High On Poker

*** WARNING: NO POKER CONTENT ***

It’s a well known fact that as hot as most Swedish girls are, there’s is an odd form of beauty. It’s the law of diminishing returns as applied to Swedes. Simply put, they may be hot at first, but stay with a Swede long enough and they just become boring.

But really, this is my take on Tiger Woods: Who gives a shit/Who gives a fuck. I mean, really. I understand that he is an athlete, and potentially the biggest profile athlete playing today. I get that he is paid the big bucks and that he is the face of an entire sport, not to mention that he also has put forth a squeaky clean image that is actually probably the cause of his downfall. But in the end, isn’t this just the same story as John Edwards and David Letterman and Michael Jordan and countless other celebrities and athletes. Famous people can get poon on tap. Can and will.

What really blows my mind, though, is the way Tiger is just being an absolute pussy. Call me old fashioned, but if my wife found out that I was cheating on her with 13+ females throughout the course of our marriage (there was never a time that Tiger wasn’t cheating, according to reports), I’d see the revelation as the perfect opportunity to split from the wife. I mean, it’s not like he will ever be able to reach a point where everything is back to normal. So, instead, the affairs were revealed to your wife, you took your lumps (both literally and figuratively) and when the dust settles, you can escape the marriage that you clearly do not want in the first place. This is opportunity knocking, Tiger. She knows you like the strange, so now go get some with absolute freedom. Don’t be a puss and crawl back, quit your job and beg for forgiveness. Forgiveness in this case is a short-term plan and will be followed by a sexless, frigid marriage. Fuck that!

I am not condoning what Tiger did, but I definitely do not condone how he is handling it. Have the courage to follow your convictions, Tiger, even if those convictions involve dirty sex with pornstars and wannabe models.

Final thought: I heard a rumor that Tiger stood to lose upwards of $300 million if he and Elin get a divorce. First off, the man has a pre-nup agreement that will avoid such a loss. But more importantly, $300 million is nothing to Tiger. Divorce is hard for the guy working as a plumber making $40k a year as the sole bread winner in his household. That guy is going to lose 50% of everything plus more, along with longterm alimony and child support. Poor Tiger, however, will still have over $400 million, even if he has to give Elin $300. In fact, Tiger is in the small group of people where the financial implications of divorce are nil. So, enough of, “What an idiot! This will cost Tiger $300 million, just to get laid!” He can afford it and thensome.

Until next time, make mine poker!

When we last left our hero, he was clutching onto his bedspread wondering when the bed would stop spinning. As we join him again, he is suddenly awake, 7:30am in the morning, Vegas time, or 10:30am in NY (i.e., reality time).

Jordan woke from his bed surprised to find that somehow in the course of the evening, he had worked his way under the covers. More accurately, he had worked his way underneath the bedspread, which as any good germaphobe knows is ground zero for uncleaned jizz stains and other sordid toxic spills. Jordan rolled out of his bed and dragged himself into the bathroom. Finding no identifiable bruises from the other night, he popped a Motrin and decided that the best cure for his queasy stomach was some food.

He had remembered a text message late at night before he fell asleep. It came from Kat and read, “Where are you? I’m so pissed right now, I’m going to punch somebody!” His feeble attempt at a response last night simply read, “Where are you?”, but he had gotten no response. Either Kat was asleep, in jail, or both. He had hoped for the former.

Jordan lay in bed hoping to get over his rocking hangover. He turned on his iTouch and began to watch a movie until it suddenly froze. SHIT! The iTouch was Jordan’s only real entertainment with him, so the flight home was going to suck without some help. He tried all of the various tricks but nothing worked, so he left the room in search of food with his iTouch and USB plug just in case.

It was too early to call anyone, so Jordan walked the casino floor stopping by the various eateries to see if anything piqued his interest. He came across an elevator in the middle of the casino floor with two signs above it. The first said “Hash House” and featured ideal food; the second said “conference rooms,” which was a little less appealing.

He entered the elevator and hit the button for 4, the number indicated on the sign above the elevator. The elevator moved before making a grinding noise, as though it would suddenly stop and then hit free fall any minute. When the doors opened, Jordan was happy to see he was still alive, but the hallway showed only conference rooms. Breakfast fail. On the way down the elevator, Jordan held tightly to the railing…just in case.

Breakfast ended up being a bagel and cream cheese from a little dinette place near Jordan’s room tower. After breakfast, Jordan walked the casino floor, hoping to find a poker game at the IP. Third try, third fail. The room was desolate. Instead, he found a Pai Gow table, where he grinded another $50 win before moving on to craps, -$97. There went all that hard Pai Gow work.

Eventually, Jordan received a text from CK and F-train, who planned to  head for brunch at the apparently existent Hash House. “Do you or F-Train have a laptop?” “Yes.” “I’ll be right up.”

Jordan arrived at CK and F-Train’s room with his iTouch ready to go. One simple plug into F-Train’s laptop and it was back to normal. God bless that F-Train. Once everyone was ready, the three left the room and headed out to brunch. The destination was the elusive Hash House.

With his two shirrpas, Jordan was finally able to find the only passable restaurant in the IP. He, F-Train and CK met Alceste of IHadOuts fame there, completing the NY foursome. Food was eaten. Jordan opted for the stuffed burger, which was incredibly large. He barely finished half. The rest of the table was filled with equally huge portions.

Satiated, the crew left brunch. Jordan ran to his room to suit up for the private blogger tournament scheduled for 20 minutes at Caesars, across the street. Once dressed, he ran through the IP in the hopes that he would make the tournament on time.

Success! Jordan arrived at the Caesars poker room with time to spare. He paid the $100 and found his seat at table 33, seat 3. He already had a set.

Jordan’s table was a good one, if for nothing else than the company. He won’t try to name everyone, especially since the table dynamics kept changing, but to his immediate right was Lightning36 (probably one of the friendliest and most likable bloggers Jordan has met), along with StB, Poker Peaker, Schaubs, Carmen‘s mom, and a bunch of other blogger/players/ne’er-do-wells.

Jordan had a good time at the tournament, getting KK in his first hand, good for 200 chips in profit. More importantly, he was hamming it up. It was one of the rare occasions that he knew that his antics would be met with appreciation, instead of violence. It’s not easy to call your opponent a donkey, but when the person knows that the source is a showboating self-important blogger like Jordan, the insults go down a lot easier.

Jordan tangled several times with Carmen’s mom specifically. Always the gentleman, he even showed her a courtesy when she was in the SB and called the BB even though Jordan had raised. The dealer announced that she could fold, but had to leave the full BB in the pot. Jordan sent it back. No harm no fowl, especially since he ended up felting Mrs. Carmen’s Mom a couple of orbits later.

By the 300/600 level, though, Jordan had been all over the place. He was up over 10k for a while, but eventually settled in to about 6k when the first break occurred. Meanwhile, Jordan’s Luckbox Team Challenge teammates, Waffles and Dr. Chako, were in better shape with about 7k and 15k or more, respectively. A quick double-up, though, with god-knows-what and Jordan had some breathing room.

“Massages!” Jordan’s ears perked up. This group of bloggers was a ragtag bunch, but it was also a generous bunch, and since landing in Vegas, Jordan had his share of freebies at the hands (and wallets) of his blogger compatriots. Now, it was his turn to give a little back. He approached the masseuse with a $20 ready to go. “See that guy over there?” He pointed to his teammate, Woffles. “Give him the best 10 minutes of his life.” He handed over the $20 and called out to Woffles, “Hey Woffles, I got a gift for you.” Woffles turned around and at the thought of physical contact with an actual female, winced. Jordan whispered to the masseuse, “If he doesn’t want it, you can keep the $20.” After all, Jordan wasn’t going to force the girl on Woffles or take his money back.

As Jordan returned to the table, Woffle’s massage started. Jordan turned to his tablemates and shared, “I’m just helping Woffles get used to paying for a woman to touch him.” Always the thoughtful gift-giver, Jordan went back to poker with a renewed sense of purpose.

Things went quiet for a while. Jordan was card dead, holding only KK that one time on the first hand and JJ one time as well. That was it for pocket pairs, but there may have been one AK as well. No AQ though.

Jordan’s table broke and he was moved to his final table for the day. There were still five or so tables, but Jordan tightened up due to his cards and the escalating blinds, and eventually found himself to be a shortstack at a table of shortstacks. Jordan used his Short Stack Specialist skills as best he could, but card deadedness is card deadedness, and he spent most of his time folding and acting the fool. He even took out his bandanna, tied it around his face like a ye ole bank robber, threw on the hood and went into super-tell-lockdown, more as a goof since there wasn’t much tells to be seen in a shorties all-in.

Jordan got so low at one point that he had about 2 BB. UTG+1, he pushed with T6h. After all, there were enough antes out there and at least with T6h, he hoped to have outs. It amazingly folded to the BB, a bald Asian gentleman who our humble narrator believes to have been one of Astin‘s crew. The bald Asian considered what to do. Jordan was shocked. It was maybe 1 BB more, and with all the antes, the bald Asian was getting amazing odds…until he folded. Incredible! Jordan is just that good.

Jordan was able to double up once with QJ over AK all-in preflop, but eventually the blinds caught up with him. He began pushing blind, since his cards were so bad that looking would only cause him to freeze up. It worked once or twice, but eventually, F-Train called with A5d. Jordan showed 67o. The flop had a 5. The turn had another. Jordan was out of the tournament with two tables left in 14th place, 4 spots out of the money. It was technically a Lemon(!) moment, but it felt like lemonade.

Jordan left the table and wandered around for a bit. He finally decided that he should play more poker. But he was at Caesars, home of the stupid 1/3 game. Should he give it one more go?

Next time on The Neverending Trip Report: Jordan plays poker…but where?  Sports bets are placed…but on whom? Jordan turns in for an early night…or does he? Find out all this and more, next time on High on Poker!

Until next time, make mine poker!

Down $300 and still raging solo, I returned to the IP to see if any of my contemporaries were awake. Nope. It was still dead in the casino, and I began to appreciate the seriousness of The Economy (TM) when I returned to the IP poker room and saw only a 2/4 limit game running. The IP poker room is not exactly a happening place, but it was not this desolate on my previous trips.

I decided to play some table games and settled on some Pai Gow, still my favorite table game of all time. I started out with the minimum $10 bets, but eventually worked my way up as I won a couple of hands. I finally decided to walk when I was up an even $50. By that point, I was playing two spots on the table for $20-30 apiece.

During the Pai Gow, I hit a full house. Lulu, the Asian dealer, gave me shit for not putting any money on the Bonus. Let me make this clear for my loyal readers: NEVER PLAY THE BONUS! It’s a terrible deal. The payout for the full house would’ve been 5 to 1…and I was already at least 9 hands into my play when I hit it. Lulu, unfortunately, did not understand the math, though, and insisted on giving me shit for missing the huge $5 payout.

The rest of the table were a bunch of chain smoking Asian guys in their late 20s or early 30s, and a 20-something white girl, whose boyfriend was playing blackjack one table over. It was a fun crowd, and we quickly got into Pai Gow chants. Lulu was eventually replaced by Lily and one of the Asians said, “Who is next? Lala?” Maybe it was funnier at the time.

Satiated, I decided to quickly freshen up before meeting up with Poker Peaker. Peaker was staying at the MGM, but was kind enough to take the Momorail to the IP before we were to head out to the HardRock, well in advance of the 7pm call time for the PLO/NLHE mixed game arranged by Michalski.

The cab ride over was easy. Peaker and I first did a lap around the casino. There was absolutely no signage for the poker room, but once we asked around we were directed to a corridor off of the circular main casino floor. The casino itself is actually pretty snazzy and well styled. I am not, however, inclined to go to a hotel that is part of a franchise that specializes in chicken fingers and signed rock star pants.

The poker room itself was actually quite pretty. The room has darker tones, by my recollection, a deep bluish purple feel. The tables were nicely appointed, big and clean. There were probably 40 tables or more. The room was open to the hallway, but otherwise clearly its own room/space.

We entered our names on the 1/2 list. It was still 4-something, so we had some time to kill. When we gave our names, the floor asked for our cell phone numbers. They told us they’d call when seats were available. There was at least one person on the list before us.

We walked around some more until my cell rang. They were opening a new table, so we headed over.

I had never before experienced this, but the HardRock actually started the new table with…four players. Ridiculous. I insisted on reduced rake (Today’s Tip: When there are less than 7 players, ask for reduced rake. You will usually get it.) and got what I asked for. I was still not too pleased, though, about the shorthanded table that included Peaker.

Fortunately, the other two guys were pretty predictable. One guy looked like Matusow and seemed to play a fairly straightforward game that was easy to exploit. The other guy was just plain bad, and would usually pay off value bets with lesser hands.

I wish I could say that I won tons of cash. I didn’t. But I did have a great time. Once I realized that a $7 raise preflop would win me the blinds, it became clear that I wouldn’t be making thousands at this kiddy table. So, I did the next best thing: I got drunk.

I haven’t mentioned it yet, but it was my birthday. In fact, it was a milestone birthday, and there I was in Vegas without any of my real world friends or family. That was cool, though, because I had my invisible internet friends, and I was happy to have a low key b-day. Seeing as how the game was boring, I decided to have one drink. By then, the table had filled out to about 6 or 7 players, and the guy to my immediate left and I had struck up a conversation. That’s when I learned that the HardRock gives premium shots for free in the poker room.

In total, I must’ve had 3 rum & cokes and 3 shots of Petron while playing. My play was noticeably deteriorating, but I was having fun, yucking it up with my table mates. Eventually, though, the blogger crowd arrived, and Peaker and I moved to our new table. I was down about $63.

At the new table was a slew of bloggers. This is where I can admit that I was officially drunk. I won’t even try to run through the roster of players. All I knew was that I was getting unlucky a bit. I was either missing flops or facing ugly turn cards that killed my hand. This was not helped in any way by the fact that my buzz had set in and I was really just riding co-pilot to my inebriation. I had a couple of more drinks and eventually even learned that I could get Don Julio instead of Patron, which resulted in at least one more shot.

I also grabbed a steak sandwich while the PLO/NLHE game was starting. Just after ordering, though, a casino host came by with a menu and offered all of the bloggers free food. This was all Michalski’s doing, but kudos also has to go to the HardRock for treating the bloggers like, well, low level rock stars.  I explained that I just ordered and the host told me he’d have it comped. Done and done. As it turned out, it was also one of the better steak sandwiches I’ve had.

At some point, we must’ve decided to head back to the MGM. All I know is that I ended up at the MGM, probably by catching a ride with CK.

I walked through the poker room and saw a bunch of different bloggers playing mixed limit games and NLHE on various tables. I was in no condition to play, now down about $500 at poker thanks to $124 in losses at the blogger PLO/NLHE game at the HardRock. I was also how shit-faced.

I left the poker room to check otu the sports book bar around the corner, where a bunch of other bloggers were hanging out. I spent some time chatting with Schaubs, Dr. Pauly, and Woffles, to name a few. I’m sure there were more, but I was in no condition to remember specifics.

At about 1am, I headed back to the IP with Pauly, Derek and Change100 (I think…we may’ve met up with Change when we arrived back at the IP). I stopped by Pauly’s room for a bit with the crew and we chatted about the amazing group and the place poker blogging may have in the lexicon of poker writing. Er, at least that’s what I think happened. By then, I was pretty hammered and after hanging out with Pauly and the crew for a while, synergy was really kicking in and I was at a whole new level of fuckedupedness. I was flying high as I probably babbled on about how the group felt like one large dysfunctional family (in a good way) and how some poker blogs, and frankly, Pauly’s blog in particular, could be seen as the definitive writings about poker for the current era. Before us (and I use “us” very loosely), guys like Alvarez and McManus wrote about the poker scene in book form. It made sense, too, since that was probably the best venue for such info at the time. But currently, blogs are able to produce a lot more output with a lot less editorial restrictions. I wouldn’t be surprised if in 80 years, people see Pauly’s blog as the definitive work about the poker scene in the age of the online and Moneymaker poker boom.

Yeah. So, after all of that, we all decided to head back to the casino floor. I, however, wanted to drop off my jacket, so I returned to my room. By then, the spins had started to kick in and I realized I was not making it back out for the night. Instead, I curled into bed and held tight, hoping that the room would stop moving. I remember thinking, “Just fall asleep and it will all go away…just fall asleep and it will all go away…” That and, “don’t puke…don’t puke…” Those were my mantras until I drifted off to sleep.

Day 2 is coming up, including the blogger tournament, some more Pai Gow, and my last night in Vegas.

Until next time, make mine poker!

The anticipation before a WPBT trip is often a double-edged sword. On one hand, you know, in your heart of hearts, that it will be a great trip. After all, it’s Vegas. Even if I was going out there for a Douchebag Expo, I’d have a great time. But there is also that trepidation. When I had dinner with some college friends last night, I mentioned my Vegas trip.

“Who did you go with?”

“Um, myself, sorta. I was meeting people there.”

“What people?”

“Um, other bloggers.” This is where I wait for the awkward pause. “I mean, um, a bunch of them are local and I’ve hung out with the group before. It’s not like that. We all know each other.”

Once I’m there and for a long while after, I can appreciate this ragtag group that borders on a dysfunctional family. But the night before, all sorts of scenarios can race through one’s head.

All that being true, I’m not one to go to sleep early. I often joke with wifey Kim that sleep is my enemy. I just hate sleeping. It’s so boring. But that didn’t stop me from going to bed around 10pm on Thursday night. After all, I had a flight to Vegas at 7:25 am, and I was way too excited to do anything productive Thursday night, anyway.

Friday morning, I got up at about 4:40 am, or 1:40 am Vegas time. While I was getting dressed in the dark, there was already a slew of bloggers in Vegas, probably shit faced drunk as I still cleaned the gunk from my eyes. Like a good soldier, I just kept my eye on the mission. I got dressed, grabbed my pre-packed bag, and left the apartment, off to the subway. From there, I took the Air Train to the airport, about a 1 hour trip door to door.

The JetBlue terminal at JFK airport is pretty awesome. Once I got through security, I grabbed some grub and found a place to wait for my flight. The flight itself was mostly uneventful. I just remembered that it was long. Very long. I guess something like 6+ hours, but it felt like 10. I tried to sleep a couple of times, but each time, I would nod off for maybe 5 minutes before waking back up. It was useless, so I spent most of my time flipping through the shitty channels on the JetBlue TV (er, maybe shitty programming, since it was so early on a weekday), and watching movies on my iTouch. God bless the iTouch.

Let me take a moment to sing the praises of traveling solo. Life is so much easier when there are no attachments. All I have is me and my backpack. No concerns about anyone else or anything else. It is an amazingly isolating and yet freeing experience.

Once I landed in Vegas, I was back in soldier mode. I headed to my next checkpoint, the taxi stand. I hadn’t brought any bags, aside from my overstuffed backpack, because I didn’t want to wait for the luggage carousel. No joking, I literally jettisoned clothing while packing merely because of space issues. Before I left for Vegas, I had already decided on no fancy meals…I couldn’t fit nice clothing in my backpack.

A quick ride from the airport (which seemed overpriced at $20 with tip, but I was just happy to be there), and I was at my Vegas headquarters, the Imperial Palace.

The IP is a great hotel if you are not looking for any bells and whistles. It has a nice sized gaming floor and is not overly dominated by wall-to-wall slots, like some places. The poker room is small, but the players are usually super fishy, not that I would play any poker at the IP this trip. The hotel is slightly dingy, but the rooms have always been clean and adequate.

Once I was checked in to my totally free room, I started to walk to the back of the hotel to my room in Tower 4, the Lost Tower. I swear, by the time I got there, I had to take two mini-escalators, a flight of stairs, an elevator, and a canoe. I think my room was officially in Henderson, even though the hotel was in Vegas.

But I’ve already skipped over a key fact. By the time I was at the IP, it was probably 11 am or so, Vegas time. As I walked to my room, I scanned the floor, hoping to see some of my fellow bloggers. As I passed the Geisha Bar, which incidentally sounds way nicer than it actually is, I had my first sighting. There, sitting at the bar, drinking various adult beverages, was none other than the One Man Party AlCantHang, Dr. Pauly, his brother Derek and a young lady by the name of Katie. It wasn’t even noon, and I had already done a shot of SoCo with Al and crew. Just typical.

And if it wasn’t obvious, whereas I was up all morning, those guys were up all night.

I got to my room, dumped off my stuff and decided to do what came naturally: poker. I was already dressed in poker gear. I was wearing a new Flash t-shirt (courtesy of wifey Kim for my recent birthday), cargo pants, and my brown Buffalo hoodie. I grabbed my other necessary items and started the trek to the poker room. I figured if I didn’t see anyone down there, I’d eventually bump into someone in the poker room.

Unfortunately, that wasn’t exactly the case. The poker room at IP had two tables going. As I got closer, it became clear, though, that I was looking at one of the saddest tournaments ever. I walked to the floorperson and asked what was spread. The Asian woman looked at me like she didn’t understand the term. I confirmed my suspicions: only a tournament right now? She nodded. I still wasn’t sure that she speekee Ingrish, but it didn’t matter. No poker for me.

Las Vegas is the land of opportunities (for VDs) though, so I took to the streets. I was contemplating my next stop and decided to just start walking. It didn’t take long until I arrived at the next building, Harrah’s. I made my way through to their poker room.

The Harrah’s poker room, unlike the IP room, is actually its own room. It looks to be a decent size, as well, with maybe 30+ tables, but it didn’t look like they needed it for their Friday afternoon crowd. Once again, the room was woefully short on players, and maybe three games were going, with at least one 2/4 limit game in the mix. I put my name on the 1/2 list with two names in front of me and grabbed a Bluff magazine from the rack. I was several articles into the magazine when I gave up. The one 1/2 table I could see seemed like no one was going anywhere anytime soon. In subtle passive aggressive protest, when I left, I didn’t take my name off the list. That’ll show them!

So, with 2 failed attempts at poker, I decided to go to a poker room that I generally hate: Caesars. Incidentally, I didn’t realize what a Harrah’s whore I am; all three hotels, IP, Harrah’s and Caesars, are owned by Harrah’s. I guess they got the last laugh.

Caesars’ room, in and of itself, is actually quite nice. It’s a big, private room, just off of the sports book. It’s actually like two rooms. There is the main room where the cash games are usually played. I won’t even hazard a guess at how many tables they have, but I’d be shocked if it was less than 60 total, including the back room. The back room is huge and is usually reserved for tournaments.

I do have one beef with Caesars, though. I hate that they spread 1/3 NLHE instead of 1/2 NLHE. It’s such a minor difference on paper, but I still find that the 1/3 throws off my bet sizing and general play. They use $2 chips also, which also throws me off.

Alas, at least there were games going, so I signed up on the list and then headed back to the sports book to place a ridiculous 5-game parlay ticket on the NBA (I lost my first pick and declared that I’d rather lose the first game in a parlay then the last). I waited about 15 minutes, and they finally called a new table.

At the new table, it seemed like the usual mix of players. No one particularly concerned me, but there were also no obvious donks. We started somewhat shorthanded, but I was fairly card dead, so I just watched the action around me. I had bought in short, at $200, since I only saw one guy with more. So be it.

Admittedly, the hands I am about to divulge are not my proudest moments. In the first hand, I held K8d in LP and after a bunch of limpers, I limped as well, finally getting re-popped preflop to $15 from one of the blinds. There were five callers by the time it got to me, so I called as well. The flop was T86, with two diamonds, giving me middle pair and the 2nd nut flush draw. The EP preflop raiser pushed all-in. It folded to me and I decided to call. He only had $88 in front and the pot was already $75+ preflop, so I was getting slightly less than 2:1. It wasn’t the best play in hindsight, as I think I could’ve found a better spot at the table, but I guess part of me was in the mood to gamble. The turn was a Jack and the river was a 6; my opponent showed pocket Jacks, so he turned the set and rivered a full house. At least I didn’t have to show my cards. I just mucked, rebought another $100 (bringing my total buy-in to $300) and moved on.

I may’ve bled some more chips on some preflop hands that did not develop. My last hand, though, just plain sucked. I held AK in middle position and raised it to $11. The button seemed like a pretty astute guy, in his 40s, tall, with glasses. It was coincidentally his birthday. It was also mine. When it got to him, he raised to $30. To my surprise, a chick who was in one of the blinds called. She was a pretty loose player, though, so I didn’t think to much of it, aside from the fact that a raise and re-raise must’ve indicated some level of strength. When it got back to me, I just flat called, hoping to see a flop before I got deeper into the hand.

The flop was a seemingly nice K53. It checked to me and I pushed all-in. I think I had a pretty penny left, maybe $130 or so, but with a $90 pot and, if I’m not mistaken, a flush draw on the board, I would be happy to take it down. The Birthday Guy folded and the Chick took a moment before calling. She then showed 55 for a flopped set. To add insult to injury, I turned an Ace. In other words, I was going broke one way or another.

After that hand, I only had $15 left. I think I pushed on the very next hand with King-high. I lost and decided to leave. After all, sometimes you can just tell that you’ve lost the table. Unless I started getting monster hands against second-best hands, I wasn’t going to be winning much with my now tarnished image. I wished the table good luck and headed out.

This seems like a decent enough place to pause. Coming up, we have my first Pai Gow session of the trip, my visit to the Hard Rock cafe, and more pokery action.

Until next time, make mine poker!

I missed all of eight hours from work to attend this weekend’s WPBT Gathering in beautiful Arctic Las Vegas, but by the look and feel of things back at the office (not to mention the wear and tear on my body and soul), it looks like I missed a week!

A full trip report will be forthcoming, but in the meanwhile, feel free to check out Poker Peaker‘s trip report post.  Peaker does a great job of explaining how some of the more awkward concerns regarding these WPBT gatherings usually end up in the most pleasant of surprises. I also give him kudos for his fine writing. Reading his report really makes me want to up my game here. So, enjoy!

But before I go, I wanted to share with you a little lesson on sports betting that I learned this weekend.

Presenting, High on Poker’s Five Easy Steps to Sports Betting Success

Step 1: Learn about bettable event. This may be done in any way, but I recommend overhearing someone mention an event; then, allow your action junkie tendencies take over (as though you had a choice).

Step 2: Find a midget. Any midget will do, but I prefer Internet celebrity authors. Alcohol dependence is a plus, although with most midgets, it’s also a given.

Step 3: Ask midget, while he is actually doing other things and therefore is only half paying attention, who will win the given event. In this weekend’s case, the event was a UFC card. When possible, get multiple bet recommendations from the inebriated little person for your parlay bet.

Step 4: Place bet at sports book; parlay if possible. Do not, under any circumstance, use any personal judgment. That’s what the drunk midget is for.

Step 5: Profit.

It’s that easy. But more on that during the full trip report. Right now, though, I need to get back to the weeks-worth of work I missed on Friday.

Until next time, make mine poker!

If you are not wearing shoes, I suggest you put them on now, because this one is about to knock your socks off.

HighOnPoker is mostly about introspection and poker, but rarely am I able to offer the juicy poker scene gossip, since I’m not really in the scene. But I do have friends, and one friend recently told me a story about a WSOP Main Event Champion that I found both delightful and pathetic.

In all the years I’ve played poker, one Main Event Champ stood out to me as the least deserving of accolades. That man is Jamie Gold. As I watched the WSOP broadcasts, I couldn’t help but think that Gold was an attention whore who gave off more information than an A-Z encyclopedia set (or Wikipedia for all of my readers under the age of 24).

So it does not shock me much to find out that he was recently allegedly involved in running a chop-shop of an underground poker game that was supposedly for “charity”. Now, I can’t say whether or not the rake really did go to charity. What I do know is that a party was originally scheduled in the location, a private bar/party room setup in Manhattan. The tables and dealers were provided by a local, legitimate entertainment company and the event organizers tried to arrange extra discounts since it was “for charity.”

On the night of the party, a backroom or two were set up for live poker, three tables or so. The players were all rich guys, likely Wall Streeters, and were terrible at poker. The games spread were 5/5 NLHE ($500 min), 5/10 NLHE ($1000 min) and when they were able to, 10/25. The players were largely drunk, didn’t know much about poker like how to know its their turn to act, and had tons of cash, reaching into their pockets for $1000 buy-ins like they were putting coins in a slot machine. Meanwhile, model-caliber cocktail waitresses served drinks in barely-there mini skirts.

Jamie Gold was holding court. According to my sources, Gold was playing on more than one table at times, and he was playing like crap. I give Jamie some leeway though, because he was obviously the sideshow attraction (“STEP RIGHT UP AND PLAY WITH A GIN-YOU-WINE WORLD SERIES CHAMPEEN!”). Often in these games, or even in actual underground games, the house will play just to keep the game going, too, and in those scenarios, its not unheard of for the host to play a weaker game, since he’s really just there to fill a seat. Both of those elements could have been in play.

If all of this is not enough (and really, this is the interesting part), the game was up again on the next two nights, sans party. And after a while, when the house, um, I mean, “charity”, was not making enough money, they covertly told some dealers to just start ratholing chips. Rake was already 10%, uncapped. Let me repeat that. 10% uncapped rake was not enough for the “event” organizers, in games with upwards of $10k on the table. I mean, a $1000 pot is not unheard of at these stakes, and 10% of that would be $100, but that still wasn’t enough for the greedy hosts (of which Mr. Gold may or may not have been a member).

So, there you have it. Now, this is all alleged, third-party information, so do not take it as gospel, but it sure sounds like Gold is involved in an underhanded scheme to make money from donkey rich poker players. I am only guessing here, but I wouldn’t be surprised if he had money problems. After all, he gave away a chunk of his WSOP winnings and probably spent another large chunk on lawyers. And lord knows he isn’t raking in the endorsement deals or winning any other events.

Until next time, make mine unsubstantiated gossip!

I’ve always found myself attracted to the darker side of life, and the degeneracy of gambling fits right in. As I was surfing the web today, though, I came across two articles that ironically tell very different stories about gambling degeneracy.

In the Wall Street Journal’s article, The Gambler Who Blew $127 Million, you can read about a centimillionaire who is now suing Harrah’s for encouraging him to gamble drunk. Ridiculous.

In the New York Times’ article, Picking (Up) a Winner Without Placing a Bet, you can read about a gambling bottom feeder who makes a sizeable living from picking through the OTB’s garbage for discarded winners.

So there you have a captain of industry who lost control and most of his money in the process, and a bottom-feeding degenerate who essentially started his own, capital-free, low-risk industry off the backs of the gambling world.

It really is the wild west out there.

Until next time, make mine poker!

Thanks to a BS comment (aka a backdoor way for some advertiser to get a free link), I stumbled across an old blog post of mine from 2005. Reading through it quickly, I saw a horrible play in a cheapo $20 max NLHE game online, but also a refreshing account of where my head was at at the time. I was still mostly a home game player, and I was planning to play in my buddy Mikey Aps homegame, filled with serious players. I stated, paraphrased, that I was keeping my confidence up by focusing on a recent tourney win and my overall poker acumen. More importantly, I also said that confidence is key to success, second only to chance, and since I couldn’t control chance, I needed to focus on confidence.

These blogs are amazing things, an almost constant time capsule, available for viewing at any time. Ironically, I think that post, albeit not including the bad play, was pretty spot on for some of the issues I’m facing today. Confidence is key if I want to move up a level (2/5), and if I play scared, I will lose.

Going back to another parallel, on my first casino NLHE attempt, I started with AA on my very first hand, played perfectly according to Doyle Brunson’s Super System, and lost to TT’s flopped set. My recent attempts at 2/5 saw me start with 77 only to double up a player with AA when I couldn’t believe my opponent. I suppose on the first go-round (AA v. TT), I had the better of it, so the situations are somewhat different, as far as context is concerned. But the more immediate parallel to me is that in both cases, I faced an initial scare and the question is what do I do with it. In both instances, the obvious and smart conclusion is that I will learn from my past experiences, so that they are not wasted. In the AA v. TT hand, the lesson was that you could play perfectly and still lose (or perhaps to be wary that AA does not always win). In the 77 v. AA hand, the lesson is to play solid poker and gather information before going to war. I could’ve lost $20 on the 77 hand if I were smart instead of $345

I was playing a $27 Turbo 45-person SNG on Stars tonight. I guess without noticing it, I chose a game that’s good practice for Vegas. I hope to hit at least a few tournaments and the 45-p SNG has many of the same features as the live tourneys in Vegas.

Boy, I can taste Vegas. I’m already texting Poker Peaker randomly to discuss the weekend, and mentally, I’m probably spending 30% of the time just planning things out in my head or basking in the elation of another vacation so near my New Orleans trip.

On a very unrelated note, I played a couple of online games last night. The first was a $27 turbo 45-person SNG, where I was able to take 5th for a little over $100. The second was an 18-person $13 6-handed SNG, where I busted early. The third (simultaneous with the 2nd) was a $27 turbo 18-person SNG, where I took second for another $100 or so. Overall, not a bad evening for such limited play. It got my bankroll back past the point of my last withdrawal, which is always nice going into Vegas.

In contrast, before last night, I was suffering a string of obnoxious suckouts. I don’t like to belabor them, though, because what’s the point. If you are an 80% favorite, it still means you are bound to lose 1/5 of the time. But these next two hands give a better reason not to get upset.

We were pretty deep into the 45-p tourney, with two tables left and 7 spots paying when I suffered a shitty suckout. I held QJo in the BB with les than 10x the BB, so I was in push or fold mode. One player in particular was playing too many hands and pushing way light, so I called with my QJ only to face Q6. I figured that was one player downa nd a decent stack to boot. But this happened:

I was mildly feeling sorry for myself when I was dealt A6o in the SB on the very next hand. A player pushed from MP and since I was so short, I figured I had not choice but to call. He had me dominated with AK. The result:

Boomerang kharma, baby! Granted it was not against the same player, but but it does illustrate the simple point that sometimes you’ll be on the receiving end and sometimes you’ll be on the giving end of the ole suckout. So it doesn’t make much sense to sweat the losses.

Until next time, make mine poker!

I spent yesterday afternoon at my buddy Roose’s house on Long Island watching the football games on NFL RedZone and his 60″ television as random buddies stopped by. I used to play poker with the Roose crew a lot, but eventually the games’ location combined with my desire to play higher caused me to miss most of the games. This is just background so that you can appreciate that whenever one of our bud’s stopped by, they each hadn’t seen me in months. Invariably, the small talk question, “How are things going?” would come up, and my mind always drifted to one place: poker! Or more specifically, Vegas this Friday! I felt like I was rubbing it in, speaking about it so often with the group, but what can I say? I’m just keeping my eye on the prize.

The new website is going well, especially after I took care of a spammer who was trying to inundate my site with 188 comments extolling the virtue of Canadian Viagra. It’ll get your hard…and polite! Still, I receive some veiled comments that seem to be weak attempts at gaining some backdoor linkage. The smart ones actually have comments that seem on point, but most are pretty obvious and I’ll ignore them.

On to other links, though, there are three sites (one poker related, two not) that I felt like sharing with my legions of readers. The first and foremost is a link to Falstaff and Special K‘s Gambling Tales podcast. I’ve listened to the first two episodes so far and I’m saving episode 3 for the trip to Vegas. So far, it’s been a very informal affair, and its refreshing to hear some non-pros talking about gambling in general, as opposed to poker specifically. It’s a fine line and mostly poker-related anyway, but any degenerate can appreciate the wider net GT casts.

If you are looking for some non-poker content, my good college bud Jefe has started his own blog. Jefe is a writer, by trade, and decided to start out a blog bitching and moaning about life’s little irks as a side project, mostly to entertain himself and stretch his writing muscles. In my estimation, his choice of topics has been pretty funny and true. Think of it as a disgruntled Seinfeld: observational bitching with humor thrown in. I particularly like his post, “Bright Lights, Big City…and other places,” where he bitches about how every piece of electronics he owns has a light on it, making darkness in his apartment completely impossible. I had the same problem with my new Dell Desktop. The damn thing had a blue glowing light on the outside that stayed on whether the computer was on or off. To make matters worse, it would randomly start pulsing. I eventually had to cover the lights with electrical tape just to get a good night’s sleep. So check out Jefe’s blog, Hook, Line and Sinister, if you are looking to kill some time.

This last one is a pet project of wifey Kim’s and something I have been helping her with here and there. It’s a very simply blog dedicated to misspelled signs and menus at restaurants. It’s called the We Delivery Blog, named after the popular phrase on NYC Chinese Food menus, “We Delivery!”

Meanwhile, I’m keeping my eye on the prize. 4 days until Vegas.

Until next time, make mine poker!

Last night, after getting out of a work obligation late, I made my way over to the new underground poker club located a brisk 5 min. walk from my apartment. The game officially started probably about a week ago and spreads 1/2 NLHE two times a week. The location is ideal, so you’ll probably be reading about it a lot here. So let’s go with the Pizza Game, since I seem to have a food theme with poker room names and the place is located near what a pizza place which apparently has the best pizza in the neighborhood.

Before the game started, it was just me, one of the dealers, the guy who lives in the apartment, and two players. The two players were large black guys. Sorry, Dawn. I always feel somewhat ‘guilty’ referring to someone as a “black guy”, but I don’t play that “African American” bullshit.

So, we are all hanging out and since there was time to kill and it was a friendly crowd, I may’ve gotten a little less than sober. I joked about how it would kill my game, but that it wasn’t really a joke, as became apparent when the poker actually started.

I couldn’t pay attention for shit and I was hyper aware of my tells, to the point that I was probably causing even more tells to come out. Fortunately, that was the perfect time to go card dead, and I stayed that way for most of the game. Overall, I didn’t get a single pocket pair except KK at the very end of the game, AKo once and AJo once. That was it. Ironically, I lost all three of those hands.

With the KK, I tried to drag money from Edgie in small drips and drabs. I thought I was being clever, and I was, until he rivered a four-card straight with his K6o. Sonuvabitch!

In the AKo hand, I was a straddler who faced a re-straddle, so I was more than happy to raise it up pre-flop, only to be raised by the re-straddler. I had to give it up when I missed the flop. He held KK. Hmm.

With the AJo hand, well, I missed the flop.

All that said, I ended up winning $35, after rake and tips, which isn’t bad. The key to winning was first, avoiding the spewage that can come with card deadedness, and second, picking my target. About an hour or more into the game, a broad guy with an olive complexion (anywhere from Middle Eastern to Indian to Italian) joined us. We were playing shorthanded most of the game and Matty Ebs was playing as well, so this wasn’t exactly a packed game. I think the players that had arrived (me, the two black guys, Edgie, one of the guys who lived int he apartment and didn’t know poker, and Matty Ebs) all were playing a very passive style game. This was as much necessity as strategy, since no one was putting money into the pot willy-nilly, so even with a good hand, you had to be small or only win the $3 in blinds.

The new guy, however, was clearly there to play a much more aggressive game. The first sign was when Matty explained to him that the stakes raise later in the night when the action players arrive. If this guy wanted higher stakes, that meant he would be pushing the action at the 1/2 game. So, when I noticed him raising fairly liberally, I started to call him down with crap cards preflop. On two occasions I took significant pots from him by hitting top pair, shitty kicker and letting him bet into me the whole way. Simply put, you have to know your players and pick your spots.

I should add this about our new compadre: even though he was looking for action, I wouldn’t call him a good player. I was giving him the most trouble and when a seat opened up, he moved from my left to my right. That’s just plain dumb. Now, maybe he realized he was having no luck on my right, but that’s his fault. Position is key to NLHE, and he had position on me. By moving, he gave up what little advantage he had.

Second side note: considering that I was card dead last night, maybe his move wasn’t terrible. Even though I caught him with crap cards twice, I wasn’t playing many hands.

Of course, when he busted, the new guy left. Go figure. I guess he couldn’t handle the 1/2 stakes after all. To be fair, though, if I was losing the way he was, I would’ve left too. It just wasn’t his night.

Edgie was the entertainer of the table, at least to me. He was hitting major hands and playing very well to stack off several players. Whereas everyone else had middling stacks, his was impressive after a couple of hours.

I got a new line from Edgie that I plan on using in the future. I missed most of the action in the subject hand, but Edgie had K9 and his opponent had KJ on a KK9XX board. When it got to the river, Edgie started to play with his stack, looked his opponent in the eye, and said with a wry smile, “The question is how much can I value bet here?” It was hysterical! And naturally, once he value bet, he got the call. Because after all, when some dipshit at the table is stupid enough to announce that they are going to value bet, how do you not pay off the punk?! Well, I do have answers for that, but I do see the psychological edge this ploy sets up. It’s almost a challenge to the other player’s manhood and it wreaks of a “strong means weak” tell even though it is actually a “strong means strong” tell.

Good stuff. I used it later in the evening against Edgie, and it worked. Of course, that was the KK v. K6o hand, so I lost it anyway. Hmm…mental note; only value bet when ahead.

The other thing I found comical was Edgie’s stare. There were more than one hand when I’d be scanning the table behind my brown sunglasses and caught Edgie staring at me intently. Now, my sunglasses don’t entirely block out my eyes, but they do a decent job, and I figured Edgie didn’t know that I was watching him watching me. I swear, if you removed my sunglasses and put a candle on the poker table, we would’ve looked like a couple of lovebirds. I honestly couldn’t resist a laugh (inebriation helped me here) because it was so absurd.

When I mentioned it to Edgie later, he said that he say where I was looking. “Good,” I replied. “I thought it was unrequited.”

I will add this, though. Edgie’s stare is a huge image tell. Basically, it lets me know generally speaking that he is paying close attention to the game. That means he is here for the money and is playing for the kill. That’s an important piece of information, because some players are just gambling or don’t even realize the importance of gathering reads and tells on their opponents.

This is the #1 reason that I advocate sunglasses. Most of the time, my head is tilted one way and my eyes are looking in another direction. I don’t want people to know that I am analyzing everything. I just want to look like the douche-bag in the sunglasses who thinks he’s a hotshot.

When the new guy busted, it just left me, Edgie, Matty and his brother. It was a shame that the game did not fill up, but this is still a work in progress. The location is great, though, and the table, chips and chairs are all top notch, so I expect to be eating a lot of Pizza in the near future.

Until next time, make mine poker!