Damm them all to Hell

Nice end around Mr. Frist. Knowing no one in there right mind will vote against a bill that increases the security of America's ports, the adding ban on internet gambling money transfers to bill was stroke of genius. In addition, doing it at the last minute to ensure no one could put fight was a nice touch.

Know this Mr. Frist, this law will not stop internet gambling anymore then the drug laws has stopped drug usage. I view my right to play poker as a right passed down from the founding father of this country ( The pursuit of happiness). You will have to pry the mouse from my cold dead hand before I stop playing poker online.

One other thing Mr. Frist, thank you alienating yet another group of Americans from the Republican Party. I will not switch parties yet, so I can cast my ballot to whom ever is running against you in the NY primary. Get ready for a shift to the left.

Some background

In response to Iakaris's request, here is some background information on me.

I was born on a sunny day in 19... err wait too much information.

Edit: I can not think of a time in my life when I have not played cards games in some form or another. As child, we played euchre and gin. When I was in the Air Force, spades and pinochle were in games played. Oddly, I only played poker once in the 21 years I was in the Air Force, which kind of goes against the stereotype of military life. This love of card games is what drew my attention to online poker.

I have been playing poker online for about 2 years. For the first year, I played mostly 1/2-2/4 limit trying to clear deposit bonuses at just about every poker site on the net. I then discovered Sit-n-Gos over at PokerRoom and have played mostly $10-$20 Sit-n-Gos for the last year with some 3/6 limit and 1/2 no limit thrown in when bonuses need to be cleared. I started playing multi-table tournaments seriously in August of this year after I got Dan Harrington’s Volume III and wanted to try out his ideas. I have had good success in playing multi-table tournaments, making 3 final tables on Full tilt (Including last nights 20K) and final table in the 40k on party. I have also won 5 4/180 on PokerStars. However, I think it is too soon to know if this is normal or if I am just running well.

Time for the 20K to start......

My first blogger tournament or another place to lose money

I played in my first blogger tournament on Monday. I was doing pretty good until I ran my AKo into TT. After losing that hand, I was card dead and couldn't find a situation to expoit to get more chips.

I was pleased the find the level of play pretty good and will be playing in more blogger tournaments in the future.

Sunday's 20K

I made it deep into FTP 30K on Sunday, finishing 13th.

Here is the knockout that I think I played badly:

Full Tilt Poker
No Limit Holdem Tournament
Blinds: t4000/t8000
(Ante: t1000)
6 players
Converter

Stack sizes:
UTG: t106810
UTG+1: t116548
CO: t106080
Hero: t79086
SB: t239000
BB: t202814


Pre-flop: (6 players) Hero is Button with :9h :9s
UTG folds, UTG+1 raises to t16000, CO folds, Hero raises to t48000, 2 folds, UTG+1 calls t32000 (pot was t82000).


Flop: :tc :7c :6h (t114000, 2 players)
UTG+1 is all-in t67548, Hero calls all-in t30086.

Uncalled bets: t37462 returned to UTG+1.

I think I should have just smooth called pre-flop. I raised thinking this guy was raising on a steal or didn’t have the strongest of hands. So now, we have rather large pot and I think the button felt he had to push because of the size of the pot, and of course I had to call. My read was right, the other guy had AcQc, a Queen fell on the turn, and out I went. If I had smooth called, I think the other guy may have bet another 16k on the flop and I could have folded the turn bet. One other line would be to push pre-flop, but I think I would have been called if I did that (which why I did not in the first place).

A start

I think I will start a poker blog. I suck at writing, but perhaps having a blog will be a way to improve my writing skills and my poker playing.

So dear reader, I promise to really proof read and spell-check these ramblings.

As far as how blogging will improve my poker playing, all I can say am I know reading other people's blogs has improved my playing. Psychology is a large part of playing poker, and reading poker blogs has helped me keep my head in the game and minimize tilt. (The book Zen and the Art of Poker by Larry Phillips helped here too.) So perhaps writing about poker will improve my game somehow. We will see!

I am fresh off making the final table in Full Tilt's midnight 12K. I played it on a lark after being bounced from the 20K and Party's 40K. I have a bunch of $75 that I was saving for 200K satellites; so I figure what the heck, give it a shot.

I was card dead for most of the tournament, but survived on blind stealing and bluffing people out of pots. One of the key hands of the tournament for me was when we got down to 16 people and I was dealt K8o in the small blind. The blinds had just increased to 1000/500 and I had 2,430 left after posting the small blind. The payout for 16^th was $114 but 15^th jumped to $153. I watched a player go out on another table in 16^th so I knew I would get 15^th at least if I went out on this hand. I decided would push all in if it was folded to the cut-off or button and they raised. Iakaris on the button did indeed raise, and I called all in. I was happy to see Iakaris’s K4o and the K8o held up.

I am very happy with my play in the tournament. I think I was making good reads and decisions.

Sleech