Sour Grapes
Last night's game was rather interesting. I finally got around to starting up the ring game and Don was the only person to show up for a while, so we played a few heads up freezeouts. Then Majdi and Ryan showed up so we played 4 handed nl holdem. I was up a 5 or 10 bucks when I was all in against Majdi with just a flush draw...which didn't come through, making me even for the night. Ryan was having a tough time, he busted out twice and with his last 10 bucks him and I went all in blind. He turned over T6s and I had 52o. But I flopped a 5 and the pot was mine!
At 7 we played our normal SNG and with the $10 buy in, I was the only one to rebuy. I also took a side bet with Ryan that he wouldn't win, and I gave him 4.5 : 1 odds. He bet me $5. Meaning if he won I would have to pay him $22.50. It got down to 3 of us, Matt, Ryan and myself. Ryan and Matt were about even in chips and I was way shortstacked. For the umteenth time in a row, I was ice cold. No AA, KK, QQ, JJ or AK. Wait, when it got down to heads up and Matt had an enormous lead on me, I picked up KK and got the blinds. I've only seen A's once in the last 2 months of our live play. I'm getting really sick of this shit.
So anyways, Ryan was getting into his ultra aggressive mode and I was getting ultra shorstacked. He raised my blind and I looked down at KQo. I had maybe $45 in chips and he probably had 3 times that. Flop came down ten high I think and he checked, and I put out a small bet, he called. Turn blank, I put out a decent bet, maybe $12-$15...to which he called. River, blank, I move in for my last $30. He folds and I show him my king high. My thinking was that if I couldn't get ahold of any chips, maybe I could tilt him with a bluff. Ryan HATES getting bluffed, and takes a preverse sort of pride in being almost impossible to bluff (even though any pro would be quick to tell you, the weaker players can't be bluffed, but you can bluff a good player.)
I kept sitting back hoping Ryan and Matt would bump heads and finally they did. Ryan raised Matt's BB. Flop came down K high with 2 hearts. Ryan bet, Matt called it. Turn brought the third heart and Ryan led out again, to which Matt called. River was a brick and Ryan moved in and Matt quickly called with the nuts, A3 of hearts. Ryan showed K2, and I made the money! Not only that but I got $5 more from Ryan for the side bet. I also cleared another $10 in the cash game, so it was a pretty profitable night. Matt ended up taking down the tourney and that was that.
There's something to be said for tight play. I didn't see a hand the whole night, I won less than 10 pots the whole game I'm sure (not counting heads up) and yet I still finished 2nd. Yes, it's boring as hell just sitting there, but if I'm getting shit hand after shit hand, I'm not gonna just throw the tourney away on garbage.
::
Absolute still refuses to post who won for the most raked hands from 2 days ago! I want to know if I should even bother trying to play a ton of hands today or not. Their site says the results will be posted within 48 hours...they've got 9 hours to go before exceeding the 2 day mark.
I like that they're trying to do more cool things, but they didn't organize this so well. If you can't see how far you are behind the leader (like Party does) it's not as fun. Being completely in the dark as to where you stand in the competition makes it more like playing pin the tail on the donkey than any real sort of competition. Absolute is a small site, but I still can't keep tabs on 100+ players.
I only ended up playing about 1300 hands but I'm hoping that will be enough to finish in the top 5, maybe even top 3. Who knows though.
::
I've been looking over on Stars a lot lately to see what's going on for the WCOOP. I'm kinda bitter that I probably won't be able to play in any of those events. I don't have any FPP's and all my money is tied up on Absolute for the time being. I love the structure for the final event for 2.5 million. Apparently you get to start out with T5000 and the blinds go up every half hour, so it's more like a live tournament. GL to any of the bloggers playing in it. I saw Wil Wheaton in every event, gl man. I'm gonna be railbirding most likely. Anybody wanna make a last-longer bet?
::
I started reading Phil Gordon's book, The Real Deal. I like how he doesn't really bother talking strategy much. There are plenty of strategy books, no need to hash out more of the same old crap. Interesting read thus far. The only thing that pisses me off is I've already noticed several typos and misspelled words. WTF is that? It's not a big deal, but this seems to be the case in half the poker books I read. Doesn't anyone bother to make sure there are no mistakes like that? If I had a book out and there were errors in it, I'd be pissed. I usually don't like it when I have errors in this lame ass blog, and when I spot them I fix them...let alone a fucking book that is gonna be read by perhaps millions. Ah what's the use.
At 7 we played our normal SNG and with the $10 buy in, I was the only one to rebuy. I also took a side bet with Ryan that he wouldn't win, and I gave him 4.5 : 1 odds. He bet me $5. Meaning if he won I would have to pay him $22.50. It got down to 3 of us, Matt, Ryan and myself. Ryan and Matt were about even in chips and I was way shortstacked. For the umteenth time in a row, I was ice cold. No AA, KK, QQ, JJ or AK. Wait, when it got down to heads up and Matt had an enormous lead on me, I picked up KK and got the blinds. I've only seen A's once in the last 2 months of our live play. I'm getting really sick of this shit.
So anyways, Ryan was getting into his ultra aggressive mode and I was getting ultra shorstacked. He raised my blind and I looked down at KQo. I had maybe $45 in chips and he probably had 3 times that. Flop came down ten high I think and he checked, and I put out a small bet, he called. Turn blank, I put out a decent bet, maybe $12-$15...to which he called. River, blank, I move in for my last $30. He folds and I show him my king high. My thinking was that if I couldn't get ahold of any chips, maybe I could tilt him with a bluff. Ryan HATES getting bluffed, and takes a preverse sort of pride in being almost impossible to bluff (even though any pro would be quick to tell you, the weaker players can't be bluffed, but you can bluff a good player.)
I kept sitting back hoping Ryan and Matt would bump heads and finally they did. Ryan raised Matt's BB. Flop came down K high with 2 hearts. Ryan bet, Matt called it. Turn brought the third heart and Ryan led out again, to which Matt called. River was a brick and Ryan moved in and Matt quickly called with the nuts, A3 of hearts. Ryan showed K2, and I made the money! Not only that but I got $5 more from Ryan for the side bet. I also cleared another $10 in the cash game, so it was a pretty profitable night. Matt ended up taking down the tourney and that was that.
There's something to be said for tight play. I didn't see a hand the whole night, I won less than 10 pots the whole game I'm sure (not counting heads up) and yet I still finished 2nd. Yes, it's boring as hell just sitting there, but if I'm getting shit hand after shit hand, I'm not gonna just throw the tourney away on garbage.
::
Absolute still refuses to post who won for the most raked hands from 2 days ago! I want to know if I should even bother trying to play a ton of hands today or not. Their site says the results will be posted within 48 hours...they've got 9 hours to go before exceeding the 2 day mark.
I like that they're trying to do more cool things, but they didn't organize this so well. If you can't see how far you are behind the leader (like Party does) it's not as fun. Being completely in the dark as to where you stand in the competition makes it more like playing pin the tail on the donkey than any real sort of competition. Absolute is a small site, but I still can't keep tabs on 100+ players.
I only ended up playing about 1300 hands but I'm hoping that will be enough to finish in the top 5, maybe even top 3. Who knows though.
::
I've been looking over on Stars a lot lately to see what's going on for the WCOOP. I'm kinda bitter that I probably won't be able to play in any of those events. I don't have any FPP's and all my money is tied up on Absolute for the time being. I love the structure for the final event for 2.5 million. Apparently you get to start out with T5000 and the blinds go up every half hour, so it's more like a live tournament. GL to any of the bloggers playing in it. I saw Wil Wheaton in every event, gl man. I'm gonna be railbirding most likely. Anybody wanna make a last-longer bet?
::
I started reading Phil Gordon's book, The Real Deal. I like how he doesn't really bother talking strategy much. There are plenty of strategy books, no need to hash out more of the same old crap. Interesting read thus far. The only thing that pisses me off is I've already noticed several typos and misspelled words. WTF is that? It's not a big deal, but this seems to be the case in half the poker books I read. Doesn't anyone bother to make sure there are no mistakes like that? If I had a book out and there were errors in it, I'd be pissed. I usually don't like it when I have errors in this lame ass blog, and when I spot them I fix them...let alone a fucking book that is gonna be read by perhaps millions. Ah what's the use.
posted by The Mystic Dragon at 2:39 PM
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