"...you must demonstrate your skill."

I've not thought to blog in the last two months. From the end of October, then all through November I was grinding hard. Above the pace I had been on throughout the year. Come December I ended up choosing many other options over poker to occupy my time and ended up only clicking about 55 hours played (100 would be my monthly average). Looking to restart now that the holidays are over, back to regularity.

My favorite MMA journalist (Jack Slack) posted an article recently which greatly resonated with me. And while he's writing explicitly in reference to combat sports, the sentiment translates to any challenge of skill:

"A striking advantage or a grappling advantage on paper is just that. A fighter can train with the best in the world and rack up a streak of finishes over tremendous competition, but every single fight is a clean slate and he must demonstrate his skill. The laws of the fight game don't care about a fighter's accomplishments or qualifications, you should know that from how harshly every legend in this game is made to age in the cage."

Far before I ever begun my poker journey I used to preach to my gaming colleagues about execution > previous accomplishments and "the game doesn't care who you are, only if you're outperforming your challenge. Since I've read that I've been using it as a pre-play reminder for myself to be as rational as possible and avoid coming into a good spot feeling like I'm owed something by just showing up.

Regina Harvest Classic Poker-cation!

Before the start of this tournament series trip my primary goals were;

Clock 40 hours played at minimum
Explore their 10-20 FL DC w/ Kill (HE/O/O8) & 2-2000 SL Omaha
Not use my phone while playing
Adhere to this casino's preposterous chip cutting/betting line rule(s).

It's the final event morning of the series, and so far I'm on point for everything. I've already clocked 43 hours, and should be able to easily clear another 10-12+ over the 15 playable hours between noon & whatever madness 03:40 am "last three hands" will trigger.

My super brief 35 minute seating in 10-20 FL DC was super fun. I must likely benefited from some positive variance, but the ocean of dead money that appears to be available in that game is something I wish I had more time to explore. I'm sure that there must be some if not several very skilled local players in that game... But probably not the one I was in briefly, because this monkey ran amok!

My shot(s) in SL Omaha was not nearly as fortunate. As far as absurd gambling poker goes watching a table open with nine people min buying for $50 and punting it all in pre in Omaha it's pretty entertaining, I really can't find myself appreciating what amounts to NL Omaha. I took some bad variance in my efforts to run a stack up, three times (in ten shots) I managed to triple/quadruple up into 160-220 territory, but I never managed to get that next chip up until I eventually called it an experience and returned to familiar formats.

Last minute, I decided that I wanted to avoid using my phone as much as possible. The lack of self generated distraction while playing is obvious. Whether I'm playing with a new crowd, or with a table full of players I feel I've figured out, this benefit is a no-brainer. In reference to saving my cognitive energy for playing sessions longer/better, it's also a lock. I really need to reduce my overall phone use while playing.

I'm not going to claim victory regarding not failing in bet execution (betting line/chip cuts) since I have a lot of playing left to do today... But so far/so good...

Nitty Haikus

A player asked me "What do you write in there?" as I was noting down something after a hand the other day. I should point out at this point that my little notebook has a holographic cover of kittens, flowers, and butterflies (found it in the dollar clearance bin at Staples... bought eight of them!). "Poetry mostly" I replied. In the amusement that followed someone said something about haiku's, so I thought it'd be funny if I made some sad sounding nitty haiku's I could just sound off... and now I doubt there'll be an end to this.

Kitten Diary
These guys won't double me up
They think I'm a nit

Sitting with one stack
Can't play speculative hands
Very fucking bored

Straddle, limp, I jam
Errrk, that's a lot of callers
All my chips are gone

Folding pairs pre-flop
Motherfuck! That was top set!
NLCP's Bad
(No-Limit-Crazy-Pineapple)

Sunday Night, wiped out and looking to recharge again. I'm back to working Saturdays, and I'm not sure how much longer I'm going to have the fortitude to work four shifts per week/Saturday graves if it continues to be such an endurance trial to reach Sunday morning. Then again this could have just been a particularly taxing week. Regardless, right now I'm facing TEN DAYS OFF and I'm pretty pumped about it.

It's been two years since my last poker trip, and I've been eagerly awaiting this coming week since the spring. Casino Regina runs two series' per year, Spring & Autumn. I really wanted to go in the spring, though I was still recovering from the shocking aftermath of the previous summer's worth of poor decision making. Now that I've (largely) gotten my shit straightened out, me and some friends are excitedly looking forward to experiencing the late fall magic that is the 19th Annual Harvest Poker Classic. Here's to my not getting penalized by their absurd "first cut" betting line policy.

Between Tuesday evening and when we leave on Sunday, I'm aiming for a minimum of 40 hours of play in their cash games. Most likely exclusively in the 1-2 NL. Though I might take a shot at Satelliting into one of the tournaments, but even then I'd most likely be better served selling the ticket off and getting back into the cash action. There's no PLO there allegedly because they don't want to teach their dealers how to calculate (3*X)+Y, which is fucking tragic. But 2-2000 spread limit Omaha might be... not as awful as "No Limit Omaha" normally sounds. I've heard good things about the 13-20 DC (Hold'em/Omaha/O8), but with how green I am in the world of limit, I'll probably just stick to what I'm good in.

Dear Diary... Jackpot!

After taking a few days away from the game about two weeks ago I got back at it, and hard. Between the previous Friday through this past Saturday (yesterday as of this entry), I clocked 64.5 hours playing. I certainly had a few decent runs in that span and only had two sessions where I was unable to overcome running bad. In the end I absolutely feel that this past week was absolutely some of my best poker played to date. By no means flawless, though I was able to make note of many situations/details I'd like to fix in the near/immediate future.

Much of the time played this past week was in PLO8 inclusive DC, and it seems as though I've managed to finally sell this game to many of the previously uninterested players who would frequently be in the normal DC game. "High/Low Werewolf" definitely sounds silly, and it definitely might be too little too soon... Call me ambitious.

There was a series of tournament events running in at CA$H, which is why I spent so much of my time there waiting for opportunities to play High/Low, now that that's concluded I certainly look forward to catching up on putting in some hours playing straight hold'em again. Outside of settling back into a more reasonable "monkey lifestyle" again, I really need to actively improve my ability to relax. Today I've been taking that to heart, and I'd like to continue to try and unwind tomorrow, but I definitely need to do more than just not play one day or two here and there.

"No-mentum"

"Without bankroll management, you'll always be redlined."

Hardly news, still it continues to be my most challenging obstacle. I knew it before someone I look for advice said it to me earlier this year, though hearing it said to me was helpful.., somewhat.

I do feel as though I have been making some decent progression in my ability. I've played roughly the average volume lately since my previous blog. Looking over the 2015 calendar goals I made earlier in the year I'm not doing terribly. I'm slightly above my quota for hours played, though if I continue to be without wheels of my own for very long that's likely going to be more expensive to maintain. Bankroll management aside, my reading/study target is very daunting.

My last day's sessions ended pretty frustratingly. In reflection, there were a lot of hands that turned away from my realizing victory and the sum of those hands easily outweighed the pocket aces (hold'em, in a fantastic chip-up spot) I had cracked in my last half hour. Neither a big deal or an especially large loss on the day either, though yesterday & today I definitely feel drawn more towards relaxing vs getting back at it.

No Bad Beat "button image"

Back when I was starting out on my Bad Beat Opt Out experiment last year, a good friend of mine mentioned that he would have done it himself, but when he found out that he'd have to have a "No" Button, he immediately changed his mind as he didn't want to draw attention to the fact that he was opting out/thinking more about the game than most players/etcetera. Many other players point this out as a negative, though I didn't really see it as that big of a deal. In my opinion, the vast majority of players that would have identified a variety of subjective connotations to me from seeing that visual cue, would have probably come to a very similar conclusion in an orbit or two's worth of play. The other night, it definitely worked out in my favor...

So I'm playing in my "Vacation Poker Room" just outside of the city. I've been there for a few hours, immediately before transferring to the main table I had just chipped up nicely to around $1,150 or so (this $1-$2 plays as $2-$5). After taking my seat on the main, another player joins from a different feeder table that I had come from. This player had won the deepstack afternoon tournament that plays once a month. He plays super aggressive & fearlessly, and during the tournament at least he had been running hotter than anyone (the hand he won the tournament, last man, and a bonus high hand all at once). Someone asked the question "What's On Bad Beat mean?", the dealer explains it, I say something akin to "it's me saying I don't want to buy a lottery ticket". "The Champ" and I talk briefly about opting out, and it's clear that he fully understood the idea before seeing me applying it in the game, as well as some of the Vegas casinos not having cash play anymore.

"The Champ" continues to run super hot, takes down several big pots including a boat over boat vs the table's most gambly player, and has continued to find success in leveraging his large chip stack into pushing players out before the river (this room is a VERY open poker game, top pair is seldom not willing to put their whole stack in). I lose one hand to the gambly guy, he showed I didn't. and maybe less than two orbits in I pickup 66 vs "The Champ" when it's his button.

$1-$2 NLHE $800~ to start the hand
66 from the BB, Button straddle to $5, SB straddle to $10, I open to $35, folded round to "The Champ" he calls (larger stack than me), SB folds. Heads up to the flop @ $80.

228 rainbow, I open to $70, he calls... $220 in the middle.

2289, I think this is a brick, and I'm expecting him to pressure hard on this street. If I make a reasonable bet here, the pot's screaming to him to go all in and I should have to fold. I check he bets $170, decision time right on schedule... Most of the time I'm expecting him to be holding some kind of face card combo with his pre & post calls. so long as the river isn't AKQ I think I can call my stack off pretty safely (J or T is a mindfuck though). I'll still have over $500 remaining if I have to let it go, so lets take a chance - Call. $560 in the middle...

22894, I expect this is a brick too. I check, he ships pretty quickly. I take a brief moment to be sure just in case I missed something. In this pause I recall our initial interaction and his understanding about opting out "but it's just a dollar", and coupled with his massive momentum on the day up until this point of course he's going to try and send the "No Bad Beat guy" back to wherever he came from, "how can he call?". He's definitely looking pretty uncomfortable, so I call. He tables KQ, and looks pretty disgusted that I have 66.

Maybe I'm crazy for thinking that this little button just chipped me up $800+$1, but I'm pretty sure that's just what happened.

July was unsurprisingly a lightly played month. Between being back on a five day work week schedule (not my choice, but I get pretty much everything I ask for so I understand) post-Stampede exhaustion, I only clocked two thirds of my monthly quota. Couple that with a horrific run bad session in DC & falling victim to running bad in holde'em followed by playing bad a little longer I needed a bit of time to reset.

August I've been back on track mostly having cleared my targeted hours with the final weekend remaining before me now. I'm pretty happy overall with some of the leeks I've been able to plug up, but I still need to get more (and more, and more, and more) hands in. I've been exercising a lot, and often sandwiching trips to the fitness center between poker sessions and/or work. I have definitely been feeling the expense of spending this much time actively engaged outside of work, when I'm at work longer than I was hoping/expecting that day.

Looking forward to finally being back on a four day work week schedule, so that I can start fine tuning my own little metro poker tour, and hopefully even start scheduling some high low games.

In my last session, a recently "banned from my work casino" player seemingly got it into his weirdo mind that I was his enemy on the table. I actually had never had any issues with the guy when I had dealt to him in the past. Although when he finally had his incident where he got himself banned, I had just relieved the dealer that was present during the cartoonishly hilarious situation, so maybe he associates me with the aftermath of his atrocious decision making.

I had played with him (briefly) earlier in the week, and both times I certainly saw a different side of him than when I had dealt to him, but nothing like this... Apart from the absurdly consistent bad runouts I was experiencing, if he had the opportunity to gamble with me he never backed down. Just between he and I we were all-in with; JJ vs Q9, 77 vs Q8, TT vs 33 vs KQ, all pre-flop... plus ATo vs A3ss (chasing a flush), and a few other flop all-in's that I'm missing the explicit details with my recoleccion (it was a 17 hour session in a 29 hour day). All of those went to him (or the third party), and whenever I'd get run down otherwise, he'd be celebrating my opponent for their good work.

Last week during a shorter handed overnight game there was another player threatening to beat me up outside. His threats were veiled as him being a bit drunk and probably just him joking around, and even if he was entirely serious it didn't concern me since there's no probable opportunity for someone to fight with me. He was a very spewey player, and he had chips left to spew so I was just being unresponsive to his attempts to generate an emotional reaction from me.

I don't ever want to discourage these kinds of morons from spraying money in my direction, though I'd like to be able to identify what I am doing well, what I'm doing wrong(?), and what I should or shouldn't be doing that's likely to have an impact on the other people in/observing the game.

I've always been conscious about having a positive image when playing poker. Obviously you're going to run into people who you're not going to want to be friends with, as well as people who are simply unpleasant to share an environment with. Beyond wanting to have people generally prefer to have me around, I believe that my working in the industry in this city brings a pretty significant responsibility to how I conduct myself to other players whom I might initially have a more competitive response.

Disc-ipline!

I have no significant plans of ditching holding down a job to just grind playing all the time, but I have dispensed the frame of mind of "my bankroll can be smaller because I have a job." Now this monkey isn't going to be over committing my roll no matter how much of an edge I've got on a table. I will always be able to play.

It's been a week or so since adjusting my perspective and initial strategy. It's been pretty straightforward so far. No straddles, no speculative hands.

I was super frustrated the other day after a bad run-out set me back a few buys after several hours of very solid play, though today I'm already in my second session and I ran up ten buy ins in one hot-hour and I'm riding the happy wave!

Ravenous

I've been repeatedly redlined over the last six weeks every time I've set chips on the felts. Yesterday was exceptionally frustrating as I hadn't played in close to three weeks, I can't even remember the last time I took that long a break... But that doesn't matter. Math is the language of nature, and nature doesn't give the slightest shred of a fuck about your story. I'm not playing the short game, I'm committed to the long one.

In reflection, I regret nothing. I will not look for further validation, and I will not look for someone to hear another sad story so that I may feel better. I have never been a better poker player than I am currently, and my competitive drive is as hungry as it's ever been. I will make sacrifices away from the game, so that I can later enjoy the rewards that come with commitment to discipline.

Whale Watching

Crushed the game at Eagle earlier for a much needed win after a grueling downswing of almost half my bankroll in my previous two sessions.

One of my Top 5 (City) Whales shows up. This guy doesn't look like he really has money, but he's got enough to keep short stacking himself into a game and more than enough crazy to frequently run a 1k stack on the regular. I don't know this guy's name, though the second result on my google search of famous whale names was the 1970 Exploding Whale incident, and considering that's right about his age range and what's going to happen to his chip stack we've got a clear winner!

Eagle 1-2 NLHE I'm in the cutoff sidelining this hand, UTG (very tight player, but deserves far more credit than he's ever really given) raises to 5 lunatic raises to 15, Exploding Whale calls 15, UTG raises to 75, lunatic insta-ships for 350~, EWhale calls with zero hesitation (having maybe 230 remaining behind), UTG takes a minute plus and lays down KK. EWhale's got AA vs the lunatic's TT, 4T4 brick brick GG on the no lose scenario. Second time I've seen this tight guy (UTG) fold KK pre, but the other time was in a AA vs KK vs QQ hand where he was in the SB vs good players, this has got to be the most impressive KK pre-fold I've ever seen.

Later on I've chipped up pretty decently, been picking up some big hands and holding. My stack's the better part of a thousand in front of me, EWhale's on my immediate right and he's got a little less than me. I haven't really started abusing him yet, but I've been looking forward to opportunities to for at least an hour.

CO a few people limp and EWhale raises to 5, I look at TT and lol minraise to 8 immediately looking at the guy on my left who appreciates my sense of humor to re-click to 11 so I can pop it to 14 if it does. He folds, SB calls, BB folds, UTG calls, +1 calls, EWhale JUST CALLS to my LOL WEAKNESS declaration.

K4Kss, check's round to me with nothing to raise my suspicion that I shouldn't continue here. I know pretty much everyone here and SB + UTG are set mining virtually all the time here. UTG is crazy but he's not checking trips, and probably not checking a strong flush draw. EWhale is almost always limping the 95% of his range that's pure shit right now. The pot's like $45-50 MAYBE, no problem I bet $65, fold-fold-fold-EWhale calls *ERK* he's the only one capable of reliably showing up with a King here, let's hope it's a good looking turn.

K4KT *MOTHERFUCKING-DING!!!!! FUCK YEAH!* EWhale checks, and in sizing him up I don't think he's at all upset with where he's standing. I bet $175, guy doesn't even sweat it and calls. I'm trying not to count his stack already since now I've bloated the pot up to $550~ and he's sitting on under $450. In my experience with this guy he's never capable of not paying me off for the rest of his stack unless he's got absolutely nothing in his hand.

K4KT4 rainbow Fuck-Me there's not much worse than that for river cards. EWhale seems upset too and checks, I try to come up with a reason to bet and immediately dismiss that notion, check. EWhale flips over AA WHAT THE FUCK IS THAT? Wow he plays bad at nearly every opportunity to do so, shame about that river card. But it's a funny story at least.

Man it's a huge relief to pick up today's win after my last two sessions. Here's hoping I can play as good or better tonight and build some momentum!

I didn't play a lot during the first half of the week, planning on hitting things hard for the latter half and weekend. So far it's been a rough start, had a very rough session at Deerfoot two days ago, a lot of just rough variance scenarios. Tried to reset and put in a good showing today before wrapping up work for the week but the fish ate me again.

My roll is down to about half after these two sessions. Hopefully I can find some games over the next few days where I can just take it easy vs go head to head with lunatics for stacks.

I hit the Bad Beat the other day as well... With my opt-out button right out front. I've taken a little needling over it since then, although it was a small prize pool ($2750~ total) so it hasn't been too much grief. I haven't really been at all upset about being in that position, but I have been sweating the overall downswing.

I don't normally tilt...

I don't normally tilt our get especially emotionally volatile in a poker room, but when I do it's nearly exclusively because of room mismanagement.

Fail to protect players from other abusive players? TILT! Ask me to leave if I'm not willing to be part of a promotion? TILT! Refuse to spread a game you have more than enough interest & staffing for? TILT! At least playing following any of those scenarios.

I don't think that I've ever spent so much energy/time trying to play poker but ending up without a game as I have this week. It's frustrating when I'm in the midst of it, but pretty insignificant in the larger picture.

High-Lo Gweilo

So it took a few weeks, but we finally got a planned PLO8 game off the ground at Deerfoot last night. I'm guessing only about a third of the fourteen players who added their names to the list were present, but they it got off the ground. We can always look to improve things moving forward.

I was a little apprehensive going into this game as I've only played 1-2 (granted with straddles and double straddles much of the time inflating it to 5-10 pre-flop), and this was 5-5 adjacent to the 5-5 PLO which is frequently playing as basically 10-20. My roll is still no where near suitable for this game but I wanted to take a shot, and I was selling off 50% of my action across several friends who thought I should play it.

When we got the game off the ground it was incredible. we must have had 5/9 players who had never even thought of playing a hand of this before. They were on the game because there wasn't a seat for them on the 5-5 PLO. Shortly thereafter (30-45 minutes maybe?) they did end up opening a new 5-5 PLO and virtually all of those players jumped ship leaving our game four handed. There was even some discussion amongst two of the players on our game of switching it to PLO in order to offer a seat to the two action players that walked in the room since there weren't seats open for them on PLO. I said that I did want to support this game running, but I wouldn't stand in the way of that decision if everyone agreed. The fourth player was decided on playing PLO8 though, and we just left it at that.

We limped along short handed for awhile, which was nice since I've never been in that situation before and perhaps largely due to receiving a decent run of playable hands I was finding a lot of spots where I could play comfortably. Lots of limped pots, lots of open raise call-call-call, though it was rare for us to end up in three-bet pre-flop hands. I was min-raising out of position when I liked the playability of my hand, and while I recall seeing a limited amount of min-raises pre from other players I don't think they were approaching that from the same perspective I was.

Looking back on of the field of players I saw on this table from when it began until it died, the very small amount of research I've done into this game has put me considerably ahead of the learning curve on this game. A friend of mine saw me playing some and they said that I seemed super confidant while I was playing. I know that I definitely felt like the big bad wolf, and while I've felt like the Alpha on a table before that's generally because there just aren't any other good/great competitors there.

Everyone's going to feel like the King/Queen of poker when they're catching cards and have built up a stack. This is in a game I feel like I'm just learning how to jog... and from what I can see most players aren't even interested in trying to crawl in it.

"I've never been as good a player as I am today"

Getting in deep into games is nothing new for me. I'd like to think that overall I've improved a lot when it comes to playing appropriately based on my (concerningly small) bankroll, but this past weekend is evidence that I'm both still prone to getting in deep early, and stable enough of a player to persevere contrary to the numbers reflected in these sessions.

Saturday overnight into Sunday I played a 15 hour session where I ended up with >40% of my roll invested. Monday morning/day I played a 12 hour session with >60% of my roll invested. Solid play on both occasions, and while I endured a lot of 2nd best scenarios and a few scenarios where I couldn't max out my value I was never playing bad poker.

I refused to accept "Some times it's just not your day" as an answer. I'm not settling for writing off time I'm free to play just because I'm on the unfortunate side of how the cards ran out. My head was on straight, I was playing well and the game was too good to give up playing. "Today I'm in for more than I've ever been in before, but I've never been a better poker player than I am today." I'm not playing to chase even, I'm making good decisions. not playing a great game means I'm losing money.

During the final hours of my afternoon session yesterday I had some breakeven-ish players leaving my table because they couldn't handle me overwhelming them most of the hands I was entering.

"What the hell you always hit right away after you raise?"
"YES! That's 100% accurate! :D"

When the game slowed down and I started to fatigue I cashed out and took a nap. Booked it up north for a few hours and finished the day up $45. I may have spent more than that on gas & food over the 17 hours of play today, but being able to see the redemption turnaround in such a brief window of play means more than the XX hundreds of dollars I swung back and forth. It means I'm right to believe in myself. And tomorrow I'm going to do my best to be better.

Yesterday the Casino I work for held our annual charity memorial tournament for a staff member who passed away a few years ago. It's always a lot of fun, bordering somewhat on a staff tournament that also might include a bunch of gaming staff from other establishments. This year was a more tame affair than last year (which was barely still in control), but it was really good none the less. I straight gambled that tournament since I wanted it to just be fun and move onto playing a cash game with colleagues. There was a good turnout from staff, regular players, and other friends as well.

We started up a PLO8 inclusive Dealers Choice game shortly afterwards, and that was a lot of fun. The other week when I was told that PLO8 wouldn't be available in Cash's DC game I was pretty frustrated. Looking back it's not such a big deal. They will still allow me to build a inclusive DC game so long as it's planned ahead of time (and I'm planning on doing that at least once a week), and as much as I've occasionally been the beneficiary of a recreational player blasting their entire stack in during a hand of PLO or PLO8 thinking they were actually playing the other game, that's a really bad scenario from a sustainability standpoint. Reg's can suck that mistake up, recreational players aren't going to want to come back.

Following that some friends and I went to eat, and afterward I wanted to keep chasing the target I gave myself a few days earlier to try and end the month on. Looking back I'm not pleased with how I performed in my second session yesterday. While mildly frustrated, reflecting on my mistakes while I take a night off (after sleeping all day for once) feels pretty good.

March has been an awesome month in just about every way I'd look at it. A few weeks back I committed myself to redoubling my efforts towards becoming the best competitive version of myself in the context of poker, setting quotas and targets to push through until the end of the calendar year. Between then and now I've mostly been doing fantastically both measuring up to my targeted numbers, and generally in life.

I won't get into the full details on here of what the specific goals are, but I would like to have people hold me accountable if they want:

1'st 1/4 2015 Stats
319 Cash Game Hours Played (aiming to clock >90 per month)
31% of my targeted $ goal
23% of my targeted bankroll
1/21 - 39 Remaining Sunday $165's
1/2 way through (PL08 Revealed by Dan Deppen) my first of 9 poker books.

Here's to making the best of the next nine months worth of smashing those goals!

Time to get more serous...

So it's coming up on four years since I began playing poker. The first year and change was a pretty rough learning experience, the six months following that I was a break even player. Since the beginning of '13 I've been a consistent winning player, though I've always been pretty swingy.

In the last few months I've been mulling over what I'm looking towards setting my sights on for goals for the next several years. I remember back when I was gaming online hard on a daily basis I didn't want to start playing poker because I knew that I wasn't ready to put in enough time to be satisfied with my efforts. Part of me has kept saying that in the back of my has though these last few years.

I have been putting a respectable amount of time and energy into improving my skills, which has been yielding very respectable gains in my ability. Even still, I haven't been obsessive with studying, discussion, review, and otherwise immersing myself in the ocean of game knowledge available to me personally in the contacts & friends I've made (and a little thing called the internet).

I enjoy working in the casino industry as my career. But the work I most enjoy in it is not going to offer me as much money as I'd like to be debt free and as financially secure in the future I want to build for myself. I've not been interested in playing for a living, though now I am committed to investing my complete attention into becoming the most monstrously capable player I can be.

"This is a bad call"

Something I've said during both of my past week's most frustrating (losing) sessions. Both times vs opponents who know how to play tight enough to not be horrible losing players, but don't really have much talent with the game. They have little idea of where I stand in relation to their monster hand, and/or have no idea how much to try and raise for value so they just blast their entire stack in. Meanwhile I'm dumbfounded by how little sense their bet makes when I fucking know better. It's been quite some time now, but I've been that idiot, I've made that bet, and I've spotted people doing it before and avoided it.

"Hero folds aren't profitable in this city." is a fantastic piece of advice a friend of mine gave me years back. I've always been decent at implementing good advice from people I know are experienced, I need to do a better job of learning from my own mistakes without having to repeat them ad nauseam. It's pretty straight forward, start making good folds vs terrible calls.

I'm awesome, and being happy is a choice. The first half of that statement isn't true if I don't live the other half even when it doesn't come easy. I once read a poker pro say that he's not living a grind, he's living a dream. That's a beautiful perspective, and I look forward to sharing it.

I don't opt out to screw everyone else...

DF 1-2, 10-11pm-ish

My $5 button straddle, a younger euro player I've got a small bit of history with (ruined his day in a tournament calling him down for his stack over three streets with AK/Nut-Nothing, it was good) in SB opens to $20, folds around to me, I've got pocket 2's so I call to see what the flop brings.

AAA

He checks, I monkey bet I'm not even sure how much but it felt like $40-$45(if I had thought about it I'd have either checked or bet $30). He calls pretty snappy, D'oh I'm 100% dead (80% Quads / 20% a Full House I can't ever beat). As the turn is coming out, I pick up my "No Bad Beat" button (which he's been fiddling with no less than 3 different times when we're not in the hand) and show/wiggle it at him to send a message to him. We come to an understanding that he sees me trying to convey this "You see this thing? Yeah this sure must mean something relevant to the present situation.", evidently something was lost in translation.

AAAQ, check, check. AAAQ9

He bets $75... I fold. He shows an A and doesn't reveal his kicker, claiming it to be AK (which would be a very believable story from what I had observed of him). Now I'm very opposed to criticizing poor play at a table, however sometimes I will try and give just the slightest bit of suggestion to see if I can't nudge someone up so that they're a little easier to navigate. This is something I should be more selective with, but I also find that it's frequently a window into unhinging someone's game when they realize they may have really fucked something up and it's not until someone else puts a spotlight on it that they clue in.

So I inquire what his goal of betting $75 was? He says something to the effect of having me fold so that he won't have to show. This poker room has a "High Hand" promotion, where his AAAAK could have won him $200 at the time, clearly he doesn't understand this. He then says if I had a full house then I would call. I tell him that I did have a full house but I still folded since it was a pretty transparent read that I can't win. I point out my "No Bad Beat" button and remind him that the signal that I gave him clearly wasn't for deception since he's (allegedly) holding Nut-Kicker Quads. So you're risking losing out on $5,000 to try and win... $75?

The wheels are clearly starting to fall off his mental wagon at this point, and I don't believe it to be a language barrier issue so much as I don't think he has any remotely firm grip on how Bad Beat's work. The conversation clearly wasn't going to pay any immediate dividends so we gave it a rest at this point, he departed shortly thereafter.

Had the scenario where I was holding pocket 10's or better for the other half of the eligibility requirements if there was an idiot betting out $75 and I was confidant that a Bad Beat were live, I would pony up the $75 to get the players on my table the jackpot even though I wouldn't be able to get the $10,000. I hadn't really thought about being in a spot where I'd actually need to consider a decision in that spot, since anyone who understands the details is just going to check to get to showdown, or if they are betting it it's definitely not live anymore and they're betting that I'm a sucker. I'm opting-out as a decision for myself, not so I can fuck over everyone else at the table. Easily a positive scene-reputation decision.

I ended up seeing the euro kid later that night when I rolled into work. While dealing to him he was telling me that "if you had a full house you would call" / "if you folded a full house there you would show". Telling him "You're mistaken" on both counts, and "Look you really don't want to have this conversation with me while you're playing at a poker table" didn't really seem to register very well. I think when he brings it up to me again, I'll just try and coach him that no matter how much you're annoyed with how someone played a hand poorly, never berate a player into leaving a game (especially not when they have $1100 they got on a bad play that ran out fortunately). That's probably an easier lesson that can be a greater benefit to my bottom line!

Tournament Series Trends

So DF has been running their winter series over the last two weeks and I've always found the adjustments in players choices in destination interesting. As a rule of thumb if there's a series or any significant draw for poker players to one room vs the others, I always default my selection to that location. I'm hardly alone in this perspective, but there are a few noteworthy deviations.

The 2-5 game has seemed to be on hiatus at least during late night. Most of the 2-5 Regs have been favoring GE's "2-5 with a 1-2 title" since a $500 max buy is generally more exploitable to try and leverage their bankroll and aggression advantages.

One regular grinder who in my observation would normally be playing in DF has been in my room steady whenever I've been at work. I asked him why actively avoid a surge in players in what his normal environment would be and said he isn't a big fan of tournament players.

I suppose I shouldn't find that especially surprising. I'd normally expect that pretty much any winning player to enjoy having a boost in activity where they'd normally play. At further inspection pretty conservative winning players that don't enjoy adjusting their play aren't that likely to be the players capitalizing the most from the busier room.

A few thoughts to reflect on...

Feeling like my "pickup an edge and push the pressure" game has mostly been as sharp as I've ever had it. Though I have been earning relatively steadily, I'm only ahead a bit due to some large hands shaking down unfavorably. Keep it going, those 3:1 & 4:1 favored spots are going to be sweet as fuck when they eventually do hold.

I've been gaining a little bit of weight. I mean I'm still under 20% body fat (although it's probably getting to be a small margin of error at this point), although I have to change something up or I think I'm probably going to continue slowly fattening up... Unacceptable. Keep making little changes in cleaning up the daily diet, and knock off the sippy cup workouts. Lifting for single sets and then allowing distractions to take over is stupid.

It's been over 15 months since I've had a sustained change of scenery when it comes to poker. "Deer hunting" is about the closest change of environment I've had in the last year, but that's basically just one day at a time here and there. Their insanity is beautiful, but I don't feel like I'm learning from that experience like I have when I've had a week or even a weekend to really grind out a completely new city's room(s).

The time's not right for Vegas, although I will make that happen before the end of 2015. I'd like to include either a week working trip to either Arizona or back to Vancouver, but until I make serious bankroll progress that's not a intelligent decision to make.

A few days ago I was reflecting on some of the parallels of how I see playing poker presently, and my experiences online (video) gaming in years past. I really succeeded in the social networking element of knowing "the who's who" in my gaming environment, and currently I'd say I've been quite successful at building a similar network of individuals in the greater Calgary poker scene without having put a lot of energy into thinking about doing that. It's time to consciously put effort into expanding that network, as well as do a better job of having some of those players let me know when there's a game I have to get into.

Weird switch...

So I had been playing on the main game at Deerfoot for a few hours, I was up a lot since I had been hitting all my big hands and I hadn't been getting put in any really tough spots by the other players.

So I'm about wrap up since I'll have to go to work and I pick up 77 UTG on the final hand I'm going to play. Button straddle is on (seat ten), a friend of mine limps in the SB, and before I act the player in seat five limps (I'm in seat three). He then realizes he's acted prematurely then I raise to $40... And without much further thought he calls my raise. I immediately call him out for such a suspect line of just calling my oddly large 8x raise after already trying to limp, he acknowledges my dialogue though he doesn't reply. My friend also calls and we're three ways to the flop...

443hh

Check-check to Mr pre-limp/re-limp and he bets $40 which seems like about the most peculiar bet I can think of considering I think the vast majority of the time he's trying to set-mine. SB folds, I run things over again my head and rule out all the really premium pairs and suited AK/AQ because everything I've seen from him over the last few hours would have him wait his turn and raise, not just pre-limp/re-limp. I'd measure this guy as a slightly winning player, and I've not seen him really get out of line at all so 22 and 55 through 99 are really the only hands he's got here on the regular... But if he believes he's winning WTF is with the 1/3rd pot bet? My conclusion is that he's information betting, so I want to give him a reason to fold. I raise to $160 total. I'm expecting him to fold almost all the time here, and to ship his stack in the rest of the time... And he just calls!?

4433hhcc

This hand is super weird. $450~ in the pot and he's got just under $300 in his stack (vs my $1150). I figure he believes himself committed at this point so I need to just shut down and swallow the $200 investment I've put into this one. I check so that it's up to him to not screw up the hand. He then bets $100... There's no way he's dumb enough to bet a full house or quads in position on the flop and then again on the turn, but how is he just being so small again?

"Do you want to play show one?"
"Maybe if you fold."
"That's not playing show one."

I give it another few seconds and then muck my cards. He says something I don't precisely recall regarding showing and I respond "show both or don't show either, I don't really care either way the hand is yours". He shows Q10hh, then says something about if he's wrong he just takes his $160 and goes home, and only playing poker a few times a year. As far as I can tell a switch in his head must have just gotten flipped when I raised his pre-limp "fuck it, this hand I'm going to beat the pro".

My friend says that with the same line if I ship out right away on the turn he can't call (though I'm guessing he would have anyhow just to gamble), but she had only been at the table for an orbit or two and wasn't giving him the credit I was for as of yet never having gotten out of line.