My blog started out having almost 100% poker related content and in the last year or so I have really not enjoyed writing about poker so I try to write blogs that are entertaining to read and about stuff other than poker. It gets kind of monotonous to write about poker day after day...good day, bad day, blah blah blah. I also have noticed that anyone who reads my blog must think I am a bagillionaire, because I really don't like to write about big losses. Its not like I am trying to make myself look like a better player or that I never lose, I just don't like dwelling on negative stuff and I doubt anyone that reads my blog does either. It hasn't been a particularly good year of poker and I suppose it is possible that it could be somewhat attributed to me getting away from thinking about my game during blog writing sessions. That is what I intended for my blog to be for in the beginning. I wanted something to make me responsible for my results and also a place to write down thoughts or ideas I was currently having about poker. An obvious benefit of doing this was that I could go back and re-read old blogs to see what I was thinking whenever I wrote them. However, just the simple act of typing out your thoughts makes them much more clear cut in your mind and makes them much easier to remember and apply in the future.
I read another poker player's blog and someone he respected had suggested that he keep a notebook on his desk so that he could record notes after each session and then review them before starting his next session. It seemed like such a novel idea to me that I began to keep one myself...and then I thought "wait a minute, I am already supposed to be doing that in my blog!"
So, I apologize to any of my readers that get bored by the poker content, but I am going to make a concerted effort to get back to writing about poker. I have been playing PLO lately and my results have been pretty awful after having just looked at my stats filtered for PLO only. After 57,000 hands I am down $859. My all-in EV is +$11,308, but that doesn't really make me feel any better. I have learned quite a bit about the game since I have been playing it, but I still make tons of mistakes that are the reason for my poor results. It does make me feel a little better that I have an overall win rate of 3.98bb/100 and the reason I am losing is because I have had such horrendous results at higher limits. I might be able to make more if I would switch back to no-limit, but I know how much of an edge is possible with the current state of the PLO games compared to the NL games. Even if I am not good enough to have a bigger edge in the PLO games yet I know that with some work I can be.
This has gotten pretty long and I have some more to say, but I don't want to get burnt out writing this one blog so I am gonna call it a night and hopefully I'll be blogging much more in the near future.
Tuesday, September 1, 2009
Friday, August 14, 2009
Things are good?
I am going to try and buck my latest trend of every day that I have a good day or stop for just a second to pat myself on the back I follow it up with some ridiculous downswing or horrible day. So I am somewhat reluctant to say.....I had a very good day of poker. I thought it might be my most profitable day of cash game poker ever, but upon referencing an older blog I fell just a tad short. I won $2,444 online yesterday playing about 4-5 hours of PLO and then I was bored and decided I would go play some 5/10 NL at the Bellagio since I was a little short on cash. For the second straight time I couldn't keep myself from playing in the 10/20 game. The game was absolutely FANTASTIC and I ended up winning $9,020 in about 9 hours despite only buying in for $2,000. It didn't really matter how much I bought in for since I was never all-in anyway. I didn't mean to play that long, but I just couldn't let myself leave such a good game. That is 1 day total of $11,464 which is apparently my second best day of cash game poker ever....I set my record in this blog with a 1 day total of $11,578.
There was only one hand that I did anything other than what I consider straight forward ABC poker and it resulted in one of the biggest hands of poker I've ever won. I made a quick note on my phone after it happened so I could re-evaluate my play later. Here is my homemade hand history:
Ad5d in SB w/$4,800 starting stack
Raise to 80 + 2 callers
I Raise to 440 + 1 caller (cutoff)
Pot:$1050
Flop Ah 9c 3c
I tanked and check called $1k
Pot:$3050
Turn 5c
Check call $1600
Pot:$6250
River Js
Check call $1k
Pot:$8250
Insta muck from C/O
New stack $8800
He just played the hand so strange that I couldn't put him on anything that made any sense so I just kept check/calling like a donkey....oops!
Here are some examples of how good the game was. Some kid was short stacking for $800 and I knew he was just looking to gamble and get it in at some point and I had already made up my mind I was going to try to bust him before someone else did. I ended up getting it in with my 77 vs. his AKs and I won. We then allowed him to rebuy for his last $785 even though the min buy-in is supposed to be $800. Next hand he tripled up with two overs and a flush draw against someone else who had a bigger flush draw and some other random hand when he hit one of his overs. So, he should have been busted for good there, but he continued to run super hot. He played a hand soooo bad where it was obvious he was pretty much drawing dead when he got it all-in 3 ways again for about $3500 on an Ax As 2s board with AK. He was up against a flush draw that was drawing dead and Ax 2x for a full house. Anyway he hit a King on the river for an $11k pot. Finally, Jean Robert Bellande joined our game and he is beyond bad. He was upset that he had somehow just lost $2,000 and his bankcard from his pocket and he suspected that a stripper he had just gotten a lap dance from was the culprit. Anyway, there was about $300 in the pot when the following mind boggling hand went down. The flop was Qd 8d 5h and JRB and short stacking kid (now with about $7500 in front of him) both checked and the button bet $100. JRB called and SS Kid made it $600. Button folded and JRB re-raised to $1600. The SS Kid thought forever and kept asking JRB if he had a set of queens...eventually JRB said "I promise I don't have a set of queens" to which the kid snap declared that he was all-in....for $7,200! JRB obviously insta-called him and then they started talking about making a deal and the kid offered to just chop the pot evenly before either of them knew each other's hand. JRB said there was no way he could give him an even chop, but wouldn't tell the kid what he had. The floor came over and told them they couldn't make deals anyway and JRB got all pissed and to try to get a deal done more quickly he finally showed the kid his hand....he had Kc Qc?!?! The kid then announced that he couldn't chop with him anymore because he was "owning him" and he turned over his hand....AQo and told the dealer to "run em"!!! The turn and river were both bricks and some how this kid just won a $15K+ pot with one pair after rebuying for $785 about 3 hours earlier.
This is way too long. I'm done.
There was only one hand that I did anything other than what I consider straight forward ABC poker and it resulted in one of the biggest hands of poker I've ever won. I made a quick note on my phone after it happened so I could re-evaluate my play later. Here is my homemade hand history:
Ad5d in SB w/$4,800 starting stack
Raise to 80 + 2 callers
I Raise to 440 + 1 caller (cutoff)
Pot:$1050
Flop Ah 9c 3c
I tanked and check called $1k
Pot:$3050
Turn 5c
Check call $1600
Pot:$6250
River Js
Check call $1k
Pot:$8250
Insta muck from C/O
New stack $8800
He just played the hand so strange that I couldn't put him on anything that made any sense so I just kept check/calling like a donkey....oops!
Here are some examples of how good the game was. Some kid was short stacking for $800 and I knew he was just looking to gamble and get it in at some point and I had already made up my mind I was going to try to bust him before someone else did. I ended up getting it in with my 77 vs. his AKs and I won. We then allowed him to rebuy for his last $785 even though the min buy-in is supposed to be $800. Next hand he tripled up with two overs and a flush draw against someone else who had a bigger flush draw and some other random hand when he hit one of his overs. So, he should have been busted for good there, but he continued to run super hot. He played a hand soooo bad where it was obvious he was pretty much drawing dead when he got it all-in 3 ways again for about $3500 on an Ax As 2s board with AK. He was up against a flush draw that was drawing dead and Ax 2x for a full house. Anyway he hit a King on the river for an $11k pot. Finally, Jean Robert Bellande joined our game and he is beyond bad. He was upset that he had somehow just lost $2,000 and his bankcard from his pocket and he suspected that a stripper he had just gotten a lap dance from was the culprit. Anyway, there was about $300 in the pot when the following mind boggling hand went down. The flop was Qd 8d 5h and JRB and short stacking kid (now with about $7500 in front of him) both checked and the button bet $100. JRB called and SS Kid made it $600. Button folded and JRB re-raised to $1600. The SS Kid thought forever and kept asking JRB if he had a set of queens...eventually JRB said "I promise I don't have a set of queens" to which the kid snap declared that he was all-in....for $7,200! JRB obviously insta-called him and then they started talking about making a deal and the kid offered to just chop the pot evenly before either of them knew each other's hand. JRB said there was no way he could give him an even chop, but wouldn't tell the kid what he had. The floor came over and told them they couldn't make deals anyway and JRB got all pissed and to try to get a deal done more quickly he finally showed the kid his hand....he had Kc Qc?!?! The kid then announced that he couldn't chop with him anymore because he was "owning him" and he turned over his hand....AQo and told the dealer to "run em"!!! The turn and river were both bricks and some how this kid just won a $15K+ pot with one pair after rebuying for $785 about 3 hours earlier.
This is way too long. I'm done.
Wednesday, August 5, 2009
Jurasic Poker: Part 2!
Whenever you finish a great day of poker there isn't anything much more satisfying that staring at your graph for a bit and patting yourself on the back. Sometimes after you have played too long of a session you can start to see some very strange things if you stare at your graph long enough. I did this once before and the things I saw inspired the wonderful artwork that appeared in this blog: http://thakilla.blogspot.com/2009/05/jurrasic-poker.html
This time while staring at my graph and patting myself on my back a T-rex jumped out at me and I immediately knew that I had to create another masterpiece.
Without further adieu I give you Jurassic Poker:Part 2 (the T-Rex).
It felt very good to go from stuck almost $2200 to up almost $4700 in about 1700 hands.
This time while staring at my graph and patting myself on my back a T-rex jumped out at me and I immediately knew that I had to create another masterpiece.
Without further adieu I give you Jurassic Poker:Part 2 (the T-Rex).
It felt very good to go from stuck almost $2200 to up almost $4700 in about 1700 hands.
Saturday, August 1, 2009
The evolution of a mustache...
So Josh dared me a while ago to grow a mustache. We discussed some type of prop bet, but I wanted to be able to shave it in case some type of situation arose that I really didn't feel like being embarrassed in. Therefore I decided to do it just on a dare. I chose a time when I thought I would just be staying around the house and playing poker without seeing too many new people that I would have to either explain why I had a horrible looking mustache on my face or just swallow my pride and pretend like I really preferred to have a mustache. I planned on shaving it before I went to caddy for Jeff, because I didn't want to run the risk of being on TV with a mustache or even worse having Jeff win and me being forced to keep my mustache forever due to its good luck! Once Jeff decided not to play I decided that I would wait until Matt and Brooklyn came in town and I would show it to them before I finally shaved it off.
Anyway, here is the progression of my Mustache via some crappy quality pictures taken by my webcam. Enjoy!
As you can see by the end of my expiriment I had really turned into a full grown man with a Burt Reynolds quality mustache....actually you can see that I officially grow the worst mustache in the history of mustaches and for some reason I grow ZERO hairs on what my little brother tells me is my philtrum. Believe it or not I could put my index finger on my philtrum and not touch any hair on either side!
I hope all 6 of my readers enjoyed the evolution of my mustache as much as I didn't enjoy letting it evolve on my face!
Another interesting fact about my mustache...I won about $9,000 and ran pretty well above expectation over the course of the 2 weeks or so that I had that hideous thing so maybe there was a little luck oozing out of the stash. If I start running bad again he may have to come back. So if you know what it good for both of us do your little rain dance to the poker Gods or whatever it is you do that you think will help to keep me running well.
Until the next mustache experiment.....this is me saying Adios Senor Mustache!
Anyway, here is the progression of my Mustache via some crappy quality pictures taken by my webcam. Enjoy!
As you can see by the end of my expiriment I had really turned into a full grown man with a Burt Reynolds quality mustache....actually you can see that I officially grow the worst mustache in the history of mustaches and for some reason I grow ZERO hairs on what my little brother tells me is my philtrum. Believe it or not I could put my index finger on my philtrum and not touch any hair on either side!
I hope all 6 of my readers enjoyed the evolution of my mustache as much as I didn't enjoy letting it evolve on my face!
Another interesting fact about my mustache...I won about $9,000 and ran pretty well above expectation over the course of the 2 weeks or so that I had that hideous thing so maybe there was a little luck oozing out of the stash. If I start running bad again he may have to come back. So if you know what it good for both of us do your little rain dance to the poker Gods or whatever it is you do that you think will help to keep me running well.
Until the next mustache experiment.....this is me saying Adios Senor Mustache!
Friday, July 31, 2009
Well that didn't last long....
I totally didn't stick to my goals...I immediately saw a fish playing 3/6 PLO and jumped right into the game like an idiot. The good news is I crushed it! I am up $5440 in the last two days and it feels pretty good. I played an 11.5 hour session (really 3 small sessions with short breaks in between) of only PLO which is WAY longer than any other PLO session I have played. It is also could be the most hours of any kind of online cash game session I have ever played...if its not then it is really close. I have played 75 hours this month which is pretty good considering I was gone for 7 days and Justin and Kevin both visited this month. I still have one more day to play a few hours, but Matt and Brooklyn are coming in the morning so I doubt I will play much tomorrow. It was a much better month this month. I didn't make what I lost last month, but I am headed in the right direction at least.
Playing PLO really slows down my pursuit of a 1 million hand graph, but I will get there eventually. I only played 20,000 hands this month in 75 hours. I only play about half the hands per hour when playing PLO as I do when playing NL. I am currently at 676,314 hands in my database. I just did the math and that puts me about 1100 hours away from getting to 1 million hands if I continued to play PLO the rest of the way. That makes me pretty sad, but it really isn't all that big of a deal.
In some other sad news, Jeff decided not to play in the Reno/Tahoe Open this year so my caddying career has been suspended until the Vegas tournament in Mid-October. His wrist is bothering him quite a bit and he wants to rest it before he plays in the PGA Championship the following week. That should give me plenty of time to grind out some mortgage payments next month, but I still intend on taking a vacation somewhere.
Playing PLO really slows down my pursuit of a 1 million hand graph, but I will get there eventually. I only played 20,000 hands this month in 75 hours. I only play about half the hands per hour when playing PLO as I do when playing NL. I am currently at 676,314 hands in my database. I just did the math and that puts me about 1100 hours away from getting to 1 million hands if I continued to play PLO the rest of the way. That makes me pretty sad, but it really isn't all that big of a deal.
In some other sad news, Jeff decided not to play in the Reno/Tahoe Open this year so my caddying career has been suspended until the Vegas tournament in Mid-October. His wrist is bothering him quite a bit and he wants to rest it before he plays in the PGA Championship the following week. That should give me plenty of time to grind out some mortgage payments next month, but I still intend on taking a vacation somewhere.
Wednesday, July 29, 2009
I haven't done this in a while (goals)
I used to be very proud of how I used to make, write down, and reach lots of goals, but I haven't done it in a long time for some reason. Writing down goals makes playing poker have much more of a purpose and keeps you from getting careless which I have been very guilty of lately.
I just got really sidetracked while writing this and I really don't feel like writing anymore. I was going to say why goals are so awesome, but you get the idea anyway....
Goals:
1. Play only $200 PLO until I win 15 buy-ins.
2. Play $400 PLO until I win 15 buy-ins.
3. Game select and mix in 3/6 with 2/4 until I win 15 more buy-ins.
4. Take some shots at 5/10 PLO
5. Win millions.
Hopefully, this will get me to update a little more frequently since I will be reporting back on my progress.
I just got really sidetracked while writing this and I really don't feel like writing anymore. I was going to say why goals are so awesome, but you get the idea anyway....
Goals:
1. Play only $200 PLO until I win 15 buy-ins.
2. Play $400 PLO until I win 15 buy-ins.
3. Game select and mix in 3/6 with 2/4 until I win 15 more buy-ins.
4. Take some shots at 5/10 PLO
5. Win millions.
Hopefully, this will get me to update a little more frequently since I will be reporting back on my progress.
Friday, July 24, 2009
Everything is getting back to normal....
Shew! I have been a busy bee the last couple of months and I was way out of my normal routine. Finally,things are starting to return to normal. Buying a house was way more work than I bargained for, but I am very happy to have put in all of that work and finally being able to enjoy my new house. I didn't have a losing month for the entire year of 2008, but I have already had 2 losing months this year. I lost in April, had a good May, and then had my worst month ever in June. It wouldn't be so bad if I just had my worst month ever, but to lose about 4-5 times what you have in any other month is pretty disheartening. I have always thought all that stuff about "what doesn't kill you makes you stronger" was a bunch of crap and usually just a a way to not take responsibility for something that you failed at or didn't handle as well as you could have. Usually, people say that when they feel beat down or overwhelmed from something they are having a hard time dealing with.....I feel like I am not doing a very good job of explaining why is dislike that saying so much, but it almost seems that when people say it they are basically conceding that they can't deal with something and saying that makes them feel OK about it.
Anyway, I think a lot of people would take the "since it didn't kill me it will make me stronger" approach to dealing with my poor results from June. However, I prefer to take responsibility for those bad results and try to fix whatever problems/leaks were the cause of it.
I'll go ahead and say it.....I played the worst month of poker I have ever played.
There can be many reasons that someone doesn't play their best poker, but the most dangerous reason I can think of is if you are playing poker when you can't focus on it because you are stressed/worried about something else in your life. The reason this is so dangerous is because it is very hard to notice that you aren't playing your best in this situation. I had a lot of stuff out side of poker on my mind during the month of June and it really, I mean REALLY affected my poker. I knew in the back of my mind the whole time that all of this was probably causing me not to play my best poker, but I wasn't able to get myself to take time off. In fact, I played more poker last month than I ever have in any other month of my career. Great, huh?
Now I am feeling very focused on poker and am much more in tune with how outside stresses could possibly affect my play. I was out of town until about the 10th of this month and despite only having played about 40 hours of online poker I am having some great results.
I feel like I am lucky in that I don't get rattled or stressed about hardly anything in life and I can honestly say that is directly attributable to having such consistent success so far in my poker career. I had a small hiccup last month, but I think that kind of a breakdown happens way more often to other people/poker players than it does to me and I am thankful for that.
Jeff asked me to caddy again for him in the Reno/Tahoe Open and I think it will be perfect timing to give myself a break from poker. I used to do a better job about forcing myself to take vacations when I needed them and I think I might need to go back to planning them out ahead of time rather than just taking them when something pops up.
It feels good to finally get back to being in a great state of mind for playing good/winning poker and I look forward to staying in this mindset for a while....maybe even forever?!?! Muahahaha!
Anyway, I think a lot of people would take the "since it didn't kill me it will make me stronger" approach to dealing with my poor results from June. However, I prefer to take responsibility for those bad results and try to fix whatever problems/leaks were the cause of it.
I'll go ahead and say it.....I played the worst month of poker I have ever played.
There can be many reasons that someone doesn't play their best poker, but the most dangerous reason I can think of is if you are playing poker when you can't focus on it because you are stressed/worried about something else in your life. The reason this is so dangerous is because it is very hard to notice that you aren't playing your best in this situation. I had a lot of stuff out side of poker on my mind during the month of June and it really, I mean REALLY affected my poker. I knew in the back of my mind the whole time that all of this was probably causing me not to play my best poker, but I wasn't able to get myself to take time off. In fact, I played more poker last month than I ever have in any other month of my career. Great, huh?
Now I am feeling very focused on poker and am much more in tune with how outside stresses could possibly affect my play. I was out of town until about the 10th of this month and despite only having played about 40 hours of online poker I am having some great results.
I feel like I am lucky in that I don't get rattled or stressed about hardly anything in life and I can honestly say that is directly attributable to having such consistent success so far in my poker career. I had a small hiccup last month, but I think that kind of a breakdown happens way more often to other people/poker players than it does to me and I am thankful for that.
Jeff asked me to caddy again for him in the Reno/Tahoe Open and I think it will be perfect timing to give myself a break from poker. I used to do a better job about forcing myself to take vacations when I needed them and I think I might need to go back to planning them out ahead of time rather than just taking them when something pops up.
It feels good to finally get back to being in a great state of mind for playing good/winning poker and I look forward to staying in this mindset for a while....maybe even forever?!?! Muahahaha!
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