FeARFaCT's Poker Hands

Day 00

2007-03-30T02:26:00.000-04:00

Well I haven't posted in a while and plan on getting back into the swing of things. I've been playing full time since my last post and so far it's been kind of a rocky start. My bankroll took a few hits due to all the expenses of moving into a new apartment with absolutely no furniture. I've also had a major lack of motivation over the last few months along with some rough poker days. I think I'm going to start all over again and start working my way back up. I'll be starting my bankroll back off at $4,000 and work my way back up to the higher games over the next coming months. My new goal is to make $200 on days in which I play. I'll be logging off as soon as I make $200 until the following day. I'm going to try to play on average five days a week, maybe 22 days a month. Obviously I won't be able to hit this goal every day since poker does involve a strong element of chance and randomness. However, I'm hoping that a set dollar amount will drive me to play more on days where I'm going slow and reward myself with a break on days I win fast.

Hopefully I can motivate myself to play more like I used to and get up to the bigger games again. Lately I've just been tossing money around without a care and obviously that's a losing strategy. I'll start posting hands beginning my next session.

Day 35

2006-12-16T20:18:00.000-05:00

Well I ended up only playing about 10 hands on 100nl before I said f' it and move back up to 200nl. I think everything is starting to click for me again. I stopped playing like a bitch and started playing smarter again. I'll see if I can keep this up for future sessions. I actually finished down a bit, but that was after a terrible start so I'm actually pleased with the results.

Main Hands:

http://www.pokerhand.org/?670885

I didn't post this hand because I would have hit my set. I made a good fold off the flop so I don't even care. I did post it because of how crazy players have been playing lately. Maybe the influx of Party Poker players has changed the flow, but it seems like some guys have been off the wall. This hand is a good example of somebody running a completely terrible bluff with almost no chance of success.

http://www.pokerhand.org/?670990

Again this wasn't really anything too special, however the post hand chat blew my mind. Both players acted as if I committed some sort of atrocity, however everything was quite standard. Again crazy Party Poker players? I don't know.

http://www.pokerhand.org/?671027

Maybe I just got lucky here, but it seemed like I made the right play. To be honest, I just didn't believe him. Maybe I get stacked here sometimes by something better than AK, who knows.

http://www.pokerhand.org/?671070

It looks like I botched this, but I really don't have a clue what hes raising and folding with here. Maybe I could have extracted more value had I slowed down. I ended up taking the rest in the following hand.

http://www.pokerhand.org/?671083

Pretty standard really. I just slowed down this hand and let him bet for me. No reason not to just shove on the turn when he has all those chips in.

http://www.pokerhand.org/?672861

Pretty horrible mistake. I swear I checked this board twice and each time saw no possible straights or flushes. This shows how poor my level of concentration has been lately. I obviously wasn't going to put him on QQ or AA so I went ahead and shoved. Terrible play though.

http://www.pokerhand.org/?673164

Again not the most exciting hand, but the post hand chat is humorous. This is also some pretty terrible play by the other two players as well.

http://www.pokerhand.org/?674877

I've been playing one table of 2/4 lately each session and it paid off here for a big pot. I really had no choice but to just slow play after I turned the nuts. I figured if they call a raise to 100$ on the river then they'd call a pot size raise as well. I probably would have shoved, but this was a pot limit table.

Day 34

2006-12-13T19:30:00.000-05:00

Starting over...

Since October 15th I have honestly not made any money from playing poker. I've still turned a profit each month from FPP bonuses and bet's I made with friends. Lately it seems like I just don't know what to do and that everyone always knows what I'm holding. I've tried everything from various 200nl setups and different multi-tabling options. Nothing seems to be working anymore. I was holding my bankroll at 12k for a while and was just planning on cashing out anything above that to finance my new apartment and car payments. It's gotten to the point where I've dropped from beating 600nl back during the first week of October to grinding 100nl now mid December. I've cashed out my bankroll to 8k and am going to try to just start over and rebuild myself from here. I've had a lot of extra stress lately, but I'm hoping all of that will go away once I finally separate from active duty. I don't think for a second that I've lost my ability to win at poker; I just feel that due to whatever changes I've made in my life since October has caused me to perform poorly. I'll be grinding it out at 100nl for the next few weeks and hopefully posting some decent hands. We'll see how it goes, GL to me.

Day 33

2006-11-06T21:03:00.000-05:00

Been a while since I made a last post. These things get old after a while. I think i'll start updating every 2 weeks or something. I've really been playing all over the place since my last run. I was doing very well at 3/6 and 5/10 for a bit and then started taking some terrible beats. Right now I'm messing around at 6max 1/2nl and plan on going back to 2/4 and 3/6 in a week or two. I also started making a few poker videos for friends at lower limits to help them get better. The link for that is here for anyone who cares http://thepiratebay.org/user/fearfact. I'll put up some hands that I played since my last post, but they are getting so old I probably don't remember much of what I was thinking at the time.

Main Hands:

http://www.pokerhand.org/?561182

Nothing Special, I recall putting him dead on KQ here so it was nice shoving that river.

http://www.pokerhand.org/?561204

This is kind of crazy. Barndog is one of the top regs at these limits. I went out betting hard on the turn; and when he called my pot bet I figured I'd just shove. I am suprised he called me off here, not sure what he was putting me on.

http://www.pokerhand.org/?561477

Terrible setup. Twin is a 10/20 and 25/50 reg who has been on a bad run lately. He'd been playing like a total maniac at 3/6, shoving every other hand. I picked up AK here and decided I'd just play it to the felt vs him if he raised me. Sure enough he has AA, ouch.

http://www.pokerhand.org/?562821

Pretty nice hand here. I didn't really do anything special, he basically just shoved his stack at me.

http://www.pokerhand.org/?562870

This is the absolute best hand i've ever played to date. Havemycash is acutally a very good 5/10 and 10/20 player. When he raised to 50 preflop, I really didn't think he had a whole lot, so I called in position with 89c. I flopped middle pair and gave him a call. I figured if he checked the turn I would be ahead and would bet out. Sure enough he did and I led a strong near pot bet. To my suprise he put in a decent reraise rather quickly. The whole time I was thinking he didn't have much here and was trying to shove me off some hand. My heart was definitly going fast at the prospect of shoving 2nd pair, but I really thought I had him so i went with the read. Turns out he had a flush draw and I was correct in my shove here.

http://www.pokerhand.org/?568078

Here's another pretty big pot with a so so hand. The feeling I got was that he was a weaker ace or some kind of draw, so I just shoved on him.

http://www.pokerhand.org/?568180

This is funny. I played the hand ridiculously hard and was hoping to catch somebody off guard. We got this allin on the turn with him drawing dead. You can't ask for much more than that.

http://www.pokerhand.org/?568305

Decent bluff here. I was not betting the strength of my QQ at all, as I knew I was behind. However, at the same time I didn't feel that he was that attached to his hand. I also felt he was capable of making a big laydown. I went ahead and represented KQ here, and that's what he put me on. I showed it because I was bored, probably not a great idea though.

http://www.pokerhand.org/?569698

Kind of in a crazy mood. It just seemed like a good spot to put in a reraise. He doesn't really know me so it's very hard to call this bet. You can see from his comments what he was putting me on, but without a big hand he can't call.

http://www.pokerhand.org/?579209

This is the hand that broke my back. I couldn't take the beats anymore. I think i lost something like 10 buyins at 600nl over the past 2 weeks and a lot of it was due to things like this. He obviously put me on AK here and shoved. What hurts the most is how well I played the hand, and ended up losing my stack because of it.

Day 32

2006-10-10T22:33:00.000-04:00

Things are going extremely well. I'm beating both 600nl and 1000nl these last few days. I decided I'll move up to 1000nl full time once I get a bigger roll. I also hit Supernova finally the other day and that was nice. I think I earn about 37% rakeback now through fpp points on pokerstars. That number may be higher at higher stakes, not really sure.

Main Hands:

http://www.pokerhand.org/?549326

One of my first set of hands at 1000nl. I can't fault my play here, I really thought I had the guy. He's been playing 72% of hands and extremely recklessly. I should stack him most of the time or at least win the pot, this is just one of those crap hands.

http://www.pokerhand.org/?549670

I think I had quads 4-5 times over the last few days.

http://www.pokerhand.org/?549765

He's playing a bit over aggresive and I do have a lot of outs. Standard play I guess, but 5/10 money is still setting in for me.

http://www.pokerhand.org/?550244

Ridiculous. Obviously bad river, but my read was that he didn't have an Ace. I'm looking at it and it seems like hes a busted straight or flush draw. This guy is terrible by the way. I can't believe he bet out 65, I think he's just planning to bluff me at some point. What sucks is I got outkicked on the river, my read was correct but he ended up having some screwball hand.

http://www.pokerhand.org/?550398

This felt so good. I had been waiting to push something all night. I hit a great card, I doubt I get his stack with a river diamond. He plays this terribly, on average 1000nl players are not good in my opinion.

http://www.pokerhand.org/?551685

I evaluated the river for about 5 seconds and decided he didn't have a straight. It looked like the A helped him so I just shoved. I don't know if he puts me on AK here or what.

http://www.pokerhand.org/?551688

Biggest pot yet.

http://www.pokerhand.org/?551719

This is a good call here. I thought it was more borderline but I'm actually 45% to win. With that in mind i'm paying $324 to win $507, which is 1 to 1.57, and I am 1 to 1.22 to win. It works out to be + $49.95 dollars for me every time I make this call.

Other Hands:

http://www.pokerhand.org/?551651

Day 31

2006-10-07T23:37:00.000-04:00

Alright, I'm up a few buyins so far at 600nl and things are still going well. I've had some long boring sessions mixed in but in the end it's been worth it. I've made 11k vpp so far for the month of October and that's the most amount of points I've ever made in such a short time span. I'd be up a bit more but I donked off $700 at 400nl short handed. I always lose there and I don't know why. I seem to do very well when full ring games get short, but very poorly at the short games themselves.

Main Hands:

http://www.pokerhand.org/?542215

This hand is absolutely ridiculous. I had to cut out about half of the commentary since it wouldn't even fit in the hand posting form.

http://www.pokerhand.org/?542266

Ouch. I keep having these moments of complete lapse of rational thinking. This was the second time he did this to me and I was getting annoyed. Stupid hands like these are killing my hourly rate.

http://www.pokerhand.org/?543729

Once he checked to me I decided the pot was mine. I made a small flop bet to set up a bluff on the turn. I wanted to act like I hit a big hand such as a set and was trying to suck him in. mrmatrix is a very good and trickey player and I was thinking this was something he'd pick up on.

http://www.pokerhand.org/?543933

Wow perfect read by me. I put Kelistaan 100% on a squeeze reraise here and popped it back up to $300. I also felt the other two callers were garbage hands. Go figure, they were and still called anyways. Even more annoying, QTo outflopped me for this decently sized pot.

http://www.pokerhand.org/?543949

Terrible beat my friend shazmeister took. Had to post this one.

http://www.pokerhand.org/?543970

Again, I'm putting him on garbage but he calls anyways. If he thought he needed a flush or ten to win here then he did not have odds to call. I honestly don't know why he calls the flop. Some players just decide that they are absolutley not folding no matter what sometimes.

http://www.pokerhand.org/?543978

Big pot for mediocre hand. I had this feeling he was calling me with QJ here.

http://www.pokerhand.org/?546579

No idea what Jdoles possibly has. The A K and Q of spades are accounted for. Maybe he flopped a low flush here. I doubt he folds 22 and apparently didn't have 99. I am more prone to think he had some kind of higher pair with a spade.

Other Hands:

http://www.pokerhand.org/?544945

http://www.pokerhand.org/?545198

http://www.pokerhand.org/?545211

http://www.pokerhand.org/?546139

http://www.pokerhand.org/?546198

Day 30

2006-10-07T22:59:00.000-04:00

I haven't posted in a while. I think I only played a few more hands through the end of September since my last post. Most of them weren't great and I got lucky on a few. I went up to boston over a long weekend and came back to see the onling gaming ban was passed. Since then I've been real motivated and playing much harder. I moved up to 600nl and have been doing very well so far. What sucks is that there's not always 6 full ring games availible so I've been mixing in some 2/4 or 5/10 games.

I'll split this into two posts since there are a lot of hands now that I look at it. This post is up through October 4th.

Main Hands:

http://www.pokerhand.org/?529237

Yep.

http://www.pokerhand.org/?537319

Definitly one of my best calls to date. I did have the straight draw here, but I called on the strength of my tens.

http://www.pokerhand.org/?537412

These players are so weak. I don't know why he's not shoving me on the river. There's no way I'm calling a re raise with this hand, but what the hell does he think I have?

http://www.pokerhand.org/?539832

97s is the best hand in poker.

http://www.pokerhand.org/?539856

Something screamed out at me to raise him. This hand seemed so fishy. I think he had something like KK or QQ here.

http://www.pokerhand.org/?539877

This sucks but I'm not going to put him on KJ here.

http://www.pokerhand.org/?540130

Terrible push. I was playing horribly this day.

http://www.pokerhand.org/?540247

Who knows.

http://www.pokerhand.org/?541546

I wanted to kill this guy. I was 50/50 to call this stupid push. I knew he was weak but I was just as weak myself. Turns out I'm out kicked here which is ridiculous. What annoys me even more is that he thinks he bluffed me off a monster. I don't know what he thinks I have, but some people just don't fold anything.

http://www.pokerhand.org/?541567

These 600nl players are true professionals.

http://www.pokerhand.org/?542079

This shove is becoming automatic for me. He gives the pot up and I don't even think about it. It makes it even harder for him to make a call.

Other Hands:

http://www.pokerhand.org/?531235

http://www.pokerhand.org/?537572

http://www.pokerhand.org/?537583

http://www.pokerhand.org/?537667

http://www.pokerhand.org/?539924

http://www.pokerhand.org/?540104

http://www.pokerhand.org/?540122

http://www.pokerhand.org/?540291

http://www.pokerhand.org/?540315

http://www.pokerhand.org/?541799

http://www.pokerhand.org/?541849

http://www.pokerhand.org/?541951

Day 29

2006-09-24T05:17:00.000-04:00

Finally turned things around. I mounted a huge comeback over the last two days and am well into the green again for the month. I've been playing very well and a few AA vs. KK didn't hurt.

Main Hands:

http://www.pokerhand.org/?519779

The post hand chat is priceless. Wasn't 100% sure if he had me beat on the flop or if i'd be able to float him off the hand. I also figured if I improve i'd stack him. After he lead hard on the turn I knew he had a big pocket and went on to pound him with my two pair. I think I still could have stacked him here if my Queen hit, but i'm not positive.

http://www.pokerhand.org/?520284

I did have a lot of outs on the turn but that's not the point. I really threw the bullshit flag out here after he potted the turn at me. This player is very loose and overly aggressive and it seemed like he was blatantly making a move on me here. The push was easier with my monster draws but I think I would still make my shove with a lesser hand as well.

http://www.pokerhand.org/?520610

Absolute nut here. He really had any two card here. I'm really upset that I checked this flop. I know hes very aggressive and I was hoping he'd lead the flop after I checked it over. In retrospect, him checking this flop let me know I was far ahead with JJ. I don't see any problem with me shoving the river, He did not have implied odds to stack me here with his hand/draw. In the end this play is +ev for me; although giving him a free card is fucking terrible on my part.

http://www.pokerhand.org/?520613

This hand happened moments after the previous beat. I really felt I was ahead 100% on the turn. I was putting him on something like 88 or 99 to be honest. He led $50 into a $250 pot on the river and I'm not going to fold even though I feel I've just been rivered. He shows off QT which absolutely screws me but at least my read was fairly accurate in that I had him crushed.

http://www.pokerhand.org/?520676

Back to the first nutbag again. I managed to win all my money back along with a good portion of the money I should have won as well. I didn't think about this call too long, I felt I was ahead and just called off the rest. I had a hand almost identical to this on $400nl a few weeks ago and it made my decision easier.

http://www.pokerhand.org/?522203

His river raise was so shitty I thought he was like KT and not a boat. Normally I just shove in this spot if I think he's a full house. I wanted some value here and didn't feel KT would call off his whole stack. I was lucky that he went ahead and pushed without considering my hand.

http://www.pokerhand.org/?522252

This hand is so ridiculous. AKlucky is considered to be a good player in my eyes. I've seen him at multiple limits including $2000nl. I really don't know what hes doing here. I think he might be trying to float me on the flop and doesn't think I lead out with a set. The turn obviously sucks and I just check it over. His bet is so small he actually gives me pot odds to catch a boat. I really just figured he was a flush here and didn't consider the possibility he's floating me. I didn't think too much of the river until I saw his hand and that it absolutely fucked me over. The other guy managed to hit a flush with his lower pair. I think I lost something like $50 on this hand when I should have stacked both of them.

http://www.pokerhand.org/?522289

When he doubled in and then lead the flop I was really thinking he was in the JJ-KK range of hands. The reason for this is that he's extremely tight preflop and I was considering him to have a big hand. When he led weak at me I really felt he'd fold to aggression so I played it soft as if I was also holding an underpair. The turn brings several draws but if my read is correct in that he has a pocket then the number of cards that improve his hand are next to nothing and I can continue to slow play and then extract extra value on the river. The J on the river was potentially a threat, but his check let me know I had the hand won. I went ahead and bet larger like some kind of bluff and he called and mucked. I was suprised to see ATc here. He actually had an enormous amount of draws on the turn. Even though I possibly played this hand incorrectly, I'm confident I would been able to fold here if he outdrew me on the river. This type of player will make weak bets with his weak holding and then jack it up when he has a strong hand.

Other Hands:

http://www.pokerhand.org/?519631

http://www.pokerhand.org/?520303

http://www.pokerhand.org/?520651

Day 28

2006-09-21T04:22:00.000-04:00

Still mostly break even so far. Bluffing off far too much money, I really don't know why I am doing so poorly lately. Playing lots of hands so at least I am getting FPP. I might make profit this month purely from selling amazon gift cards. So pathetic, at least I'm getting closer to 10k again so hopefully I can go back to 2/4nl soon.

Main Hands:

http://www.pokerhand.org/?511731

This hand just didn't feel right. I didn't think he had anything really. I decided to just go for a check raise on the turn and take him off his holding. It seemed like he had a missed pocket or some suited connector here.

http://www.pokerhand.org/?511950

Seemingly drew out pretty bad on him. I was suprised to see him call the turn. I really felt he was weaker here. I would have gone broke if an Ace fell I think, unless he lead allin at me.

http://www.pokerhand.org/?512019

Ouch. Sums up how stupid I'm playing. I don't have a problem getting it in on the flop I guess, but if I can call the small push and peel a card off I'd rather take that option. I don't feel my push would make him fold anyways. Not sure what I thought he could have had, I hit my flush but the board paired too. I don't know if that I was in a better state of mind if I would have check folded this or not. Seems like I should have put him on a set off the flop or at least top 2.

http://www.pokerhand.org/?513432

What the hell is calling $18 more with 34s? Awesome flop for me, no remorse for drawing out on him here.

http://www.pokerhand.org/?513676

This guy was a total psycho. I was tired at the time, but to this day I stand behind this call 100%. I think I will be good here at least 75% of the time.

http://www.pokerhand.org/?515357

This is stupid. I don't know what I thought he was doing with that turn lead. Perhaps I'm getting outplayed by weak players? I did have a lot of outs though so even though he was garaunteed to call I am going to win here about 40%.

http://www.pokerhand.org/?515375

He must be a pocket here or something. I committed myself to putting it all in off the turn. If he showed me AJ-AK I would have been a little suprised and short $200.

http://www.pokerhand.org/?515525

This is the #1 reason I am constantly breaking even. I've split so many stupid pots over the last few days. At least a heart didn't fall but seriously what the hell.

http://www.pokerhand.org/?515536

Lead a small flop bet to try to take it down. I knew the first guy missed but Wartortle is a nut as seen from the last hand. My little bet turned into a huge straight on the turn which I would have valued on the river had it not been a spade. Honestly though I didn't think he had the flush so I feel I should have bet anyways.

3 Way Mayhem:

http://www.pokerhand.org/?517307

I'd been raising a fair amount up till this hand. I was probably down about $50 in this 3 way action. Right here I came out firing again and faced a dinky min raise. I really felt he was weak so I called and checked to see his turn action. The turn didn't bring much and he made another crap bet. At this point I felt he wasn't very strong and just pushed allin. This probably wasn't even a great move because this guy might have called off with garbage. Lucklily he didn't have much at all and I was able to take the pot down. I didn't feel it would be a good idea to show this hand down here.

http://www.pokerhand.org/?517311

A few hands later, nothing too significant. I really should have bet more on the river because I was sure I had the best hand. I really was calling on a gutshot or pair, as I felt he had a 5. I'm sure this hand annoyed him even though it was a smaller pot.

http://www.pokerhand.org/?517303

Final hand, shortly thereafter. I really didn't put him on much and tried to get as much in on the flop as I could. I was thinking he could have a flush draw or some shit straight draw here too. The river didn't look too nice and I wouldn't have been suprised to see a goofy straight. I took almost $400 off this guy in the matter of 5 minutes.

Other Hands:

http://www.pokerhand.org/?511974

http://www.pokerhand.org/?513606

http://www.pokerhand.org/?513696

http://www.pokerhand.org/?515344

http://www.pokerhand.org/?515382

http://www.pokerhand.org/?515463

http://www.pokerhand.org/?515474

http://www.pokerhand.org/?517066

http://www.pokerhand.org/?517096

Day 27

2006-09-17T16:18:00.000-04:00

I absolutely was murdered last night. Was up a bit at one point, but the swings at 6 max are incredible. I really feel I was getting one garbage turn of events after another for the first half of the session. For the second half I don't even know what happened. People really do not fold at this game and I bluffed off so much money. I'm going back to 9 max next time I get on.

Main Hands:

http://www.pokerhand.org/?509837

Here is a nice call. I really had that feeling he was full of shit when he was raising at me. I wasn't sure what hand I was going to see shown down at the end, but I felt my pair was good.

http://www.pokerhand.org/?509856

He was betting hard but he seemed really unsure of his holding. From his comments it looks like he has a big pair here, but there's no way he can call my push off.. right?

http://www.pokerhand.org/?510076

Cobra saved me a lot of money raising here. Obviously he had the best hand, but if he wasn't involved I would have paid the AA off. I feel that AA should almost never be slow played at 6 max, especially considering his position to my raise.

http://www.pokerhand.org/?510214

Yea I don't know. I really wanted to win the pot I think. Honestly though this guy had some mid pair and didn't really know me well yet. He is a more solid player so I can make this move on him. If it was anyone else I'm sure they would have called.

http://www.pokerhand.org/?510220

I was so happy with this hand. I called out 30 mins prior that I was going to double through this guy. This hand actually takes place a little bit after I showed off a huge bluff. He was partially steaming and thinking I was full of shit again and paid me off with QQ. Honestly look how weak he played it though. What's with the river 30 lead?

http://www.pokerhand.org/?510265

Woooooow. I really did not expect to get called. I was putting him on a draw or a weak hand. He did in fact have a weak hand. How the hell do you call with Q9 here? I'm only up a little bit at this point, but seriously with hands like this I should be up a lot more.

http://www.pokerhand.org/?510285

So fucking annoying. I've been tooling this guy all night too. This is garaunteed 100% stack if no A or Q comes on the river. He completely shut down after this hand took place after he saw what I had.

http://www.pokerhand.org/?510298

Ridiculous hand I watched. It looks like an amazing call but I really think everyone here is a big idiot.

http://www.pokerhand.org/?510346

Setup Setup Setup Setup setup. He played this hand so weak too. I obviously thought I had the best hand. How does the case ten come off on the river? That is the only card left in the deck that he will call my river bet with. This is the reason I'm getting murdered.

http://www.pokerhand.org/?510363

This hand wins the award for the worst hand I've ever seen. The first guy opens for a $52 bet into a $17 pot with K7. Another guy calls with KT. On top of that, they both call my push.

The Damage:

http://www.pokerhand.org/?510328

How do you fucking call this? This limit is so annoying. He's calling my flop bet with AJ Ace high as well. I obviously wasn't paying attention to the table but this guy is incredible. After this hand I proceeded to rail this guy and took about $400 back off him.

The Aftermath:

http://www.pokerhand.org/?510324

http://www.pokerhand.org/?510327

Other Hands:

http://www.pokerhand.org/?509873

http://www.pokerhand.org/?509906

http://www.pokerhand.org/?510242

http://www.pokerhand.org/?510269

http://www.pokerhand.org/?510344

Day 26

2006-09-16T05:31:00.000-04:00

Well I'm doing a bit better now. I'm messing around on the 6 max tables; they do seem a lot fishier than 9 max. I've played so many hands since my last post that I stopped keeping track. Still down for the month, should be turning a profit soon.

Main Hands:

http://www.pokerhand.org/?499205

I love these hands. I do give this guy credit for stopping and thinking a bit on the river. Honestly though I don't see him folding at this point.

http://www.pokerhand.org/?499750

Quads are nice in the middle of a shitty session. He honestly played this like crap.

http://www.pokerhand.org/?501222

One of my 6 max tables. I actually really like how this went down on the end. I was putting him on KK basically 100% on the river. I figured he'll probably call off if I just push.

http://www.pokerhand.org/?501590

This guy was being ridiculously aggressive preflop and I had a feeling he was just playing back at me.

http://www.pokerhand.org/?503540

Another total maniac.

http://www.pokerhand.org/?503635

I got lucky with this turn. I honestly don't know if I would call that push w/o hitting a set on the turn. This player is overly aggressive and I didn't have a good feel for what he had. I really don't know why I play so passive preflop.

http://www.pokerhand.org/?505706

I seriously thought I had him 100% here. I checked on the turn to induce a bluff. Split pots suck.

http://www.pokerhand.org/?506198

This is how ridiculous 6 max is on a regular basis. I could have easily gone broke here to JTo. The other guy apparently folded a flush draw as well. I feel like I should be up tons of money after these hands but I keep breaking even.

http://www.pokerhand.org/?508598

Again, this hand is completely off the wall. Even if you think i'm drawing which he most certainly did, why push your whole stack?

http://www.pokerhand.org/?508643

This might be my only interesting hand out of all this whole post. I've been pretty aggressive and killing the table up to this point. I went out and made the standard preflop raise//continuation bet. He came back at me with a minraise and I felt it was fishy. I went ahead and called to see the turn action. He lead out $50 on the turn and I really felt he was a flush draw here. I wasn't positive but I really felt I had him for whatever reason. The river was a spade which I wasn't happy to see. However he checked and at that point I knew he was garbage. He might have had Ace high as well for a split pot, or even some very low pocket pair. At this point I knew he didn't have a flush or anything good so I put him allin; I didn't want to split this with Ace high.

Set vs. Straight:

http://www.pokerhand.org/?505645

Going broke on a limped pot. This is something I never do except when I'm working on giving all my money away.

http://www.pokerhand.org/?505840

This hand is even worse than the last one. I don't know why I feel so committed to throw all my chips in on a limped pot. But seriously, how many times is this going to happen today?

Other hands:

http://www.pokerhand.org/?499207

http://www.pokerhand.org/?499722

http://www.pokerhand.org/?505756

http://www.pokerhand.org/?505788

http://www.pokerhand.org/?505815

http://www.pokerhand.org/?505817

http://www.pokerhand.org/?508485

http://www.pokerhand.org/?508509

http://www.pokerhand.org/?508617

http://www.pokerhand.org/?508625

Day 25

2006-09-08T22:00:00.000-04:00

Result: 4500 hands, $200 net.

So my hourly rate has gone to total shit so far this month. However, right now I'm not even focusing on making money really. I've been 9 boarding and playing recklessly just so I can hit this supernova and win part of the bet. After that I'll go back to playing more normally like I was before. Honestly though, I have had some crappy runs over the last few days and my decisions have been sub par. I am still aiming to make this month my most profitable yet, even though I've started off down a few buyins.

http://www.pokerhand.org/?465111

Regardless of my river straight, I had him as bluffing the entire way anyways. I would have made this call with a pair of queens as well.

http://www.pokerhand.org/?465173

This is a good value bet for such a shitty board on the river. He got pissed off about the hand but he seriously should have raised me at some point.

http://www.pokerhand.org/?491409

Here's the start of a few hands where I just play absolutely terrible. I'm putting this guy on a busted flush on the river but I'm not sure if hes holding the Queen as well. This is a really easy spot for him to bluff, but my read was off.

http://www.pokerhand.org/?491565

Fucking ridiculous. This guy is not good, he really gave me some crying shit call on the river. There's no way he can honestly think I have a high card here.

Other Hands:

http://www.pokerhand.org/?462489

http://www.pokerhand.org/?472038

http://www.pokerhand.org/?493916

Day 24

2006-09-07T03:52:00.000-04:00

Result: 2500 hands, $1000 net.

I don't know if I'm acutally down this much, it might only be $600. Anyways, I think I started off playing rather dumb. I also had a lot of stupid situations too. Either way I am still considering this a good day. I was finally able to play a large amount of hands and will try to play even more tomorrow.

I'll post hands later.

Day 23

2006-09-05T23:26:00.000-04:00

Result: 1200 hands, $200 net.

I think this result is about accurate. I've been dabbing on and off the past few days. I tried to give it a go tonight but really played like crap. I've really been focusing on other things lately and am spending a lot of time on getting out of the Air Force. Once I get focused again I should put up good results. Again, I really have no hands to post. These last two sessions were played at 1/2NL and the hands just haven't been exciting there lately.

Day 22

2006-08-28T20:45:00.000-04:00

Result: 1500 hands, $700 net.

Really haven't played much this last week. I've probably played 1500 hands at most since my last post. I'm down a bit but I've had no interesting hands to post. I think I need to get back on top of my sleep schedule and eating/exercise habits before I can start putting longer hours in again. I'll probably play as normal after this long holiday weekend.

So far this month I've only earned 6k vpp so I won't even retain my Platinum status. This is actually pretty pathetic since I made close to 17k last month and I've been playing at a higher limit this month. However, this has also been my most profitable month as well. I feel this is probably due to my superior game selection and only playing when I'm alert and full of energy.

I still have my bets running with a friend, but since he poses essentially no threat to win at this point, my drive has slowed down a bit as well. I plan on finishing at an 18k bankroll and Supernova status by the second week of October.

Day 21

2006-08-19T18:59:00.000-04:00

Result: 660 hands, $730 net.

Almost didn't play today but obviously glad I did. I keep losing focus at around the 750 hand mark and I don't know what the hell the deal is. Either way I'm bringing in good money so I suppose I shouldn't complain.

Other hands:

http://www.pokerhand.org/?462455

http://www.pokerhand.org/?462489

Day 20

2006-08-18T17:27:00.000-04:00

Result: 750 hands, $230 net.

This had to be my most boring session ever. Some of my boards I was only playing 6% of my hands. On top of that I made a questionable $200 call which I'm not too happy with.

http://www.pokerhand.org/?461092

I don't know what the hell he was doing here. I really put him on KK+. Usually Aragon is a very tight solid player but today I guess he felt like bluffing. This whole hand went down very fast.

http://www.pokerhand.org/?461122

Here is my questionable hand from yesterday. Everyone I've showed this too says clear push, but let me make my case. Jonny plays 72% of hands, so really he has any2 here. I wouldn't put him on Q2, but I would think Q6 is possible. Anyways he makes a smaller bet on the flop and I go ahead and call. I really think if he was QJ+ he'd bet the turn as well. He would also bet with 22 or 66 here. When he checks I start to think he has nothing or a weak Q. When the 9 falls I bet out small and he fires it up quickly to $104. Now this is the thing, I'm absolutely positive he has a boat here. You can argue me all you want on my read, but my read is pretty much 98% boat for him. Now keeping this in mind, I don't think he has Q2, Q6, 22, or 66 for the reasons stated earlier. This really leaves me thinking he could be Q9 here. I don't think he is doing this raise with Qx; he's a loose player but not stupid. 99 never crossed my mind to be honest, I was putting him on Qx. The other thing is that I was in the blinds this hand. Knowing this I could have any2 cards as well. If he has a small boat like 22, most players won't call if I push out over the top on that river. They know I am solid and could have Qx boat from my blind position. With all this in mind, I didn't see a lot of ev from pushing here, and wasn't even really sure I was ahead in general. Go ahead and tell me it's an auto push all you want, and maybe it was, but I still think I made a logical play here.

http://www.pokerhand.org/?461169

Another questionable play. I really felt like playing this passively since I wasn't getting any damn hands at the table. On the turn I felt like I probably had the best hand so I put in a decent sized raise. I went and checked the river like I might usually do here and he pushed. I did think about this for a bit, but there are just so many hands he could have here. Primarily I am putting him on a busted flush here and have him as bluffing. He could also have a mid range pocket and missed on that flush draw too. I was also even thinking QJ. In general I didn't think he was AQ or a higher pair so I don't know many other hands to consider. I didn't really consider a flopped flush here I suppose, and most players probably wouldn't make that push. This player may be better than I give him credit for, but I was still thinking he was crap at the time. I think in this situation I will have the best hand enough times to merit the call as a +ev play. Today I happened to be wrong, but I think the call is still ok.

Day 19

2006-08-18T02:21:00.000-04:00

Result: 1600 hands, $1080 net.

This is my result from the last two days. I played 1000 hands yesterday and ended up $25 so I didn't bother posting. On top of that, I haven't really had any interesting hands from these last two days. I was on a roll today but my internet kept folding my hands for me. I figured ending early would save me some money and stress in the long run.

http://www.pokerhand.org/?459012

Terrible terrible terrible. I really thought Soros was a dangerous player until this hand went down. He instantly called $250 on the turn so I figured he had a monster. There was no pot or implied odds to draw to a flush here. He has 12 outs but he's calling a pot sized bet when the other guy only has $160 more. On top of that, what the hell happened on the river? Soros runs his clock down from like 80 seconds to think about this call. I couldn't have thought it to be any more obvious that chips is a big pair here. I was also thrown back that he called $250 but had to really put thought into calling $150 more.

http://www.pokerhand.org/?460436

This guy went ahead and stacked himself here. He checked the river super fast so I felt he had a decent holding. I went ahead and bet out $100 somewhat quickly and was pretty much just expecting a call. To my suprise he went ahead and pushed which brought a nice pot my way.

http://www.pokerhand.org/?460451

Played this somewhat passively. I'm putting him on JJ+, but mainly QQ+ after the turn. Not too sure if I will stack him had I played more aggressively at some point in this hand. I feel like I did get strong value out of this hand at least.

Day 18

2006-08-16T02:22:00.000-04:00

Result: 650 hands, $1000 net.

I think I played an amazing session today. I had a few crappy rivers again but my biggest hands held up. I'm really happy with my short term success at $400nl and I hope it holds up. I'm still not playing a whole lot of hands but this is usually how it goes after a break. I plan on playing $600nl once I have a 15k bankroll.

http://www.pokerhand.org/?457538

This is a very small pot that I wasn't involved in. However, look at each of the three hands involved. AA vs JJ vs AJ on an AJ7 board. I think this is the first time i've seen this. Too bad none of them had really big stacks or some fireworks would have gone off.

http://www.pokerhand.org/?457569

This is the flop I play for when I make this positional raise. This guy called $16 out of the small blind so I'm really thinking he has a set here. If he has a higher flush then I have to pay him off. Turns out he had a draw and I was really suprised.

http://www.pokerhand.org/?457597

Board gets worse each card but I'm really putting him on one pair here. I make bigger bets the whole way down since I feel he'll call down with whatever one pair he holds.

http://www.pokerhand.org/?457602

This guy plays a lot of hands. I had this sick feeling he had me beat on the turn and couldn't bring myself to push. He either had AA, 5x, or 22 here. I am about 99% positive he was being truthful when he said he had me.

http://www.pokerhand.org/?457671

Big fold but maybe it's an easy one. I am not scared of the first guy at all, my decision is whether or not I want to play a full stack with goldcowboy here. I ran my clock down here and really felt my KK wasn't good. Turns out the first guy was a lot stronger than I credited him, but goldcowboy did in fact have me drawing nearly dead preflop.

Other Hands:

http://www.pokerhand.org/?457537

http://www.pokerhand.org/?457619

http://www.pokerhand.org/?457669

Day 17

2006-08-15T12:34:00.000-04:00

Result: 1500 hands, $350 net.

So I haven't posted in a long time, this result is also the accumulation of several days. I just returned from leave though so hopefully i'll be playing more. I also made the jump to $400nl last night and did fairly well. I do think I had a shitty night though, a lot of my continuation bets weren't working and I got rivered a few times.

http://www.pokerhand.org/?446763

Just wasn't putting him on a set here. Obviously if I don't think he has a set then it's allin time. I was thinking he was on some kind of draw or weaker hand. If I recall correctly this guy was kind of wild anyways.

http://www.pokerhand.org/?448631

This guy actually ran his clock down preflop and then raised me $12 more. I'm really putting him on KK+ here. If I don't hit the set then I will play very cautiously and slow. After I hit the set the objective is to get all the money in, so I just made a pussy bet on the flop and he fired away.

http://www.pokerhand.org/?456048

Same situation as my first hand. This guy is nut's so I really don't think he has me. Really thought the Q screwed me but was happy to see J3.

http://www.pokerhand.org/?456156

Well I've been fucking this guy all night and it brings us to this hand. After he raises me on the flop I really think hes trash so I call. He makes a big bet on the turn and I still feel hes drawing maybe or just bluffing. I go ahead and min raise which leaves me with enough chips to bluff the river. After he checks the river I still feel hes just got trash so I go ahead and bet the rest of his chips.

Other Hands:

http://www.pokerhand.org/?448116

http://www.pokerhand.org/?456097

Day 16

2006-08-08T11:31:00.000-04:00

Result: 600 hands, $800 net.

I haven't been playing a whole lot lately. I'm still home on leave and am just taking it easy I suppose. Hopefully I feel energetic enough to crack 2/4nl for a few days before I go back. Last night I seemed to be hitting a lot of sets, however I did make some real good reads and plays as well.

After looking through the hands, I don't really feel any were that spectacular. I just went ahead and posted them all without any comments. I mostly called a few bluffs and pushed monsters into calling stations.

Other Hands:

http://www.pokerhand.org/?444761

http://www.pokerhand.org/?444767

http://www.pokerhand.org/?444823

http://www.pokerhand.org/?444844

http://www.pokerhand.org/?444848

Day 15

2006-08-02T22:38:00.000-04:00

Result: 1800 hands, $300 net.

This result is a cumulation of the last 3 days worth of playing. I haven't been playing as much since i've just switched my work shifts again and am getting used to yet another sleep schedule. I've been doing fairly well lately and plan on playing 2/4 nl this weekend. Hopefully I'll be able to play there full time and move on from 1/2 nl.

http://www.pokerhand.org/?433074

This guy was playing real nuts from what I recall. I obviously had a strong draw but I really figured I had the best hand when the Ace fell. I just went ahead and pushed since I figured I'd get a call anyways from whatever trash he was playing.

http://www.pokerhand.org/?435933

Really borderline decision here. Slim is a very bad loose aggressive player so I am naturally going to give him more action here. Tjalle is a decent player from what I thought but I really wasn't concerened with him this hand. After slim bet out the flop I went ahead and made a standard check raise with my decent holding into the loose aggressive player. Tjalle cold calls here and it kind of leads me to believe he's not that strong. Slim comes back and just instantly pushes allin. Right now the range of hands I'm putting him on is JT+ or a flush draw. I really don't think he's as strong as QQ here. He could conceivably have QQ but my feeling from the hand thus far was that he wasn't that strong. My decision came down to whether or not I felt I had a better hand than slim. With tjalle on some crap hand or draw my only decision was to fold or push here. After a while I figured there was a really decent chance I had slim beat and the dead money from tjalle should make the call worth while. I went ahead and pushed and was suprised to see tjalle call. As I thought, he was on a flush draw and missed. I do get lucky to split the remaining $260 with slim, however had I not filled up I would have broken even if tjalle still missed his draw. In the end I feel this was still a +ev play given the range of hands I put slim on and the read I had on tjalle.

http://www.pokerhand.org/?437512

First real hand of my third session. I was putting King7Seven on AQ or AK here. Again it's possible he has AJ but I have to keep betting hard since AQ and AK will surely call down. Unfortunate for me that he does happen to have AJ here, but what can you do.

http://www.pokerhand.org/?437566

FI79 is a tilting idiot from my read on him. He raised in strong but I figured he had crap so I just called with Q7 in position. Iffy flop I suppose and if he bets it I'll probably just have to fold. He checks through the river which leads me to believe he has absolutely nothing. At the end he fires off $10 and I really think Q high is good here most of the time so I go ahead and call.

http://www.pokerhand.org/?437567

Pulled a floater on Jono here. He's one of the better regulars in my opinion but he plays this hand like crap. First of all it's obvious he has JJ+ with his tight style re raising from the blinds. This lets me call with any two cards and I can either outplay him or outflop him. In this case the flop comes AA4 and with his bet I don't think he has an Ace. I call the flop on him and plan to take him down on the turn. The King on the turn isn't necessarily good for me since i'm putting him on JJ-KK. However he checks so I go ahead and make a smaller bet which looks like I want a call. If he has KK here I will have to fold but otherwise this bet should win me the pot.

http://www.pokerhand.org/?437663

Another hand with Jono. At this point he's calling every preflop raise I make when he has position and seems to be on tilt. He calls very fast preflop and I really think he has some kind of trash hand. I go ahead and continuation bet the flop and he makes a very quick 3x raise. I think about it for a bit and I just feel he has absolutely nothing here. I raise $55 more and he folds right away.

Other hands:

http://www.pokerhand.org/?433053

http://www.pokerhand.org/?437617

Day 14

2006-07-29T22:28:00.000-04:00

Result: 1000 hands, $400 net.

I decided to shift the focus of this blog from writing about every single hand I play to just posting more hands and only really writing about the complicated ones. A lot of the hands i've been posting are starting to be repeats of the same idea's and lines of thought anyways.

http://www.pokerhand.org/?432039

Questionable play by me, but hey I can get lucky too. This guy was real wild so I just pushed his raise. The pot was only limped preflop though so I probably made a mistake here.

http://www.pokerhand.org/?432179

This guy has the nuts on the river. I don't know why he only calls my reraise here other than the fact that hes absolutley terrible and intimidated by me.

http://www.pokerhand.org/?432121

This guy was trying to sell me a car and I didn't buy it. His turn lead was real strange and his river bet even stranger. He could have been possibly drawing to a flush here and hit but I didn't feel that was the case. After thinking about it for a bit I figured he had 8x and called.

http://www.pokerhand.org/?432143

I didn't really want to raise this flop being out of position and being involved in a limped pot. I feel safest here just calling and seeing how the rest of the flop and turn plays out. When he made a $12 turn bet I had this sick feeling he had me beat so I just folded. Turns out he hit a complete crap gutshot and a pair of Jacks calls him down.

http://www.pokerhand.org/?432237

Had so many callers preflop. This is definitly not a great flop for KK in a 4 way pot. I check behind so I can see how the turn action pans out. Herogutt makes a smaller but strong bet from first position. Before I can really think his bet out ca11girl goes ahead and reraises to $60. At this point Kings are surely not good and I just go ahead and fold. Turns out hero flopped top 2 and ca11girl turned a set.

Other hands:

http://www.pokerhand.org/?432034

http://www.pokerhand.org/?432038

http://www.pokerhand.org/?432106

http://www.pokerhand.org/?432125

http://www.pokerhand.org/?432175

Day 13

2006-07-29T05:24:00.000-04:00

Result: 700 hands, $520 net.

I think I was playing fairly decent today. Was playing aggressive and making some strong reads. Had to cut the session short since I was losing all focus and determination near the end. I didn't start till after midnight so I was just tired to begin with I think.

http://www.pokerhand.org/?431195

Well right off the bat tiggr817 comes off as a bad player. He raises 4x from the small blind so I get the impression he is strong. Flop comes KJ7 which gives me a set but leaves me vulnerable to KK or JJ from tiggr. On the flop he came out and quickly bet $20 into $26. By no means did I feel he would play KK like this. That kind of bet scares out weaker hands and much more resembles AA. I figured he'd call if I pushed so I just went ahead and did. He thought for maybe 3 seconds before making the call.

http://www.pokerhand.org/?431216

This was a pretty good hand on my part. Earlier in the night I had a hand vs Bunkbeds where I flopped the nuts and he came out betting into me. I raised him off his hand on the turn which I kind of regret, but I feel that hand paved way for this one. Here I raise to $8 preflop and I was being very aggressive at this table. He makes a reraise to $24 on the button. I really figure he's doing this with JJ+ here so I just call and take a flop. The flop comes J high and I feel it is fairly safe for me. I check and he bet's $38 into $51. I figure he's unlikely to have JJ here so I put him on QQ+. I go ahead and make a big reraise like I'm trying to push him off his hand. I feel that he won't give his hand up here just from how i've been playing and how strong he bet the flop. He goes ahead and pushes instantly which leads to me calling instantly. I'm lucky he didn't hold any spades on the river; there's a 50% chance he does if holding QQ or KK each and 100% chance if holding AA.

Day 12

2006-07-27T07:28:00.000-04:00

Result: 1200 hands, $820 net.

I think I played better today, but I really don't feel I am playing anywhere near 100% effectivity at these limits. I folded to a bluff today which would have been a $130 net for me. Granted it would have been a very very marginal call on my part but I still could have made the call. I botched a few other hands where I may have made a lot more had I played them differently. I dropped back down to 6 boards and am really going to focus on playing more aggressively and making better reads.

http://www.pokerhand.org/?427908

One of my first hands of the night. He raises me a considerable amount on the flop here and i'm not too sure what he may have. I like calling here and seeing how the turn action plays out. Most of the time i'll be able to put him on a good range of hands depending on the card and his bet. I fill up on the turn and am only losing to 77 or JJ at this point. He goes ahead and bets $40 into $107 and I really don't think he has either JJ or 77 here. I go ahead and push him in for the rest and he calls drawing dead to the river. I would have called his flop raise even if I had known he flopped a straight. I was facing a $32 call to win a 75$ pot + the extra $137.10 he has. 1-7 implied odds here when i'm about 1-6 to hit. Also, had I not filled up and he still made a $40 bet on the turn, I would have had correct implied odds to call this bet too.

http://www.pokerhand.org/?427944

This is really such a stupid hand. Unfortunate he flopps quads versus the big blind only. Honestly though, he needs to bet the turn here to get the money moving. His opponent did in fact have an open ended straight draw and probably would have called a $4 bet. He bets $2 here on the river for value and his opponent calls Ace high. I really just think this is an extremely gay way to play quads. You need to get money moving earlier and if he doesn't have a hand anyways he'll fold. Betting $2 on the river for value just shows how weak you are.

http://www.pokerhand.org/?428021

Nothing amazing but I wanted to post because of my read. I didn't really want to bet this flop here because i'm really not strong with A5s against three opponents. The small blind came out and made a so so bet on the turn. I really felt this was a split pot at this point. With the 2's pairing up and the J on board, I was putting him on Ax with x less than J. The river was a scare card for him and he checked it over. I'm not sure how this hand would have played out had I not 2 paired here. I think I would have tried to make him fold so i didn't have to split. Here I make a value bet of 1/3 the size of the pot and get A7 to call me down. This is probably more so a standard bet from the regulars at this limit, but I think the little things like this represent the gap between the big and marginal winners.

http://www.pokerhand.org/?428048

Another smaller pot but with good value on a marginal hand. Unraised pot, I go ahead and bet out strong with my TPTK. The Jack on the turn really doesn't bother me so I lead out again with another strong bet. Again I keep up with my trend of checking this river. No draws have hit other than if he had a Kx flush draw. He leads $26 here and I call to beat a busted straight.

http://www.pokerhand.org/?428297

Here's my big controversial hand of the night. I've talked about it with many players on a few notes. Some better players basically told me I was an idiot for not playing it more aggressively in the first place. This was just stupid on my part, I really don't know why I didn't just fire out like I had AK or something. Anyways, it was still interesting how the hand played out. I've played with Karl enough to know he's not going to let bullshit slip through here. With my check on flop and call of the weak $6 bet on the turn I have a good feeling he may raise here. He goes ahead and calls $6 as well. The river is a great card in that it fills me up and I am only losing to JJ at this point. Obviously no one in this hand has JJ so I have the nuts. Holly makes another weak bet and I am convinced at this point that if I just call Karl will raise. I go ahead and call and Karl makes a weak raise of $20 more. I was really hoping he raised more like $40 here; so I was thinking he probably didn't have a great hand just raising $20 more. This is probably a terrible push by me. This kind of play is going to work against a maniac, but Karl isn't stupid. I might have gotten value had I reraised to $92, but I don't think he had a whole lot anyways. He says he folded 44 here but I really don't beleive he had 44 at all. I more so think he had Jxh and missed a flush draw but paired his Jack. 44 is almost always going to raise the turn and probably raise a lot more on the river. Raising $40 on the river looks the same to me as raising $20. I more so think he raised $20 more because he had a weaker hand. My play still looked ridiculous in general though. I went from calling a $6 bet on the river to just randomly pushing. If Karl did have 44 here he would probably fold, but I think anything better he might call. Any other player at this limit would definitly call with 44 there though.

Day 11

2006-07-25T23:12:00.000-04:00

Result: 1300 hands, $140 net.

Played pretty terrible today in my opinion. I think I made a few major mistakes which probably cost me near $300 in profit. I might cut back on my tables again, I'm not to sure. On one hand I was making more mistakes, but on the other hand I was getting more hands to win money off of too. All in all I think I just wasn't playing great regardless of how many tables I had up.

http://www.pokerhand.org/?426658

I've been getting min raised like this a lot lately. Bad players are growing in numbers at this limit. Usually a min raise like this means something along the likes of AK, but even if he could be AA i'm obvoiusly still going to make this preflop call in position. His weak $14 bet on the flop led me to believe he didn't have a pair above mine in his hand; most likely he was playing AK. The Jack on the turn should have brought alert to any hand here, unless he in fact has the Jack. I really doubted he min raised me preflop with any hand containing a Jack and I know he wouldn't be playing JJ the way he's been betting. He goes ahead and pushes and this is a pretty easy call at this point. If he does have a pair above 88 then i'll be suprised but I'm confident I have him beat here more times than not.

http://www.pokerhand.org/?426671

Big pot vs. a good friend of mind. This looks like an automatic call but I really thought about this for a while. In the end I couldn't possibly seeing myself folding this but I had reasons behind my doubt. First of all, Shaz is one of the best players at this limit so i'm usually going to rule out any off the wall plays from him in general. Also, he had just finished showing me two hands not 15 minutes earlier where he flopped the nuts vs. good players and just went ahead and pushed allin, stacking them both. This all in mind I was really sitting there wondering if he flopped a higher flush on me. After a little bit though I just really doubted he was putting me on a flopped flush and more likely some hand containing one diamond or general crap. Yea I do have that pretty staight flush draw, but if he flopped a higher flush then I have at most two outs at this point anyways. In the end I decided if he really played a higher flush the way he did then I'm going to get stacked.

Day 10

2006-07-24T23:13:00.000-04:00

Result: 2300 hands, $180 net.

I'm going to start playing 9 boards now as opposed to my 6 from before. I think there's just a lot more money to be made as long as I can play optimally on all 9. I'll probably experiement with this for a few days and drop back to 6 if it becomes a problem. Otherwise, I had a fairly annoying day. I started off playing alright, although I had a ten minute stretch where I made several bad calls. I managed to turn that around until the end of my session where I proceeded to lose about 12-15 hands in a row. After the dust cleared I finished down under a buyin, but at least I was able to get a good amount of hands in. I think all in all I made about 3 big mistakes, one of which I posted below. I would have liked to finish with a positive session though.

http://www.pokerhand.org/?425070

This hand was different. I made a big raise over a bunch of limpers with a decent hand. A lot of the time i'll just pick up blinds here so it's a +ev play in my opinion. I end up flopping top pair and make a strong continuation bet on the flop. This guy thinks for a bit and then just pushes. This hand really doesn't feel right for me and I have a good feeling that I have the best hand. I end up calling after thinking for about 20 seconds and I was correct in that I had the best hand off the flop.

http://www.pokerhand.org/?425110

Nice pot for me here. I was pretty much positive that he had the Kh after he called my turn bet. We both made our hands on the river yet I had the nuts and he had the second nuts. Since I am putting him on the second nuts I just went ahead and pushed allin. I figure he calls this bet enough times (as opposed to a smaller bet) to make it worth while. He did run his clock down but ended up calling in the end.

http://www.pokerhand.org/?425334

Rather annoying. I don't consider this player to be strong whatsoever, although I did feel he has the capacity to lay down a strong pocketpair. In retrospect, I don't feel I played this hand very well. I acted too quickly and no draws really hit on the river. The only hands he is losing too are JJ QQ or Qx. I could be 33 here too. I think if I took more time and bet less on the turn and pushed the river I'd have gotten him to fold. Oh well, poor play on my part.

Day 09

2006-07-23T02:39:00.000-04:00

Result: 1500 hands, $850 net.

Finally had a real good day. I don't particularly think I even played great today, just had things go my way. Most of my hands weren't really worth posting; I just won a lot of medium sized pots and didn't get sucked out on a whole lot.

http://www.pokerhand.org/?422601

Yea no brainer I guess. This guy is pretty bad and I just acted like I was QQ.

http://www.pokerhand.org/?422621

Uh so yea. I flop quads and everyone else puts all their money in to the pot. I really wonder where these hands have been over the last few days..

Day 08

2006-07-22T01:18:00.000-04:00

Result: 2,000 hands, $150 net.

Wow today could have gone a lot better. I really think I should have been up about $600. I had one hand that I lost $200 on and I don't think I had much of a choice. I had a few others where I'm flopping a set vs. a straight and they didn't work out too well. I think I made some monster plays this session and am slightly frustrated with the result.

The first two hands are interesting. This is how you bust somebody in two consecutive hands.

http://www.pokerhand.org/?421234

Standard continuation bet on flop. I make my hand on the turn. At this point all I do is double my bets. Obviously I really want to just push on the river but he probably doesn't call an allin. The best method to extract calls is just double the bet throughout the hand. I check the turn if I don't hit a straight there.

http://www.pokerhand.org/?421235

Same guy again, very next hand. I get dealt the monster and he calls on the button. Not the best flop for me, I don't have the Ac, but otherwise I probably have the best hand. I check it over because I like to see a non club on the turn before i'll make a bet here. B&RStars decides to make a complete crap bet. I figure to have him beat here but only call and check the turn. Now he goes ahead and bets $20 into $49. The Q on the turn is another scare card for me, because one of the major hands to consider at this point is KQ. However, taking into account I just railed him in the previous hand along with how weak his bets are, I figure to be good here. At this point I really think he has 1 pair with a flush draw. Most likely KJ or even no pair with one club in his hand. I go ahead and put him allin with what I think is the best hand. I dont particularly like the river since he could be JT here and I figure to have him beat on the turn anyways. I am correct in that he had a garbage hand with one club and I take the pot down. Notice his complete tilt call on the turn. He payed $43 to win $134, and wasn't even drawing to the nuts. Had I not beat him the hand before I doubt I get all his money here.

http://www.pokerhand.org/?421347

The battle continues! This is one of my good friends on here and we are constantly going toe to toe to win pots off each other. This particular hand is interesting. I go ahead and raise 98s in early position and he just calls from the big blind. Not a great flop for me, but I do have a gutshot. He goes ahead and bets $6 which I feel is weak so I plan to float the hand on him. I will call the flop and win the pot on the turn. The turn brings all kinds of possibilities and he checks it over. I really think he has nothing right here so I consider my options to take the pot down. I can either bet 3/4 the pot, overbet the pot, or do what I did and make a smallish goofy bet. I didn't want to make a big bet here and face him raising me with nothing, because I don't know if I could have pushed my 9 high here. With my real small bet, I was fairly confident he would re raise me, in which case I would re raise him back. He goes ahead and instantly raises to $30, which I think is completely weak. I take about 15 seconds and raise just over minimum. I like this raise for me because I'm giving any drawing hand great odds to call, which kind of makes me look strong to give such crazy odds. He goes ahead and folds and later tells me he had KT.

http://www.pokerhand.org/?421548

Huge call here. Again another one of my good friends with whom i've played tens of thousands of hands with. This is real interesting and hard to explain everything in something such as this. He knows I could have a wide range of hands on the flop, anywhere from 78, to a flush draw, to AQ, to AK, etc. In all reality, I bet real big on the flop to see if everyone would just fold. He knows this and figures me to be somewhat weak, so he goes ahead and pushes allin. This leaves me all kinds of things to consider. Two obvious hands that would push here are 55 and 66. He might figure me to be AA or AK and try to suck money out of me here. In the short time I had to think, I really doubted him to be those hands, since he probably didn't think I was strong to begin with. He would not push a super strong hand against my supposed weak hand. So that leaves me with an array of weaker hands to consider. For whatever reason, I just don't think he did that with a King, so I completely discard the idea immediately. This leaves me with something like a one pair of 5's or 6's, or some kind of draw. I finally put him on either a hand like 67 or just total garbage so I make the call. He turns out to be 22 and I win a monster pot. In the end this was what my final liine of thought was. 'He thinks I'm weak here, so there's no way he thinks I can call this allin bet. Knowing this, he could have pushed a wide range of hands here, and my TT probably beats almost every hand he pushed.'

http://www.pokerhand.org/?421553

Obviously a gift from heaven here. I got slow minraised on the flop so I know hes strong. We could have the same hand here, but he could be a 2 pair or set as well, so I figure to have him beat. With his $30 bet on the turn I know he has a monster, and decide I want all the money in here. I make a really small reraise of $45 and to my suprise he only calls. At this point I figure him to have a set or two pair, but probably not a straight. There is no other options on the river other than pushing; if he hit a backdoor flush with some nutball hand then he wins. You can't be scared to put money in the pot in these types of situaitons. I go ahead and push and he calls with his set. I wish every hand was this easy.

http://www.pokerhand.org/?421599

So wow, I'm not sure what to think about this one. This guy is one of the strongest players at this limit, so it really makes me think if I should have folded the river. Again, there's just not enough room on here to really explain every thought process I was going through. To begin with however, he opens the pot for a pot sized raise from middle positon. He really could have anything like TT+ to AK here. I really would'nt think he has anything else since he is a tighter player. Awesome flop for me, I only lose to AJ or J9, and I really doubt he has those hands. He makes a standard continuation bet which means he probably still has TT+ or AK here. I go ahead and just call. A great turn card for me, I now have a full house and am only losing to TT. It gets somewhat more interesting here. With how strong this player is, and how strong he knows I am, it's going to limit what he bets with here. If either he or I was a weak player, I would fully expect him to bet AA here. However, with how good we know we both are, there's just no way he will bet AA on this turn. Maybe less than 10% of the time he would ever bet AA here. It might not make sense to some lower limit players, but with how this hand has played out so far I truely doubt hes AA. So we go and think of the range and what kind of hands make a bet here. I really think AA and JJ check so I toss those hands out the window. I have KK so we know hes not KK. I really think hes either TT or QQ here, and maybe AJs if for some goofball reason he raised that hand that strongly from his position. Lets just say hes only QQ or TT here. He goes ahead and makes a very strong bet. I think I would make this same bet with QQ as well as with TT, so there's not much else to think about it. I take a while to make this call as if I'm acting weak, (obviously I think I have the best hand). I go ahead and call and hope to not see an ace. At this point in the hand I figure he may still be betting AA, it's not till after the hand do I realize he's almost never AA here. A completely innocent 3 comes and it's off to the final bet. He goes ahead and pushes after maybe 5 seconds of thought and I instantly call. I am really hoping hes QQ here and am acutally not too suprised to see TT. I've gone over this hand in my head 1,000 times and am not sure if I would have been able to make this fold or not. I really don't think he would push QQ on that river. I am not going to call with any hand worse than QQ and he knows that, so there's just little chance he pushes with that hand. Again, if either of us were weaker players I would fully expect this, but not in this situaiton. He's definitley checking AA and JJ here, he doesn't have KK, so the only hands are TT and QQ. I really just don't think he pushes QQ here ever since he has to think I'm either KK, TT, or complete garbage. If I have garbage then I'm folding anyways. Also, the best way to get more money out of me in that situation is to check and see if I bluff the river. I'm sure he put me on QQ or KK here and just went ahead and pushed and raped the shit out of me. Maybe in the future I could have made this fold, but I wasn't really thinking of this whole line of thought during the hand. Unfortunate this shit happened, this really killed my profits for the night.

http://www.pokerhand.org/?421639

Fun hand here. I had just lost a $200 pot the hand right before this. It sucked because I flopped a set vs. a flopped straight, but what are you going to do vs. a short stack anyways. Well going into this hand is great, I pick up AA and just lost a huge pot. I can go ahead and make a huge raise here and look like I'm completely tilting. Well to my help, Lamb0fGod, who is a very solid player, raises to 8 out of early position. I go ahead with my plan to act like a jackass and just raise to $42. I am glad to see his call, he probably had KK QQ or AK here. The flop comes JJ5, he checks and I instantly push. I doubt he has any hand here that contains a Jack, other than JJ. Again, it looks like i'm tilting my ass off. I think he may have even asked if I was tilting at some point. He goes ahead and calls with KK and I win a great pot. This hand is a good example of how to make your table image work for you. I had just lost a decently sized pot and acted like I was on tilt. I ended up getting paid off by a decent player, so everything worked out in my favor.

Day 07

2006-07-20T23:01:00.000-04:00

Been pumping out hands this week. Doing very well at 1/2 NL and absolutely terrible at 2/4 NL. Making some great reads and some completely awful plays all at the same time. Getting a bit burnt out from bad days and lack of sleep. I'll probably take tomorrow off and go strong again on Saturday.

http://www.pokerhand.org/?419679

I got awesome value out of this hand. This was a four way pot on the flop and razor bet out $6 into $9. I have to put him on at least an Ace here to make a bet into three other players. I call and check the turn as if i'm weak. He makes a stronger bet and I think and call. I'm very confident I have him beat here and if i check I think he will try to value bet the river. It goes just as planned and it looks very unbelievable of me to 3x his raise when the 2d falls. He bites and I win a decent sized pot. I usually won't check down strong hands becasue more often than not I am unable to extract good value out of them. In this case however, this player started off betting into a 4 handed pot and I felt he would continue on with aggression if I just called and checked.

http://www.pokerhand.org/?419687

Somewhat interesting play of events here. Wearingred is a very strong player. She immediately min raised when action came to her. I've done this before myself a few times. In other words, it was a complete misclick and she pretty much has any 2 cards here. With 2 other people calling the min raise and a decent amount of money in the pot, I just decided to jack it up and take it down here since everyone involved in the hand is weak. Very rarely when I make a riase like this do I get called, however it's not something you can abuse either.

http://www.pokerhand.org/?419740

Somewhat mathematical hand here. I might have considered raising a bit more preflop to avoid a mathematical error, but I think this is very close to correct. To begin with the hand in general though, I really don't know what kind of hand solosier is playing. I'm fairly confident it's some kind of pocket pair or Ax. If it's Ax I am completely ahead in the hand, but i'll work out math for if hes playing a pocket pair. First of all, he starts with $203 so the maximum he will win off a single opponent is also $203. When it's his action to call preflop, he's faced with making a $32 call in a $62 pot. After making this call he'll have a total of $159 left so his total profit from making this preflop call is going to be $159 + $62 which equals $221. Now if he has any pocket pair vs. AA, he's basically going to outflop me 1 out of 8 times. To break even for the hand he needs to win 8 times his preflop call, which is 8 times $32, $256. Since he is only making a maximum of $221, he will lose money in the long run if he always pushes and I call when he hits a set and always fold when he misses. Knowing this, it is still ok for me to call his flop push even if he might of hit a set. However, if you factor in him pushing a hand like AQ or KK or a draw, it is basically always correct for me to call his push. If I call and he happens to have QQ then oh well, he still lost money in the long run. I was happy to see that he pushed KK in this specific hand and I took down a nice pot.

http://www.pokerhand.org/?419762

Second big math hand of the night, this one with a different result. The math comes in to play on the turn in this hand, but i'll work my way up there. It was a min raised pot and I decided to call with 66. On this flop I'm obviously only losing to KK. I decided to bet out real big here like I may be stealing the pot. I knew Socrates33 didn't have anything and was hoping somebody might look me up if I went wild. Bassmaster11 calls the flop and I figure he has a flush draw. If he has 34 for any reason I'm probably going to pay him off. I went ahead and just bet the pot on the turn, I would have bet more but since it was pot limit my options were more limited. Again I just went wild with the hand and hoped somebody woudln't believe me. He called rather fast and I figured he had Kx or a flush draw. When the river was an innocent 9 I went ahead and pushed him in and was suprised to see him holding 78. To be honest, I didn't see that possibility at all, but in retrospect, I had to push the river even if he might have been holding this hand. Now this is where the math comes in to play. His odds of hitting the straight are less than 1 in 5 times. He calls a $42.80 to win a $97.80 pot in the turn. He only has $75.30 afterwards so his total implied profit from his turn call is capped at $173.10. He is going to need to win 42.80 times 5 to break even, and his total possible profit is greatly below this number. With this is mind, if he folds the river every time he misses and calls every time he hits, he is losing money in the long run. Also factor in he may be calling with KJ, this is a clear push for me. If I check the river and will call an allin bet anyways, then I might as well just push and see if a two pair or a weaker hand calls me down. I said I was suprised to see 78 since I considered this player to be decent and was suprised he made such a blatently horrible math mistake.

http://www.pokerhand.org/?419773

Quite possibly my biggest mistake yet. It was a fairly good flop for me, and after the preflop raiser checked I decided to take a stab. DaEmbezzler is a very strong player and when he raised me I was considering the possibility he wasn't that strong or was making a move. In all reality, he was raising into 3 players and I should have given him more credit. I decided I really wanted to win this pot and went ahead and called the flop. Obviously I have a best hand if a heart comes, and I was thinking a King would make me good too. Going back to some quick math analysis, I am 1 out of 5 to hit a flush on the turn and paying 62$ to win a $150 pot. I will need to win another $160 from him if I hit my hand to break even. I was thinking I might be able to pull this off so I convinced myself into calling. With the Ace coming on the turn I checked it over and waited for him to make a move. He went ahead and bet $136 into this $246 pot. At this point I was really thinking he wasn't AK. I was thinking he might be 33 here or maybe some draw or even Kx. All in all I considered my options to win the pot and figured If I went ahead and pushed here that I would look very strong. If he was 33 I was hoping he'd fold to my AK maybe, I don't really know. I was also still thinking I would win if a heart hit on the river. To my dismay he ended up having KK and totally raped me. He did think for a bit before calling, but i'm sure he said to himself that if I had AK then he would go broke. He was probably thinking I had 33 here and made an obvoiusly good call.

http://www.pokerhand.org/?419972

I was completely destroying this table prior to this hand. I went ahead and completely over bet to make myself look ridiculous since i'd been acting crazy. I got him allin here with two pair vs. AA on this flop. He's about 25% to win the hand or less maybe on the flop, and ended up getting lucky and winning the pot. Somewhat discouraging hand to have in conjunction with my rough night.

http://www.pokerhand.org/?420015

Nice hand to finish the night off on. Another confrontation with Mr. Bassmaster11. Swindler was raising a lot preflop and could have a wide range of hands. When he checks this flop he's obviously weak and there's a great chance I have the best hand. The 5 is a very innocent card but I make another check to see if anyone is going to make a stab at the pot. My favorite play in these types of hands is just a big raise to take down a decent sized pot. Bassmaster steps up and makes a $10 bet into a $28 pot. This is obviously a weak as hell bet, with swindler folding I'm sure I have the best hand and raise him $25 more. He makes a call as if he's on some kind of draw. The K falls which really doesnt complete any draws. I like to check here because no weaker hand calls my bet, and checking can always open the floor for a bluff. I feel I can read bassmaster very well so I am confident I'll be able to call down a bluff if I check it over. He goes ahead and fires out a $40 bet. The only way the K helped his hand is if he was flush drawing with Kx. More likely he has absolutely nothing here so I go ahead and make the call. He shows a pair of 5's and I take the pot down. I feel he would have made a stronger bet had he had a real hand and probably would have taken more time in making it.

Day 06

2006-07-19T23:08:00.000-04:00

I cashed off of CanBet. I made two bets with a friend on PokerStars. One of which is first to Supernova and the second is a certain bankroll amount. I am going to play only on PokerStars for the duration of these bets.

http://www.pokerhand.org/?417932

Well this sucked.

http://www.pokerhand.org/?417943

Called pretty quickly. Really thought he was busted flush, not much else to think about. Check river to induce bluff; no weaker hand is really going to call if i bet out and i think he missed a draw anyways.

http://www.pokerhand.org/?418018

Interesting 3 way hand. Didn't have too many reads on these players going in. My decision on the turn is only push or fold. There is no way flat calling is a good idea. You are either ahead in the hand and need to get value from a weaker pair, or behind and will have to call the rest on the river anyways. I was really thinking a while here and felt that KK was no good and folded. Happy to see AA.

http://www.pokerhand.org/?418047

I'm obviously playing like shit lately. I've played a lot of live poker with this guy and thought he was making moves on me. What really fucked everything up is I misbet on the turn. I meant to bet stronger like $56+ but it came out as $44. When he raised my $44 I was like crap he might be making a move here. He obviously had me raped real bad, and I paid him off.

http://www.pokerhand.org/?418089

Great hand for me. When he bet out $108 into that flop after re raising preflop, I really didn't think he would play AA like that. However, he called my push so fast I was thinking he was definitly AA. Glad to see he was just tilting off his mind and my initial read was correct.

http://www.pokerhand.org/?418125

So so play by me. I should have known the player more again before making a move. Obviously I picked up on extreme weakness here. I doubt this player had any reads on me, he's just a bad player. You can see how he just check called with KK on the scary board isntead of being more aggressive. I'm going to have him beat here when I bet like this most of the time, unfortunate for me that I was caught bluffing this time.

http://www.pokerhand.org/?418142

Monster hand of the night. It was real awesome to see Ghostridah raising in to me. He's a very solid player so I suspected he had 55 here. If he has QQ then i'm going to go broke. I really thought vault was on a flush draw so I figured the river fucked me. Happy to see he was being an idiot with KK. Unfortunate hand for Ghostridah, he was hoping I was donking around with AA here as we both knew vault was being an idiot.

http://www.pokerhand.org/?418238

I finally have a real hand vs a calling station. This is exactly how NOT to play JJ.

http://www.pokerhand.org/?418244

Very easy call here. Hyper aggressive player raising out of early position. I really doubted he bet $8 into $19 with a Ten. When he instabets $20 on the turn I'm sure I have him beat. I call down to let him bluff the rest off on the river.

http://www.pokerhand.org/?418252

Nothing special, just showing how bad some 1/2 NL players are. I obviously put him dead on AA from my in game comments. He shows his hand like its some big suprise. I really wish I had T9 here so I could whack him off the table for playing so poorly.

http://www.pokerhand.org/?418278

Hello one outer. If he has A5c or 67c and hit his straight then I'm going to go broke. More likely he has 22 here and probably not JJ. Standard call, standard suckout for my luck.

Day 05

2006-07-19T02:08:00.000-04:00

I'm all screwed up again from this schedule change. I keep wanting to play but I'm so tired and making one dumb play after another. At least I'm not losing money. Started playing more and more short handed poker, no great results yet.

Also started playing some on http://www.canbet.com. Supposedly really fishy tables. The interface is a little bit harder to navigate, but in the end it comes down to where I make the most money from. I'll probably play here for a few weeks and decide where to stick it out after.

http://www.pokerhand.org/?416230

Uh no brainer here. Standard continuation bet on flop. The turn I made a bigger bet, 32 into 43, something people might think I wouldn't do with the Ad. After he min raised me I really took my time like I had the Qd before calling. Same thing on river, even though he was really committed at that point.

http://www.pokerhand.org/?416601

Nothing spectacular. This player is an idiot though. He's normally really LAG, but he checks the flop and bets $2 on the turn. I naturally raise this with my hand, but I'm obvoiusly beat to his stupid dub. If he hadn't played this hand like a pussy he may have won a $75 pot.

http://www.pokerhand.org/?416631

Standard play. After he calls the flop and the turn brings another Q, I really think he is just on a draw. Fairly safe river card. The only way I'm making any more money here is check calling a bluff.

http://www.pokerhand.org/?416702

Just decided to float this one. This guy is a maniac, raising maybe 30% preflop. I could be good even on the river, who knows. With the way it played out, it looks like I have a straight or flush so really it's an easy pickup for me. I'm also going to think I have the best hand here if the river is an A or K as well.

http://www.pokerhand.org/?416840

Standard play vs. a bad player. On the river he either has a failed draw or Ax. By the way he played it and considering his skill level, there is almost no chance he has a full house here. I just hope he was calling with Ax and make the push, since a missed draw will fold anyways.

http://www.pokerhand.org/?416951

This hand is so annoying. I really think gnado is an idiot for pushing after I raise to 50 from the small blind. I'm not too sure what kind of hand he thought I may have doing that. Obviously this is a +ev hand for me in the long term, I just hate short term downfalls. After a few seconds of thought I decide hes making a move with AK and call with QQ. At least I was correct in making the call.

http://www.pokerhand.org/?416981

Great story here. $H-Stakes$ pushes for no reason really, he says misclick but who knows. The funny part is that carnak2005 insta called. He apparently clicked the check/call any button accidently and put $200 in preflop after the first guy pushes. He's lucky he only had AKs and not a higher pocket pair. carnak2005 complained for 10 minutes and was trying to get H-Stakes write a letter to pokerstars saying that he misclicked and to return the money. Yea ok =].

Day 04

2006-07-17T23:10:00.000-04:00

Things started picking up again as usual for the weekend. I had better sleep going into it and was real motivated to do well.

One interesting thing I did do was check out a new poker site. This site is www.worldpx.com and is the first online site to introduce rake free poker. Essentially, their poker room is all for non profit and offered more as an advertisement to their other services like sports betting and casino gambling. The site itself is very simplistic and only allows three tables max. I did deposit $600 on it and opened a few 1/2 NL boards. The action was very tight and it was hard to make big wins. However, there were a few complete fish giving money away. In the end I finished up about $100 and earned $40 back in rake. I cashed this out on Monday since I'm confident i'll make more money playing with rake on pokerstars than with no rake on these tighter tables.

Back to PokerStars now, I have a lot of hands ranging from last Saturday through today.

http://www.pokerhand.org/?410354

Huge bluff here. When I feel my image is tightening up on a table i'll start raising more with oddball hands in position. This is a clear example from my PL table. I'm not positive I really had any major reads on this player before this hand materialized. The flop came down 3 way and this hand was just interesting from the start. I really felt both players weren't that strong and made a smallish bet on the flop, possibly like I was trying to suck people in while I was holding AK. With his call and check on the turn, I really thought he was weak and fired out at 3/4 pot bet. He called rather fast and we go to the river. Here I think he bets out $40 rather quickly and I sit and think. Right away I think there is something strange about this bet. After about 15 seconds or so I felt he had a decent hand but really wasn't confident in it at all. I decided to make the push representing AK and hoped that he would lay down whatever hand he felt unsure about. He thought for a while and eventually folded. I'm happy with how the river panned out on this hand in particular. I'm not sure what line I would have taken had he checked the river again, however with him betting out weak it really opened up the floodgates for me to make a push and have him lay it down.

http://www.pokerhand.org/?410424

Interesting hand here too. I've been raising UTG lately with hands such as these or JJ+. A lot of the time it just folds around but a few times it gets interesting. Skoly here is a very LAG player but I'm thinking that he's probably re raising with a PP or AK KQ preflop. I flop a nice gutshot with the A on board. Standard here is to check and probably fold to a continuation bet from Skoly. I doubt he would give me odds to catch the gutshot if he did make a bet. This hand is three way though so his prospects of blulffing are severely reduced. I really don't think he would check AA here just because he's a fast player, although it is still possible. After he checks this flop I feel that he initially reraised with a decent sized PP or suited connector that missed. Aceto5 is also a crazier player so I decided to take a stab at the pot on the turn after Skoly showed weakness. Aceto5 could easily be slowplaying a set at this point but my feel was he was weaker. With Skoly folding the turn I opened up with a 3/4 pot bet on the river and had Aceto5 lay down whatever he was playing.

http://www.pokerhand.org/?411727

Nothing too special here. This guy has made a few random pushes throughout the night and I highly suspected foul play here. This call is standard if he doesnt have KK or AA for obvious reasons, but I felt he might have been AQ or KQ here too.

http://www.pokerhand.org/?411831

Aggressive hand here. Made a standard preflop raise and continuation bet. After he called the flop I'm obviously not in a great spot. The turn greatly improves my hand giving me top pair and top kicker. I decide to check it over and see what he wants to do with his possible PP/Drawing hand. He instantly pushes which rules out any made hand and makes me pretty sure AK is good.

http://www.pokerhand.org/?411858

Funny hand. This is a weaker player and I'm putting him on an obvious flush draw. I want him to call since I will profit in this play so I bet a strong amount but not his full stack. I know that if a 4th heart comes I must be beat but working out the math I'm winning money in the long run even if I make that final $8 call. I bet his last bit, $8.15 into a $121 pot on the river and he folds. I found that rather amusing.

http://www.pokerhand.org/?412089

Standard smaller raise from early position. He bets out which I feel is weak and I raise. I know I should have raised more here, especially if he was on a draw. He instantly check-raises me allin on the river here. I say blah because under normal circumstances he would have me beat with a play like that. The more I think about it, the more I think he doesn't have a made hand or even a set here. I make the call and find he was overplaying and possibly just bluffing JJ.

http://www.pokerhand.org/?412190

Interesting PL hand. I make a strong raise over a limper in earlier position. Nice flop for me here. He instantly raises me to pot so I really don't think he has QJ. The river he instantly pushes and i'm inclined to think hes drawing or is just being an idiot. It didn't take me very long at all to make this call on the turn. He shows AJ and I end up being correct.

http://www.pokerhand.org/?412212

Wild hand. I don't have a read on TheRebbell really, although I think he might be a looser player. He cold calls my reraise and that puts me on alert right away. He could be slow playing a big hand or calling with a weaker hand. The small blind then pushes for a little bit more and the Big Blind also calls allin. At this point I'm not even sure AK is good vs how strong the small blind looks, and still don't know what TheRebbell has. I really don't want to push here to make it three way because i'm not even positive I can beat davdog6. I call and decide if he pushes i'll fold AK. It's only $23 more into a bigger pot anyways. I didn't improve on the flop and check to see how TheRebbell plays his hand. He makes a very strong bet and I just fold because it's not worth it at this point. I was very amused at the end at the array of hands shown down. The small blind decided to push 44, and the other two guys both hit sets with their 66 and 88.

http://www.pokerhand.org/?413337

This guy is extremely LAG. My stats show him playing 30% of the pots and raising 21% of the time. With my TAG image I make a reraise in position and feel that I will outplay him on the flop. His range really is anything when he calls. I doubt hes a premium hand though. The complete action on the flop probably took a total of three seconds. He instantly leads $40. This is a total crap bet with how fast he made it on this nothing flop; I took about a second and just pushed $160 confident that he had nothing. He didn't even think for more than a second before folding and I was happy in my read.

http://www.pokerhand.org/?413388

Three way pot with the same guy. jmh24c is also a very weak player. Right away I felt weakness in his flop bet, after Rexzizo folded out of the hand I just pushed figuring I was probably good but hoping he'd just fold.

http://www.pokerhand.org/?413471

I pretty much had more outs than cards left in the deck with this hand. I called the flop bet because I don't mind calling pot sized bets so much with position and two cards to come. After the 5h comes on the turn, I figure to have the best hand if I make a Flush, Straight, Trips, or Two Pair. He again bets the pot and it's an easy call with all my outs. He makes a horrible mistake of betting the river and commits himself to a call.

http://www.pokerhand.org/?413501

Standard Set over Set. I like raising the flop here like I could be a 2 pair or flush draw. I call behind on the turn not too sure what he has and more so hoping the board pairs. After he bets out strong on the river it's obviously my full intent to get all my money in. If he has KK here then he stacks me, otherwise I have him beat.

http://www.pokerhand.org/?414696

Some six handed action. I know due to some prior hands that this is a weak player and likes to call down. I raise the flop in position with a strong drawing hand; I figure to be good if I hit a Flush, Trips, or Two Pair. He bets out again on the turn and i just raise him up with the best hand. The river is a total blank and he leads again. I make another decent size raise for value and he calls with garbage.

Day 03

2006-07-14T03:07:00.000-04:00

Did a lot better today. I keep having this problem with blowing money right at the end of my session. Pissed away $300 in two stupid hands. Still ended up fairly decent. Having some real bad plays still, as I am still pretty frustrated over this week.

http://www.pokerhand.org/?408740

This is definitly one of my tilt hands. I really said the only hand this guy has at this point is probably AA, but started talking myself into pushing since 'there's no way I can keep being this unlucky'. Pretty stupid way to start the day off.

http://www.pokerhand.org/?408848

I'm real pumped about this one. I usually don't play a set like this versus an obvious overpair, but this is that asshole that two outed me the other day. I was also aware of the fact that he was heavy overbetting his hand and felt he would probably think I was tilting or bluffing. This time he didn't manage to catch a two outer on me. I'm real glad he let me know a set was good at the end, I think 72 was good too.

http://www.pokerhand.org/?409388

Real nice hand at a Pot Limit table. These players are horrible so I approach hands differently. I might not have pushed this at a NL table with stronger players. I knew the first guy was full of shit and really felt the second guy didn't have a set. The check on the turn was obviously to induce a bluff, which worked.

http://www.pokerhand.org/?409472

Probably the most controversial hand of the night. Under normal circumstances this is an automatic fold. Maybe not on the flop but on the turn for sure. However, this guy is one of the biggest nutbags/ losing players on this limit. At the time he was down over $450 and had a 25% showdown win. I really thought he was some crap like AJ or 99. I keep thinking this hand over and it seems like I should fold but with this player I don't know. My doubts were strengthened a few hands later when this same guy either made or called a huge allin bet with low pair no kicker.

http://www.pokerhand.org/?409490

Pretty awesome hand although I was skeptical during it. I considered him to be in the JJ-AA range on the flop, but really felt he wasn't AA on the turn. I made a good value bet on the river to get JJ or QQ to call, but his reraise really made me think. I started thinking maybe he hit some goofy hand with 77 or 88, or maybe he really did have AA. Thinking it out though, I realize this player is not a strong player so I don't think he would have played AA or a boat like that. I had to make the call as I was thinking there was a good chance he really was JJ or QQ.

http://www.pokerhand.org/?409556

Hillarious hand from the 10+r tournament. The thing to note is that the rebuy period is over when this hand takes place. The first nut pushed 64s and the second guy decides to call off all those chips with 23 off. Apparently he thought he had a 40% chance to win the hand, I really don't know but it's so funny.

http://www.pokerhand.org/?409620

This isn't anything major. I posted it because this guy is one of the regular winning players at 200nl. It goes to show you how bad people at this limit are. I was really going to take him off the hand on the turn, but when he made a gay minbet I just called and planned to take it on the river. Again he made the same minbet so I raised it up as if I was calling for value. Of course you can say I had nothing to lose since the board made a straight, but I was making this guy fold regardless of the river.

http://www.pokerhand.org/?409662

Another hand showing how terrible players are. This guy isn't a winning player or anything, but it looks like he came straight out of 25nl. The old slowplay AA preflop and push the flop move. I really thought I got sucked out on when the board 2 paired, I started laughing when he mucked the river.

http://www.pokerhand.org/?409671

Pretty decent hand from another PL table. He really didn't put any thought into the hand or even considered me to have a monster. I think he put me on QQ+ and just autocalled. You probably can't blame him, but if he was a better player who knew how I played he might have made this fold.

Day 02

2006-07-13T02:26:00.000-04:00

The night started off looking real promising. I had an early big stack going in the 11+R and was up a few hundred at the cash tables. I like how i played this hand during the rebuy hour of the tournament. I figure nobody to have any peice of that board so I just bet huge to make it look like I'm full of it.

http://www.pokerhand.org/?407998

After that thing's just went downhill. I got donked out of the tournament in a matter of three major hands. This first one was obvious crap, had I won this pot I would have been geared to go deep.

http://www.pokerhand.org/?408112

I managed to build back up to about 18k when two key hands come up. First, I'm dealt JTo in the small blind and raise the big blind in an attemped steal. He pushes over the top and I have to fold. The very next hand I get JJ on the button. This is a perfect hand for me since I can make the same exact raise and look like another steal. The guy in the big blind is also nuts so i'm expecting him to play back at me.

http://www.pokerhand.org/?408114

At this point i'm getting beat down but still have a fighting chance. I fold around to the big blind where i pick up KK. This hand comes down between me and the same guy again.

http://www.pokerhand.org/?408115

I had huge hands all tournament and was really in great position to make a final table. At this point I could really go for a few thousand dollars too. At the same time I'm not really having any big hands at the cash tables. I don't think I had a single pot above $300 all night. I had monster hands here and there but never got any action when I was strong. I must have been raising between 10 and 12% preflop so I don't why I'm not getting played back at. I finished another long night up a little over a buyin but this lack of progress is getting ever more annoying.

Day 01

2006-07-12T06:08:00.000-04:00

I've been having a real rough week as far as poker goes. I decided to play 1/2 NL when I was too tired and am down about 10 buyins over the last few days. On top of that I seem to be losing almost every time i am a 80% favorite. Prior to this week I've been playing as high as 3/6 NL and have been beating those games, so it's real discouraging to be stuck messing around at 1/2 NL again.

I decided to also cash out a larger portion of my bankroll into my checking account as this new bill lingers over my head. I'm not really sure what's going to happen with it so i'm just going to have to wait and find out.

http://www.pokerhand.org/?406004

This just seems to be a typical hand from these last few days. I'm getting my money in strong and then something goes wrong.

http://www.pokerhand.org/?406717

Apparently I was bluffing so he called my big river bet. I like raising with draws on this flop, it really conceals my hand. Also I can usually take the turn down with another strong bet if I need to.

http://www.pokerhand.org/?406719

I really don't know what to say about this one. It's my fault for bluffing into a calling station. I was really putting him on a flush draw after the turn and felt that my river bet of 90 into a 210 pot was real strong in the fact that it made it seem like I really was betting a strong hand. I'm pretty sure any other player at this limit would have made this fold.