Finally Back on My Game

As some of you might have known, I have been struggling for the last 1.5 Months. I am fairly sure it was an extended period of varience with the tilt that comes along with it, but I finally am back in the right mindset. I cashed in another MTT this week playing the $40 Short Handed 25K with a 22nd finish. I was making a run at a large chiplead for that extra push for 1st, but I ended up losing a coinflip. It was actually a nice structure, starting with 5K in chips and 5/10 blinds. It was the 1st real deepstacked tourney I played and I had fun. Gave me the confidence that when I play my first BIG event, I will be able to handle my chip stack.

I should start playing more SH tourneys, I seem to do well in them.

I'm back on the horse and now I should be able to make the next big push.

Interesting Thread

So there is an interesting thread at Pokertips about what makes a great player 'great'. Check it out:
http://www.pokertips.org/phpBB2/viewtopic.php?p=94913#94913

Deconstructing a Bluff

Well, yesterday I made my return to The Golden Palace at Hayward and one of the biggest NL games in the bay area. The blinds are 2-2-1 with 5 to bring it in, but there is over $15,000 on the table every day. And it is very easy if you keep your wits about you and have the courage to play your hand.

There are also a fair amount of regulars there so even though I hadn't been to the place in many months, I recognized a fair amount of the players there. I'm not sure how many recognized me. What impressed me was that my mental catalogue was still sharp after playing with these guys once or twice before and I could jump into the game.

There is this one kid, Samson, who plays very loose and sometimes too aggresive, but is very capable of making a big laydown. In the beginning of our session (we sat down at the same time) he had made a big preflop raise with AK and then fired out big on the flop even though he missed. I had then later see him showdown AA and QQ and he played them "quietly" preflop, not making any big raises (in fact, not raising at all).

So it comes down to this hand: I have around $850 (I started with $1000) and he has me covered by a few hundred. This game had been fairly passive preflop so I limped in UTG with A7 in clubs. It's limped around to Samson in the Little Blind who made it $120. I instantly put him on AK. That is the only hand he could have. I don't think he would play any other hand that way (though the possibility of JJ or TT entered my mind). Now I figured there were 2 ways I could win: I out flop him or we both miss and I push him out. I knew he respected my moves beause I had been only getting active with a real hand and he would be wary of me. So I called and so did this passive preflop-calling station. That surprised me, so I put him on either really big cards as well or something like an 8s or 9s.

Pot: $380

The flop came 552. Samson leads out with $175. I think about this for a 2nd, just to go over my game plan. My instincts wanted to go with what my head was thinking, that Samson had AK. I wasn't quite sure what LP guy was going to do, but the bet was big enough and if I called it, he would probably laydown his mid pair. So I called. Other guy thought for a second and then folded.

Pot: $730

The turn is the beautiful 6 of clubs, giving me an over card (one of them was sure to be good), the flush draw and an inside straight draw. Samson checks to me, fully on the defensive. I pondered for a bit. I was trying to figure out how much to bet. I could stick my $550 in right now as a big bluff, or I could separate it into 2 bluffs. The tricky part is that the pot is very big and a big bet that was called would leave me nothing for the river. I decided on a $200 bet because that left me enough for a nice river bluff plus the the bet was big for the game and even though the pot was as well, I am sure he wasn't quite thinking that. I also think that the $200 bet was scarier and more threatening since I had money behind it. He has to call and then hope I don't bet again. The nice thing about live NL is that the pot size isn't just stated there for you, you have to figure it out and what really ends up mattering is the size of the bet, not the size of the pot because a lot of people don't always see that. Samson could have very easily thought that this was a $500 pot and my $200 bet seemed scarier.

My image was good, the board was good, and my opponent is very capable of folding, plus the range of hands I put him on were not too good at this point. I fired the $200.

He folded.

$50+5 6 Handed on Full Tilt

Well, I busted my tournament drought today with a 4th place finish in a short handed $50+5 tournament on Full Tilt Poker. I was pretty happy with how I played except I should have been able to lay down KJ of an AATJQ board. That hand really hurt and then my KQ ran into KK when I couldn't fold it. Still, I put my loose-aggresive style to good use and ran over those tables. I only played big pots when I wanted to and controlled the flow of the game fairly well.

Now I'm off to do some 'real' work.

Short Stack is Better

When I first started out, I firmly believed that when you played NL, you should always buy-in for the max. Well after doing some experimenting over the last few days, I find that buying in "short" (half the max, or 100 BB in a no max game) is better. Here is why:

1) Easier decisions. When you have Ak and $100 left with the pot being the same on the turn with an Ace, it is easier to play it hard. With $300 left, you could be put to a tough decision.

2) People play looser. When you have a short stack, you are going to get called a lot more often and looser because it is "not that much"

3) You lose less in tough games. You can always buy-in for more, but you can't take money off of the table.

4) People will read you as a weak player. They will try and bully you and when you fight back, they will walk away with a bloody nose.

5) Less at risk. You can play in the bigger games with the same number of buy-ins that you would at the smaller games and have a greater chance to double up.

This is not to say that you should never buy-in for the max. If there is an especially bad player and you are in great position to take advantage of him/her, then go for the max. Short stacked is especially good for online play because you are able to get less reads just because of the nature of the game and playing short will just make your decisions that much easier in an environment where you have less information than what would be normally available to you.

WSOP Circuit: Lake Tahoe Edition Part III

Well, after that first event, not much else has panned out. That mainly has to do with the fact that my brother went in for surgery after he got a fairly large piece of wood lodged in his pinky. He just got out yesterday, but it has curbed my ability to play in any more events. I could play in the $500 event today, but I am going to go to the rennaisance faire with my brother instead. I do plan on hitting up a nice session tonight though.

Anyways, here is the weird hand I played on Thursday. I am at the 3/5 NL feeder table. This guy sits down two to my left and has been staddling $10 UTG everytime and then doing a steal raise when there is no action besides limping when it comes to him. A new guy sits down between us with about $300 and posts the BB this hand. It is folded to me in the SB and I call $7 more with 97o. I have about $800 and the UTG straddle guy has me covered. BB calls and UTG does his usual steal raise to $35. So I reraise him to $125. And the BB cold calls! That really threw me off. He has a little bit about $150 left and I decide to put him all-in if I catch a piece. Of course, the UTG quickly folds his shenanigens.

The flop is K93 rainbow, I put the BB all-in and he calls with KJo. Now that blew my mind! Why not just stick it in there preflop or at least do the courtesy of folding like I wanted him to. Of course, the turn is a 7 and the river is a 9 and the whole table just gawks at me when I sheepishly flip over my cards. Now I've got a real crazy table image!

Of all of the hours I've put in on those tables this week, that hand come so out of left field for the play I had been observing. The expression on my face was priceless.

WSOP: Lake Tahoe Edition Part II

Well that was a bust...sort of.

I started off playing well, picking up small pots and building my stack. I wasn't getting any real hands, so I didn't get into any real confrontations until the 50/100 level. With a stack of 1875, I open raise to 250 from UTG with JJ. A loose player on my left calls and a short stack on the button with 750 chips goes all in. I reraise all in to isolate, caller folds and the other guy flips up AK. And I lose my race. This was my spot and if I had won this, I was sitting in decent chip position. At the end of the level, I push all in with AJ having 975 and get a slightly shorter stack to go allin with TT and the guy wih AK from before calls me with, you guessed it, AK. K on the flop, A on the Turn and Ten on the river to put me in 3rd place for the pot. I finished around 220 out of 363.

I proceeded to play the 3/5 NL game for the next 10 hours, buying in for $900. I ended up losing that with my QQ vs. AA when I flopped a straight draw and stuck it in. So I rebuy for $500. And in comes Mickey.

Mickey is raising almost every hand from $65 to $100 preflop. He busts once and then starts to catch and destroy some people. I play an AK soft against him for $100 and his JT catches up and then I pushed with AQ and pick up the pot. I should have done that with the AK.

Here comes this hand which was really weirdly played. A couple limpers and Mickey does this weird raise to $20. I call in the cutoff with JJ after thinking if I wanted to reraise or not. It was such a weirdly played hand with the small raises and there were a fair amount of people in the hand, so I decided to play this cautiously. Then the button reraises to $40. And here is where I make a big mistake. Everyone calls and it's to me. The fact that nobody reraised meant there were no Aces/Kings/Queens around and the button was just making a pot building raise. I agonized for a bit and instead of sticking it in (which i should have done) I just call.

Flop is 96x 2 clubs. Mickey makes a smallish bet at the flop ($30) and I reraise to $150, wanting to know where I stand. This tight player cold calls and the Mickey calls. The turn is a non club 8. It's checked to me. I have around $400 left and I figure that any proper bet will commit me and that I need to make a proper bet to protect against the clubs. So I stick it in. To my relief. Tight older guy folds (I thought he had a weak hand because he just cold called me on the flop and was getting fed up with Mickey's antics) and Mickey calls after a while with 104 of clubs. T on the river and I am up a little bit for the session. An hour later my brain stops working and I decide to call it quits because I need to drive home.

$25 session profit. Yay.

Yesterday was way more profitable for me, but the hand on the day there will have to wait until next time.

WSOP Circuit: Lake Tahoe Edition

Tomorrow I am going to play my 1st WSOP Circuit Event at Harvey's in Lake Tahoe. It is the smallest event ($300), but depending on how I do at the tournament and on the tables, I hope to play further events. I've been practicing the structure using Poker Academy and I feel really psyched.

I was in Vegas last Friday night and ended up seeing David Spade. That guy is not very funny. At least, he has no funny orginal material. The warm up act was much, much funnier. After that I checked out the Ceasar's room for the 1st time and man is it nice. I played in a 2/5 NL game with no cap and had a good time. Game was not very hard though I got off the a bad start! Not that I was losing, but I wasn't showing down any hands! I was getting monsters, flopping bottom set on an AQ board and not getting ANY action in a 5 way pot, flopping the nut straight and this weak tight player folding the Ace after I give him a moderate raise.

While this is all fine and dandy, it's not how I like to start out. I like to develop a tight image and then loosen up later on. On the plus side it meant that I was going to get paid off on my great hands eventually, but that hinged on the fact that I did get great hands!

I had sat down with $700 (which covered the table when I got there) and when I ran it up to $900 by chopping at pots. and middle aged Asian man sat down on my immeadiate right with $1000. It was all that I could do to not smile. In my experience, asians with a lot of money equals overaggresiveness and I could trap this guy for a big pot. Of course, I ended up being both right and wrong.

He started out aggresive, but slowed down a lot after one pot. I wasn't quite sure about him when this pot came up. UTG with about $130 made a raise to $15. The asian gentleman called and so did I with pocket 10s. I thought about reraising, but I wanted to keep the pot small and smack the Asian guy around if I hit big.

The flop is the beautiful T53 with the 53 being diamonds. UTG bets $30, Asian guy calls, and I pop it up to $130. I figure the short stack will call all-in since he's being seeing my aggresive play and I could have anything. I put the Asian guy at beat on a flush draw, though I figured that he would have raised with it. UTG calls all in after thinking for a few seconds and the Asian guys reraises $300 more. Now I am almost sure he has the flush draw, but I don't like it because he's going to go all the way with me now. I push all in for $440ish more and he hesitates. He has the classic "ouch I stubbed my toe" look on his face. He eventually calls.

Turn and river are offsuits 8 and Q. I flip over my set and rake in a very nice pot. The asian guy later confides that he had 55 for middle set. By the end of my session, I realize that contrary to my 1st impression, he is playing a but more passive than I thought he would initially. I think that there is a 20-25% he had the flush on that hand.

After that pot I count the money on the table and realize I just have under half of it. I almost leave, but I am in such control that I decide to see how the table develops. Some big pots go down and some fresh blood comes in and and the money on the table doubles. After 40 minutes after the monster I rakes in, I decide to leave because I am getting tired and table conditions were less than optimal if I am going to be an active player with a big stack. Plus I play super loose when I am tired and have a bigstack, which always equals money lost.

WIsh me luck tomorrow and I'll try to give a blow by blow account of it.