January

After a month (well two weeks anyway) of nothing but Multi Table Tournaments I have 39 played and an ROI of -51.53%. In Satellites I have 3 played for an ROI of 321.49%. Overall that means I lost money this month.

I've managed to learn something about the low buy in events. I learned my "normal" style of play is a losing style. I have a tendency to be very erratic overall in my play. I can move from tight to aggressive and vice versa very quickly and I do so often. Presently, that's a recipe for disaster.

I would surmise that in order to consistently cash in these events, and thus give myself a shot at winning them, I'm going to have to aquire a very rigid straight forward approach. This approach is three pronged.

First, during the initial hour of play I will need to be tight and play straight forward ABC poker.
Second, during the next hour I will step up the aggression and begin open raising more liberally.
Third, If I make it into the money I will look for large trapping opportunities.

I'm not sure this will be a good final approach but over the next two weeks I will give it a try and see how everything is meshing out. I'm also going to start rotating some cash game play into the mix. I keep trying to deny that part of my game since I suck at it but I simply can't fight the urge. My work schedule for the rest of the week will also prevent me from playing tournaments so I'll need cash game play to take up the slack. I've resigned myself to playing only one cash table at a time and also stepping up stakes. I'm hoping that will force me concentrate more and take the game more seriously.

That last sentence sounds stupid, but it's true. My brain is just fucked up that way.

On The Poker Docket

My sporadic vacation from poker has been nice but it's time to once again join the fray. Starting this week I'm going back to five days of play but I'm going to start with nothing but MTT's. I will be looking to play four tournaments at a time and joining new ones as I bust out of earlier ones. I will not be playing all of these events but this is the schedule I plan on using each week.

Schedule:
Sunday
(varied) Sundays are a family day and I don't plan on playing any of the majors so the tournaments I play will be random whenever time permits.

Monday-Thursday
8:00 pm - UltimateBet 5K bounty
Full Tilt Daily Double A & B
PokerStars $5.50 NL

8:45 pm - UltimateBet $11 NL
Full Tilt Token Frenzy

9:00 pm - PokerStars $16.50 NL
Cake Poker 2K
Full Tilt 28K

Friday-Saturday
OFF

Blogger tournaments will be thrown in sporadically whenever the mood strikes.

See you at the tables.

Asshats - The New Cool

I decided to play 6 MTT's at the same time last night. This was the online poker equilavent of throwing a bunch of shit at the wall and seeing what sticks. The results were well below expectation as I managed to cash in the lowest buy in I played and I managed to win the one with the smallest payout.s
During The Math event I noticed a trend that I'm becoming very concerned with. I believe that as a "community" poker bloggers should be supportive and cordial to each other. Instead the trend has fallen to, who can berate and belittle the most effectively. If this was merely a form of trash talking or good natured ribbing I wouldn't care. Sadly it just doesn't seem like this is the case. There are even polls where everyone is vying to be the most "hated" blogger. Do you really want to be the biggest Asshat? Is this something to aspire too?

I don't get it. Then again, I'm probably not supposed to.

It won't stop me from playing the events. I'm secure enough in my belief, perhaps misguided, that I have game. None of it gets to me on a personal level. My concern is for the new players wanting to join in. My wife is a nurse and they have a saying that "Nurses eat their young". This talks to the fact that the experienced nurses treat the inexperienced nurses like shit. Giving them all the dirty nasty work. I just don't want the blogging community to turn into an equivalent where the inexperienced players are discouraged and shunned from playing and participating in the community.

My Fourth Night

Had some time to play last night so I fired up four tournaments and set out to make some money. I played the 28K., a 2K, a FTOPS sat., and a $5 event.

It was a night of bad cards as I only managed to squeak into the second hour of the 28K and the$5. The satellite went really well as I won the event and my seat. The seat wasn't into the tournament I thought it was though. Turns out is was a "Super" satellite and not a "true" satellite so I get to play again in February for my seat into the FTOPS event #8.

In the 2K I made a bad read and went out just barely in the money. I put my opponent on a pure steal because his reraise was just too big. I decided to re-steal against him but he called with his middle pair and I couldn't hit either of my two overs.

If you count the seat win as money then it was a profitable night. If not... then it wasn't.

I've had almost a full month off from the tables now as my playing time has been very sporadic. I plan on going to a five day schedule of tournaments Sunday-Thursday starting in two days. No cash games.

Playin' The Tourney's

Finally took the time to play some tournaments last night. I went online around 9pm central and signed up for a $5 on Cake Poker, a $5 on Full Tilt, and the 28K Guarantee on Full Tilt.

Even though my mtt game is very rusty I was extremely happy with my play last night. I found the Cake field to be full of very bad players that loved to overcall with second pair and the Full Tilt games were populated with better players overall, but still their were some pretty bad ones as well. In an odd but somewhat common occurence I busted out of both $5 events at about the same time. I was out in one after 78 minutes of play and 83 minutes in the other. The guarantee was a different story and I lasted 266 minutes, or 4 hours 26 minutes. Not long enough to get the win but I did manage to finish 29th out of 1,310 players.

I enjoyed a top ten chipstack for most of the latter stages but managed to have three hands that caused my downfall. The first hand in question I held 140,517 in chips with the blinds at 2,500/5,000/600. I was in the small blind with JcTc and a short stack who had 41,096 in early position pushed all in. It folded to me and I really considered folding my hand but then re-evaluated. If I lost the hand I would drop to just below an average stack, but if I won I could really solidify myself for a final table run. I decided to call considering his range could be large in this position and he showed me two Jacks. I was pretty well sunk but then I picked up an OESD on the flop and a flush draw on the turn. Alas I didn't hit any of my 15 outs.

The very next hand I lost 13,900 more chips when I held AcQc on the button. The flop came 8KK and I really felt my opponent held a small pair so I couldn't call his flop bet.

The death blow came at 4,000/8,000/1,000. I was in the BB with 66,021 and 9s8s. It folded to the SB who raised it up to 24,000. He was a player who had been playing tight earlier but had changed gears and had begun raising me on a regular basis when we were heads up. His range was big in this spot and I had a nice drawing hand so I pushed on him. To my amazement he instacalled me with KdJc. Granted he's ahead here but I had tightened up substantially and his call put almost half of his stack at risk. I obviously don't like his call here and the flop came out 5hKs3s. I liked my chances but the flush didn't come and I was sent packing.

I wouldn't have changed my play on two of the three hands but I probably should have pushed preflop with the AcQc hand. My opponent had about the same stack size as I did and he was capable of making a lay down. Overall I am happy with my play regardless of the outcome so that's always a good thing. That also makes me up on the year and it's also always good to start the year winning.

Introducing...

I finally played some poker on Monday night. Not much, only two low buyin tourneys, out before the first break in both. I'm still riding the X-Box 360 Christmas high so playing poker has taken a backseat.

That doesn't mean I'm not writing about poker though. I've been wanting to do more writing lately, but I didn't want to use this blog as that outlet. This is supposed to be a poker diary blog and I'm going to keep it that way.

I've been leaning toward writing more op-ed pieces so for that my writing home will be pokersift.com. My posts can be found here. The first post is already up so I encourage you to to go check it out.

This blog will also continue as it always has so don't stop that feed.

No Play...No Post

I haven't played a hand of poker since before Christmas. Haven't missed it either.

I didn't set any 2007 goals so I'm not going to bother setting any 2008 ones either.

As far as a year in review, well... 2007 was my worst full year of poker. If it wasn't for my SNG play during the third quarter of the year I would have lost money. As it stands I barely finished in the black. The missing link this past year was a lack of tournament wins. Tournaments have accounted for over 90% of my profits in the past but this year I finished down $83. I simply didn't have the time needed to spend in front of the PC. I played less than half the number of tournaments that I played in 2006. I also spent $5,000 less in buyins.

Morale of the story... play more tournaments in 2008.