Online Playing

I don't normally post about online play because I would much rather play live than online. I love the physical aspects of the casino. The smell, being able to see the people, talking(sometimes trash), the feel of the cards, etc. You just are able to get so much more information live than looking at a computer screen. Plus there is still that back of the mind thought that the internet cardrooms somehow are not fair, it might be the software or just the collusion that is possible in these games. That being said I played online yesterday because I did not have the time to go down to the Casino last night.

I never put much money into a site. I usually start with $200 and try to work it up to the higher levels. Sometimes stepping up and taking shots, sometimes running it up and cashing out. Right now I am in the run up mode at UB, I think I will leave it there and take some shots at the bigger games. I went from the 5/10 shorthanded games to the 10/20 games yesterday, all limit. I started at one table because my bankroll was only $800 at the start of the day, which is not enough to two table and take the swing. I ran that up to $1200, then cashed out and started to two table. I don't like to do more than two because I feel I can not concentrate after that. I am super impressed with guys that can do 4,6, heck I know a guy playing 12 at once on Party and won $70,000 last month. How the hell do you do 12 and win? That is just incredible. I keep thinking he will lose but he never does. How is that possible? So I move to two games. I have not played in a while online, it is amazing how bad some of the players are online now. Even as you step up into the bigger games online the play has not gotten any better. You can run bad shorthanded and lose all your money fast getting chased by the fish that call everything, but if you can just run average you can't lose. I would imagine that the play will start getting better as I move up to the 15/30 or 30/60 game. We will see. That said I ran my account at UB up to $2450 yesterday from $800. On to the 15/30 short game.

By the way my screen name online is Seattlejohn, pretty original huh? My party name is SJ_tilt, but I hardly play there, I can't stand to look at the graphics of that site. It looks like I am playing on an old Atari video game. Lastly, Aaron got bounced from the main event at the Mirage at the end of the first day. Really bad month for him. Hope he does better at the WSOP. He won the first limit event last year and I was there to see the final table, hope for a repeat and bracelet number 2. Talk to you soon...SJ

Quick Vegas Trip Report

Went to Vegas over the weekend for a quick trip. Only got to play cards on Saturday. Started out around noon in the $80/$160 must move game shorthanded. The problem was no one else ever showed up to play so we only kept the game going for about 30 minutes before it broke and I was the odd man out for a seat and stuck $600. I waited around for about 45 minutes before I finally got a seat in the main(and only) 80/160 game. Game was good, some loose players and fairly tight readable players. Not any great players that you had to be concerned about. I just played a solid aggressive game and slowly built up my chips to get up about $2,500. Then at the end I went card dead and gave back some chips and had to leave for dinner. Finished the first session up only $1,095 not bad, just had hoped for more in that game.

I came back at night after dinner to find the 80 games completely filled and not moving on the list. I gave up and just played $30/60. Glad I did. That game was incredible. Full of really bad players that were calling stations, not aggressive, and even in about 3 seats looked scared that they were playing above their heads. I think they were playing 15/30 and decided to move up. Had no clue how to play this game, and just got chewed up. I went into super aggressive mode, because no one would play back at me, and beat the shit out of the game for two hours. Bluffed and no one would call, then someone would decide to call and I would have the nuts. Lots of the flops were coming with multiple players, unusual for this game usually, but not tonight. One hand AA let me in cheap UTG when I had the button with 8,9 off in a 7 handed pot. The the BB raised after I called, and I called another bet with the seven callers. AA still did not pop it, then the SB decides to pop it again, and we take the pot off 7 players for three bets. The AA did not 4 bet here, not that it would have mattered now. The flop came 10,J,Q. Crap, I thought. The AA bet this time, one other called, and I raised. No three bet. Good I was thinking no AK maybe. I could not believe everyone else dropped with that much money in there but good for me. Turn a 6, checked to me I bet, AA raised, third player left. Oops I am in trouble he's got AK, and I am dead. Too much in pot to go away now. River a shitty 9. I am now beat by AK and pocket KK, or even K,Q hell K,3 beats me. He bets I call with my one card bottom end of the straight and win while he shows me AA's. Wow. big pot because everyone else played so poorly. I should never have even see that flop if the AA plays it more aggressively. I ended up that session up $2,040 in two hours. I quit because I to go someplace but net day was $3,135. Good day.

On a side not, I went to check out the new Wynn card room. Not nearly as good as the newly remodeled Bellagio. Bellagio still wins for the best room. The action will not move. The Bellagio was packed and the Wynn had some people but not packed. The new private room at the Bellagio for the super big games was awesome. The old high limit section is still there, but the biggest game went to that room. They had two $400/$800 mixed games and a $25/50 blind no-limit game at the top end. Unfortunately the biggest limit game was just $80/$160. If I were going to stick around longer I would have tried to push a higher straight hold-em game, but I could not spend enough time to want to get that going. Maybe next time. I will try to get down for the short handed no-limit event of the WSOP on June 7th and then come back for that weekend. Aaron has not had a good month, in fact you could call it awful. No cashes in any tournament's and no good wins in the cash games. I hope he plays the final event today and does something to redeem himself before the WSOP. Talk to you soon SJ

Tuesday Night Special

Went out to play on my regular Tuesday night down at the Muck in Aurburn. Started my day around 3:00pm in the $10/20 game as I could not get into either the $20/40 or $30/60, they were full with a list which is pretty unusual for a Tuesday. So I warmed up by getting beat around in the $10/20 game for about 45 minutes and lost about $200. I was geared to play the larger games today, but 45 minutes of multi-way pots and loose calls was enough to get me in tight mode when I got to the bigger games. I went to the $20/40 game and both the bigger limit games were full of some really bad players. I was still in tight mode, but was getting some hands to play, and managed to get my money back and a whopping +$77 profit before the tournament started at 7:15pm.

This tournament on Tuesday is becoming a joke. It was already fast with the blinds going up every 20 minutes and only $1500 in starting chips playing 25/50 blinds, but now they have eliminated some of the jumps to make them even larger. At this point it is almost completely luck and very little skill. If you get some starting cards you survive if you do not then you are done. I did both sucking and getting sucked this day. I started my tournament with pocket 99, and called a raise from the button. The flop came down 6,8,2, it was checked to me and I bet the pot and the BB moved in, I called he showed me pocket 66's for a set. I managed to catch a 9 on the river to knock him out and I was in chips and feeling good. Then on the very next hand I pick up 9d,10d one off the button and it is limed to me 4 people already in. I call and see the flop. The flop came 10,6,7, the BB bet, it was called in one spot and I raised. Both people called. The turn came a 3, it was checked to me I moved in. The BB mucked, and then the one guy on the table who had me covered calls and shows me 5,6 for an open ender. What a wacky call. He put his money in getting 2.5 to 1 on a 4.5 to 1 shot, and presto a 4 comes off on the river to bust me. I re-buy my one time and never catch anything to get back into business and go out with three tables left.

So off to the $30/60 game with a brief stop at the $10/$20 again for 15 minutes because there was not a seat open. I did manage to win one had at $10/20 and take an extra $100 with me to the $30/$60 game. The $30 game was great. Some weak tight players that were not really gambling. Love those games. Easy to bluff, easy to read, and not very dangerous when you have a big hand. There was only one guy gambling and fortunately for him he was winning huge as well. Just made a note to be careful with him. I waited for a big hand to start my night with because I wanted to project a tight image to this table so I could open my game up and start bluffing. I picked up a big hand early, A,K or Q, I really don't even remember but I won the pot, showed the hand and we were off to the races. I changed gears really well in the game. I would go long stretches where I would play tight, and for a round or two I would start raising with 5,6 suited in early position, 8,9 suited, J,9. I would either hit the hand or just bluff at it and win. Because it was a weak tight game the flops were all heads up or three handed, perfect for bluffing. Then I would go back to tight when people started calling my raises again. All in all a great night, played well, was reading pretty well, and the game was ripe to take down as there was not a lot of gamble. I actually even ran pretty well for a change. Almost forgot what that was like. Net for the night including losing my $210 buyin from tournament was a win of +$1,707.

On a side note Aaron only stayed home for one day. He went back to Vegas last night to play in today's tournament. He said he may also play Daniel in one of his freeze out matches for $150,000. Someone else will take a piece of that action as he does not have that much on him anymore. Look for Aaron in Daniel's blog in the near future. Good luck AK. I will head down to Veags this weekend to play some side games as there is no tournaments this weekend most likely. Talk to you soon SJ

New Theory

As I mentioned yesterday Aaron came home to take a break from the Mirage tournament because he was just taking some tough beats both in the cash games and the tournaments. His style is one of hyper aggressiveness and splashing around in a lot of pots. He plays better than almost anyone I have ever played with after the flop which makes his style work for him. He usually wins, and wins big, because he gets people to put their money in when they can't read him with the nuts. Then he takes down others with well timed bluffs, as he reads pretty well. The problem is that this style entices action, which can be a good thing, but sometimes you just don't want that much action. He gets under peoples skin(he can be rather irritating when he gets talking), makes them think he is gambling, and then people are just out to get him. When you are playing in these huge no-limit or pot-limit cash games, much like a tournament, it only takes one really big beat to knock you out. In the cash game if you are super deep you can take a few stupid beats and stay in action. He has the cash but is not super deep for the games he is in. That is aonther problem, I think he should stay out of the super huge games as he just is not deep enough to survive a bad run of cards, but that is another debate.

I theorized that this style of hyper aggressiveness and creating action results in getting called a higher percentage of the time(duh?). Now you are supposed to win your percentage of them when you are a favorite, but you still lose sometimes, even when you are a huge favorite and someone hits a one outer on you. If you are in a situation where one beat puts you out of action, like a tournament, you don't want to get called every single time even if you are a Huge favorite to win. I think you want to create an image that gets people to lay down their hands sometimes, but not be so tight that people only put you on big cards. I don't want people to call every single time. You don't want them to not believe you every time they have a draw or a small piece of the flop. If you lose you are out. Bad Beats still happen, otherwise we would have nothing to talk about at the table. The variance goes up the more pots you see to the river, that is just a fact. If you can only fade one bad beat, you don't want to be in that situation lots of times. The 2% still gets there 2% of the time. You want it sometimes not all the time.

Then I thought about how this might apply to some of the bigger tournaments that a woman has never won. Why has there not been a winner of a WPT final or WSOP main event yet? This theory might explain partially why. Most men just hate to lose to a woman. I know they do not make up that much of a percentage of a field, but still by now you would have thought we would have had a winner of a main event. I know from first hand play that I think they are as talented as any of the men in the field. If you sit with a Jennifer Harmon, Annie Duke, Mimi Tran, Cindy Violette, etc. they are good. They can beat the shit out of you in a cash game. They are net winners in the cash games they play in. In a tournament situation you can only afford one beat and you are out, bad or not. Women most likely get more action, wanted or not, because men can't stand to lose to a women. Men may call in a marginal situation with a woman that they would lay down to a man, just because of that factor. They may actually gamble against them more because of that same fact with stupid hands. Do Women entice action just by the fact that they are Women in this game? Then the randomness of the cards takes them out. Like I said even when you are an 8 to 1 favorite you sometimes lose. It only takes one bad beat and you are out. Are women in more of these situations in a tournament than men, thus get taken out by the randomness of the cards more? Who knows, just a thought. Aaron's beats this week made me think of why getting action sometimes is not the best thing in the world, even when you are a huge favorite, sometimes winning lots of small pots is a lot better than winning and losing the huge pots.

I am interested in anyone's thoughts on this. I may just be smoking dope, and this in no way was meant to offend anyone. There are some killer women players just as there are men. There may be a completely different reason, but I think this is a big part of it, as Aaron has shown me that you can be one of the best players in the world and still get unlucky on a consistent basis when that one hand takes you out of a situation. Talk to you later. SJ

Better Week

I have been delinquent in my posting last week. I have been super busy at work which cuts into the poker time, as well as the blog update time but here goes. I actually played twice last week. Once on Tuesday night late. I got started at 11:00pm and played until 2:00am. Not a long session but a good one. I finally beat the stupid 8/16 game up at Parkers. I have been stupified by my lack of success in this game. It is made up of new players and bad gamblers which adds to the variance but should be beatable nonetheless. I played a super solid game and did not gamble at all. I beat the game for a little, and I am convinced that there is no other way to play this wild game then to just play tight and not gamble at all in pots unless I just start to run hot, which of course has not happened in a long time. You just can not bluff in this game, you will always get called by someone with a piece and you just have to fade the turn and river and hope your hand holds up. Mine did at a reasonable percentage so I came out winner. Yeah! won +$275.

I then went out and played again on Thursday. Not my normal night but I was itching to play so I did. I played from about 9:00pm to 2:00am. I again played a tight aggressive game, and had a good table image as the night wore on. There was lots of gamble going on in the game, so you had to fade some really wacky calls, but I managed to do so as the night wore on. At the beginning it looked like one of those night were good hands were just going to get beat every time you had them and I hovered around even for three hours. Then the game got a little short, and I stepped up the aggressive play and started to blow people off pots. I even hit a few big hands and people paid me off. It felt good to have a solid table image and play good poker. We will see if this trend continues. Total win for the night +$460. I am still in the hunt for the big win night as I have not had one of those good days in a while. I guess you could say I am due, as I have had a few really bad running nights so I should get one good one, if you believe in that stuff. I do. I think you should try to break even on the bad nights and really load up on the good nights. Unfortunately, on the bad nights I have been loading down, so I need to make that up, and change the results. I am heading down to the Muck tomorrow night and playing in the $20/40 and $30/60 games plus the tourn. I hope to have a big day tomorrow.

On a side note, Aaron has just had a horrible trip to the Mirage. He has been crushed in the side games, and bounced early in the tournaments. Not one positive result. He actually quit and came home last night to return for the main event next week. Too bad. I hate when that happens. The only positive was the heads-up tourn. when he won his first match against Phil Hellmuth. I guess Phil whined like a baby when Aaron beat him. That would have been fun to see. He then lost to Scotty in the second match. Scotty finished second to "Grinder" in the final. I Guess Scotty was just trashed in the final. Why would someone drink to that point playing in the final? Makes no sense to me. Aaron actually had 4% of "Grinder" so he got $4000 for the result which helps offset the $15,000 entry fee. I can't go to the Mirage now this week as I have to attend a funeral of a business friend. O well, I guess there is next year. I now need to figure out when I can get to the WSOP as I have to play in at least one event. I also want to try and play in one of these bloggers events as I keep missing them. I just have not had the time to play on line lately. Talk to you soon SJ.

Shitty week

I went to play in the monthly rich business guys poker table last night and they have kicked it up a notch. Lost some players but that is good thing. We were playing 2/5 pot limit with a $300 to start buy-in and then up to $500 after. I continued to run pretty crappy. I think I might have played 6 pots all night. Almost every time I got crushed by a stupid hand that matched up against my cards. I did not want to buy in a lot of times so I kept is pretty low each time. I bought in three times for $300 each. The money on the table got pretty big so I was the short stack most of the time. Unfortunately for me that meant I was all in by the turn in every pot. I lost with AQ when a flop came Q,7,4. I raised pre-flop, there was a $50 bet in front of me on the flop. I came over the top for $300 and he put me all in for another $125 and showed me pocket 4's and I was drawing dead to runner runner which of course did not come. Lost most of the nights money in that pot, and never sniffed another hand. The game ends kind of early so you can not get it back either. Shitty week. Dumped -$729 last night. Crap. This month is starting off poorly. I need to have a big Tuesday to make up for the month. Talk to you then.

On a side note I like the analysis that Paul Phillips did on the Hasan, Tuan situation at the final table of the Bellagio event. I actually heard that Tuan had 71% of himself and that Hasan had only 25% of Tuan. Still that was a pretty weird situation that I think definitely impacted how Hasan played that hand. There is not much you can do about it however. People will trade and put people in even if there is a ban against it. You just can't get around it. I do hope that it does not lead to teams forming to play these tournaments, but that might be where we are heading with all the money in these things. You might just have to play against more than one person at a time a table. Strange stuff. Know your players and who they are putting in. It is pretty easy to find out if you know the poker scene and who is broke, and who is playing for who. There are a lot of people playing for the few with huge bankrolls. Tuan will be broke again, just might take him longer to loose a few million this time. Talk to you soon. SJ

One of Those Days

I just got back from LA on a vacation and made one of those spur of the moment decisions to go out and play last night. Should have just stayed home. I had one of those days where you never get your share of good cards, your table image goes to shit because of it, and then you never win a hand. I played for 4 and 1/2 hours and one a grand total of two hands all night. I could not steal a pot, and the one big pocket pair of Q's that I had lost to a flopped set of Jacks. I will not bore you with the minor bad beats on the way but needless to say if I caught top pair on the flop I got outdrawn every time. I never hit a draw on my end, and most big non-paired hands did not hit and were either dumped on the flop or turn. I am now on a mission to beat this stupid 8/16 game at Parkers. I just have to find a way to beat this game. My play will get better. I might have played a few too many speculative hands last night, but mostly never hit a hand played in position or out. The game is good. I need to figure out what I am doing to produce these results in this game. It happens with too much regularity at Parkers. Just Stupid. Net loss for the night of -$983.

Aaron plays in the Reno event this weekend and gets ready for the two month run in Vegas. Hope to join him for a few events. Talk to you soon...SJ