Well, I just got back from a $100 NLHE tournament. It was a local tournament and it paid out to the top 4 players. I got knocked out at 5th place. Go figure.
I was the short stack as the BB. I had $2175 after my $400 BB (the blinds were $200/$400-$50 ante). So I was very short stacked. Anyway, I had 5-2o in the BB. There were 2 limpers and the blinds in the hand pre-flop.
So the flop comes 2-5-J. Well, with about almost $2000 in the pot, I went all in figuring my two pair was best. Well, I got called. I was hoping for a mid-pocket pair or two high cards or even A-J. Nope. The guy called me with pocket fives. That was the one of very few hands that had me dominated. I would need to hit running deuces to win. Of course that didn't happen. Oh well, there is absolutely nothing I can do with that. I can't fold and neither could the other guy. I was destined to lose that hand and go out on the bubble.
However, I think my play today was very good. In fact, I think I played extremely well. I made a good play with pocket Kings early:
It was early in the tournament and I had pocket Kings in the big blind. My opponent raised it to $175 (the blinds were $25/$50). I just called in the big blind. I checked in the dark. The flop comes out 6-8-J. He bets out $200. I min-raised him to $400. He thinks about it and calls. The turn comes, blank card. I bet $500. He was pretty perplexed with that bet. I said he hit the flop but he ended up folding.
I think he probably had K-J or maybe even A-J. He's played with me plenty of times and probably put me on a strong hand like QQ or something of that strength. He knows I'm a pretty tight player and wouldn't call a raise out of position with a marginal hand. I think I got about as much as I could for that hand.
The other hand I think I played pretty well was a bluff. I was in the hand with two other players as the BB. Three hearts came out and the small blind checked, I checked and the last player checked. The small blind was pretty short stacked but had about 12 BB in him. So after the flop, a non-heart came out and he checked and I bet about half the pot. I was thinking how I would play the hand if I hit the flop but was afraid of the flush? I think I would check the flop and bet the turn. So I bet the turn. The guy in position folded and the small blind called. I had absolutely nothing. I had two spades, in fact. The last card put another blank card - non-heart. The small blind checked and I had to bet in order to win the pot. I knew with his stack, he couldn't just call and hope to win. Every bet he puts out there is one less bet he can steal with later if he doesn't win this hand. So I bet half the pot with nothing again and he even said, "I think you have a pair with a flush draw." and mucked his hand.
The next highlight hand was with the same guy I bluffed, in the exact same position. He was the small blind and I was the big blind. I had pocket 10s and after he limped, I raised him three times the BB. He called. The board made my 10s an over pair. He checked and I bet half the pot. He called. The turn brought a flush and I checked and he checked behind me. The river paired the board. The pot had about $1000 and he bet $500. So at this point, I don't have a hand strong enough to raise but I did have a hand that could beat any pair that he might have made. Also, he could have tripped up or slow played the flush. So I just called and he showed Ad-6d. He caught his 6 on the flop and thought I missed with AK or AQ possibly.
I showed him my pocket 10s and took down a nice pot.
So this guy to my right was very short stacked now. About 3 or 4 hands later, I see him limp in with a hand. He probably had about $700 and the blinds were $50/$100. So really he was in the all-in/fold mode. So I was really wondering why he's limping in. But in this particular hand, I saw him limp and then check call a $200 bet on the flop. So I'm thinking what the hell is he just calling? I was thinking, he has a monster hand and trying to extract maximum value. So the turn comes, he bets $200. The fool playing him calls. The river comes and goes all in with the remaining $200.
The idiot has to call with those pot odds....not realizing his opponent was playing the complete opposite of short-stacked play. Turns out he flopped a set. He doubled up. I saw his play a mile away. I would have shut it all down after the check-call on the flop.
Anyway, I was pretty proud of how I played and got all my reads correctly.
Still need to deposit $250 into my other pokerstars account to play some cash games online.
Well, that's about it. I'm still loving my iMac. It's great.
As a side note, I play in a band (keyboards) and we're playing in N. Va. on August 5th. It will be my first live performance since my piano recitals when I was like 16.
That's it!
Tuesday, June 26, 2007
Wednesday, June 20, 2007
now a mac-er
Well, I made the switch to the mac. After about a month of frustration with my pc, I finally gave up on Windows. I'm about 90% sure that the hardware was fine and windows is a piece of shit. The problem with all this is there's no pokerstars software for the mac. At least not yet. I emailed support and they're working hard for a mac version.
So far so good on the mac. I thought I'd be lost but it's not that bad. Pretty easy transition. I did my research on the external drives making sure that I didn't lose anything in the transition. That was a relief. The only hiccup in the transition is I have all my internet email pop-forwarded into my Outlook inbox. So the emails don't reside on server once they are forwarded. So I have this huge .pst file that isn't compatible with Entourage (the Mac version of Outlook). It took me about a day to research this. I found all kinds of tools that cost money to do the job. But I found a tip from some website and the solution is quite simple:
Download Mozilla Thunderbird.
Import all your email from Outlook into Thunderbird.
Once that is complete, your email files will be in your windows profile folder typically, C:\Documents and Settings\\Application Data\Thunderbird\(etc.)
There will be a file with no extension that will contain all your emails for that particular folder. That file is a regular text file using the MBOX format.
Transfer the files to your mac.
Drag the file to the Entourage folder and let the importing begin!
Now I have everything...well not everything.
Right now I have to play poker online using my Tablet PC which is fine for now. There might come a time where I might be forced to run an emulator on my mac (right now the best one is called 'Parallels') for work. If that happens, then I'll install pokerstars and can do everything on the same machine. We'll see.
Well, onto actual poker discussion.
Last Sunday, I played in a mega-satellite for the main event at the WSOP. There were almost 7000 entrants. I finished in 1080ish place. I was pretty card dead the entire 4 hour session. I only saw 12% of my hands on the flop or later.
As we were heading to the 4th break, I was the BB with KJo and it got folded all the way back to the SB. I was pretty short stacked ($1300 with $100/$200 $25ante). Suddenly the SB, who btw had a decent lead in chips compared to me, goes all in. I figured he had a weak hand and wanted to steal before the break and figured I didn't have much of a hand at all. So I insta-called with my KJ. He showed AQ and I got knocked out. It was a great play. I was short stacked, it was folded to just us. An all-in move would get no respect and any kind of hand would call, at least I would. An additional thing is, had this person raised, I'd either fold or go all-in.
Oh well, maybe next year.
Right now, I'm interested in getting into some cash games and start carving out a professional career. I'll have to start off small. Based on the book I just read, I'm gonna need a bankroll that will allow me to build.
Since I'll be specializing in NLHE, the max buy-in is 100 times the big blind.
This means at a $1/$2 table, the most I can sit down with is $200.
According to the book, experts (most players aren't expert level) would need about 15 times the max buy-in or in this example, $3000.
Good to very good players need about 25-30 times the max buy-in. I think I'm at that level so that puts me at $5k to $6k. Yeah...a little too rich for me to start off.
So I figure the $0.05/$0.10 game is around my neighborhood.
At 25 times the max buy-in for this game ($10) is $250. That is better.
So, very good players average about one big bet per hour. That is, at a $1/$2 table, a very good player can make a profit about $1 every hour they play. Consequently, to play professional full-time, I'd probably need to play profitably at the $25/$50 tables.
Anyone who thinks one big bet per hour is easy, try it. Take into consideration how many hours you've ever played in your life. Consider all the big wins and losses and all the break-even days. Even at 25/50 cent limits, if you've played 1000 hours in your lifetime, do you think you've profited $500? That's a lot of money if you think about it just from recreational playing. Surely you'd know if you're up that much.
Well, I'm gonna put it to the test.
I'll use this blog to record each day I play and how many hours I played, how much I started the session with and how much I ended with at the end of the session.
I'll be playing the 5/10 cent games.
I'll have to use my other account to keep money separate from my tournament money.
Oh, btw, I'll probably be playing 4 tables at a time. This way I can quadruple my earnings (actually 8 times). The great thing about internet poker is I can play as many tables as I want without having to increase my bankroll. The one big blind rule is based on a brick and mortar casino table. You roughly play twice as many hands online than you do in a casino. Playing 4 tables every hour is effective to an entire day!
So far so good on the mac. I thought I'd be lost but it's not that bad. Pretty easy transition. I did my research on the external drives making sure that I didn't lose anything in the transition. That was a relief. The only hiccup in the transition is I have all my internet email pop-forwarded into my Outlook inbox. So the emails don't reside on server once they are forwarded. So I have this huge .pst file that isn't compatible with Entourage (the Mac version of Outlook). It took me about a day to research this. I found all kinds of tools that cost money to do the job. But I found a tip from some website and the solution is quite simple:
Download Mozilla Thunderbird.
Import all your email from Outlook into Thunderbird.
Once that is complete, your email files will be in your windows profile folder typically, C:\Documents and Settings\
There will be a file with no extension that will contain all your emails for that particular folder. That file is a regular text file using the MBOX format.
Transfer the files to your mac.
Drag the file to the Entourage folder and let the importing begin!
Now I have everything...well not everything.
Right now I have to play poker online using my Tablet PC which is fine for now. There might come a time where I might be forced to run an emulator on my mac (right now the best one is called 'Parallels') for work. If that happens, then I'll install pokerstars and can do everything on the same machine. We'll see.
Well, onto actual poker discussion.
Last Sunday, I played in a mega-satellite for the main event at the WSOP. There were almost 7000 entrants. I finished in 1080ish place. I was pretty card dead the entire 4 hour session. I only saw 12% of my hands on the flop or later.
As we were heading to the 4th break, I was the BB with KJo and it got folded all the way back to the SB. I was pretty short stacked ($1300 with $100/$200 $25ante). Suddenly the SB, who btw had a decent lead in chips compared to me, goes all in. I figured he had a weak hand and wanted to steal before the break and figured I didn't have much of a hand at all. So I insta-called with my KJ. He showed AQ and I got knocked out. It was a great play. I was short stacked, it was folded to just us. An all-in move would get no respect and any kind of hand would call, at least I would. An additional thing is, had this person raised, I'd either fold or go all-in.
Oh well, maybe next year.
Right now, I'm interested in getting into some cash games and start carving out a professional career. I'll have to start off small. Based on the book I just read, I'm gonna need a bankroll that will allow me to build.
Since I'll be specializing in NLHE, the max buy-in is 100 times the big blind.
This means at a $1/$2 table, the most I can sit down with is $200.
According to the book, experts (most players aren't expert level) would need about 15 times the max buy-in or in this example, $3000.
Good to very good players need about 25-30 times the max buy-in. I think I'm at that level so that puts me at $5k to $6k. Yeah...a little too rich for me to start off.
So I figure the $0.05/$0.10 game is around my neighborhood.
At 25 times the max buy-in for this game ($10) is $250. That is better.
So, very good players average about one big bet per hour. That is, at a $1/$2 table, a very good player can make a profit about $1 every hour they play. Consequently, to play professional full-time, I'd probably need to play profitably at the $25/$50 tables.
Anyone who thinks one big bet per hour is easy, try it. Take into consideration how many hours you've ever played in your life. Consider all the big wins and losses and all the break-even days. Even at 25/50 cent limits, if you've played 1000 hours in your lifetime, do you think you've profited $500? That's a lot of money if you think about it just from recreational playing. Surely you'd know if you're up that much.
Well, I'm gonna put it to the test.
I'll use this blog to record each day I play and how many hours I played, how much I started the session with and how much I ended with at the end of the session.
I'll be playing the 5/10 cent games.
I'll have to use my other account to keep money separate from my tournament money.
Oh, btw, I'll probably be playing 4 tables at a time. This way I can quadruple my earnings (actually 8 times). The great thing about internet poker is I can play as many tables as I want without having to increase my bankroll. The one big blind rule is based on a brick and mortar casino table. You roughly play twice as many hands online than you do in a casino. Playing 4 tables every hour is effective to an entire day!
Sunday, June 10, 2007
new ring game
Well a poker buddy of mine introduced me to a new cash game on Sunday nights. It's not a weekly game. It's like every 3 Sundays or so.
So I came down to check it out.
The first game I was in, I lost to a girl who flopped quad jacks. The game was 0.50/1.00 limit. The cap buy-in was $100...pretty standard. Anyway, this girl limped in for a $1 with pocket Jacks. That practically made it impossible for me to put her on a couple jacks. So when the flop came out with two jacks and a Ten, with 8s9s I had an open ended straight. The turn, another spade, brought me more outs that were in reality all dead. She gave me the right odds to call and when I hit my flush, I thought I was good. She value bet her quads and I had paid her off. I definitely put her on a Jack but not quads. Oh well, a hand like that should get paid off. I don't think I played that one bad but I just ran into some bad luck.
As the night progressed, I was down to my last $22 but made a comeback with pocket 5s on a scare board that showed all clubs. I knew if I got called, I was losing. But nobody called.
Next all-in moment came when I called a raise with 4 others in the pot with AJo. I flopped top pair and went all-in with $38 and got no callers. I was on my way back to getting back to even.
Then two hands later, I got priced in with J9o in the small blind and made the call with 6 players. I flopped the absolute nuts(8TQ-rainbow). Being in the small blind along with my tight image, I checked. This guy to my right is quite aggressive with any type of hand, so I got another reason to check. So UTG guy bets out and got two callers, including the guy to my right. Awesome...I'm getting more dead money into the pot. Turn - 3c. No help and no flush draws either. I'm still sitting pretty with my straight. I check. The UTG bets out and chases out the other two bettors and it comes back to me. I examine my stack and wondered if I should go all-in or just call. So I posture a little and count out my stack and also take a look at how much I'd have left to potentially call on the river. I call. A 9 comes out on the river which pretty much was a scare card for my opponent. Now all kinds of hands I could have been check calling would have made it and I knew if I checked, he'd check behind me. So I had to bet first. I didn't have much left but I felt the right amount had to be a little less than an all-in. I bet $25 into about $95 pot. I felt it was about right. I'm giving him almost 5:1 on his money to call. He smiled figuring I had the Jack and called. I showed him my cards and I slow played the nuts the entire time.
That hand catapulted me into the black by about $40 - which coincidentally was for the most part contributed to the dead money with two callers on the flop.
Of course all my profits and stack went to shit about 30 minutes later. I was in late middle position with AJo. It was min-raised and min-re-raised to $4. I called and the small blind raised it up to $6. He wanted to see how strong his hand was. I noticed that everyone who called the min-raise called. Action was back to me. There was already about $40 in the pot with nobody showing any kind of real strength. So my only options were to fold or go all-in. IMO, I considered the dead $40 just waiting for an owner. So I took the rest of my chips and went all in which was around $140 more. Everyone, like I expected, dropped out like flies. Until it got to the host. He sat there trying to figure out what kind of hand I had. He pondered for a good minute thinking he felt lucky and ultimately made the call. He showed A8 and I turned up AJ. Apparently, I made other people fold 99 and JJ due to my tight image. Well, the flop came out Ax8. Well, at that point I wanted to puke but with two jacks gone, I'm drawing to one jack in the deck and of course I didn't get there. But I shrugged it off and said, 'That's poker.' I didn't feel like re-loading for another $100. The host apologized and honestly, I was fine with it. I mean it was a bad call but to get mad about it doesn't do anything but get other people in a bad mood and it doesn't change a damn thing. The last thing I want is to discourage people playing poorly. In a cash game, the good thing is you're never out. You can buy back in with more money and in the long run make it all back. Part of playing poker is making the best decisions and poker all the time. The money will take care of itself in the end. I think I made the right decision in the pot, I could have folded but it was against my intuitions. I would have made my Aces on the flop against the JJ and the 99 and took down the pot anyway. It would have been a coin flip against those pairs and I thought they wouldn't want to gamble the rest of their chips. A couple of those guys already had to re-buy a couple of times already. I didn't think they wanted to tangle with me for all their chips.
So, the thing that I found pretty remarkable was I wasn't as pissed off on the inside as much as I thought I'd be. I'm much better with taking bad beats. I know I with this crew, I'm going to be a long-term winner. Anyway, I think a large part of my attitude was reading the book on being a pro. Bad beats are good for poker. It keeps the poor players keep playing poorly.
So I came down to check it out.
The first game I was in, I lost to a girl who flopped quad jacks. The game was 0.50/1.00 limit. The cap buy-in was $100...pretty standard. Anyway, this girl limped in for a $1 with pocket Jacks. That practically made it impossible for me to put her on a couple jacks. So when the flop came out with two jacks and a Ten, with 8s9s I had an open ended straight. The turn, another spade, brought me more outs that were in reality all dead. She gave me the right odds to call and when I hit my flush, I thought I was good. She value bet her quads and I had paid her off. I definitely put her on a Jack but not quads. Oh well, a hand like that should get paid off. I don't think I played that one bad but I just ran into some bad luck.
As the night progressed, I was down to my last $22 but made a comeback with pocket 5s on a scare board that showed all clubs. I knew if I got called, I was losing. But nobody called.
Next all-in moment came when I called a raise with 4 others in the pot with AJo. I flopped top pair and went all-in with $38 and got no callers. I was on my way back to getting back to even.
Then two hands later, I got priced in with J9o in the small blind and made the call with 6 players. I flopped the absolute nuts(8TQ-rainbow). Being in the small blind along with my tight image, I checked. This guy to my right is quite aggressive with any type of hand, so I got another reason to check. So UTG guy bets out and got two callers, including the guy to my right. Awesome...I'm getting more dead money into the pot. Turn - 3c. No help and no flush draws either. I'm still sitting pretty with my straight. I check. The UTG bets out and chases out the other two bettors and it comes back to me. I examine my stack and wondered if I should go all-in or just call. So I posture a little and count out my stack and also take a look at how much I'd have left to potentially call on the river. I call. A 9 comes out on the river which pretty much was a scare card for my opponent. Now all kinds of hands I could have been check calling would have made it and I knew if I checked, he'd check behind me. So I had to bet first. I didn't have much left but I felt the right amount had to be a little less than an all-in. I bet $25 into about $95 pot. I felt it was about right. I'm giving him almost 5:1 on his money to call. He smiled figuring I had the Jack and called. I showed him my cards and I slow played the nuts the entire time.
That hand catapulted me into the black by about $40 - which coincidentally was for the most part contributed to the dead money with two callers on the flop.
Of course all my profits and stack went to shit about 30 minutes later. I was in late middle position with AJo. It was min-raised and min-re-raised to $4. I called and the small blind raised it up to $6. He wanted to see how strong his hand was. I noticed that everyone who called the min-raise called. Action was back to me. There was already about $40 in the pot with nobody showing any kind of real strength. So my only options were to fold or go all-in. IMO, I considered the dead $40 just waiting for an owner. So I took the rest of my chips and went all in which was around $140 more. Everyone, like I expected, dropped out like flies. Until it got to the host. He sat there trying to figure out what kind of hand I had. He pondered for a good minute thinking he felt lucky and ultimately made the call. He showed A8 and I turned up AJ. Apparently, I made other people fold 99 and JJ due to my tight image. Well, the flop came out Ax8. Well, at that point I wanted to puke but with two jacks gone, I'm drawing to one jack in the deck and of course I didn't get there. But I shrugged it off and said, 'That's poker.' I didn't feel like re-loading for another $100. The host apologized and honestly, I was fine with it. I mean it was a bad call but to get mad about it doesn't do anything but get other people in a bad mood and it doesn't change a damn thing. The last thing I want is to discourage people playing poorly. In a cash game, the good thing is you're never out. You can buy back in with more money and in the long run make it all back. Part of playing poker is making the best decisions and poker all the time. The money will take care of itself in the end. I think I made the right decision in the pot, I could have folded but it was against my intuitions. I would have made my Aces on the flop against the JJ and the 99 and took down the pot anyway. It would have been a coin flip against those pairs and I thought they wouldn't want to gamble the rest of their chips. A couple of those guys already had to re-buy a couple of times already. I didn't think they wanted to tangle with me for all their chips.
So, the thing that I found pretty remarkable was I wasn't as pissed off on the inside as much as I thought I'd be. I'm much better with taking bad beats. I know I with this crew, I'm going to be a long-term winner. Anyway, I think a large part of my attitude was reading the book on being a pro. Bad beats are good for poker. It keeps the poor players keep playing poorly.
Tuesday, June 5, 2007
cooler magnet
Well, I've been on a general losing streak. After two months without a refill, I finally had to last night. Since I've been playing at the $50+ sng, I had to put in for $200.
Anyway, lately, I've been getting more aggressive with a short stack. Normally, when the blinds are at $50/$100, I used to play the same tight game. However, if I'm at below $1500 mark, I only have 15 BB left. Now I wouldn't panic yet, but the next level is $75/$150. So I need to start stealing and if unsuccessful, I'm in all-in/fold mode.
Well, so when I find myself short stacked, I've been going all in with any ace usually. Depending on the table, I'd also go in with suited connectors and hands I feel that would call and dominate me. So hands like K4 or K8 are hands I avoid.
Anyway, I end up going all in a lot more now and I find myself constantly running into coolers - meaning Aces, Kings or Queens. I don't know why I find myself running into these hands. I feel it shouldn't happen as often as it has.
10:18 PM:
Well, I just layed down a monster pot with QQ. Someone in early position raised and I called. I was reading about how not to telegraph your hands by re-raising pre-flop. So I just flat called the initial raiser. However, the seat to my left re-raised (from 60 to 220). So the initial raiser folded. I called as well. So the flop comes out K-K-7. I pause and check. Raiser checks behind me. Turn card - 4. I bet about 300 into the 600 pot. The raiser now goes over the top and goes all in.
I figure my Queens are beat by either A-K or Aces. I doubt if he flopped quads, he'd go all in. But I feel he didn't have A-K because he'd flop trips and I'd be drawing to two outs - why scare me out? I think he had Aces. I think he'd was willing to go broke with that hand had I had A-K. Aces make the most sense because he raised so much pre-flop and then went all in on the turn.
10:46 PM
Well, got knocked out by another donkey. I had about 1300 in chips and the blinds at 50/100. The donkey on the button raised with Ad3d. I had AcKc. He raised it to 300 and after thinking about it, I went all in. He insta-called. I was in great shape to double up after seeing his 3d being dominated. However, the flop brought 2 diamonds. Of COURSE!!! The turn brought the Kd. Pokerstars had to make it painful.
That was the end of me. It's exactly those kinds of hands that make me really wonder if online poker isn't fixed.
Oh well, I should go to bed now.
Anyway, lately, I've been getting more aggressive with a short stack. Normally, when the blinds are at $50/$100, I used to play the same tight game. However, if I'm at below $1500 mark, I only have 15 BB left. Now I wouldn't panic yet, but the next level is $75/$150. So I need to start stealing and if unsuccessful, I'm in all-in/fold mode.
Well, so when I find myself short stacked, I've been going all in with any ace usually. Depending on the table, I'd also go in with suited connectors and hands I feel that would call and dominate me. So hands like K4 or K8 are hands I avoid.
Anyway, I end up going all in a lot more now and I find myself constantly running into coolers - meaning Aces, Kings or Queens. I don't know why I find myself running into these hands. I feel it shouldn't happen as often as it has.
10:18 PM:
Well, I just layed down a monster pot with QQ. Someone in early position raised and I called. I was reading about how not to telegraph your hands by re-raising pre-flop. So I just flat called the initial raiser. However, the seat to my left re-raised (from 60 to 220). So the initial raiser folded. I called as well. So the flop comes out K-K-7. I pause and check. Raiser checks behind me. Turn card - 4. I bet about 300 into the 600 pot. The raiser now goes over the top and goes all in.
I figure my Queens are beat by either A-K or Aces. I doubt if he flopped quads, he'd go all in. But I feel he didn't have A-K because he'd flop trips and I'd be drawing to two outs - why scare me out? I think he had Aces. I think he'd was willing to go broke with that hand had I had A-K. Aces make the most sense because he raised so much pre-flop and then went all in on the turn.
10:46 PM
Well, got knocked out by another donkey. I had about 1300 in chips and the blinds at 50/100. The donkey on the button raised with Ad3d. I had AcKc. He raised it to 300 and after thinking about it, I went all in. He insta-called. I was in great shape to double up after seeing his 3d being dominated. However, the flop brought 2 diamonds. Of COURSE!!! The turn brought the Kd. Pokerstars had to make it painful.
That was the end of me. It's exactly those kinds of hands that make me really wonder if online poker isn't fixed.
Oh well, I should go to bed now.
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