welp

haha...104k

Maybe todays the day...

Got this odd feeling something big may happen today so I'm restarting the blog.

Will be playing only 3 tourneys:

Warm-up on Stars ($215)

FTOPS 8 NLHE 6 Max KO ($256)
$75 6 max on FTP

Good luck to me. Got up, had breakfast, ran a mile, played some Rock Band with the wifey. I feel like I am going to play my best and the results will hopefully take care of themselves.

Skiing, Losing, FTOPS, etc

Was in Breckenridge, CO skiing for the weekend and playing poker at night and had a great time during the day and miserable. I didn't have a winning session in the 4 nights I was there I don't think. Was REALLY getting frustrated and still am to an extent. But overall it was an awesome trip and its so good to get away for a few days every once in a while. Being at work for weeks on end in a row puts me on life tilt and I really do think I play better poker when I'm not pissed off all the time.

I am down ~5k on my stake and am kind of panicky to an extent. Its just really frustrating to spend as much time and effort as I have in the past 6 months or so and not be putting up decent results. I don't think I knew anything about poker 6 months ago and I was a winning player. I am sooo committed to becoming a winning player and I just don't seem to be getting there. I get no more than 6 hrs of sleep per night because I always try and get in at least 5 hours of poker (playing or studying) per day. I spend every day falling asleep at work because I stayed up all night playing. Somethings got to give, its not worth it to be putting in all this time and affecting the rest of my life if I'm never going to put up results. I'm going to continue to learn and play for a few more months I think. I really am totally obsessed with becoming a good player but its tough to be positive about it when I continue to lose my backers money.

Alright, enough whining. As bad as my results have been lately I continue to feel like my tournament game is getting really close. I played ftops 1 last night and sattied into the $320 nightly on stars. Had big stacks early but never really could get anything going. In the Stars tourney, I finished 5 people from the money when rdcrsn flatted me p/f in position. I have AQ and the flop hits Q 5 3. I bet....he raises....i tell my friend he has AA or KK but w/ only like 10 bbs behind I decided to call and he flips AA gg me. He played it like he had AA or KK but I decided that he was a good enough player to make a play on that dry of a board on the bubble. It sucks, looking back I wish I woulda just folded out a few more hands and collected my $500. Thats a good score to me right now when nothing has gone right recently. Regardless, I fealt like I played well in both of the tourneys. Aside from doubling early in both, I was super card dead. I am just going to keep playing what I feel like is good poker and hopepully I can run good in the middle stages of one of these big tourneys. I need something soon. It's easy to say "I think I am playing well" but its really tough to actually believe it when I haven't gone deep in a tournament in months. I am going to go back through both HH's from last night and try to see some things I could have done differently. I'll be playing a few tourneys tonight (7pm - $109 stars and $75 ftp) and then will be taking friday/saturday off to spend some time w/ my gf and my dog. Sunday I am going to la casa de dg0016/pokerskibum/romes23 to play the two ftops events and hopefully satty into some of the sunday majors. Will post results if anything good happens.

WTFFFFFFFF

Stuck almost 2k tonight from cahs and I get on the bubble with a huge stack in a 109 mtt on stars and i get fucking heros making the stupidest fucking calls in the world ON THE BUBBLE. WHAT THE FUCK IS THIS? I really dont think i could have played this any better. I might fucking suck at poker but there is no fucking way he can make this call.

PokerStars Game #14922884183: Tournament #75209399, $100+$9 Hold'em No Limit - Level XII (600/1200) - 2008/01/29 - 22:06:00 (ET)
Table '75209399 72' 9-max Seat #2 is the button
Seat 1: chaffy4598 (28773 in chips)
Seat 2: boltsva (18787 in chips)
Seat 3: E-WeE (23007 in chips)
Seat 4: trippkirk (48525 in chips)
Seat 5: JJ_fieldman (45958 in chips)
Seat 6: pangrar (23922 in chips)
Seat 7: thenutzzzz12 (13029 in chips)
Seat 9: WeissMAN (19150 in chips)
chaffy4598: posts the ante 125
boltsva: posts the ante 125
E-WeE: posts the ante 125
trippkirk: posts the ante 125
JJ_fieldman: posts the ante 125
pangrar: posts the ante 125
thenutzzzz12: posts the ante 125
WeissMAN: posts the ante 125
E-WeE: posts small blind 600
trippkirk: posts big blind 1200
*** HOLE CARDS ***
Dealt to trippkirk [3h 3d]
JJ_fieldman: raises 2400 to 3600
pangrar: folds
thenutzzzz12: folds
WeissMAN: folds
chaffy4598: folds
boltsva: folds
E-WeE: folds
trippkirk: calls 2400
*** FLOP *** [7c 9d 5h]
trippkirk: checks
JJ_fieldman: bets 4800
trippkirk: raises 7400 to 12200
JJ_fieldman: calls 7400
*** TURN *** [7c 9d 5h] [8h]
trippkirk: bets 13775
JJ_fieldman: calls 13775
*** RIVER *** [7c 9d 5h 8h] [4c]
trippkirk: bets 18825 and is all-in
JJ_fieldman: calls 16258 and is all-in
*** SHOW DOWN ***
trippkirk: shows [3h 3d] (a pair of Threes)
JJ_fieldman: shows [8s As] (a pair of Eights)
JJ_fieldman collected 93266 from pot
*** SUMMARY ***
Total pot 93266 | Rake 0
Board [7c 9d 5h 8h 4c]
Seat 1: chaffy4598 folded before Flop (didn't bet)
Seat 2: boltsva (button) folded before Flop (didn't bet)
Seat 3: E-WeE (small blind) folded before Flop
Seat 4: trippkirk (big blind) showed [3h 3d] and lost with a pair of Threes
Seat 5: JJ_fieldman showed [8s As] and won (93266) with a pair of Eights
Seat 6: pangrar folded before Flop (didn't bet)
Seat 7: thenutzzzz12 folded before Flop (didn't bet)
Seat 9: WeissMAN folded before Flop (didn't bet)

Update

Well, pretty uneventful week or so of poker. Managed to cash in basically every tourney I played in without ever really going deep in anything last week. I dont THINK my mid-late game is that bad I really think i have been running kinda bad late in tourneys but I'm gonna do some review of my play the next few days and try to figure some things out. While I cashed in everything last week I cashed in NOTHING on Sunday. Sattied into 3 tourneys (Sunday WU, Sunday Million($530), and FTP 750k) and bought into the Sunday Brawl and Sunday Second Chance. I think I made it to the first break in one of these tourneys and cashed in none of them. I think the $530 Million equaled the largest buyin I had played online and I managed to last 4 hands. Here is the bustout hand.

I know some will say I should fold p/f here but I think playing hands like these in position w/ deep stacks is profitable, especially in a tourney where the field is as weak as the Sunday Million. I almost flatted the flop to make sure a scare card didnt' come down on the turn but decided I needed to go ahead and protect here and I could always check behind on the turn. I REALLY didnt expect him to 3-bet me here. When he did, my first thought was a set. But since I had a j and a 9 he was unlikely to have jj or 99. So that leaves 77 in his range. I didnt put 10-8 in his range. I thought possibly a flush draw and possibly an overpair. Since only one of the hands I had in his range had me in trouble (77) I decided I needed to go ahead and get the chips in here. I don't think I played it bad want I'll have a chance this w/e to discuss the hand w/ some other people.

POKERSTARS GAME #14868059355: TOURNAMENT #74372571, $500+$30 HOLD'EM NO LIMIT - LEVEL I (25/50) - 2008/01/27 - 16:34:22 (ET)
Table '74372571 253' 9-max Seat #9 is the button
Seat 1: ghost crab (10244 in chips)
Seat 2: Mr_kjeks (9831 in chips)
Seat 3: krmont22 (9850 in chips)
Seat 4: Colombo218 (10100 in chips)
Seat 5: sep_87 (9925 in chips)
Seat 6: gank (9925 in chips) is sitting out
Seat 7: toweliestar (10000 in chips)
Seat 8: trippkirk (9825 in chips)
Seat 9: avolioalex (10300 in chips)
ghost crab: posts small blind 25
Mr_kjeks: posts big blind 50
*** HOLE CARDS ***
Dealt to trippkirk [9c Jc]
krmont22: folds
Colombo218: folds
sep_87: folds
gank: folds
toweliestar: raises 100 to 150
trippkirk: calls 150
avolioalex: folds
ghost crab: folds
Mr_kjeks: folds
*** FLOP *** [9h Js 7h]
toweliestar: bets 250
trippkirk: raises 400 to 650
toweliestar: raises 1300 to 1950
trippkirk: raises 7725 to 9675 and is all-in
toweliestar: calls 7725
*** TURN *** [9h Js 7h] [5h]
*** RIVER *** [9h Js 7h 5h] [Ks]
*** SHOW DOWN ***
toweliestar: shows [8h Ah] (a flush, Ace high)
trippkirk: shows [9c Jc] (two pair, Jacks and Nines)
toweliestar collected 19725 from pot

Anyway, gg me.

In the FTP 750k, a guy called me 3 bet p/f for 1/3 of his stack w/ 33 v. my AA and obv flopped bottom set....gg me. All in all, I don't think I played bad aside from the brawl where I 4 bet a SUPER LAG button 3-better w/ AJ from the cutoff and he wakes up w/ AQ. While I had a bad Sunday I really feel good about my tourney play recently. The past month or so have really struggled to get ahold of any chips early and this week I seem to be stacked up in everything I've played.

Been playing more cash sessions of late as well and have been playing a lot tighter style than I was previously. During the week while I'm working I have decided every night I'm going to play a timed 2 hr session 4-tabling 2/4 full ring games. Through about 3k hands so far I'm up about $1500. I'm going to continue to grind these games and hopefully I will be able to use these cash games to held steady the variance of MTT's. I'm still in the midst of putting together a list of goals for 2008. I really have decided its going to be Jan-July 2008 goals since I have some goals I wanna hit before the WSOP. I'll post those soon. Aside from poker, I'm heading to Breckenridge, CO this w/e to ski w/ Romes23, DG0016, and Pokerskibum. I suck at skiing but it should be a good time. Will be playing poker at night so hopefully I can make some money w/ 3 good poker minds to help me out. Will try and update if I do any damage this week/weekend.

Props to pocket22s, w/e, etc...

Back at work as usual Monday morning. Weekend didn't go to well. Played some cash on Friday/Saturday and managed to lose all the money I had on UB( not that much), so I guess I am temporarily retired from UB. Back to Stars and FTP. First of all HUUUUUGE props to pocket22s(jordanstone19 on p5's) for taking 4th in the Wednesday 150k guaranteed on Stars for a cool $14k. Breakthrough score for a good friend of mine and expect to see more of these types of finishes shortly. Decided to play only the Sunday Million on Stars yesterday bc i was a little busy. Had to play the Million though because it is the most +EV tourney on the planet. Without ever getting a hand I managed to get into the money with about an average stack only to dwindle down and eventually bust like 700th for around $450 i think. Anyway, pretty uneventful weekend. I'm going to continue with the poker schedule I did last week. When I get done w/ work everyday play some 2/4NL cash and then play the 7:00pm tourneys on Stars ($109) and FTP ($75). I like this schedule because it allows me to get to bed fairly early (barring a deep run in a tourney) and still get my MTT fix. Anyway, I recently mentioned I started playing everything under stake so I'll update where I'm at on that. ($-1900). Not too bad considering I was stuck more than 3k for a while. I'm not worried about it and hopefully my backer isn't either because I am pretty sure I am running way below expectation in cash games and I feel like my tourney game is getting a lot better. I will try and update later in the week or sooner if anything significant happens. Good luck

DEAD MONEY ON UB !!!!

So apparently I am really bad at poker. Or at least that is the way it has appeared for the last week. I haven't had a winning session in 9 days(since last Sunday). In those 9 days I have lost a little under 5k playing 2/4. I have been getting absolutely murdered. I haven't really stacked anyone in around 20 hrs of play. I think (hope) am I just running bad because I feel I am playing strong poker. Every time I have a hand I either get sucked out on or coolered. Got overset 3 sets in a row at one point last week. Here's a fun hand from last night that just exemplified everything that has happened in the past week. A set up finally goes my way only to get rivered.

gjakey: -- --
IDoUrDaughter: -- --
neverplayaa: -- --
tkirk12: Ac Ad
wbfinist: -- --
Sandybritches: -- --

Pre-flop:

gjakey raises to $14. IDoUrDaughter folds.
neverplayaa folds. tkirk12 re-raises to $48.
wbfinist folds. Sandybritches folds. gjakey calls.


Flop (board: 2d Jd 9s):

gjakey checks. tkirk12 bets $85. gjakey goes all-in
for $381.40. tkirk12 calls.

Turn (board: 2d Jd 9s 9h):

(no action in this round)


River (board: 2d Jd 9s 9h Kc):

(no action in this round)




Showdown:

gjakey shows Kh Ks.
gjakey has Kh Ks 9s 9h Kc: full house, kings full of nines.
tkirk12 mucks cards.
(tkirk12 has Ac Ad.)

I have totally lost confidence in my cash game that I have been working so hard on. Had been watching a lot of Green Plastic and felt soooo good last week after 3-4 good winning sessions in a row. But I really don't know what to think now. Don't know if I was running closer to expectation then or now. I guess I'll find out over the course of the next week or so. I am going to just continue and play solid(I think I'm playing solid) and hope things turn around. Will try and give an update later this week. GL