ABORT, ABORT...

Seriously, I can't be this bad!! The SnG mission on Party Poker is over. I'm not going through with 50 of these things. The beats I have been taking have been brutal. I did place in the money just two days ago (3rd place grrrrr), but before that I probably averaged 4th or 5th place. The structure of these mother-effers is so messed up that it forces you to play kinda bad. But the beats....ARGGGHH! This is one of my favorites and sums up the play in these $10+1's;

Middle of 2nd level of blinds (15/30). AKo on the button (730 chips). One MP limper (about 500 chips), one player next to him raises to 100 (he has about 300 left), and I seriously knew I had the lead here. I put in a 350 raise to shut out the limper and let the raiser know i mean business. The limper goes all in, as does the raiser!! Wonderful i'm thinking...but for some odd reason I knew I was in the lead. This is what I was up against: MP limper - JTo, MP raiser - AQo...of course a Jack hit and I was down to a little over 200 in chips. The best thing is the limper says in the chat box "there's a lesson for you, sometimes Jacks are better than Aces". Thanks retard. I told him I didn't have aces and that if I did he'd have been out, but thanks for the lesson.

So, it's cash games only on Party Poker from here on out. I thought about trying out the 20's, which i've heard great things about, but I don't want to have to re-deposit after taking these kind of beats.

Thanks to NeccoWafers on plusone, I have been on a roller coaster of sorts playing $2/$4 Triple Draw. On Sunday I had my worst run and almost lost a buy-in. I think I left with about $15. I really got absolutely no cards to speak of and tried to make hands out of crap. Then last night I turned $84 in to $205 playing what I consider to be close to flawless (and a little lucky). By lucky I mean I was defending my bb (which was almost always raised) w/ 23xxx,24xxx and hitting perfect cards. I think I drew out of position three times in 2 hours. I do have to stop pushing hands like 268xx out of position. That is just awful. But at least I know it now. In the .25/.50 and .50/1 games these didn't hurt as much so I didn't realize how bad they were. But when you lose a $25 pot because of a rough draw, you start to see things a bit more clear.

Here's my favorite hand of the night, before I went on the $2/$4 run!

Hand #9779145-3394 at Saint John ($1/$2 Triple Draw 2-7)
Powered by UltimateBet
Started at 28/Nov/05 21:18:29

graysonf150 is at seat 0 with $100.
jamfreek is at seat 1 with $105.25.
scottpoker04 is at seat 2 with $25.50. (This guy bought in for $100 i believe)
Zebulon300 is at seat 3 with $10.50.
worldcup2010 is at seat 4 with $70.50.
GreaterThanU is at seat 5 with $18.50.
The button is at seat 3.

worldcup2010 posts the small blind of $.50.
GreaterThanU posts the big blind of $1.

jamfreek: 8h 5c 7d 3s 4s
scottpoker04: -- -- -- -- --
Zebulon300: -- -- -- -- --
worldcup2010: -- -- -- -- --
GreaterThanU: -- -- -- -- --

First Round:

jamfreek raises to $2. scottpoker04 re-raises to $3.
Zebulon300 folds. worldcup2010 re-raises to $4.
GreaterThanU calls. jamfreek calls. scottpoker04
calls.

worldcup2010 takes 2 cards. GreaterThanU takes 2
cards. jamfreek stands pat. scottpoker04 takes 4
cards.

Second Round:

jamfreek: 8h 5c 7d 3s 4s
scottpoker04: -- -- -- -- --
worldcup2010: -- -- -- -- --
GreaterThanU: -- -- -- -- --

worldcup2010 checks. GreaterThanU bets $1. jamfreek
raises to $2. scottpoker04 re-raises to $3.
worldcup2010 folds. GreaterThanU calls. jamfreek
re-raises to $4. scottpoker04 calls. GreaterThanU
calls.

GreaterThanU takes 1 card. jamfreek stands pat.
scottpoker04 takes 2 cards.

jamfreek: 8h 5c 7d 3s 4s
scottpoker04: -- -- -- -- --
GreaterThanU: -- -- -- -- --

Third Round:

GreaterThanU checks. jamfreek bets $2. scottpoker04
raises to $4. GreaterThanU calls. jamfreek
re-raises to $6. scottpoker04 re-raises to $8.
GreaterThanU calls. jamfreek calls.

GreaterThanU takes 1 card. jamfreek stands pat.
scottpoker04 takes 1 card.

jamfreek: 8h 5c 7d 3s 4s
scottpoker04: -- -- -- -- --
GreaterThanU: -- -- -- -- --

Final Round:

GreaterThanU checks. jamfreek bets $2. scottpoker04
calls. GreaterThanU folds.

Showdown:

jamfreek shows 8h 7d 5c 4s 3s.
jamfreek has 8 7 5 4 3.
scottpoker04 mucks cards.
(scottpoker04 has As 6d 4c 3c 2c.)

Do you fold a $50 pot w/ an A? Of course right. And trust me, he didn't think it was A-5....I saw this guy push hands and raise and re-raise w/ 45789! He called people down with Q high after they were pat after the second draw. He must have been on some serious TILT!

Triple Draw...Playing Over My Bankroll...

So Necco, on PlusOne, gave me this crazy idea that I could play 2-7 at the 2/4 limit. I really think I am a good enough player for this limit, but boy is it frustrating. I really shouldn't play that high, mostly because I might play a little scared, since $30 pots come and go. And, with a game like TD, suckouts happen so much. Regardless, I played 2/4 Sunday night for the first time and lost like $50. I was just completely card dead for almost all of the 2 hours that I played. But, as Necco said, the play wasn't that great. For the most part, it was pretty straightforward. So I decided to play again last night. I again saw the same straightforward play, people pushing their one card draws and decent two card draws. One thing that is different, is that you don't see a pot that hasn't been raised before the first draw. Occasionally there will be a limper, but 95% of the time the button is raising or the CO. I also see a lot more rougher hands winning. I've never seen so many rough 9's. But these guys pay attention. I am the king of the value bet and aggression after the last draw. I almost NEVER check OOP after the last round. If I am pat I want them to be confused and scared to call with there 8. So I got called down one time value betting a pat 9 and lost a decent pot to an 8. But now I know that he knows that I might do this and I can exploit it. I don't think it's all that bad to be aggressive like that. It mixes up your game so that they will call you down. I just have to control it a bit more. Necco is the king of this (not the control part but the aggression). I was watching him play last night (10/20), and he would either have the nuts or a completely ridiculous hand. Now he was playing 3 handed which will open up your starting hand requirements, and he too was playing over his 'roll, but I saw so many times he would get called down and win his biggest pots with his good hands. He was about break even though, and a little tilted. I'm going to keep playing it though, although I may step down a level. I just can't stand the .25/.50 table. I've had great sessions there, but winning 30 bb's in 1 hour (which is a great winrate) is only like $15, while last night I won about $80 in 2 hours. If I am averaging 10 bb's an hour at the .25/.50 level, I think I can make a jump.

I also played in two tournaments last night. One WSOP super satelite (my first), and the $5 7pm that I took down a couple months ago. The super was really a spur of the moment thing. It was a turbo tourney, and I seriously hate those things. I played pretty bad though, only lasting about 30 mins. The 7pm was great until I busted! I had an above average stack the whole tournament until the ante's kicked in. There were about 600 that played, and I think I went out around 130 or so. I had JJ UTG, and raised to 1500 (my stack was about 10k blinds were 200/400 w/ 50 ante). UTG +2 re-raised to about 4-5k. The button called. I pushed. I really should've layed it down looking back, but I just can't do that with that much in the pot. I figured the re-raiser for AK, but the button smooth calling was sooooo weird. So the re-raiser goes all-in and I know I'm toast now, as he had to have an overpair to JJ, and surprisingly the button calls. I think this was about a 30k pot. It turns out I was up against QQ and ATs<--WTF. I guess he was priced in, but seriousy the smooth call!!

Anyway, i'm glad I had a decent night playing Triple Draw to make up for the tourneys and the $50 from the other night. The Turkey Tourney is one day away, and I can't wait to play live. If only I could get my friends to play some other games besides hold'em!!

Need an update

Man, it's been a while since I posted anything on this blog, so I figured I'd see what comes out. The last thing on here was our 1 year anniversary picture, which was a great night. We had a lot of fun and ate a ton of excellent food. Eating is like our hobby. My gut proves it! I finally got a bunch of new music though and actually went to a show last night at the 9:30 club in DC. Mo got me a $100 gift card from Tower Records (one of my favorite all time stores of course!), and I have about $20 left on it. I bought the newest Leo Kottke and Mike Gordon CD, The Bad Plus' newest release, Trey Anastasio's great new album called "Shine", Drew Emmitt, and Robert Walter. Chris and I went to see Umphreys McGee last night, as I said, and it was rockin' as usual. I have been listening to the show all day today since I bought it right after the show. These guys are seriously on fire! They just don't produce a dud of a show ever! It was Chris' second UM show and I think he had a good time...i don't know, didjya Chree? We spent a lot of the preshow chatting and drinking beers. I love that the 9:30 has such excellent brews on tap. Of course at $6 a pop, it can get pretty expensive.

I have realized something this month and October in that I really haven't played much poker, or should I say as much poker as usual. I have actually been doing a little experiment on Party Poker, and I have played nothing but $10 SnG's. I haven't had a very good run after about 15-20, but I think I am in a little bit of a funk. I believe I know the best course of action in these things, it's just my hands aren't paying off as much as they should be or I am getting a little unlucky. It's weird, but I don't think i'm paying enough attention as I should either. I will look at my results after about 50 and see what comes up. I really want to get 100 under my belt to really look at my PokerTracker statistics, which should be interesting. I did get to play two live home tourneys though, one of which I placed second. It was a really good mix of players about 20 or so, and three of them I had played with before. This was a $100 buy-in tournament that was possibly going to have a couple of "The Junkies" of WJFK playing in. Somehow they were all friends with these guys so I was looking forward to playing with them, cause they are funny as hell! Alas, they didn't show, but I took down 2nd place in the first tournament for a payday of $300. I was pretty pissed at myself when it got down to heads up. I feel like i've played so many SnG's and HU SnG's that I am comfortable with the cards and how to play in that situation. The problem was that I can't remember a time when i've played heads up live. I felt that my opponent had an excellent "read" on me and could tell when I was weak or when I was strong. At least I read the last hand correctly and got all of my money in with the best hand. It went down like this. I was sitting with a little less than my opponents stack, he had me covered but only by about 300-600 chips. The blinds were 500/1000 and I was in the sb/button with J5s. I doubled the bb and my opponent re-raised me to 4x the bb. Here I sensed that he sensed that I was weak, which I was...LOL. I thought it out and decided I'd call and see a flop, leaving me with about 1/2 my stack. The flop was an insignificant rainbow except for a 5 that gave me middle pair. My opponent immediately went all in and I beat him to the pot and called. He turned over KTo and I was ahead at the moment, but he had 6 outs to beat me. He turned a K and I got no help on the river and it was over. Not a bad beat really, but unlucky nonetheless. I went on to play the second tournament, but went out after something like 10-12 hands. My JJ ran into AK after an A Q x flop that I had to muck (he later told me he did indeed have AK). And then I was left with a short stack that I donked off when I had top pair to a made straight. I was just happy to play some live poker and actually make a profit. I can't wait for another chance to play with those guys though, they were a good group of players and nice and friendly to boot.

So I look forward to playing some more online soon, as well as the much anticipated poker night with our good buddy Aman. He is in town with his wife for Thanksgiving and we a tournament scheduled the day before. I really don't care how well I do, I will take it seriously, but I am just looking forward to watching "Shmee" in action!