Wednesday, January 31, 2007

Keeping the Focus

Staying true to not playing when not focused is working. Normally I would have fired up a few games last night and donked away some cash. But not anymore! I was looking to get a Wii but instead settled for a PS2... yes the cost was cheap enough that it didn't matter and I wanted to play God of War... and II when it launches soon.

So a bit of video game time later and some actual sleep has me in a good mood for poker today. That would normally mean some live action tonight at the club and beating up those tournament donks that bust early. Instead, I got offered steak and a raptors game at courtside.... so maybe some poker if the beer flow is slow enough. Otherwise head home and get ready for tomorrow when I get my annual review and bonus number.... the wait is agonizing for the number that is a very large percentage of our earnings for the year.

I do have to say that I am very pissed off with the workers for the Go Transit system. These lazy shits keep cancelling my train that I use in the morning due to a labor dispute. Now I am someone who really hates unions in this day and age so these childish ways of denying your customers service is a disgrace. You guys want a raise so you call in sick for a few extra days? All of these people should be fired instead of caving into demands from those who don't realize how good they have things with their current CN based pay package. Oh and if you idiots are going to cancel a train please send out an email using your service to notify the passengers at least... that way I can forward it to my boss who is wondering what the hell is slowing me down in the morning. So enough of my tilted rant about using a gov't run service that just doesn't give value for the cost. Let it go public and we can strip all this crap out and make these people really work for a living and to generate a return on my money.

Monday, January 29, 2007

POY Event 1 & Live Last Week

So last week I decided to take the CR style and put it to good use at the live tables and see how it fares against the calling stations at my local club. All I can say is that it sure tightens a table up a bunch when they are scared of getting reraised and have sizable bets coming their way all night.

Focusing on position also allows me to steal a bunch of unwanted pots that I enter so my stack is much larger than it would normally be when the bad beats arrive. So overall the first week of CR style while playing live was +$400 and I still don't know what the hell I am doing yet!

On the online side I had to get back to NL25 after donking away 3 buyins at NL50 while drinking and playing... it was fun but have to earn that back (and continue to work on playing the CR style at 6 max tables) before I can jump up to higher levels.

So all this rambling gets me to discuss my play last night in the WPBT event 1. Played a bit tighter with Lucko on my right keeping me in line with his fantastic style. I still don't know why everyone tries to pick him off since he likes to call bets that are larger than value bets with middle pair! Nothing worse than a solid LAG on your right and with a ton of chips. The good thing is that these guys recognize the guys who play a TAG style and adapt. Had a phone call where I folded a BB where I should call and would have won a monster pot... damn mother in laws! Then the laptop decided to make it a tough night and folded my QQ on the BB with StatiKing with a shortstack raise. Reboot and try to play some poker... still over 2k chips no time to worry.

Finally get doubled up when I flop a set vs. AA and got all in on the turn. From there on I only had one really bad play that that was against Change100. *She* raised the SB when it folded to her and I took that to be a steal so I pushed with KQo and after thinking it was a steal only to see the call with AJo so still a race but 60/40 and I won. Sorry Change100 it was my worst play but the karma would come back to bite me on the butt later on.

Not enough bloggers know that Raveen is my poker nemesis... my poker goal is to stack him so often he drops out of medical school due to the shame! Actually he seems like a cool guy who kicks ass at poker but he was a luckbox last night. I announced to him that I would bring swift justice to the one who drops quads on my TPnoK hand for a stack at 1/2 NL (also known as the worst hand I have played in about a year)! Well I managed to reraise him 3 times and that drove him over the edge!

Raveen raises from MP which is his standard way to enter a pot. I know that I have been pushing back at him a lot so I decide to let him know that folding isn't an option for me in this hand with AQs and 15 people remaining. Blinds are 300/600 with 100 ante if I remember correctly. So his raise to 1,800 looked weak and from the CO I reraised to 6,666 and I only had 5,400 approx. behind. Why not push? Because I didn't want it to look like a desperate move with a small pair. And he knows that I have pot committed myself to my hand so no way can he feel that he has any fold equity in this hand. He pushes and I am hoping to be against a smaller Ax... instead he turns of 65o.... hmm that is interesting considering he is one of the chip leaders and I wasn't too far behind and only 7 get paid this evening. He hits the straight and I am done for the night.... ugg... at least he went on to win the whole tournament.

Now the concept of people just playing blogger events for fun making such moves normal just doesn't make sense to me. After investing 2+ hours of time the buyin for the event shouldn't dictate play anymore.... now we are down to the few guys who are actually trying to win this evening. With my KQ hand I actually thought I was ahead of steals (according to Pokerstove it is a top 9.2% hand) vs. doing the same with 56o (71.6% hand)... heck Hoy complains about calling reraises with AQo (6.5%) so I know where he stands on this hand.

In the end I got my money in good. Win that hand and then running towards the cash with a good stack and lots of people sitting with low M's getting ready to push. Good to know that my prior raises can get people to do silly stuff because they get tired of someone playing back at them. Still focused and working hard to be that pest who can get you to put your tourney life on the line preflop with a non paired 6 high. Either that or I am running into a lot of guys who would rather go to bed than win an event... who then go on to win the event.

Thursday, January 18, 2007

Won the 2nd Chance!

PL Omaha Hi is a game that I still have no clue how to play. I asked slb and he just told me to be aggro and I used that technique postflop by reraising him and pushing him off a hand.... I wasn't sure what I had but it looked alright so I went with it!

Hit a couple good hands when needed and built up a good bunch of chips. I was also playing two cash tables where the suckouts have continued. I even joined a NL100 table and found a donk who thought bottom pair on the flop with no kicker was good enough to go all in on the turn. I held TPTK which is good against a short stack so an easy call of that small push only to watch that 3 kicker give the donk 2 pair. Ugly. Just make a note and hope to find this fish again.

So it was good to win a blogger event and also to play well and not get tilted in the cash games. KK < Q4 when my 5x bb raise was called and they hit top two pair! Ugly! At least I am not paying off these guys too much in those situations but it is still a bit annoying. My bankroll could use a couple positive hits to give me some room to take some shots at bigger games.

Wednesday, January 17, 2007

More Rigged Live Game Play

Well I was out meeting with a few friends last night and when a couple of the said they play poker "once in a while" I got a little excited. Luckily I am not endowed like Bobby or they would have noticed! So we go hit the ATM and 15 mins later sitting at the underground club slinging some chips. Two orbits in I get AA at a six handed table so I raise to the standard $10 from UTG+1. Now both of my buddies sat to my right so I wouldn't have to steal their blinds which they wouldn't imagine folding to me. Lets just say that they were a little drunk while I was slightly tipsy but ready to rock the table.

So an Asian dude who wore "cool" glasses and a fancy dress shirt calls (very loose table overall) from the SB and my buddies both call. Flop is KdQx4d so with the flush draw I reraise buddy in the BB (he bet $10) to $70 to isolate. Everyone calls but I see the nice Ax on the turn. No flush so all is good in the world as I can't put them on J10 but the flush draw looks real. SB bets $25 and both buddies call, so I reraise to $125 and everyone calls again. Of course SB has the flush draw with A3d and hits on the river. My buddies both had a K mid kicker which showed their inexperience to play that for their stack especially after the A on the turn.

So the SB says for sure he was willing to go to the felt with that draw because of how strong it was. He wasn't even worried when I showed the set of A's .... little shits like that seem to draw out far too often. Only played for another 1/2 hour and won back that buyin and also a bit of extra cash. Then one tight player left the game and that was my cue to get out of there.

Losing a $700+ pot to an idiot really hurt but I played well and I know those opportunities will come up again.

Tuesday, January 16, 2007

Lacking Focus for Timeframes

I need to setup a couple new rules so that I can focus properly and not start off down 1/2 - 1 buyin before I start playing well.

1. No big pots without the nuts against anyone you have less than 60 hands against. Too often I end up backing down from a crazy reraise with TPTK only to find out that was the maniac that had 2nd pair.

2. Leave tables when they aren't worth the time. Found myself at a table with 4 TAG players and here I am trying to play a looser game against those sharks... find waters that are safer.

3. Watch a full Cardrunners video prior to playing as listening to the constant consistent play of Taylor is a good way to focus.

4. Get some damn sleep... last night 3.5 hours the night before 2 hours. Not close to the 6 hours I am trying to average this year. Tonight I might just watch a couple videos and then go to bed early.

So down a couple buyins last night with some positive points. One I used the play of reraising pot against a person who led out at a pot with a small probe bet. I had nothing but took down a good pot instead of just calling which is my typical play. Keep control of the hand and punish people for calling my raises. I wasn't good at letting hands go or keeping pot size small when I had okay (TPTK) hands but that is something that will be the goal over the next week.

The good thing is that I am committed to making me a better player but hopefully my mistakes plus the bad beats don't kill my bankroll. Pissing away a buyin last night was probably the dumbest thing I have done in a while. 3 bullet bluffs into a TAG who has a high aggro rating but is calling tells me I am beat.... check it down .... I do not have to win every hand I raise.

Monday, January 15, 2007

Now the work begins

Well finally finished that damn 3k raked hands on the B2B network... crazy f'n site where I lost a couple buyins on silly plays but a handful more on crazy bad beats... I am not one to whine too much about that stuff as variance has been good to me in the past... just hurry up and get done with kicking my ass!

So now to rebuild my game I am starting at NL25 6 max on FT. Overplayed JJ last night but other than that the first 500 hands went well. slb watched me playing against a super donk (other than him!) and I finally had to bust the guy by going all in with KJs vs. K9. Next hand A9s vs. QJ. Luckily he wanted to continue to pay off my big hands and he scared the hell out of the rest of the table... most folded to his cbets. Going to look for that guy tonight to double up on that fun.

Time to get the most out of this Card Runners subscription.... the easy part was signing up... the hard part is working on my game.

Friday, January 12, 2007

Getting back on track

After blowing a bunch of my bankroll on FT with silly plays I decided to get back into the grind. Played in the D2S tonight and you know that you are playing well when they are complaining about my steals early in an event. Also, the guy who looked up my PS results in sharkscope was just funny. He got stacked by me a little while later so I guess it goes around.

Here is the screenshot of my results.

D2S 2nd place 01/11/06
So I started the night out focused and the results were good with a good suckout to give me the big stack with 5 left. It is always nice when you win a couple races and then can just roll into the cash. Got all in HU with K8 on a 5s6x7s board vs. AJs. So we both had lots of outs to win the hand and we both whiffed! A high takes it down.... but I was happy with my play.

I then went back to B2B to work off a bit of the bonus while trying to avoid situations like this from the other night!

http://www.pokerhand.org/?732688 The friendly people at the site mentioned that I couldn't take down the Bad Beat Jackpot but they would look into giving me something... that was great customer service from these guys.

Found that if I was patient with a super LAG that I could find a spot to take him down instead of trying to play back at him. Poker is so much more fun when you are patient and have a solid game plan.

So after attempting to follow through with the few things I have picked up from Cardrunners I was up 80 euros this evening (plus . Not sure how many people are aware of how solid the CR guys did at the PCA 4 of the top 6! Glad I am working with this crew to improve my game. Wes also did a good job of making the cash in this event which is great to see bloggers represented!

Ending the evening tonight by watching a 10/20 cash game video... these videos are great for taking the game to the next level.

Wednesday, January 10, 2007

Late Live Play

Got out for a couple quick drinks last night with a buddy of mine who is just an action junkie at the poker tables. He also was way ahead of me in the drinking department when I showed up at 8 pm to grab a drink... well next thing I know we are having food and having a night cap at the SoHo hotel and then on to the poker club.

Amazed that an almost full table is already slinging chips with no scary players around at all. I build up my $200 stack to $350 when the wheels come off. In the BB with 67o I call a raise to $6 due to good pot odds. Flop is a golden 589r so I check knowing that one of the five other people in this pot will attempt to take it down. UTG raises to $6, the next guy reraises to $21, a tight player at the end of the table calls the $21... so I shove it all in figuring that some guy with an overpair or a set will call me and hopefully my hand can hold. It folds to the tight player who calls with top two pair as he said he could lay it down for the other $200 in front of him.

Turn is a blank and then the river is a 8.... live poker is so f'n rigged.

Posted my hand from the last post onto the cardrunners site and they said I am a chip spewer... oh okay but I doubt I will tighten it up too much but I will attempt to implement a more conservative stance and play back at people with the goods when they continually raise into me. Have to stop looking for places to beat a player and instead focus on winning cash.

Tuesday, January 09, 2007

Learning is always painful

Donked out of the Hoy last night due to my over excitement to get back into the big blogger 1/2 cash table. Call that mistake number 1. I have to focus and enter each event in order to at least end up in the money. If that isn't what I am feeling at the time I should just rail the event because the chat is a good part of the fun.

Got to the cash table sitting to the left of a guy who plays a very similar game to what Cardrunners tells people to play. Everytime he was on the button he raised any unraised pot ... usually a pot sized raise if a couple limpers or to $7 if no one else was in the pot. So I watched him to this for 6 orbits and finally decided to take a stand. He raises to $7.... I reraise to $23 and he is the only caller to a 10 high flop with two spades.

Flop couldn't have helped him so I lead out for a $40 bet into a $48 pot because I can't put him on a super strong hand just yet. He calls. Turn is another 10. Here is where I think I made the mistake by not going all in as I instead bet $66 which was about half of what he had left (also 1/2 pot). If he pushes I know I am beat and can fold and save some bucks.... he thinks for a long time before going all in. I fold. At least I am attempting a few things that I wouldn't have tried before but maybe learning should be done at a lower level than normal! That just wouldn't be my style.

Now on the turn I could have checked to see if he would bet and maybe get a free card or pushed... now anyone reading this far.... what am I holding and what is my opponent holding? Up to this point I am playing a TAG style of 22/11/3 and he was SLAGing it with a 35/17/4.5 with all his raises from the button or two to the left of it. So I know he is a strong positional player and I know I have them worried about my hand but couldn't get them to lay it down.

Positives: 1. Picked the player and figured out his game plan. 2. Built a plan to exploit that style. 3. Waited for my opportunity to execute and then took action. 4. Followed through and attempted something new. 5. Reviewed the situation to learn as much as I can from it.

Negatives: Played this hand about 2 mins later. Got sort of tilted and then I donked off my stack at the 1/2 game with TPnoK. Ugly. Back to NL25 6 max to learn how to play shorthanded and work up from there.

I did go to the B2B network and won back $60 and worked off 200 hands towards my 200 euro bonus so only 800 more hands to go. Will also get an additional PSO bonus with 1,300 more hands so I will definately play to get to that level. We will review where I should play at that point as the table selection on the B2B network isn't great as the Europeans are all sleeping. The guys I do get to play against are some of the most passive players around.... but I want to get back after those guys at Booyah where I had good success in the past.

Until then I will be Full Tilted until I win back some of my cash!

Monday, January 08, 2007

Cardrunner.com

Joined Cardrunner.com after taking note of the Gnome's success at cash games on his blog. If anyone else is interested in joining you can list guin36 as a referral. So far watched about 3 hours of video and tried out a few new moves last night at the blogger 1/2 table... of course after waffles got cracked by weak player it turned into a regular cash table.

Lost $85 in trying out being even more aggro with position but still think I am not raising enough preflop to drive out some limpers. Gotta punish them more and post the trouble hands onto the forum...

Which gets me on to the goals for the year... I know I am slow to post this stuff but time to catch up.

1. Focus on my game such that I am trying to actually win money instead of treating it like "play" money currently. My brother wants to buy a license for a taxi cab (over 100k CAD) and it would be cool to fund it from playing poker. Not to mention buying a bunch of great wine to enjoy over the next few years... need some quality for Fuel's visits to town as eating out will get too expensive.

2. Sit out when the wife is talking to me.... currently she is the only person who puts me on tilt... one outer... oh well that is poker... wife telling me to empty dishwasher while someone just reraised my AA on an 8 high board throws me for a loop!

3. Have more family nights where the closest I get to poker is through reading. This way I can put a book down easier mid sentence and still spend plenty of time with the wife and little Guin. Utilizing the forums at Cardrunner and 2+2 should improve my play more than just grinding it out. The family is super important to me and I don't want them to feel left out of my schedule.

4. Play when I am ready to play my best game and not because there is a game to play.

5. When I play live it is to win money and not just to play. Anyone noticing a trend of me f'n around with poker too much in the past year. Hitting my 10k goal would have been easy if I just worked on the game and didn't mess around.

Looking back at last year I think I only moved up to NL100 but I really should have tried to get to NL200. I go through stretches at NL100 where I dominate for days on end over 16 ptbb / 100. Just have to build the bankroll to play the 2/4 game.

6. That leads me to my big goal for the year which is to play 3/6 and even take a small shot at 5/10. Can't wait till I can bet in 36, 66 and 136 increments at a cash table.

7. In general I need to get more sleep (avg 4 hours now - try for 6 at least), eat better, drink less (keep binge drinking to minimum), and work harder (at work and at poker) to make this year as successful as it should be. Throw in a bit more exercise and sex (sex counts as exercise right?!) and it could be my best year ever.

Before I forget I did post my one pixel at 36 x 36.

Thursday, January 04, 2007

Villian / Superhero

Thought I would follow the trend (interesting results!):

Your results:
You are Lex Luthor


































Lex Luthor
80%
Dr. Doom
72%
Riddler
61%
The Joker
57%
Apocalypse
57%
Magneto
55%
Kingpin
48%
Juggernaut
42%
Green Goblin
42%
Venom
41%
Mr. Freeze
40%
Two-Face
38%
Dark Phoenix
36%
Catwoman
31%
Mystique
26%
Poison Ivy
21%
A brilliant businessman on a quest for world domination and the self-proclaimed greatest criminal mind of our time!


Click here to take the "Which Super Villain am I?" quiz...


Your results:
You are Iron Man
























Iron Man
80%
Green Lantern
75%
The Flash
60%
Catwoman
60%
Superman
50%
Spider-Man
50%
Supergirl
43%
Batman
40%
Hulk
40%
Robin
33%
Wonder Woman
28%
Inventor. Businessman. Genius.


Click here to take the "Which Superhero are you?" quiz...