A Night to Forget....

Well, I knew one of these was possible because I'd seen a couple of guys have them, but I always hoped that I'd be able to avoid it. It was marathon night over at Corey's home game. Most of the night we were short-handed and I was staying around even till around midnight when I took a couple of big hits. It was like I was a boxing opponent of Mike Tyson when he was about 20 years old. There were three different times that I pushed all my chips in and had my opponent dominated only to end up chopping the pot. For instance, I've got AJos, the flop is A, A, 8. My opponent bets and I come over the top all in. He turns over A9os. The turn is a brick and the river is an 8..... so we chop with Aces full of eights. The only other hand that I'll tell you about is the very last hand of the night.... We've actually kicked the game up from $2/$4 No Limit to $5/$10 No Limit. I have 4d, 5d on the button. The small blind bets $20 and there are no callers except me. The flop 4c, 5h, 6d. The small blind bets $20 and I call. The turn is the 5c. The small blind bets $35 and I raise all in. He quickly calls. I turn my boat over.... fives full of fours. He turns his boat over.... fives full of sixes. That or something very close happened about 4-5 times..... It's a wonder that I didn't quit poker..... again!

I only made one New Year's resolution last year..... Not to kill anybody this year. I almost blew it that night!

Jeff's last hand of the night!

It started off rather blah-say, but we're playing just three handed and I had pocket eights! Jeff bet $15 and I raised it to $35. He calls and the flop is 7, 9, 10. He bets $30 and I go all in for about $180 more. He turns over his A, 10 and calls. The turn is a magical Jack! I really didn't sign up to bad beat him, but as it turned out, I was ahead pre-flop.

Oooops... Misread Petey!

I stopped by PKR Wednesday night while the family was tied up with hockey practice and there was another very small crowd there. We were playing five handed with me, Crazy Carl, Petey, JoeBob, and Drunk Paul (I'm not sure people actually call him that, but they probably should). Everytime I've seen him he's been drunk. Probably not the best condition to be in while you're playing poker, but I guess it makes him feel invulnerable. I have noticed that when he plays, he can't determine whether he is speeding or falling off a cliff. So far, everytime I've played with him, he was falling off a cliff. He busted out three times in less than an hour and a half on borrowed money. LOL.

Petey appears to be someone who likes to be the table captain, but the role just doesn't fit for some reason. We're playing $1/$2 No Limit. This particular hand, he raised pre-flop to $12 and JoeBob, Drunk Paul and I called. I've got 7s, 9s and the flop comes 6s, 8s, 9c. I don't think you could get me out of this hand with a handgun. So Petey bets $17, JoeBob calls, Drunk Paul folds, and I raise to $34. Petey calls and JoeBob folds. The turn is 2d. Petey checks and I bet $30. Petey calls. The river is a Ks. Petey bets $45 and I call. He asks if I have a flush, I flip over the 9 high flush and he doesn't even show his cards. LOL. I should have re-raised, but I was a little concerned about a higher flush. But still it was an OK size pot.

I basically won back the $$ that I donkeyed off on Tuesday night. LOL. But I did accomplish one thing that I wanted to... before I left, Eli showed up and I got his business card to see if we can get him to plug into our weekly game. I think he'll like our group. No Drunk Pauls in our group.

Later!

Suck out night @ PKR

Well, last night was not a good night for me at PKR. Everytime I tried to get value for my hand, I got sucked out on. Twice I flopped a straight only to have a higher straight hit on the river. One of those I won anyway as Rick was trying to suck out with a lower 2 pair. Oh, then he mumbles something about my memory and my inability to remember hands correctly for the blog... LOL. Well, I can remember when he is an a##hole. Oh, but then that's all the time so that is not really a challenge is it. LOL.

It was a very non-PKR kind of night. I was one of the first to show up and by 7:30 we only had 5 players. Jason lost with high pair about 5 times and cut his losses and got out of dodge. Then, and just for Rick, in case I don't remember this one correctly...... Bite me! I wasn't at the table when it happened. The "almost" drawing dead hand of the night came with the guy who won all the chips last night and Stone. I can't remember the guys name, he's a pain, let's just call him butthead. Apparently, in my opinion, it appears that, he raised pre-flop to about $18 or so and Stone calls. The flop is A, K, brick. Butthead bets and Stone pushes all in. Butthead immediately called. Well, can you guess what they have? Butthead has pocket rockets and Stone has the case A with a K. When I came back to the table, Stoney was goney and we were playing 3 handed. We did have one other player show up and just for tricky Ricky, I'll tell you about one other suck out that he did on me.

I had pocket deuces and flopped a set, but unfortunately, Tricky Ricky was holding a suited Ad and a 4d came on the turn which was the boards 3rd diamond. The board doesn't pair and as usual, he is extremely proud of his suck out capability and bets $25. I call just to show the room that he indeed is the suck out master.

At this point, I slipped into the donkey mode trying to double up a few times and ran into Slick Rick when I pushed all in with about $40 preflop on a hand that I straddled for $7 when he had pocket 10s! And, of course, no deuce so I moon them and leave. LOL.

How's that for memory? Biatch!

Monday @ PKR....

Another $1/$2 No Limit night @ PKR. I played like a monkey. I made two perfect reads and then, paid them off. I guess I was just tired as I also mis-played my hand one time... actually forgot what my hole cards were and thought they were something that they were not... basically stupid crap. It is amazing that I only lost a little less than $100. But I did make some very nice moves as well. I got paid when a couple of my sets hit because I had made a couple of lame plays early on.

It was a full night. I got there about 6:45 and by 7:00 we had a full table and by 8:00, there were two full tables.

Probably the most memorable hand for me of the night was against 3 players. I had Qc, 10c and the flop was 8c, 9h, Jc. There was a pre-flop raise to about $12 and 3 callers. I was in late position and there was a $20 bet on the flop and one guy called in front of me so I raised to $75 and both called. The turn was brick, 5d. Both checked and I bet $45, they called. I love the Loose/Passive player. There seems to be an abundance of them, too. The river was Ac and both checked. I bet $110 and both called and turned over smaller flushes. LOL.

I do love this game!

PKR - $2/$4 No Limit Friday Night *MONSTER POT*

As described earlier, the largest pot that I've seen at PKR happened this past Friday night. It was, as you'd expect, between Elly (sp?) and Akash. Elly came in earlier and bought in for $400 and made an unbelievably bad all-in call with no hand and very little draw when he busted out and said, "I've got to go, I'll be back in about an hour!" LOL.

This isn't going to be slam Elly post, but I was in the big blind with AKos, I raised it to $15 and there were a couple of callers. The flop was 8, 8, 3.... no bets. The turn was Ah so I bet $50 and Elly pushed all in for about $40 more. I call "hoping" he wasn't slow playing an 8 or pocket 3's. He turns over A, 3 and calls two pair, Aces and threes. Oh well, I turn over A, K for two pair, Aces and eights with a King kicker. Oooops.

At any rate, the biggest pot that I've seen at PKR happened after he returned about an hour later. He had bought in for $400 a couple of times and topped it off once or twice. In this particular hand, he raises it pre-flop to $18 which seems to be standard bet in $2/$4. There are a couple of callers and Akash raised it $50 more and everyone calls. The flop is Kh, Jd, 8d. Akash bets $100 and Elly calls and there is one other caller. The turn is a Ks. Akash bets $100 and Elly pushes all in for about $900 more. Akash deliberates for what seems like an entire season of CSI:Miami but eventually makes the call with nothing but a flush draw. The river is a Queen. Elly turns over K, Q giving him a full-house Kings full of Queens. Nice! Somewhere around $2,500!

At this point, I was up about $800 but was leaving town early Saturday morning, so I just called it a night! I don't know what happened after that.... I'm sure it wasn't boring!

PKR - $2/$4 No Limit Friday Night

What an action night! I was sitting right in the middle of the table and typically like that seat because my vision isn't what it used to be.... LOL. At any rate, there's a pre-flop raise on practically every hand and although there's a full-table, you've got to play a lot of hands or just get run over. I went up a couple hundred dollars within the first hour and then tried to play more hands to trap somebody. Well, it finally worked!

I was on the button between the two most agressive players at the table, Akash and Elly Z. Elly raised it to $12 and there were about four callers. I had Qc, Js and decided to see the flop since I knew the exact cost of that view. The flop was almost perfect: Ah, Ks, 10s. Everybody checked around to me and I decided to make a little value bet of $26 and there were three callers, Elly, JoeBob and Akash. I had already determined that on the turn I was pushing all-in, regardless of the card, but was certainly hoping that it didn't pair the board or complete the flush draw. At any rate, its the 10d. It checks to me and I push in about $250 and Elly folds and JoeBob takes a long time and finally calls. Akash folds and I turn over my straight and JoeBob turns over Qs, 7s which gives him more outs than I had hoped he would have, but after taking as long as he did, I knew he didn't have a boat. So any spade on the river and he wins and any Jack and he chops. I guess $250 was a lot to call for that size pot and those outs, but he did it. Fortunately the river was a brick and took down the pot.

It was also interesting that this was basically the same flop that knocked me out of the tournament last weekend and it was with JoeBob as well. You may remember that he flopped the top set and flopped two pair, Aces and tens. Glad that this one had a different outcome!

Omaha High - Rick Get's the Monkey!

$2/$4 No Limit @ Corey's on Tuesday night and a beautiful hand!

Rick is in position with 7s, 10c, 10d, Jd. There was no pre-flop raise and probably 4-5 players. The flop is 2s, 7c, kd and Jim, in early position, bets $12 and there are two callers and Rick raises to $45. Everyone folds except Rick who only calls. The turn is the 10s and Jim checks and Rick bets $45 and Jim calls. The river is the case 10h. Jim checks and Rick bets $50. Jim takes several minutes, probably suspecting that he's beat, then comments that the pot is too big and he has to call. He turns over pocket deuces giving him the boat, 2's full of 10's. Rick then announces.... "Get the Monkey!" and turns over the quad tens!

Very nice.....

Sometimes the cards are cruel.....

$2/$4 No Limit night at Corey's. We play a mix of Hold 'em and Omaha High. This is a game where you cannot play only good cards or your lunch will get eaten. And Dave is usually the one that is seated at the main seat with silverware in hand. Last night was really not much of an exception. He played rather loose at the beginning and sucked out on me on a couple of big hands and then he played change up all night, moving from periods of betting/raising every pot to not playing any hands for extended periods. There was a big pot with Dave where I flopped the top set on a flop of Ah, Qd, 6s. I bet $21 against a $12 pot and everybody folds but Dave and he just calls and mumbles something about the monkey and a straight flush. LOL. The turn is 9s and I bet $35 and he calls. The river is another spade and he hit his 5 high flush. I'm persuaded there will be a special place in hell for Dave.... LOL.

There were two other big hands for me for the night. Both of them involved Queens. The first happened with Jim. I've got pocket J's and the flop comes 8, 8, J. Not a bad flop for wired Jacks! I check and everybody checks. The turn is 9 and Jim bets $15 and there are a couple of callers. The river is a Queen and Jim bets $17 and I push all in with another $200 but Jim only had $87 and he calls and turns over QQ. He hit the two outer on me. Again.... when to try to get value for your hand and when to take it down. It's a tough question and apparently one that I haven't figured out the answer to just yet.

The second hand happened within 1/2 hour of that hand. We're playing Omaha high now which is a little scarier when slow playing due to the additional outs that everyone has in their hands. At any rate, I've got Q, Q, 10, 7 and the flop hits me big time.... J, J, Q! Jeff is first to act and he bets about $17 and there's one other caller. The turn is 8 and Jeff bets $30 and I call. The river is a brick and Jeff bets $35 and I raise to $70 and Jeff pushes all in. Dave folds and Jeff turns over J, and the case Queen. Talk about a cold, cruel deck!

At any rate, Dave was the big winner last night. Not sure what he won, but he cashed out over $1,100. I played all night and broke exactly even. Sometimes the cards are cruel....

Monday @ PKR.....

I dropped by PKR last evening to play a couple of hours while my wife and son were to be tied up with hockey practice. This is actually turning into a weekly habit for me. There were a couple of significant hands that warrant a post.

The first was basically the same hand from Sunday. The game is $1/$2 No Limit and I was in the big blind and there was a $6 raise. I've got Ac, 10c and call. The flop is 10, 10, 7. I check hoping that someone bets. Everyone checks. The turn is a J. I was really hoping for a card that wouldn't give straight or flush options. The small blind bets $13 and I raise to $45 (approximately the size of the pot). No one calls and the turn is the case 10. Oh, to know when to slow play.

The other hand happened a little later and I was in early position again with pocket nines. There was a $12 raise and there were a couple of callers. The flop was 10, 10, 3. (Yep, the 10's were hot)! I lead out with a $35 bet and only got 1 caller, Nate. The turn was a brick and I checked and Nate checked. The river was another brick and I checked. Nate asked, "How much will you call?" and tossed in $20. I guess I could have taken that as he was hoping that I would meaning that he had the nuts and how much can he bet that I would put in the pot. But, in fact, the way that I interpreted it was how much do I have to bet to get you to go away? Well, $20 wasn't the number. I threw in the $20 and he turned over A, K and I took the pot with 10's and 9's.

There was a huge crowd there last night. I was there before 7 and by 7 we had a full table. Before 8, there were two full tables.

Why I love and hate re-buy tournaments!

Let me give you a great example.... Saturday's tournament at PKR, the very first hand I get wired 10's and the guy under the gun, Jason, raises the $25/$50 blinds to $400 and I re-raise to $1,000. He pushes all in and I call. He's got pocket J's and of course flops a set, turns a boat and rivers a higher boat. So there you go.... both reasons in one example.

PKR - $100/$20 No Rebuys

Well, we started rather short handed with only 8 players. I had been playing pretty conservatively but took a couple of pots. After the break, JoeBob, who will raise or call with practically any two cards raises the $100/$200 blinds an additional $800. I peer down at Ac, 10c and in an uncharacteristic style, call. The flop is A, K, 10. I immediately move all in assuming that JoeBob has a medium pair or an A, no kicker. Oooops. He turns over AA. I'm pretty much drawing dead to runner/runner 10's or I could chop the pot with Q, J. No such luck. So I get to go see the Chronicles of Narnia which turned out to be pretty good.

I'll update when I find out who won the event.

PKR - $50/$5 with Re-buys

I finished 2nd in the tourney today and we chopped rather than play heads up. The hand of the day for me came while we were still in the re-buy period. I had already been drawn out on twice and re-bought for $20/$5 both times. I'm in the small blind when the blinds are $50/$100 and Randy in position 4 raises $250 on top and Brian in position 6 calls. I am getting pretty tired of getting pushed around so I call with Qc, Js and the flop comes 9h, 10c, Qh. I hit the top pair with an open ended straight draw so I immediately push all-in with about $5,000 in chips. Randy is covered and he calls and Brian is covered and he calls too. Care to guess what they have? I went from excited to depressed in a matter of seconds. I thought that I had the best hand and was trying to push out the flush draws. Randy turns over 10d, 10s and Brian turns over Qd, Qs. Neither had hearts but both flopped sets! It is amazing how many times the cards reward the agressive player and the turn straighted all that out when the Kh hits giving me the straight and the river doesn't pair the board so I triple up and go on to finish 2nd in the tournament to a rather flustered Jason.

He played a great tournament and was the short stack with 5-6 players at the table for about an hour. He must have gone all in 10 times or more. He did double up on Quinlan when Jason's big slick off suit spiked a King against Quinlan's QQ. Quinlan wasn't happy.

There was one other monster hand that Jason got just about as lucky as one person can get.... he calls Randy's all in. Randy has AQos and Jason has A3os. The flop is Q, 3, 5. The turn is a 7 and the river is the two outer.... 3.

So I guess we'll go give the $120 a shot on Sunday!

The power of 7h, 2h

Have you ever been looking at cards and just KNOW that they are going to hit. You don't know exactly how, but you just KNOW it. Well, I've seen it happen quite a few times, but two of them really stand out.

Once was a couple months back at Corey's game. Bryce folded pocket deuces to a big bet and he showed them me before he mucked them. I immediately looked at him and said, "you know they're going to hit like a banchee, right?" Well, the flop.... the other two deuces. LOL.

This past week at Corey's, I'm near the button is $2/$4 No Limit and have a look at 7h, 2h. There's about a $12 raise and I show them to Rick and tell him, I know they're going to hit. But I do the right thing and muck them. You guessed it, the flop was 7c, 7d, 7s. The raiser immediately pushed all in.

Food doesn't even taste the same anymore.

No Prisoners.....

Well, I've learned my lesson and I am not happy about the cost of the lesson. There have been quite a few times over the past months at the poker table when my "good heart" has let someone slide for the full cost/value of my poker hand. It could be any one of countless reasons that I have done it. They look pitiful, their car is in the shop, they're between jobs, their cat has diarrhea, they're a good friend. I could go on, but you get the point. I get the monster hand and instead of getting paid, I let them have the free ride and sometimes even chop the pot with them only to have them a little later in the night grab me by the back of my neck and with no kiss, no dinner and no lubricant.... well, you get the picture. LOL. No more..... if you see my cards, you'll be paying the price.

Oh, and by the way, don't be surprised if I don't get excited about it.

You know who you are.....

There are a couple of guys who play in games with me on a fairly regular basis who, let's just say, are not on my list of favorite people.... which is probably OK, since I am pretty certain they don't go play poker to spend time with me. I don't necesarily understand their disdain for me, but I can't see how they live with themselves. LOL. At any rate, we all probably have one or two of these guys and everytime they're in a pot, it makes you want to play the hand even more and so you spend an extra second or two trying to make the 7-2os look powerful enough to come back over the top! You know, you'd rather bad beat these guys out of $2 than win a $100 pot from anyone else. I don't really know how they go about getting to the top of this ever-so-popular list, but they have found their way to the top!

Last night at PKR I was fortunate enough to have them both at the same table. A veritable dream come true only to be cut short by family obligations. I love earning pots against these guys. Just before I left I entered a hand against the weaker of the two players with 9-4os playing $1/$2 No Limit when he raised to $12 pre-flop. There was one other caller and flop came 10, 9, 3 with two diamonds. He bet $16 on the flop and everyone folded to me. The turn was an Ah and he bet $23, I called. The river was a 7d and he bet $23 and I raised $75 more. He folded. My night complete... I cashed out and went to meet my lovely wife and son for dinner! Life is grand!

WSOP - My Biggest Error!

Yep. I can point right at it. Thursday night at the cash game in the poker room. It's not mis-playing a hand or bluffing at the wrong pot, it's leaving the table. I'm probably up about $400 and most of that had come within the last 20 minutes. I need to make a phone call and get up and instead of leaving my chips on the table, decide to take them with me and go back to the room for a moment. Definitely my biggest mistake of the week!

When I get up, Jeff B, moves from his seat to the one that I am vacating and when I returned about an hour or so later.... he was up about $1500! He definitely was a card rack and playing well along with it. And he even got a bigger payout when I returned. He had pocket JJ in late position and the flop was a JJ7. There was a guy to his immediate left betting into him with pocket 99. The turn was a 9 and that only increased the guys betting ferver. Jeff smooth called him both times. When the river brick hits, the guy makes a bet and Jeff pushes all in and the guy calls with about $500 or so in front of him. What a dream come true!

So.... Jeff says "Get the monkey!"

WSOP Dec 2

Day 2 was better than day 1 for me in terms of the tourney. Same tournament details.... $500/$60 and the details were traveling around the group. There were 299 entries making a total payout of $149,500 and that they would be paying 28 positions. Unfortunately for me, prone wasn't one of them. LOL.

I had AA get cracked after 2 hours and I did get down to 1 individual chip two different times. At the dinner break, I had about $3,100 in chips and was one of the shorter stacks remaining but at that point there were only about 60 people left I knew it was going to be tough for me to survive through 30 people with the blindsand the antes going up rapidly.

There were a couple of very interesting hands that happened during Day 2. I had the same cards in the same position two different times with almost identical board cards, but with different outcomes. At one point, I had rebuilt my chip stack to about $2,100 and had 86os in the big blind. Everyone folds and small blind limps in. I check and the flop is 8, 6, 6. The small blind checks and I bet $500. He calls and the turn is Q. He checks and I check. The river is a 9 and he goes all in having hit his open ended draw. I took that pot with my boat. The second happened a little later when again, I had 86os. I'm the big blind and everyone folds to the little blind who limps in. The flop is 6, 4, 4. I bet $500 and he calls. The turn is Q and we both check. The river is an 8 and the small blind bets $1,000. I knew he had me beat, but I called and he had hit his open ended with the 5, 7 as well. I knew that I should have bet the turn, but just checked because of the over card. Dang, I hate poor play on my part and that was one of the weakest hands of my week.

The hand that crippled me Day 2 was another giant suck out. I had A-10 on the button and bet $500 with $100/$200 blinds. I get one out of position caller. The flop is Ah, 10d, 5s. I bet $1,000 and he moves all in. I call and he turns over A, 5. He rivers a 5.

The hand that busted me out was of course, AA. I pushed all in with only about $1,500 left in chips and had two callers, KJ and KQ. I like it! But unfortunately for me, the flop hit everybody but me with JQ7 and the turn was another J. So there you go.

Back to the cash game! I did meet a great guy there. His name is Mike Hefner and he was actually seated with Jeff B in the first $500 tourney and Jeff pointed me out to him and he introduced himself to me. He is a purple heart recipient withthe military in Special Forces out of Fayetteville. He is recovering from a gunshot wound that he received in July in Iraq. He's still in physical therapy now and will be for a while. He was on a rush and I when I sat down at his table, he had about $3,000 in front of him from a $400 buy-in. I am now including him on our weekly poker game at ITX. I played for about 7 hours only to break even at the table. And some of that was my fault from playing 2 particular hands very soft. I hate it when I do that.

All in all though, I really enjoyed the trip and I did learn a lot. The primary thing that I learned is that I don't believe that I'll play in the $300 or the $500 buy-in tourneys again. I believe that my money would be better invested in the $1000 or even the $10,000 buy-in events in order to weed out some of the poorer quality players. I'll be back!

WSOP Dec 1

Well, my first day was..... expensive! I flew into Philadelphia to save some $$ on the flight. The flight to Philly was $100 and the flight into AC was $300. I was a little late arriving so I had no time to make any arrangements for the trip over so I had to just grab a cab. The price, $175. I told him that if I paid him $175, we'd have to play hold 'em in the car on the way over. He dropped the price to $150, but that was still more than I wanted to pay. Yes, I guess I'm cheap by nature. At any rate, I arrive in time and actually go through the casino at the Showboat on my way down to the tournament area. I stopped off long enough to play a few hands of one of my favorite casino games, 3 Card Poker. It's pretty much all luck and apparently I caught it at the right time as I plopped down $75 and hit a 30 to 1 payout with trip 10s. Now we're talking.

Today's tourney is $500/$60 No Limit Hold 'em with no rebuys. We get $1500 in chips with blinds starting at $25/$50 which I believe too few chips for this buy-in. In talking to others later, I wasn't the only one who felt that way. It almost felt like a shoot-out.

I get to the table and unfortunately didn't last long. I got pocket AA and pre-flop got all-in against QQ and JJ only to have the JJ hit a set on the river. Ouch! I said, "Damn, that's a suck out just like back home!" The table got a good laugh but I was pretty much crippled. I got JJ a couple hands later only to run into QQ that held up for him.So.... Off to the cash game. I met some great people there. It is funny though that there seemed to be a lot of red-necks there. It was an extremely small poker room that seemed to get very hot and stayed that way. I played at the $2/$5 table and while I didn't win a ton, I stayed up the entire night. I finally cashed out around 3AM and was up about $300. That plus my trips at the 3 Card Poker table basically paid for the trip and day one.