Just to remind me (should I ever need reminding).
Myself and Chris have a 10% agreement in any tournament we both play in. Let's just say to date he's done a bit better from this deal than I have so far...
Of course, Mr Webber delivers his best ever casino result the day before an exam, when I'm not there.
You bastard.
But congrats!
Friday 30 May 2008
Shame, Vegas and Procrastination
Shame: I spelt Optimistic wrong, and the blog was shit. It really was, so am shunting it down with this long overdue effort.
Procrastination: I should be revising, got a freaking exam at 9:30am tomorrow (that's a Saturday) - and I still need to learn the course, but just can't concentrate at the moment.
But Vegas, baby, has been over two months since I've returned. I finished a tidy $2.5k up, but was very disappointed that it wasn't more.
It started so well, after driving down with two friends from San Franciso, I decided to take a walk down the strip to check out the poker rooms and get some info. I stumbled into Planet Hollywood at 6:58pm with their $60 freeze starting in two minutes. I got the second-last ticket, and outlasted the other 98 runners to take down a $1400 payday before the poker was even supposed to start!
It meant I didn't have to make a single withdrawal from my account for the rest of my time there. Helped by winning two of my next three tournaments and FTing the other (won $65 Caesars Palace for $800, 4th in PH $60 - about $140 for that - and then 1st at PH for about $450).
I'm sure the eagle-eyed have noticed that would make my winnings $2.8k already, or about $2.5k profit after buy-ins. It didn't go too well after that. I'm not a cash game player, but I was card dead. The deck hit me in the face in tournaments (in an hour period I hit quads twice and flopped two straights, one with a nut flush redraw, getting paid off each time), and in cash games I could go 8 hours whilst seeing just 4 top 10% hands and having to lay down the best, QQ, to a pre-flop limp re-raise. I tried to play tight, but I just didn't hit a thing. I had a couple of good sessions, but broke-even at best over the trip.
One highlight was FTing the $10k guarantee (they took >15k) at Binions on my first ever trip there, until my chip leading dominance was derailed by a complete monkey:
I've already cold-decked someone else in the extreme to give me the chip lead with around 30 players left of the 156 that started. With blinds at 100/200, UTG (~8k) raises to 600, folded to me in the BB with 33 (I have around 11k). I call and check the flop dark. I don't look at the flop and just stare at him, he looks at me and checks behind. I glance back.
The flop's AA3 - with his check I have him!
Turn.....3
So naturally I bet 1600 into the 1300 pot with quads. He flat calls. I am now 1000% certain he has an A.
River J
I bet 3k, he grabs a large stack of his chips and just sticks them over the line. I move all-in for his last k or so. He calls and flips AJ. Hehehe!
Anyway, back to the situation in the last 30. Blinds are 600/1200. BB has been quiet, and is moaning with his last 3400 chips, and says to me he's going in no matter what. I don't think anyone else was paying attention. I'm UTG with AJ and raise to 3600 (my stack is approx 35k). It's folded round to the SB, who calls (he's an absolute donkey, with 25k or so he's jammed off me, with A8s v A8s. I've also had people shove into me, giving me 3:1 odds, with Q7o and A9o, needless to say I didn't win either of those, anyway, the standard is poor).
BB keeps his word and moves all-in. The pot is 10,200 with 400 more on the side.
Flop JJ4 two diamonds. I'm happy to take it down here and bet 4k into the dry side pot. This should be a massive warning sign! SB calls.
Turn 2d. Great, flush draw down, he checks, I check behind.
River Td. 4 diamonds now, he grabs 10k and sticks it in, I insta-pass in disgust and he shows AK with just the Kd. Well done, idiot. He's chip leader now but doesn't even make the money (top 18).
I drift along to the final, no able to pick anything big up, and go out in 7th despite sucking out on AQ with T3. I can't repeat the trick with J7. They chop 5 way as well, so my $400 could've been $2k. Argh.
Got very bored of poker after a week, which didn't help me play my best game. Sitting down at the Mirage with $200, only to lose it all first hand with set over set doesn't help. But on one notable occasion the deck ran my way.
Planet Hollywood $1/$2, 9 handed.
I'm BB, and it has been straddled to $4. UTG +1 calls (he seems tight, relatively weak, but not going to be playing trash). Someone in MP calls, as does the Button (no info) and me with 7h5h.
Flop 6d 8c 8h
There is a tendancy to overbet in Vegas, and I fancy seeing a cheap turn, so chuck out $5. EP player and Button both flat call.
Turn 9h
Woo, I turn the straight, and am immediately putting EP on an 8, and he's also shown no tendancy to play suited connectors, he's a high card guy. Not sure about the button, but I think I'm likely to have the best hand here.
Then chaos. I bet $20. EP min-raises to $40. Button raises to $105. Now I'm flummoxed, but don't believe either player would be raising with a full house on this kind of board, so I flat call hoping to bring EP and his A8-type hand along too, believe the button has a similar hand.
EP reraises to $210. Button moves all in for $170 total and the decision is back on me. EP has about $80 behind. I decide to talk to them, saying neither would raise with the boat, so I think my hand is good. Neither of them look comfortable, and when I push all in, the disappointment on EPs face is apparent as he pushes his final $80 in, feeling he's pot committed. Button turns to me and says 'Have you got a full house?' and tables T7 - ouch, didn't put him on that. My read on EP is spot on as he shows A8.
River 2h
Ship it!
Other than that, I am pottering along nicely both live and online. I've stopped the cash for a while, as I'm not playing well in it. The tournaments are going well, I feel like I'm outplaying people at will and only continued bad beats and cold-deckings are preventing me from more frequent and bigger scores. Despite this, I am slightly up over the last month live.
Online, I have discovered the 45 man Full Tilt $26 SNGs. They're juicy! 18 tournaments, 2 wins, 2 seconds, 2 thirds and a fourth. Again, various suckouts are crippling me even in these, KK v TT three times for example! The luck is well in the negative column, but with my ROI at 152% and my online ranking up to 21,000 or so, I can live with it.
It's just a bit frustrating when you know there's so much more on offer. I can't win a race to save my life, but I can't even win one in two when I've built a dominant chip position.
Consecutive hands, short stack shove with AKs, I call with QQ, he flops the nuts, I turn the set, miss the boat. Next hand, he shoves again with QQ, I reshove with AKs, obviously the QQ hold up this time! It costs me half my stack!
FT on Grosvenor Wed tournie. I lose a race with AK v 77 3 handed for 90% of the chips in play, then about 10 mins later, another race with AK v 88 for 70% of the chips.
16 people left in the £150 Freeze in Southampton, after being card dead and winning 5 pots all night, I shove 9k in with QQ, get two callers, the blinds. I win the pot I am up to 3rd and one of the favourites for a £3.5k payday. They both flip AK, so I'm a 3:1 fave. Obviously the A flops.
Moaning over. I'm still winning. And if the luck goes my way too, I'll be disappointing a lot of people at final tables!
Procrastination: I should be revising, got a freaking exam at 9:30am tomorrow (that's a Saturday) - and I still need to learn the course, but just can't concentrate at the moment.
But Vegas, baby, has been over two months since I've returned. I finished a tidy $2.5k up, but was very disappointed that it wasn't more.
It started so well, after driving down with two friends from San Franciso, I decided to take a walk down the strip to check out the poker rooms and get some info. I stumbled into Planet Hollywood at 6:58pm with their $60 freeze starting in two minutes. I got the second-last ticket, and outlasted the other 98 runners to take down a $1400 payday before the poker was even supposed to start!
It meant I didn't have to make a single withdrawal from my account for the rest of my time there. Helped by winning two of my next three tournaments and FTing the other (won $65 Caesars Palace for $800, 4th in PH $60 - about $140 for that - and then 1st at PH for about $450).
I'm sure the eagle-eyed have noticed that would make my winnings $2.8k already, or about $2.5k profit after buy-ins. It didn't go too well after that. I'm not a cash game player, but I was card dead. The deck hit me in the face in tournaments (in an hour period I hit quads twice and flopped two straights, one with a nut flush redraw, getting paid off each time), and in cash games I could go 8 hours whilst seeing just 4 top 10% hands and having to lay down the best, QQ, to a pre-flop limp re-raise. I tried to play tight, but I just didn't hit a thing. I had a couple of good sessions, but broke-even at best over the trip.
One highlight was FTing the $10k guarantee (they took >15k) at Binions on my first ever trip there, until my chip leading dominance was derailed by a complete monkey:
I've already cold-decked someone else in the extreme to give me the chip lead with around 30 players left of the 156 that started. With blinds at 100/200, UTG (~8k) raises to 600, folded to me in the BB with 33 (I have around 11k). I call and check the flop dark. I don't look at the flop and just stare at him, he looks at me and checks behind. I glance back.
The flop's AA3 - with his check I have him!
Turn.....3
So naturally I bet 1600 into the 1300 pot with quads. He flat calls. I am now 1000% certain he has an A.
River J
I bet 3k, he grabs a large stack of his chips and just sticks them over the line. I move all-in for his last k or so. He calls and flips AJ. Hehehe!
Anyway, back to the situation in the last 30. Blinds are 600/1200. BB has been quiet, and is moaning with his last 3400 chips, and says to me he's going in no matter what. I don't think anyone else was paying attention. I'm UTG with AJ and raise to 3600 (my stack is approx 35k). It's folded round to the SB, who calls (he's an absolute donkey, with 25k or so he's jammed off me, with A8s v A8s. I've also had people shove into me, giving me 3:1 odds, with Q7o and A9o, needless to say I didn't win either of those, anyway, the standard is poor).
BB keeps his word and moves all-in. The pot is 10,200 with 400 more on the side.
Flop JJ4 two diamonds. I'm happy to take it down here and bet 4k into the dry side pot. This should be a massive warning sign! SB calls.
Turn 2d. Great, flush draw down, he checks, I check behind.
River Td. 4 diamonds now, he grabs 10k and sticks it in, I insta-pass in disgust and he shows AK with just the Kd. Well done, idiot. He's chip leader now but doesn't even make the money (top 18).
I drift along to the final, no able to pick anything big up, and go out in 7th despite sucking out on AQ with T3. I can't repeat the trick with J7. They chop 5 way as well, so my $400 could've been $2k. Argh.
Got very bored of poker after a week, which didn't help me play my best game. Sitting down at the Mirage with $200, only to lose it all first hand with set over set doesn't help. But on one notable occasion the deck ran my way.
Planet Hollywood $1/$2, 9 handed.
I'm BB, and it has been straddled to $4. UTG +1 calls (he seems tight, relatively weak, but not going to be playing trash). Someone in MP calls, as does the Button (no info) and me with 7h5h.
Flop 6d 8c 8h
There is a tendancy to overbet in Vegas, and I fancy seeing a cheap turn, so chuck out $5. EP player and Button both flat call.
Turn 9h
Woo, I turn the straight, and am immediately putting EP on an 8, and he's also shown no tendancy to play suited connectors, he's a high card guy. Not sure about the button, but I think I'm likely to have the best hand here.
Then chaos. I bet $20. EP min-raises to $40. Button raises to $105. Now I'm flummoxed, but don't believe either player would be raising with a full house on this kind of board, so I flat call hoping to bring EP and his A8-type hand along too, believe the button has a similar hand.
EP reraises to $210. Button moves all in for $170 total and the decision is back on me. EP has about $80 behind. I decide to talk to them, saying neither would raise with the boat, so I think my hand is good. Neither of them look comfortable, and when I push all in, the disappointment on EPs face is apparent as he pushes his final $80 in, feeling he's pot committed. Button turns to me and says 'Have you got a full house?' and tables T7 - ouch, didn't put him on that. My read on EP is spot on as he shows A8.
River 2h
Ship it!
Other than that, I am pottering along nicely both live and online. I've stopped the cash for a while, as I'm not playing well in it. The tournaments are going well, I feel like I'm outplaying people at will and only continued bad beats and cold-deckings are preventing me from more frequent and bigger scores. Despite this, I am slightly up over the last month live.
Online, I have discovered the 45 man Full Tilt $26 SNGs. They're juicy! 18 tournaments, 2 wins, 2 seconds, 2 thirds and a fourth. Again, various suckouts are crippling me even in these, KK v TT three times for example! The luck is well in the negative column, but with my ROI at 152% and my online ranking up to 21,000 or so, I can live with it.
It's just a bit frustrating when you know there's so much more on offer. I can't win a race to save my life, but I can't even win one in two when I've built a dominant chip position.
Consecutive hands, short stack shove with AKs, I call with QQ, he flops the nuts, I turn the set, miss the boat. Next hand, he shoves again with QQ, I reshove with AKs, obviously the QQ hold up this time! It costs me half my stack!
FT on Grosvenor Wed tournie. I lose a race with AK v 77 3 handed for 90% of the chips in play, then about 10 mins later, another race with AK v 88 for 70% of the chips.
16 people left in the £150 Freeze in Southampton, after being card dead and winning 5 pots all night, I shove 9k in with QQ, get two callers, the blinds. I win the pot I am up to 3rd and one of the favourites for a £3.5k payday. They both flip AK, so I'm a 3:1 fave. Obviously the A flops.
Moaning over. I'm still winning. And if the luck goes my way too, I'll be disappointing a lot of people at final tables!
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