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Earth Hour

Harrington to the Rescue

Barring the unforeseen and unforetold, this weekend I hunker down to read both volumes of Harrington on Cash Games. Hopefully there will be enough snippets of wisdom to be gleaned, so that upon their completion a renewed assault on the medium limit Vegas cash games will result in at least my recouping the bankroll-crippling $64 outlay for the books.

Smee

This Post Intentionally Left Blank

Seat open, 23!

I must apologize for the lull in posting, caused in part by playing too much live poker. My sessions were long and enjoyable, punctuated by the usual encounters with douchebags (Wynn), spiced up with the occasional lascivious ogling at waitresses (Wynn and Venetian), with some soul-crushing suckouts thrown into the mix (Bellagio).

Looking forward to starting my new job tomorrow as a sound effects technician with the Chippendales.

Good call, malaka!

It all started out perfectly. I was feeling fresh and rested as I lowered myself into the 9 seat, just in time for my first hand as the big blind. There was a waiting list for $5-$10 and seats open for $2-$5, so I thought I would play a little $2-$5 till my name was called for $5-$10. I bought in for $500 and looked down to see TT. There were 3 limpers, the small blind (SB) called and I decided to check. The flop came :

J T 9 rainbow

The SB checked, I bet $25, everyone folded to the SB who raised to $75. The SB, an elderly gentleman whom I had never seen before, had me covered. I decided to push rather than just call or reraise, and was instacalled. The thought of facing KQ, or another straight, crossed my mind.

Turn : 6

River : Q

I stared in disbelief as the SB turned over KJ for the rivered straight. He had instacalled a $420 all-in reraise with top pair and a gutshot. Even though I got my money in as the 84% favorite, it was the very first hand FFS, so I did feel some pain. Nevertheless, I was in control of my emotions and restricted myself to a sarcastic "Good call". I did, however, turn toward Dennis, the Greek dealer, and rhetorically ask, "How did that malaka call?"

I immediately left the poker room, muttering to myself. Ten minutes later I was still walking around the Bellagio muttering to myself, the only saving grace being that it was better babbling in front of strangers than steaming at the table.

LeCheese

Thanks to Joe from RakeBrain for inviting me and some other bloggers to participate in the LeCheese Challenge freeroll on Full Tilt. Congrats to BadBlood for taking it down.

Moving up?

I've spent the last few weeks playing NLHE cash games at the Bellagio ($2-$5, $5-$10, $10-$20), Wynn ($2-$5) and Venetian ($2-$5). There is a discernible difference between $2-$5 and $5-$10, as there is between $5-$10 and $10-$20. There are structural differences within $2-$5 as well - Bellagio has a capped $500 buy-in, Venetian is capped at $1,000 while Wynn is uncapped. My current preference is the Venetian $2-$5 where I can buy in for 200BB and enjoy some semblance of deep stack play. The Bellagio $5-$10, with a capped buy-in of $1,000, is quite good as well, though my recently acquired disdain for 100BB-capped games may lead to my migration to the other uncapped $5-$10 games in town.

I played 2 sessions of $10-$20 at the Bellagio and felt a little out of place. I won both times, played some huge pots with the likes of Bellagio Jay, David Levi, Kenny Einiger, Doug Lee and other regulars, but still felt like a stranger.

Tommy Angelo describes one of the challenges of moving up in his Elements of Poker :

"You might not survive forever at the higher level. You might need to employ one of the vital skills for moving up, which is moving down."

As seen on billboards

Yahoo!?

One has to laugh when Yahoo! chooses the video format to exacerbate the very problem they are reporting on.

Schadenfreude

There is no shortage of local douchebags polluting the tables of the Bellagio. When I encounter one, I keep my communication to a minimum and avoid any confrontation. I don't make any special effort to target them in the future. I do, however, enjoy watching them lose very big pots together with their accompanying reactions . This is not a good thing and I'm working on it, although it is not high priority.

Bodog Poker Blogger Tournament Series

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Starting tonight!!

$50 but for sloth?

Bellagio $5-$10 NLHE. I am in the 10 seat and last to act among 5 players in an unraised pot in which there has been no betting, just checking, on the flop, turn and river. The board is 3-T-X-3-X and there is $50 in the middle.

Showdown time. Small blind, in the 1 seat, says "Queen" but still has not turned over his cards. The big blind mucks. Player 3, in the 5 seat, mucks as does Player 4 in the 8 seat. Their mucked cards are still in front of them, face down. The dealer, one of the older females on the staff, does not make an effort to kill the hands. I have king high and table my hand at about the same time the small blind turns over his queen high. At this stage, Player 4 says "I thought you said three" and reaches out and turns over an ace from his mucked hand. The dealer is flummoxed and I call for the floor.

The floor ruling is that the hand is still live as it hasn't hit the muck and the pot is awarded to Player 4. I agree that cards are live until they touch the muck, but believe that dealers should kill hands as soon as there is a motion towards the muck.

In the grand scheme of things, this is a small pot and I don't make a big deal out of it. On to the next hand. Nevertheless, if I am Player 4 I don't muck my hand till I actually see a 3 (Poker 101). I will await feedback from other players and dealers before I formally relegate the dealer to my Poker Hall of Shame.

Vignette from Venetian

The title is deliberately misleading but my fondness for both Middle French and alliteration leaves me no alternative. So kindly replace Venetian with Bellagio if you have reached this far.

I am in the 1 seat and am heads-up in a hand with the 8 seat, who bets $100 on the turn into a $150 pot. After some deliberation, I fold by flicking my cards towards the center of the table but they overshoot and land in front of the 5 seat. For some unexplained reason, the latter took this as an opportunity to openly and unabashedly peek at my cards. Some players half-jokingly berated him but he made nothing of it. I chose to ignore the whole incident.

Is that all there is?

Bellagio 2-5 NLHE, Thursday 8:30pm. The room is crowded as usual as I take my seat on Table 32. After about 3 orbits I lose my stack when my pocket queens are no match for a flopped set of jacks. I remain relatively calm and rebuy. I steadily rebuild my stack when I lose a huge pot on the river to a 2-outer. Again I am pleased with the ensuing lack of pain, self-pity and morbid thoughts. Numbness? Immunization?

Joe, the fastest dealer in town, provides for comic relief as I ready myself to quit for the night. I am down a buy-in but consider it a very good session.

Elements of Poker - Tommy Angelo

"My bankroll is the amount of money I would spend or lose before I got a job. It is calculated by adding my net worth to whatever I can borrow." - Tommy Angelo

I have just finished reading Tommy Angelo's Elements of Poker. I highly recommend this work, even though by doing so I reluctantly give up my advantage of book reciprocality.

This is a book I will re-read, and re-re-read, on a monthly basis. It contains everything I need.

The coldest seat in Vegas

Last week I had the misfortune of playing on Table 36, Seat 6 at the Bellagio. It is located directly under an air conditioning vent and is about 40 degrees cooler than any other spot in the room. After about an hour, I started shivering uncontrollably and had to be air evacuated to UMC suffering from severe exposure and frostbite, the 3 of diamonds still stuck frozen to my right index finger.

2008 - New Year, New Hope

My poker career hinges on Dan Harrington's new cash game books coming out in early 2008. Hopefully he will provide the necessary impetus to turn things around. I will be looking for fresh ideas, new strategies and, more importantly, the princely sum of $29.99 for its purchase.

The gradual decay of my bankroll during 2007 is elegantly captured in the following 3-dimensional curve:

TOC and Toches

Congratulations to Julius_Goat and Fuel55, the winners of Write Your Way To Australia. They join 25 other bloggers to battle it out in the TOC (tonight 22:00 ET) for the $18,000 Aussie Millions prize package. Good luck to all and thanks to Al and Full Tilt.

Things were looking up both literally and figuratively yesterday when my proctologist placed a large order for message pads (see previous post).

Padding the bankroll

I have been extremely busy with my latest venture into the online marketing of low end office stationery. Initially I will concentrate on the message pad niche. Here are 2 samples of my merchandise: