Hammer Day News and A Deeeeep Run in HORSE

Well it was Hammer Day after all and it was the hammer being sucked out on that virtually crippled me.

I had a tough table to start with and it only got tougher as more bloggers replaced the non-bloggers. At one point I think every player at the table was a blogger. I dropped the hammer at one point when a player raised from early position and I came over the top. All folded and I showed the suited hammer. Shortly after that I doubled with KK in a similar situation where I came over the top of an early raise with a slightly bigger then min-raise. The flop was 445 and being first to act I thought an over bet for value would work and it did. He called my push with 33 and I’m sitting good. I got no cards for the next 30 minutes until the return of the hammer. I re-raised a short stack because I could and I called his push. His aces sucked out. A short time later I pushed an early raiser with my 66 and he called with JJ and I was done. It was fun to drop the hammer and not take the event so serious. I know I could have made a deeper run considering I was in the top 30 when I dropped the second hammer but who cares.

All this time I was playing in a HORSE MTT and making a good run. I eventually got here.














I didn't have a big stack but I was sitting with some chip equity. After 20 minutes of play we still had the same amount of players. My chip stack hasn't really changed.














We finally lost one and I chipped up a little.














Eventually I had to make a move and I got all my money in with 2 pair. He had a draw that didn't hit doubling me to a new level.














With new chips in my hands we moved along until we got here.














We had a great time fighting for position but eventually takeitdown81 and baronebrood slipped on the ice and I got heads up with 8888KUSH.















The hand above was won by me and gave me a 4 to 1 chip lead. But then stud came along and I ran into his KK behind 2 hands in a row while I held JJ and 1010 behind. It was a short time later that I eventually got finished off with some forgetable hand.














It was a nice run. Man I wanted 1st.

Hammerday Live Post

I'm gonna try to live blog todays event and play a horse MTT at the same time so stick with me.

8:00 An we're off. I have dugglebogey, love-elf and miamidon as bloggers at my table. SMTL to start.

8:07 waiting for the first hammer drop.

8:13 take a pot when I raise with AJ. Notice I said raise with AJ.

8:16 Kat got knocked out early.

8:23 buddydank is at the table.

8:27 double with KK vs 22. I reraised and pushed when the flop came low and got called. Overbet for value. Weak_player is at the table.

The table is almost filled with bloggers at this point.

8:35 sitting in 6th place in horse with 48 left.

8:37 dropped hammer Jeciimd is at the table.

8:40 4th in horse. Dugglebogey is gone with his 66 vs buddy's 77.

8:44 new table with vinnay and smokkee

8:49 2nd in horse

8:55 hammer got sucked out on by AA


I'm out. I pushed a raiser with 66. He held JJ.

The Hammerday Poker Event and Self Appraisals

Play in this tonight if you have a chance. It will be a good time but I can't play.

What a day. We had a nice snow storm dump around 5 inches of fluffy fun everywhere so the commute home was a blast. There is nothing like driving home with a bunch of idiots on the road trying to put you in the ditch. Anyway, the boss came by around 2:00 and gave us all permission to go home for some reason. I stayed late and was the second to last to leave.

I bought a snow blower back in December because I’m fat. It was the best investment I’ve ever made based on the 5 minutes of time it took to clear my driveway. I should have done it years ago when, at my old house, I had a 100 foot driveway. We took turns shoveling that huge driveway and even with both my wife and I it would take well over and hour with a small snowfall. Live and learn I guess.

So after dinner I get a call from the HR guy at my work place. This is a strange thing because I can’t understand why he’d call me at home when I had just left there a couple of hours earlier. Crap, here we go again. Time to look for a new job or some other shit. Maybe Waffles and I can play $10 Razz tourneys everyday for a $2 profit. But as it turned out I needed to have my self appraisal ready for today.

I spend the next few hours answering silly questions about how I see myself doing my job. It wasn’t really that hard but I think that some of the questions are stupid. For example…

9. Adherence to Policy - The extent to which an employee follows safety and conduct rules, other regulations and adheres to company policies.

Now this is a standard question with responses being outstanding, very good, good and so on. How can you do an outstanding job of following the rules? You either follow them or you don’t. Good is the standard answer for doing your job requirements so anything better then good is self aggrandizing. Anyway, I got through that and fell asleep a little later. Great times.

I’ve thought about saying something like swimsuit models or Anna Benson to try to get more hits but I wouldn’t do that. Maybe something like A-Rod and Yankee baseball could get a few more hits.

Poker Office and Adjusting Your Game

I made a few adjustments to the categories for classifying players. The level for tightness was too large and I also made some adjustments to flag super tight players. I have never used any poker tracking software before so this is kind of fun. I can see some holes in my game, though they are not glaring holes, I should be able to plug them. The funny thing is that some of my issues will be taken advantage of by good players while other issues cause problems with less skilled players. I should have been using this much sooner.

And what am I using. It is PokerOffice. It works similar to other products and is customizable. If you don’t currently use any tracking software then I would suggest using this one. You can load hand histories into the database or use the live tracking function to start when you open a new table. It will also allow you to data mine other table even if you are not playing to gather information on future players you may face. Another added function is that you can evaluate your game at different buy-ins. This is a good tool for improving your game.

You can click on the link above and start using PokerOffice today.

The Bears Suckfest, Poker and More Poker

Friggin Bears. Run the ball morons. It’s a downpour and the wind is blowing 20 miles an hour. Rex doesn’t have to do the same things that Colt’s quarterback does.

Donkeypuncher summed it up. That’s all I have to say about it for now.

Played like an idiot for the most part Friday night. I did go deep in a $5 MTT for a small cash but I donked it up in another tourney. I also played about 2 dozen sngs with limited success.

The sngs were the same as ever. I haven’t played many of these for a while so it was kind of fun to grind them. And other then getting all my money in as a favorite 7 straight times only to lose was frustrating. You know the story. Play pocket Aces vs. QJ and watch him hit runner runner for a straight. ButKarma came back later on to see me get my money in ahead, get behind on the turn and resuck on the river. I also hit runner runner to win another hand.

The $5 MTT was a nice grind. I never hand a really big stack and was never in any real trouble. I won a hand with 99 for a nice early pot before losing some on a steal attempt. I doubled up when I called a re raise while holding AK. The flop have me the nut flush draw, the wheel straight and straight flush draw and two over cards. I push and he calls with JJ and I spike the King of diamonds on the river to scoop with the flush. I had 18 outs twice so I think this is a good move. Anyway, I gained some more vs. a small stack when my KK held vs. AJ. Chipped up some more with AT suited when I came over the top of a weak turn bet. I held nothing but my read was that the small blind had a small piece of the flop and that I could represent a better hand. I won a pot with 34 suited when I flopped a pair of 3s. It was checked by all to the river when I hit trips and I reraised a steal attempt to take the pot. With the blinds at 150/300 I won a checked down pot while holding J6 after the SB, holding KQ never raised the pot prefolp. After getting blinded down some more I took at pot with 55. I finally double again when my KQ beat the all powerful K7 held by a big stack. I held my ground with some small pots until…..I don’t remember the last hand other than I was short stacked and pushed with two cards and lost. If I remember correctly the big stack called with any two and I was ahead like 60-40 and got out flopped. Still a nice run.

I’ve been looking at my game as compared to a few players whose games I am amiliar with. Now they all have the same tag as I do but I found a couple of spots that could make the difference between making deep runs on occasion and making regular runs at bigger money.

Player 1 is someone we all know as a good player. He has made some nice runs and continues to have success.

Player 2 is a solid player who has some success but has a tendancy fizzle out by giving away chips after getting a nice chips stack.

Player 3 is another solid player who from what I know has had some success.

Now I have been to final tables with each of these guys at some point and do have a good understanding of how they play. A few thing stand out.

Player 2 plays many more hands then 1 and 3. I have seen this when playing with him. When he hits a hand early his VPIP will go up in relationship to his stack. He likes to test but sometimes can't get away from a hand.

The difference I saw between 1 and 3 was 1st in raises and the ability to slow play a hand. Player one will do each in the right situation but player 33 has not shown that he will do it.

Now I understand that this is a small sample of information but these are also the reads I had before tracking.

Now how do I compare?

I don't see enough flops and I don't come in enough as the first raiser. These are one in the same in that I'm losing out on some blind steals that would increase my chip stack and get me through the bad beats. And though my aggresstion is consistant it coul maybe stand to move up. I'm not sure on that one but I will keep it in the back of my mind.

The proof is in the pudding. Many times I get to much respect for my hands and lose out on raises because I play to tight. I'm not sure I can change any of this. We shall see

Kitten Cannon

Klick this link to play.

636 is my best so far.

751

Kitten Cannon

Duh Bears and Pokery Fun

It is colder than a witch’s tit. It’s too bad the Super Bowl isn’t being played in Chicago because the Bears would have a big advantage. I think the high for Sunday is going to be 8 degrees or some thing like that. Anyway, the cat was waiting by the door to go out this morning so I open it up. She sticks her head outside, looks around and high tails it back into the house. To cold for kitty.

I have all my Bears stuff on today which includes a hat, uniform and a Bears t-shirt. I’m looking forward to spewing out how well they Bears played and how they will repeat next year. Rex will have a great game and go down in history as one of the great Super Bowl quarterbacks. And now back to reality.

Tonight will be a night of pokery fun or that is what I hope. I’m going to Sam’s Club after work to get essentials for this weekend and maybe dinner with the family while we’re out. With luck I’ll be able to play the daily double and then go from there.

I’ve cut back my poker playing. That was a statement of fact. It has nothing to do with anything other then I was playing way too much. When the virtual world starts to interfere with the real world then there is a problem. I don’t think it got to that point but spending 4 or 5 hours a night, 5 or 6 days a week was too much. If I was making a bigger return then that would be OK but I could do much better working a part time job at the hardware store or something. I’m going to cut it back to 2 maybe 3 nights a week and see if I survive. One thing I’ve noticed all ready is that I’m not nearly as tired at the end of the day. Narcolepsy is not going on and I feel healthier. I guess 4-5 hours of sleep a night for weeks straight does have a negative impact. I was hard to do at first in that after the kids went to bed I was ready to fire up the laptop. After a few days I got used to the new flow and now look forward to my next night of playing instead of feeling obligated to playing.

So have a good weekend everyone and make sure you put your money on the Bears. It’s a sure thing.

The Mookies' and Slow Rollers

I still don’t have Word loaded on my computer so I have to work with other media. It’s a pain but I’ll get through it.

I played the Mookie last night and went out around 30th place. I played OK but could have played better. I lost a good chunk of my stack early when I raised with AK from the SB to some limpers. I get one caller and the flop comes 746. I make a pot size continuation bet of 400 and get re-raised to 800. I let it go and he shows pocket 7s for flopped trips. An orbit later I get 77 and push my 690 chips over the top of lightning’s raise and he calls with AJ suited. My 7s hold up and I’m back to 1430. 2 hands later I get dealt pocket aces and call lightning’s all-in push with AK to almost double up an knock him out. I lost more chips when I raised with KQ suited and get re-raised. I call and folded to a crappy flop. I should have dropped the hand preflop. My downfall was limp re-raising and pot committing my self. I held 88 and limped from early position. There was a raise from a big stack and I came way over the top. I didn’t realize that I left myself thin on chips or I would have gone at it differently. I folded to a AKJ flop. I doubled back up when I pushed a raiser with my short stack while holding A9. He held JT and I won. My last hand I held 64 in the BB and called a raise and a call getting almost 4-1. The flop was 776 and I pushed with my almost post size chip stack. The villain who had been killing me all night has AA and I’m done.

The PLO HL tourney was fun and I ended up in 5th, 2 from the money. The highlight was flopping a straight flush on the first hand when the flop showed 678 all spades. I held the 95 of spades and got semi paid as three of us got all our money into the pot before it was over. I held tight but saw some flops. Never got the one hand I needed to make a serious run. With 5 players left I was the short stack but I did have fold equity and used it to chip up a few times. Eventually, I had to take a shot and got knocked out when holding Ac 2h 9s 4c. The flop is 4s 7c 2c and I push with 2 pair. NumbBono held the open ender and hit it.

I won’t go into Razz because it was un eventful.


Last but not least was a $2 tourney I jumped on. I played most of the tourney at one table and made it to 23rd place before getting slow rolled by an ass hat. I was as card dead as ever but took advantage of my 8% flops seen. As we got closer I took blind and got lucky when this happened.

I get K2 both spades and see a free flop from the BB. The flop is 465 with two spades. I check the action and it gets raised by 2/3 by my opponent. This is an easy call her. But do I want to call because I‘m 52% to win. I have 9 outs to the second nut flush plus 3 more cards for a straight. I’m in a coin flip situation. I may also have outs with the king so I might actually be the favorite. I push. He had me covered but I think calling a check raise from the BB with this board for 85% of your stack is a bad move. He calls with 88 and I hit the 3 of spades on the river to double up. He said ”nice suck out” in the chat box. I later doubled with AA and moved into the top 10. I increased my stack when I called a min-raise with A9 of diamonds. The flop is J3A and I check call a pot size bet. The turn brings a 9 and I check re-raise 2/3 pot bet and take it down. I could have min-reraised here but I would have been pot committed anyway so I figured I should push. I may have left money on the table. I lost a big chunk when I got 35 suited in the BB. The flop come TQA with 2 clubs and I check. My opponent makes a 3/4 pot bet and I raise to put him all-in. He calls with AJ and I don’t get the flush. This may have been a questionable move by me but I felt he had a weak ace with his limp. I wasn’t far off and many players will lay that hand down. I cranked up the aggression as we got deeper and my stack was short and stole numerous blinds. I eventually got knocked out with AJ suited. The big stack made a standard raise to 2400 and I pushed. He waits and says “lets race” and flips over pocket aces. I hit a J on the flop but that was it and I’m done. I was hoping instant Karma would get him and give me trips but it didn’t happen. F’n slow rollers suck. So if you see this guy (nosuckoutplease), clean his clock.

Cheap is Cheap

Man this sucks. When I got my company laptop a few months ago it came with a trial version off Microsoft Office Suite. I asked about getting a full license but was told to wait until the trial was up so I did. Well this morning I tried to write up some information and got a message that my trial was up. The real problem is the guy who takes care of this stuff is out and will not be back until tomorrow sometime. Kind of hard to do your job without the right tools.

So tonight is the Mookie and I will be playing. I’m sure I’ll go out early as I have lately when my big pocket pair gets cracked by some hand like 62 off suited after I re-pop an early raise to 10x the BB. I will also play the 2nd chance, Pot Limit Omaha HL, event if Razz doesn’t get in the way. I like Omaha HL and can donk it up with the best of them.

With the absence of blogger tourneys out there I’m thinking of holding a blogger Razz tourney. I may also look at adding a bounty on a particular Razz expert’s head. I’ll post some more on this in the future but I would like some input on the idea.

See you at the Mookie.

Life and Poker Thoughts

Tonight I get the pleasure of putting together an air-hockey table. It is a wondrous thing to read through the directions of any devise that requires construction by the person who bought said devise. Do we really have to put all those screws in it to make it run right? Anyway, it with be an act of attrition upon my soul to get through this. My thumb still hurts and is only at maybe 50%. Have you ever tied to tie your shoes when you can’t use your thumb? It is hard to do. And try to button your pants. At least my wife knows how to dress me. So hopefully I can get started on the air-hockey table tonight.

******************************

To date I haven’t said much about Neteller and my ability to get money on and off the sites that I play. For me it is more a question of managing the money I have. I’m not a person who will take random money from the family account to reload a poker account and try to stay within a budget. By budget I mean I manage the money I have. Not having Neteller is a hindrance though because I would move money for reload bonuses and other promotions. I know that I will play for as long as I want on the money I have just by managing the levels I play. What I see happening is the lower priced games will get bigger fields while the high level games will generate smaller fields. Eventually, the numbers of players will dwindle and the games will get harder for the average player.

This will happen unless there is a change. Regulating the industry would open up the avenues for us as players. The tax money our government could generate from legalized on-line casinos would be huge. Now I don’t like having my life regulated by my government but if it brings the fish back into the pond then I’m all for it.

The blogsphere is full of short term ways for people to get their money on to poker sites right now but they are short term band aids. We will always find ways to get money to these sites but the hoops we will have to jump through will get tiresome. Do I want to open an account with every new Neteller, Click2pay, or epassporte that comes along? No I don’t. A taxed and centralized system regardless of how it is regulated may be the only way for all of this to continue like it did in the past.

There are also IRS implications that surface with something like this. If it regulated then will we get a 1099 every year to claim our winnings? Do we have to keep track of our loses to offset the earnings we make? Will each session be a separate transaction so that we will have to log all of our play? It could become a pain in the ass. I’m sure the poker sites have records of every game that we have played down to each red cent we’ve bet so a report at the end of the year shouldn’t be hard to come by. I’d actually like to see one because I don’t track my play as well as I should.

Does this bring us closer to a conclusion? Not really but it I the thoughts of an amateur poker player who would like to keep playing.