I went to Oceans 11 on 19th March hoping for my third final table in a row. Instead I lost my chips in the following way about mid-tournament:
Hand 1: I have A-J suited and limp with it. The flop is all low non-connected cards and a rainbow. A player who is short-stacked moves all in for about 1800 chips (I have 3300 in my stack) and it folds round the me on the button. I look at him for a while. He is quite a well-known player and I am told he is "good" whatever that means. He is staring directly at me and the more I look at him the more I feel he has a low pair from the flop and little else. I have not hit anything so I have to decide to call or fold. All I really have is 2 overcards with no flush/straight possibilities but they look so pretty and I am so focused on 'is my read on this guy right' that I end up calling just to find out. Hey good move you dummy. My read was right and my overcards did not hit on the turn or river so I gave away most of my chips. Stupid stupid move.
Hand 2: about 5 hands later I am pretty short stacked and pick up kings. I move all in and am called by A-6 off suit. He hits the ace and I am history.
So what did I learn from this week. Tournaments are won and lost on mistakes as much as good play. When I missed the flop and he bet I should have got out of there. But I have spent much of the last week reading up on poker tells and how to read other players and I got so caught up in my new latest greatest theories I made a basic mistake. All I had was a draw - albeit with pretty high cards. I only had 6 outs which meant I was at least a 3-1 dog if my read was right. I have to put in 1800 chips to try to win 2700 so my pot odds are horrible. Everything I did on this hand is wrong.
Next week I want to make the final table again - maybe instead of 3 final tables in 3 weeks I can boast of 3 final tables in a month. That still has a good ring to it!!
Friday, March 21, 2008
Pokerstars - a cold streak (is it rigged)
Maybe I suddenly turned into a bad player. All of a sudden I cannot win a race on pokerstars to save my life. I lose with AA, KK, QQ, AKs you name it I lose with it. Pretty much every tournament I enter I bust out of with fantastic premium hands. Is my timing off suddenly.
I play pokerstars and full tilt concurrently. I may have 2 or 4 windows open with different tournaments. At the same time I lose consistently on Pokerstars I am winning consistently on Full Tilt. How can that be? I am the same player. I play the same way on both sites. But I am consistently getting unlucky on pokerstars right now.
I tried to analyze this.
Maybe there are better players on pokerstars - people who call with A-4 off-suit and crack my kings, people who call with 44 and crack my aces, people who hit their miracle backdoor flush or straight against my top pair when we both went all-in preflop. I do not think this is the case but maybe....
Maybe its all rigged. Can certain user-ids be set to run hot or cold for a while in their software? Now I am not accusing anyone of anything but as a computer programmer I know it would be easy to program things that way. I am sure a smaller startup might have something like that in their code but not the biggest poker site in the world. They *have* to run good clean honest software don't they?
Maybe its all in my head - or I have some moronic tendencies on Pokerstars that I do not have on Full Tilt.
I have no clue why this is happening to me - my plan is to take a couple of days off from pokerstars and then see what happens. I'll be sure to let you know when the cold streak ends......(if).....
I play pokerstars and full tilt concurrently. I may have 2 or 4 windows open with different tournaments. At the same time I lose consistently on Pokerstars I am winning consistently on Full Tilt. How can that be? I am the same player. I play the same way on both sites. But I am consistently getting unlucky on pokerstars right now.
I tried to analyze this.
Maybe there are better players on pokerstars - people who call with A-4 off-suit and crack my kings, people who call with 44 and crack my aces, people who hit their miracle backdoor flush or straight against my top pair when we both went all-in preflop. I do not think this is the case but maybe....
Maybe its all rigged. Can certain user-ids be set to run hot or cold for a while in their software? Now I am not accusing anyone of anything but as a computer programmer I know it would be easy to program things that way. I am sure a smaller startup might have something like that in their code but not the biggest poker site in the world. They *have* to run good clean honest software don't they?
Maybe its all in my head - or I have some moronic tendencies on Pokerstars that I do not have on Full Tilt.
I have no clue why this is happening to me - my plan is to take a couple of days off from pokerstars and then see what happens. I'll be sure to let you know when the cold streak ends......(if).....
Oceans 11 - why not chop?
After my 3rd place finish on Weds 5th of March I returned to Oceans11 for the next Weds tournament and came 9th. This is 2 final tables in a row.
Interesting I was about 7th in chips at the start of the final table and the chip leaders needed to be somewhere soon. They wanted to chop the prize money evenly 9 ways. This meant each player would get slightly less than the 3rd place prize amount. All players agreed apart from one who was about 6th in chip count.
Why would he disagree? It is true the smallest stack was going to be the BB and may be quickly eliminated but even so it was extremely unlikely this player would make 3rd place because the 5 bigger stacks were much bigger than his. As it happened the small stack got a lucky break on his BB and play continued.
I cannot understand this guys logic. Did he think he was a much better player than the other players at the final table? Did he just want his tournament to last longer? Why do players not do the math when it comes to chopping at the final table?
Frustrating - you bet!!
Interesting I was about 7th in chips at the start of the final table and the chip leaders needed to be somewhere soon. They wanted to chop the prize money evenly 9 ways. This meant each player would get slightly less than the 3rd place prize amount. All players agreed apart from one who was about 6th in chip count.
Why would he disagree? It is true the smallest stack was going to be the BB and may be quickly eliminated but even so it was extremely unlikely this player would make 3rd place because the 5 bigger stacks were much bigger than his. As it happened the small stack got a lucky break on his BB and play continued.
I cannot understand this guys logic. Did he think he was a much better player than the other players at the final table? Did he just want his tournament to last longer? Why do players not do the math when it comes to chopping at the final table?
Frustrating - you bet!!
Thursday, March 6, 2008
Monte Carlo qualifier on Pokerstars - another bubble
Pokerstars are running a $9.99 rebuy super-satellite to win a trip to Monte Carlo and entry into the EPT final event. I entered on Weds evening (after my Oceans 11 cash in the afternoon) and was pleased to build my stack to a pretty good size without having to rebuy at all. I did take the add-on and then played fairly aggressively to get to the top 20% of players in stack size. Then I plodded along playing premium hands until I got to the final table.
After all the buyins and re-buys there were 2 entries into the $1050 Monte Carlo qualifier and a third place of $608 (not bad for a $20 buy-in).
So of course I came 4th when my big pair got beaten by a lousy back-door runner runner straight. I was the short stack and felt sure this hand was my double-up opportunity but the poker gods reminded me I am still "bubble boy" at least for a while longer.
Sigh - try again.....
After all the buyins and re-buys there were 2 entries into the $1050 Monte Carlo qualifier and a third place of $608 (not bad for a $20 buy-in).
So of course I came 4th when my big pair got beaten by a lousy back-door runner runner straight. I was the short stack and felt sure this hand was my double-up opportunity but the poker gods reminded me I am still "bubble boy" at least for a while longer.
Sigh - try again.....
Oceans 11 - finally hit the big money
Well, big is relative. I finished 3rd this week and took $585 (for a $60 buy-in). After tipping the dealers my take was $522 which is $460 profit. The tournament lasted from 10am to 2pm so about $115 per hour. This almost matches the money I used to make as a computer consultant.
I was kicking myself on the way home about how I went out. The big stack was bullying people at the table (as he should) until I took a large pot off him and at the same time eliminated the 4th place guy. Now the stacks were about 65k, 51k and 45k with me in 2nd place. We offered to split the money but the big stack wanted to play. Here is how the very next hand went.
Antes were 2k. I was the BB (8k) and the big stack on my left raised me to 16k (as he had done most hands when he was a much bigger stack than everyone else). The SB folded. I looked down at K-J which is a pretty good hand 3-handed and PUSHED all-in. More about this play below. I knew if I won this pot I would probably win the tournament. The big stack went into the tank and eventually decided I was making a move on him and called showing A-4o. The ace held up and I went out in 3rd.
So should I have pushed? The key thing going through my mind here is that he raised me first so I should have folded and waited until I was the raiser. Did I get impatient? The very fact he raised suggested he had a hand (or did it - as he raised most of the pots prior while he was a bigger big stack). I am sure there is an answer to this question based on the math - please let me know your opinions.
Hey - I'm still happy to have cashed in 3rd but 1st place got $1800 so I am just a bit disappointed (similar to how I felt at the Aussie millions where I got $2650 for 33rd but the top 10 got 20k+ each).
Maybe next week I can get first.....
I was kicking myself on the way home about how I went out. The big stack was bullying people at the table (as he should) until I took a large pot off him and at the same time eliminated the 4th place guy. Now the stacks were about 65k, 51k and 45k with me in 2nd place. We offered to split the money but the big stack wanted to play. Here is how the very next hand went.
Antes were 2k. I was the BB (8k) and the big stack on my left raised me to 16k (as he had done most hands when he was a much bigger stack than everyone else). The SB folded. I looked down at K-J which is a pretty good hand 3-handed and PUSHED all-in. More about this play below. I knew if I won this pot I would probably win the tournament. The big stack went into the tank and eventually decided I was making a move on him and called showing A-4o. The ace held up and I went out in 3rd.
So should I have pushed? The key thing going through my mind here is that he raised me first so I should have folded and waited until I was the raiser. Did I get impatient? The very fact he raised suggested he had a hand (or did it - as he raised most of the pots prior while he was a bigger big stack). I am sure there is an answer to this question based on the math - please let me know your opinions.
Hey - I'm still happy to have cashed in 3rd but 1st place got $1800 so I am just a bit disappointed (similar to how I felt at the Aussie millions where I got $2650 for 33rd but the top 10 got 20k+ each).
Maybe next week I can get first.....
Wednesday, March 5, 2008
Poker training sites
So how do we advance our poker training. Are the "paid for" sites worth it. My brother and friends in the poker world suggest there is enough information available online and in books that there is no need to pay for a training site.
However after my recent run of bubbles (just missing the money) I wanted to improve. I looked at various different sites but finally settled on:
http://www.pokerxfactor.com
This site is run by users 'JohnnyBax' and 'sheets' and mostly features videos/hand-history playbacks of tournaments they have entered and hit the money (often winning). There are also several guest pros with video commentaries showing how they play cash and tournament games. So far I have been a member for a week or so.
So what do I think. First I noticed several areas where I play differently to the pros in the videos. Then I listened to commentaries where they explain some of the biggest leaks in peoples games some of which correspond to my play. I tried watching a range of videos (different pros talking about different games) but one thing I immediately noticed is some contradiction on how different pros play and how different types of games play. This probably just made me more confused and made my game worse. So being a smart guy, I changed my approach and watched just one of the many pros and all of his videos relating to ONE type of game. I chose single table SnG games and watched the videos posted by 'sheets'.
There is no doubt this has made me a better player at single table SnG and this has been proved in my results. It has also taught me how to play the bubble in a much more effective way. I am very pleased about the improvements in my game this week.
Of coure there is a flip side. My MTT (multi-table tournament) play has got worse and where before I was cashing occassionally in 90 and 180 player SnG MTT tournaments now I am missing by a mile. This is probably because I have taken some of the single table SnG strategy and it is no good for multi-table. So I will have to spend more time watching the other videos and try to figure out the difference.
I will let you know more about the training as and if my results get better (which I really hope they do).
However after my recent run of bubbles (just missing the money) I wanted to improve. I looked at various different sites but finally settled on:
http://www.pokerxfactor.com
This site is run by users 'JohnnyBax' and 'sheets' and mostly features videos/hand-history playbacks of tournaments they have entered and hit the money (often winning). There are also several guest pros with video commentaries showing how they play cash and tournament games. So far I have been a member for a week or so.
So what do I think. First I noticed several areas where I play differently to the pros in the videos. Then I listened to commentaries where they explain some of the biggest leaks in peoples games some of which correspond to my play. I tried watching a range of videos (different pros talking about different games) but one thing I immediately noticed is some contradiction on how different pros play and how different types of games play. This probably just made me more confused and made my game worse. So being a smart guy, I changed my approach and watched just one of the many pros and all of his videos relating to ONE type of game. I chose single table SnG games and watched the videos posted by 'sheets'.
There is no doubt this has made me a better player at single table SnG and this has been proved in my results. It has also taught me how to play the bubble in a much more effective way. I am very pleased about the improvements in my game this week.
Of coure there is a flip side. My MTT (multi-table tournament) play has got worse and where before I was cashing occassionally in 90 and 180 player SnG MTT tournaments now I am missing by a mile. This is probably because I have taken some of the single table SnG strategy and it is no good for multi-table. So I will have to spend more time watching the other videos and try to figure out the difference.
I will let you know more about the training as and if my results get better (which I really hope they do).
Another Wednesday, another bubble at Oceans 11
This week (27th Feb) I came 18th out of 108 players (top 10 get paid). Another week and another close run. I guess this is normal. Some tournaments you hit the money and some youdo not. I am not sure what a good ratio is but the better players on the internet seem to have a ROI of about 20%.
Taking this literally (which you are probably not supposed to do) I guess I should cash 1 out of every 5 times. So next week look forward to hearing about me winning some money.
Taking this literally (which you are probably not supposed to do) I guess I should cash 1 out of every 5 times. So next week look forward to hearing about me winning some money.
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