Bank roll update 2/26/2007

I took a turn for the worst this weekend and I was down $50 on FTP poker. I don't think I played too bad, but I had some defeats.


Current bank roll
Full Tilt Poker: $350.00 + 3/$26 satellite token
Pokerstars: $186.24
PartyPoker: $0.00
Live: $100.00

Bank roll update update 02/05/2007

Here's my current bankroll. I haven't check in in a while, but I am doing better than I expected.

Current bank roll
Full Tilt Poker: $446.75 + 3/$26 satellite token
Pokerstars: $189.59
PartyPoker: $0.00
Live: $100.00

Money on Midnight Ukulele disco

This is a great ukulele song.

Cops bust North Denver poker club

Bad boys, bad boys what you going to do...

From the RockyMountain News:

The Denver Police Department arrested 36 people Tuesday night in a suspected illegal gambling shack.

SWAT teams and agents busted the Matterhorn Social Club located at 3918 Tennyson Street at about 10:30 p.m., said Sonny Jackson, spokesman for Denver police. Authorities found a large amount of cocaine, a minor and $10,000 in cash in the club, said Jackson. The suspects were playing poker.

I can understand playing poker but you lost me on the cocaine. The cops probably would not have busted the place if there was no cocaine. I'm sure they'll go lightly on the gambling charges and go harder on whomever organized the games and the drug charges.

Gambling in Colorado

IMHO, The Gambling laws in colorado are too restrictive especially for card games. You can play limit ring poker up to $2-5 at the historical mining towns in the mountains (cripple creek, black hawk, and central city) and they have no-limit tournaments but you can't play no limit cash games. So poker is treated the same as a slot machine or no spread table games.

I'm convinced the casinos like it like this was because they can make more money and take a higher percentage of the rake/pot in a limit game than they can justify in a no-limit game. So the casino's have no incentive to change this rule. There have been some initiatives in the last few years to bring indian casinos to the front range and I'm all for it if they have no-limit and higher limit cash games. But I would especially like to see card rooms legalised in Colorado. I think a card room would be great especially in a location like Lodo or Commerce city. You could still have the slots up in the mining towns, but have card rooms else where.

Bankroll update 8/28

Taking a Break, slowly growing

My bankroll has increased a little, I've taken a break from poker for a few weeks, while I was on vacation and started a new assignment at work. In terms of poker, I've just concentrated on playing patiently and waiting for things to happen. I also started playing some sit-n-go's on FTP to get some Satellite tokens. I want to build my $26 tokens to about 10-20 and then attempt ot get some $75 tokens.

I also played some live $1-2 NL in Niagara Falls NY. I played well when I limited my game to a few hours. I was so happy to play NL live and I can't wait to go back.

Funny clip from GSN's High Stakes Poker.

Current bank roll
Full Tilt Poker: $549.15 + 3/$26 satellite token
Pokerstars: $117.44
PartyPoker: $0.00
Live: $100.00

Bank roll update 7/11/2006: Tilty

Tilty.

I've been playing very tilty lately, I was up to almost $600 on Full Tilt Poker and I was feeling very confident in myself. I then hit a very bad spot. I was bluffing too much, not playing to the near nuts, and none of my nut draws have been hitting. I checked my poker tracker stats and it indicates that I'm Tight-Aggressive/Aggressive (TAA). I'm thinking that I may be too aggressive post-flop and not waiting for the cards to hit well. I'm going to tighten up a bit and play the $0.10/$0.25 games on FTP, until I can recover my bankroll up to $400 before I can try the $0.25/$0.50 games.

I'm at a state where I look down and see AA's or KK's, and I say, "Well, how much am I going to lose this time?" The most important thing I think is to play as correctly as I can, and not get too passive.

So my goals are to:
1) Play correctly.
2) Play small pot poker with small cards
3) Play big pots when you have the near nuts.
4) Draw to the nuts when you have the correct pot-odds.
5) Don't play fearful, call when you have the odds pre-flop to big raises.
6) Folding to a raise is a small mistake.


Current bank roll
Full Tilt Poker: $367.45 + 1/$26 satellite token
Pokerstars: $117.44
PartyPoker: $0.00
Live: $150.00

Bank Roll Update 6/19: Scared Money.

I had a pretty good run the last week on Full Tilt Poker, I ran it up to $600. I'm pretty happy with the results and I feel pretty comfortable on the 0.25/0.50 NLHE tables and sometimes I take a shot on the 0.50/1.00 NLHE tables. FTP updated their software to create a custom listing of tables and I choose to display at a minimum the 0.25/0.50 NLHE and up to 1/2 NLHE games.

Scared Money
I went up to Black Hawk this saturday night and I played at the Gilpin casino. I went up to play a C-note ($100 buyin/$100 rebuy) tournament at 7PM. I got there a few hours before hand so i played a 2-5 limit hold'em game. I was up $40 in that game after 1.5 hour of playing but I made some big mistakes.

I was gathering up my chips and I looked down to see pocket 77's, I called the $2 raise and then the $5 re-raise. There were 4-5 callers, so I had the correct odds to call. The flop came 45K and I bet out and I got re-raised so I folded and left the table. I should have either folded pre-flop or not raised after the flop. It was a dumb mistake that costed me $10.

C-Note Tournament.

I did okay in the tournament, I wasn't getting any cards so I had to let go some good calling hands pre-flop to a re-raise. I let go KQs in UTC after a re-raise and some other games. I called a all-in with another caller with QTs in the BB because it was only 2BB's to call. I hit a Q on the flop check check and a K hit on the river. The all in tripled up with a pair of Kings. The table was pretty loose aggressive, so I was looking for spots to put some pressure on other people, so I wouldn't get pushed around. I called from the Blind with A8d, The flop came two diamonds, I check raise all in and got a pretty aggressive player to fold. My last hand, some guy in middle position who was very loose aggressive raise 3-4 BB, I knew he was weak and probably just had an Ace or small part and just wanted to pick up the blinds. I went all in with AJs, when he thought about it for a while, i knew I had him and he called with A4s. He sucked out with an 4 on the turn and I was out.

Later

I went back to the limit hold'em table and the game was very loose. Money was just being poured on the table and I wasn't picking up anything. It's more easy to play a tight aggressive style in NLHE, because you can pick up 20-30BB in a pot if you wait for good cards. I didn't open up my game and I was lost. I need to revisit SSHE some time and review how to beat this game.

The main thing is I was 'scared money' I was putting up 30-40% of my live bankroll on the table and I wasn't willing to gamble it all. When you have 5-10% of your bankroll on the table, the risks are smaller. I really want to bet that game up there, but I have a lot of work and reading to do to do that.

Current bank roll
Full Tilt Poker: $601.90 + 1/$26 satellite token
Pokerstars: $117.44
Live: $150.00

Bank Roll Update: 6/15

Super, Thanks for asking.. - Big Gay Al, South Park

My Bank Roll has improved, I've been playing .25/.50 NLHE on FTP and I feel pretty comfortable at that level. On PokerStars, I took a bit of a hit and I'm back down to .05/.10 NLHE. You have to play a bit different on Pokerstars versus FTP. There are four times the players on Pokerstars than Full Tilt Poker, so you have to expect the variance in players to be different as well.

The New York Times published an article in it's Sunday Magazine entitled The Hold-'Em Holdup. Their whole magazine was about debt and this article was about how college kids are playing high stakes poker with borrowed money instead of attending classes. There was even a honor roll kid who stuck up a bank to get some money to paid for his gambling debts. The same can be said for those cheap credit card offer every student receives. I'm sure there are cases of sophomore shopaholics who have done the similar things.

Debt is a big problem in this country, whether it be from the Federal Government's huge deficit to retail 'Check into Cash' stores. American's love their debt.

Poker really should be called Patience.
- Mike 'the Mouth' Matusow on The Circuit.

I think of this as an opportunity. Money and Time Management should be part of any college education . I propose a Poker 101 class for all beginning poker players. The first few sessions would not even talk about the cards.

The first lesson would be about the self-psychology of poker. The importance of Discipline and Patience to your game. The extreme highs and lows of gambling. Going on Tilt. Walking away when you are bested. Knowing when you are addicted and programs like Gambler's Anonymous.

The second lesson would be about Expected Value. You have to expect to lose. The game is about making the correct decisions, even though you might lose that hand. The Fundamental Theory of Poker, making more correct decisions than your opponent.

The third lesson would be about Bank Roll management. Keep your normal money separate from your bank roll. Never risk more than 5% of your bankroll. Never put all your bank roll on the table. Build slowly.

After this base is established, then you can start teaching about the fact that there are cards involved in some way in poker.

Current bank roll
Full Tilt Poker: $473.65 + 1/$26 satellite token
Pokerstars: $103.19
Live: $300.00