End of the year

So 2008 is pretty much in the books. I probably won't get out for any more poker this year. I played the poker almost as a part-time job this year, almost 1k hours, the most I've ever put in one year. Mostly because my wife spent quite a bit of time away from home with the kids, giving me like a solid two months of being a bachelor, allowing me to put in lots of hours.

From my charts, you can see that I have some very wild swings. I've come to realize that I have a very high variance style, I really like to push small edges whenever I can. I think that if I can plug some small leaks, and ratchet up my value betting, along with making some good river folds, and possibly not always making the high variance play, I think I can kick my game into the next gear. When I am running good, I seem to run like a god, but when I run bad, it's not pretty. Plus there were some stretches of like 5 or 6 sessions, where I know that I played bad and played too late into the night. Keeping focused on the goal at hand, and playing your best poker game is tough 100% of the time. I have a lot of respect for professional grinders who somehow grind out a living doing this day after day, knowing that they need to win.

In any case I had another winning year at poker, and for something that I take as just a serious hobby, it's nice that it pays me as opposed to the other way around.

Here are the charts:

Breaking the 100 Big Bet Barrier

I won $4001 last night playing 20/40 at Oceans-11. Previous to last night, my biggest win in terms of big bets was 98.33 big bets in the 30/60 game at Canterbury Park in 12 hours of play. Last night I won 100 big bets in 4 hours! I was smoking hot, and even the hands I was tossing preflop were turning into gold. I shouldn't have mucked anything! It was an awesome game, because the entire table agreed to live straddle, so every pot was a 3 or 4 bet frenzy with 4 or 5 players usually seeing a flop. I made some monster hands, and some just good mediocre hands, but I played them well and got max value on most of them. I got in what must have been at least half a dozen river check-raises as well, most of them with 2 or 3 other players in the pot too. I only wish that I didn't have to travel today on business, otherwise you would have had to drag me away from that table kicking and screaming!

Last month of the quarter, and things are shaping up well. I am up 8879 in the last two months, with a low point of -5930 and a high point of 10770. I had one really, really bad night where I dropped 8 dimes. Take out that 8 dime loss, and I would be having a really awesome quarter as opposed to just a good quarter.

So with only 1 month to go in the quarter and in the year, let's hope that I can make an awesome run to the end, and get my last half of the year up to the $40/hr mark. I need to win about 14000 in 100 hours to do it. That's a 140/hr, so it's going to be pretty tough, but I will try my best. I'll probably fall short, but I'd like to make at least 20k for the year, and I only need 8000 more to reach that goal. That's a lot more realistic and doable. In any case, I really shouldn't be results oriented, just make good solid poker decisions and the money should come in.

Up & Down

Hmmm, I think I had a good night last night. I won $1700, so I think that is good. There were two 20/40 running last night, a main game and a must move. The must move was short most of the night, and I was at the Jesus table. I was running over everybody, particularly Freddy and the Persian fish. Then lagastic Jason waltzes in a messes up my friendly little 4-handed game, and proceeds to raise like every hand like I was doing, starting a 3 and 4 bet frenzy. Ai-yah! I get moved to the main game up 1700, a little while later the must move game breaks, and they make the main game 10-handed. I proceed to win 2 massive pots and before I know it I have 10 racks in front of me. I play for like another hour and a half, and proceed to play bad (too many chips in front of me syndrome), and get sucked out on left and right. So I had a win of like $4000 at one point, but didn't lock it up, and spewed off $2300. That sucks.

Ship it!

FINALLY! In all of my years of playing poker, I have never won a jackpot, not even a table share. Or any other promotion. In other words, I have never got one red cent from any casino, despite the thousands of dollars I have payed in rake. Tonight was different. I won $800 in Oceans-11 Sunday hourly football drawings. I won the last drawing of the night at 9pm. Earlier in the day I had told the floor man, that if he didn't call my name tonight, I was leaving and never coming back.

Really funny, was when they were doing the announcement for the winner at 9pm, I had just tabled my queen high hand to win a small blind versus big blind battle. I jumped out of my chair, and yelled "SHIP IT!" Half the table thought I was talking about my queen high hand winning! I ended up tipping the two floor guys 50 bucks each, so I only really netted $700, but damn it feels good to win money for nothing. In the grand scheme of things $700, relatively isn't all that much, considering I normally buy in for 2k when I play the 40/80, but as they say, money won is much sweeter than money earned!

I had a good weekend of poker as well. Today and yesterday I played the 20/40, logged 17 hours, and won $3945, plus the 700 from the promotion. Kind of makes up for the 14k loss I had in the 40/80 at the end of October, but not really.

Expert Play

I played an interesting hand last night. 40/80 at Oceans-11. I have just won a couple of pots off of Max and it looks like he was starting to tilt a little bit. He announced that he was going to 3-bet me every time I opened the pot. Couple of hands later, this hand pops up. Mike limps UTG, I 2-bet pocket aces, couple of folds to Max, who 3-bets, button calls, both blinds call, Mike caps it for me, everyone calls. 7 way action 4-bets each. Flop comes JT5 2 clubs, I have the ace of clubs. Check to Max who bets, button folds (really, really bad, not sure how you can fold anything here getting 29:1, with any hand you called with preflop), SB raises, BB calls, Mike calls, I decide to just call, expecting Max to 3-bet. Max just calls (whoops). Turn is a rag spade, now putting 2 clubs and 2 spades. SB checks (can we say flush draw?), BB checks, Mike checks, I bet, Max raises, SB calls, BB folds, Mike folds. River is a red 9. SB checks, I check, Max bets, SB folds. I tank for a little while, Max starts talking, I check/raise after like 30 seconds of thinking. Max instacalls. Pocket kings no good sir. I was going to just call, until Max started chirping.

Gift Wrap

Great 40/80 game last night at Oceans-11. My wife and I took our kids to Legoland for their Brick or Treat Halloween spooktacular. Kids had fun, and my wife told me before we left that we could take two cars, so I could head directly to Oceans after we were done at the park. Legoland is like 10 minutes from the casino, so it saves me quite a bit of time from having to go home and then back up to North County.

Last night's game was very good. It started off short-handed with a drunk Chris P. He took a bad beat and quit, for a little while. He came back later that night still drunk and proceed to piss off a lot of money. In the game at various times, were Evan Almighty, Korean Joe, Chinese Jason, Chris P, Wayne, Jed, Chaldean Ryan, and Lam, plus some various others.

I got in for 5 racks, and made a spectacular comeback, winning 1 rack.

I flopped quad queens against Ryan while 3 or 4-handed. He opened on the button, I 3 banged it from the SB, BB folded, he called. Flop was QQ7. I bet, Ryan raised, I 3-bet. Ryan called. Turn was a rag. I bet, Ryan raised, I 3-bet and Ryan mucked. He claimed he had pocket kings. Not sure I totally believe him.

Chris P, gift wrapped 640 to Ryan. In an overs pot, he went 4-bets on the turn on a KK79 2 spade board, and then check-folded the river when spades missed.

Celebrity Poker Sighting?

Jose Canseco has been in the news lately, due to some alleged border crossing woes here in San Diego. Guess who showed up at Oceans-11 last night? Yep, Mr. Juice himself. He was playing in a 10-10 no limit game for a while. I think he got stacked or something, because later in the night I saw him in a 2-3 no limit game. The regular group of boys I was playing with in the 40-80, wanted him to come join our game.

Nothing spectacular happened, I booked a modest win of $1400, should have actually lost more, but some schmuck totally misplayed his hand and I lost the minimum with pocket aces against his pocket eights when he flopped a set and foolishly decided to slow play it. Also had some random guy sit down in the 40/80 with half a rack of blues (dollar chips), and a couple of greens (25 dollar chips). He tried to short buy like $80 into the game, when the dealer told him the minimum buy-in was $400. He subsequently complied, bought in, lasted about 2 orbits and busted out. His bust-out hand? Q6o on a ATJ5 rainbow board. Interesting play sir.

Heater check, I still got it!

Heater is still intact. I've played 6 sessions since October 1st, winning 5 and losing 1. The losing session was a 100 dollar loss in the 20/40, otherwise I'm running like a god lately, plus I have been playing well too. Since October 1st, I am winning a little less 5BB/hr.

I must say that I think 2+2 has really helped my game. There are some very good poker players over there, who post, think, and analyze hands very well. I don't always agree with their analysis, but it's definitely interesting to hear other opinions. I have really ratcheted up my value bets since I started reading and posting there. I now realize the power of the bet/fold river line as well, when making thin value bets as opposed to check/call. I also seem to have reached an inner confidence where I can confidently fold hands where I'm certain that I'm beat, that previously I probably would have made crying calls only to be shown the winner. I have also adjusted my play greatly depending on the opponents in the hands, and have learned to confidently value bet middle or bottom pair.

Roaring Start

Off to a good start heading into the home stretch of the year. I played in an awesome 40/80 game last night. We were playing mandatory live straddle with an immediate rebate. Meaning that UTG posted a live 80, if it came around for 3 bets, the straddler had the option of calling, but not putting in any more chips, or folding and taking 4 chips back. That really sparked the action. Eventually some people left, busted out, and some new people took their places and the must-straddle died out. But it was going good for quite a while. I finished up 2100 in 3.75 hours, and quit when the game got short and went and played 20/40 for 1.75 hours and dropped a 100 there, so overall I finished the night up 2000. Good start!

3rd Quarter Results

3rd Quarter 2008 is in the books for me. I played a lot more poker in the last 3 months than normal, since my wife was out of town for so long. I logged over 320 hours the past three months, and finished the quarter up $1506 for a screaming hourly rate of 4.69 an hour! Woo-hoo, winner winner chicken dinner. Actually I'm quite happy with these results, as you can see from the graph, I was severely stuck at one point and made a nice comeback. Hopefully the 4th quarter of 2008, I won't have a big nosedive at the beginning of the quarter, and my current hot streak will continue.

Here's the summary by game:
6/12 +74 0.5
8/16 +210 12.843
15/30 even 5.5
20/40 +1229 124.6
30/60 -1800 19.0
40/80 +2420 155.75
2/3NL +30 0.16
5/5NL -657 2.6

Guess, I'm a no-limit fish, but I don't play it very often.

Oops!... I Did It Again

I went 4-bets on the turn drawing dead.

40/80 4-handed. UTG limps, button raises, I call with pockets 7's in the SB, BB calls, UTG calls. Flop comes TT6. Checked to the button who bets, I check-raise since the button shouldn't have any of that crap. BB calls, UTG calls. Crap, I don't like my hand anymore. Wow, 7 on the turn, I just check-raised myself into a monster, or so I thought. I bet, BB raises, UTG calls, I 3-bet, BB 4-bets, UTG calls. River is a Q. I bet, BB calls, UTG raises! Damn, really? QT? I call, BB calls. UTG has pocket tens for flopped quads, BB had pocket sixes for flopped full houses. Later I found out the button had AJ. Damn 7 on the turn. I could have easily folded the turn if that 7 doesn't come.

Grrrr!

Two losing sessions in a row, and I'm back in the red for the quarter. Argh, oh well just standard variance and it's not like it's so much that I can't make it back in a single good session. Down a little over 3k quarter to date, with 16 days left in the quarter. Maybe I'll get 3 to 4 more sessions in before the quarter ends, we will see.

Playing blind and loving it!

So I got into a lame 20/40 game last night. Very boring, so I start drinking with Sean S and Chris J. I got pretty loaded and decided just for fun I would play my hands blind, until the river, using my position and the others players actions to dictate my actions (with the exception of I was not folding until the turn, and only then if I had to face 2 bets cold, then I would look). On the river if I was out of position, I would check, and if my opponent bet I would look and then decide. If I was in position, and I was checked to I would look, and then decide to value bet or check. I made like 2 racks doing this for about an hour or so. Most fun I've had at a poker table in a long time!

In the Black!

For the third quarter of the year, I finally broke into the black today! It's only a small win, +107 for the quarter to date over 262 hours of play. However, at my low point for the quarter I was down $17,858 on August 8, 2008. Since then, I have been on a massive heater and have won it all back in 129 hours of play, averaging $138.98 an hour!

My wife and kids get back from Minnesota tomorrow, and I have put in a ton of hours since she has been gone. So I think I'll probably take an extended break from poker for at least a couple of weeks if not more. I'm feeling pretty burned out right now.

Today I played the 40/80 @ Oceans-11 and booked a 2100 win. I ended up playing short-handed 3 players, and then heads-up with Mike. I told Mike, that he didn't have an edge against he heads-up, and that he shouldn't play me, but he wanted to. I told him he could quit at anytime, even if he was up. I busted him for his last $400 or so heads up, and he bought another $500 and I busted him again in like 20 minutes. He quit after that. The game broke around 9:00pm, so I came home early tonight.

Jack High - No Good!

I called with Jack high for the first time in my life last night. Obviously it wasn't good, but it was almost good. It was a SB vs BB battle. I raised with J9o in the SB, BB defended. Flop comes 884, two hearts. I check, BB bets, I check-raise, BB 3-bets. Turn is a 2. Check-check. River is 5, no heart. I check, BB bets. I think for a long time, I think the BB has a busted flush draw, like 9 or T high. I call, and he shows me Q3h. Ooops, Queen high good sir. I made the right read, but didn't have the guts to raise the river.

Massive Heater!

Since coming back from Minnesota I have been on a massive heater! I'm up 211 big bets in 77.6 hours of play. That includes one night where I dropped 5 racks in the 40/80 too! I had a nice run tonight as well. I cashed out 8 racks in the 40/80 game tonight, in 2, so up 6. We were playing short-handed the entire time. At most we had 6 players, but mostly 4 or 5, sometimes as little as 3. There was a major donator in the game who was keeping the game alive and well. He was the same donator, who on Friday night got in 4 racks, went on a massive heater and ended up cashing in like 7 or 8 racks, or so I heard. I left around midnight on Friday, after dusting off 5 racks. That game was amazing, but I couldn't catch anything, and when I rarely actually flopped a hand, I got outdrawn almost every time. But I knew when to call it quits and go home with my tail between my legs.

Home Game

Got invited to a home game/tourney tonight. The tournament was a 100$ buy-in with 78 players, with 1st place getting 50% of the prize pool. I was doing fine, had a little above the chip average when I busted out. My bust-out hand was the following: I limped in the small blind with 7h4h, 5 players took a flop of 74t. Checked around to middle position who bet 800 (minimum bet, blinds were 400 and 800). I checked raised all-in for 5600 total. She hemmed and hawed, and finally called with JsTs. She of course hits a ten on the river to knock me out. Fortunately, for me she knocked me out! I got into a 5-5 blind max $300 buy-in no-limit cash game that was running. I made $1500 playing this game in like 5 hours! The players were absolutely horrible. Other than a couple of people at the table other than myself, these people had no-clue had to play holdem, let alone no-limit holdem, where I was stacking people left and right playing literally any two cards if there was no raise preflop (which often there wasn't). It was like guys, just give me your money, it would be quicker and less painful for all involved that way. Hope I get an invite next year!

Quadzilla

Had an awesome session in the 40/80 game at Oceans-11 last night. After getting buried 2 racks in, I rebuy another 2 racks and proceed to run over the game, cashing out 7+ racks total.

I made quad 8's on the following hand.

Charlie open-raises in MP, Ron 3-bets next up, folded to me on the button, I flat call with pocket eights, blinds call, 5-ways to the flop for 15 small bets. Flop comes AA5, two spades. Checked to Ron who bets, I raise, folded to Charlie who calls, Ron calls. 21 small bets in the pot. My raise on the flop, is to charge the flush draws, and if Ron has something like pocket kings or pocket queens, I may get him to make an incorrect lay down. Likely, he has an ace, and is going to slow-play it once I raise. Ron loves to slow play his big hands, which I will never understand. I have like 10% equity in the pot, so if by raising I can get a free river I can get two shots to hit my full-house, and with 21 small bets, it's worth the high variance play. Plus if I hit, I am going to get max action, especially if the 8s comes off completing the flush on the turn. In any case, turn is the 8c. Checked to me, I bet, Charlie folds, Ron check-raises, I 3-town it, Ron calls. 16.5 big bets in the pot now. River is the last 8 in the deck, and now Ron leads into me with his aces full of eights, I raise of course, and he calls. I announce quadzilla, and Ron flashes his ace-king and mucks furiously. 20.5 big bets is the final pot size! Horribly played by Ron. And this was just after I cracked his pocket aces with my 74 suited! He played that hand bad too. I think Ron now hates me.

Sleeping is Overrated (NOT)

I played in an absolutely awesome 40/80 game last night at Oceans-11. I played until 6am this morning, went home, got like 3 hours sleep and then had to get ready to go the Minneapolis. The game had Evan Almighty, Tommy, and Pierre in it. Pierre just kept reloading $500 at a time from the ATM/Money Fairy machine. It was pretty ridiculous. I think he went to that damn machine at least 5 or 6 times. Every time he bought 500, and being short-stacked he still played like every hand. Talk about loose-passive, check-call, check-call, check-call, like every time. The few times he actually had hands, everybody else either mucked immediately as soon as he made an aggressive action, or outdrew him since he was short-stacked. I outdrew his pocket queens with pocket deuces by filling up on the river when I hit a deuce. I raised preflop 4-handed on the button with the deuces, he just called in the big blind with pocket queens with only 4 sbs total in his stack! Flop comes like 996 or something like that. He bets, I tell him to put it all in, he complies and I spike my 2 outer on the river.

Unfortunately, even though the game was awesome, I finished up only up 1 rack. Still it has been a while since I booked a win in the 40/80 game, so I'll take it.

Minnesota

Headed out to Minnesota again this week. Leaving on Tuesday night, back on Sunday. The rest of the family is staying out there until the 23rd. Lots of my wife's family is all going to be there. Should be one large family "picnic" of a time. Hopefully my wife will give me her blessing to make a repeat visit to Canterbury Park. One slight wrinkle, a new card club opened up in the Minneapolis area, called Running Aces. Apparently the 30/60 game is bouncing around these two clubs now. Not sure if it has found a permanent home yet.

Vegas!

Going to Vegas next month with a buddy of mine to celebrate his birthday. Not sure how much poker playing I'll get in while I'm in Vegas. I'm sure that the Bellagio and probably the Wynn or the Venetian may have some decent mid-limit games while I am in town. Unfortunately (or maybe fortunately) I am going mid-week so hopefully it won't be too crowded. I plan on just relaxing, maybe play some blackjack and craps, and maybe take a shot at the 100/200 at the Bellagio if I run well at the pit games.

Cashing Out

I cashed out 300 hours from the Oceans-11 Racing for Dollars promotion. 300 hours pays $300, so I made a dollar an hour for playing poker. The promotion starts with $500,000 dollars and as people cash out it diminishes. It started back on March 24, and people are going to start cashing out 1000 hours, which pays $5000, so the money is going to start going here pretty soon. Hopefully I can play another 100 hours or so, before the money runs out.

I booked a nice win today in both the 8/16 and 20/40 games. I finally sucked out on a huge pot in the 8/16 game. Kill pot, and I pick up AdAh in the small blind, raise before the flop and get 3 callers. Flop comes TTK, with 2 diamonds. I bet and got called in the 2 spots. Turn was a rag diamond. I bet, BB calls, Button goes all in for 25 chips. I call, BB calls. River is the beautiful Ace of clubs. I bet, BB raises, I 3-town it and BB calls. BB had KT for a flopped full house. Button mucked, but I'm 100% positive he had a flush. BB played the hand about the absolutely worse possible way. If he plays it correctly he's going to win the pot, but he decided to slow play and it cost him.

In the 20/40 game, I made a straight flush with 89d. Flop came QJ7 all diamonds. I bet, got called by a new fish in the 2-seat. Turn was the 6d. I bet fish raises, I call. River is the 5d. Originally I thought that the 2-seat had the ace diamonds, so I figured with a rivered straight flush, I should be able to get 3-bets in. So I bet out and he just flat called. So, he either had just the king of diamonds, or no diamond at all.

Book it!

Played the 20/40 last night. Finally booked a decent win of $1127. Could have been better, but I tried to bluff Troy twice and both times he had pocket kings, for top-set. One, he lost anyways when the SB flopped a straight. It was capped preflop and on the flop, I had pocket 9's. Flop was 345 rainbow. SB had 67o for a flopped straight. Turn came a king, Troy bet, I raised, Moke in the SB 3-town, Troy 4-bets, and I muck.

Later, I make a real steal raise with T4s from the cutoff, Troy 3-bets from the BB and we see a flop. I catch a pair (4's) and a flush draw. Turn is King, Troy bets, I raise, he 3-bets, I call. I blank on the river (plus it paired the board), he bets and I muck. He shows me his full house anyways.

So other than those and a few other disasters, I still managed to book a reasonable win! I won a huge pot with pocket kings that was about 1/2 my profit. 5-ways capped before the flop. Flop comes Q44. I bet, get called in 3 spots. Turn is a ten, Kay donks into me, I raised, fish on my left donates $80, Kay calls. River is a blank, I bet, fish folds, Kay pays off like a slot machine. QT no good, Kings up takes the pot!

How do the fish win?

I was playing in an awesome 40/80 Friday night @ Oceans-11, yet I still lost 5+ racks. Normally I would quit playing after losing 3 racks, but this game was just awesome. We were playing 40/80 with overs and the whole table was overs, meaning we were really playing 40/80/160. Preflop the blinds were still 20 and 40, and the bets were still in $40 increments, but after that the bets were 80 & 160. Plus the whole table was agreeing to do a live $80 straddle. Here was the lineup as I remembered it:
Seat 1: forgot
Seat 2: Sean from UCSB. A big LAG who knows how to play postflop and isn't afraid to sling his chips into the pot. Not the easiest spot in the lineup.
Seat 3: Charlie, reasonable player, a bit on the weak tight side, but has his moments of spew.
Seat 4: Doc Jose, total fish. Plastic surgeon from Tijuana. Plays everything and anything, unafraid to run a bluff or call you down light.
Seat 5: Forget his name, but a young marine looking guy. Also a bit on the loose side, snapped me off on a one-outer that I will tell you about in a bit.
Seat 6: Lam. Another very loose player, who can't hand read worth at all. I've seen him willingly put in multiple bets drawing dead/thin.
Seat 7: Chris, another total fish.
Seat 8: Bruce, total fish, but is dangerous since he doesn't fold and is willing to open raise very loosey goosey. Snapped me off twice, once to put me on total tilt, and the final one sent me home.
Seat 9: me. I've got 3-fish to my right, and only Sean & Charlie I have to worry about to my left.

Doesn't matter, I still lost 5+ racks.

I lost to a 1-outer for the 3rd time ever in my life during this session. In the 40/80 must move game, seat 5 from above posted in the cut-off. I open-raised UTG+3 with pocket jacks. Sean called, he called, plus the blinds 4-way to the flop. Flop comes A47 two clubs. I hate the flop, but I bet, planning on folding if raised. All call. Turn is off suit jack. check-check-bet-fold-raise-fold-reraise-cap. River was a 4. bet-2bet-3bet-4bet-call. From the action preflop I knew he didn't have pocket aces. Which left him with pocket 4's or pockets 7's. They way I played it I could have had pocket aces, and when he 4-bet I knew I was in trouble. Even so, I have the 3rd nut hand, only two hands beat me. I call hating it, expecting to see quads, and yep he has pocket 4's for rivered quads and a 1-outer. ARGH, I hate poker.

At the main game with the juicy lineup I described above, Bruce twice killed me. One he opens with Q2s in the cutoff and I 3-bet him from the button with AK. No worries flop comes 224. That hand put me on tilt. The sword-inducing hari-kari final hand of the night comes when he opens from UTG with 42o, I 3-bet him with AK, everybody cleared out and he called. Flop comes KJ2 rainbow. I bet and he called. Turn was a blank, and I bet my last 12 chips. He almost mucked and then said ok, I'll donate. River was 4, for bottom two which was good. Sickening, I was taking horrible beats all night like that.

For the 3rd quarter of the year I am down a sickening $8800 in only 34 hours of play. I've got a long ways to go to reach my goal of averaging $40 an hour for the last 6 months of the year. No doubts in my mind that I can do it, it's just going to be a long grind unfortunately.

Drawing Dead

I was in the 40/80 on Thursday night. Not a good night for me. I was doing ok, until this hand came up and then it seemed like it fell apart for the rest of the evening. UTG raised, 2 folds, MP calls two cold, button calls two cold, SB folds, I call in the BB with pocket sixes. Flop is K65 rainbow. Sweet I think to myself and bet. UTG raises, MP folds, button 3-bets, I call, UTG calls. Turn K. Checked to the button who bets, I raise, UTG calls, button 3-bets, I cap UTG calls, and button calls. River T. I bet, UTG folds, button raises, I make a crying call, praying that he has pocket 5's, but really expecting to see KT. Nope, he has K6o, having called two cold preflop on the button with that piece of trash. I am drawing stone dead on the turn, and put in 4 bets! That has never happened to me before. Poker sucks.

Lights Out!

For the second time in my life I have been in a casino when the power went out. Last year when I was in the Bay Area, I was playing at Garden City when the lights went off briefly for like 20 seconds or so. Last night at Oceans-11, the power was off for more than an hour. Their backup generator didn't work so well. I had just sat down in an 8-16 game while waiting for a seat in the 20-40, played 3-hands when boom, lights out! Waited around, had a couple of beers, played some 5-card draw no betting 1$ ante just for fun, while waiting for the power to be restored. By the time the lights came back on at 10:30pm, most of the games had already broken, so just for fun I played 4/8 and rammed and jammed it with any two cards. Ended up booking a $56 win, playing wild & crazy maniac style.

2nd Quarter 2008 is in the books.


Ended up slightly up, but it's been a wild ride that's for sure. Here's the game by game breakdown:
8/16 +51 2.65
15/30 +1700 2
20/40 -5846 90
30/60 +5900 12
40/80 -1013 104.5
2/3NL +55 1
5/5NL +458 2.75

totals = +1305 214.9
For an hourly rate of $6.07/hour! Smoking! Good thing I have a day job!
I've been getting my ass kicked in the 20/40 lately, so I am going to bear down and really start playing my A game and have a great end to 2008. My goal is to average at least $40 an hour for the remainder of the year. No more splashing around just trying to get lucky and have fun. Serious poker from here on out.

Straight Flush & Heads up with Wayne

I flopped a straight flush last night in the 20/40 game. I limped in with 67h. Flop came 345 all hearts. David T bet, Wayne raised, I called, David 3-bet, Wayne 4-bet, I called. Turn was 2h. check-check-bet-call-call. River was 3d. bet-call-raise-call-fold. David had Ah2d, for the 5 high straight flush. Wayne claims he had pocket 4's for a full house on the river. So close to a jackpot. In all my poker playing I have never had even a table share of a jackpot. Granted I don't play in jackpot eligible games very much, but I have put in a reasonable number of hours in the 8/16 and 20/40 in the past. David T needs to have A2h instead of Ah2d, or the river needs to pair the 4 instead of the 3. Oh well, eventually I will get a jackpot, it is a statistical certainty.

Eventually the game got short and Troy, Wayne, and myself were playing 3-handed. I was pounding on Troy, while Wayne was pounding on me. I prefer playing against Troy. Troy is actually a thinking player, while Wayne is still a 1st level thinker even heads-up. We eventually busted Troy and then Wayne and I played heads up for about an hour and a half. Wayne should be easy to play against, he never folds a pair, never folds any draw, even gutshots, never folds overcards, never folds his blind. Basically playing against Wayne heads-up is playing showdown poker, since he won't fold unless it's hopeless for him. I've had reasonable success playing Wayne heads up, this was our 3rd time. I may need to rethink my strategy on how to play Wayne heads up.

Isn't poker fun?

Dropped 4 racks in the 20/40 game last night. Sometimes when I lose and I am sitting at a table full of donkeys, I don't understand how I could be sitting at this table and be losing. Oh yeah, then I remember, the gutshot fairy and runner-runner pixie dust is out in full-force tonight. Oh well, I'll get them next time I suppose.

Pocket Nines

Played 20/40 last night. Got to the casino rather late, since my wife went out with her girlfriends in the early evening. Got in around 11:30pm, planning on playing the 40/80 but the game had already broken. Not sure if it is the economy or just the poker craze subsiding, but the limit holdem games at Oceans-11 have been pretty weak lately.

I had a winning night, up $470. Should have been more, but I got a couple of bad beats. Both times I had pocket nines, both times I flopped top set, both times I lost to a straight when my opponent held 10-7! It was different opponents each time, but still. In the first I raised the button and the SB 3-bet me with 10-7 suited. He flopped a gut-ball plus a flush draw, and hit his straight on the river. The other time I raised in the cutoff with pocket nines and the big blind called and he flopped open-ended and got there on the river.

Other funny thing happened last night, some player I had never played with before sat in the 20/40 game and the first hand he played he tried to go all-in preflop. The dealer and the players explained to him that we were playing limit, not no-limit. He played a hand so weird against me that I was totally confused. Short-handed I raised UTG with A3 suited. Called by the cut-off (weird no limit guy abbreviated WNLG), and the big-blind (Chuck an off-duty bad playing dealer). Flop comes 8 3 2 rainbow. Chuck bets, I raise, WNLG 3-bets, call-call. Turn A, checked around. River 2. Chuck checks I bet, WNLG cuts out $120 in chips to raise. Dealer tells him he can only raise to 80. Chuck folds, and I'm completely at a loss of what to do. I have no history with the guy and am totally confused by his line. Against anybody I have some reasonable history with I would likely raise like 90% of the time, but since he played it so weird I just called. He tabled pocket queens, and I win the pot. What a weird line to take with pocket queens.

WSOP Absence

World Series of Poker is going in Vegas right now. Means that the local cardroom has been kind of empty these days. Been on a pretty big downswing since returning from Minnesota, down 100 BB's in less than 100 hours of play. Been playing a lot of short-handed 20/40 as well. Arab James has been killing me lately. Flop top set of queens when I 3-bet preflop out of the big-blind, and he called two cold on the button with T9 offsuit. Don't worry, flop comes QJ8 to give me second nuts to his flopped straight and of course I can't fill up. Nights like that are frustrating sometimes. Would like to get out Vegas during WSOP time, maybe take a shot at the 100-200 game out there. We'll see.

Canterbury Park Recap

Date : 5/12/2008
Place : Canterbury Park Card Club, Shakopee Minnesota
Mission: Pay for the family vacation
Result: Resounding success!

Man, the players at Canterbury Park were just horrible! It's like they just started spreading holdem, and nobody has figured out how to play the game properly! I won 1700 in like 2 hours of play at 15/30, when there was just an interest list for 30/60. It's not like I even played that many hands, but just about every pot I entered and played on past the flop I won. One example of a hand I played, I limped with KQs under the gun. Loose crazy Helen whom had been playing for like 45 minutes and in that 45 minutes I correctly had her pegged for loose crazy, unbluffable limps as well. Button pops it, small blind calls Doug -> weak tight, never folds, and big blind calls Dule -> reasonably decent player.

Flop comes Q, 6, 4 rainbow.
Following action:
check, check, bet(me), call(Helen), fold, checkraise(Doug), fold (Dule), reraise(me), call(Helen), reraise (Doug), call(me), call(Helen).

Turn K, still rainbow:

bet(Doug), raise (me), call (Helen), call (Doug)

River, offsuit deuce:
check-bet(me)-call(Helen)-call(Doug)

I got overcalled by Doug on the river. Guess the hands? Doug had AQ, for top-pair top kicker on the flop, but didn't 3-bet a field of limpers and a button raise preflop. I really didn't like his re-raise before the flop. His check-raise wasn't too worrisome, as I thought he probably just had a queen, reasonable kicker like a ten or jack. His 4-bet had me worried. Helen had K2 suited for a rivered two pair, plus a backdoor flush draw on the flop. Her call of 2-cold on the turn, plus my raise should have made Doug muck his hand, but oh-well. His overcall on the river is horrible.

After that I shortly moved over to a short-handed (5) 30/60 game. Game filled up reasonably quickly and was full for most of the 12 hours I played at the table. I made a straight flush with 56c about twenty minutes after someone else had made a straight flush with 56c as well. I got a free Canterbury Park cap for that. I made quad 7's on a pot with a live 60, and a blind 90 to start off with, with me first to act. I made it 4 bets to go, and it folded over to the blinds and the straddlers who all called. I flopped the set, and turned quads. No river payoff. I showed anyways. Would have flopped quad jacks, with QJd, but Dule open-raised UTG and I mucked even though he had been getting frisky lately. Player in the 1 seat 3-bet it, and eventually won it with pocket aces. Would've gotten max action from him if I had called preflop.

I played another interesting hand where on the button I had AQd, young wannabe-pro open raises from mid-position, next wanna-be pro isolation 3-bets. I call on the button. Flop comes Td, Jd, rag. Many bets go in on the flop. Turn is a rag, bet(donk1), raise (donk2), call (me), call (donk1). River is an offsuit queen. check-check-? (I took like 30 seconds before I decided what to do. At this point I thought did someone really play AK that way on the flop river the nuts and check it? I was 60% sure I had the best hand but wimped out and checked). donk1-KTo, donk2-KQs, I table AQd and take down the pot. It was like that all night, and I finished up 5900 after buying in for only 1500. I should move to Minnesota and play there professionally! :-)

Back Home

Got back from Minnesota tonight. While in Minnesota, over the weekend the family drove to Wisconsin Dells in Wisconsin to stay at the Chula Vista resort. The kids enjoyed the indoor water park there. I went to the Ho-Chunk casino with my brother-in-law one night. The poker room there was pretty small-time. The biggest limit game that had going was 3-6, and they had a couple of 1-2 no limit games with a max buy in of 300. Didn't even bother to play, not worth my time to sit down in those games.

I got to play at Canterbury Park on Monday. I put in a long session, around 14 hours or so. Most of it in the 30/60, with a couple of hours in the 15/30. I made a killing, finishing up 5900 in the 30/60 game and up 1700 in the 15/30 game. Right now I'm pretty tired, so I will post more details later, including some memorable hands of the night.

Hitting the Road

Going to the land of 10,000 lakes tomorrow with the family to visit the in-laws. Don't know if I will get any time to play poker while in Minnesota, but they have a good (at least when I was there last time) 30-60 limit holdem game at Canterbury Park.

The second quarter of the year has been kind of slow for me. Haven't gotten out too much and right now I am 2479 in the red for the quarter, putting me into negative territory for the year. Maybe a change of scenery will help.

Careful what you wish for!

How can you make a $500 win feel like a loss? Start off with a $3400 win, and lose it until you have only a $500 win instead!

As you can see from my last post, I like to keep my chip stacks in a big triangle. You get a perfect triangle at the following number of stacks (a stack being 20 chips): 1, 3, 6, 10, 15, 21, 28, 36, etc. I had my chips up to 27 stacks plus change on Friday night, and I wanted to get to that next perfect triangle and call it a night. Instead Mike Landucci shows up and proceeds to run over the table including myself. It was a combination of me playing bad, getting sucked out on, and going on mini-tilt! Stupid triangles!

I'm not a big movie fan or TV watcher. I think most of the things that come out of mainstream Hollywood is garbage. I am not a pop culture kind of guy, haven't been for the past 5 years or so. The TV that I watch is generally sports, documentaries, Discovery Channel, and Food Network TV. That being said, I did watch a good movie last night based on a friend's recommendation. August Rush , was a very enjoyable movie, despite the obvious made for the movie "moments". It struck somewhat of a personal chord with me as well, having quite a bit of empathy with the main character, and understanding his intense desire to be reunited with his parents.

Chip Stack

Had a great Wednesday night. Played 4.75 hours and booked a 3900 win in the 40/80. Chris(aka DeathDonkey) a fellow alum from UCSD although he attended much later than I did, along with Mike Landucci were in the game. Both were on my left, making me play much tighter than normal, as they were liberally re-raising when in position. Chris runs a website called deucescracked.com, which I hope is doing well. Here's a picture of my stack I took that night.

60 or 160?

Damn, playing pool is killing my expected value. I put in a short session yesterday. I showed up at the casino at around 8:45 pm, got into a 20/40 game and won 708 in 2 hours and 45 minutes before I got called for the 40/80 game. I won 295 in 45 minutes at the 40/80 game. I told Danny that I wanted to win another $60 bucks so I could be up a thousand on the night. The game was really juicy, and I'm pretty sure that I could have cleaned up, but Danny really wanted to go, and I was up almost 1k. So I tell Danny just let me play this last round and let me see if I can make my 60. This is after the button has already passed me, and I have like 4 or 5 hands to go before i have to post the big blind. I muck all the hands until I am under the gun. I get ace-king, raise it up and everybody folds, making me exactly $60 and putting me up a little over 1k for the night, so far.

Then I played pool with Danny, and dumped off 60 bucks to Danny plus 20 for time so a total of 80 on the night. That two hours at the pool hall only cost me who knows how much from what I could have made at the poker table. Next time if my win goal is 1k for the night and Danny wants to go shoot pool, I'm going to tell him I need to win a hundred extra to cover my pool losses.

Tourney Time

I'm currently playing the 3K guaranteed on bodog.com
I have 22k in chips, average is 10.7k, 37/266 runners remain.
I'm guaranteed at least 37th place which pays 15.00. The buy-in was $8.80. But I used tourney credits to buy-in so it's pure profit as far as I'm concerned.

Most of these players are complete donkeys. I had only 1 real bad-suck out on me. All folded to me on the button. I raise with AQo, BB calls with a small stack. I flop an ace, we end up allin on the flop. He has pocket queens, no straight draw no flush draw. He pushed into me! Spikes the last queen in the deck on the river.

First pays 735. I'm hoping to final table.

Update 1: I'm currently chip-leader with 51k in chips. 22 remain.
Update 2: Just busted a big stack with AK vs AQ. We both rivered a boat. Have 81k in chips now.
Update 3: Made the final table as chip leader 92k in chips. Blinds are 1500/3000
Update 4: On break at the final table. 4 of us left. I am second in chips with 124k. Big stack has 215k, 2 small stacks with 39k and 21k. Coming off the break blinds will be 4000/8000 with some ante probably a 1000. I'm sure the big stack and me will try to take out the small stacks first and then play heads up for first place. We'll see what happens. I'm tired and want to go to bed however. I didn't think I would make it this far when I started the tourney at 10:00pm PST. It's now after 1:15am in the morning.
Some stats from the tourney so far: I have played 233 hands winning 20% of them. I have seen a flop only 17% of the time. When I see a flop I win the hand 55% of the time.
Update 5: Finished 2nd. Won $465. Going to bed at 1:45 am.

First Quarter in Pictures

I'm a winning player, finally!

Broke into positive territory for the year, last night booking a 2700 win in 2.5 hours. Then I dumped off $40 playing pool with Danny. Could have been worse, but I won the last two games to salvage a small loss.

Here's the quarter's results. Doubt I will get out again before the quarter officially ends.

8/16 411 7.75
20/40 -2975 91.75
40/80 2825 139

totals = 261 238.5 for an hourly rate of 1.09/hour! Screaming hourly rate! Making less than the guy at McDonalds! Considering where I was coming into the month of March, it feels real good just to get unstuck and finally be showing a profit for the year, even if it is only a couple hundred bucks.

Back to Normalcy

The wife and kids get back into town tonight. It will be very nice to have them home again. I missed them very much. It also means my "semi-professional" poker playing days are over. I put in a lot of time at the poker tables while my wife was gone in the month of March. Here's the month's break down:

8/16 408 2
20/40 -683 49.75
40/80 10683 61

totals = 10408 112.75hours, for an hourly rate of 92.31

For the 1st quarter of the year, I'm still in the red, but I'm one decent winning session away from breaking into the black for the year.

Up & Down

Salvaged a winning weekend of poker. Had a good Friday night, winning 2845, then gave it all back on Saturday night booking a -2992 loss. The Saturday night game was juicy as ever, but I ran bad and then tilted off the last 1000. Should have just racked up and left and took the $2000 loss. Anyways on Sunday, I made $1555 to end the weekend up $1408. So in all not a bad weekend of poker, but could have been better. Haven't gone on massive tilt like that in a long time.

Pool Shark - Not

Damn, I gotta quit playing pool. A bunch of the guys I play poker with at Oceans-11 have taking a liking to play pool after a session of poker. I used to be a really good pool player back in my college days when I played like every day.

Of course, we play for money, nothing major 5 or 10 bucks a rack. Even so, I've shot pool with them like 4 or 5 times now, and I'm down like 200 bucks.

Bachelorhood

So my wife and kids have been out of town since March 2nd. Them not being here, really makes me appreciate having a wife and a family. I have quite a few bachelor friends, and I don't know how they do it. Coming home from work to an empty and cold house is pretty lonely and brutal. I don't think I could do it for any real stretch of time. In any case my wife is coming back March 25, so at least in all my free time I have been able to get quite a bit of poker in. Right now I am on a huge rush. Here's my last 10 sessions:

20/40 +120
40/80 -726
20/40 -800
20/40 -295
40/80 +213
8/16 +84
40/80 +2750
40/80 +2360
20/40 -380
20/40 +1865

total +5071

I'm still down for the year, but if I can keep my results like this for the rest of March, I should get back into the black before the wife gets back into town.

Finally!

Been having a rough start to the year. Hopefully things are finally starting to turn around.

Historically, my average winning session has been $1023, while an average losing session has been -$1065. Don't worry, I have more winning sessions than losing sessions.

Since the beginning of the year, prior to last night, my losing sessions have averaged -$964 (less than my historical average), but my average winning session has only been $268 (way under my historical average). Thus when I have been losing, I have been losing about what I normally do, but lately when I win I've been booking very modest sessions wins, like $200 here, $300 here, not bad, but not great, and certainly not enough to make up for the nights where I drop 2 racks in the 40/80 game.

Last night however, I think(hope?) the magic may have returned. I booked a $1400 win in the 20/40 game in 4.5 hours of play with probably about 1.5 hours of that short-handed. I pounded on Chuck and an unknown to me most of the night.

I should get to play a lot of poker in the month of March. My wife is taking the kids and going out of town to visit her sister for most of the month, leaving me to my own devious devices. We'll see what kind of trouble I can get myself into.

Straight Flush!

Made a straight flush last night. In a short-handed 20/40 game. Wayne limps, I raise on the button with 89c, Tong calls in the BB and so does Wayne. Flop comes 6c As Tc. Check-check-bet-call-call. I don't really mind getting called in two spots here. If one of them folds I will likely have to fire the turn again in order to take down the pot. With both calling, I am assured that I will need to hit either the turn or river, in order to take it down. With position and the flop bet however, I'm likely to be able to check the turn and see the river for free. So with my gut-shot straight flush draw, I'm likely the equity favorite with 2 players in and 2 cards to come. In any case turn comes the 7c, giving me the stone cold nuts. Tong bets. Wayne folds, and I raise, Tong calls. River is the 4c. Tong bets again! I raise, praying that he has the ace of clubs and will reraise me. Tong just calls, and I table my straight flush.

In all of my poker playing I have made 5 straight flushes in my life.
89c -> last night @ 20/40
Q8d -> last March @ 40/80
67d -> couple of years ago at a 5/5 NL
KQs -> on-line at UB many years ago on a .10/.25 NL (actually this was my only royal)
JTh -> at a home-game playing Omaha-8

Paying Off

Was playing in a short-handed 40/80 on Saturday night. Yeah I know I told myself I wasn't going to do this very much this year, but the 20/40 had already broken and I didn't feel like playing 8/16. Plus there was a major fish in the game who was making it good.

This is a two hand thought process, as the first hand sets up the second hand somewhat.

3-handed, I have A9o in the big blind. Button open raises, SB folds, I call. Flop comes A 4 2. check-bet-raise-call. I was hoping to take in down on the flop. I'm not super in love with my kicker, but I have a gutball wheel draw, plus the button may have a pocket pair, not convinced that I necessarily have the ace. Top-pair is almost always going to showdown in a short-handed game. I decide to check-call him down unless I improve. Turn and river are bricks, he shows A5 offsuit, I show my hand and take it down.

About twenty minutes later this hand comes up against the same player. I'm in the big-blind with A8 suited. Button open-raises, SB folds, I call. Flop comes AT4, one of my suit. check-bet-raise-call. Similar sequence as last time, and again I'm not super in love with kicker, but 3-handed top-pair is a good hand. Turn is an 8. I decide not to get tricky and lead out. I get raised by the button. Consistent with AK/AQ/AJ/AT. I 3-bet, button 4 bets. Now I absolutely hate my hand. Button has to have either pocket 4's for a set or pocket 10's for a set. Likely pocket 10's as he's not showing any fear, clearly and rightly so not putting me on pocket aces, since I didn't 3-bet preflop. My 3-bet on the turn announces my hand as at least two pair, likely aces-up. The only hand that I am possibly beating when he 4 bets is a A4, which I don't think he would 4 bet the turn with. Now here's the dilemma, I put him on pocket tens for a set, but given that it was short handed, and I still had some outs, plus I could be wrong and maybe he's grossly overplaying AK, I need to call him down. I call the turn, and check-call the river, and yep he shows me pocket tens for the flopped set. Not sure if I could/should have done anything differently. I knew I was beat, but had to make the crying call.

4th Quarter Results and Year in Review

Man the holidays have been brutal on the bankroll. I was doing fine this quarter, until the month of December rolled around and then my results just tanked for the quarter.

Here's the quarter results:

8/16 3.75 303
20/40 62.5 495
40/80 159 -7378
75/150 10.5 4530
totals 235.75 -2050
Hourly Loss = -8.70

For the year (just the main games I play)
8/16 19.667 -460
20/40 198.584 -2490
40/80 501 16726
75/150 30.16 12148
totals 749.411 25924
Hourly Rate = 34.59

So all in all I didn't have a bad year. An extra 25k in my pocket for incidentals, Vegas, money for my wife, etc is okay by me. The first two quarters of the year were spectacular, while the final two were poor, with the third quarter being the worst. The final quarter of the year I was doing fine, but then I got ruptured in December all in the span of about 5 sessions.

Looking back on this last month, I have come to realize a couple of flaws in my game and mindset.

1) I am playing too long sessions. No more coming home at 4 or 5 am. I am going to set some pretty strict time limits on my sessions in 2008, unless the game is so good that I'd be insane to leave (like when Brenda or Jerry Buss are playing).

2) I am playing way too much short-handed 40/80. While I can beat the game, there's not a lot of upside potential there. Usually when the 40/80 gets short-handed it's the better players in the game, which means I need to play extra sharp where gaining or saving a bet here and there is crucial. I don't need the extra stress, when I can go play a full 20/40 or 8/16. True my hourly rate may go down, but so will my variance, which lately has been very high. I've been playing a lot of short handed and making some big scores and some big losses.

3) This is coupled with 2 and 3, when I play short-handed, particularly late at night, I am making too may mistakes which are costing me bets. Here's an example of a horrible play I made the other night. I'm in the BB with J2o. Button mucks, SB completes, I check and we see a flop of A K K. Check-check. Turn is a rag. Check-Check. River is a Jack. Check-Bet-Call. That's the worst bet in the world by me. I can't be called by any hand that I am beating, and hands that are beating me but don't have monsters are surely going to call. SB shows A2o and takes the pot.

So in all, I think I will take a bit of a break from poker for at least a couple of weeks. Especially with the NFL playoffs in gear and the San Diego Chargers who I think will win their first round game, but probably lose in the second round to either Jacksonville or Indy. I'm hoping that the Chargers do better, but I'm always the eternal optimist, while my wife is the realist in the family, at least when it comes to the sports teams I root for. My birthday is coming up in February, so I might get a free weekend to either go to Vegas or play some poker during the daylight hours.

I've noticed a slight up-tick in site traffic. So I'm guessing that someone out there is reading this other than myself. Even if nobody else is reading, that's ok, the blog is mostly for me anyways.

Happy New Year everyone!