I suck at MATH

I decided to play the MATH last night, but as usual I had 4 other windows up at the same time, which I am starting to notice is the reason for my poker demise. I logged on a little after 9pm and saw a token 2 table was about to start so I hopped on hoping that it would end in less than an hour. I sat to the left of InstantTragedy and when we both made the final table he proceeded to bust himself on the bubble. It was a bad play in my opinion to min-raise on the button and then shove on a whiffed flop that the BB managed to hit. He was gone after the next hand and I had my token. Bubble play in satellites and playing them in general is becoming a little clearer to me. I folded AQs and AJs on the bubble simply because I had a lot of chips and had no reason to gamboool. I like that. I wouldn't have been able to do that a few weeks ago, I think.

So I signed up to play the MATH with my token and along with 25 others. Top 3 paid so I had to play smart. My starting table was full of the who's who of the blogger webbernet, including Hoy himself, KOD, Columbo and a few others I am forgetting right now. I managed to double up early after playing very tight for the first few orbits, but then I gave away a lot of my chips to jeciimd when he held an over-pair and I tried to push him off it. Bad move on my part, but at least I had the chips to make that mistake.

I made a pretty good value bet when Chad (KOD) called my flopped 2-pair SB special with just a pair of 7s on a pretty scary board. I slow played it and made him pay me off, which felt good. I was cruising along at the top or near the top when we were down to about 12-13 players. And then I made an awful mistake.

Hoy had been catching some awesome cards and starting to bully the table. He was two to my right and raised my SB to 700 (3.5xBB) and got the button to call. I looked down at AQo and re-raised to 2200 because I believed he was on a steal again since he now had a lot of chips. I should have realized that he would only raise this much if he had a hand. I should have just called instead and seen the flop. Instead he pushed, the button folded and I thought that maybe he was trying another move, like pushing with A7o that he did earlier. I called and he had KK and I was gone.

So to recap:
1) I should have called 600 instead of re-raise and hoped to flop an Ace.
2) I should not have called his push with AQo.
3) I should not play a Razz freeroll when I am this close to the final table of the MATH. Idiot!
4) I should try to avoid broken laptop speaker tilt at all costs.

I think from now on I am going to focus on playing a single tournament at a time. I think my new focus is going to be the deep-stack $10 90SNG on Full Tilt.

To Mac or not to Mac

I am a PC guy by default. I have to use a laptop for work and have done so for the past 10 years. But every once in a while I get the urge to throw the damn WinTel box out the window and switch to a cool looking Mac instead. One of the things I worry about is software for the Mac and all kinds of compatibility issues that might arise. And up until not too long ago I was worried about being able to play Online Poker on a Mac.

There are a few sites that actually make it easy to understand how to make certain poker sites work on a Mac through Virtual PC or other techniques. But recently a lot of the poker sites have started coming out with actual downloadable executables that will not run as some weird Java or Flash applications. There's a great list right here.

I've used Compatible Poker before for all kinds of other reasons. They have a great page detailing all the funding options available to US players. For example, I only recently found out that the old trusty Gift2Go cards sold at Walgreens are no longer available or accepted on most sites. I think that kind of halts my ability to make deposits if I bust, so maybe that will lead to some more disciplined play on my part. I wanted to go ahead and put some money on Bodog and found out its harder than I thought. They do have some Phone Card option, but I need to research that a little more.

Anyway, back to the topic at hand. The big two US supported sites that will run on a Mac are Absolute Poker and Full Tilt Poker. PokerStars will still require either an emulator or you will need to actually run Windows on your Mac (kind of defeats tha purpose though). There are many other sites that will run on a Mac including Party poker for all you non-US based players. If you want to read a quick review of the sites and software they use just go here.

So, what's the verdict for me? I think I will wait it out a little longer. I can't really throw away the corporate PC just yet. But when I do, I am going for the Mac for sure.

If you're going to San Francisco....

.... you should go play at Lucky Chances!

More on that later. First we need to kick off this trip report with the obligatory wacky travel happenings.

I am Delta Gold so I got upgraded on the way out. I take my seat and find that this is a newly renovated plane and has a single jack headset system and free movie selection. I need to update a ton of movies on CineJax. TripJax is slacking too, so I don't feel that bad about it.

Guy next to me is about 400+ lbs and reeks of vodka. He proceeds to order three double vodkas before we even take off and the flight attendant informs him after the second one that he will have to wait till we're airborne. He immediately falls asleep and starts snoring. Thanks you Sony for noise canceling headphones.

As soon as we take off I start to watch one of the movies. Big guy wakes up and starts to fumble around with the headphones. Numbnuts is trying to insert the two prong jacks into a single prong slot. After about 3 minutes of this I help him out. He then goes on to clip the headphones backwards. Sheesh.

The rest of the flight was uneventful and we actually make some good time and land about 40 minutes early. I hop a quick cab and head for the city. My cab driver is completely insane and is hitting the 100 mph easily while honking at everyone in his way. If you ever saw the movie After Hours, there's a scene where Paul Hackett takes a cab and is thrown around violently in the back. That's how I felt.

Anyway, stayed in a nice hotel with free wireless and although I was exhausted I played a little online. Nothing to report there. I was too tired and made awful moves and tried to bluff too much. I need to stop bluffing. Must. Not. Bluff. I think I will put a sticky note on my screen to remind me.

Next day was death by PowerPoint for about 8 hours. I was going to hit up Lucky Chances, which was only 2 miles from where the meeting was but everyone decided to go to dinner at the Beach Chalet. Worst steak I have tasted in my life. We took a cab back to the city and I decided there was no way I was heading out in the cold to go find the casino now. I fired up the wireless and proceeded to make two final tables in the $4 180SNG on PS. I have to win one of these. I just have to. I have some great hands I will go over in a different post.

Today was another PowerPoint torture but luckily we were done around 2pm. Everyone headed to the airport and I ditched them and headed to the casino. I even told two of my bosses that I would rather go play some poker than hang out with them at the VIP lounge in the airport. Some people would be mortified to pull that off but that's just how I roll. I think I actually gained more respek right there.

So let me set the scene for y'all. Lucky Chances is the newest addition to the card room scene in the bay area. They have two large rooms with about 20 tables in each. One half is full of crazians (crazy asians) playing all kinds of insane -EV card games. The other half is pokah. I love play pokah (said while rubbing nipples). They have Hold'em, Stud and Omaha with all kinds of limits. I put my name on the 3/6 limit and the 1-1-2 200 max spread Hold'em games.

Let me explain for those who have never played this variety before (me included). The button posts $1, then the SB is $1 and the BB is $2. There is no limping allowed and you can only open raise to $4 or more. You can buy in for a minimum $40 and a maximum $200 and the maximum bet/raise on any street is $200. So for example, if on the turn someone bets $60 you can only raise to $260. Needless to say this is an extreme action game. We saw flops 6 and 7 handed a lot of the times. Let's get to the action.

They opened a new table for us which meant two things - I can choose where I want to sit if I get there first and we all start with a $200 max with nobody having a deeper stack. I chose seat 5 across from the dealer and bought in for the max. The table started filling up and most of the players were buying in for 100 or less. I'll describe the players as I go through the hands as many of them busted and we had new blood every 15-30 minutes.

First hand I pick up JJ in the SB. It was opened to $4 and called in two places so I raised it to $12 to see where I am at. Got two callers, the 9 seat who was a young Asian in a fancy suit and some serious bling (turns out he works in the financial industry somewhere in the bay) and the CO who was the 3 seat, a 40+ white guy who seemed like he worked in construction or something like that with a raspy voice. So we see a wonderful hammer flop of 722 three handed and I bet out $24 into a pot of about $40. The 9 seat raises it to $60 and the CO goes all in for $100. What the hell? This is the first hand!!! I think about it and decide one of these guys has me beat. I fold and the 9 seat calls and flips over pocket 7s for the boat. The CO shows 10s, mucks and rebuys. Good fold Kaja!

The very next hand I fold some junk and the 9 seat cracks the 1 seat's slow played Aces when he turns a straight.

Two hands later Aces get cracked by 7s on a turn 7.

Two hands later 2 players are all-in and Qd7d makes a river flush.

Next hand AQ vs AJ all-in on an Ace flop, but a Jack on the turn.

Let's take a breather. One orbit. About 8 times all-in and about 8 rebuys. This is going to be insane. I am putting my tight hat on.

The first hand I play is again in the blinds with 33 which I fold to a button bet on a flop of K72 and he shows pocket 2s.

The 9 seat left after going broke against all these maniacs. A new guy (heavy Asian with braces) sits down with a $100 buy-in and on his second hand picks up Aces against my Kings in the SB and I double him up. Nice cooler.

The 2 seat keeps putting up a live 8 straddle. I pick up AQ and bump it to $28 and everyone folds.

I get A8o in the BB and 4 of us see a flop of 985 rainbow. I bet small and the SB calls. Turn is a 10 and we both check it. River is an Ace and the Sb bets $24 which I call with Aces up. He has the almighty J7o for the turned straight. Glad I didn't go crazy there and just called. Maybe I am learning something. I was actually more afraid of a higher two pair or a set.

I get the hammer in the SB next hand and call the limp in with about half the table. The flop is 755 with two spades and I bet out $8. One caller, the 7 seat who is a suited donk and has been chasing flushes to the river a lot. Everyone else folds. Turn is a King and I bet out $20. 7 seat starts complaining and mucks, so I show him the hammer and proceed to tilt the whole table. Hammer-time!

Same suited donk in 7 seat wants a piece of me a few hands later. I get AJ in the SB and raise to $20 and still get 4 callers. I get no respek after showing the hammer. The low flop gets checked around and I bet $20 (into an $80+ pot) on the turn Ace. 7 seat is the only caller. River is a queen and I go all-in for my last $50. He calls, mucks and storms off. I think I had him out-kicked or something.

There was a wonderful hand that i was not a part of. Suited donk raised in 7 seat, 8 seat (a sunburned, long-haired, weirdo that looks a little like Allen Cunningham) moves all-in and the 3 seat (who is now some old aggro-Russian) calls. 7 seat calls as well and the flip over......
3 seat - pocket 6s (called a raise and an all-in with that shit? Kaja makes a little note)
7 seat - pocket Aces (suited donk gets a hand, but is short)
8 seat - Pocket Queens (good play trying to isolate the short suited donk)
Flop is A6x and everyone is cracking up.

I limp with AT. About 6 see a flop of AKx. I bet $20 and only the 6 seat (a tough guy in sunglasses who has been playing very well) calls. Turn is another Ace and we both check. River makes quads and I think about how much to bet. I decide to bet $40 into about a $60 pot and he thinks about it and folds a King! I don't get paid off and he says that if it was a smaller bet he might have called. Good fold sir.

I get Aces in the CO and raise to $10 and get 5 callers. Flop is KJ3 checked to me I bet $20 and all fold. Damn.

Ks2s limp with 6 others and flop KJ2. I check raise a shortie in the 9 seat and he's all-in with QT which doesn't complete.

The 1 and 2 seats are crazians who have been playing like complete maniacs (the 2 seat with his tarded live 8 straddle every orbit). The 1 seat has a nice stack in front of him and tries to bluff with nothing on the river and gets called. I tell him he's crazy to try to bluff an un-bluffable table and especially the suited donk in the 7 seat. He laughs it off and says I have been bluffing the whole time. Goo, you think that buddy.

Two hands later I make my move and limp in position with Jh2h. The flop is A22 with two clubs and I bet $20 and 1 seat calls. The turn is a 7 so I bet $60. He thinks and shoves. I call before he is done moving his chips and he mucks and walks away. I don't bluff, I told you!

At this point I thought I was over $500 and instead of tightening up I spewed chips like an idiot to lots of aggression on the table's part. I was actually only a little over 400 but the thought that I was now back to even was totally tilting me.

So the first hand where I gave a bunch back was when I played Js9s for a limp and saw a QT9 flop giving me bottom pair and an OESD. I bet out and get called by the 9 seat who is a young Hispanic guy who has a constant frown. He has been playing pretty aggressive so far. Turn was another T and we both check. River is another T and I have the baby boat, which loses to a lot of hands but I bet out $40 and he goes all-in for $2 more which I call. He shows T4 - stupid limp Kaja!!!

Mad old Russian in seat 3 has been relentlessly bullying the table. When he finally got called he showed some awful hands. But he had been building his stack and has told me twice that I am going to get called with my bluffs. So when I look down at JJ and he raises to $8 I re-raise it to $24. The flop is a terrible AQx and he bets $24 so I raise it to $100 (cause that's what you do when you're tilting and have third pair. He's all-in and I call, he shows the Ace and I catch a J on the turn to felt him. He walks away in anger. Oops.

No it's time to felt the angry Hispanic guy in the 9 seat. I get AK in the SB and raise to $10 and get 4 callers. The flop is a beautiful KK7 with two hearts. I lead out small for $10 to try and thin out the field or even get a chance to get re-raised, but instead I get 3 callers, damnit! A second diamond hit the turn and now there are two possible flushes out there and I decided to take down the $80+ pot. I bet $100 and the 9 seat shoves. As soon as the other two are out I call and he has KQ. Down to the felt he rebuys 3 more times for a hundred each, looses them all quickly and leaves the table.

Up to around $480 again. I decided to tighten up for real this time and only play position with great hands. Two young white guys join the table. They seem so preppy I figure they will be loose and wild. The 3 seat gets overly upset whenever he is re-raised. The 8 seat raises big and is willing to lay down a hand.

And then my dumbest/best play of the night. Dumbest because I was out of position with crap and bet out with nothing and best because I made the best single read of my live poker career. I would love to hear comments if anyone made it this far:

I get Ad8 in the BB and raise to $10. 3 seat guy calls and we are heads up.I know he is not going to give me any free cards so I make a mental note to lead out against him. The flop is 9d6d5c and I lead out for $20 and get a call. After the flop he checks his hole cards, so I know he's checking for those diamonds. The turn is a low diamond that couldn't help anyone unless one of us just made the flush. So I go ahead and lead out for $20 again and he thinks for a second and the says in a very strong manner "All-in" and throws is hands in the air and leans back in his chair. I almost start to laugh and nearly called the floor to get an Oscar for all the acting. He's got almost 200 by now and I have him covered. There's no way he made the flush. He's acting so strong that he must be weak. I call and flip over my diamond Ace high for the nut flush draw and an inside straight draw. He looks in disgust and flips over KdTs for a total of 6 outs. He doesn't hit any of them and goes off to steam. He hasn't been playing for 20 minutes and doesn't want to re-buy. He actually tells his buddy he wants to leave and his bud starts to laugh in his face. Once out of earshot his buddy tells the table that's exactly what happened last time they played, where the guy busted early on a bad flush draw.

I was up to $760 and packed it up. I had to head to the airport and I figure leaving up almost 3 buy-ins after 4 hours was a good day.

$

Some other funny stuff that happened during the session:

1) Once in a while I would get a questions about my card protector - an original Princess Leia action figure from 1977 that I found in a pile of junk somewhere a while back. I either reply that she's my only hope or that she's one lucky bitch and get a laugh from the table.

2) I think I invented a new poker term: "Limplied Odds". Feel free to use it whenever you want. You're welcome. It's what you get in the BB when the entire table limps. I got a couple of snickers on that one as well.

3) Lucky Chances is well known for the terrific table side menu they have. First thing I tried was a free "Lucky Sandwich". After I ate it I got my first cooler with the KK vs AA. I was still joking about Lucky Sandwich and the regulars told me it's a way to trick the out-of-towners to loose money. I said that I'll be lucky if I don't spend the rest of the night in the can. But it turns out it was a lucky sandwich. And then I ate something off the huge menu and it was really good.

Annette_15 is Blind

Well, not really blind, but rather playing blind. As in, she can't see her hole cards. And yet she manages to win a $4 180-SNG on PS. Without looking at her cards. Except for once where she lost the hand. I am going to go throw up now.

Ok, I'm back. Still feeling a bit queasy.

I try to read the great stuff on Plan3t Gong whenever I get a chance. I came across this link to the PokerXFactor video of Annette_15 playing blind. You only need to register in order to view this session as well as many others. Since I have not yet been able to win one of these, although I final tabled a couple, I was intrigued. So here is my analysis:

1) She gets lucky every 50 hands or so and performs a major suckout on some poor soul. I guess you have to get lucky to win one of these.
2) She almost always plays in position. I guess she has to play position since that is the most information she can get. But she does it very well.
3) She almost never limps. I like that and I like that strategy. Also, because she has no idea what cards she has, she can't afford to limp.
4) She attacks weakness every chance she gets. Especially effective when playing in position.
5) She stays out of the way of the big stacks. She doesn't play back at them, rarely attacks their blinds and almost always folds to their aggression.
6) She never calls an all-in that will put her tourney on the line.

Ok, so what have I learned from this? Nothing that i didn't already know. These are all great tournament strategy points and I guess it takes a lot of discipline to play that way and stick with it. Obviously getting lucky 4-5 times in the early stages kept her in the game, but the rest of it made complete sense.

One more thing to note is the way she played heads-up. She started with about a 3-to-1 chip deficit:

1) She almost always raised her button.
2) She would check if the button just called.
3) She would fold to all-in raises.

Again this makes a lot of sense. The only problem would be folding monsters you don't know about. She actually got KK and AA during heads-up play but didn't make any money on them.

So about 250 hands into this thing I started thinking about how I would play against someone like this. And I think I came to the conclusion that I would catagorize her as:
Weak-Tight-Aggressive (and Lucky).

Obviously this is with the benefit of seeing all her hole cards but the reason I added the 'weak' into the description is that she usually folded to aggression. She rarely check-raised and almost always folded to a check-raise or a re-raise, even in position.

Anyway, I still think it is a pretty amazing feat. And it is a session worth watching. Hopefully, I can learn a lot from this. This is a teenage girl for crying out loud! I heard a rumor that she has a team of players that she trained to play for her. She taught them her strategy and they are online 24/7 breaking the bank. I hope that's not true. Or in the immortal words of Maria in 'West Side Story': "Make it no be true"!

Chris Farley is alive !!!

No Magic

After the last home game I hosted, where BrainMc brought along 4-5 of his pro-neighborhood playahs, I got invited to go play in one of their games last Saturday. I was hella excited about it because they were using a circuit event buy-in structure, with 10K starting stacks and 30 minute blinds.

But everything went wrong....

It started with me getting a pass from KajaWife to go play this thing. I figured it would be OK since we were going to have a garage sale that morning and she would be to exhausted to care what I do that evening. I was right and I was cleared for poker night.

But everything went wrong....

The garage sale was a huge success. Only problem was we got up at 6am to start setting stuff up. And then I pretty much sat in the sun for the next 8 hours. I don't need no stinking sunscreen. Just give me more Gatorade. And beer. And diet Sprite. And water. And after all that, pack the crap that's left over and haul it to Goodwill. Unpack it there and drive back home. Pick up KajaKid and take her to the pool for another 2 hours of fun in the sun. Climbing up and down the big water slide. I don't need no stinking sunscreen.....

You get the point by now. I was fried. My skin doesn't get lobster red anymore, but I felt like a crisp piece of bacon. I got back home from the pool, fed the kid, bathed her and plopped her in her bed. She didn't take a nap that day so I knew she would go down easy and early. Now I was all set for poker....

I packed 6 bottles of water in my cooler (pussy), grabbed my card protector (Princess Leia) and headed out. I got there and found a motley crew of guys hanging out in an unfinished basement waiting for the game to start. Got my starting stack and made my way to my seat. We were supposed to have 30 runners but I think only 24 showed up. I invited my neighbor BR to come play and he was already there.

I already got a feeling these guys play a lot. Some of the guys had played and cashed in the last WSOP, a bunch of the guys routinely head out to Tunica and in general this seemed like a tougher crowd than my usual home game donkey pool.

So we sit down and I find out that I am sitting in the direct sunlight coming in from the window. I joked that I should have brought my sunglasses, for real. I pick up KK on the second hand and have to fold to a check raise on the turn after an Ace flop. I fold my cowboys face up to try to show I am willing to lay down a big hand. I then proceed to go card dead and try to play positional poker. I manage to tangle with the same guy 3 times and lose about half my stack. This calling station would not fold TPTK to any bet even when the board has a made flush on the turn. Twice he called my 1K bet on the river. The first time I had second pair and a busted draw. The second time I had the nut flush draw with a naked Ace and he still called. The third time he raised UTG and the comments from the other players helped me put him on a premium range. I looked down at 5c4c and decided to flat-call in position and see what happens. I flop a flush with QcJc8c and after he bets out I raise. He calls and the turn is another club - 7c. I pretty much figured I just got counterfeited here but still fired a second bullet which he check-called. I was praying for the 6c to come but instead I got a 6d. This time he bet out 1K and I had to decide if he was bluffing or not. He had seen me play suited cards and both times I showed the Ace. I should have shoved at that point and I might have gotten him to fold, but I called instead (bad move) and he showed two black tens for the fourth nuts.

At this point I was exhausted and short stacked and called a min-raise from the BB with KJ. Four of us saw the flop which was Kh8h5c. SB checked, I bet pot, UTG and UTG+1 folded and SB check-raised me all-in. I asked him if he was the SB or the button (this is how fried I was) and he said he was the SB. I thought he might have gotten lucky and flopped two pair or he was just trying to push me around because I was short. I called and he showed his set of 8's. GG me - NOT!

I was Gigli in a deep stack tourney and I wanted to kick myself in the ass. Instead I decided to deal for the table and did that for another half hour. But fatigue set in and I saw that before a cash game could start a lot of people would need to bust and that was not going to happen soon. So I wished BR luck and headed home. I was asleep before 10pm.

BR took second place at 2:30am after making the money short in 4th and watching the big stacks knock each other out to bump him up two spots.

I hope I get invited to this game again. This time I am sure that I will not spend 10+ hours in the sun before the game....

Tubby Tobey

Perez Hilton managed to mess up the WSOP in a nice way:

Tubby loves poker!

Tobey Maguire cashed in during two events at this year’s World Series of Poker, held this weekend in Temecula, California.

In event 45, out of 728 players Tubby busted 66th ($6,159). In the $10k main event, with a field of 6,358 players Tobey lasted three days and went out in 292nd place ($39,445).

Not too shabby!

P.S. Yes, Shannon “F List” Elizabeth was there too.

When is Jennifer Love Desperate going to join the poker circuit????

Some of the comments are hilarious.

What would you do?

As usual, out on the road I get to play my best poker. The only downside is fatigue, especially after going to the left coast, but I have handled triple days without sleep in my life so I can still focus and play well.

So the other night I played some big tourneys and cashed in almost all. Midnight Madness - 153/1430 after a bad re-steal with AQ ran into AK (damn you Hoy!!!).



$2 Donkament on PS - 50/1148 after leading the thing for most of the night. A couple of tokens won. A final table bubble in a 180, etc. Pretty solid night. I really want to win one, but I know I am close.

So I have three hands to ask your opinion on:

1) I decided that I was running well enough to try a deep stack $30 on FTP. On the 2nd or third hand I get dealt Aces in EP and raise 3xBB to 90. Button goes crazy and raises 30xBB to 900. I shove and he calls with AK and goes runner runner for a straight. Did I play this wrong? Do I smooth call and when he misses the flop check raise his c-bet? Or do you have to jam with Aces pre-flop against a single player every-time? What would you do?



2) In the $2 tourney I was cruising along making some awesome plays and catching great hands. Bigger stack moves to my right and he's playing pretty loose and wild even though we are getting close to some serious money (top spot is over $400, not bad for a $2 investment). Some of the shorties are busting like crazy. So shorty UTG shoves for about 7.2K (blinds re 800/1600/150), folds to big stack who has 69K who smooth calls. I have KsKc and shove 48K. Folds back to big stack who insta-calls with AhKh and who rivers a wheel and sends me packing. Did I play this wrong? Do I just smooth call and then jam the all diamond flop? UTG had Qs7s so nothing of importance. If I smooth call and see and all diamond flop and I don't have a diamond do I fold to big stack aggression here? What would you do?



3) In the money, I get TT in the CO. Small stack in MP raises 3xBB to 900 and I re-raise to 2100. SB shoves for 5105 and then BB shoves for 3605 and it is back to me after MP folds. It's 3K to call into a pot that now has 12K, so I am getting 4-to-1 to make the call. I started the hand with 21.1K and will have 16K if I lose the hand, but I can bust two players here and getting 4-to-1 to do it. I think this is an automatic call against two short stacks. I called and they had AA and AQ. Is there anything else I could have done here? I feel pretty good about my call here. What would you do?



Ok, that's it for now. I have some awesome hands I will share later where I flopped monsters and still got people to pay me off big time. Those are also interesting to analyze, but no time right now.

Daily Hand Quiz

I love this site. They always have something interesting to think about. Today is a great example of why I don't play 300/600 NL Heads-Up with OMGClayAiken.

More Table Talk and WSOP ME FT and Seattle

Not even sure what tournament I was playing in when one of the players busted. This is the funny table talk that happened right after:

Dealer: TheMilkMan77 shows [Jd Th]
Dealer: atr3124 shows [Ks Js]
Dealer: TheMilkMan77 shows two pair, Aces and Jacks
Dealer: atr3124 shows two pair, Aces and Jacks
Dealer: atr3124 wins the pot (6,480) with two pair, Aces and
Jacks
TheMilkMan77 (Observer): '
Dealer: Hand #2963963081
Dealer: Kajagugu has 15 seconds left to act
Dealer: Scott Holbrook wins the pot (300)
Dealer: Hand #2963964983
Dealer: jeff26m has 15 seconds left to act
VeryMonkeylike: the milkman casts a last desperate
appostrophe in frustraion

I almost peed my pants.

****

So last night I was just catching up on some ME updates and found a link to a site that was streaming the PPV FT live. I thought it must be a joke but decided to chekc it out. It was for real. And it was sloooooooooow and boooooooooring. No wonder it took them 16 hours. I watched when they were 4-handed and every hand took forever!

So, what do I think of the FT? I think Yang did an excellent job and most of the other players played like complete monkeys. Especially Lee "monkey boy" Watkinson who, with all his experience, shoved 49xBB with A7o. Are you kidding? What kind of play is that? At the very best you are dominated. At the very worst you are up against a pocket pair and have 3 outs!

And that crazy Hilm who moved all in with a flush draw? You can make those moves when you have a massive stack and can take a hit, but not when it's you tournament life at stake. How do you go from FT chip leader to out in 9th in less than an orbit?

I think Yang played a very aggressive game and got everyone so scared that they didn't know what to do with him. So good job Yang! Well deserved.

****

I am heading to Seattle and have a free evening. I know that Washington state is one of those "illegal online poker" states but has a bunch of cardrooms. Does anyone know a good place to go play in Seattle? I might try out some live poker.....

Watch ME FT now

http://channelsurfing.net/

Not sure where I saw this. Use Explorer. Double click to get full screen.

Enjoy!

Analysis of another bad hand

I want to go over a hand I played 4-handed in the 180 that I wrote about earlier in a little more detail.

POKERSTARS GAME #10972252457: TOURNAMENT #55621207, $4.00+$0.40 HOLD'EM NO LIMIT - LEVEL XIII (1000/2000) - 2007/07/16 - 15:58:09 (ET)
Table '55621207 17' 9-max Seat #6 is the button
Seat 2: stefjuuh (39979 in chips)
Seat 4: Kajagugu (96860 in chips) - I am the chip leader 4 handed and probably the most active player at the table. My image is shot and I have been really bullying the table in the last few orbits. But when I show down hands they are usually good.
Seat 6: acemaster82 (76994 in chips)
Seat 7: TOWBAR29 (56167 in chips)
stefjuuh: posts the ante 100
Kajagugu: posts the ante 100
acemaster82: posts the ante 100
TOWBAR29: posts the ante 100
TOWBAR29: posts small blind 1000
stefjuuh: posts big blind 2000
*** HOLE CARDS ***
Dealt to Kajagugu [8s 8d]
Kajagugu: raises 6000 to 8000 - Ever since the blinds got to this level this has been my standard raise.
acemaster82: calls 8000 - He is second in chips and in the SB. I don't like this call.
TOWBAR29: raises 20000 to 28000 - This is about half his stack. It seems like either a squeeze play or a resteal. I didn't actually put him on a range of hands here.
stefjuuh: folds
Kajagugu: raises 68760 to 96760 and is all-in - I had a few options here:
1) Fold - I don't think 4-handed this is a great move, but since the SB called my raise maybe I can get away with minimal damage here?
2) Call - This is a tricky one because I don't know what the SB will do. He is pretty much priced in with 64K in the pot and having to call another 20K gives him 3-to-1.
3) Re-raise - Well, any re-raise here will be an all-in to isolate the BB. I chose to shove and I am still not sure this is such a big mistake.
acemaster82: folds - Good.
TOWBAR29: calls 28067 and is all-in - Uh oh - not so good?
*** FLOP *** [7h Qd Ah]
*** TURN *** [7h Qd Ah] [7d]
*** RIVER *** [7h Qd Ah 7d] [5s]
*** SHOW DOWN ***
TOWBAR29: shows [Th Tc] (two pair, Tens and Sevens) - Crap, this was not supposed to happen!!!
Kajagugu: shows [8s 8d] (two pair, Eights and Sevens)
TOWBAR29 collected 122534 from pot
*** SUMMARY ***
Total pot 122534 | Rake 0
Board [7h Qd Ah 7d 5s]
Seat 2: stefjuuh (big blind) folded before Flop
Seat 4: Kajagugu showed [8s 8d] and lost with two pair, Eights and Sevens
Seat 6: acemaster82 (button) folded before Flop
Seat 7: TOWBAR29 (small blind) showed [Th Tc] and won (122534) with two pair, Tens and Sevens

After the hand the table talked about it and I made the comment that if I just smooth called I could make him fold on the flop. With two overcards, one of the being an ace I might get it checked to me and then I could put him all in. But that only happens if three things happen:

1) The SB folds to the BB re-raise and my smooth call.
2) The BB checks after the flop.
3) I have the guts to not put HIM on a high ace and a slow play on the flop.

So what do you do in this hand? How do you play it differently? I am still not sure that my shove is all that wrong in this position. Folding pre-flop to the re-raise seems very weak in my opinion as well. I'd love to hear your comments. Thanks.

Funny shit

One of my sales people sends me an e-mail about an error in a quote they have been working on. Here's the error in the Excel sheet:



Yeah, you saw that right. The number was too big for the cell and they couldn't figure out that they need to drag the cell border a bit to get the number to fit. This is what I have to deal with on a daily basis. Doh!

Then, I check my Google Analytics stats to see if anyone is actually reading this crap and I find an interesting keyword entry:



I have a couple of problems with that:

1) I don't recall ever writing about Kristy Gazes or having anything remotely connected to XXX here, but any traffic is good traffic, I guess.

2) Who in their right mind would look for Kristy Gazes XXX material in the first place? Are you people sick or something? Well, if you are, then welcome sick readers. I welcome you all.

UPDATE: I figured it out. My archived February page has a couple of posts that contributed to these keyword ending up here. I had a post about Kristy and Clonie playing on TV in the UK (almost at the bottom of the post). Then a few posts down there is the always hilarious "Kajagugu vs United Fritata" battle where I describe the seating configuration with a bunch of XXX's.

There. Mystery solved. Still can't understand who was doing that search, but I also found a couple of links to Change100 in the search results (Aug '05 and Apr '07).

Another Final Table in the 180

Seriously, I don't know why I do it every time. I really need to work on that end game and avoid making dumb mistakes. I played some hands beautifully and then gave away all my chips like an idiot.

4/180 is not good enough !!!

I had been playing a bunch of the $4 180SNG tourneys and creeping up in finishes. 75th, 61st, 35th (still not good enough, but I did play like an idiot in some of these). Then on the fourth try I got hit by the deck. Hard.

I doubled up in the first 8 hands and kept chipping up from there. I was able to maintain my chip lead for a very long time and bully the table with it at times. My wild play got me a lot of action and people would just not believe I had a hand and call all their chips off with nothing.

I made a great play with the following hand:
POKERSTARS GAME #10971449711: TOURNAMENT #55621207, $4.00+$0.40 HOLD'EM NO LIMIT - LEVEL X (400/800) - 2007/07/16 - 15:09:30 (ET)
Table '55621207 9' 9-max Seat #4 is the button
Seat 1: gibby8082 (39525 in chips)
Seat 2: huddibras (10870 in chips)
Seat 3: POPPO77 (15080 in chips)
Seat 4: xx4352xx (16914 in chips)
Seat 5: TOWBAR29 (34202 in chips)
Seat 6: Kajagugu (32786 in chips)
Seat 9: BuCam (23288 in chips)
gibby8082: posts the ante 50
huddibras: posts the ante 50
POPPO77: posts the ante 50
xx4352xx: posts the ante 50
TOWBAR29: posts the ante 50
Kajagugu: posts the ante 50
BuCam: posts the ante 50
TOWBAR29: posts small blind 400
Kajagugu: posts big blind 800 - I had been getting great flops in the blinds so if nobody went wild I was going to see a flop again.
*** HOLE CARDS ***
Dealt to Kajagugu [Ah 8h] - not bad I guess.
BuCam: raises 800 to 1600 - this guy was butting heads with me a lot. He was pretty good, so a min-raise could probably signal that he wanted me or someone else to re-raise.
gibby8082: folds
huddibras: folds
POPPO77: folds
xx4352xx: folds
TOWBAR29: calls 1200 - SB calls so I am now definitely priced in as well.
Kajagugu: calls 800 - I make the call and hope for a good flop.
*** FLOP *** [5s 7d 8d] - flop is good. Let's see what happens.
TOWBAR29: checks
Kajagugu: bets 2400 - feeler bet of about 1/3 pot to see where I am.
BuCam: raises 2400 to 4800 - soooooo, he has an overpair. I am not worried about a set because no way would he min-raise with a low pair UTG.
TOWBAR29: folds
Kajagugu: calls 2400 - I have good odds to call and might get lucky here.
*** TURN *** [5s 7d 8d] [8s] - I get lucky!
Kajagugu: bets 8800 - I decide to bet my top set top kicker, because if he has an overpair he is screwed. This will also disguise the fact I made the set.
BuCam: calls 8800 - I like the call. Maybe a reraise would get more money in, but the call is great.
*** RIVER *** [5s 7d 8d 8s] [8c] - Whaaaaaaaaa????
Kajagugu: bets 8037 - I hoy the villain. I actually hit the time button for a few seconds to make it look like I had a pair here that made a boat.
BuCam: raises 1 to 8038 and is all-in
Kajagugu: calls 1
*** SHOW DOWN ***
BuCam: shows [Qs Qc] (a full house, Eights full of Queens) - My read was right on!
Kajagugu: shows [Ah 8h] (four of a kind, Eights)
Kajagugu said, "sorry man"
Kajagugu collected 48426 from pot
Kajagugu said, "gg"
*** SUMMARY ***
Total pot 48426 | Rake 0
Board [5s 7d 8d 8s 8c]
Seat 1: gibby8082 folded before Flop (didn't bet)
Seat 2: huddibras folded before Flop (didn't bet)
Seat 3: POPPO77 folded before Flop (didn't bet)
Seat 4: xx4352xx (button) folded before Flop (didn't bet)
Seat 5: TOWBAR29 (small blind) folded on the Flop
Seat 6: Kajagugu (big blind) showed [Ah 8h] and won (48426) with four of a kind, Eights
Seat 9: BuCam showed [Qs Qc] and lost with a full house, Eights full of Queens



So that was a tough spot for my opponent but he played this all wrong. The min-raise on pre-flop was bad. The min-raise on the flop was bad. Bad call on the turn, bad call on the river. Sure, this is a hard hand to get away from, but he just kept pricing me in.

Ok, so I get to the final table with a serious stack, we get down to four handed and things go haywire. I pay off a luck-sack when he flopped a boradway after calling a big raise with QTo. Yummy. I win a big pot with presto against Ah9h with no hearts on the board. I win another couple of big pots with total bluffs in position. I am now the first player over T100K and decide to dump it all with stupid plays.

1) UTG limps, I raise 4xBB to 8K with 88 on the button, SB calls, BB raises to 28K leaving 28K behind. I shove, SB folds, BB calls with TT. Booooooo. I really thought he was re-stealing.

2) I steal some more and then lose half my stack to the BB who slow played KK to my A3s in the BB. I love battles of the blinds. They hurt soooooo much.

3) Next hand I get AdQd in the SB. Guy from the TT hand is now the button and raises to 8K, I shove the rest of my stack in (about 24K) and he calls with AK. KTdX on the flop gives me a chance for a straight and back door flush, but it doesn't arrive and I am out in 4th place.

Maybe Hoyazo was right about my over-aggro play late in tournaments. I'm kidding, I know he's right.

Points for improvement:

1) Bluff less. I was going to actually say "don't bluff" because some idiots call with anything. But I think I need to just tone it down and find better spots against bluffable players.

2) Slow down. Think it through and count to 10 before making a move. Use the time clock to think things through.

3) Think of my image. If I am wild and crazy I will get called more often and I need to find the right spots.

Chips

Orange you glad you had a piece of pink peach for dinner?

What a clusterfuck this WSOP has turned out to be. We can't even tell the difference between blue and black chips when we play some of our home games. How in the hell is anyone supposed to be able to tell the difference between these millions of chips with the same colors at the WSOP?

Kaja the Critic

What's the saying? Those who can't do, teach and those who can't teach become critics? I have no idea. I think I just made that up. SO with this slight confusion I am going to critique a couple of things I have watched/seen lately:

1) WSOP on ESPN. What a waste of time that is. I swear with all the commercials there are probably a total of 10 hands. The first episode started of with a graphics glitch that caused the the left hole card to slide off the screen. It also made that buffoon with the mustache's name Norman Cha (why are there no Asian poker commentators with such a huge population of Asian players?). I actually liked the idea of not knowing the players hole cards, but about 10 minutes into it they fixed the problem. I am not sure I will be watching all the events, especially after I pretty much read everything that happened on these fantabulous sites:
Tao of Poker
Wicked Chops Poker
PokerNews

2) "Bigger Deal" by Anthony Holden. I was actually going to dedicate a whole post to this book but it doesn't merit that much work. As the follow up to his celebrated poker narrative "Big Deal", Tony should have called this piece of fluff "Big Whoop". What an anticlimactic book this is. When the stated goal of the writer is to win the 2006 WSOP ME and all he pretty much does during the year is play freerolls and get sponsorships because of his "poker writer" status, you kind of hope something big is going to happen. Shit, half the bloggers I read could have written a book like this about playing online with aggro-donkeys and then busting on day one of the Main Event. I was going to try to have some contest and give the book away to a lucky reader, but I like you people too much to inflict that pain. And I don't want to waste your time either.

That's it. I will now probably try to get back to reading the FTP Tournament Guide, which is extremely confusing to me, but I will try to get through it. I might just go back to reading Harrington all over again. I am stuck in Volume 3 because none of the suggestions he gives are making much sense to me right now.

KAJA is (the) nuts

I donked it up real nice in the RiverChasers last night. I think the problem may have been the fact that I had 6 (yes, six!) games going on at the same time. There was a Tier 1 and Tier 2 token (which I won both), a 180 $10SNG on PS (which I bubbled the final table in true KajaDonk fashion), a 360 $9.90 on PS (which I came close to cashing in but KajaDonked it up again) and another 180 $4 on PS. So six tournaments. Cashed in 3 - I like the results - could have been muchos muchos better than that.

Anything fun to share other than that? Let me think for a sec. Ok, here are some screen shots for fun:

1) This is why it's called the RiverChasers. This guy check called all the way to the river and then called with JackAce high. We love it!



2) In the 360 $9.90 I was all the way down to 130 chips (last place with about 300 still playing) and managed to work my way back up to 3rd before flaming out. Some friendly guy at my table was trying to start a sing-a-long of "Too Shy" which was hilarious. So then I naturally played hard against him and slow played my monster all the way to the river. When the Ace showed up I typed in "crap" and activated the time clock. Then I moved all in for a wonderful over-bet for value and he called and I almost felted him. Good times:



3) In the 180 $10SNG I was moved to a table in the middle of the following hand with three players all-in. Yes, that's right, boat over boat over baby flush. That made me laugh:



4) One more example how the FTP RNG loves the club flush. Guy min-raised with Aces and I called from the BB with trash. Flop the tiny-teeny-wittle-baby flush draw and bet pot. He thinks for a bit and calls. My flush arrives on the turn so I push and he calls and rivers the nuts. FU FTP RNG once again!!!



6) Now to the real reason we're here today. I was so bored and had nothing to do so I fired up the dumbest, donkiest poker game invented. I think I am going to make this my new best friend. Yes folks, we're talking 'bout good-ole' LIMIT Omaha hi/lo - Whaaaaaa? They play this shit in limit too? Must be a helluva game, then. So this was just a $2 single table SNG and I went to town on these poor guys. I don't think I called once the whole time unless someone was all-in and I couldn't raise again or the pot was capped. It was raise, raise, raise all day long. I think I eliminated at least 2/3 of the table. Eventually made it to heads up with the only decent player (mind you, I did not say 'other decent player' because by no means do I consider myself to be a decent LIMIT Omaha hi/lo player or any other form of Omaha). I had him out chipped about 10-to-3.5 (math is hard, y'all) and it took us longer to finish the heads up than it did to get there. I think we played over 80 hands until I crushered him into submission. It took a total of 1 hour and 12 minutes and I won 9 whole bucks (minus buy-in and rake, lol).

I think LOHL (Limit Omaha hi/lo) may be the real poker equivalent of Pai Gow.

FTOPS V is coming

Seems like we just ended one and another is in the door. FTP managed to sneak it in before the WCOOP over at PS. This one has a guaranteed prize pool of $7M and will feature a 2 day event #12.

Check out the schedule here.

Checklist

Token Frenzy Royal Flush - Check!



Yeah, this was the 7th hand of the tournament. I don't think I played a single hand before this one. I think it got min raised by the genius with AKs who was UTG+1. When the SB called with 75s (genius call) I was pretty much priced in. The flop was georgeous and I was now looking at 9 hearts, 3 aces and 3 nines for a total of 15 outs twice. I bet out about 2/3 of the pot and UTG+1 shoves. Then the SB shoves as well. What to do? What to do? Of course this is a call. And whadda ya know? Bring on da pain with a Royal Flush on the river. Easiest token frenzy ever after that....

Final Table Mookie - Check!
First Ever Mookie Cash - Check!

This has been a long time coming and I want to credit the deep stack format. I think I really enjoy this format a lot more than the half stacks. I went out in 5th place after an awfully played hand (what else is new, right?). The Spanish Inquisition (AKA Katitude and her 85o) who I know is a tight player makes a big raise UTG and what do I decide to do with my JTs? Push on top of her AK. GG me. Well done to Kat for making it all the way back to 2nd place and to crazdgamer for taking it down.

I was actually down to 13th of 13 remaining and managed to not only make it to the final table, but climb back as high as second at one point.

Final Table Dookie - Check Yah!

Well, there were only 15 runners but still this is definitely not my game. It was Stud hi/lo and I was just making everyone mad with my stupid play. People, it's the Dookie! Chill and enjoy.

New Card Protector - Check!



I lost my lucky card protector somewhere. It was the red chip on the right. I figure it fell out of my travel bag at some point during my last business trip. So going in order, I had to give the princess a try. And she came through for me last night, so she is going into the ring and will have to bring on her lucky, hairy cinnabons.

Anatomy of a Blow Up

I am still mad at my final hand in the $2 donkament on PS on Monday night where I played very well and busted in 17th place like a complete idiot. I got the hand history and will now analyze all the mistakes on this hand. I would appreciate comments from you fine readers.

To set the stage, this is a $2 tourney paying 20%. Obviously it's going to be a total insane asylum early and the really big payouts will be at the final table. I have been playing very solid up until now, not taking many chances, switching gears in time and even holding the top spot into and long after the money bubble burst. We are now down to 2 tables and I just managed to get a decent pot and sitting somewhere around third place.

POKERSTARS GAME #10862467532: TOURNAMENT #54722129, $2.00+$0.20 HOLD'EM NO LIMIT - LEVEL XV (1500/3000) - 2007/07/10 - 04:01:29 (ET)
Table '54722129 61' 9-max Seat #4 is the button
Seat 1: franzfranz (79748 in chips)
Seat 3: tonniew777 (132519 in chips)
Seat 4: H*Runner (151290 in chips) - Just got moved to my right when the final two tables merged
Seat 5: Kajagugu (149390 in chips) - I am around 3rd place with an M of 21, only two players at my table have more chips.
Seat 6: Prozdogg (76211 in chips)
Seat 7: VICANO (194652 in chips) - Chip Leader
Seat 8: farva19 (112282 in chips)
Seat 9: JLizard (142463 in chips)
franzfranz: posts the ante 300
tonniew777: posts the ante 300
H*Runner: posts the ante 300
Kajagugu: posts the ante 300
Prozdogg: posts the ante 300
VICANO: posts the ante 300
farva19: posts the ante 300
JLizard: posts the ante 300
Kajagugu: posts small blind 1500
Prozdogg: posts big blind 3000
*** HOLE CARDS ***
Dealt to Kajagugu [Kc Ks] - Finally a great hand. I hope I get some action here.
VICANO: folds - Chip leader folds, damn. Or good?
farva19: folds
Kajagugu said, "62o lol" - H*Runner had raised from the SB on the previous hand and I folded my crap hand.
JLizard: folds
franzfranz: folds
tonniew777: folds
H*Runner: raises 3000 to 6000 - Min raise from the guy who stole my BB. I got you now sucker!
Kajagugu: raises 6000 to 12000 - What should I do here? I decide to re-raise to 4xBB, trying to represent a weak re-steal. Or trying to represent general weakness. The thing is I don't really have a plan. I need to think out a plan before a serious hand like this. I have to work on that. Would you re-pop it more? Out of position? I am not sure what the right play is here. I obviously wanted a call without giving away too much info.
Prozdogg: folds
H*Runner said, "just so you know I wasn't being a jerk" - He showed A8 suited. Sign of things to come? I have no info on him as we only played two hands so far. All I can tell is he likes suiteded hands and will play an Ace. But that is likely the range at this stage of the tournament.
H*Runner said, "lol"
H*Runner: calls 6000 - I guess what I would have liked more was a re-raise from him so I could push and be done with the hand, but he is getting good odds to call here and he does.
*** FLOP *** [6s 7s As] - This is an awful flop for me. There's an Ace out there, there's a flush out there. But I have the nut flush draw, which is good and bad cause it could cost me a lot to draw to it.
Kajagugu: bets 12000 - I could have checked here to see what he does. But once again, I don't really have a plan. Even if I check and he bets I would need to think about calling with my nut flush. I guess the lead-in bet is ok. The pot is a little over 29K so if he is drawing to a flush, he is drawing to a worse flush than I am.
H*Runner: calls 12000 - Smooth call. Not sure what to make of it. Possibly a flush draw? If he hit his ace, he would not smooth call here, but rather raise to see if his Ace is good, right? Why give me a chance to catch my draw? Or maybe he has an Ace and puts me on a weaker or stronger Ace? Maybe he's got an AXs hand with a string spade kicker?
*** TURN *** [6s 7s As] [2h] - This should be a blank for both of us.
Kajagugu: bets 30000 - I bet a little over half the pot here. I have no idea why I made this bet. The only thing I can think of is that the turn card hasn't helped anyone, so if I was ahead or behind on the flop, I am still ahead or behind on the turn and this would be a good way to find out. What would you do here?
H*Runner: raises 30000 to 60000 - This is not what I wanted obviously. He could be making a move here. This should be the time to either push or fold and in hindsight I should have folded here.
Kajagugu: calls 30000 - But the pot is 143K now and it costs me only 30K to call and try to hit my nut flush. Or I could still be ahead. I have to at least call, right? Let's count the outs - 9 spades and 2 kings for 11 outs if he doesn't already have a flush or only 7 outs if he has a flush. That would give me around 22% or 14% to win the hand. My pot odds are very close at around 21% (30k/143k). But the implied odds are much higher, because if I do catch the nut flush I will be the dominant chip leader. I have to make this call. Right?
*** RIVER *** [6s 7s As 2h] [3c] - another blank. This would only be a scare card if my opponent was playing 54 and just made a straight.
Kajagugu: bets 65090 and is all-in - What the hell was I thinking, here? This is the real blow up. And had I thought about it for a little longer I would probably not made this stupid move. I will probably only get called by a hand that beats me and I am now risking my tournament life since my opponent has me slightly covered. Did I tell a good story with my betting up until now? The nuts here would be a made flush. Have I played it like a made flush? I could have, but not likely unless I flopped the nut flush. I probably don't have 54 either for a straight. So any Ace, made flush, two pair or funky straight beat me. Do I get called by a worse hand than mine, probably not, right?
H*Runner: calls 65090 - Insta-call. This is not good although I have seen players insta-call with nothing as late as 5 minutes ago, so you never know. But I don't think this is good.
*** SHOW DOWN ***
Kajagugu: shows [Kc Ks] (a pair of Kings)
H*Runner: shows [8s Js] (a flush, Ace high) - Nice flop catch. FU PS RNG!!!
H*Runner collected 303580 from pot
H*Runner said, "gg"
*** SUMMARY ***
Total pot 303580 | Rake 0
Board [6s 7s As 2h 3c]
Seat 1: franzfranz folded before Flop (didn't bet)
Seat 3: tonniew777 folded before Flop (didn't bet)
Seat 4: H*Runner (button) showed [8s Js] and won (303580) with a flush, Ace high
Seat 5: Kajagugu (small blind) showed [Kc Ks] and lost with a pair of Kings
Seat 6: Prozdogg (big blind) folded before Flop
Seat 7: VICANO folded before Flop (didn't bet)
Seat 8: farva19 folded before Flop (didn't bet)
Seat 9: JLizard folded before Flop (didn't bet)

So to summarize:
1) I could have made a bigger pre-flop re-raise but I tried to get some value from my premium hand.
2) I should have been done with the hand after my flop bet was called.
3) My turn bet was a big mistake. I should have checked and hoped for a free card.
4) My call after the re-raise was borderline. I shouldn't have been in this situation but my opponent gave me just the right odds to make the call.
5) My river shove was a dumb play. There is no way I will win if I don't learn to stop making these kinds of moves.

So there. What do you think? What would you have done differently? What do you think of the way I analyzed my play here?

Odds (and ends)

All kinds of stuff I thought I would just mention here. Might be a good read, but probably not.

1) Yesterday I attended an IT summit and it was pretty dull for the most part. but once again I was stunned at how much pokery goodness there is out in the world. First example came when the CIO talked about one of his VPs and thanked him for taking on a tough task. He said this VP might show up for good or bad reasons and the only way to know was to look at his face. Since he has no "poker face" to speak of, you will immediately know if you are in for it or not. Then the keynote speaker gave an interesting strategy for the smaller players in an industry, called "The Puppy Dog Ploy". There are some interesting comparisons one could make to short stack play, but that would be too deep of a discussion for this type of post. Anyway, the idea is that the Puppy Dog, instead of going into a tough dog fight with the Top Dogs only takes small nibbles of the market share and doesn't get into trouble. Oh, hell, just read the MIT article and be done with it. The point I was making was that the speaker said at one point that if the puppy wants to attack the dogs on their turf he is probably already "drawing dead". So both of these made me snicker.

2) I read somwhere that the Bellagio Cup III main event starts today and is going to be a very tough tournament. I had previously read some criticism about the Bellagio and the WPT going head-to-head with the WSOP ME. But now it makes complete sense to me. They are going to get all the Day 1 bustouts to play in their event. Guaranteeing that all the non-US pros who made the trip to the ME will want to try their luck at the Cup. That would be a nice check-raise right there by the Bellagio. Nice hand, sir.

3) This just came in the mail. Wimbledon pic of the day:


4) I think David Singer was right and Harrah's is wrong. I think they should refund his entry fee at least but I think that letting him play again would have been a mistake. Who does he think he is? Vinnie Vinh?

5) The count is in for the total number of entries. Does the total number include Vinnie Vinh buying in, getting a refund and then buying in again? Does it count all the stacks that were taken out of play because the people who pre-registered did not actually finish the registration process and didn't show up to play? Maybe this is a case for some of you poker detectives out there in Vegas.

6) KajaWife is going out with the girls tonight and tomorrow night so looks like I am going to play the Mookie and the RiverChasers events where I can keep applying my over-aggro style early and late in the MTT blonkaments. I keed, I keed.

17/1174 - Bad play gone awry

UPDATE: TripJax correctly stated in the comments that this was not a "blind defense" so I had to go change the title. Thanks for the extra work you caused, Trip. And now I have to go post a full hand analysis too...




It was only a $2 donkament, but I managed to make it through a lot of mines and get oh so close. When we broke the money bubble with 198 runners left I was in 1st place and maintained my lead for a long time. When we were down to around 30 or so I won a big pot and got back up to third. When the tables merged with 18 players left the guy to my right kept raising every hand. When he stole my BB with A8s I said I had to fold my 62o. Then the very next hand I get KK in the SB and he raises 3xBB from the button again. I re-raise to double his raise and he calls. Flop is Ace high, all spades and I have the Ks, so I go ahead and bet out around 2/3 and he calls. The turn is a blank and I bet the pot and get reraised double and call. River is another blank and I go all in for the rest of my chips. He has me covered by about 1500 and calls with a flopped flush. Yes, the all mighty J8s took me down.

I suppose I could have gotten away from this hand. I am going to bed mad. Again.

Wicked Chops Poker Soft Playing Da Brat?

I love WCP. I think these guys are awesome. But I have to admit I am a bit alarmed at this latest development. They reported on Phil Helmuth crashing a racecar but totally soft played the story.

So I had to leave the following comment:



Damn, you guys are really soft playing this one, don't you think? The real WCP I know would have been all over this like flies on dung, but I guess with the RawVegas stuff you have to make nice nice with Da Brat?

This press release is pathetic. "The poker world is holding its breath"? Are you kidding, who cares? "lost control of his high-speed racecar"? while making slow turns in the parking lot of the Rio? "testing the 200 mph racecar in the Nevada desert"? Once again, he was driving miss daisy in the parking lot!

The only reason Phil could get severe whiplash from this "accident" is because he might have had his head too far up his own ass.

We expect more from you guys.

Poker, Poker, Everywhere (and nowhere)

Sooooooo, I land in the awful Texas heat and head to my hotel. On the way I pass right next to Beal Bank. Yes, the same Beal Bank owned by Andy Beal who took on a bunch of pros heads-up, yadda, yadda, yadda. Nice building, I must admit. He must be doing quite well for himself.

Then it's on to a five step registration process:
1) Badge - They don't have my badge.
2) Program - I get the event program.
3) NDA - I need to sign a waiver stating my company has a signed NDA with the host.
4) Release - I need to sign a waiver for the mechanical bull at the dinner/event tonight.
5) Tour - I have to sign up for a tour (which I will not go on because I am splitsville tomorrow).

I ask the friendly registration lady if she has a general bull waiver, but she doesn't get the joke. I then ask her where the Texas Hold'em Poker tables are located since we're in Texas and all, but she stares at me for a few seconds and then decides I am truly an idiot.

I head of to my room to drop the kids in the pool before tonight's event and find out that Andy Beal does not own one of the 100 most expensive homes in Dallas as stated in my in-room magazine selection. Must not be doing that well, I guess. Some of these people have 30K square feet homes. One person has a 3.2K square foot garage and another has 12K of basement space. A person could really host a nice home game in a basement that size...

I flip through the program and find an interesting few pages that I automatically relate to taking poker notes:
New Contacts
Potential Partnerships
Stacks I Can Impact
Stacks I Can Impact (second page)

Holy Stacks, Batman! Did they really have two pages titled "Stacks I Can Impact"? IT people are huge ignoramuses. Too funny.

Why am I here? Because the sales people I work with can't figure out how to do a 20 minute presentation on their own. Or when in a 24 hour time span it will actually take place. I am thankful though, as I will get to practice my skillz (see previous post) tonight.

I wish I knew a good poker room in the area. Although with all the busts Pokerati has been reporting on, maybe I should just play the online variety.

Okay pardners, I am off to dinner and to ride that mechanical bull.

I get no Respekt

Sitting at the ATL airport off to another lousy client meeting. Catching up on some bloglines I run across the hand I stacked IG in the Big Game. That was a tough hand for her. But then I read the comments and see this:

Hammer Player a.k.a Hoyazo said...

I don't see how you can possibly fold the 99 preflop, least of all against Kaja who has skills but otherwise has been known to be well over-aggro in spots early and late in the blonkaments.

So I don't know if that was a compliment or not, but at least I guess I got skills. I need to work on those skills a bit, though. If anyone wants to see me working on my skillz youz betterz comez overz to FTPz tonightz where I will be working on my over-aggro skillz early and late in MTTz.

Respekt!

Hairy Gymnast

Otis asked to link his buddy. So for all of you who don't read Up For Poker (seriously, what rock are you hiding under?) go check out the Hairy Gymnast and wish him some luck.

Luck

"Luck is nothing but probability taken personally."

That is one of the best lines I have heard or read in a long time. And puts a lot of stuff in perspective. Penn & Teller said this at the opening of Day 1b of the WSOP ME today. It's not their line, but it is still awesome.

So go over to Lightning36 and give him a hug and a pat on the back because he just finished 2nd for the 4th time in a row in the last week. Brutal. Unlucky.

Home Game Fool

I hosted a MASSIVE home game last night. I had no idea we would have this turnout. Insanity, I tell you.

Being 4th of July weekend and all, I knew a lot of the regulars in the hood will be gone. I did my regular invite and ended up with 21 players. Can you dig it? Well my basement AC didn't. And even though it is usually as cold as the Amazon Room at 11am, with all the warm bodies down there I couldn't get it below 76 degrees. I was sweating it up.

I got bounced out of both tournaments pretty quickly. Really bad plays. Not worth typing them in.

But I made up for it in the .25/.50 cash game we started. We did a 10$ buy-in and I ended up with $54 or up 4.4 buy-ins. Sweet.

Thanks to all the guys that showed up including:
Surflexus
BrainMc
Kurokitty
Sham
Weakplayer

I might have forgotten some. Deal with it.

Read more...

I'll keep it short and sweet. Why would some of you only feed a couple of lines into your RSS feed? Do you really need the actual page hits to get revenue dollars? Are you all in it for the moola? Why do I have to go through all those ads on PokerWorks to read your posts, huh? That is so annoying. And I hate the "Read more..." crap as well.

So give it a rest and let the loyal readers get full entries.

That is all.

Joke

My Uncle-in-law sends me lots of junk e-mail. But once in a while I get a good one:

This morning, I was in a huge hurry and on my way to work. I was pre-occupied with what my day held and I rear-ended a car at a stop light because I was not really paying attention. I had hot coffee in my lap and I was running late.

"Great, just great", I moaned.

The driver opened his door, leaned out of his car and stared at me. He was a dwarf. He got out, studied the damage on his bumper and walked towards me as I rolled down my window.

He said, "I am not happy."

To which I replied, "Well, which one are you then?"

Dumb

I scored 25/25. And that includes all the freaky US measurement questions.

I have to say, I watched "Are you smarter than a 5th grader?" and while Foxworthy is pretty funny, this show pisses me off. It is a celebration of mediocrity and the "dumbing down" of America. Anyone who can't make it to half a million should be ridiculed for the rest of their lives. I mean, seriously.

And there is no way anyone would be dumb enough to go for the million anyway because it makes no sense. If you miss it you go home with 25K. So it's never going to actually happen. And of course when people get there they would have known the answer, because IT IS SOMETHING A 10 YEAR OLD SHOULD KNOW!!!

I kid you not, people have answered these questions wrong:
"On what continent is Mt. Kilimanjaro"? - Africa (answered Asia)
"If Y=3X and 3X=12, how much is Y"? - Duh, 12 (answered 4)
"Density is defined as the Mass of an object divided by what"? - Volume (answered Air - whaaaaaaaaaaa?????)

I can keep going, but this is too painful.

I watched again last night and saw Alex Outhred, professional poker player take half a mil. He did well and took some gambles but missed some easy ones. Luckily he got saved by the kids. He kept plugging away at how poker was great and all, so that made it watchable, I guess.

Raymer the Hutt?

WTF? Has he been eating his $5M ME winnings? Greg "Jabba" Raymer looks like he needs an extra wide lense to pose for pictures these days. Hell, you can barely see his eyes:

Swear Jar

I am sure everyone has seen this already, but I just had a good laugh watching it for the first time:

Blogger Big Game Blah

I get no respect. Apparently with my play at the blogger events I have an image of being the KajaDonk. But I really don't care.

I played pretty well in the Big Game last night coming in 8th of 45. I made a few mistakes along the way. But the real downfall was at the final table when I ran KK into AA:



I was extremely short after that and had to make some short stack moves which worked well until I ran AJs into AK (from the same player with the Aces, one to my right):



Once again I was short and eventually went out with AK vs 77 in 8th place.

I had a very tough table starting out, with Lucko, Don, Hoy, TripJax and JeciiMD at my table:



It started out great when I got Aces in early position and after a 3xBB raise I got 4 callers. The flop was A97 with two spades and I checked in EP. IG bet the pot, so I knew she got a big piece of it and was protecting against a flush. But then another player called her in LP and I check-rasied them about half my stack. IG shoved, other player folded and I was happy to call with my top set. IG had 99 (I think also know as the IG) and went down with set over set:



Then I made an awful play with 9h8h. I flopped an OESD that turned into a flush draw as well on the turn. When I missed my 17 outs on the river I still went out and bet and when I got re-raised I had to let it go. I lost almost half my stack there:



Then Lucko decided to give me his chips when he played 7d6d against my AhJh. By the turn I had trip Jacks and he had a flush draw that missed. He still shoved and I doubled up again:



I was moved to another tough table with Smokee, OSU, lightning36 and jeciiMD. On one of the first hands I was in the SB with Ac5c and raised 3xBB. OSU shoved and I was sure he had air and called. He actually had a pair of Queens and I busted him when I caught an Ace on the river:



After this hand Somkee started giving me shit about my play, which I didn't care for too much, but it worked in my favor because Mike Maloney decided to mess with me, putting in a nice value bet which I called on the river:



Somkee gave me more shit for that call and just to prove him right I called his value bet a few hands later when all I had was Ace high. That was not good. But a few hands later sellthekids shoved on my Aces in the BB holding only 82o. He did hit a 2 on the flop but didn't get lucky to crack my aces:



I made to the final table in decent shape but couldn't get anything going and you already know the rest.

Congratulations to TripJax for taking it down with only a penny left in his FTP account!

(sorry for not linking everyone up, I don't have all the links and it just takes too much freaking time)

Blog Rating

Shit, really? What the fuck do I have to put on this motherfucker to get away from this shit rating? Oh, fuck. Who gives a shit anyways.

Fuck you Waffles for sending us to this crap site to get rated.

UPDATE:


Much better.