2 for 3 in the miniFTOPS

Date: Wed, May 12, 2010 Internet

I've had some success this time around in the miniFTOPS. Started off a bit shaky with an exit in hour three of Event #1. I felt a bit dejected because I was playing pretty well and a $22 buy-in coupled with the bad week I had leading up to it was eating into my Full Tilt bankroll.

Things turned around in Event #5, the $10+$1 rebuy. I manage to get through the first hour with a minimal buy-in of $31 and have a stack of around 15K. Once again I play well and do actually get lucky in a hand when I push AQ and run into QQ. I river an ace and build my stack. I lasted into the 6th hour losing KK to AQ when he lands running Qs to cripple my stack. I get A8o all-in a few hands later and exit 366th. I made $124 quadrupling my buy-in.

The next day, Sunday, I decided to play the $33 Event #9, which is the big Sunday miniFTOPS event and had 14396 runners. I play well again, managing to make timely folds when I just didn't feel right about certain hands in multi-way pots and more times than not my uneasiness was justified. With 52K in chips, a loose player raises in front of me and I have TT. I've seen him raise like this a few times and figure he's just making a move to gain chips, so I push in. Unfortunately, the BB wakes up and calls me. As does the Early Position player. BB has QQ and original raiser has KK. Flop comes 988 with a turn of 7, so I'm praying for a T, J or 6, but none come. I finish 674th for $114, another money finish.

I keep seeing those $75K+ first place prizes, but I can't even get to the Final Table.

I'll be writing a series of articles and posting them here as well as at ITH and IPR. There focus will be about micro and low buy-in tournaments with guarantees and the opportunities they provide you.

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World Series of Poker Satellites

Date: Wed, Apr 28, 2010 Internet

I've never played in the World Series of Poker. I've always wanted to but for one $10,000 is a lot to part with, especially someone like myself with a modicum of talent and no real live tournament experience. Certainly there are a lot of satellites out there, but therein lies another problem....I've never been a good satellite player. In fact I could imagine myself squandering a ton of money and still never quite getting there.

Full Tilt

Party Poker



Bodog Poker

bwin Poker



Cake Poker



Everest Poker



Carbon Poker

Good Luck on your journey.

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Bubble, bubble, Toil and Trouble....

Date: Thu, Apr 22, 2010 Internet

Call me bubble boy. Call me Mr. Almost.

It's been a tough road these past few weeks. I've had a lot of money bubbles and Final Table bubbles lately. Certainly, I seem to have cashed some, but the bubbles have been stacking up:

• Four 6th place finishes in $2 and $3 27-person SnGs
• One 19th and one 20th places finish in Stars $4/180s
• 10th in a $2 Rebuy on Full Tilt with 480 runners
• 14th in the Full Tilt Daily Dollar Rebuy with 4200 runners

Despite not being able to get over the hump [and not being able to close out my multi-table SnGs with a win], I've managed to make a small profit these past two weeks.

Just need to remain focused and eventually, I'll push through.

Good luck at the tables!

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Sporadic Play while on the Road

Date: Fri, Apr 2, 2010 Internet

Visiting in-laws and family tends to detract from adequate poker playing time altogether. I like spending time with my relatives and let's face it, as I age, so do they, so the more time the better. Old stories that I remember, new stories they remember.

I've seen a ton of movies though. A lot of stuff I wouldn't pick out myself, but some that is agreeable. Some that stand out:

• All Hat with Keith Carradine
• Storm of the Century by Stephen King
• Zombieland with Woody Harrelson

Poker has been relegated to a few Daily Dollar rebuys on Full Tilt [one of which I ended prematurely with a hefty stack because I was getting very sick], a few PL O/8 MTTs on Stars and a cash game run of NL5 on FTP. Nothing substantial. Still miffed about getting sick when running well. :(

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Poker on the Road

Date: Wed, Mar 24, 2010 Internet

I like to visit my mother-in-law. She lives in a small town of 40 some people called Helmer along Idaho State Highway 8. Three miles to the west is Deary with a population of around 300. But anything resembling a chain store is simply non-existent. Certainly Helmer has a very fine cafe with, and I'm going to sound bias here, the best damned hamburgers anywhere. My mother-in-law owns the place and I tend to gain about 5 pounds of blubber every week I'm there. Moscow or Lewiston are roughly 30 and 45 minutes away, respectively. Certainly these cities have "modern conveniences" and chain outlets, but there is something to small town life that is so appealing and comforting....as long as I can get into my non-smalltown comfort zone.

You see, I like playing poker. But in Idaho? I can go to an Indian Casino, but for some reason they don't spread poker. Oh, they'll do slots and weird table games [plus a few automated blackjack tables], but no poker with the exception of "for fun" games. So the internet is my life-line when up here to real for money poker.

The problem had always been, however, the geographic location of my mother-in-laws town and home. Nestled between two hills with satellite towers, Helmer was excluded from both as neither tower has line of sight to Helmer and neither overlap Helmer. For the longest time, the populace of Helmer were truly stuck in the early 20th century. They'd manage the big 3 stations on television as well a few locals that would penetrate due to the modern convenience of rabbit ears. Internet was even more archaic up to about 2006. I was literally stuck with 14.4 connection over-the-telephone connecting speeds. Yeah. Not a single one of my poker sites would run on my laptop because of the constant speed interruptions. I'd had enough. In 2006 my wife and I convinced my mother-in-law to get DirectTV to come in and set up a node in Helmer. The people were ecstatic. The cafe is now the local internet hotspot. The townsfolk all have access to the service.

More importantly....I have access to high-speed internet. In fact I'm updating my blog from here now. I get poker in every day I want while here. Indeed, I can do my work at InternetTexasHoldem.com from here and I have been. Life is good here in Helmer.

Now, if I could only figure out a small-town solution to the badbeats I've been suffering....

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Staying Patient

Date: Tue, Mar 9, 2010 Internet

Well, I wasn't exactly patient, but it paid off. So I had time Saturday to play some MTTs and SnGs. There is a real dearth for good low buy-in MTTs at Cake Poker, so rather playing above my comfort level [or playing a satellite for a Sunday MTT I couldn't play], I decided on sprinkling in some 30-person SnGs from Cake with the MTTs I played.

I decided on a Deepstack $2 and $2 rebuy on Full Tilt. I added an $8 Stars $5,000 Guarantee and $4 Stars $2,000 Guarantee. Finally, I loaded up a $1 Cake 30-person and settled into playing some poker. All I managed from this first burst of energy was a 73rd in the Deepstack for a $3.84 prize. Way behind. I managed two final tables in Cake $1 30-person SnGs, but that didn't pay as 8th and 10th is out of the money. This made me sick to my stomache. I hit the final table at 2/10 and 1/10 only to suffer some bad beats. I had loaded up a $6 Bounty 30-person SnG on Cake right after I busted the deepstack MTT on Full Tilt, finishing 13/30 with nary a bounty.

This is where I decided to chase my losses. I loaded up my final stab at winning by loading another $6 Bounty 30-person SnG on Cake. Nothing was going right. I don't know why, but I don't seem to collect bounties in KO MTTs. I managed, finally, to catch a shorter stack, and get a bounty, but I figured that was it, I'd lose $3.60. A combination of poor hands and aggressive opponents kept me from being able to make a move while I still had FE. The other telling blow was losing a pot to a shorter stack. Anyway, I was down to about 3 BB when I pushed K2, getting called in two places and managing to triple. I started rolling it up a bit and managed getting to the final table with a bit more than 22K which set me up with 11 BBs. I started getting dealt a few hands, but the key hand was flopping the nut flush versus a K-high flush. When we got 4-handed, I started pushing almost everything. I was so short with basically 5 BBs for 3-4 orbits. I get all-in vs the two chipleaders and triple. Then I hit two back-to-back hands against the former chip leader and move into a commanding position over the final two. 2nd player knocks out 3rd setting up the final see-saw battle heads-up. He was really awful. I could raise him off most anything and he either limped or folded his SB. I finish winning the SnG for $36 and 4 bounties. Overall, I only made a bit over $8, but it was gratifying.

Monday I played some cash games. Once again, I am struggling with NL4 at Cake. I managed to lose $7.16 [almost two buy-ins!]. Oddly enough, however, I did well enough at Poker Host [now on the Merge Network with Carbon Poker/PDC Poker]. I finished up $11.48 at a NL10 cash table. Overall win. Just wish I could figure out Cake.

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NL Cash Games

Date: Sat, Mar 6, 2010 Internet

I've been running in opposite direction with Cake Poker and PokerStars. It's starting to even out. Early in the year when I switched from Fixed Limit to No Limit, I was doing quite well at Cake in NL4. I was, however, getting beaten up on a daily basis in my NL5 games at PokerStars. Of course, it's simply too small a sample size to draw any real conclusions.

I got tagged with a big 3 buy-in loss at Stars in early February which was the reason for my hideous ptBB/100, but Wednesday and Thursday say me bring my ptBB/100 to -0.59, which is a far cry from where it was.

On the Cake side of things, I had a big positive ptBB/100 with a nice 2 buy-in win in late January. A couple of average days and my ptBB/100 was running well. I'm settling into an average which has brought the curve down to a respectable 2.44 ptBB/100, but I'm not happy with this. If I can't utterly flog my competition at NL4, I'm going to have a very long process earning my bankroll up to higher NL levels.

As I stand now, I'll need to win another 10 buy-ins at NL5 at PokerStars to move up to the next level, which is NL10. If I do well enough in my tournaments and SnGs this week, I could be playing there next week. Of course, if I don poorly, it'll set me back. I've got a long way to go at Cake Poker, however, so I'm not in a hurry there.

Other than PokerStars, Full Tilt and Poker Host [Cake Poker Network] are nearing a bump up in levels.

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Close but no cigar

Date: Tue, Mar 2, 2010 Internet

Fresh off of Sunday's success I managed to get some 180s and 90s played before bedtime. Don't know if I was just running bad or going for the chip accumulation and push to the final tables, but in 2 of the 180s I finished 19th. Call me bubble boy. I also managed a 20th in a 90. Overall loss of just over $25. I think I played well enough. Did have a hand in one of them that really blew my mind. I had AA and raised from UtG. Folded to some novice [literally, this was the 2nd MTT/SnG he played on the site] and he flats me. Flop comes KJ2, two diamonds. He checks and I C-bet to just a bit over pot. He pushes. This really has me wondering, but he's showing 80/26/Inf for stats after 54 hands. I call. He has J8o. You know how this story goes. Running diamonds and I'm history.Certainly he still has non-running-diamond outs, but c'mon now. Does it really have to get this stupid?

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SnGs and MTTs

Date: Mon, Mar 1, 2010 Internet

Friday, February 26th - Multi-table SnGs. I played two $2 90-person SnGs and a 27-person SnG at PokerStars. I also played two $1 90-person SnGs at Full Tilt and a 30-person SnG at Cake. Didn't do well overall. Busted the bubble of one of the Full Tilt SnGs. I did manage a final table appearance at a 90-person PokerStars SnG, but finished in 9th when I ran QQ into AK and lost the flip. Overall lost $5.40 for my trouble.

Sunday, February 28th. Ah MTTs. Haven't played many lately. Last time I played was on 7th of February and I didn't do very well. What a difference a few weeks make. I managed a 6th place finish in a Full Tilt 180-person scheduled tournament for $79.20. I also managed a 179th place finish on PokerStars' $7,500 Guarantee, which was a bit more than $10. Finally, I decided to play a bit more poker after dinner and landed a 17th place finish in a 8-Max, $2,000 Guarantee tournament. I was so dead in this tournament at one point. I had roughly 25K in chips when I pushed with QQ and was called by AKo by a slightly shorter stack. He managed to outflip me and there I was saddled with 3500 chips and blinds of 800/1600 fast approaching. I doubled when K8 beat AK. Before I knew it I was up to around 100K at one time. Card dead in abundance, aggressive opponents led me down to around 10BBs. I get all-in on a J high flop with AJ versus QJ, but he hits a 3-out Q to knock me out. Easily could have made another final table without that beat there. Overall, I profited by $81.21, so I'm happy overall. Let's hope the next time I play some MTTs that I can hit some more final tables and actually win one.

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Single Table Woes

Date: Thu, Feb 25, 2010 Internet

I ran bad on Tuesday in single table SnGs. Managed a 3rd on a Bodog Beginner which paid $4.00, but didn't cover both Bodog buy-ins. A PDC Poker $2 ended in a 7th place finish. Added to that was a final table appearance on a 3-table Stars $3. I finished 8th, a few spots from the money.

Wednesday was much better. I managed to load up a Full Tilt $1 90-person and a $2 90-person on PokerStars. The Full Tilt tournament SnG ended very badly. I had a good size stack at about 14K versus 200/400 blinds when a loose guy in the cutoff decided to push all-in with his ~6700 chips. I was dealt KK on the button and there was a rather loose player in the small blind. I figured if I just call, he's coming along and I don't want a raggy ace in with me. So I push all-in to isolate. SB snap calls and yup, he has AA. That's been happening a lot lately. But nothing I can do. In any case I'm probably seeing all my chips gone no matter how it gets played preflop.

So I concentrate on my sole 90-person SnG at PokerStars. I run very well in this. I get KK beat by Q3 at one point and am left with 370 chips far from the money. I push my next hand K8o and manage to double up on AK. Next hand I get AK and double again versus JJ. In fact, between my aggression and picking my spots I get to the final table in 6th position. I start raising, pushing and beating up the table. A few times I knock people out, a few times short stacks get my number. In the end I go out 4th for a decent profit. I get KdJd in the SB. The BB is a bit of a weird player. He's aggressive int he wrong spots, passive in the wrong spots and generally hard to read. After two folds, I limp, which is about as horrible a play as I can make here. I really should have raised. He raises 3x and I flat the raise, another mistake. Flop comes 643 with two diamonds. I push. He snap calls with Ac3c. Now, I think this is a horrible call by him, but he made it and I didn't manage to pick up any of my 15 outs. Not that this isn't the normal outcome anytime I have a strong draw....I suck at draws for some strange reason. I just shook my head atthe call, but what can you do?

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More SnG Fun

Date: Tue, Feb 23, 2010 Internet

I played 14 SnGs on Saturday and two yesterday [all I could fit in]. Sunday was an off day. I played four at Cake winning a $1 Single table and placing 2nd in a 3 table $1. I lost a little coming in 3rd in a Bodog Beginner $2 and finishing out of the money in the other. I did basically the same at PDC Poker. I placed 2nd in a Full Tilt $1 SnG, which allowed me to profit a bit despite a 8th place finish in the other. The final four were at Lock Poker [Cake skin] where I did dismally in 3 single table $1 and got crushed in a $1 three-table. Showed an overall profit of about 3 buy-ins, so I'm not really complaining here.

Monday I played in two Bodog Beginner $2 SnGs, taking 2nd in one and 8th in the other. I had KK beat in the one I monied by 94o which left me at 340 chips vs 25/50 blinds. I climbed out of that hole and knocked out players 3 and 4. Chip leader had me down 3:1 and at one point we were near even when my KK ran into his 93o on a 338 flop. Heads-up lasted about 20 minutes before I lost with K5s all-in vs A8o. Still managed a miniscule profit.

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Grinding 12 SnGs

Date: Sat, Feb 20, 2010 Internet

I might have quit after 8 SnGs, but I felt I shouldn't quit while I was ahead and playing well. I decided for some split action. Play half my SnGs in the Bodog Poker $2.20 Beginner SnGs and half at the $3.40 PokerStars SnGs. I ran into a lot of problems at Bodog. Some real weird turn of events. I won't bore you with all of the details, but there was definitely one hand that sticks out.

I get 75s on the button on a real limpy table. After two limpers, I decide to just limp behind and see a flop. I thought about raising, but one of the limpers liked to limp and then push all-in if someone raised behind and I felt like playing the pot for as little initial investment as possible. BB checks. Flop comes 7T7 rainbow. BB checks and the first limper makes a 30 chip stab at the 120 chip pot. Other limper calls. I raise it up to 200. BB folds. Both limpers think about it for a few seconds, but both call. Turn is a T. This is a crappy card for me obviously. It took no time whatsoever to decide what I was doing when first limper pot bet and second limper shoved. I knew second limper had a T. I folded and first limper called. First limper had T5o, second had QTo. I thought about getting sick. Between the two of them, they had 1 out.

Overall, I lost a buy-in at Bodog, finishing 3rd twice and 4th once.

PokerStars was much different. I finished 2nd three times for a $3.90 [bit more than buy-in] profit. I could never close the deal though. I'm a bit worried in that when I get HU I tend to have a severe chip disadvantage. I know I can play back into the lead and win, but in 3 HU finishes I got it in good twice and lost. The third time I ran A4s into AA. That's never a good idea. :)

I'm not complaining, however. One such SnG I ran AKs into QQ and didn't improve. I was down to 5th of 5 with 390 chips. The guy I lost that hand to got KK twice and JJ once in the next five hands. I beat him with AJ, AQ and KT, knocking him out. That's a lot of luck there.

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Another Set of 6 Bodog Beginner SnGs

Date: Fri, Feb 19, 2010 Internet

Still playing the $2+$0.20 Beginner Bodog SnGs. Started off pretty horribly. I quickly ran decent hands into better hands after getting initial reads off players, One such was a player who called a 5xBB bet preflop from another player with 75o. He doubled when he flopped two pair vs JJ. I ran AQs into his AK. I know, I know. Never go broke with AQ. Sigh.

Another poor choice and another SnG down. I loaded up another pair bringing me up to my 6.

Meanwhile 2 of my originals went pretty well. The first saw me lose raising AKs first in while 6 handed. Shorter stack pushes on me [I have him covered by 380 chips]. I snap call and he shows J8o. Flop comes Q75, 2 on turn, 8 on river. Smacked. I push next hand with K4o. I get called by A8. This time I double. A few hands later I get all-in with QJs and triple. Managed to salvage a bad situation. Long story short, I end up 3 handed. Chipleader has a massive stack. He's pushing every hand, but I'm sitting on a stack of 2200 chips with 200BB, so I have 11 BBs. The 3rd player gets impatient and calls with Q8o. Chipleader has AQ and stacks him. He continues to bully me. I pick up A8s and limp [complete]. He pushes I call, he shows A4 and I double. He has about 10K to my 5K. I lay in wait again and wait for him to push. This time I'm on KQo and he pushes Q4. I double again. He now slows down and I win a few small pots by 3-betting his completions. I get AKs and complete, He decides to push and I call. He shows J8o. Rivers a J to double. Uggh. I go down a few hands later when my A5s goes down to his A3o. 2nd.

The other original table sees me dominate from start to finish. I knock a player out on hand 3 and never look back. Certainly get challenged a few times, but overall, this table is easily manipulated and I cruise into the top finish.

My two added SnGs go horribly awry. I bust KK into AA in one and finish 10th. The other I manage to get nothing going. Flop top pair with KQ on K84 flop and villain has 84. Did manage to save my stack. Later I lose to same villain when I flop a set of 3s. He flops a set of 7s.

Overall $11 profit, but $13.20 in buy-in/fees. Running ROI through 12 SnGs: -5.30%. Still real early for my SnG play this year. Let's see how it is at year's end.

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Bodog Poker's Beginner Sit and Gos

Date: Thu, Feb 18, 2010 Internet

I like Sit and Gos [SnGs] because they allow for a lot of poker action in a large variety of situations. You get the early stages, the mid-stage where being good at bubble play is important and the late stage where, hopefully, you get heads-up with another opponent for the top prize. Certainly, SnGs don’t pay the top positions nearly as much as a real deep final table run in a multi-table tournament, but the added benefits of SnGs more than make up for the larger fields of MTTs. Good SnG players can make a good living at poker and most of the time with less variance than the typical tournament grinder.

An added benefit of a SnG is the field size and start times. Heads-up, 6-Max, fullring and anywhere from 1 to 20 tables are all available to the SnG player. The ultimate benefit, however, is the start times. You register, wait for the SnG to fill up with opponents and start play. There is no necessity to put the family on hold for that special 8PM tournament you like. You don’t have to worry if that late breakfast with your dad is going to make you late for that morning’s $100 rebuy. In the era of high-speed internet connections and rapid lifestyles, SnGs are the ultimate in plug-and-play poker.

This brings me to Bodog Poker’s “Beginner” Sit and Gos. When I first found their Beginner SnGs I initially thought that players would only have access to them for a limited amount of time after signing up for a new Bodog Poker account and depositing. This is not the case.

The name is a bit of a misnomer. They are listed as “Beginner” SnGs due to the very different prize structure. Rather than pay out to the top 3 spots as per traditional SnGs, the Beginner SnGs pay out the top 5 spots of players [10-person tables]. This is very user-friendly for players who are new to SnGs….and to good players who are looking for a little less variance. I know what you are thinking. Aren’t these basically just Double or Nothing SnGs where the top 5 players earn double their buy-in sans fee? On the surface, yes. The top half of finishers get prize money, while the bottom half do not. Where they vary is in the payouts.

In a Beginner single table Sit and Go, the prize pool is split 30%-25%-20%-15%-10% paying out 1^st to 5^th, respectively. Players get less variance, but at the small cost of less of the prizepool when they finish in the top two positions. The added benefit of the Beginner SnGs is consolation prize money when they hit 4^th or 5^th place.

So how do Beginner level SnGs compare to regular SnGs? If you were to play ten $2 SnGs of each type and finished in each of the 10 possible positions, both SnGs would garner you a return of $20. This would give you a Return of Investment [ROI] of -9.09% in each type of tournament. Keep in mind that even though you won as much in prizepool as you paid into it, you gain a net loss of $2 because that is how much you paid in fees to play. Now, let’s switch it up a bit. You play ten $2 regular SnGs and ten $2 Beginner SnGs. This time you win twice, finish 2^nd and 3^rd once each and finish 4^th twice and 5^th once in each. The other 3 times you finish somewhere between 6^th and 10^th. Here is what your results would look like:

You’d make an extra $1 in profit playing the regular SnGs under this example with an ROI of 36.36% compared to 31.82% for the Beginner SnGs. However, just finish one more time in 5^th place and the ROI for the Beginner SnGs increases to 40.91%. These “bubble” finishes in regular SnGs won’t pay off like they will in the Beginner SnGs.

Like anything else, players need to find what they are comfortable with. I like both regular and Beginner SnGs. The key, however, is that Beginner SnGs are only available at Bodog Poker, so when I play there I like having the opportunity to play them.

Single table Beginner SnGs are available in the following buy-ins: $2+$0.20, $4+$0.40, $8+$0.80, $16+$1.60, $32+$3.

Beginner SnGs are also available in 2-Table $4+$0.40 and 3-Table $2+$0.20 variety, paying 8 and 10 places, respectively.

I played a set of 6 of the $2+$0.20. I managed to win $14, meaning a measly $0.80 profit. For having not played any SnGs in probably 2 or 3 months, I'm happy with the roughly 6% ROI. Let's see how I do in the future!

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