DADI IGH Early

Played like a donk for the first part of the tournament but managed to hang around to just after the first break. I then used that loose image to get my money in quite good.




NewinNov min raises and I reraise with a hoy and somehow he calls with AJo. Now most players know that you are so happy that he is chasing a 3 outer but then he did pay to see five cards.

I did ask him if he thought he was ahead when I reraised and he said no. Grrr... get 'em next time I guess.

Jackpot during Live Action

Played live last night and just missed the Mookie by 15 mins because the cash game was really hot. Won $300 with 35s in the BB and flop is 46As and it checks around. Turn is the miracle 7s and it checks around again. I lead out with $5 on the river hoping that the Ks will show up and reraise me. Luckily I get a caller with 10s because if you don't show down on river you don't win the jackpot money. So a bit risky but it helped put me in that crazy category.

Only other hand of interest is when I get AA in CO. One loose player limps to my right and I raise it to $15, (1/2 NL) and it folds to the BB who calls along with the guy to my right. Flop is KQ8 rainbow and it checks to me and I bet $25. The BB is an action junkie (asian dude with a ponytail) and he min raises me to $50 and I hope that loose guy calls and then I can get HU and give him the action he desires. Instead, loose guy pushes all in and I know that AA is not good any longer. So I fold and pony tail shows J10o and loose guy has KQ. Turn is a 9 for a nice suckout since I have two of his outs and the straight holds up. Nice to see bad players get paid off for mistakes like that. I did see a guy buy in for $60 and go all in with 6's on his first hand (he stole the blinds) and then called an all in with AQo (I told him he was dead) for his second hand and the other guy turns over AK. He left right after that. Cash games with guys pushing with AK is awesome!

Looking forward to next week when Kat and Jules come out to play live in Toronto.

In other news I am working to get a company to put a bounty on my head during blogger events... I want it to be $36.66 to keep in line with my penGuin like attitude. If a player with a bounty on them wins the tournament does that mean it would be rolled over or go to me? Hmm... something else to think about.

Couple tokens make up for quick exit

Was feeling a little tired last night so figured I would push the edges a little bit harder and see how that went. The only thing I figured out is that if you push back at Kat a couple times she will call you down with the goods! So out early in the WWdn: Not The which left me feeling a little unsatisfied. Prior to playing in that event I was on FT and won a token playing against a bunch of donks.

After the WWdN I figured I might as well go for another one of those tokens so I can sit down and play in the 17k guaranteed along with a sat to a 200k guaranteed tourney. Smokkee was in that one as well but he ran his JJ into KK early and that was the last I saw of him. I ran TPTK into two pair and that hurt me but managed to double up and steal my way to the final table. I find the turbo ones are great once you get a bit of a stack because you just start taking a bit of time each turn to act. This increases the blinds and you can really use that to your advantage. In the end managed to get the second token of the day (Hoy would say Paris Hilton tokens for page rank but I am not seeking Google fame yet!).

On Wednesday night there was supposed to be a good $30 MTT live tournament in Toronto. Sad thing was that a fire inspector was inspecting the building and then the landlord found out that a poker club is being run out of that building. How stupid can people be when showing up to do something illegal but to mention to any random person that they are looking for the poker club?!?! Idiots. So I will give it a week and if the club is still there then all is good in the world.

So instead of trying to rush home for the Mookie we decided to go to another club that is a short cab ride into a bad part of town. To compare the two clubs is like night and day. The usual place is spacious and has five tables, nice looking ladies with good attitudes working there and horrible poker players. The other place is cramped with only two tables and no ladies and tough poker players! But I wanted to play poker so off to the 2nd club we went. Bought into the 1/2 game for $150 and my buddy buys in for $80 (he is good at tournaments but his cash game is suspect).

The full table has a great assortment of characters. To my left I have asian guy (tight, will use small raises to trap), my buddy J (loose, likes to mix it up), bald guy (tight, shuffles chips like a pro but doesn't watch table = not a pro), fat guy wearing isreal army hat (loose aggressive, likes to tap on the glass), asian guy (tight, looks like he is scared money), big head euro guy (maniac, called fat guys $150 reraise with J10o - I want to play against him), asian guy (solid player, cbets a bit too often but has shown goods enough to give him respect), red haired guy (loose, likes to raise small amounts - reraise him with air and he will fold), young college kid (super tight, respect raises cuz he will have the goods).

When I am buying in fat guy is yelling at big head about his horrible call with J10o cracking his AA. Big head goes on to double up red haired guy and then he really goes maniac on the table. Preflop raises are to $35, with three callers!!! Wow action table now give me a playable hand dealer! It sort of looks like a $1 turbo SNG with everyone fighting to get chips to the middle first. Big head loses his cash and rebuys for $100 and then over the next orbit manages to quad up his stack. I have still yet to even have a hand worth considering putting money in the middle with yet. Big head decides he has had enough and leaves the table which is a big shame. This settles the table down a lot. My buddy J ends up getting stacked and borrows $70 off of me. An orbit later with me on the button I look down at 33 and limp in (should have raised but didn't). SB completes and BB raises to 10 and we both call. Flop is Ks 10x 3s. Here is how pokerstove breaks down this hand.

Board: Ks Tc 3s
Dead:
equity (%) win (%) tie (%)
Hand 1: 78.0865 % 78.10% 00.00% { 3c3d }
Hand 2: 04.0952 % 03.98% 00.11% { KcQd }
Hand 3: 17.8184 % 17.71% 00.11% { KdTs }

It goes check, check and I bet $15 into the $30 pot knowing that these guys might want to draw to the flush. SB reraises to $40, BB pushes all in to $58, so I reraise to $135. SB thinks for a while where he shows the table his hand before calling about a minute later. I am pleased because my read was right ... no way they are slowplaying KK or 10 10 from the blinds. Turn and river were blanks and I take down a nice pot. Lost a bit of it later on but still ended up a little over $100. Not bad but would have been more fun if Kat was in on the action.

WWdN: Another 2nd place finish

Tonight was a night where the results miss how lucky I was earlier in the evening. Final table first hand for me UTG, and I push all-in hoping to steal the blinds. Instead, a smooth call right behind me, and then the button pushes all-in. Flop was 632, so I ask Pokerstars for a 5, and the site delivers. More than triple up and that is what got me to the final two players.

Shadowtwin thanks for the chips tonight but sorry I couldn't take the chiplead all the way. Hoy's bro Aquaverse played like a superstar from what I thought was the toughest seat at the final table. Kat did her usual, kicking butt and finding solid hands until I got lucky with a set vs. her two pair. She will probably make me pay for that tomorrow evening in our live tournament. But I tip my hat to the guy I called to win it with 6 left: ABVidale. I don't think I saw a mistake out of him at the final table. When it was heads up, I had the chip lead until I ran 88 into 1010. From there I managed to double up twice to regain my former stack size. Then my two pair ran into his set of Q's that he slowplayed. It was all over the next hand when I reraised all in with 5's and he called with KQo. He hits two pair and it is all over. Fun time and some of the fun came from the wife joining in and watching me play. She had to play my hands for the first 20 minutes while I was eating and managed to double me up.

It doesn't look like my sponsor can get things setup for the WSOP but hopefully we will find a suitable tourament to send me to represent them later in the year. The good thing is that I can focus on improving my play to hopefully win a seat to one of the events. It has been a while since there was a poker goal to achieve but planning on playing a large tournament should inspire me.

Ullrich All the Way!

Well Jan Ullrich just won the Tour de Suisse and hopefully he can show up in the form for the Tour de France. Without Lance being around he should win it all.

I was trying to get to the July weekend in vegas with all the bloggers but it looks like my sponsor might want me to play the main event instead. Lets just say that I am not arguing too much about that development. Ever since I watched Rounders and heard of this tournament I wanted to sit down and play against the "best and worst" poker players in the world. I suggested that they offer a piece of my winnings (if any) to anyone who signs up to use their services between now and the start of the tournament. Hopefully, the blogger community will turn out and support me on this cause when I get more details.

Played in the Hoy tourney last night and finished 7th. Chipped up early when slb couldn't river me (in my mind I could see the A falling on the river) with his AK vs. my QQ all in on the flop. That lead lasted until near to the final table. My computer has been acting up on me recently so close to the end of the hockey game I put it on sitting out mode. Then I get KK and try to click the I'm Back button but missed it. At this point the computer is starting to freeze up but I only need another 5 minutes. I look down to see that I have KK again and click the button and no luck at all. Two players ended up all in on a K high flop and that is where I think I lost the tournament. Edmonton loses the game so I can finally continue playing poker.

Now in the scuffle of getting my laptop down to the basement (where it is nice and cold) and rebooting the computer I don't recall who I knocked out on the final table bubble. In MP with 55 and the aggressive player with shorter stack to my right raises. I drop the hoy and get pushed all in. AKs vs. 55 and the flop hits me so hard 533! To the final table we go and I was just card dead the entire time. Was chipleader at the final table for a short period but overplayed some hands and didn't maximize value when I could have. It is hard not to give too much respect to guys like cc and hoy who are top notch players. Iakaris was my nemesis last night and it will not be forgotten soon. Overall, happy with my play until my computer died and then I was like a novice playing poker. Funny how easy it is to get out of the groove of playing your game.

Gave it my all!

Sat down tonight when I got home and said I would try to play solid poker tonight for a change. So I joined a $1 MTT on Party to get warmed up and start taking guys out. Then the 17k on FT started and I managed to chip up early there as well. Funny thing is that you can play solid for about 1 hour with no problems and then you start to get cocky. Stealing blinds when it is 25/50? I can be such an idiot sometimes. So that steal cost me 1200 but he knows I am serious now!

Going to test uploading another image and hopefully you can click on them to see more detail... if someone could tell me what I am doing wrong that would be helpful.



Anyways... I did a good job tonight of chipping up early but failed to turn it into cash due to a couple suckouts against me. I did make some really good laydowns and only saw one person bluff me off of a pot. Dropped the hammer once with Duggle at the table which got one guy to reraise all in with A5s vs. my KK on the button. Funny comment from the big stack at the table in that is what I get when I show 72o. Umm... I think I will take the reraises from those type of hands all night long... at least when I have KK.

Long time since I have posted

Been busy lately with work and when I finally get home, playing poker, or posting have been low on my list.

Had a blast playing live with Kat last week... she took third and makes many more reads of people live than I make. I find I still focus on betting patterns to tell me if someone is full of it or not. There are times where you can see the super tight player trying to bluff live that allows me to go over the top with air but that doesn't happen often enough. The guy I liked playing against finished in second that night. Three of us in the hand with a flop of 9h 4x 4h. I look down and see I am playing Q9o in the BB. Small bet leads out from the small blind and I call. The superstar behind me calls as well. Turn is a 9x giving me a boat and it checks around. Now I am calling for a heart to put the flush out there because these idiots wouldn't be able to lay it down. 7h on the river is just beautiful. SB leads out and I push all in. Superstar says "you really want to do that?" (He usually tries to play the no emotion or talking type of player = no fun) and I know he has quads. The SB had K9 and called the all in and both of us were taken out by his quads... but his final comment was the dumbest comment that could be expected "That is why I don't drink while playing poker." I tell him I will bust everytime against quads with my hand and that has nothing to do with drinking. Anyone else play a hand like that differently?

Good news from a company that they want to send me to a poker tournament as their ambassador. If I can swing it I would love to head to vegas for the July 7th weekend with all the bloggers around. I don't think I can take the time off right now to do the main event as the market is quite choppy.

Played in a token event on FT with Upforpoker last night and got my token with a 1st place finish. UFP didn't have my luckbox skills last night but it was cool to have another blogger present. I might take a run at the 17k event tonight to work on the MTT part of the game. I really needed a reason to play well and a big live event should get me in the mood to work on the game.

First WWdN: Not The and first WWdN - a 1-2 Punch

Last Thursday I played in my first WWdN: Not The event. Great time trying to out hoy everyone including Hoyazo himself. It had to be a tournament where I sucked out more than should be humanly possible but I will take the win.

Tonight was my first WWdN event on this festive 06/06/06 day. This is an event where I got a good chiplead and just watched it grow as I won a few races against small stacks. All except shadowtwin who I managed to double up at least three times (I think I deserve a bit of your prize money!).

So I start to get a big stack but not doing too much stealing but raising or folding to keep up the pressure on the table. Then I get the perfect hand in the BB with raising and calling ahead of me. I pushed here because if shadowtwin had AQ or AJ I want him to call here because Peacecorn probably has a similar type of hand.

An orbit later I had the opportunity to do what all bloggers love .... raise UTG with the hammer and take it down.

So now I am a big stack and stealing blinds a bit more as we approach the final table... we get there looking like this:

Let me just say that everyone played great but heffmike was the guy I expected to see heads up. We didn't contest many hands because most often it was decided preflop. Great player who put lots of pressure on everyone regardless of stack size. He folded one hand against me where he raised from EP to 4k and I reraised another 20k to put him all in and he folded. Later he raised from EP again and I had 1010 and I reraised him again and he called.

Eventually I finished second as we only got one hand of heads up ... darn since I have been reading a bit about it in Harrington vol 2. Great read Kaellinn as that couldn't have been an easy call with 2nd pair! That was 4 races in a row that you won against me which is probably the leak in my game that I have to fix. Time to chat online to see what the optimal play is in those situations of having K8 or K9 4-handed on the button. Live and learn... but it was a blast. Forgot to mention that I played in that HORSE event and just donated my money since I don't know how to play any of the other poker games! Razz looks interesting to me.