Boom- Sunday Wrap Jan 9 2011

The day started out pretty slow. Since the first of the year I had no final tables and had been putting in twice the volume than normal. I was really actually torn about whether to play anymore once the 4:22pm double-deuce was over. I had played and busted from all of my first 11 or so tournaments and felt pretty dejected about the whole thing. Sundays have normally been good days for me and just from my experiences on that day (I was playing well but just running below expected), I felt like it might be a good idea to take the rest of the day off and join the family for dinner. However, since Sundays are the juiciest for most varieties of poker, I thought it would be best to stick it out and register in the evening stuff as well.

I played everything from 6pm to midnight as well as a bunch of smaller buy-in, non-guaranteed tournaments.(For those who don't know - most tournaments have a guaranteed prize-pool that encourages a larger amount of people to sign up for it so they can play for its larger top prizes). As midnight came around, I still found myself in 4 tournaments and pretty deep in two of them (7pm superstack and $3rebuy). I was doing well in chips and as usual in the lower stakes,  I am by far the best player left. The first place prizes were pretty decent and anything that I see that is over $2500 is definitely worth playing for. With the Sunday-sized fields, I was pretty pleased with the first place prizes for $11 and less buy-ins. 

For the most part, online MTTs show quite a high variance (Even with my low $2000 bankroll I go on swings as much as down $1000 before I win again and as seen the first week into the year being down $450+) and the luck factor is largely the same for most with the exception of the superstacked tournaments. Full Tilt runs 3 superstack tournaments: 930am, 1pm and 7pm. These tournaments provide so much play that if I am able to get deep in one of them wiht 40+bbs, I am a big favourite to take it down.

Side note, for the deep stack tournaments many adjustments have to be made to playing styles if you play similarly to myself early. My style is to play tight early and wait for the blinds to go up and antes start. Once that happens, I play a lot more aggressively in position and am able to mix it up a lot more. Since for the first hour you are 100bbs deep, I only play AKo and any pair from pos and KQ, A10 or better and any pair from late position. What this allows you to do is get a feel for the table while also avoiding unnecessary deepstack play out of position with weaker hands.

So as I am getting into the money in these two tournaments, all the others are finished, its about 2am and I am near the chip lead in both. At this point I am feeling pretty confident. I have pretty good ideas on how everyone at my table is playing. I am in 4/27 in the Superstack and 1/19 in the $3 rebuy. As the tables break and get shorthanded again, I begin to run over everyone. I don't use a heads-up display or poker tracker so I am not sure how many hands I won in the span from 3 tables to the finish, but I am pretty sure it is about 40%. It got to the point where people were talking to me, saying:  "You can't have it everytime" and trying to encourage others to step in and take me on. With my big chips and my ability to see who wants to make the final table more than take a chance, I am able to accumulate chips and fold trouble hands with the idea that I can outplay people so much that I don't need to take a chance by getting into races. I am folding AQ, JJ and smaller pairs. i even check call twice and get a check back on the river with QQ to an allin player with a side pot versus 99 when the 99 had me slightly covered because I know the value of making the final table and outplaying these weaker players. Now don't get me wrong, I did have to call some allins and for the most part I ran well in those spots. I did win a pretty big pot that catapulted me to the final table of the superstack. 

Int he hand I was utg+2 with 26 players left. I had the chip lead with 1.2 million and a player utg raised 4x (I was pretty sure from his 4x raise that he had a big hand - he had around 600k). He had raised to around 40k and I have KK and because of his raise size, just call. A player with about 14bbs behind goes allin and he isolates for his whole 600k after very little thought. Now, I am not saying that I won't ever fold KK preflop (I have done it twice in mtts but both much earlier in the tournament), but considering the stacks sizes and the fact that I have totally undervalued my hand here, I have to call because he could be doing it with so many other hands (AK, QQ,JJ, 1010, AQ maybe). I call and he shows AA. The other player had 1010. The board comes out 910J two diamonds (I have the Kd - he has no d). The turn is gin Qd and he is drawing only to a K. The river is the Ad and I take down a huge pot. Now I would not have been out if I had lost but I had a final table stack with 26 players left, so I was in a good spot.

Even though it was for low stakes, it was kind of cool to see the two final tables right next to each other and at this point I was already counting the money. We were 3 handed on the $3 rebuy and down to 9 in the superstack.

After starting the rebuy final table slow I was still able to raise and steal so many blinds that I was able to absorb the 3 big races I lost at before any players were eliminated. i did win two allins with a smaller ace all-in preflop to bring me to chip leader with 4 players to go. After one of the players began to come back in the tournament and was right on my heels, something weird happened. His internet cut out and he was sitting on away mode with 3million in chips! Immediately to my right and the two other players shortstacked, I would get he benefit of stealing his BB and getting walks from him when I was in the BB. I thought I would leverage the other players to get blinded out until they made a stand and eventually get headsup with a dead stack.

Now this, I think is a question of ethics. Should I ever feel bad for this fella having his internet disconnect and as such, play slower? I don't think I can afford to. With the other players at the table in such a difficult position, I think I have to say too bad to him and really put the pressure on the others. Surprisingly they fought back quite a bit and I ended up doubling them each up on a race in which i lost both. The away player came back and seemed pretty tilted. Though he had a normal stack, he quickly donated his 1.8million that was left to me and I was 3 handed with 6 of the 10million in play. I did my normal raising and the third player went out shortly after when I sucked out for a 2.5million chip pot with a8 vs AJ. Headsup was going to be quick. I had him 6million to 2million and I hoped to win it all when we got allin on a J57 board. He had QJ and I had 68. I bricked and he talked deal. The break down was 1st - $2992 2nd- $1843. So with even stacks we decided to play for $100 and split it around $2400 each. I was okay with this. I had yet to win the other tournament and with the blinds pretty big (35bbs each) I thought it was okay to secure some extra funds. I tookdown the heads-up in short order and banked almost $2500 for that win* (partial chop).

The superstack took much longer but I found even less resistance. I went into beast mode and was taking down every blind til we were 3handed. With a first place prize of $5476, I was pumped to take it down. 3 handed I about 6milion in chips and second place 5million, 3rd 1.5million. I was playing very aggressively and knew that the third place player wanted to move up in payouts as he barely played any hands and did not have much success in his previous cashes. It came to a hand 3 handed that set up the rest of the tournament.

In the SB I picked up Kd5s and after the button (1.5m) folded, I limped for 25000 to complete the 25k-50k 10k ante blinds. The BB (5m) raised to 150k. I thought about it and called as he had raised a decent amount of time and I was able to outplay him on flops. The flop came down Ad5h4d. i check and he bet  225k. This is a pretty auto-cbet so I call with my mid pair and backdoor flush draw.  The turn is the 7d, putting 3 diamonds on the board and giving me a pair and the nut flush draw. I lead for 425k into a  880k pot. He thinks and calls. The is the 2d giving me the nuts (other than 34d for straight flush- I put this out of his range needless to say). With the pot at 1.7million. I bet 1.020m and expect to get calls from any diamond 9 or 10high and raised by only a bluff and maybe the Qd. He thinks and then shoves for his remaining 4.2m. I think for a second or two but can't fold ofcourse. I call and he shows QsQd for the second nut flush. I take a massive 11.5m to 1.5m chip lead into headsup. 

The first hand of heads-up I limp with 59o and he checks. The flop comes down 257all spades and he open shoves for 1.4m. I think about it and with 9s I call. He shows J7o and no spade. I get superlucky and turn another 5 to win the tournament. A great feeling to get this done on the same night.

A total profit of $7625.83 on the day and my first $5k+ cash of the year. Things are looking up! With my total profit above $7k in the first 10 days, I am happy to see how the rest of the year goes!

I did end up joining Tournamentpokeredge.com and was able to listen to a couple of their MTT podcast discussions while I played. I was able to pick up some good ideas and I think for the most part my weakness is playing too tight in the midstages with a medium stack. I will still be looking to pump out over 2500 MTTS this year and I think I'll be able to keep that pace going. Overall, Great start to the year!

First Close call of the year

Just finished a deep run in the 10am 16.5k and ended up busting out in 15th for $138. I was playing well and had about 110k with blinds (1200-2400 300ante) and about 27 people left. I raised Utg to 6340 with AA and the sb shoved for 40k with KJd and flopped two pair. After a missed bluff hand I was into survival mode and held on til 15 players left and I had AK in 2nd pos. I shove with blinds 2k-4k for 34k and the button iso'd with JJ. I turned an Ace and the river was the J. A good run and I really played well. The field is so weak and after searching everyone at my table once inside the money I was only able to find one winning player. After 50 tournaments this year I have not quite made my share of deep runs but I have also not run quite up to expectation. In this, the first week of the year, I have played twice as many tournaments as I was last year per week and I think the benefits will begin to show as the downswings will come and go much faster. Probably going to play the full slate sunday and might get a chance to play tonight or tomorrow night versus the really weak players.

Take Care

Most Brutal Hand from 2010

The hand I chose to include here, I found while searching the net. In this hand the German kid becomes the scum of the earth with his play. I can't believe everyone at the table handled this so well - I might have punched this kid in the mouth but at very least I would have provided a few choice words for him.
UNBELIEVABLE!

TournamentPokerEdge.com??

The last two days I have put in 9 hours each day and played about 25 total of my best tourneys. I have been finding some good success getting into the final 20% of the fields based largely around just playing standard and accumulating chips playing ABC and making good hand selection based on positions. I have been noticing the raise-sizing more often from players and have been really diligent in making notes on them.

I have found that not watching TV while I'm playing is helping me stay in the games BUT I do also find that I can get a little bored if I am only playing 3-5 tables. I have considered playing more tournaments, however, since the last couple weeks has been pretty slow, I have decided to play just the tournaments that I have been the most successful at. Though, as I write this, I decided to jump in a OHiLo $26 FO (I did win it a one of the most recent times I have played). I have cut out playing the small rebuys as I find them to be too much of mine-fields in the mid stages and I don't feel like sweating all those all-ins early on; the main problem with the quality of play is that the really poor players are not eliminated as they can always rebuy.

The newest and most exciting thing is my plan to join Tournament Poker Edge - a training website that is sponsored on Poker Road Radio. It is pretty cheap to join and I would be able to join for $70 for 3 months. As I wait to confirm that I will be provided the option to leave the site after the three months, I will be joining this week.

I had thought that I would post a hand history each day to keep myself introspective but that seems to be quite the task following a full day of playing. I have two hands that I will post below probably mostly for myself to see at a later date as I doubt anyone reads this very often.

In this hand the action preflop was a C/O raise 2.3x I flat from sb and bb calls also. The Flop checked around and the turn I lead 2/3 pot at what looked like a safe flop. The bb called and the c/o min raised. I shove and the bb isoshoves and shows 88. Pretty tough hand to get away from with about 140 people left of 2300 in a $11 superstack. I was sitting at around 30th place in chips and this is what seems is the only way I ever go out of tournaments in this type of position - but not much you can do about that.

In this hand utg had min raised to 1000 and next player made it 3500. I cold called in the bb and utg called also. the flop I checked and the utg lead 1500 - the next played huge overshoved. I had seen this played shove twice in the last ten hands for several times the pot without showdown and I thought considering the board and the weak lead that KK or AA would likely raise smaller and since I had undervalued my hand I thought it was very possible that he could have an overpair 99-JJ and maybe even AK. I called and the utg folded. All-in player showed AA and knocked me out deep in a tournament. Again, not sure if I could have played it much different.

That is it for now, will be back later this week - hope to get a good weekend in of play and focus on my main tournaments where I find success. 

Take Care
 

First Sunday of the year

January 2nd was the first big poker day of the year. The fields were big and the players were weak as usual but it was hard to get much going. While running well below expected I finished 3/21 in the money and in the cases where I did cash, I didn't come in with a big enough stack to do much.

I played about 6 shootouts to the 750k and got to the final two in 5 of them in the first round but lost in the "big blinds and jam" heads-up sections. I think I might have been out played in 1 of them but got in pretty normal preflop allins with the best and worst hands the other times. That part was frustrating.

In the one tournament that I did have a decent stack late, the 12pm $26, I was in a hand with the really good pro "P0KERPR0". I have played with him a bunch of times before and find that his mid-stage game is really strong. If he puts in a preflop raise, a lot of the time he is never going to fold it. To some it may seem like an exploitable tactic, however, considering the stakes and the players he is playing against in these low-buyins, I have found that it works well for him and that the other players really need to pick up a hand. There is one hand I remember from a while back where I button raised 2.5x with KQo late in a tourney and he three bet shoved from the bb for about the fourth or fifth time and I just didn't think he could have something everytime. I called for about 30bbs and he showed AJo. I outflopped him and he was out. Those seemed to be the type of good situational plays that he had made - maybe a lot of it was luck for him, that I had a decent hand and he finally hand a hand for showdown but it felt like he put himself in a lot of spots to make his opponents make mistakes.

In this hand we were down to the final 197/2063 and i was at about 18bbs. The H/J min raised and P0KERPR0 called from the C/O. I have a pretty easy call with KQc in the bb.

The action went as follows and I am left with a decision. I think most of the time PP (P0KERPR0) would 3bet pf with AQ, KK, AA and he might not raise a min lead with QQ on this flop. At this point I am left with him on a bluff, 66, 77, KQ. His raise size is such that it appears that he wants to raise enough to get away from it (or appear as though he can) but I think my hand is probably too strong to fold at this point. Considering the min cbet, my hand is definately under-repped but I think this is one of the spots where it is too strong to fold.
I shove, HJ folds and PP calls and shows KK. In retrospect and considering the stacks behind him, I really should have included AA or KK in his range as raises with most hands in pos and most often when he is just flatting preflop, he will be doingv it with a big hand at this stage.


I made a very small cash there and finished the day -$225.80

Here comes 2011 - Goals for the year

With 2010 being over and not having such a great year by the numbers - profit just under $30,000 and didn't play nearly as much as I would have liked to. I decided to set some goals for myself for the year along with my stats for 2010 next to them.

• $70,000 Profit (US$)
• 2 months over $10,000
• 6 cashes over $5000
• 50 Final tables
• 2500 MTTs
• play two live tourneys $1000+
• get bankroll to a steady $5000

I think I can very realistically attain all of these goals and I am determined to do so. While the game is getting harder, I think the small stakes still provide a much softer chance to make lots of deep runs and avoid luck to do well.  

Sunday Wrap-Up

After the past three weeks, my modest bankroll has been taking a hit. It had gone from $2400 to around $1150 coming into today. I had been playing less than perfect I think and also taking some chances playing non-NLH tourneys - I usually find that to be a leak, though I did take down a OHiLo tourney last month. With all sorts of christmas things going on I did not feel I was focusing enough attention on playing. Tonight I was able to get deep in a couple tourneys and finished with 4 cashes in about 10-12 tourneys. 

I made a deep run in the 1pm Superstack and played really well. As usually with this one, I think I should have gone out much earlier, but the shear weakness of the fields allowed me to stick around. It is hard to explain but the players that I play against in these small fields are so weak that I should be winning more often. The best strategy that they can hope for is that I am not able to get chips and they raise a ton. If i am able to get chips anywhere late in these small buy-ins, it is almost never a question of me winning.

I played great and even though I was in last for chips for most of the FT, and I lost two races being all-in and called only twice (the final hand and kk v 1010 near the start of the FT to double me up to 25bbs).

Here was the bust hand above, pretty standard allin preflop with 17bbs to a button pot raise from a maniac. Nothing I could do. In a way I wished I continued to not get any hands as I was avoiding all kinds of tough spots and moving up throughout the FT. Their betting and timing patterns made their hand strengths pretty apparent and this has both boosted my bankroll and got me excited to play again.

In other news, i decided to go to the WSOP in July and will be saving a portion of my winnings until June (probably 10-20%) to fund the trip. I hope the start of the year is good and I can make some big scores- I would love to play a few small events at the WSOP.

I will be comprising a list of goals for 2011 and I think this was a good way to end the year. I might play the slate a couple more nights. I will be starting the year with my normal $2000 bankroll - one of my goals will be to have a much bigger roll by the end of next year. Nice to get a little cash in the mail soon and get back at it.

Wednesday Action - 0/3

Put in a short day yesterday playing only three small tourneys. Just outside the money of the 9am $26 KO I was in a good spot in chips. With 90 making the money and down to 120, I had about 30bbs and was sitting around 50th. This hand came up:

Preflop:
It folded to the sb and he raised to 2400. This is a pretty standard range with most of the hands he is going to play considering the player and the situation. He knew it was close to the bubble and I might not want to play a flop but I can't narrow his hand by too much. J10s is a good hand and I call most of the time in pos incase I whiff the flop I can get away with still 25bbs.
Flop:
The flop comes as seen and he bets 3250, I contemplate his cbet and decide to call. I believe I could easily have raised 2-2.5x with the intention of stacking towards the larger end of my raise. Still, I think a call here is okay as I would call with most Ks two pair, A9, A8, j10 or q10 (maybe).
Turn:
9h hits the turn and he checks. I think he checks most hands here any king, ahigh hands, A8 and probably a 9 also considering the stacks. For some reason, I check pretty quick thinking I could hit my straight or maybe 10 or J for free. I really think I should have bet here - though, with a 9 and the board as such I check here most of the time to hopefully get value on the river.
River:
6d - BRICK hits the river and he checks pretty quick. There is about 13k in the pot and I have 17k in my stack. I decide to bet repping a 9 here - I would also consider betting a 8 for thin value bet - but that would only be if I know the player better. He thinks for half a second and calls with AQo. I put myself in a really bad situation for the remainder of the bubble and have to shove with 9bbs a couple rounds later with Q9o in the c/o and lose to AK.


I think I played the hand wrong on the flop as I could have raise and I didn't plan ahead that if I was going to bluff a brick on the river, I should have bet the turn as it would be much harder for him to call. The question though on the turn would be how much to bet? Do I bet 8k into the 13k pot leaving me 9k back that pretty much has to go in on the river when he is likely to call both or just shove which looks like too much of an overbet from a 9... 


The other two I played in I got pretty deep but ran into some unfortunate situations. While not an overly thrilling day of cards, I still feel it will help me to discuss at least one hand a day.

16 hours, 3 miniFTOPs, 24 tournaments about even...

Today was one of those long days I usually love to put in. I play sometime from the time I wake up, through the morning tournaments (best start at 9am) and hopefully there is a big overlap between with the morning starts and the afternoon starts (which can begin at 1pm due to late registration). I played the morning stuff with no success, luckily was able to have a nice break from 1130am til 1pm and have lunch and relax. I knew that I had wasted the morning but on a day like this when I am determined to play a lot, I love to get a break and back at it. The afternoon stuff saw very little success - I played in two miniftops and got pretty unlucky in the PL HA event - which I am essentially dead money in anyways. I scored one meaningless cash in the early double B around 60th place. In the 630pm Headsup I did really well in the round of 128 after getting a bye and then got outplayed against a guy who got quite a few hands but played them well.

The MiniFTOPs event was a 4x Shootout $55 with 2544 to start. The first round of the shootout was only 3 people at the table. As I understood there were 729 tables and the winners would move on. only the top 7 of those players would get paid and the next pay just came at 81.

The first round I played a really good player with good stats heads-up and was feeling it against him. I could sense when his button raises (always 2x, as mine were) were in a weak spot and when was right 3bet him (almost always 2.5-3x). He was folding to my 3bets and through about 100 hands of headups and my 3betting his button 2x about 8 times he finally jammed with a7s with about 25bbs. I had 99 and could sense he was going to move - just fortunate. I was able to take him out and had to wait about 1.5 hours for the next round to start.

The second round saw back to a 9-man table. As I knew I would be playing with these players a lot, I used Officialpokerrankings.com to search all of them and found that 7 of the 8 players were solid winning players. All 7 had profits over 16k and 3 of them over 60k. Sadly, I think this was the toughest table of midstakes grinders I had ever played at. I played very slow to start out called a small raise on the button with 33 and flopped a set to the utg raiser, he lead 2/3 pot on a jh8h3s board and I flatted (about 70bbs deep each) hoping to induce a call or raise from bb who had also called pf - bb folded. 10r hits the turn and he check calls my 2/3 pot bet. Having about a pot sized bet left, he check calls almost his whole stack with AJo to double me up. Good start. After playing well and into the money, got headsup with Tragedy83. He was a solid player and he came in with a 21k to 6k chip lead. We battled and I was able to peak at 12k to his 15. We were playing fast and I was doing well. All the button play was min raise or fold with maybe 3 limps on the button. I had dwindled to about 8500 and a double up would put me up 2-1 in chips.

This curious hand that I don't know if I could have played it differently ended it for me.

Full Tilt Poker Game #26410884513: MiniFTOPS Event #19 (190747256), Table 9 - 150/300 - No Limit Hold'em - 23:42:23 ET - 2010/12/14
Seat 1: llebdet (8,522)
Seat 9: Tragedy83 (18,478)
llebdet posts the small blind of 150
Tragedy83 posts the big blind of 300
The button is in seat #1
*** HOLE CARDS ***
Dealt to llebdet [9d Td]
llebdet calls 150
Tragedy83 raises to 900
llebdet calls 600
*** FLOP *** [9c Qh 2c]
Tragedy83 bets 500
llebdet calls 500
*** TURN *** [9c Qh 2c] [9h]
Tragedy83 checks
llebdet bets 2,400
Tragedy83 raises to 4,800
llebdet raises to 7,122, and is all in
Tragedy83 calls 2,322
llebdet shows [9d Td]
Tragedy83 shows [2h 2s]
*** RIVER *** [9c Qh 2c 9h] [6d]
llebdet shows three of a kind, Nines
Tragedy83 shows a full house, Twos full of Nines
Tragedy83 wins the pot (17,044) with a full house, Twos full of Nines
*** SUMMARY ***
Total pot 17,044 | Rake 0
Board: [9c Qh 2c 9h 6d]
Seat 1: llebdet (small blind) showed [9d Td] and lost with three of a kind, Nines
Seat 9: Tragedy83 (big blind) showed [2h 2s] and won (17,044) with a full house, Twos full of Nines

I didn't raise the button because I felt he was going to 3bet if I did and this was too good a hand to have to fold, I knew if I limped, he would only raise 3x so I would get to see a flop. I limped and he made it 900. He does not have to have a hand here as I had folded this spot twice before and I could tell that taking the lead was a big thing to him. On the flop his follow is standard small which he had made and before and shut down on the turn. my call keeps the pot small and could free a lot of bluffs on the turn as I had just been calling with top pairs in the same spot. when the 9 hits the turn and he checks my bet is not to end the hand but to look like a bluff. I thought that he could put me on J10 or XcXc and when he min raises I have to think about it... However I think sometimes he could put me on one of those hands and check raise with KQ,AQ, KK, AA to get the money in with all my non-9 hands as well as maybe get a crying call from my draws. He could definately have played or A9, K9 (the hand he had also fits here) in the same way as since he is out of pos he may as well get it in now because his hand is still vulnerable. I think he could check call and lead the river with QQ as he is not afraid of any draws and should want to get my last 4500.

I also thought there was a chance he could check raise the turn on a bluff and maybe just cower and fold to the remaining min raise but that was very small and likely only if he thought I floated his small lead on the flop which I might have done before as I had call a lot of flops and bet when he checked the turns.

Either way, I think I played it fine and considering the depth of stacks and the lengthy heads-up I was okay with having 7 outs to win. Didn't work out but I played very well. 127th for about $130

The rest of the night went okay but I was not able to get much going besides a small cash in the Daily Double A. Overall I was only down $25 after cashing in $215 TDs.

A day of running below expected and a boat-load of tourneys. Happy that I was able to get this post in, it will hopefully help if I am able to discuss one thing a day.

Posted that last hand to P5's. Interested to see what they think.

http://www.pocketfives.com/f7/2nd-rd-miniftops-tonight-hu-analysis-611863/ 

November was a pretty decent Month

Considering the amount of time I put into playing in November, I would say it was a pretty good month. It was certainly the best month I have had in awhile. With a profit of $7374 playing low stakes multis and playing only 104 tournaments, this was a good result. I won 3 tournaments and finally won the midnight madness again (a tourney that I had crushed in the past but had recently not done so well in.
Here are some pictures of the results I had in November.

I spent the last two weeks getting a lot of family stuff done and have missed a great portion of the miniFTOPS. I am starting it back up again and hoping to make a strong finish to the year in preparation for a good run in 2011. I am in the middle of setting up my goals for the year but am running into some problems in projections. I am concerned that I will not be able to get enough volume in. Should I be offered a job, I would almost certainly take it as the longer I remain out of the job force the worse it looks on me. I will be finalizing my goals for 2011. This year was pretty slow and I played my lowest volume in the past 3 years but still managed to profit $29000 before subtractions for the short backing deal I did and $23500 after I gave up a cut.

Before the end of the year I will also go over the positives and negatives I had this year in poker. But the year is not done and I am still confident I can knock out a couple good scores before it is.