Man, that was a fun weekend. It was long though. I feel like I need a weekend, to recover from the weekend.

Ron and I played in a qualifier on Saturday morning. This one had 142 people in it. Ron went out on an absolutely horrid beat. He’s got AQ in the big blind, everyone folds and the small limps in. He raises the blind from $400 to make it $1000 straight. The small calls. The flop is 3 suited A, Q, rag. Small checks, and Ron moves all-in. The small blind calls him with Ad,9d. (the flop had one diamond) This guy is dead to runner-runner (two 9’s or two diamonds). He hits two running diamonds, and knocks Ron out.

Viscious.

I ended up playing for 5.5 hours that day. I made it down to 31st place (29 cash) and got busted one off the bubble. Losing that close to the money feels a lot like getting kicked in the balls. Hard. I was actually in decent shape, but I was moved to a table where I was the short stack, and put I had big slick in the blind, and I moved all-in. I was called by a guy with pocket 8’s. The dealer ran the flop, and flipped the cards over. The door card was a King, and I was feeling great. That is until she spread the flop to reveal 8, 8 under the king. The guy flopped quad 8’s, and I was smoked. It sucked. Still sucks.

We had a good time though. It was a really good experience, and I will for sure do it again in the future. Those tourneys are a ton of fun to play.

Well, I didn’t make the main event in todays qualifier. I went out in 38th place. I played pretty well, I just had no cards. The last two blinds levels I didn’t see a card higher then an 8. When I would think I was going to makes a move, someone else would raise it on front of me. I had no chance. When I did get a face card, I moved in and was dominated. So no ah ah for me. Ron made it to 29th place, but also missed the cut.

We played some table games for a while, where after like 5 hours, I ended up plus 25, lol. We decided to try one more satelitte. I got the chip lead early but took two hellacious beats in a row to get knocked out. Ron however, made it and won a buy-in for tomorrow mornings tourney.

So here I sit, trying to decided if I should just pony up and buy in tomorrow. The one thing I can say about those tourneys are they sure are fun.

I’ll post what I decided to do, when I decide to do it.

PS
Ron must think this hotel room is like his house. It’s like a fucking bajillion degrees on here. We walked in and he said “at least it’s warm in here”.

Warm? Feels like a sauna.

Party Poker confiscated 180k from one guy whe he was found cheating online. He has multiple accounts (2 proven) and would play with both of them in the same tournament. This goes on a lot in the online poker world. Ironically, this guy got caught because he won 140k in one tourney. Think about that. If he loses, he never gets caught.

Life is silly that way.

You can read about it here.

RPR=Rouvalis Poker Room

Clever huh? Anyway, it’s a new year, so we started a new leaderboard for our little poker league which is now called the Rouvalis Poker Room Poker League. I actually tried to make it more wordy, but couldn’t come up with anything. Maybe Rouvalis Poker Room Poker League for People who like to Play Poker and Poker type games…with poker Chips.

Anyway, there is a link on the bottom right to the new leaderboard. It only has two games on it right now, so it will fill up more. I took everyones name off of it, and will add the names of people as they play.

Also, there is a new point system this year. Instead of the 5, 3 and 1 point system we had going the last few years, we’re doing it a little differentely. The points are based on the amount of buy-ins for that particular game. The way it works is first place get’s 1.5 x (the amount of people). Second place get’s 1xthe amount of people that they beat. And so on. Last place get’s one point.

For example in a 10 person game:
1st place=15 points (1.5×10)
2nd place=9 points (1×9)
3rd place=8 points (1×8)
and so on

Should be good. I’m also working on a system where your total points are what sets your starting stack amount for the TOC at the end of the year.

Played cards last night, and it had kind of a fun ending. Down to heads-up it was Fish and I left in the game. At the start, he had the chip lead. I took a few pots, to give myself the lead. One hand, he had moved all in preflop, and I decided to call with A6o. He says “good call” and flips over T8. The flop comes 9, 8, 8 and I’m dead to runner runner. The river was a T to give him a full house, which wasn’t necessary and actaully kind of mean, his set was enough. Anyway, he doubles, and I’m hurtin. Two hands later, I’m all in for less than the blinds. Fish calls with pocket 3’s, and I flip over 57o. The flop is 6, 8, 9 giving me the straight. I double up. A few hands go by, and Fish is short stacked again. He moves all in, and I call with AKo. He flips over KJo and I’m in great shape. Until, of course, the flop comes 3, J, J and he doubles up again. Back and forth, back and forth. We traded chips forever, then I dealt a hand and without either of us looking at our cards Fish says “how much are we playing for?” I tell him and he asks if I want to chop. He was a slight chip leader at this point, but time was more a factor for me. I asked the time, and he said it was 11:20pm. Good enough for me, let’s chop it up. So we split the pot.

We decide to play it out just to see what would have happened. Wouldn’t you know it, I look down at the hand that’s been sitting in front of me while we were chopping, and it’s pocket 7’s! SHIT! I tell him I would have gone all in the next hand, and he tells me he would have called with is TJo! We run the cards and the flop was Q, 9, 3 giving him an open ended straight. Turn card was an 8, and I was drawing dead! He would have made his straight on the turn and busted me! Heh, one more hand and it would have been over. We figured, we both had the other guy on the ropes multiple times, and the short stacked always sucked out, so we both should get something. We both win, and we get home at a decent time.

Is it okay to go on tilt from a bad beat in a hand? That is the question of the day. When is it okay to complain about a hand, and when is it wrong? Is there a time when you can complain about a hand, and a time where if you do, you’re an asshole? Apparently there is. Apparently it is okay to complain about a hand, as long as you meet a certain criteria. If anyone knows what the fuck that criteria is, please fill me in, because I obviously don’t know.

The board has been switched over to the point system, but the final rules and whatnot have not been finished yet. Again, I will post them when I know them.

What is luck. According to dictionary.com luck is:

luck n.

1. The chance happening of fortunate or adverse events; fortune: They met one day out of pure luck.
2. Good fortune or prosperity; success: We wish you luck.
3. One’s personal fate or lot: It was just my luck to win a trip I couldn’t take.

So it seems I do have luck, it’s just the shitty one. Go figure.

Okay, I updated the score board.

I’m making a new MPT rule. Why? Because I can. We’re going to have a sign in sheet at these events. You don’t sign in, you don’t get updated. Plain and simple. Updating the site for last weeks game was rediculous.

Everything should be right. Post here if it’s not. Have a great day.

I realized that being a student of poker more than likely hurts me more than it help me. See I don’t mind being out played, but I hate losing to the numbers. What I mean by this is when I’m 95% to win a hand, it drives me crazy when I lose to that 5%. It shows that no matter how good you are, you can always lose to luck. This is where being a student of the game starts to suck. It makes studying the game useless, if only for that one hand. Once luck is involved, it doesn’t matter how much you know, or don’t know. If I was simply a casual poker player, and not someone that studies the game the way I do, I don’t think things like this would bother me.

This is what makes poker great, and a great game to hate.

Let me show you the roller coaster of emotions you go through in one hand, if you follow the numbers. This happened in a game that I played in recently.

I had: A,K of spades. I was all-in heads up against A,10 off suit. As of right now, here are the odds of this hand:

AKs 75% A10off 25%

Right now if you’re in my position you feel great. You have their over card covered which makes it a race between a King and a 10. I’ll take the King all day long. Here’s the flop:
7, 10, 2 rainbow (3 different suits)

Disaster! So far, we’ve been outdrawn. The numbers now look like this:

AKs 14% A10off 86%

Look at that swing! We just went from a 75% favorite, to a 14% underdog. But this hand gets better yet, here’s the turn card:
7, 10, 2, K

BAM! We hit the joker on the turn. We now have a pair of Kings over their pair of 10’s. Let’s look at the numbers again.

AKs 95.5% A10off 4.5%

That’s better. We started with a better hand, and now we’re back to where it should be. They have nothing but a 4.5% chance of out drawing us. They’re are reduced to needing one of the last two 10’s. Of course, we all know how this ends right, the river card was a 10 and they out drew us.

Now look at this rollercoaster. People who don’t pay attention to the numbers game don’t realize what just happened here. People who do, need a release. This is why I get all huffy when this happens. Because I was on that rollercoaster. This is what i mean by playing the numbers. Like everyone says, that’s poker. But when you know you are 95.5% to win a hand, and you lose to the 4.5% chance, it sucks. Maybe these things wouldn’t bother me so much if I didn’t know.