real solution, but hopefully something worthwhile can be intuited from it. If/when I do this, I'll keep you posted (awful pun intended).

Also, congrats to Roddy who cashed onto UB again like two days ago and has already made like... twelve-thousand final tables. He might have all the money, but I can drink legally and he can't.

Look At Your Game Girl

So far (granted, it's early) today has been much better.

The good news: I'm running +20PTBB/100 hands over 750 hands. Not a bad day.

The bad news: I forced myself to play lower until I think I have a semblance of an idea of what the fuck to do while playing poker. Not astronomically lower, mostly .25/.50, but obviously it's frustrating when I can play well at these levels but play like shit when I move up to 1/2. Granted, this is also a function of 1) better opponents and 2) me playing differently, but honestly, I think the biggest difference was just me playing terribly and impatiently.

This morning, for the first time in a long time, my first thought upon waking was "Christ, I played so abysmally last night." That's not a good feeling, trust me. This morning I FINALLY registered Poker Ace HUD. I'm a moron for having waited so long. Granted, I said the same thing about downloading PT and getting rakeback.

I'm also conflicted right now: my recent run means I need to work on my game. One thing I want to try costs a little bit of money. That thing is Cardrunners. So do I make the small investment, hoping to get it back, while simultaneously trying to endure a shitty downswing?

Probably.

Will I put it off for another two months until I finally get it, and chastise myself for not having had it all this time?

Oh, no doubt. Their site has gotten a lot of good feedback from at least three people I know (mag, lucko and UrBluffingMe) [I p1mp their blogs so much]. Plus, they have Sbrugby and Green Plastic doing tutorials. And they're both sickos.

I'll get it eventually.

Arielle will be home on Friday for two weeks! Can't wait. Seriously, I barely can.

(for bonus points, the title of this post is an allusion to which "musical artist"?)

The Times They Are A-Changin'

Today went awful. No matter what I did, I just couldn't win. I even managed to get one-outed for the first time in I don't know how long. I also got taught some pretty brutal lessons for trying to slowplay big hands.

Tomorrow will be better. It has to be.

Ups and Downs

March isn't starting off very well. I'm up, but just a tad, and I feel like I'm making beginner mistakes. I attempted way too many bluffs today, especially in spots where I knew for a fact that I was going to be called. I watched myself doing this, chastisizing my hand as I clicked "bet $20" but I was hopeless to stop it.

I played 1/2 for a little bit today, but then found myself playing this hand...

Hand #39412689-61884 at Fountain (No Limit Hold'em)
Started at 05/Mar/07 19:03:28

themffulton is at seat 0 with $199.20.
Red Moondog is at seat 1 with $227.
Chvbngnzreal is at seat 2 with $628.15.
iamadrunkard is at seat 4 with $129.95.
RUPokerGal is at seat 5 with $266.35.
The button is at seat 2.

iamadrunkard posts the small blind of $1.
RUPokerGal posts the big blind of $2.

themffulton: Ks Ad
Red Moondog: -- --
Chvbngnzreal: -- --
iamadrunkard: -- --
RUPokerGal: -- --

Pre-flop:

themffulton raises to $7. Red Moondog folds.
Chvbngnzreal re-raises to $24. iamadrunkard folds.
RUPokerGal folds. themffulton re-raises to $75.
Chvbngnzreal goes all-in for $628.15. themffulton
goes all-in for $199.20. Chvbngnzreal is returned
$428.95 (uncalled).

Flop (board: Jc 3h Tc):

(no action in this round)


Turn (board: Jc 3h Tc Ah):

(no action in this round)


River (board: Jc 3h Tc Ah 7s):

(no action in this round)




Showdown:

Chvbngnzreal shows As Ac.
Chvbngnzreal has As Ac Jc Tc Ah: three aces.
themffulton shows Ks Ad.
themffulton has Ks Ad Jc Tc Ah: a pair of aces.


Hand #39412689-61884 Summary:

$2 is raked from a pot of $401.40.
Chvbngnzreal wins $399.40 with three aces.
----------------------------------------------------------------

...and moved back to .5/1 for the evening. I was worried that I'd overplayed this a bit, but the guy was playing 47/26/2 (albeit over a mere 18 hands), but lucko and mag both told me that, although having to call $125 more is a little sick, there's really no getting away from it in this spot.

After this hand and a series of a few (previously mentioned) detestable plays at .5/1, I took a short break, gathered my thoughts, and told myself that I was going to play well.

At this point, I was stuck about $200 or $250 for the month, having been up a bit from yesterday.

I played for about an hour laying in bed and won a little. Feeling cool, calm, and way too fucking confident for a guy who had previously been playing about as awful poker as possible, I drove down to the Aroma (coffee shop downtown I frequent way too often, for those who don't know) and logged on again.

I played hard and focused as hard as I could. I trapped, got max value (while dodging my opponents outs), played aggressively against the right idiots, and bluffed at the right times. And obviously, I got a little lucky.

I lost about 20 on the day. Not bad, all things considered. I wish that I had played well earlier in the day, but I learned some things from my mistakes. Mostly, I just have to consciously remember to always bring my A game or not even bother sitting down. This game is hard enough when you take into account variance and having to compete against good, aggressive opponents; I've gotta be fucking nuts if I think I can be lazy while playing and hope to end up a winner.

In non-poker news, I watched Vertigo for the first time tonight. Fucking incredible film. Definitely see it if you haven't.

Let's see...

...what have I been up to lately?

Updated the blog a bit. Added some new links. Let me know if there's some way to make it more aesthetically pleasing.

I didn't play much poker the past few days. I was stuck working the night shift, then went out of town to OU to see Girl Talk again.

I woke up this morning about ready to die, barely able to breathe because of the sea of mucus in my esophagus and two dozen or so pumas clawing at the back of my throat. I managed to clear my throat, grabbed my laptop, went back to bed and played cards for the first time in four days.

I sat down at a .25/.5 heads up table against a guy with 75 in front of him. 21 hands later, he was down to 15 and sat up. Fun times.

Here was a pretty interesting hand towards the end of that "session". At this point I'd been running him over, playing really aggressively and on the one hand I played passively, I cracked his TPTK with a straight.

themffulton is at seat 0 with $93.
GqBury is at seat 1 with $29.35.
themffulton posts the small blind of $.25.
GqBury posts the big blind of $.50.
themffulton: Kc Qs
GqBury: -- --

Pre-flop:
themffulton raises to $1.50. GqBury calls.

Standard so far.


Flop (board: Ah Ks 9c):
GqBury checks. themffulton checks.

Usually I'm going to value bet a hand like this, especially in a heads up game. But in this spot, I decided not to. I felt like he was too likely to check-raise with a worse king or a nine, as well as with an ace, and I didn't want to be forced off of my hand. Plus, this gives him a chance to catch up a little, because in all likelihood I am pretty far ahead here.


Turn (board: Ah Ks 9c 6c):

GqBury bets $3. themffulton calls.

I decided to just flat-call here. I figure this bet can be one of the following:

Hands beating me:
1) A set: possible, but unlikely. I think he's going to reraise preflop with a pair, especially how fast I'd played him.
2) Two pair: possible. It's not AK here for sure. It could be A9/A6/K9/K6/96. He was folding often enough preflop that I don't think K6/96 are in his range. Flat-calling against this is an obvious mistake.
3) Pair of aces: pretty possible. Again, flat-calling against this hand would be a mistake.

Something lucko has been trying to get through my thick skull lately is that when you have a decent hand (and 2nd pair TK is definitely decent) and you show weakness, do NOT let people take advantage of this weakness.

That, and I'm still ahead of the following:
1) A worse king: against this, he's got 3 outs to win, and 6 to chop. I'm more than willing to play this street slow in order to extract more from him on the river. Re-popping here will make a lot of the weaker kings to lay down.
2) A nine: same thing.
3) A six: probably going to be tough to extract value from this on the river, so letting a naked six draw for free is probably a much bigger mistake than the nine.
4) A draw that was picked up on the turn: should definitely raise these hands.
5) Air: might as well let him bluff off again on the river if he wants.

I'm pretty sure he's betting $3 with all of these hands.

Against the non-air range, I'm a slight dog.

equity win tie pots won pots tied
Hand 0: 48.272% 46.27% 02.00% 4927 213.00 { KcQs }
Hand 1: 51.728% 49.73% 02.00% 5295 213.00 { ATs-A2s, K6s+, QcJc, QcTc, Qc9c, Qc8c, JcTc, J9s, Jc8c, T9s, Tc8c, Tc7c, 98s, 9c7c, 87s, 8c6c, 76s, 7c5c, 65s, AJo-A2o, K8o+, Q9o, J9o, T9o, 98o, 87o, 76o, 65o }

I think that's a decent estimate of his range, but tough to tell after less than two dozen hands. Throw in some air, and I'm a slight favorite.

It's close, and while I don't want to let a draw get there for free (especially because if he hits a straight, I'm going to pay him off way too often, and probably a flush occasionally, especially for a small bet) I don't want to raise and/or build a huge pot with a decent but marginal holding.

So calling here has a few benefits:
1) Let's him bluff the river again. That's always fun.
2) Costs me less money if I'm already behind.
3) Dodges a reraise, whether it's for value or a bluff.
4) I have position on him on the next street. If he bets again, I can make a decision based on how much and what card. If he checks, I can go for a value bet or just knuckle behind, depending on the card.

The drawbacks to calling are pretty obvious:
1) Let's them draw for free(-ish)
2) Keeps me from getting full value on this street

The second part is a little interesting because as I mentioned earlier, I'm not necessarily losing value on the hand in its entirety because I can get another bet in from him on the river, whereas a raise might not be called.

River (board: Ah Ks 9c 6c 3h):
GqBury bets $9. themffulton calls.

Total blank hits. Assuming he always bluffs, getting 2-1 I have to call:

equity win tie pots won pots tied
Hand 0: 50.209% 48.95% 01.26% 117 3.00 { KcQs }
Hand 1: 49.791% 48.54% 01.26% 116 3.00 { ATs-A2s, K6s+, QcJc, QcTc, Qc9c, Qc8c, JcTc, J9s, Jc8c, T9s, Tc8c, Tc7c, 98s, 9c7c, 87s, 8c6c, 76s, 7c5c, 65s, AJo-A2o, K8o+, Q9o, J9o, T9o, 98o, 87o, 76o, 65o }


Of course, I don't think he's bluffing all of the time. But then again, he's probably not going to bet rag aces that hard either.

In any case, because the draws all missed, in addition to the fact that I could tell even in this short period of time, I had to have gotten under this guys skin, I opted to pay him off; if I had the best hand on the turn, I was definitely still good here.

So was he bluffing? Or more specifically, was he bluffing at least 1/3 of the time? I thought so.


GqBury shows 8c Tc.
GqBury has 8c Tc Ah Ks 9c: ace high.
themffulton shows Kc Qs.
themffulton has Kc Qs Ah Ks 9c: a pair of kings.

He sat up after this hand. I wonder how differently this hand should play out on both sides if it was towards the beginning of the session or if he wasn't stuck. I'm much more often betting the flop and ending the hand right there, but for the times that I happen to check the flop, I think his turn bets are still very similar. I think vs. these bets I have to raise more often because there will be less tilt-induced semi-bluff reraises I'll have to fold to. On the river, I am pretty sure his bet is a fold. I think he's probably bluffing a lot less than 33% of the time there. Whatever thoughts you all have in a spot like this (vs. an unknown opp) would be appreciated.

After this, I played some .5/1 with UrBluffingMe/xxIsleroxx and won a few more bucks, as I managed to win more than I would make in an entire day at work, before I got out of bed.

Almost forgot...

Don't use the Beta Version of Full Tilt.

Didn't quite make it

Didn't manage to play the 5.5K hands I wanted to this week. Part of this is because I actually had to go into work twice this week. I also found myself moderately (Friday) and inexplicably (Saturday) drunk this weekend.

All in all, I feel like I played pretty well this week. As I already mentioned, I got to work on my heads up game a bit while playing with Mag. I played another guy heads up on UB for about 300 hands. I managed to break him three times, but he bought in short every time. And since the match went on for so long, the big winner of the game was Ultimate Bet, not me. I had a chance earlier to finish him off when I turned 2 pair and jammed on him, but he called with his TP + flush draw and caught up, and went on a pretty sick run for a while until I managed to wear him down to a point where he was open-jamming 20BB on me.

Not much else happening. There have been some awesome threads going on at +1. It's nice to see that the poker sections there have started to pick up again. On the other side of the coin, however, there has been some atrocious discussion going on over at CP. I do my best to give solid, well-thought out advice while simultaneously kicking people in the teeth.

Interviewing at NEOUCOM in the morning. Not really nervous, but I hate waking up early. If all does not go well, I might have to start playing a hell of a lot more than five thousand hands a week...

...yes, I was joking.

My next post will be more interesting, I promise.

A few scattered thoughts

I'm trying to play ~5.5k hands this week. I've played about 3.3k so far I think. I figured out that in an hour I play about 137 hands (playing shorthanded), so if I were playing 40 hours a week it'd equal about five and a half thousand hands. Of course, since I multi-table, 40 hours a week is gonna be a lot more than that. But as of right now, this is my goal.

By the way, 5.5k hands is considerably more than any live player is gonna get. Even if a person plays for a week straight, and they have a fast dealer at a short-handed table and is getting about 40 hands an hour (yeah, right) they're playing 40*24*7 = about 6,700 hands. More realistically, I think 25 hands/hour * 60 hours = 1,500 hands per week. I'm double that already.

I played Mag heads up a few nights ago. It did not go well, but he gave me some solid advice to help my heads up game. Luckbox also won the $30 flip we did. Good times. Definitely worth the lessons.

I'm actually playing okay in SNGs lately. I've cashed in 9 of my last 10 SNGs, but I've had way too many thirds, not enough firsts.

I finally downloaded PAHud. I have to buy it soon. Very sweet program, and found a template to use for UBs mini-screen. If only it worked for the resizable FTP screens.

I'm very tired right now.

I've been watching High Stakes Poker. I can't imagine how a lot of these players (Farha, Elezra) can manage to play these games. Maybe they play limit games (and for Farha, apparently PLO) well, but they need to stay away from NLHE. The people who've played the best are the ones who aren't known for playing in the big game (with the obvious exceptions of Greenstein and Brunson). I used to think people like Mag were crazy for saying that if you took five of the players from the big game and five of the best online NLHE cash players, put them at a NLHE table and the internet players are going to crush, but my mind has changed drastically.

I think I'm going to sign up for Cardrunners. Maybe.

I wish I had this shirt.


Okay, more later.