I had a day off work on Friday and decided to play in the 888 Deep Stack Tournament at 10.30. You get 3000 starting chips and the opening blinds are 10/20, giving you 150 big blinds to start with. There are no rebuys or add-ons; this is my kind of tournament. Here are some edited highlights.
Early on I get KJ on the button, so I raise 4x the blind (4xb) to narrow the field. With a couple of callers, I hit top pair and a flush draw on the flop. I bet half the pot and get one caller. The turn gives me two pair. I put in a bet of 3/4 pot and the opposition folds, adding about 600 more chips to my stack. A good start.
I bet 4xb pre-flop with JJ. I get re-raised to 10xb, so I fold my Jacks. The hand continues and at the end the raiser shows KK. A good fold.
This time I get KK. I raise and get one caller. The flop is all low cards. The caller puts in a decent sized bet and, after some thought, I raise enough to put him all-in. He calls, showing 5 7 (!), giving him bottom pair and a straight draw. He hits a straight on the turn and then there is a straight on the board on the river. A split pot. Hilarious.
I have AK and an Ace comes on the river. I end up all-in against one other player who has A 4. I double up.
With only one player limping in I raise 2xb from the big blind with K 8, and get called. Out of position, with a marginal hand and no help from the flop, I put in a continuation bet and get called. Still hoping to push the opposition off the hand, I have another go on the turn. This time I get re-raised all-in and have to fold with egg on my face. Got rid of about 1000 of my chips with this move.
I call a 3xb bet with 99. The flop looks fairly safe, so when my opponent makes a pot-sized bet, I call. When a 9 comes on the river, giving me trips, I call the other player's all-in bet. It turns out he was betting on Ace high. Another (almost) double-up.
With 8000 chips in hand, my JJ comes up against AA and I drop down to 5000. Jacks are not coming through for me today.
I raise with QJ and get one caller. The flop is Q 6 *, giving me top pair. I bet, he calls. The turn looks safe so I bet enough to put him all-in. He calls and shows 66 for trips. Now I'm back down to my starting stack of 3000, only now it only amounts to 20 big blinds.
Getting nervous about my stack size, I call an all-in bet with AJ against 99. A classic coin flip situation. I win and my stack goes back upto 6000. Welcome to the roller-coaster.
I get Q 4 on the button. As a few players are limping in I decide to call and see what the flop brings. The top card on the flop is a Queen. I realise this could be very good or very very bad. I end up calling big bets from another player all the way down to the river, even though I'm getting increasingly worried that he has a better Queen. It turns out he has QJ, a better Queen. This drops me down to 3000 chips, which is now worth 10 big blinds. A very bad call.
With less than 10 big blinds I have two options pre-flop: go all-in or fold. I wait for a suitable all-in hand but nothing comes. When I'm down to 7BBs, I get Q 8s on the button. Even though one player has put in a minimum raise, I go all-in. I'm called by two players and get beaten by AJ. After one and a quarter hours of play I get knocked out, 77/208.
I had my share of good luck and bad luck in this game, but in the end it was a couple of bad decisions that proved the difference. Hopefully I've learned something from this. Hopefully.
Tuesday, 26 June 2012
Thursday, 21 June 2012
Seven Goals for 2012
As yesterday was the shortest day of the year, I thought it would be a good time to review my progress towards achieving a set of poker goals that I set at the beginning of the year. These were originally posted on a different blogging site in February. I list them here in order, starting from the one that I think is most likely to be achieved, down to the most difficult to achieve.
1. STAY IN THE BLACK. At the beginning of the year my bankroll was sliding back down towards the break-even point. Since then, things have got better. Even though I'm currently in the middle of a bad run of losses, I'm still reasonably confident of staying on the winning side of the equation.
2. PLAY FIXED LIMIT HOLDEM. This would be item number one if it wasn't for the fact that there have been no FLH games available recently on my online poker night. However, I note that there are games available at a higher buy-in level, and this is still within my buy-in limit. I had hoped to play at a lower level until until I got used to the game, but if necessary, I'll move up a level.I'm determined to play this game at least once a week and, hopefully, figure out how to win.
3. LEARN THE ODDS. I've just recently revisited the pot odds tables for different numbers of outs and I think I have that pretty much memorised. The next step is to get into a bit more detail with the odds for different starting hands. I just need to get the right book or visit the right website. So I'm headed in the right direction.
4. PLAY LIVE GAMES. This didn't look very likely at the start of the year, but I've started playing the Friday pub game again and it looks likely to continue. I'm also working on getting a game going at the club where I play pool, but it's early days yet.
5. READ SUPER SYSTEM. Doyle Brunson's Super System is a poker classic and I'd really like to read it. In theory, nothing could be simpler; I just need to order it from the library, go down and pick it up, then take it home and read it. In practice, my free time seems to be taken up with a lot of other stuff, not least of which is actually playing poker rather than reading about it. I'm going on holiday later in the year. Maybe I'll do it then.
6. DOUBLE MY BANKROLL. This is looking increasingly unlikely. A couple of months with net losses means that I'm playing catch-up. June is also not looking good at the moment. So I'll have to have a couple of spectacular results to get anywhere near this target.
7. START A HOME GAME. At the start, doubling my bankroll was always going to be the most difficult goal. But now, I'm nearly halfway through the year and the likelihood of getting a home game going seems remote indeed. It's a shame because I really used to enjoy the home games I played with my Pool Club mates up until a couple of years ago. But they've all lost interest now and I don't see any other likely prospects. I think this one is going on the back burner for now.
Looking at this list, I'm reasonably happy with my progress so far. I'm well on my way towards achieving the first four goals, and should be able to fit in number five. That just leaves the last two. Doubling my bankroll is entirely dependant on me developing my skill as a player; something I keep working on. As for number seven; well, I still have six months...
1. STAY IN THE BLACK. At the beginning of the year my bankroll was sliding back down towards the break-even point. Since then, things have got better. Even though I'm currently in the middle of a bad run of losses, I'm still reasonably confident of staying on the winning side of the equation.
2. PLAY FIXED LIMIT HOLDEM. This would be item number one if it wasn't for the fact that there have been no FLH games available recently on my online poker night. However, I note that there are games available at a higher buy-in level, and this is still within my buy-in limit. I had hoped to play at a lower level until until I got used to the game, but if necessary, I'll move up a level.I'm determined to play this game at least once a week and, hopefully, figure out how to win.
3. LEARN THE ODDS. I've just recently revisited the pot odds tables for different numbers of outs and I think I have that pretty much memorised. The next step is to get into a bit more detail with the odds for different starting hands. I just need to get the right book or visit the right website. So I'm headed in the right direction.
4. PLAY LIVE GAMES. This didn't look very likely at the start of the year, but I've started playing the Friday pub game again and it looks likely to continue. I'm also working on getting a game going at the club where I play pool, but it's early days yet.
5. READ SUPER SYSTEM. Doyle Brunson's Super System is a poker classic and I'd really like to read it. In theory, nothing could be simpler; I just need to order it from the library, go down and pick it up, then take it home and read it. In practice, my free time seems to be taken up with a lot of other stuff, not least of which is actually playing poker rather than reading about it. I'm going on holiday later in the year. Maybe I'll do it then.
6. DOUBLE MY BANKROLL. This is looking increasingly unlikely. A couple of months with net losses means that I'm playing catch-up. June is also not looking good at the moment. So I'll have to have a couple of spectacular results to get anywhere near this target.
7. START A HOME GAME. At the start, doubling my bankroll was always going to be the most difficult goal. But now, I'm nearly halfway through the year and the likelihood of getting a home game going seems remote indeed. It's a shame because I really used to enjoy the home games I played with my Pool Club mates up until a couple of years ago. But they've all lost interest now and I don't see any other likely prospects. I think this one is going on the back burner for now.
Looking at this list, I'm reasonably happy with my progress so far. I'm well on my way towards achieving the first four goals, and should be able to fit in number five. That just leaves the last two. Doubling my bankroll is entirely dependant on me developing my skill as a player; something I keep working on. As for number seven; well, I still have six months...
Friday, 15 June 2012
Fulltilt
My wife and I went to play in the Friday night game last night, but it didn't happen. Some of the regular players had gone out to dinner and they hadn't turned up by 9.30, so we went back home. At least my wife had fun; she had a good win on the pokies.
While I was sitting at the bar a couple of guys came in to ask about the poker game. I got talking to one of them and he told me that he'd lost about $500 when the Fulltilt poker site was shut down. This made me thankful that I'd only had $US43 in my account when the shutdown happened. This is the first time I've met someone else who got ripped off by Fulltilt Poker.
I still don't really know what happened with that site, and I've never gone to the trouble of trying to get the full story. All I know is that the American FBI closed the site down and that I was unable to get any reply from the Fulltilt website in the brief period when it re-opened with a UK URL. From the little that I've heard from various poker websites I gather that the local Gaming Authority revoked their license after that and nobody got paid back.
My understanding is that the US authorities shut the site down because they were admitting American players. Apparently they were getting around financial transaction regulations related to online gambling by channelling the money through shell companies and by making false declarations about the origins of the money. Or something like that. All I know for sure is that I ended up out of pocket.
This is the reason why I stick with 888poker, despite the problems that I sometimes have with the software updates. Fulltilt Poker was the first poker site I played on, so after that experience I went looking for the safest site I could find. I checked out a few websites that rate the different poker sites and 888 seemed to be the best option. Not only is it a licensed online casino but it is also (apparently) listed on the UK stock exchange. Or something like that. In the end you can't really tell how reliable any information that you get from the internet may be. After all, anyone can get published online. Even me.
Anyway, the wife and I went home and, even though I'd been drinking, I played in a couple of Sitngos. As everyone knows, playing poker and drinking is a sure way to lose. Just to prove that there's an exception to every rule, I came third and first in the two games I played, so not a bad night after all.
Maybe one day I'll look into the whole Fulltilt thing. Then again, maybe I'll just move on.
While I was sitting at the bar a couple of guys came in to ask about the poker game. I got talking to one of them and he told me that he'd lost about $500 when the Fulltilt poker site was shut down. This made me thankful that I'd only had $US43 in my account when the shutdown happened. This is the first time I've met someone else who got ripped off by Fulltilt Poker.
I still don't really know what happened with that site, and I've never gone to the trouble of trying to get the full story. All I know is that the American FBI closed the site down and that I was unable to get any reply from the Fulltilt website in the brief period when it re-opened with a UK URL. From the little that I've heard from various poker websites I gather that the local Gaming Authority revoked their license after that and nobody got paid back.
My understanding is that the US authorities shut the site down because they were admitting American players. Apparently they were getting around financial transaction regulations related to online gambling by channelling the money through shell companies and by making false declarations about the origins of the money. Or something like that. All I know for sure is that I ended up out of pocket.
This is the reason why I stick with 888poker, despite the problems that I sometimes have with the software updates. Fulltilt Poker was the first poker site I played on, so after that experience I went looking for the safest site I could find. I checked out a few websites that rate the different poker sites and 888 seemed to be the best option. Not only is it a licensed online casino but it is also (apparently) listed on the UK stock exchange. Or something like that. In the end you can't really tell how reliable any information that you get from the internet may be. After all, anyone can get published online. Even me.
Anyway, the wife and I went home and, even though I'd been drinking, I played in a couple of Sitngos. As everyone knows, playing poker and drinking is a sure way to lose. Just to prove that there's an exception to every rule, I came third and first in the two games I played, so not a bad night after all.
Maybe one day I'll look into the whole Fulltilt thing. Then again, maybe I'll just move on.
Friday, 8 June 2012
Friday at the Phoenix
It looks like I've found a live poker game to play in. Oddly enough, it's the old venue where I used to play. My wife and I used to play at this South Auckland pub on a regular basis when they held Friday night Texas Holdem Tournaments. But then I made the mistake of teaching the locals how to play Omaha Holdem. They liked it so much that the Friday night game became an Omaha ring game. This was unfortunate for me because by that stage I'd come to the realisation that Omaha is the most frustrating and annoying game in the universe. What's more, I'm no good at it. We went along to a couple of the games but gave it up late last year.
I continued looking for a new live game that was within my buy-in limits, but with no success. I like the convenience and variety of playing online, but you can't beat the experience of sitting around a table of actual people and fiddling with your chips. So, in the end I decided to bite the bullet and go back to the Friday night Omaha game.
It was a pleasant surprise to discover that the game was now dealer's choice: Texas Holdem or Omaha. As it happens, everyone was choosing Texas Holdem. We probably played about half a dozen hands of Omaha all night. What's more, this is a low stakes spread limit game, similar to the fixed limit games I'm playing online.
I didn't win in this session but that doesn't matter; I'm sure I'll get my chances in later sessions (although flopping a full house and then having my wife pick up a better full house on the turn didn't help the size of my chip stack). So I'm looking forward to a busy season of online and live poker games.
I continued looking for a new live game that was within my buy-in limits, but with no success. I like the convenience and variety of playing online, but you can't beat the experience of sitting around a table of actual people and fiddling with your chips. So, in the end I decided to bite the bullet and go back to the Friday night Omaha game.
It was a pleasant surprise to discover that the game was now dealer's choice: Texas Holdem or Omaha. As it happens, everyone was choosing Texas Holdem. We probably played about half a dozen hands of Omaha all night. What's more, this is a low stakes spread limit game, similar to the fixed limit games I'm playing online.
I didn't win in this session but that doesn't matter; I'm sure I'll get my chances in later sessions (although flopping a full house and then having my wife pick up a better full house on the turn didn't help the size of my chip stack). So I'm looking forward to a busy season of online and live poker games.
Tuesday, 5 June 2012
Queen's Birthday 2012
Thinking that we're getting older and wiser, when we're just getting old. David Gilmour
As yesterday was a public holiday, it was the ideal opportunity to play in the 888 Deep Stack Tournament at 10.30 in the morning. I'm working during the week and normally busy doing other things on the weekend, but Queen's Birthday Monday was free. So I cranked up the computer and immediately got a user message: "Please wait just a few seconds while we update the software". I knew what that meant straight away: freeze-out.
So, muttering and cursing under my breath, I went through the now familiar routine. I uninstalled my 888 software, went to the website and started downloading the new version of the program. I knew I'd miss the 10.30 Tourney, but there was another at 12.30. Just after midday I got an error message informing me that the download had failed. Cursing loudly and colourfully, I began the download process all over again. To cut a long and frustrating story short, I eventually got into a tournament at 3.30 pm. The prize pool wasn't anywhere near as good as the Deep Stack Tourney, but at least I got to play. So why do I stick with 888 despite all this crap? More about that later...
Meanwhile I played in a tourney where big pre-flop hands played a large part in my fortunes. First up I put myself at an early disadvantage by forgetting a golden rule that is written in capital letters in my poker notebook on several different pages. With T5 in the big blind I got to see the flop for free. A Ten on the flop gave me top pair. I just called my opposition's small bets on the flop and the turn, then he put in a big bet on the river. There was a possible straight on the board. I called. The golden rule is: IF NORMALLY PASSIVE PLAYERS START RAISING, FOLD. THEY JUST HIT A MONSTER HAND. He had a straight.
I managed to build my stack back up a bit after that, but then I picked up KQ in the small blind. I am seriously considering dropping KQ as an early position starting hand, but in this case I raised three times the blind and got called by one player. Inevitably there was an Ace on the flop, and a Queen, just to keep me from folding. Anyway, the Ace paired on the turn and I convinced myself that that my two pair was good. In the end, most of my chips were in the pot when my opponent showed A7 for trip Aces. Once again I have confirmed my inability to correctly play a paired board. The fact that my opponent made an idiot call is little consolation.
At this stage things were looking grim and with fewer than ten blinds left, I was preparing for an early finish. Then I picked up AK, went all in and, much to my surprise, doubled up. I picked up AK two more times over the next few hands and it came in for me each time. By the time we were approaching the bubble (the last ten players) I had a mid-sized stack. This allowed me to continue playing through the bubble and pick up a few chips from the shorter stacks. By this stage my goal was to continue playing aggressively and set my sights on first place. That's when I hit KQ again.
With 24 blinds I was the third highest stack of six players. I put in a minimum raise and my opponent, with fewer chips than me, re-raised. This should have set off alarm bells. It didn't. I called. The flop was Q J 6, giving me top pair and second kicker. The other player bet 4x blind. What I should have been thinking is this: "With a pre-flop re-raise and now a big bet, he must have something good. I'm in trouble if he has AA, KK, QQ, JJ, AQ, or QJ. In fact the only big hands I can beat are AK, AJ and KJ. Do I really want to risk it?" But what I was actually thinking was: "I've got top pair with a King kicker. The only hand I really need to worry about is AQ. Let's put him to the test". So I went all in and he called and showed pocket Aces.
That move left me crippled with just five blinds left. So I waited to get a halfway decent hand to go all in with. A couple of hands later I went all in with QT and got called by a player with... pocket Aces! That was the end of my tournament, finishing 6/86. Not a bad result considering my own efforts to shoot myself in the foot.
As yesterday was a public holiday, it was the ideal opportunity to play in the 888 Deep Stack Tournament at 10.30 in the morning. I'm working during the week and normally busy doing other things on the weekend, but Queen's Birthday Monday was free. So I cranked up the computer and immediately got a user message: "Please wait just a few seconds while we update the software". I knew what that meant straight away: freeze-out.
So, muttering and cursing under my breath, I went through the now familiar routine. I uninstalled my 888 software, went to the website and started downloading the new version of the program. I knew I'd miss the 10.30 Tourney, but there was another at 12.30. Just after midday I got an error message informing me that the download had failed. Cursing loudly and colourfully, I began the download process all over again. To cut a long and frustrating story short, I eventually got into a tournament at 3.30 pm. The prize pool wasn't anywhere near as good as the Deep Stack Tourney, but at least I got to play. So why do I stick with 888 despite all this crap? More about that later...
Meanwhile I played in a tourney where big pre-flop hands played a large part in my fortunes. First up I put myself at an early disadvantage by forgetting a golden rule that is written in capital letters in my poker notebook on several different pages. With T5 in the big blind I got to see the flop for free. A Ten on the flop gave me top pair. I just called my opposition's small bets on the flop and the turn, then he put in a big bet on the river. There was a possible straight on the board. I called. The golden rule is: IF NORMALLY PASSIVE PLAYERS START RAISING, FOLD. THEY JUST HIT A MONSTER HAND. He had a straight.
I managed to build my stack back up a bit after that, but then I picked up KQ in the small blind. I am seriously considering dropping KQ as an early position starting hand, but in this case I raised three times the blind and got called by one player. Inevitably there was an Ace on the flop, and a Queen, just to keep me from folding. Anyway, the Ace paired on the turn and I convinced myself that that my two pair was good. In the end, most of my chips were in the pot when my opponent showed A7 for trip Aces. Once again I have confirmed my inability to correctly play a paired board. The fact that my opponent made an idiot call is little consolation.
At this stage things were looking grim and with fewer than ten blinds left, I was preparing for an early finish. Then I picked up AK, went all in and, much to my surprise, doubled up. I picked up AK two more times over the next few hands and it came in for me each time. By the time we were approaching the bubble (the last ten players) I had a mid-sized stack. This allowed me to continue playing through the bubble and pick up a few chips from the shorter stacks. By this stage my goal was to continue playing aggressively and set my sights on first place. That's when I hit KQ again.
With 24 blinds I was the third highest stack of six players. I put in a minimum raise and my opponent, with fewer chips than me, re-raised. This should have set off alarm bells. It didn't. I called. The flop was Q J 6, giving me top pair and second kicker. The other player bet 4x blind. What I should have been thinking is this: "With a pre-flop re-raise and now a big bet, he must have something good. I'm in trouble if he has AA, KK, QQ, JJ, AQ, or QJ. In fact the only big hands I can beat are AK, AJ and KJ. Do I really want to risk it?" But what I was actually thinking was: "I've got top pair with a King kicker. The only hand I really need to worry about is AQ. Let's put him to the test". So I went all in and he called and showed pocket Aces.
That move left me crippled with just five blinds left. So I waited to get a halfway decent hand to go all in with. A couple of hands later I went all in with QT and got called by a player with... pocket Aces! That was the end of my tournament, finishing 6/86. Not a bad result considering my own efforts to shoot myself in the foot.
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