Playing a 40K guaranteed on party right now. Trying to parlay the $50 they gave me into something meaningful. 1st pays 11K plus. I'll blog about winning it in 6 hours or so. I am into my 3rd pint of Foster's, so I'm at the top of my game. I think my MTT game is getting better. I've reached that 8.5th level of thinking where I know that my opponent thinks I'm thinking what their thinking about. I am rebluffing the rebluffs. I have no clue what I am talking about.

update: I just doubled up in the 40K when my pocket tens turned a boat. Bet an A55 flop. 1 caller. Checked turned boat. River brought 4th diamond. raised river, called by 2nd nut flush.


I look back at most of my previous posts and realize they are a bunch of half developed ideas. I would like change that. This is how I plan to do that. 1) The first step to writing; compose an outline.


Moving on. NHL playoffs have started. I like the coverage on OLN. Mostly b/c some of the games have been CBC feeds. If you are real hockey fan you understand why HNIC coverage is SOOO much better than it was on ESPN or NBC. And don't even remind me of the disaster that was the Fox NHL coverage. Fucking 'Fox Trax Puck' is all you need to know.

I just donked off 1/2 my chips on a big bluff in the 40K. I called a small raise with suited connectors on the button. Flop comes 8 high and I pop what seems to weak continuation bet. He flat calls???? Turn is a K and he make another weak bet. Any raise would put me all in and he's basically committed. Fold. I suck.

Here are my NHL picks. Carolina in the East and San Jose in the West. Carolina wins.

Just busted in 40K. Lost with 10s to AA. I should bust my party bankroll in a few minutes here.....I am going to let it ride on the 7K guaranteed 7CS tourney. Play is HORRIBLE there.

Done.

everyone wins at poker

I don't think I've ever seen or spoken to anyone that admits that they are a long-term loser playing poker. I lurk on different message boards, read various blogs, dig in the garbage of various poker professionals and no one seems to be losing. If everyone is winning, then someone has to be losing, yet no one is owning up to it where I look. Now, it's probably just the case that the people dumping tons of cash in online poker don't hang around 2+2 reading strategy posts.

Well, I recently found out about an SNG search tool called sharkscope, which tracks SNG play on pokerstars and a few other sites. Recently, I have used it to search for record of people I've been playing with. I ran across the record of a guy who has dropped 8K+ over ~800 SNG's. His stats are pretty amazing to me, take a look for yourself. I wonder who the hell this person is. Seemingly, this person has deep pockets, but has shown no sign of improving over time. Is this person some rich dink who enjoys the rush of super aggro play, shoving your chips all in and hoping for the best? I would guess not. For one, this person seems to be playing alot of turbo SNG's which requires blind aggression, especially late in the match and I would think they would be fairing a little better just due to luck. And the action junkie likes to win. This person seems content with losing, alot.

Is it possible that this person has lost their mind? Maybe this person is a hopelessly depressed 20-something trust fund baby blowing through their inheritance just to feel something. Perhaps, it is an elderly gentleman with Alzheimer's who is aware enough to keep reloading his account, but doesn't remember one hand from the next let alone one SNG from the next. Someone with severe dementia could play SNG after SNG with really no idea what is going on.

Any background story I can think of seems really sad. How should we (i.e. winning poker players) feel when our bankrolls are likely fed by the emotionally unstable, the deranged, the demented people in our world. Is it wrong? Does gambling by its very nature not involve any sort of moralilty?

nice to see you old friend

Party poker gave me $50 free dollars and now I'm trying to clear 500 raked hands to keep it. I've played 4 SNG's and have finished ITM in all of them. I've played a few multi's also, no luck in them. I think it's been over a year since I have visited my old friend party poker. The first time I played no limit cash games were on party. Oh the .10/.25 tables. Some real rounders there. My first time I had money in party I ran 50 bucks up to about 500 or so in a few weeks. Then over the course of few days I gave most of it back. I was convinced the site was rigged, so I had them send me a check for $78 dollars or something like that. I had no notion of bankroll management or long-term goals. I think I approached poker like I would when I used to play blackjack occasionally. If I won, I had a little extra spending money and if I lost, then oh well.

good things about party poker:
1) You can actually get a limit omaha hi game going. This is pretty rare, even for larger rooms.
I'm sitting here playing right now getting my nut hands paid off by pimply faced college sophomores.

2) The SNG structure has improved, but the games are still soft. Can I squeeze it, Mr. Whipple?

bad things:
1) The turn and river cards come flying in super fast. Next thing you know, the pot's sitting there in front of you, or not.

2) It's not easy to review the action in a hand, especially in split games. You have to scroll back through that little box.

3) The congrats and fireworks for winning a hand. Think if they did this at your B&M. You scoop a pot up and the dealer tosses a string of lit ladyfingers in front of you. I just reminded myself of that scene in Boogie Night when Dirk Diggler, Reed Rothschild, and Todd Parker try to sell of some phony coke and there is a Chinese kid there who keeps lighting off firecrackers. Genius.

addendum:
Thanks to Iggy for tossing up a link to this little blog a few weeks back. I actually I had more than 10 hits that day. Take that fuckers.

blog entry titles are for losers

Come to Milwaukee, the place where off duty cops can beat the shit out of people and get off scot-free. There are alot of great things about Milwaukee, but it's Fucking Embarrassing to live in MKE right now.

Came up two slots short of the final table in $10 MTT with 900+ people in it. I think I had all my chips at risk only 3 times. The last time did me in when my JJ lost to AJ. So, I'm still looking for my first 4 figure score. I'm pretty sure I'd have it if I were able to play more tourneys. The play in these low buyin tourneys is pretty bad, especially early. My best example of the poor play is a hand early where I flopped a set of 7s on a 678 board. There was maybe 200 in the pot and this dude shoved in about 1200 from the SB. I called and he showed 55. That flop is decent for his hand of course, but risking all your chips to pick up 200 is pretty silly.

Other recent poker highlights include finishing first in my last two SNGs and talking a $160+ dollar pot in a .10/.25 pot limit omaha game on full tilt.

I think this (below) is a little more impressive however. And by impressive, I mean shit luck impressive. This will probably never happen to me again. To spare you the chore of looking over the hand history. I Flopped back to back quads......bitches.

PokerStars Game #4574762068: Tournament #22802513, Hold'em No Limit - Level VIII (200/400) - 2006/04/09 - 18:06:34 (ET)

Table '22802513 1' 9-max Seat #9 is the button

Seat 1: Werty83 (3015 in chips) out of hand (moved from another table into small blind)

Seat 2: HarryO44 (1840 in chips) out of hand (moved from another table into small blind)

Seat 3: Sweed12 (1655 in chips) out of hand (moved from another table into small blind)

Seat 4: BorisKarloff (2755 in chips)

Seat 5: lynch0408 (645 in chips) is sitting out

Seat 6: rgpars (8940 in chips)

Seat 7: questing (1780 in chips)

Seat 8: suspectzero (1000 in chips)

Seat 9: smountain (5370 in chips)

BorisKarloff: posts the ante 25

lynch0408: posts the ante 25

rgpars: posts the ante 25

questing: posts the ante 25

suspectzero: posts the ante 25

smountain: posts the ante 25

BorisKarloff: posts small blind 200

lynch0408: posts big blind 400

*** HOLE CARDS ***

Dealt to rgpars [6d 6h]

rgpars: raises 800 to 1200

questing: folds

suspectzero: calls 975 and is all-in

smountain: folds

BorisKarloff: folds

lynch0408: folds

Sweed12 said, "is that KY"

*** FLOP *** [6c 6s As]

rgpars said, "jeebus"

*** TURN *** [6c 6s As] [2h]

*** RIVER *** [6c 6s As 2h] [9h]

HarryO44 said, "me?"

*** SHOW DOWN ***

rgpars: shows [6d 6h] (four of a kind, Sixes)

suspectzero: shows [Ac Kd] (two pair, Aces and Sixes)

rgpars collected 2700 from pot

Sweed12 said, "yea"

*** SUMMARY ***

Total pot 2700 | Rake 0

Board [6c 6s As 2h 9h]

Seat 4: BorisKarloff (small blind) folded before Flop

Seat 5: lynch0408 (big blind) folded before Flop

Seat 6: rgpars showed [6d 6h] and won (2700) with four of a kind, Sixes

Seat 7: questing folded before Flop (didn't bet)

Seat 8: suspectzero showed [Ac Kd] and lost with two pair, Aces and Sixes

Seat 9: smountain (button) folded before Flop (didn't bet)

PokerStars Game #4574768708: Tournament #22802513, Hold'em No Limit - Level VIII (200/400) - 2006/04/09 - 18:07:13 (ET)

Table '22802513 1' 9-max Seat #4 is the button

Seat 1: Werty83 (3015 in chips)

Seat 2: HarryO44 (1840 in chips)

Seat 3: Sweed12 (1655 in chips)

Seat 4: BorisKarloff (2530 in chips)

Seat 5: lynch0408 (220 in chips) is sitting out

Seat 6: rgpars (10640 in chips)

Seat 7: questing (1755 in chips)

Seat 9: smountain (5345 in chips)

Werty83: posts the ante 25

HarryO44: posts the ante 25

Sweed12: posts the ante 25

BorisKarloff: posts the ante 25

lynch0408: posts the ante 25

rgpars: posts the ante 25

questing: posts the ante 25

smountain: posts the ante 25

lynch0408: posts small blind 195 and is all-in

rgpars: posts big blind 400

*** HOLE CARDS ***

Dealt to rgpars [2h 2c]

questing: folds

smountain: calls 400

Werty83: folds

HarryO44: folds

Sweed12: folds

BorisKarloff: folds

lynch0408: folds

rgpars: checks

*** FLOP *** [3s 2d 2s]

rgpars: checks

smountain: checks

*** TURN *** [3s 2d 2s] [9s]

rgpars: bets 400

smountain: folds

rgpars collected 410 from side pot

rgpars said, "un fuclking real"

rgpars collected 785 from main pot

rgpars: shows [2h 2c] (four of a kind, Deuces)

HarryO44 said, "nah Rhode Island"

*** SUMMARY ***

Total pot 1195 Main pot 785. Side pot 410. | Rake 0

Board [3s 2d 2s 9s]

Seat 1: Werty83 folded before Flop (didn't bet)

Seat 2: HarryO44 folded before Flop (didn't bet)

Seat 3: Sweed12 folded before Flop (didn't bet)

Seat 4: BorisKarloff (button) folded before Flop (didn't bet)

Seat 5: lynch0408 (small blind) folded before Flop

Seat 6: rgpars (big blind) collected (1195)

Seat 7: questing folded before Flop (didn't bet)

Seat 9: smountain folded on the Turn

Das ist kaput

HD on my laptop decided to take a crap yesterday. It started with a slight clicking noise coming from the left hand side. Turned the machine off and no go after that. Ran some diagnostic/recovery program and now it sounds like there is a little man in there trying to pound his way out. Like an idiot I had not backed up much of anything on there. So, I lost my last several months of poker records, some pictures, and vids of 'High Stakes Poker.' I've been googling different ways to recover data off a crapped out HD and came across the practice of sticking the malfunctioning drive in the freezer and then reconnecting it. I tried it once, but to no avail. I'm gonna freeze that fucker good tomorrow and see what happens. Maybe I'll toss it in the dryer and iron it out afterwards. Who knows, it might work.

Johan the man.....

Watching the opening day game for my beloved Minnesota Twins. Johan looks pretty sharp and Tony Batista already grounded and flied out once. An out-machine for sure. Gleeman is right.

Last night I played in the blogger WSOP satty organized by Iggy. My first table had DoubleAs and pokernerd among others. Joe Speaker moved in at some point. I know all these guys have had some success and I figured I needed to get lucky and play smart to get far in the event. I got lucky some, but didn't play all that smart. It was a deep stack event and had 30 minute levels. I've always avoided deep stack events simply because of time concerns. I don't often have 8 hours to play a tourney. The first major hand I had I was dealt AA in the big blind. There was a standard raise from UTG and I popped it back and got a call. Flop came Q high I got a call on my flop bet and was reraised all in on the turn. I went into the tank and decided the guy either had QQ or KK. I made the call and saw the bad news, he held QQ. I hit my two outer on the river to double up. I started raising more pots after that and had minimal success. The table was stocked enough to realize what I was doing and I started to get played back at more, but I still hovered around 10K in chips and was in the top 10. Somewhere around the second hour I got KK in the cut off and got a call from a someone who limped UTG. Flop came 7,8,2 and I got checkraised. Tanked again. I realize 77 and 88 are possible holdings here, but I figured I was just as likely up against 99-JJ(I guess 27 is even possible in a blogger event). I put the player all in and saw I was up against top set. No two outer this time. Went out around the end of hour 3 with AK to AA. The competition was good though, and that is refreshing after playing against donks most of the time in cheap ass SNGs and ring games. In a very classy move Iggy kicked in an extra few hundred to get the prize pool high enough to send two bloggers.

Twins update: Johan just gave up a bomb to one of the 24 Molina's who play catcher and have the least athletic looking frames in baseball. Suuuper excited to see the Twinkies when the come to MKE in May. The experience of watching games at Miller Park is 100 times more enjoyable than going to a game at the Metrodome.

Why?:

Seats all face homeplate.
Tailgating at Miller Park.
Outdoors (mostly).

out.