Poker Blog – icemonkey9 on PokerStars

Well, the last post couldn’t have been more prophetic.  I had one of my worst sessions results wise at 100nl in a very long time.  It’s not devastating but it’s tough to lose 4 buy-ins in a session no matter what game or stakes you are at.  It always stings a little more when you have just moved up.  I really don’t want to think about what it did to my monthly bottom line.  I’ll probably cry.

I have to admit I felt the pangs of tilt creeping in at the end of that fateful 1,000 hand session.  It started to feel like no matter what I do, it would come out all wrong.  Sound familiar?  Ya, sounds like every other 10-15k hand bad-run I’ve gone through.  Keeping in mind I’ve put in a grand total of 2,700 hands at 100nl, the number of bad beats and coolers is disproportionate to their expected level, thus I am well below All-in EV and other indicators.

So, this is a good reason why I set aside 60 buy-ins for moving up, I’m still doing fine bankroll wise to hang here and I am 1000% positive I can play here.  I can’t run into coolers and lose every flip and get outflopped and hit only 5.6% of sets over the long haul.  The real issue is just making it through another rough stretch.  Here are the major hands from the session I put in, if you care to look.

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Here I am with KK. You might remember that last session I had AA lose to KK AIPF. Here’s the opposite-double-negative of that.

Poker Stars $0.50/$1 No Limit Hold’em – 9 players -
MP2: $98.50
CO: $147.85
BTN: $139.85
SB: $76.85
BB: $100.00
UTG: $100.00
UTG+1: $101.50
UTG+2: $49.90
Hero (MP1): $100.00

Pre Flop: ($1.50) Hero is MP1 with K K

3 folds, Hero raises to $3.50, MP2 calls $3.50, CO calls $3.50, BTN raises to $16, 2 folds, Hero raises to $50, 2 folds, BTN raises to $139.85 all in, Hero calls $50 all in

Flop: ($208.50) Q 5 A (2 players – 2 are all in)
Turn: ($208.50) 6 (2 players – 2 are all in)
River: ($208.50) 9 (2 players – 2 are all in)

Final Pot: $208.50

BTN shows A A (three of a kind, Aces)
Hero shows K K (a pair of Kings)
BTN wins $205.50

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This hand was actually at the EURO tables. The villain is a 38/22 over 50 hands with a 10% 3bet figure.

Poker Stars $0.50/$1 No Limit Hold’em – 8 players -
BB: $101.50
UTG: $122.60
UTG+1: $46.50
MP1: $118.70
MP2: $70.65
Hero (CO): $100.00
BTN: $105.50
SB: $44.50

Pre Flop: ($1.50) Hero is CO with Q Q
1 fold, UTG+1 raises to $3, MP1 calls $3, 1 fold, Hero raises to $12, 3 folds, UTG+1 raises to $46.50 all in, 1 fold, Hero calls $34.50

Flop: ($97.50) 6 3 5 (2 players – 1 is all in)
Turn: ($97.50) 7 (2 players – 1 is all in)
River: ($97.50) 3 (2 players – 1 is all in)

Final Pot: $97.50
UTG+1 shows A A (two pair, Aces and Threes)
Hero shows Q Q (two pair, Queens and Threes)
UTG+1 wins $95.50

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This was against a 34/17 with an 11% squeeze number.

Poker Stars $0.50/$1 No Limit Hold’em – 9 players -
UTG+1: $109.65
UTG+2: $100.00
MP1: $87.15
MP2: $100.00
CO: $100.90
BTN: $174.45
SB: $39.75
Hero (BB): $100.00
UTG: $103.00

Pre Flop: ($1.50) Hero is BB with A K
6 folds, BTN raises to $3, SB raises to $39.75 all in, Hero calls $38.75, 1 fold
Flop: ($82.50) 6 6 3 (2 players – 1 is all in)
Turn: ($82.50) T (2 players – 1 is all in)
River: ($82.50) J (2 players – 1 is all in)

Final Pot: $82.50

SB shows 4 4 (two pair, Sixes and Fours)
Hero shows A K (a pair of Sixes)
SB wins $79.50

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I grabbed this hand to show what happens when I do flop something, this didn’t come from the “big loss” category…

Poker Stars $0.50/$1 No Limit Hold’em – 8 players -
MP1: $52.70
MP2: $50.00
CO: $215.60
Hero (BTN): $101.50
SB: $127.00
BB: $117.75
UTG: $101.50
UTG+1: $140.20
Pre Flop: ($1.50) Hero is BTN with J A
4 folds, CO raises to $3, Hero calls $3, 1 fold, BB calls $2

Flop: ($9.50) J 7 2 (3 players)
BB checks, CO bets $7, Hero calls $7, BB folds

Turn: ($23.50) 9 (2 players)
CO checks, Hero bets $14, CO calls $14

River: ($51.50) 5 (2 players)
CO checks, Hero checks

Final Pot: $51.50

CO shows K K (a pair of Kings)
Hero mucks J A
CO wins $49.00

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So that’s all I care to show at this point. Standard? Sure. Sucky? Absolutely. Tilted? Not exactly, but I think it’s a good thing I am calling it a day and heading out for a dinner with some friends. See you next time and in the meantime send your positive mojo and good luck my way, por favor.

I’m going to tell you the story of a groundhog.  You all know one and chances are, we’ve all been one at one point in our poker career whether you are a recreational player or seasoned professional.  A groundhog pops out of his hole and sees a shadow, then dives right back to where he came from.  The mere sight of potential trouble has him scurrying back to where he came from.  He barely ever stuck around to see if the shadow was even really there.

Sound familiar?  It should.  Whenever we move up in stakes, be it for Sit & Gos, Tournaments or Ring Games, we’ve all been the groundhog.  As many people believe, as soon as you move up in stakes, the doomswitch is activated and you will immediately go through a rough 10k-ish stretch of terrible hands.  It happens everytime and to seemingly every player.  If you don’t believe me, ask your friends that play regularly, it’s as sure as the sunrise is in the morning.

This is where the importance of bankroll management comes into play.  Two years ago when I was first climbing the micro-stakes into the small stakes games, I thought 30-35 buy-ins was plenty to “take a shot” at the next level.  The only problem is that it really didn’t leave me much wriggle room for that inevitable run-bad.  Many players have never gotten over this hump and keep taking 3-5 buy-in shots at the next level, which in my mind is just always poised to fail.  I drop 3-5 buy-ins regularly in a session, but in the end, always come out a little bit ahead for my modest but consistent win-rate.

After reading Dusty Schmidt’s book I realized the issue without him totally going into what was exactly affecting me.  He advocated that 100 buy-ins is the way to go, which I don’t think works for me at all.  But the concept of having more than enough buy-ins to withstand a rough stretch was one I never ever really accounted for.

During my Phoenix-like rebuilding of my PokerStars bankroll, I moved from 25nl to 50nl and started a prop bet to get me to play a bunch of hands rather quickly.  Of course, I ran bad for a while then played through it and won at a decent enough rate.  But one thing I did was decide that 60 buy-ins was what it takes for me to move up.  There’s plenty in there to withstand a terrible swing and recover without freaking out too bad.  I thought about the number for some time and 60 was a little more than I thought was really necessary for me.  That’s when I knew I had the right number.

So, with 66 buy-ins I moved back to my old stomping grounds on PokerStars, playing 100nl Full Ring.  Some old names were still plodding through those stakes, playing their 10/8 nit game, 20-24 tabling and making 0.4BB/100.  Lots of fish are there too and the games really haven’t changed much at all, thankfully.

Of course, within the first session, I ran three buy-ins below EV.  In fact, here’s one of the first hands I played after moving up:

Poker Stars $0.50/$1 No Limit Hold’em – 9 players -
MP1: $101.90
MP2: $166.05
Hero (CO): $100.00
BTN: $100.00
SB: $49.00
BB: $194.90
UTG: $110.60
UTG+1: $111.25
UTG+2: $161.80
Pre Flop: ($1.50) Hero is CO with A A
2 folds, UTG+2 raises to $3, 1 fold, MP2 calls $3, Hero raises to $12, 3 folds, UTG+2 raises to $24, 1 fold, Hero raises to $60, UTG+2 raises to $96, Hero raises to $100 all in, UTG+2 calls $4
Flop: ($204.50) 8 3 Q (2 players – 1 is all in)
Turn: ($204.50) 9 (2 players – 1 is all in)
River: ($204.50) K (2 players – 1 is all in)
Final Pot: $204.50
Hero mucks A A
UTG+2 shows K K (three of a kind, Kings)
UTG+2 wins $201.50
(Rake: $3.00)

Wow right? He didn’t show his cards right away but by the river, I figured my goose was cooked. Then there’s a marginal cooler in this hand where I lose with a boat:

Poker Stars $0.50/$1 No Limit Hold’em – 8 players -
BB: $61.70
UTG: $103.00
UTG+1: $142.20
MP1: $120.65
MP2: $177.00
Hero (CO): $118.40
BTN: $102.50
SB: $100.00
Pre Flop: ($1.50) Hero is CO with J A

4 folds, Hero raises to $3.50, 2 folds, BB calls $2.50

Flop: ($7.50) K 5 J (2 players)
BB checks, Hero bets $5, BB raises to $10, Hero calls $5

Turn: ($27.50) K (2 players)
BB checks, Hero checks

River: ($27.50) J (2 players)
BB bets $16, Hero calls $16

Final Pot: $59.50
BB shows K A (a full house, Kings full of Jacks)
Hero mucks J A
BB wins $56.60
(Rake: $2.90)

Not terrible but hey, it always sucks to lose with a boat. Then there’s this that always seems to be the kicker:

Poker Stars $0.50/$1 No Limit Hold’em – 6 players -
Hero (BB): $100.00
UTG: $108.55
MP: $100.00
CO: $108.75
BTN: $100.00
SB: $49.00

Pre Flop: ($1.50) Hero is BB with A A
5 folds (A walk)

Final Pot: $1.50
Hero mucks A A
Hero wins $1.00
(Rake: $0.50)

Funny. I snorted actually when this happened but didn’t tilt like I usually do. I was rather proud of myself for just taking it in stride.  I didn’t panic and I didn’t freak out and yell and scream and just say “F THIS I ALWAYS RUN BAD!!!” after I lost a few other pots later in the session.  I just stuck with it, fought back, won some hands, and minimized the loss for the session and made sure I reached my target goal of hands played for the session.  ”This is why I set aside 60 buy-ins,” I would tell myself.  And thus, the groundhog became a Phoenix.

Well, I think I’m playing well … at least I am identifying situations a lot better, making better laydowns and betting for value with a much better purpose than before.  There are a lot of fundamentals that I’ve worked on and I’m really not reading into results.  Well, that is until my last two sessions because there were some kinda weird hands that actually had me lol and says “wow really??” … so for some interesting tid-bits:

Hands: 685
Result: -1 buy-in
W$SD%: 35%

I was chatting with CaseAce48 on AIM and explaining that I usually do fantastic against the regs and the fish just always somehow pull “one pip higher” on the hand chart right out of their asses.  I think my sample size here is *clearly* very small but I was curious to see what happend.  Something felt off and I wanted to know why, so I did some digging.  Here are some hands …

• Fish shows AK on a 5JAT2 board … I have AQ
• 4 bet four times in 200 hands from people that never 4bet (different tables)
• TT < JJ as well as TT < QQ in pots where villain flatted behind my raise and check-called to the river when we *both* have overpairs to the board
• AQ < AK vs SSer who goes nuts on the blinds
• AJ < AK on a AT594 board where he check-calls to the river

Strange stuff.  I think the biggest pot I’ve lost in these two sessions was only $60 which might explain why I’m just down the one buy-in, which to be honest, I didn’t even know I was down until I looked.

Anyways … what I was hoping to do is find out what was going on because in the back of my head it felt like “wow gee are my reads off, why am I paying these guys off all of a sudden” but I don’t think the problem is that bad.  Something to think about though when the month is through and I do my end-of-month DB analysis for myself, which is why I am writing about it here.

And now … my favorite hand … not complaining but an eye-roller nonetheless …

Full Tilt Poker $0.50/$1 No Limit Hold’em – 6 players – View hand 437596
The Official DeucesCracked.com Hand History Converter

SB: $100.00
Hero (BB): $123.15
UTG: $101.05
MP: $141.10
CO: $108.15
BTN: $33.70

Pre Flop: ($1.50) Hero is BB with Q Q
UTG calls $1, MP calls $1, 1 fold, BTN calls $1, SB calls $0.50, Hero raises to $8, 2 folds, BTN calls $7, 1 fold

Flop: ($19.00) 9 A Q (2 players)
Hero bets $26, BTN calls $25.70 all in

Turn: ($70.40) 7 (2 players – 1 is all in)

River: ($70.40) K (2 players – 1 is all in)

Final Pot: $70.40
Hero shows Q Q (three of a kind, Queens)
BTN shows 3 A (a flush, Ace high)
BTN wins $67.40
(Rake: $3.00)

I ended up playing in a  bunch of tournaments yesterday, which means for me five.  That is seriously a month’s worth of tournament play for me wrapped up into one giant ball of a day.  I don’t even remember all the ones I played in and the only one you are going to care about is the MiniFTOPS Main Event.  I bought in for Full Tilt Points so it was a bit of a freeroll, but as a reader did mention in my previous post some of the buy-in will be deducted from my rakeback.  Just lovely.

I cashed in one of the five tournaments I played in, a “lol” $11 SNG.  That covered the buy-in for that one plus one of the $5 buy-ins I entered.  I know, big spender.  Anyways thoughts of the MiniFTOPS Main Event:

• It was a lot of fun playing in a “main event” tournament and being so deep
• Had a real good run early and was up to 35,000 in chips after the third break
• Went card dead for a while before losing a few pots
• Busted in 2,400ish place out of 15,000
• $0

Anyways, just reinforces the fact that tournaments are just a collosal waste of time for a cash game player.  Did I have fun? Absolutely.  Do I regret buying in? No way.

As a few loyal readers will know I started getting coaching from a friend who is now an instructor at Stox by the name of “Clean” who is really getting me to think properly about poker and 6max play.  I don’t want to harp on the results because that’s not what he has me focusing on – just the fundamentals of solid play and theory.  I definitely feel more focused and feel more confident in what I am trying to accomplish during a given hand during a session.

So, that basically has meant that 100n 6max has gone real well for the most part.  For the results people (typically me haha) I’ve just been killing the regs and running into the fish who have “one pip better” hands at the river.  It would be real frustrating if I let it tilt me but so far I’ve just gone back and analyzed my play and looked for mistakes.

The goal for me as a poker player is to really be comfortable over a good stretch of hands (30-50k) at 100nl and make sure I really know what I’m doing.  At that point I’ll finally take a stab at 200nl games when they are juicy and just focus on playing the same game I’ve been playing and not overcompensate.

In terms of my poker writing things are going really well.  I’m really enjoying the articles I am writing for Poker Table Ratings and for the most part they have been really well received by the site’s fickle crowd.  I have some really great things coming up for Poker Software and Mac Poker which are great sites if you haven’t already bookmarked them.

It’s Christmas on Friday, so for you Christians that practice your belief, have a very Merry Christmas!  My apologies for not wishing those of the Jewish faith a Happy Hanukkah previously, but accept it here.

Take care, and goooooo San Diego SUPER Chargers!!!

Well September has been a busy month for me professionally.  I’ve written 10 articles this past week ranging from WCOOP and MiniFTOPS previews to the rise of poker software for a Mac.  For those of you that haven’t seen “BlazingStars” and Poker Copilot 2 in action together, it’s something to behold.  Basically BlazingStars is a hotkey program and Poker Copilot 2 is a full hand history tracking utility with a HUD.  Both are awesome.  Big news came when PokerTracker 3 people said a Mac version is on the way which is real exciting for me since I’ll be on the private beta test.  If you’re a dogmatic PC person that thinks Macs are for hipsters, you’re definitely wrong.  The operating system and architecture, not to mention the stability are something that even computer neophytes will appreciate.

Poker Playing

So far the start to the month has definitely been very swingy.  I started so cold it wasn’t even funny.  I was thinking to myself I really didn’t seem to be hitting any flops or big hands, so I did a check in Holdem Manager and sure enough, through 3,000 hands I was hitting 2.6% of sets (supposed to be 11.5%) and looks like I was whiffing bad a lot of the time in other situations. Look at 3bet pots and man I was getting killed by not hitting and my opponent hitting hard so cbetting became suicidal.  That’s nothing huge to read into but just confirmed my observations at the table.

There are some mega-frustrating hands that would happen and it seems like hands that are top pair top kicker over overpairs are getting outflopped every time.  And every time, it’s against a massive fish.  Take a look at this hand for example:

This guy is a 37/15/3 and his min-raise was pretty suspect.  But the fact that he just kept barreling made me wary that he indeed hit that flop hard and was going with it.  I don’t think at any point I was thinking of raising him and maybe on the flop that was a mistake.  I posted this hand and basically everyone agreed it’s a crying call at the river.

Anyways hopefully this stretch of “this stuff” happening is behind me (at least where it happens a majority of the time) and I’m judging to simply get my hands in and play some cards.

It’s like CRACK

A good internet poker buddy of mine that works for a few of the sites I write with suggested I try hyper turbo multi-table tournaments.  I usually look for a game to give me some variety from the daily grind and WOW these things are fun.  You start with 10 big blinds and the blinds move up every 5 minutes (on Full Tilt) or 3 minutes (on PokerStars).  I have been playing the $7 matrix ones on FTP and those are a great distractor.  I’ve played four and “taken it down” twice (meaning won at least 1 of the 4 tournaments + 1st place overall bonus). Anyways if you are looking for something stupid and fun, I highly suggest these tournaments.  They are like poker crack.

Congrats to ChuckTs (aka CLEAN)!!!

A good friend of mine, Taylor, just announced that he got hired on as a coach at popular poker training site Stox Poker.  Taylor’s a perfect fit over there and I am so glad he got this gig.  As many of you might know Taylor is my coach (when I book sessions that is) and he’s dramatically improved my game.  I guess I’m not *too* happy he’ll be improving others!  Nevertheless, I think Stox got themselves one of the up and coming stars of 6max online poker.

Vegas Report Coming

I did take my wife to Vegas for 4 days and 3 nights last weekend for her birthday and I do have a report coming soon.  I only played poker over at the M Resort where we stayed one night with no real results to report.  Vegas is kind of played out for me at this point and I don’t think I’ll be going back for at least six months unless I get some magical assignment to cover the final table of the WSOP.  Anyways, I have a biting commentary about Vegas night clubs coming soon. (they suck)

I’ve started the 100nl Full Ring grind again and the start of the month has included a lot of hands – 3,155 to be exact!  Being on a 1k hand a day pace is obviously not sustainable for me, but pretty fun nonetheless.  I’ve had some really funny/weird stuff happen at the tables.  It’s not to say it’s way out of the ordinary but these are things that were just LOL and nothing more to do.  Some of these “weird” things include:

• Two times flopping a set on a monotone board.  One time the villain flopped the flush in a 3bet pot with QTs … wow … the other time the villain called pot bets with an over card and a flush draw and hit. Bummer.
• Two times flopping the stone cold nuts (straight) and getting it in against the villain … only to see him flip over the same 2 cards for the same nuts. Unreal!
• Open raising thanks to a software glitch UTG to $23.50 with 10 10.  Yeow!  Fortunately everyone folded.
• Been seeing a villains “get there” on the river more … fortunately I’m not spewing there and only once so far this month have even paid them off.  I have about 10 examples of this happening … no need to list them all out.

The good news is that I’m still winning for a modest winrate, but it’s only 3,000 hands so there’s no way to draw conclusions or look at results.  In fact, I’m kind of disappointed in myself that I looked at the hands/results so far for August.  Much too soon to do so!

Not sure what else to post about.  Watched the first episode of the WSOP 2009 coverage … they do a great job as always and am looking forward to the rest of the episodes.  Major update for PokerStars is coming tomorrow, basically gives people some features already on Full Tilt Poker such as synchronized breaks, so I am sure the PS people will be stoked.  I guess that does it lol … anyways hopefully the next blog post will be more interesting!

As the month wraps up and I’ve passed the 10k mark for my new nitty Full Ring experiment, I was faced with a crap-hole trifecta today at the tables during a single session.  I usually play 7 tables of Full Ring play and get in about 450-500 hands per hour.  So during this single session this “trifecta” consisted of KK, QQ and JJ all running into AA pre-flop – in that order!

It was really crazy to have that happen but I was able to make the reads and really minimize the damage.  I was lucky that one guy actually showed the AA to make me feel better, the other guy I **KNOW** had AA and the third time I shoved into the shortstacker (so minimal loss).  It got me thinking about the last 10k hands and hands I’ve had (and run into) during an all-in pre-flop scenario at Full Ring play.  The rule of thumb is that AKs is the absolute bare minimum and usually isn’t even good enough because most everybody won’t even get in QQ pre-flop.  Welcome to the new world of nitty 100nl ($0.50-$1 blinds)!  I did a filter in HEM, and here’s what it came up with for me …

- JJ vs AA (shortstacker)
- AKs vs AA (shortstacker)
- KK vs AKs
- AKs vs ATo (shortstacker)
- QQ vs TT (shortstacker)
- AA vs KK
- AK vs QQ vs ATs (2 shortstackers)
- AQo vs A5o (shortstacker)
- QQ vs AA (shortstacker)

Out of the 9 times I’ve been in an “all in” scenario, a whopping 7 were against shortstackers.  Interesting to look at that and wonder what I’m doing right or wrong.  It’s possible I’m laying down hands like QQ or even KK too often (well KK just once this month, and I’ll explain why below).  Chances are though I’ve been making good reads thanks to the HUD and having looked through other villains it looks like I’m on the right track when playing against a fellow deep stacked opponent.

There was a hand, which happened today, where I laid down KK pre-flop.  I can’t remember the last time I did that, if ever – of course that’d be a mortal sin in my normal 6max play.  This time around though let’s look at the action and villain. 

- I have KK UTG and make it $4 to go.
- UTG+1, a 14/9/2 nit with 3% 3bet stat (note that it’s 1% 3bet in EP) 3bets me to $13.
- I 4bet to $30.
- Villain insta-5bets for $110 more
- I tank. I fold.

Although there is no 5bet stats in HEM, I really didn’t think I needed to see it.  I had 5k hands on this guy so he’s someone I know pretty well and this was just so far out of the realm of normal behavior for him it wasn’t even funny.  Given that his probable range was 1% as HEM said it was … what on Earth could this guy be doing this with?  QQ? Impossible.  KK?  Very unlikely since I have it too.  AK?  Never ever.  JTo?  LOL, who knows.  AA?  That fits the bill perfectly.

I know a lot of players will blindly shove in KK even if the other player is giving off every possible tell they have AA because they beat all the bluffs, are a big favorite over AK (the unlikely possibility) and will suck out 20% of the time against AA.  But in the end, it’s still a woefully losing proposition against THIS type of player I faced in the hand.  That’s the important thing to note.

That’s my 2 cents on the issue.  I’m hoping not to have a big pocket pair run into AA again anytime soon, I definitely had my fill today!

First of all I’m on web browser tilt.  For whatever reason after upgrading to Mozilla Firefox 3.5.1 (or whatever it is) everything inside the browser took a giant e-dump and now lots of sites are showing up as not existing and it’s SUPER annoying to have to hit the refresh button two or three times in order to get it to load (if it does at all).  I recently upgraded IE to its new 8.0 (or whatever) version and it looks solid enough and plenty fast.  Looks like I will just use this one for the time being until Mozilla gets their act together … but the whole thing is just upsetting even though nothing has really changed (I’m just browsing web pages!).

I had a real interesting day at the tables.  The first two sessions I had were “lost a big hand early then made an epic comeback” type of sessions which were fun and had me feeling great.  The last session was just plain weird.  I played about 600 hands in a little over an hour and had to review things to make sure what I thought was happening really happened.  What “happened” was that in 6 hands out of those 600 I got to the river making a value bet only to see it face a sickening raise.  It’s just one of the worst feelings in poker to see your river value bet raised.  You’re just almost never good and it takes some sick hand reading ability to sniff out the rare bluffs.  Fortunately my radar was on and I’m pretty sure I made some good laydowns and I did make 1 good call but in the end it was only a -1.5 buyin session so nothing huge and I think I was actually up like $20 or whatever on the day, so definitely not complaining after such a weird session like that.

Another really “smart” thing I did was play the Midnight Madness $11 tournament tonight … wow that was dumb too because nothing is less productive for me than playing in a multi-table tournaments.  I don’t run particularly well in them, at least, I don’t play enough of them to justify dabbling in them so I can make my expected ROI.  Anyways in this one I actually came out with a great lead and a top 100 stack out of the starting 2,300-ish players.  Then with a 7k stack and blinds at 80-160 it all fell apart.  Someone with 2,500-ish shoved into me and I got AA.  He shows 22.  You guessed it, AA<22 AIPF, so I see my stack roughly cut in half.  Literally next hand UTG I have AQ and I made a raise, 2 callers and the flop is QT6 rainbow so I go ahead and shove and get called by 66.  And that was that … lol, gotta love tournaments!

Anyways so I have my mental razor working to delete those entries from the memory banks and actually am happy I’m not upset in the least bit, just kind of smirking at hands like the KK<K9s in the 3bet pot at 100nl.  Just weird stuff went on today, so I can just forget about it.  These kind of days/sessions will occur and make the rest of the winning ones just that much sweeter.

Poker-wise that’s about it.  I’m hoping to put in a good amount of hands in at 100nl Full Ring before the end of the month and look at my nit-ville approach and see some decent indicators of success.  At the 2p2 forums it seems like 4 or 5 regulars from 200nl are dropping down but I don’t think I’ve spotted them just yet, but I don’t know their screennames so who knows.  I hear so many conflicted reports that 200nl is  reg-infested and tough … while others say the regs are bad and 200nl is actually easier than 100nl.  Who knows, right!?  All I can do is just keep my head in the game I am playing and take 100nl literally one hand at a time.

So I’m now in full swing at the new site with a 20 buy-in bankroll after being able to deposit (yet again) via credit card. Assuming my check from Stars doesn’t bounce (fun to be in the middle of THAT whole international controversy!) I’ll be sending my CC the necessary funds to cover the deposit which I got a 100% bonus on. I am now up to $1,800 in bonus money to unlock which unfortunately goes slowly but between the bonus money, points for cash and the rakeback at the site, I’m doing a lot better rewards-wise than I was at Stars. Does Stars care that they lost a customer that normally pays them about $900 a month (in rake)? No. They should though, I think I’m not going to be the last one that does this, especially if legislation gets passed to open up poker in the USA (for the love of SANITY I hope it does).

Anyways, to say the new site is full of bad regs and fish is an understatement. Saturday tables are naturally fishier than normal but today was just beyond the realm of comprehension. It’s like the “good” regs don’t like money. For example, this was against the “best” villain at the table (stats wise at least lol):

Beyond Reason and Sanity

Okay, so let me explain my play here. KQ suited from UTG+1 is really not normally something I play from there unless the table is weak/passive postflop which this one was. I get a two callers and my position sucks but I flop well with two overs and the King high flush draw. I was seriously thinking of the best way to get BOTH their stacks in. I figured if I led out that would be the best move, but I wanted to try to get one of these guys to bet at the flop and either flat to get all of us to the turn for action or just pop it up big time. Anyways I elected to flat which I really regret now but hey the hand would have turned out the same way. The turn I stick to the plan to try to get the pot to about $100 to the river which could conceivably be enough for all of us to get it in. The button bets $20 which I am really happy about, I flat and gleefully the other guy calls too and I get my wish of a big pot three way and we’re all still deep. I figured if I raise there on the turn it just *screams* made flush. The turn is a beauty in the 7 which fills the straight draws!! I lead out with a half pot bet thinking it’s a no brainer that someone comes over-the-top and we get stacks in (ideally all 3!). Instead Player 1 folds (WTF did he fold here!??! Why did he want to see the river if the 7 didn’t help him!?!??!) and Player 2 on the button FLATS … with … THE FUCKING NUTS!??! Are you kidding me?! LOL – again I’m in the weird spot of being shocked at my opponent’s cards and at the same time a little grateful he didn’t get the last ~$46 of my stack. Unreal! He typed in the chat, “honestly put you on the straight flush” which is just stunning. Anyways, weird hand, probably biffed the flop play but man what a weird result.

LOL at the villain’s hand

If you can explain the villain’s thinking and play here I’ll send you $0.25 on PokerStars. Seriously, something rational that I can believe please.

Well I finally got the deposit working (first try no less) on the new site but for whatever reason they put in the wrong amount, so after a chat with the customer service department to the tune of “hey why did you get the deposit amount wrong by $30?!” I was finally rocking and rolling.  Unfortauntely I am still woefully short on my bankroll at the new site to be playing 100nl 6max, but I figured, what the hell, I know I’m good for the money overall so I decided to give it a swing.

The regs there are not good. I wouldn’t say bad but the good profitable regs there are a far cry from what I am used to.  There’s a few “regs” there that are just beyond the realm of understandable.  I think the contributed rake method seriously lets some players play a 50/1/2 game where they either flop the nuts or fold but get their rakeback either way.  Too bizarre.  Anyways these regs that show profit are 25/19 types that cbet like 50% of the time and tend to float too much, so it’s nothing I can’t handle.

Anyways, naturally during the first 100nl 6max session and underrolled at this site, I play one of the weirdest hands ever. Take a look!  The villain is a 70/1/2 over a good chunk of hands (guess I’d seen him at 50nl):

Bet ya didn’t see THAT coming. I had such a wild mix of emotions.  First – absolute SHOCK that I lost it. Second – mild amusement that he just flatted my min-raise at the river (lol at the value bet there, I figured he’d auto-shove if I did that while there was a chance he’d fold if I shoved). Third – Quick rush if I hit the bad beat jackpot but lol oh yeah that’s quad 8s or better. For fun I put the hand into pokerazor:

Now that is funny