First session back online. . .

20 minutes in I've had KKs cracked by JTo and A5o and AA cracked by AKs. . . oh boy.

. . .

About 7 hours later I've wrapped up the night with the dismal news that once again my game was cracked wider than. . . not sure right now, too burnt out, bleh.

In total I played just 23 Sngs (and 2 mtts which won't show up down there in the >12 hours graph). I'm fairly confident I played my A game minus a couple spazz outs. . . maybe that works out to a B game?? Anyway, I was finding lots of spots to accumulate chips and never got it in too bad. In return, I was fisted repeatedly. I did score a 5th in a $69 45 man but it really doesn't feel like much right now, and honestly it's not.

One of the hardest things when things are going bad is to maintain composure, inside and out. Some time ago I noticed that I was really being hard on myself taking everything seriously. I plan on playing tens of thousands of poker tournaments in my life. . . there are tournament players who play that many in 3 months! And the truth is that you're going to lose all but a hand full of those tournaments. Of course it depends on the size of the tourney, but the fact remains that I will spend most of my time losing poker tournaments as long as I continue to play this game! The wins are excellent of course, and make it all more than worthwhile (at least financially), but the fact remains that if I continue to get pissed at losing I'll be spending most of my life angry, bitter, and frustrated. And if that's the case, why the hell am I playing poker?

So I work at trying to have fun while I play poker. Seems so stupid to write that out, but I think that often goes over looked. The fact is it should be an enjoyable game to play, and THAT is why it is awesome to make money playing it. If it's really a dismal heart wrenching grind. . . maybe try a real job, right? Anyway, a stupid trick I play sometimes is to call out my opponents cards and cheer when they hit. I even like to type a hahahahaa into the chat box while laughing maniacally. I feel sort of crazy doing it, but it works. Tonight I didn't do that so much. . . I think I spent a lot of time rubbing my forehead and saying ohmygod and why over and over again.

I'm going to reread Almost There With Success and Failure and call it a night. I think it's an excellent read for just about anybody, and it sort of describes this increasing feeling I have that mastering poker is a truly Zen science.

Username	Games Played	Av. Profit	Av. Stake	Av. ROI	Total Profit	Form	Ability /100	Network	Filter
J4bberW0cky	23	-$24	$29	-89%	-$546	Super Tilt	55	FullTilt	<12hours>
J4bberW0cky	1,211	$6	$25	31%	$7,679	Super Tilt	79	FullTilt
J4bberW0cky	1,018	$9	$26	40%	$8,659	Super Tilt	79	FullTilt	SNG Only

Vegas Recap Part 1

Don't have the stamina to make the blog I oughtta, but here's a rundown for now.

I took 3k to Vegas but only 2.1k of that was earmarked for cash games, and the 2/5 game that I had planned on playing had a $500 buy-in. It was a very optimistic approach which basically banked on some early successes, which I never found due to a variety of factors. The main factor however was that I ran like shit throughout the trip, managing to book one small win early on, a good win a little later which was actually bigger than any of my losses individually. . . but I was basically demoralized and struggling with a drastically reduced bankroll for most of the trip following a total lack of success in the tourneys I played and several pretty fast, big losses at the cash tables.

Like I mentioned before- confidence and morale and bank roll are almost EVERYTHING when it comes to poker, with perhaps bankroll management being the key stone holding it all together. After all, it doesn't matter how you do in one particular session, week, or even month of full time play if your bank roll management is in order as you've planned ahead in such a way so that no matter what happens you won't be taken out of the game over any short term series of events.

When the money starts running out a deep panic sets in. . . money lost hurts a little more, the good, aggressive plays are harder to make (you wanna make a $300 bluff on the river with your LAST $300? Or maybe you'd rather spend it on a buffet, a few drinks, some gas money for home, or even, god forbid, put it back in your bank account and call it a day?)

Some other reasons for failure-

A growing sense of desperation and/or futility from repeated lousy card outcomes. You lose with JJ 1/2 a dozen times in a row until finally you make a bad stand in a lousy spot, refusing to believe. Fact is JJ will lose many times in a row occasionally- it's an incredibly vulnerable hand especially once all 5 cards are out. The chance of the hand going down in flames goes up dramatically as well depending on how many opponents are in the pot with you. This is all to say that it certainly shouldn't come as a surprise when it loses repeatedly in succession, and what the job of the professional is is to treat isolated results as nuetral, mathematical events. The only thing the pro needs to analyze is their play of the hands- ie did you maximize your chance of winning the hand? Did you lose as little money as possible when you were behind? Ultimately your own decision making process is the only thing you have control over yet it is so easy to become convinced that the cards are trying to tell you a story, and that story is that you're a fucking loser! (A quick calculation using poker stove shows that JJ is only a 77% favorite against any 2 cards- this means that if you go all in with JJ from the small blind and the big blind calls without even looking at their cards first they will win on average almost 1/4 times!)

Of course when I say "you," what I am really getting at is the fact that all these destructive, painful, counter productive thoughts were flowing willy nilly through my own sensitive anxiety ridden noggin, and I wound up playing far less poker than I would have liked and so my results are ultimately representative of a much smaller sample than I intended. . . and in any small statistical sample wild swings are possible, and even probable. A large source of anxiety amongst new players stems from a basic lack of understanding of what a significant sample size is to demonstrate your true edge. For instance with online tournaments sample sizes are widely recognized as insignificant until you've played over 1000 tournaments! That's actually quite a lot- can you imagine being a big money loser after 200 tournaments and having that be no solid indication of skill? Especially considering the many hours of play, focus, and dedication that goes into the process of trying to play 200 mtts profitably?

I'll try and edit/add later. I have a few hands I played that I really felt like I learned a lot from, so I'll try and go over them and discuss my mistakes. Today I'm not sure I'll get to the online pokers but this week I plan on putting together a mad session and really making a run for the top of the June leaderboard for the BBP contest I'm in. Wish me luck, I'm eager to make a crushing re entry into the game I know and love best at this point- online mtts and sit and go's where I am able to play a much bigger volume of games for my money and hopefully get into that elusive "long run" a lot faster than I can in live play.

Viva! Las Portland!

I'm becoming a real hater of live poker. I'm imagining it's mostly the same for other people, but my cards seem to run sick swingy- after a grueling monday through wednesday of cold decks and J3s non stop I ran like a golden god of light at the Nugget last Thursday winning $880 at their 1/2 game. It was miraculous- I would raise with AQ and guess what? An ace or queen would flop and it would be good! Fucking crazy I know.

Since I got back into Vegas yesterday the grind has continued- 3 outers galore, the crappiest cards in the deck coming to me two at a time for hours on end while grinning donkeys happily splash and win pots before my very eyes while I am powerless to do anything about it.

Which all brings me to a horrible truth- live poker makes me fucking miserable! At least online I'm playing thousands of hands a session and the long run has a chance to manifest. Here I'm seeing 25-30 hands PER HOUR and the levels of patience that are required to muck J2o OVER AND OVER AND OVER is flying from me FAST.

I did have a lovely afternoon at the Mirage pool today, but three hours after sitting at their 1/2 game I'm debating buying heavy artillery to end it all in dramatic fashion.

Actually, getting back to my computer in Portland, though it sounds sick, sounds like pure fucking heaven right now. I need to make some money and I know I can do it online. I'm ready to go home and play a couple thousand sit and go's while sipping my favorite teas and local brews.

Gaaaaaaagh.

On the way back to the hotel I put myself on the list for the 4/8 limit HORSE game at Harrahs. I won't make my millions playing there but I could make a little bit, and it actually sounds like FUN which would be really novel at this point.

I'm not so sure right now that poker is a very healthy activity for me at all. Oh well, wish me luck! Tomorrow is satellites and pool at the Rio and if the cards can just be a little forgiving for an afternoon I'll make a good show of it.

Tuesday $225 Shoot Out

Wasn't a shoot out at all. It was a 15 minute blinds, 1500 chip starting stack with 25/50 blinds to start, winner take all single table tournament satellite into another tournament, a straightforward mtt held the next day. Some tables weren't even taking an hour to complete. This wasn't the structure I was looking for at all but the idea of satelliting into a 100 player field tourney with a huge prize pool still sounded sweet. Also, I've played a ton of super turbos and whatnot so I'm used to fast structures and I think they are actually really fun. No sweat, no worries, All IN!! Good times.

However, 225$ winner take all turbo satellites can make a low dough kid like me broke in fat ladies heartbeat since the variance is so high. I feel like I could win in this structure much more than %10 of the time, but how much more? Are my odds twice as good as the average guy? I highly doubt it actually since the structure of the game meant that my cards were face up on the table and I was completely at the mercy of chance the whole time. My aggressive blind stealing kept me in the hunt down to 4th place but I lost all 4 of my all in confrontations in that time. BvB I lost with K4o against A6o, Q6s shoved from the CO ran into A7o in the sb, and lastly my KTo went down against 89o. There was another hand in there as well, but you can see the structure virtually forces people to shove wide and call wide and you're going to be at the mercy of the cards quite a bit.

That being said, if I could play 9 of them at once I'd be in heavan since I think there was a lot of value there.

Shortly after I played my first cash game, buying into the 2/5 at The Venetian for $350 as I had decided earlier. Over all the table was a bit better than I was hoping for but I still didn't feel threatened. Most of the local "pros" I've played against in Vegas seem to have a strategy designed to fleece tourists as safely as possible and you generally don't have to worry about getting 3 bet bluffed and outplayed for the most part. This table was no exception- not especially tough, not especially soft, and after a couple hours of play I was up $130 when Carrie arrived with her friend and we all decided to get a change of scenery and check out the pool at the Rio. Which was closed. Can anyone tell me why these beautiful Vegas pools close at 6pm while the sun is still shining?

We did get a chance to stargaze at the WSOP and it was hilarious to see Carrie calling out players names before I could. She didn't know a lick of poker before she met me but of course she's seen every episode of High Stakes Poker, most of the WPT productions, and a slew of other random shows now, so she was able to name maybe twenty different players yesterday.

I'm having my usual problem of making myself actually play serious poker. I'm not sure if I'm just trying to avoid failure or I'm being prudent since I'm operating on a short bank roll and I really don't want to play in anything less than totally ideal circumstances. For instance what I really want to do right now is go to the pool while it's still open and get myself a gooey blended drink, but that's kind of a horrible way to prepare for a poker game you want to take really seriously, so. . . we'll see.

I'm rich in spirit

Today I played my first event at the Venetian- a $340 NL tourney that drew almost 900 players and boasted a first place prize of 69k. 69k buys a fuck load of tamales (even in Vegas) so I was really excited heading into the event even though I was operating on very little sleep.

I wasn't sure at all what to expect of the playing field. There's been a lot of buzz amongst some of the low dough tournament sharks I know about this series and I was worried the room would be packed full of young grinders who weren't yet bankrolled for the WSOP events down the street.

Not the case. These are good, juicy tournaments with a decent amount of play and a really great structure if you (like me) are used to low dough crap shoots with 20 minute blinds that regularly double and 50 bb starting stacks.

However, despite the decent starting stack and long levels the general looseness of play still dictated a degree of caution. Several hands in the early going saw 4 players head to the flop for 3 bets each and 4800 in the middle before the flop was dealt- it adds up quick even with 50/100 blinds. It was a loosey goosey kind of game so I was determined to take it nice and easy and choose my spots carefully. I'm not so sure that was the right strategy now. If you have players willing to stick it in with ATo and whatnot for large raises pre it doesn't really make sense to slow play AK (like I did) But, it was my first live tournament in quite awhile and I was determined to make a good show of it and probably played it closer to the vest than I should have. I don't really know.

How Not To Play AK

(also known as "How To Play AK like A Real Proffessional" in the alternate universe in which I won this hand and wrote a results oriented blog about it)

Me - 13,500 chips

75/150 blinds no ante

loose UG raises to 300 (previous min raises from this guy hadn't signified great hands)

I flat with AsKc in m2 (what a great idea)

Button flats

Sb (new player with near 12k starting stack) reraises to 1500 total.

UG folds

I call 1200

Button folds

Pot size- 3750

FLop- Ad 5d 2s (two diamonds)

Sb leads 1500

I call

Pot size- 6750

Turn- Jh

Sb checks

I bet 2500

Sb check raises all in for 6825 more.

What does he have??

The hands I was worried about here were AJ and JJ. Nothing else made sense to me, except perhaps a stubborn KK, AQ, or AJ (the table had been really loose so far which impacted my thinking certainly- unfortunately I had no information on this guy since he had only arrived a couple hands prior). I was about to fold when I decided to count up the pot- one glance at all those 1k yellow chips and I immediately forgot about folding. I had to call 6825 to win 18575 and I felt like an incorrect fold would be catastrophic, especially since I had under repped my hand so much.

I called, he tabled 55 for the flopped set (I hadn't even considered 55 or 22 as I just couldn't imagine someone making a big squeeze with those hands when it was so cheap to call and set mine).

My first thought- what a lucky asshole! Who 3 bets 55 against an UG raiser and two flatters from the small blind- AND THEN ACTUALLY FLOPS A SET!?

My next thought of course was how I could've done just about anything differently in the hand (5 different spots to deviate- 6 if you add folding AK to the reraise preflop to the mix, which is pretty impossible for someone who plays 45 man tournaments on Full Tilt constantly where AK glows like the Virgin Mary's Holy Ass Crack) and could've conserved chips or convievably even won the damn pot.

1. A reraise my AK preflop to 1000. I do not know what happens after this as I don't know if the sb would flat here. If he does flat I probably wind up calling an all in c/r on the flop due to the flush draw and smaller big aces possibility. Same result. If he folds I pick up a nice, easy pot most likely.

2. When the small blind 3 bets and UG folds, I could've reraised. I put him on a really strong range however and thought I'd be better off taking a flop in position rather then getting in a race situation preflop for a ton of chips.

3. I could have raised the flop. Unfortunately most raises are pretty committing and he'll probably fold a few hands I can try and get more value out of by slow playing my AK. I kinda doubt raising the flop would've gotten me very far.

4. I could have checked back the turn. The Jack wasn't a great card for me, but I'm still most likely way ahead or way behind. I really felt like I had the lead in the hand and wanted to squeeze in a little value on the turn. I felt like KK and QQ would call me one time, and AQ wasn't going anywhere either. Now of course I really wish I had checked back the turn. The river brought a king however, so I'm not sure I would've been able to avoid doubling him up on 5th street anyway.

5. Lastly, I could've folded the turn to the check raise. When I have AK and flop top pair and get check raised all in at some point I try to ask myself if this guy would do that with a weaker ace, a draw, stubborn KKs. . . basically I try to talk myself into calling because the guy must be a donkey, even though I *know* that that spot is often a clear FOLD. Would AQ or AT really be check raising all in on that turn or would they be trying to keep the pot small and allow me to bluff? Could he be convinced by my passive preflop and flop play that I have kicker trouble, or an underpair to the ace and he's just trying to muscle through with his KK or QQ? Did my flat of the flop convince him that I had some sort of draw and now he's trying to protect his hand?

Moral of the story- I'm a donkey? I don't know. My intention going in was to play as much small ball as possible and try to use my "superior reading ability" to make good decisions post flop. Apparantly I failed that test- but hey it's tournament poker and shit happens, and luckily there is tomorrow to look forward to, and I'm actually pretty excited to play again.

After losing that pot I was left with 14 bbs- which is actually a pretty comfortable position for me lol. I think I'm pretty good low on chips (I'm good at making 1 decision per hand apparantly) AND felt like my short stack was actually quite a bit stronger than normal being that it was a live tournament and I was able to pick up all sorts of info that enabled me to let go of small pocket pairs and weaker aces where i don't think I could've withheld jamming if it were online. I hung in for another 2 hours or so oscillating between 7 and 17 bbs at various points until a particularly brutal level jump (200/400 with 25 ante to 300/600 with 50 ante) left me on the ropes. To make it worse I made it past the blinds on one table only to be moved to another table UG1 to have to fold through the blinds AGAIN and be down to just 4 big blinds. Getting an inauspicious table change at those times can really feel like God is sinking a wet crap into your throat, but unfortunately it's considered completely fair and normal, even if a little unlucky.

Finally I sunk my chips in after it was folded to me in the CO with 57o and ran into AJs in the bb. It was a gross spot to go all in but the bb had a good stack to pick on so there it went. Bye bye.

I haven't been sleeping well at all since I've gotten here so I'm hoping to catch some zz's and perhaps play some cash at the Venetian later tonight. Incidentally I've decided to take rryu's advice (a fellow grinder/poster at BadBeatsPoker.Net) and buy in for 70 bbs for these games to get max value out of my limited bankroll. In his words- 50 bbs to double up with and 20 to splash around with! Sounds like a plan.