Pickin' Strawberries
Date: Fri, Jul 4, 2008 Professional
The strawberry pickers have it tough - stooped for up to 10 hours a day in the heat for an average of $8 an hour. This reward is pretty much exactly in line with the meagre profits I generated in my 7 hour stint at the Loose Cannon last night.
I ground out £78 profit on the cash game, and taking out the £50 tournament entry that left me with a £28 return, coming in at £4 an hour. Joy.
I played pretty well in the tournament until my implosion hand occurred. We were short handed most of the time, so playing a large volume of hands was the order of the day. Unfortunately, when medium stacked I pushed over the SB's raise when I was in the BB with trash and he had Aces. Nice timing.
The cash game was fierce - there were no weak spots at all, and some fine poker was played. The drinks flowed, and we heard tales of wine, women and Mozart (not as cultured as it sounds, but I probably can't go into it on here).
I could have been up by a significantly bigger margin, but I was completely owned in one hand, the dynamics of which are still troubling me. It played out as follows:
I raised a couple of limpers to £5 with 8d9d. I get 3 callers.
Flop is Ac, Ah, 7c
It's checked around, and I decide to represent the Ace, given that I was the initial raiser.
Turn is 7s
I check and player bets £20 and I flat call - the others fold.
River is Qh
I check and player bets £50. I min-raise to £100 with nothing, but the betting really looks like an Ace now. However my opponent INSTACALLS with Qc4s. Good grief - am I that transparent? The fact that he paired the Queen on the river is pretty much irrelevant - he simply didn't believe me and effectively was happy to bet/call with Queen high to go with the 2 pair. Should have made it more on the end I think, but the speed with which he called, leads me to think he'd have had me anyway.
I actually dreamt about that hand last night..............better than dreaming of The Baron drinking Sancerre sitting in his duds I guess.
PROFIT/(LOSS) USD 2008
Live Holdem Tournaments 3,305
Live Holdem Cash (1,325)
Live Omaha (190)
Live "Professional" Tournaments (6,316)
Home Games 540
Online Holdem Tournaments 56,628
Online Holdem Cash 17,026
Online Omaha 330
Sundry 854
Rake (4,177)
65,460
In From The Cold
Date: Wed, Jul 2, 2008 Professional
"Go on Tony, it was only a small oversight"
"Peter - the interest on that loan you didn't declare was £2,200 a month - I'm not sure the public will like it. You've only been gone from the Cabinet 10 months."
"The Lord preaches forgiveness Tony"
"Alistair says I'm not allowed to do God"
"Who's the higher power Tony? Alistair Campbell, God or Me?"
"You are Peter"
"So..................."
"Ok - you can be Secretary of State for Northern Ireland. Just don't tell Gordon or Alistair until you pitch up at the next Cabinet meeting"
And so it came to pass in 1999 - the persuasive Peter Mandelson slide effortlessly back into the cabinet ,after 10 months out in the cold.
My London tournament form had given me feelings of being the forgotten man over the last 3 months. I had ONE cash in the whole period (althought that was a first place), after losing seemingly every race I got into. All that changed last night - some solid play combined with a few strokes of luck earned me 3rd place in the Better Poker £50 event, which was worth a payout of £500. Here is how it panned out:
Hand1
I raise to 150 on the button with Ac3c and get called by the SB. Flop comes down Ad, 3s, 8s. I raise his 300 lead to 1k and take it down. If he does have an Ace here, I really don't want him hitting a disguised bigger 2 pair there, and costing me a bundle.
Hand2
I limp UTG with JJ for 100. I get 4 callers. Hmm - that wasn't the plan.
All is well though with a JQ5 flop.
I bet 600 and get one caller.
Turn bricks.
I bet 1200 and take it down.
Hand3
I try to steal from the cutoff with 4c9s but get a caller and then a shove from the big blind. I go into the break on 5k from a 3.5k starting stack.
Hand4
I raise with AcJc UTG to 600. Prowler calls in the BB.
Flop is Ks, Jd, 6c
Prowler leads for 1k. He only has 1.7k behind so I foolishly put him in and he eventually calls with KQ.
I river a Jack to eliminate him. Up to about 9k now.
Hand5
I call a raise to 700 with AK on the button, and the SB calls behind. The BB shoves for 3k total, and after the initial raise drops out I pretty much have to call. The SB undercalls all in as well.
It's AK(me), KQ(SB), KK(BB)
All of his Kings are gone, but he holds, and I am back down to 6k.
Hand6
Blinds now 200-400 and there is a raise to 1k - I call in the BB with Jd9s
Flop is 9d, 5d, 4d
My hand is pretty huge - top pair, decent kicker, decent flush draw so I check shove on him and he makes the call with A5 (no diamonds). I fade the meagre outs he has and am up to 10k.
Table move - I am now on a much harder table - contains lots of big stacks, and the owners of said stacks are The Baron, Sonny and Graeme Newman (Grazza = Ladbrokes World Online Poker Championship Main Event winner).
I get a few raises through to snuffle the blinds and then comes a key hand:
Hand7
The Baron limps for 1200, and Grazza makes it 5k. I push for 10k total with AQ. Grazza pretty much has to call, but it's a disaster for him as he has Q4, and I hold to get up to 20k.
The bubble bursts and we are off to the final table - I am probably in about 5th spot of the 9 remaining runners.
Hand8
I am in in the BB with 18k, blinds are 1k/2k. Grazza raises to 6k from mid position. I remember from the Irish Open that he does like to raise his fair share of pots once the blinds kick in, so his range is pretty wide here. I shove with 9d10c and he eventually makes the odds call, with 7s8s. My hand holds, and Grazza is crippled, busting out soon after in 9th spot.
Hand9
I donk off 6k of my new wealth calling an all in with AJ sooted. Opponent has AQ - bad call.
Hand10
We are down to 7 players. There is an early raiser to 8k. With my stack at 25k and nowhere near the chip lead, I decide to (hopefully) take a race on and shove with 66. Early raiser calls with AJ and I hold, eliminating him and move into contention for the win for the first time.
Now 4 left
Hand11
I call an all-in for 8k holding AhJh in the BB but get outdrawn by KsJc.
Now 3 players remaining
I shove a bit to keep up with the monster blinds but finally succumb pushing over the top of the button's raise to 20k with KJ with blinds at 4k/8k and my stack is at 50k. He has Ace rag and it holds. 3rd place for me and £500 - a very pleasing performance.
Sonny wins the tournament to maintain his good form. He is off to Vegas tomorrow - good luck that man. I also play some 5/6 card Omaha and lose £150 of my winnings. Not a great fan of that game - seems to me you need to have pretty close to the nuts to get involved, particularly in the 6 card beast.
So, like good old Peter Mandelson, I am back in from the cold. The warm environment of the MTT London winners circle has finally embraced me again. Hopefully I can stay there over the coming months. Better not upset the apple cart by trying to facilitate passports for rich Indian businessmen I guess........
PROFIT/(LOSS) USD 2008
Live Holdem Tournaments 3,415
Live Holdem Cash (1,481)
Live Omaha (190)
Live "Professional" Tournaments (6,316)
Home Games 540
Online Holdem Tournaments 56,628
Online Holdem Cash 17,026
Online Omaha 330
Sundry 854
Rake (4,167)
65,424
Quarterly Review
Date: Mon, Jun 30, 2008 Professional
I was bitten by a donkey on Sunday. This being a poker blog, I imagine you think I am talking about a poker analogy, but no, I was actually bitten by a real donkey. I was at a donkey sanctuary with my son, and whilst he was stroking it, the bedraggled looking creature started snuffling at my shirt. And then it bit my beer gut............hard. I have a large purple bruise all around the middle of my stomach now. Donkeys are clearly a souce of pain both on and off the table..............anyway - quarterly review time:
Overall
An average 3 month period resulted in a profit of $3,700 across all disciplines. This figure is after subtracting $2,300 worth of rake (those Vegas tournaments certainly charge a lot of juice!).
Live London Holdem Tournaments (3/10)
I lost $1,100 over the period. Whilst not playing badly, I didn't make as many cashes as I would have liked, and certainly didn't kick on in the Loose Cannon league, after being nicely positioned at the end of March. I think I need to make some adjustments in this area - I am getting into too many confrontations where I in a coin flip scenario, and I haven't been winning the races.
Live London Cash (7/10)
A definite improvement in this area. Despite going back to all my old habits on Friday night where I lost $340 playing way too agressively and drunken, I have been playing a more measured game and it has been generating some modest returns. I hope to continue in this vein for the rest of the year, and hopefully elimate the wrecklessness all together.
I've noticed I have had strong results when we are playing multiple games (such as rounds of Omaha/Irish/Holdem), but bad results on just Holdem. I have a real issue getting bored in the "Holdem only" game and thus end up in pots I should be no-where near. The problem is, if there are any new players at the table, you can't really make them play Omaha if they haven't played it before. I made a profit of $400 in this area over the period. I would love to see the split between "vanilla" holdem and mixed games, but I haven't kept a record.
Live Professional Tournaments (8/10)
Finally got the monkey off my back by cashing in the WSOP 5k. This was very important for my mindset. I blew great positions in WSOP 2007 and Irish Open 2008 (if a bit unluckily) so if I had missed out on the cash again, I would have started to doubt myself. I can take comfort from the steady improvement curve in my big ticket tournaments so far I think:
EPT Warsaw 2007 - I was outclassed and bullied
Irish Open 2007 - Top 20 in chips 1 hour from end of Day1 - but didn't make Day2 :(
WSOP 2007 - One of the dominant forces at table - above average chips near the bubble, but busted when big stack nutter called my re-shove with my 6d8d against his 2s3c.
NPL 2007 Main Event - Final table - but didn't cash due to tiny field of 34 players.
Irish Open 2008 - 8th in chips after Day1 - lost half stack with set v overpair and then tilted.
Newcastle UKPT 2008 - played pretty well, but ultimately compromised after making two big laydowns.
WSOP 2008 - Cashed 44th place in 5k event.
I made $3,900 in the period in these events.
Home Games (8/10)
I am normally everyone's cash cow in the home games, but made $1,100 over the 3 months. It must be noted $700 of this profit was after a brutal outdraw against the Baron.
Online Holdem Tournaments (7/10)
I simply didn't play enough, but can't argue with results when I did make time to enter. Profit of $1,800 for the period.
Online Holdem Cash/Online Omaha (N/A)
Hardly played at all. My 1k to 100k challenge hardly got off the ground due to lack of time. Combined loss of $100.
In terms of future events, I think I am almost certain to play the UKPT Grand Final Main Event in November as well as some of the side events. I may also play a WSOPE side event if there are any good ones this year.
Unfortunately I have now run short on holidays available from work until December after the Vegas jaunt, so I'll have to be pretty selective over the big ticket tournaments I enter for the rest of the year. I'll aim to keep the form ticking over by playing regularly at LC and Gutshot over the coming months. I will also try to get to the Empire a bit more, as I hear the cash games in particular can be a bit juicy there.
This week will see the Better Poker event tomorrow night (I always bust out of that on level 4 to some random outdraw it seems :)) and then the new Loose Cannon UKPT League kicks off on Thursday night. This time, we are playing for multiple entries to the £500 side event which runs at the Vic a few days before the Grand Final.
PROFIT/(LOSS) USD 2008
Live Holdem Tournaments 2,515
Live Holdem Cash (1,481)
Live Omaha 110
Live "Professional" Tournaments (6,316)
Home Games 540
Online Holdem Tournaments 56,628
Online Holdem Cash 17,026
Online Omaha 330
Sundry 854
Rake (4,167)
64,824
No WSOP Main Event
Date: Wed, Jun 25, 2008 Professional
I missed out on the WSOP freeroll final, placing 10th in the end (only one seat up for grabs). I guess this is pretty below par considering I set off fifth in chips, but I was playing pretty agressively with the ultra top heavy structure, as it didn't really matter if I busted 10th or 3rd. Perhaps I could have waited a bit longer before making the move I did, but I felt I was getting behind the field.
Two interesting hands, both played terribly by myself:
Hand1
Blinds are 200-400, and Mark raises in the cutoff to 800. This looks so suspicious, as it's not even an attempt to steal the blinds. I have AQ on the button, and kinda feel like folding already, but I decide to see a flop. The blinds get out of the way.
Flop comes Qh, Js, 6h.
This is normally a great flop for AQ, obviously. Mark bets out 1200 which again looks like it is screaming for a call. I have it in my head that he has AA-JJ and, after realising that it will cost my whole stack to call him down all the way on every street, I decide that it is either push or fold. I go with my read and fold and Mark shows Kh5h. Oh dear. I guess that is up there with some of my worst laydowns. At least it only cost me 800.
Hand2
Sonny limps for 600 UTG and I complete in the small blind with Qs6s.
Flop 7d, 8c, 10c
Check, Check
Turn 8h
I try and take the pot down by betting 1200 into the 1800 pot with my ropey gutshot draw.
Sonny flat calls, and I'm starting to think he has a club draw.
River is a 2h.
I think Sonny has missed his club draw so I push with my Queen high for my remaining 2800.
Sonny instacalls and I am toast. Of course I had read the situation perfectly, and when I started betting, Sonny had just turned his full house having flopped a set. :(
Not the best performance, as you can see. At least my strong recent cash form continued and I won £180 in the 4 hour game afterwards. I make that 5 out of 6 winning London sessions now (although some admittedly small wins), so I hope that can continue.
Good luck to Big Mark, who will be flying the flag for Loose Cannon in his usual PC way in the Main Event.
PROFIT/(LOSS) USD 2008
Live Holdem Tournaments 2,515
Live Holdem Cash (1,501)
Live Omaha 110
Live "Professional" Tournaments (6,316)
Home Games 540
Online Holdem Tournaments 56,628
Online Holdem Cash 17,026
Online Omaha 330
Sundry 854
Rake (4,167)
64,804
Odds Aren't Always Everything
Date: Sat, Jun 21, 2008 Professional
I think I made a decision which was technically correct, but strategically woeful, during the LC League match on Thursday night. The situation was as follows:
12 players remain, average stack is 7k, my stack is 6.5k. Blinds are 400/800 (there are a surprising amount of players left at this stage) and I am in the big blind.
Action folds round to Tony, who is short stacked on 2.5k, pushes on the button and the small blind folds. I have 6s8d in the hole. I am being asked to invest 1700 to win the 3700 in the middle. If it was myself on the button in Tony's spot, I would push with any 2 cards, although I imagine Tony might be more patient than myself. However, even if he has an Ace or a King, as long as he doesn't dominate me I unquestionably have the odds to call. I weigh up my options and make the call. Tony has A5 unsuited, so I have about 43% chance of winning the hand. Unfortunately Tony hits his Ace and I am down to 4k and in casualty. I bust out soon after pushing 2d8d into Sonny's pocket rockets in the big blind.
The key point in this hand, is despite me making a correct call odds wise, it is highly likely I am underdog in the hand. If I lose the hand it reduces me from average stack to short stack. In tournaments I think it is sometimes worth giving up the odds, if an adverse outcome will have such a devastating effect on your tournament prospects. In a cash game, it is a call everytime, due to the fact you can go back into your pocket for more ammunition, but at that stage of a freezeout I think I made a poor decision there.
Tony went on to cash in 4th place - food for thought.
Monday is the final of our league, with a Main Event WSOP seat up for grabs. I think I go off about 5th biggest chip stack, so amongst the favourites, but with only one prize anything can happen, and the short stacks will be getting busy early. I have about 5k starting stack, but about 16 players will have 2k or less. There are 36 runners in total.
Goodness knows how work will take me asking for unpaid leave to play the Main Event if I win. In some ways, it would be better for me to get heads up and then offer my opponent the package in return for 50% equity. We shall see.
I won a modest £90 in the cash game after the tournament, so left a happy camper. Slowly but surely I am getting the live cash balance back towards the black......
PROFIT/(LOSS) USD 2008
Live Holdem Tournaments 2,515
Live Holdem Cash (1,501)
Live Omaha 110
Live "Professional" Tournaments (6,316)
Home Games 540
Online Holdem Tournaments 56,628
Online Holdem Cash 17,026
Online Omaha 330
Sundry 854
Rake (4,167)
64,804
USA v Europe - Playing Mentalities
Date: Thu, Jun 19, 2008 Professional
After playing tens of hours of poker in Vegas over the last 2 weeks, I've come to the conclusion that there are marked differences in playing styles on either side of the Atlantic (in the live arena in anycase). Some of these differences I plan to use here in Europe over the next couple of months to see if they work, others I hope to use against the Americans next year in Vegas.
1) Pre-Flop Raising
In European no limit games, 3 or 3.5 times the big blind is the standard raise early in tournaments. In Vegas, this tends to be 2.25 or 2.5 instead. The key to the Vegas mentality is that if a person is going to play their hand, it makes little difference whether the raise is 3 or 2.5 times the blind. Interestingly, the real impact of this strategy, is that continuation bets on the flop, turn and river are reduced exponentially due to the caller having to put less in each time also.
Where this strategy is completely inappropriate, in my opinion, is later in tournaments where antes exist. consider a level at 400-800 with a running ante of 100. If you are in the BB having already invested 900 in the pot and somone opens for 2k, you only need to put in 1.2k to have the chance of winning 4.2k. It needs pretty bad hole cards, to make calling in this spot a bad proposition. Many of the american players did not take antes into account when choosing their opening raises.
Ironically, Vegas tournaments have more ante structures than anywhere else, due to their long, deep stacked structure. However, I think the Americans may have something on the raise sizes without antes, so I plan to try out the smaller raise/smaller continuation bets in the live UK arena over the next month or so and see how it goes. If I get too many callers, I'll re-visit this strategy.
2) Pre-Flop Hand Selection
Live American players seem to love picture cards. Whereas many europeans will play small suited connectors with relish, the US counterparts would prefer QJ, QK, KT etc. Interestingly, the big impact this had on my style, was that KQ no longer played like a trap hand over there. In the UK, when you play KQ you end up playing against AQ and AK. In the US, you are just as likely to be facing KJ and QJ.
3) Pre-Flop Mentality
If the initial raises are smaller in the States, re-raising is more problematic. The tables I played on, re-raised pre-flop as a matter of course. I was re-popped pre-flop by QJ three times during my stay for example. I cannot remember the last time this happened in Europe. Whilst I don't think this strategy is very good, it can be hard to play against as you never know where you are. A re-raise pre-flop in Europe generally means very strong hole cards, in the States in can just mean paint sometimes.
4) Post Flop Action
I experienced people betting strong "only when they had it" during the tournaments I played (except the deranged Equadorians at the Venetian). I am sure this is not true of top American players or the online crew, but I found the games in the US more straightforward than in Europe post flop. It was also very hard (in fact impossible) to get someone to put top pair or an overpair down. Interestingly I was check-raised far less frequently than in Europe.
5) Short Stack Strategy
Live Vegas players tend to wait till they have something of value before pushing the stack in. In several tournaments I pushed all in with nothing 3/4 times in a row when down to 10 BB and had everyone fold. With antes in play this returned me back to a respectable stack. This resulted in an interesting short stack strategy. If you found a player who raised frequently, you could push over the top of him short stacked with nothing and he would tend to fold, hence increasing your short stack much quicker than just stealing the blinds. Several times I snap called short stack all-ins when I assumed they were stealing, only to be shown AA or QQ.
6) Bubble Play
American players seemed more proficient than us at using the bubble time at tournaments to increase their stacks, if they were deep relative to the rest of the table, often taking huge risks 3 betting pre-flop and getting medium stacks to pass.
In summary, I think for now I will just start off trying the smaller pre-flop raises for a while (I really believe this has some merit in non-ante tournaments) and see how that goes, starting with the LC League night tonight. When I return to Vegas, I'll change my tactics after further analysis of the above.
PROFIT/(LOSS) USD 2008
Live Holdem Tournaments 2,625
Live Holdem Cash (1,881)
Live Omaha 110
Live "Professional" Tournaments (6,311)
Home Games 540
Online Holdem Tournaments 56,628
Online Holdem Cash 17,026
Online Omaha 330
Sundry 854
Rake (4,167)
64,539
Vegas Day 9 - That's all folks
Date: Sun, Jun 15, 2008 Professional
It's been a long 10 days at the tables. I just busted out of the Caesar's $500 deepstack on level 8. I made a good start when someone decided to call my all in with KK when they had AJ, but then busted out when I shoved over the top of someone with AA and they called with AQ, and it didn't hold up.
I also won $600 on the cash game last night, but I becoming increasingly grumpy at the tables now, and am not really enjoying the game after over-exposure. I have found myself becoming increasingly aggressive and moody towards young american players, and I guess that means it's time for a break.
Give it a few days and I'm sure I'll be back, but tomorrow I am going to go back to the spa and have a few nice meals out I think.
Next game for me will be back at Loose Cannon, my home ground as it were. I'll probably do some Vegas observations later on as well, because the style of play over here is completely different to England, both in terms of bet sizes, pre and post flop play.
VEGAS MINI P&L (FINAL) (USD)
Big Ticket Events +3165
Crapshoots (315)
Cash Games (200)
Total +2650
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