High On Poker

I’m appearing with TripJax on the Flop tonight. It’s currently 6:30 and I’m on hold. I’m in my office and several coworkers are still lurking about, so I plan to close the door (an office no-no) and bunker down.

6:35pm- I’m still on hold. Mark and the other host of the Flop were discussing playing low suited connectors. Some of the knowledge they are giving is rudimentary, but they also give a full analysis of the perils of those hands. It’s interesting, because clearly they are catering to a diverse audience. In many ways, what they are doing is like live radio blogging, er, which…

6:36pm- Ooh! They are back from commercials. I’m going to be on soon. They are hyping up blogs. Mark has mentioned the DADI HUC. Mark was the winner, so of course it was ‘fun to play on.’

I’m losing the clock. I’m too busy for this business. I hyped the DADI. I hope I don’t sound like a tool. He kept on referring to the full name. I’m not going to correct him, because calling it the “Daddy” sounds, erm, gay.

I dropped Pauly’s blog name. That’s payback to him for helping me get started. Mentioned Trip and my site too. I’m a whore. Hi, new readers! Check out the links on the right for some of my favorite posts and for some of the other fine bloggers out there.

We are talking about playing online. It’s convenient, and blah blah blah.

We are just about wrapping up at 6:48 or so. I’ve pimped DoubleAs at the end, and the whole blogging community by explaining how readers can learn a lot from blogs. I believe the line was “Anyone can get Super/System, but most people don’t know about the untapped resource of blogs on the Internet.”

Okay, well, that’ s it. Somewhere in there I explained the concept behind blogging and the community. I hope I did the poker community proud. I’m going to ask Mark to rush posting the audio on his site. We may be appearing again in the future to pimp DADI (I don’t want it too big though) and generally talk about poker and blogging. Until next time…

It’s official. Go to The Flop’s webpage tonight and hear TripJax and I on the Flop at 6:30PM. The show starts at 6pm. It’s on 1490AM in Florida, but you can get it online live too.

The host is Mark, the winner of DADIII HUC. We’ll be talking about the DADI tournaments, the blogging community, and just about anything else that comes to mind. If you miss it, old shows are posted on The Flop’s website as well.

The best part, you can here my whiny voice!

Lately, it seems like I’ve been burning the candle on both ends. At the office, I am constantly moving from one crisis to another. At home, I recently went to Boston which was planned within a week, had a surprise birthday brunch for wifey Kim which was also planned within a week, and generally have been trying to keep up with everyday chores. My free time on weekends seems to be dedicated to friends’ birthday parties (some, friend of friends of friends), so burnout is fast approaching. Unfortunately, this has ‘gotten in the way of’ attending certain blogger events, if you will.

For instance, on Sunday, after driving 4 hours from Boston, I attended a shiva (a Jewish wake) for a friend’s grandmother. I would not miss it for anything because the friend is like a brother to me. Consequently, I missed the Veneno v. Katitude Heads Up match, in which V used her suckout poison to lay the smack down on the upstart. I was hoping to guest announce with Sir Waffle, but it just didn’t work out that way. I can only hope that I can make the next one.

Meanwhile, I am hoping to appear on the Flop radio show this evening at 6:30 pm. You can hear me live (hopefully) from the link on the Flop’s website. I’m sure it’ll be in the archives in a week or two as well, so I’ll keep you updated on that.

The Poker Champ and I are ironning out the details for our best of seven Heads Up series. If all goes well the first game will occur on Thursday at PokerStars in a private tourney arranged by TripJax. We will probably only play one HU SNG at that point and save the rest for a later date. This assumes that the Champ and I can both make that date/time. So far, so good.

An unnamed blogger’s birthday is coming up and it was my understanding that there will be a private MTT in his honor this Sunday. Another blogger who told me of the hush-hush event just posted all the details. I’ll post them here if I get the thumbs up. Otherwise, hopefully a few of you will be invited or see the post by the other blogger and join. I really want to play, but lately I just don’t know with my busy schedule.

Finally, I’d like to talk about my play last night. I signed up for Doyle’s Room through a rakeback program. I am working on getting an affiliate deal with the lovely rakeback people, so hopefully you’ll see that banner up soon and we can all hang at Doyle’s.

Doyle’s is actually the same as Golden Palace, my original stomping grounds. It was interesting to go back. I played a $10 Turbo 6-p SNG. It surprised me that the blinds were at 100/200 iin seeming minutes, until I realized that Doyle’s has Speed tourneys (akin to Turbos at Stars) and Turbo tourneys (akin to Roulette, I guess). I busted out of that one in 4th place on a suckout.

Meanwhile, I entered a $10 Speed 9-p SNG. I couldn’t get anything going there either, and eventually went out in the middle of the pack.

As I played those two tourneys, I decided to check out the MTTs offered at Doyle’s. At 10:45 or so, a $20+2 MTT was scheduled. There were only 20 players and a $1500 guarantee, so, with 20 minutes until the tourney started, I expected a big overlay. By the time the tourney was about to start, there were 98 players. I quickly clicked unregister, and then clicked register again. I’m a fickle bitch, but in the end, my desire to play for big money got the best of me.

I played my usual game, folding unless I had something impressive. The game lasted for over 2 hrs, and during that course, I was usually in the middle of the pack. On occassion, I stole chips, but the table was fairly loose, so even this was rare. When it was down to the last 20 players or so, I was in desperate shape. The blinds were high and I probably had 5-6x the BB. I got lucky with A2 v. AJ, but then went back to going the way of Broomcorn’s Uncle. With a short stack, I held 33, and decided to push. I got two callers. The flop had a 3, and the river paired the board, so my full house took it down. My chip stack was still in the Rule of 10 after the blinds escalated. I played push and fold poker like only I can, getting AQ, AK, and AJ in a row, and pushing each time. The AQ was called by 99 and I won a race. The AK was folded to. The AJ was called by K9, probably because of how often I had been pushing. My A hit, twice, and I doubled up again. To cut a long story a little shorter, I placed in 7th place out of 98 players, netting a $78 profit. Subtract my SNG losses and $25 in losses on Party’s 1/2 limit (don’t ask), and I ended the day with a $30 profit. It’s not an amazing feat, but one I am proud of nonetheless. That MTT was needed to turn the night around, and if you’ve been reading steadily, you know that this has been my theme lately: the comeback SNG or MTT win. I can’t complain.

Lot’s happening so keep your eyes open. Also, check out some of the great blogs listed on the right. You’ll be doing yourself a favor, and your employer a disservice.

I went to Boston on Saturday, and returned Sunday. I did not play poker. End trip report.

So, I played a 2-table SNG with SirFWalGMan last night. I outlasted the Waffle, but only made it to the final table, where I was out first. It wasn’t my best showing, and I didn’t feel like I was adequately concentrating.

Meanwhile, wifey Kim was watching Dancing with the Stars on DVR, and complaining about how they delay everything. The show did not need 2 hrs just to announce a couple of names. I cannot fathom how producers think it is necessary to show recaps of recaps of recaps. How many times do I need to see the same damn clips! Humorously, as wifey Kim was making the same statement, I pointed out to her that we had DVR’ed the show for a reason, and we can just fast forward to the good parts. She still insisted on sitting through the umpteenth time that they went through each of the finalists names, pausing 30 seconds between names to build excitement. If I were the producer, the entire series would have been about 1/4 shorter than it was, but who am I to doubt the reality TV geniuses? On that same note, I cannot stand the stalling that occurs on shows like Survivor, where they take their time before announcing who is going to be tossed from the show, or they take 10 minutes to explain an obstacle course that doesn’t really matter anyway. Really, people. Are they trying to tell me that in the 24 hr, 7 days per week of videotaping, the only interesting thing that happened was Jeff Probst stalling before announcing that Ruth Marie was voted off.

But that isn’t poker! This is. I played at the 1/2 Limit Beginner’s tables at Party last night. In a few hands, I was up $25. On one of those hands, I called bets to the river where I hit my inside straight draw. I was clearly not playing well, but at least I didn’t have to be embarassed; I was at a beginner’s table. Meanwhile, I couldn’t get anything going at the regular shorthanded 1/2 limit table. I ended up $16 at the beginner’s table and down $16.50 at the shorthanded table. With my SNG loss, it was a negative day, to the tune of $11.50. Worst of all, my 9-day winning streak ended. Of course, at least 3 of those 9-days were wins under $5 ($3.50, $1, and $0.25), but a streak is a streak. I could have kept the streak alive by quitting after winning the $25 at the beginner’s table. I don’t regret sticking around though. I’m just proud I was able to quit loser, before I let myself continue to play horribly. I think it may have been one of those situations when play wasn’t optimal. After being in Boston overnight (no poker) and returning to NY late, I was really looking to play, and this impulsiveness does not equal good poker.

Speaking of impulsive poker, I am still working out the details with the Poker Champ to have our Heads Up match. Right now, I am going to shoot for Thursday at 9pm, but I have to make sure that the Champ is available. I see that DuggleBogey and the Champ have been having a back and forth. I’m keeping out of that. I want to just explain something for a moment. Regardless of the Champ’s views on my poker abilities, tourists, and women, I don’t want this to be a pile-on the Champ situation. I left a comment at the Champ’s blog about showing some respect, to which he responded that he has shown as much respect as he has been given. Damn it, but he was right. I guess the other thing is that I have always been a devil’s advocate and a fan of the underdog, so I don’t want to just slam the guy because it has become fashionable. No matter what though, I hope we have some railbirds for our game.

If I’m not a tool, I’ll also remember to listen to the Flop radio show tonight online, and contact Mark, the winner of the DADIII HUC. If all goes well, I’ll be on his show with TripJax tomorrow night at about 6:30. Now I just need to follow through. This is not my specialty.

Lately, when I fire up Party Poker for some hot limit action, I’ve been jumping into whatever table has the highest amount of hands per hour. I know it is completely a fallacy, but my logic is that many hands per hour means a lot of folding. I’m fairly aggressive, so this is okay by me.

But as the self-proclaimed Devil’s Advocate of Poker Bloggers, I pose this question: Does table selection matter, and if it does, should it?

I’m no Phil Ivey, but I want to be. I can surmise that Phil Ivey does not need to look at the precentage of players seeing a flop before he decides to play. Ivey can sit at any table and have confidence in his abilities. Most specifically, he has confidence in his ability to adapt.

That is what it is, people. Adapt or die. If everyone is very loose, adapt to that style. If that means tightening up, then go for it. As the DAPB, though, let me also suggest loosening up preflop when playing with a loose table. You might not always flop monsters, but when you do, you’ll get paid off, regardless of how coordinated the flop is, at an ultra loose table.

On the other hand, if the game is uber-tight, pay attention and keep out of the tight players’ way. Maybe steal some more, but pay attention to resistance and be ready to fold you 99 when you are reraised after missing the flop.

My point is this: adaptability should be as valued as any skill (and more valued than some) when you are developing your poker skills. Table-selection is great if you are a grinder, trying to make your money one way and one way only. But if you are an action player, like me, or if you want to consider yourself and all-around player, then maybe forget table selection, and focus more on reading the players at whatever table you sit.

That is all. Enjoy.

I’ve heard many a blogger talk about how poker is becoming an addiction. As a man who understands (to an extent) addiction, I must concur (also, to an extent). There are times when I would rather stay home and play poker than go out and socialize with the ‘real world’. But I am not upset that poker is sometimes addicting to me. Instead, I embrace it, because, at the end of the day, I truly love the game of poker, and any opportunity to play it and improve my skills is at least working toward something. You smoke cigarettes until you get sick. You do heroine until you die. You gamble until you are broke. But you play poker until you are a pro.

With that said, last night I played about 45 minutes of 1/2 limit on Party Poker, in an attempt to earn my $25 bonus there. It is kind of humorous that I am working off such a meager bonus when my gameplay lately has been so solid. In my 45 minutes I actually won $25.25, so the bonus is not that much money per se. But at least it gives me a goal, and that is worth a lot.

I was shocked, yesterday, at the terrible play at my 1/2 limit table. I know that all the fish play at Party, but I had some trouble there in the past, so I guess it changed my mental image of the Party landscape. That image is constantly being corrected by the aweful play I am seeing at the table. I’m glad I was only single-tabling (not intentionally), because I would have missed out on huge opportunities if I had been playing my usual game against anonymous players. Instead, I was playing my game against one particularly crazy donkey. The donkey, Goldie, was doing things I just couldn’t understand. In one hand, he limped with 34o, called a bet on the 279 flop, hit a 3 on the turn, and called bets on the turn and river. He won that hand….against me and my pair of 2s. BUT, I played that hand because he was calling just about anything, and foolishly re-raising too.

This is what I mean about opportunity. I’m on the button with Q8o. I normally would fold, even in a shorthanded game. However, Goldie was in the BB and there was a player who had already limped in. I knew I’d get paid by Goldie if I hit, so I limped. The flop was Q-high. It’s checked to me and I bet. Only Goldie calls. The turn comes down, and it’s a blank. I bet. He re-raises. Now, I folded earlier to his re-raises before learning about how the table was. This time, I decided to re-raise with top pair, shitty kicker. Oddly, he re-raised me back. To anyone, this is a sign of trouble. But here, I had no confidence in his cards or play. I called. The river was a blank. I bet. He called. I won the hand. I can only imagine what he was playing. I certainly know this much though, it was NOT optimal poker.

I just don’t get it. Who is this guy and why is he playing poker? I guess he is a gambler, plain and simple. I was speaking to Robbie Hole last night. He and Roose went to the All-In Club in NYC, but were turned away at the door because they didn’t have ‘membership cards’. What a crock of shit! We’ve been there a handful of times, and only now do they have membership cards. Anyway, they caught the tournament at Genoa instead. Hole went out early because of his usual loose self. On his final hand, he had 800 chips with 50/100 blinds. He was in the rule of 10. With QTo, he raised to 300. Someone pushed him all-in. He called. His opponent had AA and won the hand.

As Hole told me this, I was thinking, “What the fuck, man? QT?” I didn’t say it though because I didn’t want to rub it in. Fortunately, he said it for me. As he put it, he knows he shouldn’t play those hands. He tells himself that before he plays. But when he is sitting down at the table, he just wants to play. Hole is a gambler. But we are going to work with him, and soon, he’ll be a poker player again. Self control is a bitch. Especially when you are dealing with addictive poker.

Finally, let me commend myself. Wifey Kim had a friend and her fiance come over last night. When they left at 10:45, I immediately wanted to play poker. Wifey Kim wanted to watch our DVR’ed Survivor. I decided that her idea was better. Wifey Kim and I have a bet going. Every season we choose a Survivor contestant at the end of the first episode. If my guy/girl last longer, I get something, and vice versa. It used to be dinner, but since we are now married, we are changing it up. The winner gets a $50 giftcard to a store of their choice. Yep. It’s still from the same money pool, but at least it feels like a gift. Wifey Kim will win this year. She chose Jerry, the older male Air Force guy who just found the immunity idol (exciting to all you non-Survivor watchers, right?). I chose a blonde chick, whose head is already on the chopping block.

But I digress. After the show, wifey Kim had adorably fallen asleep. My wireless laptop was calling me. “Play with me Jordan. Play!”, she cried out. “Damn you harpy!” I shouted with rage (internally, as wifey Kim was sleeping next to me). “Damn you! I will not donk off my money while tired. I will not play on a whim late at night. I will not lose!” And I didn’t. I kept my self control and left the computer where it sat.

Sometimes it isn’t easy controlling this addiction we call poker. But sometimes, its absolutely necessary.

Last night I decided to play in the first of ten PSO league games. If you play in 6 of the ten games, and you have the best cumulative finishes for your top 6 scores, then you win a $1500 WSOP seat and some spending money. Sounds good!

So, I signed up for the event on Absolute Poker. At about 8:30 I realized I had no dough there, and I have no dough in Neteller either. It’s all on Party or UB or Stars or FullTilt or I-PokerTable. I will have to change that up soon, so that I can always join someone or something on the spur of the moment, but since the PSO league is so important to me (well, maybe not SO important), I decided to deposit $50 onto Neteller from my bank account. This is where the lovely wifey Kim comes in. My account is just about empty because wifey Kim and I have a system that I won’t go into. But she didn’t flinch (okay, a little flinch) when I told her I was dipping into our savings to make a $50 deposit to play poker. Of course, as a show of faith, I’m going to withdraw $100 probably. Hell, we could use the dough anyway.

Once I was signed up for the PSO league game, I checked to see who was around. Kipper and Wonka were playing the Absolute tourney as well (although Wonka joined our chat room a little while later). GCox and Trip were also online. After we were all settled in to our Yahoo chat, Joe from Check It Down joined us as well.

Joe is a newcomer to this blogger group. He started blogging in October 2005, and has been seen commenting here under his first name. This is why I stress that when possible, try to give info as to who you are when commenting. When I leave a comment (even on my own blog) I leave it as Jordan from High On Poker. I do this because you might not know who Jordan is. Or you might not know that this guy named Jordan who leaves witty and compelling comments has a blog called High On Poker. Or you might know Jordan and you might know High On Poker, but you might not make the connection. I offer that as general advice, and not specifically to Joe. As it turns out, I know Joe and I know Check It Down and I know Joe is from Check It Down. I’m just saying, is all…

Well, I lost $5 playing 1/2 limit on Party while playing the PSO MTT. I wasn’t feeling the limit game, so I asked about an SNG. Trip, G, Joe and I decided to go for UB, where Joe generally plays. We also decided on a MTT SNG for $10, and as it turned out, we ended up in an 18-person, 3-table, shorthanded game. It’s an interesting twist to the usual.

When we were first seated, G was across from me and Trip was on my left. I was playing fast and loose because of the shorthanded table format. Also, I sincerely believe that with the right attitude, it doesn’t matter if you lose a bunch of your chips early on a play. You can get them back later if you are patient and make sure not to go all-in with the worst of it. The other three bloggers were whooping ass, but at one point, if you added my chips from the SNG and PSO MTT combined, I wouldn’t have had as much as the lowest of my blogger comrades at the SNG alone. In other words, I was fairly shortstacked and remained in the middle or back of the pack for most of the game, with little surges up or down. The swings are a natural part of my style of play, something that I have moved away from generally, but am now just rediscovering.

Soon, we were down to 2 tables and all four bloggers were still around. Meanwhile, Kipper was slowly accumulating chips at the PSO tourney, and I was folding anything but premium hands, and usually pushing all-in when I did hold anything playable. My stack on the PSO reached a low of about 525. At one point on the UB SNG, I was down to 400 or so.

When we got down to the final table of the SNG, I was happy to see Joe, Trip and G still in the running. I was on the shortstack, but I had been messing with the head of one of the nonblogger competitors, and I had a good read on him. The other nonblogger was playing well, but I knew it was make it or break it time.

Zen and the Art of Poker talks about the natural rhythm of the game. I have mentioned it myself in my early posts about a style of heads up play I use, which I have dubbed Ebb and Flow poker. Last night, for the first time in a long while (if ever) I really got in touch with the rhythm of the game. Things started tightening up and I started loosening up. My aggression wasn’t blind though. I could feel when it was time to move in on a hand. My shortstack grew and grew until I was one of the chipleaders. For the most part, I didn’t get to many showdowns, because the blinds were high and my play would be hard to defend against unless you had a monster or balls of steel. I took out the nonblogger who I had been messing with. I truly enjoy the smack talk, and that is part of the reason why. I think my smack talk helped somewhat in setting up my prey. G lot a huge hand to Joe and was forced to push his remaining 200 or so. Joe, Trip and I called. I had T6 and hit my 6 on the flop. It was enough to take out the Skipper to my Gilligan. The remaining nonblogger was next out. While there were just four of us, I went on a rampage in a slew of hands. I raised the minimum (which was still damn high) or the pot on about 6 to 8 consecutive hands. Each time, it was folded to me and my stack got bigger. I was raising quickly and the others were folding quickly, so I got them in a submissive position working at my frantic tempo. In all reasonableness, they probably all had bad cards, but when someone played back at me, I was ready to re-raise the pot. As it turned out, for the most part, the frenzy started when I had a mid-pocket pair. I raise, everyone folds. The next hand I have an Ace. I raise, they fold. Another Ace, another raise. K-high, raise. Pair of 2s, raise. I mean, I wasn’t cold-decked. But I wasn’t holding monsters either. Of course, when they re-raise and I hold 66, I’m willing to re-raise back because they think I’m just bullying with garbage. That, and as a chipleader, I’ll take a cointoss here.

With the non-blogger out, Trip, Joe and I made the money. Trip was out next, after a lot of back and forth. Heads up with Joe was interesting. I kept my aggression on because all those small and big blinds added up to a lot. We got him all in with two overs to my pocket pair and he doubled up. At that point, however, I had about 17K to his 6K, so it didn’t hurt me. I immediately went on the offensive again because he had me barely covered in chips. Once I was ahead in chips, I was ready to make my stand. With K2 and a pre-flop raise by Joe, the flop came down A23. I believe I pushed him all-in and he called with TT. By the river, I had a fullhouse with a 2 on the turn and a K on the river. To the untrained eye, it was a suckout and I got lucky. Hell, that is the truth on the most basic level. But beyond that, my aggression allowed me to be in a situation where I could make marginal calls. He was already down to about 6K again by this hand, and a loss would not have crippled me. Luck being what it is though, I thank Joe for a good game and a graceful exit.

Joe fit in with the group extremely well. For that, I am glad. When I was discussing the blog with my bro-in-law Marc, I told him that to me, it was about building a community. That’s why I started the Limit Challenge, SNG Challenge, and HU Challenge. It’s also why I came up with the DADI events. Poker is great, but playing poker with people you know and like is 10 times greater.

After the SNG, with my $79 payday (booya!) and my streak continuing, I realized that I was still in the PSO MTT. I had been folding folding folding and pushing with AJ, AQ, etc. At one point, I accidentally went all-in with K6 and won against AT. But this was all during the SNG. After the SNG, I asked Kip about how many were left. The answer: 34 out of 183. I ended up going out in 34th, out of the money, after I was mostly all-in preflop. It was the first hand after the break. Still, 34th is not bad for my league stats. WSOP, here I come!

That was poker last night. It fucking rocked! I’m in the flow, feeling the game, and doing well. It’s a nice change of pace. So now, I’m just keeping stride.

Be good!

I just noticed more white hairs coming into my beard. I’m 26 and I’m already mostly bald. I joke that I don’t mind finding gray hairs, because at least they are hairs. But a white beard! It’s official. I’m no longer George Castanza. I’m officially Mr. Celine Dion! There couldn’t be a worse fate.

Last night was a fabulous night of poker. Work kicked my ass first though. Right before heading out the door at 7:10, I was grabbed by the partner who is part of our 2-man team. As it turned out, a very important document was never filed on one of my cases. It was from before the case became mine, per se, but it would have been nice if I caught it. Unfortunately, those are the breaks when you are still a young pup at this law thing.

When I got home, I re-heated my dinner and sat down with wifey Kim. She continues to be the sunshine of my life, even if her taste in televisions leaves a lot to be desired. To her credit, she is slowly converting me, and I actually found myself enjoying the music stylings of the female contestants of American Idol. Also to her credit, wifey Kim didn’t so much as flinch when I proceeded to comment on the physical attributes of the contestants. My bet is that Opera girl and blond safe girl (not blond my-father-is-in-jail-boo-hoo) are going to be tossed from the show on Friday. The male group looks like a freask show, and I’ll probably be watching their performances tonight (thanks for the rerun, Lost!).

Fortunately, I bought a wireless card for my laptop that connects through the USB port. The port that used to hold the wireless card is not working and hasn’t been in months, so I’ve been plugging the ethernet in directly. This has kept me tethered to my easy chair, which is only four feet from the couch. Now that I’m wireless, I’m free to move that 4 feet, and surprisingly, I think it might be helping my game. I can now be closer to wifey Kim, and a minor change of scenery has perked me up.

Thus, last night I found my stride. During Idol, I played some more 1/2 Limit on Party. The players there are really rather aweful, and I guess this is no news to anybody but me. My luck has been fairly good lately too, so my KK held up a couple of times, as did my JJ and a couple of other big hands. My QQ fell to T2, with me betting the entire way and him hitting his T for two pair on the river, but hey, that’s poker. All in all, I won about $20+ playing there in about an hour. I also cleared a fifth of the raked hand requirement to get my bonus $25.

After wifey Kim fell asleep watching a DVR’ed Real World/Road Rules Challenge, I decided to play some more. I sat down for a $16 2-table turbo SNG on Stars. They have the weirdest buy-ins. I also entered a $13 2-table shorthanded (12-p) SNG on Stars. I was doing well in both, keeping above the average for the most part. I played smart too, keeping out of big hands and picking up pots when I could. Unfortunately, I lost the Shorthanded game. I don’t even remember the hand well, because at that point I was just about on the bubble of the Turbo SNG. Turbos may be my niche. I can keep out of the fray long enough to outlast most of the competition. I was one of two shortstacks when it got to the bubble but I know how to play a shortstack and was able to double up to secure 3rd place. That’s where I eventually went out, with a $30+ profit. I think these 2-table SNGs may be the way for me as well. I haven’t had much luck hitting the top spot, but with $30+ profit for third, I can make do with thirds until I finally hit 1st. I don’t recall the exact payout for 1st, but it must be near or over $100.

I was trying to get on the Undercard of the Veneno v. Katitude HU series scheduled for noon on Sunday. Poker Champ may be a lot of things, but I guess we can’t include coward. As it turns out though, he doesn’t think that he can make that time, so look for the Champ and I to have our best of 7 series on some future date. Sunday night right now looks to be the favorite. I would love some railbirds to join, so expect me to announce the date and time here.

I love poker, and so do you, so check up with me later and I’ll have some more pokery goodness. I have been tabbing pages in Zen and the Art of Poker so I can share some of the better portions with you. But I’m still busy as fruck, so I’ll be getting back to you all later.

Ooh! One last thing. Go to PokerSourceOnline immediately and sign up for the PSO Poker League. It’s a series of $5.50 MTT events on Absolute Poker, with the first event tonight. You don’t have to sign up for Absolute through PSO (you can have a pre-existing account), but you do have to sign up for at least one PSO promotion (if you’ve done one in the past, you are good to go). I suggest Bodog, which is very easy to complete. Go for the 6000 PSO points and use bonus code NEWYEAR on the page where you tell PSO your Bodog info. This will earn you 9000 PSO points. Check out PSO’s point store to see the vast amount of stuff you can get with that. As for the League, if you play in 6 of the 10 events (or more than 6, and take your best 6 scores) and you have the best score, you win a seat to any $1500 WSOP event. 2nd through 5th pays a whole lot of PSO points, for more free merchandise (including gift certificates to Party Poker). In every tournament, 1st through 3rd also get PSO points, on top of their winnings (as I understand it.

Also, VegasPokerPro has a great option on their site. Click the Tournament Feed link and you can see all the upcoming MTTs on various sites all at once. It’s much better than what I usually do, openning up sites, checking MTTs and closing them down looking for the best option. Thanks VPP!

I don’t know what it means to make someone your ‘huckleberry’ but the word just rolls off of my tongue. For that reason, I am announcing that I am my own Huckleberry. Why?

You may recall that I have been running poorly for a month or two or three or so. All the while I was trying to convince myself alternatively that it was luck, and then that it was my play.

To be honest, I think it was mostly luck. My game is solid. I play a style that is fairly aggressive and therefore, swings will happen. I’ve changed my game to avoid coin tosses in tournaments unless necessary and I’m constantly tuning up the game, but overall, I have confidence that I can continue to play profitable poker.

Want some short term proof? Me too. That’s why I am happy to say that I am currently on a 5 or 6 day winning steak. I can’t offhand remember which.

Here comes the Huckleberry part. On the night of DADIII I won an SNG and lost three tourneys (2 SNGs and DADIII). The result was that I was up $1 for the day. Now, $1 is nothing to write home about, but it helped my streak start/continue and I was done playing for the night regardless, so I booked my W.

Yesterday, I played 2 games, principally, online. I entered a 6-person $13 turbo SNG on Stars and bubbled in third place. Now, I lost because I made the same mistake I have made two other times recently. This was the hand:

I held A9. I was 2nd in chips, barely above the 3rd place player. The first place player had me covered by at least 1K and probably 2K, but overall, he had been losing his stack. He minimum raised me from the Button and I called. The BB folded. The flop was 789, rainbow. I checked. He pushed all-in. I called. He had TT.

I have (previously) held fast to the general rule that if a player pushes all-in, and it is a huge overbet (as here) on the flop, he probably missed the flop entirely and is trying to take down the hand right away. I thought that my top pair was good, so I called. I was wrong.

So, that is the first way that I have become my own Huckleberry. I have fooled myself into thinking that my rule of thumb is a hard-fast rule. It is not. In fact, from my recent experiences, it seems like the opposite is true. With these players, a large all-in overbet on the flop usually means a good hand. This goes back to something I’ve read in Zen and the Art of Poker, which I am currently reading. Basically, the author suggests that you not project the way that you would play on other players, because they can and do play different style than you. Here, I wasn’t projecting my style, but rather the style I have seen from other players. I must admit, though, even now, a play like that would look fishy to me (no pun intended) and I’d be tempted to call.

This leads me to the 2nd way that I have become my own Huckleberry. After finishing the tournament, I played 1/2 Limit on Party Poker. I was up $13.25, and then I decided to call it a day. I ended up $0.25 for the day…continuing my streak. The streak had some effect on my decision, but so did wifey Kim and her friend who had just come over. So, all-in-all, I can’t complain. Let the streak continue…

I also played at Robbie Hole’s last night for another live game spectacular. This time, we only got in 2 $20 tourneys. I lost the first, but placed 2nd out of 7 players in the second, which netted a $20 profit. In other words, I broke even. The big winner of the night was Peter, a 40+ year old guy that has the personality (god bless him) of a 6 year old with a new toy on Xmas. He placed 1st in the first game, his first win so far in the 6 or so months he’s been playing at Hole’s. He caught some cards (hell, a lot of cards) with poor hands, but I still was glad to see him win. Yes, it sucks to have a tourist (LOLOL) win, but that’s what keep the tourists playing.

Jordan, out!

I am so freakin’ busy today! Have you ever had one of those days where you are super busy but nothing is getting done? Instead, you are doing triage, running from one problem to another hoping to keep slightly ahead so that you don’t get entirely destroyed by the tidal wave of work. That’s me. But since, I didn’t post much during the long weekend and I value my readers greatly, I’m going to do a clearing house on some interesting hands I already had copied and pasted into blogger.

This one will constitute

You Decide #29

It’s a multi-table SNG tournament on Poker Stars. We are on Level VII (100/200/25). I am the 2nd in chips at my table, with about 8K in chips. I’m in the SB with TT. EP raises all-in for 925 on top of the 200 BB. Everyone folds to me. I raise 2075 on top, trying to isolate. I don’t want the BB to call with a marginal hand and beat me. So, I raise so that he has to go all-in to call. He does just that. As it turned out, the BB had QQ.

I thought that the isolation play was a good one, but I ignored the possibility that if he had a monster, I’d be toast. I’m still not sure if my ‘gamble’ was a good one.

I don’t have much else for you now. Time is a-wasting. Bear with me for the next day or so. I appreciate your patience.

On a quick side note, I’ve been playing a slew of SNGs with bloggers, and I love it. There is nothing better or more entertaining. So look me up on Yahoo IM (highonpokr, leave off the last E for +EV). See you at the tables.