High On Poker

It is official. The Donkeys Always Draw Special Omalympics is here. The room has not been set up yet, so await a future announcement. Tentative date is Wednesday, January 11, 2006 at 9PM.

Free money down the drain. Maybe you fucktards are right. Last night I finished my PSO promotion through Gaming Club. I am now trying to withdraw that money, which has been slightly more than difficult.

In the meanwhile, I decided to work on my free money at Royal Vegas. Not heeding my readers’ advice, I stuck with 2/4, under the misguided belief that my bankroll at Royal, $79, could take it. 20 BBs lost later and I’ve busted out. Ouch! I was sitting to the immediate right to a Luckbox of Biblical proportions. I decided to play it loose and follow up if I hit the board, which would be a great strategy given his decision making. However, it was a terrible decision given his inordinate amount of luck. I mean, dude calls me down with J4 every street. I hit 2 pair on the river which gives him a baby straight! That was the last hand I played. It’ll probably be the last hand I play there for a while.

So, now what? I’m going to try some SNGs to see if that helps the bankroll. I’m also considering doing the final VPP promotion that I am eligible for, Poker Time. I’m hesitant because I may want to first work off some of my dormant Titan Poker bonus. I’ve always done well there and I may want to focus on Rio SnGs, which are 6-person $20 stakes, with 3 out of 6 places paying. Folks, I can’t say it enough. Check out VPP. Not only are the free stuff, like gift certificates and DVDs, awesome, but the people who work there are solid upstanding people. That and their bonuses are easier to earn than PSO. There really is no reason not to check it out.

I’m working on getting a new poker site to offer a private freeroll for HighOnPoker readers. Of course, if/once that is finalized I’ll publicize it and encourage all bloggers to spread the word. After all, it isn’t about keeping it small and tight, but including as many people as possible in an environment where online poker meets the socialness of live poker. Live poker with a bunch of sarcastic, smack talking buddies.

I have to go concentrate on my SNG now. It’s about time I stop losing. This shit is getting played out.

Damnit! I just can’t take it any more. If you look at two posts before this, I set my goal for 2006 at $1800 for the year. This began a string of discussion about moving up in limits and bankroll management.

I am by no means an expert at either thing. But I have my opinion and I am the master of my domain so you have little choice but to read it or move on. Here we go…

I believe HIGHLY in the Limit Challenge Structure, which originated, as far as I know, from DoubleAs. If you have not seen it, please click the link on the right side of the page under Notable Posts.

I estimate that I have a $300 bankroll. It may be more and it may be less. Under the Limit Challenge, I should be playing 1/2. However, in order to earn my Gaming Club bonus, I’ve had to play 2/4. I will return to 1/2 now, because bankroll management is the 2nd most important factor in being a successful poker player. The first is general poker skill.

I do not believe in arbitrarily moving up in limits without first running the bankroll up at the lower limits. It would be very easy for me to put an extra $500 online and go after the higher games. However, I feel that to justify that sort of gambling, I have to earn my way there. I earn my way there by beating the lower stakes.

Never having played anything higher than 3/6 online, I can’t say for certain that players at 10/20 are any better or worse. My thoughts, though, are that they are probably more similar than different. The difference with those players are that they have more money to gamble. Some will be great players that have worked there way there, whereas others are donkeys with money to burn or gambling habits to feed.

So, there it is. I do not believe that you need $1000 to play 2/4. Sorry Wes. If you loose 250 big blinds (4 x 250 = 1000), then you shouldn’t be playing 2/4 in the first place. PLUS, once you lose 150 or so (4 x 150 = 600), then you should slow down and play within THAT bankroll. Put plainly, I think that $1000 for 2/4 is overly cautious. Now, overly cautious is 1000x bigger than too risky. But I’m looking for the happy medium.

Comments? Inquiring minds would like to know.

Two posts in two hours? Yeah, I know. But this is something I’d like to write about. Here goes:

Daddy has packed up Snailtrax. The rumors were going about a month ago, but it seemed like he decided to stick it out. I linked to him very recently and when I followed the link, everything was different. Apparently a porn site took over his URL.

The today DoubleAs put up a post about wanting to quit his blog. I could tell that DoubleAs’ postings have changed. I didn’t realize that he was holding back stuff for his book, but that is apparently part of the cause. The other cause seems to be boredom.

I’ve said it before and I’ll say it again: Blogs are like literary masterbation. There really is no purpose other than self gratification. I don’t get paid, per se, for this. Okay, I have been making a little from ads and referrals, but it is definitely more a drop in a bucket then a rainstorm.

I don’t get any accolades really for this either, aside from some readers comments and the occassional compliment.

So what the hell do I get from this stinkin’ blog? Honestly, I don’t know. I was thinking about an odd subject yesteday. What if one of the bloggers I knew suddenly passed away? Would I mourn them? I would, but it may even turn me off of the whole blogging thing. Surely, there are better ways to spend me time.

Well, this is just musing. High On Poker isn’t going anywhere. It’s my way to play poker when I am not able to play poker. I guess that is what it is most of all.

Double, don’t quit. Just take a break. Take it easy. Don’t post for 2 months if that is what it takes. But don’t draw that line in the sand that says, it’s over. Because, buddy, lemme tell you, blogs are literary masterbation, but even when you shack up with the hottest chick in town, sometime you just need a quick release.

Last night I received my $50 bonus from Gaming Club….and then proceeded to give it away like a certified donkey.

The game was 6-handed .25/.50 NL ($50 max buy-in). I was a little lit from some sangria with dinner (which is a whole other story) and I was anxious to play. Unfortunately, it was one of those second-best-hand nights. That said, I blame myself for playing marginal hands and being aggressive and passive at the wrong times. Repeatedly. Consistently.

Stated plainly, I sucked.

Bottom line is, I was in not in a poker state of mind, regardless of my impulse to play. This is the largest leak in my game, and I will have to defeat it in order to move up to the next level. If I get to pay tonight, it will be a test. Usually after a night like last night, I’m on extended tilt for a day or two. So, I’m going to try to avoid that all together by only playing if I am ready (yeah right!).

I’ve decided that it is time to use the $50 BestBuy giftcard that I got from VPP. I plan on buying a dinky MP3 player for under $30 and then buying some PC game. I may go Chipper‘s route and try WarCraft. The key for me is to find a game I can play INSTEAD of poker when I feel like playing but are not focused. As for the MP3 player, I don’t need anything that holds 10,000 songs. A good 4 hrs of music is MORE than enough. All I need is something that has FM radio and can play some trance music when I’m playing live. A little bit of trance music goes a long way for calming the nerves and focusing my attention.

As for the ESPN Fantasy Poker, I’ve changed my mind. Let’s just lay it out there and have whoever wants join up. If we can work out some sort of betting pool after the fact, then great. If not, we’ll play for pride. Go to ESPN Fantasy Poker, Donkeys Always Draw game, password: HEEHAW!!! Don’t forget those exclamation points. That’s 3 in total.

With HUC2 done, could there be an HUC3? Maybe, but probably not for a while. These things are tricky because they involve coordinating people from all over the world. The HUC1 was quick because we had 8 devoted players. HUC2 lagged because with 16 players, it’s a bit harder to coordinate. People are now asked to pay their bet ($25) straight to the winners after the fact, a good month or so since the payer played their last match. I have to imagine that there is a better way. An HUC3 could be very interesting, but right now it seems like the DADI events are the way to go. Maybe after another DADI or two we can get a really large field that is willing to give their $25 immediately. One can only hope.

Final thought. It’s time to set a new goal for the next year. This year’s goal was to win $1200 for the year, $100/month. I’ve reached that with $55 to spare as of my AC trip. That doesn’t include the $450 in gift cards I earned through VPP and PSO, which arguably should be considered. After all, my goal was to see if poker was worth the time, and I got just as much benefit from those giftcards (my large TV purchase) then I did the other $1200.

But that is this year. Next year my goal is $1800. Joaquin suggested that I make it 3x my current goal, but I don’t think I can realistically expect that sort of growth. The bottom line is that I don’t play high enough stakes online and I don’t play enough live to really justify anything higher. If I go over and above, then so be it. I just think $150/month is an appropriate goal right now.

Look, Daddy. Teacher says every time a bell rings, an angel gets the nuts.

WOW!!! What a day!!! I’ve got lots of exciting announcements. Let’s start from the top!

The Donkeys Always Draw Invitational was a HUGE success. To keep things interesting, be on the lookout for the 2nd event, The Donkeys Always Draw Special Omalypics. The game will be Omaha H/L, with a $10 buy-in. Tentative date (emphasis on tentative) is Wednesday, January 11, 2006!

Looking for more Pokery Goodness? Well great! Play with me in the ESPN Fantasy Poker League. You get 30 credits to buy up to 7 players. I don’t know much more than that, but I’ve started my own private game titled Donkeys Always Draw. Join up! I’m going to do things slightly differently. Let’s do a $10 bet. If you want in on the action, leave me a comment with your email address OR send me an email at brodybanky@aol.com. Depoending on how many players we have, we’ll work out a prize pool. For this reason, I am leaving the password under wraps. Contact me and I’ll give it to you.

My roster includes: Chris Ferguson, John Juanda, Antonio Esfandiari, Jennifer Harman, Fossil-man, David Williams, and Dutch Boyd. I know Boyd is a Looooooooooooong Shot, but I’ll give him a go anyway. I’m not too happy with my picks overall, but they’ll do for now. Damn, I forgot. I need to add Johnny Fucking Chan. Back to the drawing board!

If things get going, we can even set up some prizes for the winner! Maybe have everyone toss in $10. If we do this, we’ll arrange payment of the $10 immediately, as opposed to how I ran the HUC2.

On that subject, Trauma Poker won HUC2! Trauma, as many may recall, first got noticed (by me, anyway) when he was involved in a controversy with TripJax. Trauma was talking smack, so when I invited him into the HUC2, I didn’t realize he was who he was. I was concerned that the controversy would cause problems, but I like to be inclusive rather than exclusive. I was also hoping to knock him out of the first round, but that clearly didn’t happen. But, Trauma, you proved yourself, not that you had anything to prove. And the rest of the contestants, including Trip, proved themselves also by not believing the hype. People talk smack in this world we call Pokeronia. And even Jesus smack talked! “You Pontius Pilate, you one straight trippin’ bitch!” It’s in the Bible people. The Bible!

That’s it for now. Join me in the ESPN Fantasy Poker League. Also, I have to thank Matt on Poker for turning me onto this.

The Donkeys Always Draw Invitational was last night and it was more of a success than I could have imagined. 62 players joined the fray, and rumor has it, we had a better turnout than the Wil Wheaton tourney one night ago. I have to give a huge thank you to all of the players, TripJax for helping set this thing up, and all of the bloggers who announced the tourney on their blogs or amongst their friends. It was a fantastic time and I can’t wait to do it again. Without further adieu, the winner of last nights DADI was:

Change100 from Pot Committed

Change played a fantastic game, never letting up on her aggression. She had some self-proclaimed suckouts, but she put herself in position, chip wise and hand wise, to make those calls and suckout.

So, who knocked out Jordan to win the right to rename this blog: Change100! The one-woman wrecking ball finished me off when her 88 beat my 87. I was forced all in after C-Mitch from O-Poker crushed me with his AK v. my QQ. We were all-in pre-flop, and the bastard caught his Ace…twice. If I had played better earlier, maybe I wouldn’t have been in such a rush to push. However, generally speaking, I like pushing with Qs in tournaments.

I had Aces twice within 10 minutes, and each time I raised 4x or 3x the blinds in EP or UTG. The entire table folded to me…twice. Keerist!

JoeSpeaker wouldn’t let up on me in the early rounds. He also played exceptionally well (with a suckout or two for good measure). He placed 2nd, so a hardy congratulations to him as well.

Mowemdown is a new blogger, if memory serves correct. He took 3rd. I look forward to reading his blog and learning more about the player. Scott “The Dream Machine” McMillan took 4th. Even when he was the shortstack out of 4 I thought he’d take it. He is no mere mortal poker player. He is a machine! I later learned why he ONLY took 4th…he was 2-tabling a tourney on Full Tilt at the same time, and took 4th there as well. Yep! Scott’s my role model. He’s one of the only players, aside from possibly DoubleAs, who I wouldn’t think twice about bankrolling. Of course, they don’t need my money. They could do it all themselves.

Also, congrats to Trip for making the final table. GCox made it to the top 20 as well.

So, overall the tournament was a raving success. I didn’t want to do them too often. My mental plan was once a month. But after last night, I came up with another idea. In two weeks, we should hold the DADI Omaha tourney. That’ll shake things up a bit. This is still a work in progress. We may even go with a new title. How about the Special Oma-lympics!

In other news, I finished my Gaming Club promo and I expect the bonus to be released soon. I have no idea how much it is. I should probably check PSO. Even though I’m done with the GC bonus, I still have about 100 hands or so to burn through before I get the PSO bonus, so I’m no done there yet. The 2/4 limit has been a break-even or slightly profitable game for me. I expected to lose following the Hollywood Poker debacle, so this will do for the time being. Meanwhile, Veneno continues to rip up Royal Vegas. She earned the VPP bonus there in about a week. For anyone looking to bonus whore for free prizes, that’s the easiest promo by far. So, check out VPP for their Royal Vegas promotion.

“Your fame is well deserved, Change100. I don’t think there’s ever been a gladiator to match you. As for this young man, he insists you are Moss reborn. Or was it Ungar? Why doesn’t the hero reveal herself and tell us all your real name? You do have a name.”
“My name is Wrecking Ball.”

The Donkeys Always Draw Invitational is tonight, and I can guarantee a good time. Several bloggers are offering bounties, so there will be a whole lot of mail sent out following the tourney. I invite you to play. For more info, please see the post below!

In other news, I am working on overhauling this here blog. If you look at Notable Posts, I have a new listing, Glossary, which is probably useless to most readers. However, if you were ever befuddled by my use of initials like UTG or terms like rainbow, take a look. I know, bloggers, to you UTG is clear as day. But we all can’t be as cool as you!

I’ve also added a page called Trip Reports which provides links to my various trip reports since this here blog started in March 2005.

Soon, I will be adding a You Decide page, instead of the current long list of links on the right. I do this all for you, dear reader. That and because I like to procrastinate the important stuff.

Last night I got several hours of 2/4 limit in at Gaming Club. It’ll only take another 50 or so raked hands to release the $50 bonus (I believe its $50), but after that, I think I need another 100 or so to finish the PSO promotion. I was thinking about getting another Best Buy giftcard through PSO, but now that I have the new TV and surround sound, I don’t know if I need anything else. I already have a $50 giftcard through VPP that is gathering dust. Maybe I should finally get myself a decent MP3 player. But not too decent. I’m not made of giftcards!

As a result of my play, I brought the Gaming Club bankroll up to almost $200. This is far from spectacular, but it is a positive move from the original $150. While I was playing, Sox Lover and I were chatting. He suggested we play heads-up, but I told him I wasn’t feeling up for it. “Let me rephrase that,” he added, “Do you want to play heads up, bitch?” His tone of voice was flat. The sentence was the same one he asked a mere 10 seconds before. But that five letter word was all it took. Let’s do this!

Or not. As it turned out, I was having trouble with UB, so we decide to do PokerStars. Now, Stars rooms fill up very fast. Unless you are doing a private tourney (DADI, achem), you’ll have trouble coordinating. This is especially true in HU matches. As a result, I ended up playing against a stranger. I won, but for a while I was the short stack. In fact, I won about 2-3 hands in a row at the end after losing most hands. That was all it took. I went from a low of under 300 chips (you start with 2000) to winner in 5 hands or so. The entire time, I was calm and cool. I didn’t mind loosing chips. The blinds increased slowly and I knew I could win it back. Sox seemed concerned about my shortstack, but I let him know it didn’t phase me in the least. Either I lose or I win. That’s all there is to it.

I finally had the advantage with 2900 or so chips to his 1100. In the last hand, the flop was 2d3d4h, and I held Ad6h. Preflop I bet small and he called. On the flop I bet small and he raised. I re-raised, he pushed. I called. He held Q4. The turn was an Ace and I won.

Sox thought it was hysterical that I sucked out. I didn’t see it that way. I had momentum and the chiplead. I had two overcards, a straight draw, and a backdoor nut flush draw. Out of all of those things, I think the chiplead was most important. In these games, you have to take chances. BUT you want to take those chances when they won’t wipe you completely out.

After that win, Sox and I tried again…and failed again. The new competitor ended up beating me. So be it. I was done for the night anyway.

Tonight is the night, and I’m excited as hell. The DADI. Bring your friends. Bring your family. But most importantly bring your money and bounties.

It’s all in the chips. It’s all in the chips…

Ladies and gentlemen, boys and girls, children of all sizes. Presenting due to self-indulgent demand, the SNG to end all SNGs. The hype-master himself Jordan from HighOnPoker and blogger of the stars TripJax invite you to join them and a plethora of bloggers and readers alike in the first ever:

Read Parts 1 and 2, below, first. But if you couldn’t figure that out, then I doubt this announcement will do much.

When I arrived at the poker room on Xmas night, the room was substantially more packed. I was in the hole for $355 due to -EV table games and slot machines, so I had a determination about me. Roose and Hole were already seated at a 1/2 NL game, and seemed to be doing well. Hole looked short, but he’s an aggressive players, so I expected some swings. Over the course of the evening, they seemed to take turns being ahead and behind. Roose finally busted late in the evening. Hole ended ahead over $100.

I, meanwhile, placed my name on the 1/2 NL, 3/6 Limit, and 1-5 spread 7-card stud game. I wanted to play, and the NL list was long. Meanwhile, parents Roose came down and we talked about my mother. After dinner, she slipped on some grease on the floor, injuring herself. I heard about this earlier in the night and spoke to my Dad, but he insisted that she was okay, aside from a high blood pressure (odd for my low-blood pressured mom), an injured knee, and injuries up her entire left side. They had gone to the infirmary and were treated as though they were conmen looking for a quick buck. Fuck Harrah’s for that. But as a lawyer, I knew the reason. Harrah’s didn’t want to look guilty. Well, fuck them anyway.

I went up to see my mom. She was okay, considering. My parents wished me luck and my dad put $200 in my hands. “This is for you AND Kim. Make sure she gets her $100.” Shit, pops. I’m a degenerate but not THAT much of a degenerate.

When I returned to the poker room, my name had just been called for 1-5 Stud. I sat down with the old fogies and watched the hand play out. I knew that I’d need to play smart and use my young gun image. After all, Stud is an old-timers’ game. But before I could get chips, they opened up a new 1/2 NL table and my name was called. I immediately got up.

The table was a mix of caucasian white males. One female sat down. It was her birthday and she was atrocious. To my left was an intelligent late 30 year old player. We chatted for a bit and immediately made friends. We had the rest of the table pegged as a bunch of amatuer college students or just-out-of-college kids. We were right too. Two players in the 1 and 2 seat were tight. The next guy had crappy hand selection and was loose post flop as well. I could just about say the same for the guy to his left too. 4s was eventually replaced by a guy who insisted on trying to raise me out of pots. I was playing tight, and I guess he knew it. 5s was a real mongoloid retard. Turns out he went to my High School too and was 2 yrs younger than me. I played against him the first night and he joked with me about how crappy he played. He added, “When I left, someone said, ‘that is the worst player I ever saw.’” I quietly said to the guy on my left, “That was me. I said that.” Mongo (that’s what I’m calling him) said, “What?!” “Just joking.” HAHAHA! We all laughed. I wasn’t joking though. He sucked. To his left was a non-consequential guy, followed by the girl and an Internet player, and finally some prag to my right who I busted. He was followed by an Asian guy named Blue. We got along well. Clearly, he, I and the guy on my left were the only good players. On this, the three of us agreed.

Now, specific hands have sort of left me for the most part. I played tight. I limped when I could and folded whenever I could as well. I have learned that at these tables, you make most of your money on a handful of hands. Leave the other ones for the raising donkeys.

I had won a few smaller pots early and then folded for what seemed like an hour. I knew my image was tight. I looked down to see Qc4c. I decided, in LP, that it was time to make a play. I bet 12 total. The loose guy in the 3 seat, who I’ll call Orange for his shirt, and the 4s Re-Raiser got in on the action. The flop was 426. I had made the low pair. I decided to continuation bet for $10. Orange folded. Re-Raiser, well, he reraised to $20. The turn was a 2. I checked and re-raiser bet $20 to 40. I don’t exactly recall. I called. The river was a 4. I rivered a full house. I bet $50. He called. When I showed my full house he mucked his hand. Oh well oh well.

That got the ball rolling. I was chatting away when Hole came over to see what was happening. At that moment, I held AA. I bet big pre-flop and got two callers. The flop was K high with two low cards and I bet again. Orange pushed all-in. I called and took down the hand. He held 77 and had missed the board. Another one down. He rebought (probably 3 times at least while I was there).

Let me add here that I am probably mis-representing a lot of the action. As I write, I am losing the specifics. These hands look like I got lucky. But rest assured that I was playing the players AND the cards. I made good decisions and got good results.

In one hand, I held the nut flush draw with AQs. I believe I raised pre-flop to 12. After the flop, I bet out 20. Orange pushed for 25 more. I called, and then hit the flush on the turn. Unfortunately, he had a set (pocket pair hit the flop) and the river paired the board. I was just happy that he had won it instead of another player. I knew I could get it back.

There was one hand that I was particularly proud of. I held AKo. It was getting late (3am) and some new players just joined the table, including the Nerdy girl from the morning session. I didn’t want my crappy image from the morning hurting me here. She had about $800 to 1000 and had to actually take chips off of the table. The table max was $200, but since she was moved from a breaking table she could only hold as much as the chipleader, me. I held $450.

I was thinking that it was time to move on and I was UTG+1, so this would be my second-to-last hand. I looked down at AKo. I bet $20. I get two callers, Orange and Mongo. Joy of joys.

The flop was KQ3 with two spades. I looked across the table at Orange and said, “I bet what you have.” He counted it out. $54. Orange looked sheepish and folded. Mongo called. The turn was a 2d. I looked at Mongo and said, “It’s your turn now. I bet what you have.” He had about $50 more. He folded. I guess I could’ve gotten more, but I just felt so damn good about beating down the players. I got up and left. Rob joined me. I was up $322 in that session alone. The result was that I was down only $33 or so for the whole trip. I couldn’t wait to get upstairs and wake up wifey Kim with the news. But first…

Robbie and I walked the casino trying to calm down. He played some Wheel of Fortune and I sat back. We decided to go upstairs and relax, but first we wanted to check the table game limits. They were all $15 minimums and it was 3am in the morning! And then we passed Pai Gow.

I shouldn’t play, I thought to myself. I am almost back to even and I don’t want to lose it now. But I figured that I could play one hand for $20, the minimum, just so I can break my Pai Gow cherry. I felt sheepish and I apologized to the three Asian players when I sat down with one $20 bill.

Now, let me go over pai gow for a minute. You are dealt 7 cards. You bet once, and only once, unlike most other poker table games. Once you get the 7 cards, you arrange them into a 5-card hand and a 2-card hand. The 5-card hand MUST BE higher than the 2 card. 2 card flushes/straights don’t count. The dealer then arranges his 7 cards. If you beat both of his hands with both of yours, you get paid, minus a commission to the casino. So, basically, 20 pays 19. I guess this is because, for the most part, you push. So, if you are dealt AAKKQJ4, you can arrange as AAQJ4/KK or AAKK4/QJ. The first makes more sense, since you will definitely win the KK, absent a dealer getting something like a straight plus AA.

In total, I won $95. Hole joined in and won $83 or so. In the whole time I played, I only lost twice. It was a real pleasure. When we were done, Hole and I retired for the night. I crawled into bed next to wifey Kim. In her half-asleep haze she asked, “how did you do?” “I won it all back…and then some. We are up $62 overall.” I then enjoyed some sweet dreams.

The rest, as they say, is history. Roose and Hole stayed a bit later than me the next day. I decided to actually not gamble in the morning. The $200 88 v. AA taught me an expensive lesson. The ride back was fine. I couldn’t help rehashing the last night in my head, over and over and over. By sheer will I was able to win back all that the Casino took and then some. Even better, I felt like a great player. I played well and I know I can do it consistently. In poker alone I won $394. If I didn’t make that 88 v. AA misread, it would be $594. If I had avoided all table games (aside from pai gow) it would’ve been a nice score. But the games were entertaining for wifey Kim and I and this wasn’t a trip about poker. It was a trip about her.

Best of all, I did it. In January, I set a goal to win $1200 in poker this year. It was a modest goal, but at that point, I was a micro-limit player with a $50 online bankroll and my home games were for $40 profit if I was lucky. I rarely played/play in casinos and I never had entered an underground card room. In the early summer I was more or less wiped out. In half a year, I was able to climb back to a profit AND meet my goal. For this, I am proud.

Thanks for reading.