Argh.. *gnashing of teeth*... Rarrrr!

So I thought I'd have a crack at recording myself playing. For posterity, for fun, and hopefully to show off. Let's say it didn't go well. The video is a bit shaky, 'cos I'm still getting the hand of recording.

Basically I've come to this conclusion: because I don't play enough poker, I am becoming terrible at it. Plus, I am playing at micro stakes, and becoming deluded into thinking that the way these people play is the *right* way to play.

Therefore, I am playing like a bitch. As is demonstrated in the video..

I think the one good thing to come out of this little videotaping experiment was that it means I can watch the hands back afterwards, and see just how terrible I was.

... more.

A massive 6,157 players hit the tables for the PokerStars Sunday Million event yesterday (15th), with the prize pool totalling a staggering $1.2 million dollars.

Hacken walked away with 1st place, and just over $176,000 dollars for his efforts (15% of the total prize fund).

Full Tilt poker had 1,127 players in it's $500,000 guaranteed. The top 108 players shared the prize pool of $563,000, with a first prize of over $125,000, and Ultimate Bet saw 896 players fighting for a top prize of $45,000 in their $200,000 guaranteed.

Altogether the three big boys hosted 8,180 runners with a total prize fund of around $2,000,000. Yes - 2 million dollars. 1st place finishers shared $346,000 between them, while the average entry fee was a teeny tiny $245.

Online poker is illegal huh? Online gambling will come crashing down huh? I'll believe it when I see it :)

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Well.. I thought it was.

Here's the hand - my A5 of clubs, all animated and such.

It started out so well. I raised from the button (probably a bit weakly), and thinned the field to me and another geezer, with me in position. The situation is looking good.

The flop looks great, especially after his horribly weak bet. I raise him plenty... and he eventually calls.

Here comes the hard part - the turn is a blank. So I slam a huge stack of chips on the table after his check, and he waits. And waits. And waits some more... then calls off all his money except $0.01 !?!?

Now I know he's only been playing the game for a day. Who calls off their entire stack, leaving 1 small blind?

Was it a terrible bluff? I was steaming a bit from the treachery of the queens before, but I still think given his w... more.

Two black queens on the first hand, two red queens on the second, and a mix of both after 10 or so.

The first two I don't mind so much, but the monkey on the third who called $0.16 into a pot of $0.39 on the flop with a four flush really narked me.

Even more when he played incredibly badly a few hands later. It happens so often.. I work so hard to scrape a few BB out of the table, then some goon comes along and ruins all my hard work!

I know, I know. It's these donkeys that make the game profitable, but why is it never me that profits from them?

Grumble grumble grumble. Pocket queens 3 times... only won once.

According to the ESPN podcast "The Poker Edge" with Phil Gordon and Andrew Feldman, the WSOP will not accept online qualifiers in starting from 2007, thanks to the recent laws banning online gambling in the US.

Basically, Harrah's are not allowing poker sites to buy their players into the WSOP. As a result, Full Tilt are no longer running satellites to the 2007 WSOP, effective immediately!

The immediate reaction to this news is one of a simple workaround - instead of the poker sites buying the players in, they could just credit their accounts with the $10,000 so the players can do it themselves.

Once you've got the $10K though, it's a different matter. I can't imagine what my girlfriend said if I told her I'd just won $10K, but that she cou... more.

Catching A Bluffer In The Act

I am so pleased with this hand. Well actually, I'm not pleased with the check on the river, but I am extremely pleased with my call.

I realised that I've been playing quite weak-passive recently, and it leads me into the dark alley that is fifth street - just like in the hand in question here. I bet, bet, then decide that if my opponent has called so far (considering the odds I've been giving with my bets), he must have some sort of hand that possibly beats me, so I check in the hope that he will want to showdown cheaply.

You're probably reading this going "Arrrghhh.." to yourself, and yes, it's a horrible play to make. I realised I'd done it again this time, and whereas I'd normally fold to his large bet almost instantly - I had had enough.

After thinking through the hand, I realised there was a strong likelihood he was bluffing, since with a very safe look... more.

This guy cracks me up. I'm not sure why, but this video has me in stitches. Perhaps it's his manic dancing, or perhaps it's the slightly childlike way he grins at the camera for moronic approval from fellow pimply online YouTubers (yes.. like me).

Anyway, cyber9rounder plays lots of poker, and has a few videos of himself multitabling. Then there's this odd one thrown in.

Enjoy! Oh, and is it just me that finds this sort of thing funny? Come on.. own up.

A couple of others worth watching:

• Strip Poker On A Gameshow
• The Lynx Effect In Poker... more.
  

So I was intent on dominating some cash tables for a while. It didn't happen that way though.. I kept getting out flushed, out kicked, and generally out flopped (QQ < 55 on a 58T flop. Bah).

All in all an uneventful session, exception for this hand in the BB.

I start with J6o, not a great holding but it was a free flop, which came down JJ5. Wonderful!

So I check with the intention of a hairy great check-raise... and right enough, the button bets but just as I'm smiling to myself, the small blind throws in a hefty check raise!

Now I'm perplexed. What does he have? What does the button have?

The button

Chances are the button has nothing. He was having a pop at the pot, and it backfired. He may have a 5, or a flush draw, or even some overcards. Either way, his bet wasn't indicative of much strength, since a very strong hand would have checked there (like I did).

So I can dis... more.

"You need Pokerbility. Pokerbility is a poker odds calculator, one that uses the patent-pending CombiCalc™ Calculation Method in order to provide you with the most accurate, real-time poker advice applicable to each and every hand. It will run with most poker rooms right on your desktop, as your pro level partner."

"Pokerbility helps you win by providing poker advice derived from game simulations and probability calculations, adjusted for your style of play and the quality of your table. If you plan on winning then you need the poker edge called Pokerbility."

Yes it's got a bit of a silly name, and while it's not the prettiest piece on the market, it does do it's job and supports tons of different sites.

Plus, you c... more.

I finally had a good day at the poker cash tables. I realised while I was playing that I'd become a bit worried about going all-in, since i usually lose to a better made hand or get drawn out on. Of course, this is the newbie fish in me that's talking, since the seasoned pro knows that what goes around comes around and that it's all a matter of odds. Right.

It didn't start out so well though. Flopping a straight is good, but getting runner runnered is a beast. It was the first hand of the table, so I figured I should defend my blinds, especially at the 5-1 odds I was getting on my T7o. That's the sort of hand (ie, his call on the turn) that makes me worry about going all in.

Anyhoo, I didn't let it get the better of me though, and I soldiered on. On a different table, I had an over-pusher. I'd watched him shove all in at least 3 times in the last ten minutes, so figured he could probably be taken down. So I waite... more.

I've always wondered how much the big guys (Gus Hansen, Mike Matusow, Phil Ivey, John Juanda etc) were making (or losing!) online. Now it seems, we have a small insight into their bankrolls.

David Benyamine has a blog, although I'm not sure if it's really him or not. On the blog, he posts some rather interesting stats.

Big Earners

For example, he has lists of big earners on Full Tilt and Ultimate Bet, which I'll repeat here (for more stats on Omaha games and for Ultimate Bet, visit David's blog):

FullTiltPoker

Limit Texas hold'em
Name			Balance		Hands
serefecheers,		+$384k,		8427
TexasLimitKing, 	+$360k, 	10,559
John D'Agostino, 	+$208k,		22,245
eastsideslim, 		+$169k, 	4392
reztes757, 		+$131k, 	15,788
Skywalker1709, 		-$295k, 	5057
mrnutz (Thomas Keller), -$199k, 	2500
David Oppenheim, 	-$146k... more.

A long post today. Please note, I'm not a lawyer, and I'm not qualified to give advice. What follows is not advice, just my opinion. Take it lightly, and with plenty of salt. Thanks.

Overview Of The Bill

I won't go into detail, as a decent search of the web will provide lots of resources and probably the bill itself, but basically some members of the US government has been trying to push through a law that will prohibit gambling on the internet for US citizens.

The Safe Ports Act (H.R. 4954), which contains the Unlawful Internet Gambling Enforcement Act, is expected to be signed into law by President Bush on Friday, October 13th.

Clearly, this has some important implications - both to players, businesses and the game and it's community as a whole.

A Quick Summary Of The Bill

The act basically prohibits anyone engaged in the process of betting and wagering from knowingly accepting money associated with internet gambling. This suggests t... more.

We know that multi-tabling makes poker go "faster", in the sense that you get to be a part of more action since you have more chance to get playable situations (not cards!), but this is insane.

I've heard of pros 10-tabling SNGs but to play 20!? Madness.

I find my limit for cash games is 3. Any more than that and I can't stay on top of the action and I end up timing out a lot of the time, or not having enough seconds on the clock to make a good decision. This might be because I play short handed though.. I would guess that with full 10-max tables I could probably manage 5 or so simultaneously.

Of course, there is the added incentive that playing multi tables... more.

Poker is all about pressing your skill, your edge, your competitive advantage. If you have an edge over your opponents, in the long run you will be a more profitable player than them. So, various tools have appeared helping online players do just that.

These tools include software add-ons like PokerOffice, PokerTracker etc, that track and record your play - then present you with lovely graphs showing your profits, losses, best hand, worst hands, best times of day and so on.

They also include odds calculators, automatic advice engines and entire e-courses devoted to instructing you step by step in the art of profitable poker. BUT.. the stuff I want to mention below brings a new level of detective-ness into your play. Behold, the power of the internet :)

Live Online Tournament Lists

These sites display a live, real-time list of tournaments that are starting across dozens of sites, all... more.

This week I decided that I would tap into my feminine side and maybe let loose with some fashion tips.

With the huge TV coverage that the WSOP is getting these days, it is becoming more and more a place for people to show off their poker fashion tastes. I found a few little nuggets that you shouldn't be without, either at the casino or at your local home game.

In one word - pants.

I've been sorting out university and doing lots of work so I just haven't had time for the amount of poker I wanted.

With that said, I haven't done terribly - I'm down $0.40c in my SNG stash, and broke even (exactly!) on the cash stash. It was a bit up and down (as you can see from the graph below), but I ended up all square so I'm not too bothered.

It's disappointing to get up to almost $15 and then end up back where I started though. I only played 2 SNGs, so I won't even bother posting the spreadsheet for that - just know that I finished 14/45 and 7/45 (and ITM of 50%!) and only lost $0.40c.

2006 WSOP Controversy

Anyway.. in other news, there's plenty of controversy raging over this year's WSOP ME.

Firstly, there was the 2 million extra chips that were accidentally introduced during the chip demonination change up in the late stages. WSOP Director... more.