Sunday, June 21, 2009
Excellent!
Another night of junk kicking; wherein AK < AQ and 99 < 44 and that's how every tourney ends. Sweet!
Friday, June 19, 2009
When Donkeys Languish
Over a month without posting must be some kind of recent record, but no one seems to be complaining or concerned. I’m definitely in a bit of a funk as far as the old poker table goes. It’s hard to discern whether my play is a result of that funk or is the cause of it. Regardless, I feel like I continue to make strides toward becoming a better player and at the same time I still have holes in my game through which you can drive the proverbial truck.
It would be one thing if these were completely new holes that develop as my game changes and I deal with the differences in playing a tougher group of opponents. But, for the most part, they are just the same holes that get patched, blow open again and have to be repatched. Right now I’m calling off too much money in situations where there’s a good chance that I’m beat. Or I’m finding myself unable to believe that, for example, my opponent actually called a pre flop raise out of position with the one crappy hand that has me beat; which, of course, they do time and again.
The biggest hole of all is bad bankroll management, which leads me to build up a decent roll and then piss it away by playing too high for too long. It’s fine to “take a shot” every once in a while, but when I empty the chamber firing shot after shot and don’t happen to capitalize on any of them I eventually have to reload or drop way back down and grind my way back up. And that’s where I find myself today. Not broke by any stretch, but well down from where I was a couple of months ago.
The money’s not the issue per se, although the fact that reloading just became significantly more challenging thanks to our fine federal government is a bit of a bother. I have plenty of money and if I lost my entire roll a few times over it really wouldn’t be noticed. It’s the fact that I know the issue and should be able to manage it better, but I just don’t. Plain and simple.
So right now my play is schizophrenic at best. On the one side, I have days or tournaments in which I play like crap and call off my stack in situations where I should be folding (or should never have gotten into in the first place). On the other, when I do play well it just seems that I can’t win a race or fade somebody’s three outs.
Other than a first in that $3 MTT last month, my other big online poker successes have been a double cash (my first ever, WTF?) in the FTP Daily Doubles. Oh, and a second in this week’s HORSE edition of the Dookie for a cool $16.50, baybee. I now have a higher net in the Dookie for the year than the #5 player on the leader board, which is nice.
Meh. Standard. [Insert your favorite Internet cliché here.]
Some bloggers, on the other hand, are having their way with the WSOP.
Congrats to LJ and CK for a couple of close-but-no cigar cashes and to sprstoner for his nifty third-place payday in event #13. I still am bitter at the guy for the sick beat he put on me in the only tournament hand I think I’ve ever played against him, but I’ll suck it up and hand him the props he is due.
Another blogger with a nice, albeit indirect, score at the WSOP is Jamyhawk, a fellow St. Louisan who had a 1/52 slice of event #28 winner Mike Eise as a result of a series of WSOP qualifiers that a local group ran over the course of the last year. Pre-tax that amounts to about $12K by my calculations.
That's that, my friends. I'll try to spew out another post or two before I head to the Swiss Alps for a two-week vacation over the last half of July.
It would be one thing if these were completely new holes that develop as my game changes and I deal with the differences in playing a tougher group of opponents. But, for the most part, they are just the same holes that get patched, blow open again and have to be repatched. Right now I’m calling off too much money in situations where there’s a good chance that I’m beat. Or I’m finding myself unable to believe that, for example, my opponent actually called a pre flop raise out of position with the one crappy hand that has me beat; which, of course, they do time and again.
The biggest hole of all is bad bankroll management, which leads me to build up a decent roll and then piss it away by playing too high for too long. It’s fine to “take a shot” every once in a while, but when I empty the chamber firing shot after shot and don’t happen to capitalize on any of them I eventually have to reload or drop way back down and grind my way back up. And that’s where I find myself today. Not broke by any stretch, but well down from where I was a couple of months ago.
The money’s not the issue per se, although the fact that reloading just became significantly more challenging thanks to our fine federal government is a bit of a bother. I have plenty of money and if I lost my entire roll a few times over it really wouldn’t be noticed. It’s the fact that I know the issue and should be able to manage it better, but I just don’t. Plain and simple.
So right now my play is schizophrenic at best. On the one side, I have days or tournaments in which I play like crap and call off my stack in situations where I should be folding (or should never have gotten into in the first place). On the other, when I do play well it just seems that I can’t win a race or fade somebody’s three outs.
Other than a first in that $3 MTT last month, my other big online poker successes have been a double cash (my first ever, WTF?) in the FTP Daily Doubles. Oh, and a second in this week’s HORSE edition of the Dookie for a cool $16.50, baybee. I now have a higher net in the Dookie for the year than the #5 player on the leader board, which is nice.
Meh. Standard. [Insert your favorite Internet cliché here.]
Some bloggers, on the other hand, are having their way with the WSOP.
Congrats to LJ and CK for a couple of close-but-no cigar cashes and to sprstoner for his nifty third-place payday in event #13. I still am bitter at the guy for the sick beat he put on me in the only tournament hand I think I’ve ever played against him, but I’ll suck it up and hand him the props he is due.
Another blogger with a nice, albeit indirect, score at the WSOP is Jamyhawk, a fellow St. Louisan who had a 1/52 slice of event #28 winner Mike Eise as a result of a series of WSOP qualifiers that a local group ran over the course of the last year. Pre-tax that amounts to about $12K by my calculations.
That's that, my friends. I'll try to spew out another post or two before I head to the Swiss Alps for a two-week vacation over the last half of July.
Thursday, May 14, 2009
A Little One, But I'll Take It…
…especially after an extended run of junk kicking that I have endured over the past two months. Losing races, 4-1 faves, getting my pair counterfeited on the river, blah, blah blah. In fact, this was my second MTT final table in the past three days.
I've played a few of these recently and it's good lightweight fun. I diddled around for quite awhile, then got my first bump into 10th with 263 left when I flopped a set of Ks and was able to induce a call from a QJo on the AKx flop with an OBFV. A while later, I was able to get TP2K in against my flopped set with a similar move. I must be disguising the OBFV better lately because for a while I've been getting folds to them and calls of my all in bluffs, which is the exact opposite of what I'm going for, obviously.
Another key hand came in a blind-vs. blind battle with me having 67s in the BB. The SB completed and I checked. The flop came with two clubs and the SB checked. I bet and he called. The turn completed my flush and it went check, bet, call on the turn and again on the river. He showed down one of the most poorly played pocket rockets that I've seen in a long time.
I muddled around in the top 10 for most of the rest of the tournament. Then, heading for the FT bubble I set up a stop-and-go that worked out better than I had hoped when I flopped trip Ts with KTo. AJ had been happy to call my apparent bluff and the K on the turn sealed the deal.
From there I limped to the final table and was at death's door thanks to a steady run of hands that included mostly unpaired 2s, 3s and 4s. Then I desperation shoved with QTs and was mortified to see two calls followed by an all-in reraise from one of the leaders. One of the early callers folded and I was in against 77 and KK. The K on the flop put me on life support, but I somehow managed to go runner-runner straight to shoot me back up into first with five remaining.
More incredible crap hands followed, but I managed to stay in the top two until the deck finally hit me. With three left I picked up KK and got 88 to shove into me. that sent me into heads up with a nice chip lead and I pounded on the other player with decent hands until he got frustrated and shoved when I happened to have AK. No help for his two undercards and that's all she wrote.
I'm going to angle to play in the Mookie next week, so perhaps I will see you (singular, I assume) there!
I've played a few of these recently and it's good lightweight fun. I diddled around for quite awhile, then got my first bump into 10th with 263 left when I flopped a set of Ks and was able to induce a call from a QJo on the AKx flop with an OBFV. A while later, I was able to get TP2K in against my flopped set with a similar move. I must be disguising the OBFV better lately because for a while I've been getting folds to them and calls of my all in bluffs, which is the exact opposite of what I'm going for, obviously.
Another key hand came in a blind-vs. blind battle with me having 67s in the BB. The SB completed and I checked. The flop came with two clubs and the SB checked. I bet and he called. The turn completed my flush and it went check, bet, call on the turn and again on the river. He showed down one of the most poorly played pocket rockets that I've seen in a long time.
I muddled around in the top 10 for most of the rest of the tournament. Then, heading for the FT bubble I set up a stop-and-go that worked out better than I had hoped when I flopped trip Ts with KTo. AJ had been happy to call my apparent bluff and the K on the turn sealed the deal.
From there I limped to the final table and was at death's door thanks to a steady run of hands that included mostly unpaired 2s, 3s and 4s. Then I desperation shoved with QTs and was mortified to see two calls followed by an all-in reraise from one of the leaders. One of the early callers folded and I was in against 77 and KK. The K on the flop put me on life support, but I somehow managed to go runner-runner straight to shoot me back up into first with five remaining.
More incredible crap hands followed, but I managed to stay in the top two until the deck finally hit me. With three left I picked up KK and got 88 to shove into me. that sent me into heads up with a nice chip lead and I pounded on the other player with decent hands until he got frustrated and shoved when I happened to have AK. No help for his two undercards and that's all she wrote.
I'm going to angle to play in the Mookie next week, so perhaps I will see you (singular, I assume) there!
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