davidross
03-07-2004, 04:08 AM
Well another happy week in the davidross household. I really wanted to report that I was on my way to Vegas for the WSOP, and I came close, but alas that dream is still just a dream. Empire/Party have continued to have technical problems all week. The tournaments seemed to be most affected by it, with several days and nights where they didn’t run any tourneys. I understand they are under some ‘Denial of Service’ attacks, and I sure hope they get it sorted out. Doesn’t seem to be affecting the number of players though. Over 40,000 some nights this week. I played a couple of qualifying tournaments early in the week and for a couple of reasons decided to stop and just pay the $215 and enter the Saturday semi-final. First of all, there were a couple of nights where the qualifiers didn’t run, and 2nd of all, playing in the multi table qualifiers is costing me a lot of playing time. Between the income I’m not earning, and the ancillary benefits (E-points and affiliate income) I don’t get because my hands played go down, I decided it’s not worth it to keep playing a lot of these qualifiers. On the other hand, I’m getting better at them so I will still play a couple each week.
First the ring games. I had another great week. I’m getting very comfortable with my new pre-flop raising standards. I am finding it much easier to play post-flop as well simply by raising more on the flop. I have to assume I’m getting better than average cards right now as well, so it’s difficult to say how much my improved results have to do with my play, but I’m not complaining. I started out Sunday with a nice $318 win. Monday was another $668 in the win column, and Tuesday was a big day winning $1,302, most of it after my curling game and a couple of beers. Wednesday was almost as good, up another $1,180, and at that point I had 8 wins in the last 9 days. Thursday started out pretty well, but around 1:00 AM I started my first big losing streak in a while. After being up over $700, I lost almost all of it and finished the day up $65. Then Friday I didn’t play in the afternoon, but struggled all night and lost another $427. I played only a few hands Saturday and lost another $70 putting me in a 120 BB losing skid right now. I need to tell you about my Saturday Tournament though to get my final number for the week.
As I mentioned I decided to just pay the 200 + 15 for the WSOP qualifier and there were 74 entrants. For some reason the prize pool was set out like a normal tournament with 1st place getting over $4K and paying 10 places. There was no mention of a WSOP seat even though they advertised 1 seat for each 60 entrants. As of right now I still don’t know if the winner got his seat plus the $4K, but because I made the final table I do know that they paid as per the prize pool they listed. As happy as I am to get paid, I am confused why the payout was like that, and until I figure out what happened I won’t play any more qualifiers. Bottom line was I finished 4th and got paid $1,480. That put my final total for the week at $4,262, my 2nd biggest week ever. I have averaged over $2,500 / wk for the last 8 weeks, making even more certain that the fresh blood has made the Party/Empire games softer.
In a complete turnaround, I did very well in the multi-table tournies this week, and very poorly in the single tables. I made the final table in all 3 of my multi’s, and only cashed once in 6 single’s, a second. The first final table I made I came to the final table with only 1 big blind worth of chips and was gone right away. In the 2nd I had a healthy stack, and was about 4th, with 2 players to qualify. I proceeded to get TT, JJ, TT and QQ in the next 2 orbits, and lost them all, and I was out. But on Saturday, I had my best finish ever. I got no big pairs at all in the whole tournament, which makes my results even more remarkable. I played 280 hands without getting a pair over 10’s. I did get TT 3 times, and won with them each time. I got to the first break with almost exactly my starting chips. No big hands, but a couple of small pots kept me even. I never made it to 2,000 chips, but I never got below 800 either and as we approached the 2nd break I was still hanging in and we were at 2 full tables. I folded my blinds just before the break leaving me with $729 and the blinds at 100/200, limits of 200/400. My first 6 hands all had a 2 in them and I folded all of them. With the blinds approaching I played a rather remarkable hand. I raised an UTG limper with KTo. It looked like AA to me after all the hands I had seen. He had a lot of chips, but was very quick to fold on the flop and I was really hoping to play just him. Unfortunately I got a cold caller as well, but both blinds folded. Flop came 9 8 3 rainbow. UTG checked and I bet 200. Cold caller called again, but UTG folded. Turn was another 8. I bet my last 129, and the cold caller folded!!! I can’t begin to fathom what he had, that he would fold this 2K plus pot for another 129 dollars, but I thank him. Suddenly I had enough chips to go around a couple more times. And I took advantage of it. The chip leader at the time was really playing the bully, and very successfully. He was raising any Ace, and betting any flop. I played back at him a couple of times with good hands though and he folded. Very quickly I had over 5000 chips and was comfortably in a final table position. There were 11 left when this hand came up. Our table was 5 handed and I open raised 99. Folded to the bully in the BB who 3 bet me. He did this all the time. Limits are now 400/800, and he has triple my chips at 15K. Flop is Jd 6d 2d. I have no diamond and he bets. I call. Turn is Kd. He bets and I fold, leaving me 3400, and still in a position to make the final table. It wasn’t an easy fold because he would play any hand this way. But I think it was smart. The final table started with me short on chips, but I went on a roll finally. I won a couple of pots from the bully, we lost a few players and suddenly we are 5 handed. Bully has 23,400, and I’m second with 17,700. The pivotal hand of my tournament went like this. Bully limps from the button. He has done this a lot since I 3 bet his button raise 3 times earlier. I get a free play with K2o. Flop comes K 4 2 rainbow. I check, he bets and I just call. He will bet the turn no matter what so I decided to check raise him there. Turn is a 3 putting a second club on the board. I check, he bets and I raise him. He 3 bets me. He has folded to all me raises so far, so I’m not sure what this means. I don’t know if he’d make this play with AA or AK, but I think he would. Limits are 600/1200 so the pot is big. I just call his 3 bet. River brings another K. I check, he bets and I raise. K4 and K3 are all I have to worry about now. He 3 bets, I cap and of course he has K3. I watch 20,000 chips slide his way, and I’m down to 7000. I felt like I’d been kicked in the balls. One more guy went out and I climbed back over 10K when we were down to 4 players, but two AK hands that missed put me out. It was pretty exciting though, and I can’t wait to try again. My patience was much better tonight. I guess I could have saved a few chips on that K2 hand, but that was pretty unfortunate.
Some random musings from this week. It’s pretty clear to me that we all have different reasons for playing poker. Obviously we all enjoy card games and the thrill of competition, but I think if you asked everyone what their number 1 goal, or reason for playing was we’d get a bunch of different answers. Personally I am trying to make as much money as I can, but that wasn’t always the case. The first year I was playing I was trying to improve my game as much, and as quickly as I could. Towards those goals I played in games that were above my level of proficiency, and quite often I lost. I did however improve, so I guess you could say I still achieved my goals. It is my belief that a huge number of poker players are playing a limit beyond their abilities, but that doesn’t mean they aren’t achieving their goals. Some wall street fund manager making 7 figures, isn’t going to enjoy himself playing 2/4 poker, yet that might be the proper limit for him. So he drops a few hundred, or even thousands playing 10/20 and doesn’t bat an eye. His goal is just to compete. And I see a lot of people playing who just want someone to recognize how great or smart they are. These are the table coaches. Their goal can’t be to earn as much as they could, or else they wouldn’t tell others how bad they are playing. These are the guys who have to show you the AA you just cracked so you know they had the better hand pre-flop. As much as I want to take them to task for being idiots at the table, I have to recognize that they would rather play that way than play optimally. More power to them.
There are so many tells I am starting to recognize that are used by average players. The real trick is determining who the better than average players are and not falling into the trap of thinking they are playing like joe average. When the flop comes out like JJ6, and the average guy bets from the blinds, he doesn’t have a J. The average guy slowplays his J and try’s to get more. The better players bet out with their trips and tend to make more on the hand overall. I almost made the best laydown of my life yesterday, but I still didn’t believe what is an obvious online tell. I had AQ and was in a 4 way pot. On the river, the board was KKKQJ. I had led the betting every street, and when the 3rd King rivered I bet again. My opponent used up half of his clock before raising. The long dramatic pause is such a giveaway I knew he had the quads. But I couldn’t bring myself to fold my hand and I paid him off. He did have the K.
Just for an update, I have 70,000 hands in my Poker Tracker database now, all from 5/10 shorthanded games. I’ve raised my BB/100 hands to exactly 2. Considering it was at 1.02 just 3 weeks ago, I’m thrilled with that number. Until this last week my rake paid was almost exactly the same as my earnings. I have now pushed my earnings almost 2K ahead of my rake paid, but I’m still paying a phenomenal amount of rake every month. Some interesting observations are that UTG I’m losing money with 88 and 77 (I don’t play the smaller pairs UTG). I don’t know if I should start mucking them too or not. I’m also losing money with AQs, but not with AQo, so I think that’s just a statistical anomaly.
Poker Tracker has also identified 5 or 6 regular opponents that I have played over 10 sessions with, that are significant winners. Until recently I had all of them pegged as recklessly aggressive. Clearly weak tight is not the way to play shorthanded poker.
Life is sure sweet when you’re running well. I’m on an amazing roll, and the affiliate money is in. Please remind me of this when the next losing streak hits and I’m whining because I’m losing. Have a good week everyone.
First the ring games. I had another great week. I’m getting very comfortable with my new pre-flop raising standards. I am finding it much easier to play post-flop as well simply by raising more on the flop. I have to assume I’m getting better than average cards right now as well, so it’s difficult to say how much my improved results have to do with my play, but I’m not complaining. I started out Sunday with a nice $318 win. Monday was another $668 in the win column, and Tuesday was a big day winning $1,302, most of it after my curling game and a couple of beers. Wednesday was almost as good, up another $1,180, and at that point I had 8 wins in the last 9 days. Thursday started out pretty well, but around 1:00 AM I started my first big losing streak in a while. After being up over $700, I lost almost all of it and finished the day up $65. Then Friday I didn’t play in the afternoon, but struggled all night and lost another $427. I played only a few hands Saturday and lost another $70 putting me in a 120 BB losing skid right now. I need to tell you about my Saturday Tournament though to get my final number for the week.
As I mentioned I decided to just pay the 200 + 15 for the WSOP qualifier and there were 74 entrants. For some reason the prize pool was set out like a normal tournament with 1st place getting over $4K and paying 10 places. There was no mention of a WSOP seat even though they advertised 1 seat for each 60 entrants. As of right now I still don’t know if the winner got his seat plus the $4K, but because I made the final table I do know that they paid as per the prize pool they listed. As happy as I am to get paid, I am confused why the payout was like that, and until I figure out what happened I won’t play any more qualifiers. Bottom line was I finished 4th and got paid $1,480. That put my final total for the week at $4,262, my 2nd biggest week ever. I have averaged over $2,500 / wk for the last 8 weeks, making even more certain that the fresh blood has made the Party/Empire games softer.
In a complete turnaround, I did very well in the multi-table tournies this week, and very poorly in the single tables. I made the final table in all 3 of my multi’s, and only cashed once in 6 single’s, a second. The first final table I made I came to the final table with only 1 big blind worth of chips and was gone right away. In the 2nd I had a healthy stack, and was about 4th, with 2 players to qualify. I proceeded to get TT, JJ, TT and QQ in the next 2 orbits, and lost them all, and I was out. But on Saturday, I had my best finish ever. I got no big pairs at all in the whole tournament, which makes my results even more remarkable. I played 280 hands without getting a pair over 10’s. I did get TT 3 times, and won with them each time. I got to the first break with almost exactly my starting chips. No big hands, but a couple of small pots kept me even. I never made it to 2,000 chips, but I never got below 800 either and as we approached the 2nd break I was still hanging in and we were at 2 full tables. I folded my blinds just before the break leaving me with $729 and the blinds at 100/200, limits of 200/400. My first 6 hands all had a 2 in them and I folded all of them. With the blinds approaching I played a rather remarkable hand. I raised an UTG limper with KTo. It looked like AA to me after all the hands I had seen. He had a lot of chips, but was very quick to fold on the flop and I was really hoping to play just him. Unfortunately I got a cold caller as well, but both blinds folded. Flop came 9 8 3 rainbow. UTG checked and I bet 200. Cold caller called again, but UTG folded. Turn was another 8. I bet my last 129, and the cold caller folded!!! I can’t begin to fathom what he had, that he would fold this 2K plus pot for another 129 dollars, but I thank him. Suddenly I had enough chips to go around a couple more times. And I took advantage of it. The chip leader at the time was really playing the bully, and very successfully. He was raising any Ace, and betting any flop. I played back at him a couple of times with good hands though and he folded. Very quickly I had over 5000 chips and was comfortably in a final table position. There were 11 left when this hand came up. Our table was 5 handed and I open raised 99. Folded to the bully in the BB who 3 bet me. He did this all the time. Limits are now 400/800, and he has triple my chips at 15K. Flop is Jd 6d 2d. I have no diamond and he bets. I call. Turn is Kd. He bets and I fold, leaving me 3400, and still in a position to make the final table. It wasn’t an easy fold because he would play any hand this way. But I think it was smart. The final table started with me short on chips, but I went on a roll finally. I won a couple of pots from the bully, we lost a few players and suddenly we are 5 handed. Bully has 23,400, and I’m second with 17,700. The pivotal hand of my tournament went like this. Bully limps from the button. He has done this a lot since I 3 bet his button raise 3 times earlier. I get a free play with K2o. Flop comes K 4 2 rainbow. I check, he bets and I just call. He will bet the turn no matter what so I decided to check raise him there. Turn is a 3 putting a second club on the board. I check, he bets and I raise him. He 3 bets me. He has folded to all me raises so far, so I’m not sure what this means. I don’t know if he’d make this play with AA or AK, but I think he would. Limits are 600/1200 so the pot is big. I just call his 3 bet. River brings another K. I check, he bets and I raise. K4 and K3 are all I have to worry about now. He 3 bets, I cap and of course he has K3. I watch 20,000 chips slide his way, and I’m down to 7000. I felt like I’d been kicked in the balls. One more guy went out and I climbed back over 10K when we were down to 4 players, but two AK hands that missed put me out. It was pretty exciting though, and I can’t wait to try again. My patience was much better tonight. I guess I could have saved a few chips on that K2 hand, but that was pretty unfortunate.
Some random musings from this week. It’s pretty clear to me that we all have different reasons for playing poker. Obviously we all enjoy card games and the thrill of competition, but I think if you asked everyone what their number 1 goal, or reason for playing was we’d get a bunch of different answers. Personally I am trying to make as much money as I can, but that wasn’t always the case. The first year I was playing I was trying to improve my game as much, and as quickly as I could. Towards those goals I played in games that were above my level of proficiency, and quite often I lost. I did however improve, so I guess you could say I still achieved my goals. It is my belief that a huge number of poker players are playing a limit beyond their abilities, but that doesn’t mean they aren’t achieving their goals. Some wall street fund manager making 7 figures, isn’t going to enjoy himself playing 2/4 poker, yet that might be the proper limit for him. So he drops a few hundred, or even thousands playing 10/20 and doesn’t bat an eye. His goal is just to compete. And I see a lot of people playing who just want someone to recognize how great or smart they are. These are the table coaches. Their goal can’t be to earn as much as they could, or else they wouldn’t tell others how bad they are playing. These are the guys who have to show you the AA you just cracked so you know they had the better hand pre-flop. As much as I want to take them to task for being idiots at the table, I have to recognize that they would rather play that way than play optimally. More power to them.
There are so many tells I am starting to recognize that are used by average players. The real trick is determining who the better than average players are and not falling into the trap of thinking they are playing like joe average. When the flop comes out like JJ6, and the average guy bets from the blinds, he doesn’t have a J. The average guy slowplays his J and try’s to get more. The better players bet out with their trips and tend to make more on the hand overall. I almost made the best laydown of my life yesterday, but I still didn’t believe what is an obvious online tell. I had AQ and was in a 4 way pot. On the river, the board was KKKQJ. I had led the betting every street, and when the 3rd King rivered I bet again. My opponent used up half of his clock before raising. The long dramatic pause is such a giveaway I knew he had the quads. But I couldn’t bring myself to fold my hand and I paid him off. He did have the K.
Just for an update, I have 70,000 hands in my Poker Tracker database now, all from 5/10 shorthanded games. I’ve raised my BB/100 hands to exactly 2. Considering it was at 1.02 just 3 weeks ago, I’m thrilled with that number. Until this last week my rake paid was almost exactly the same as my earnings. I have now pushed my earnings almost 2K ahead of my rake paid, but I’m still paying a phenomenal amount of rake every month. Some interesting observations are that UTG I’m losing money with 88 and 77 (I don’t play the smaller pairs UTG). I don’t know if I should start mucking them too or not. I’m also losing money with AQs, but not with AQo, so I think that’s just a statistical anomaly.
Poker Tracker has also identified 5 or 6 regular opponents that I have played over 10 sessions with, that are significant winners. Until recently I had all of them pegged as recklessly aggressive. Clearly weak tight is not the way to play shorthanded poker.
Life is sure sweet when you’re running well. I’m on an amazing roll, and the affiliate money is in. Please remind me of this when the next losing streak hits and I’m whining because I’m losing. Have a good week everyone.