Monday, September 25, 2006
Not much poker
I haven't played much poker over the past 5 days or so. Played exactly 2 MTTs on PokerStars and didn't cash in both. The first one, I was actually the first player out of 906 entrants to bust when my flopped set ran up against a flopped flush. For some reason, I do really badly on PokerStars. I only really play the MTTs on Stars and I think I must have dropped somewhere around 3K on that site so far since I opened an account about 4 months ago. I've never even cashed in the 22-180 SNGs even though I've played around 30 of them by now. PokerStars is a disease. I'll stick to PartyPoker SNGs till my PokerStars doom switch is switched off or I get a tin foil hat.
Anyway, it's not as if I've been slacking in the past few days. Instead of playing poker, I've managed to hang out with my friends, fly across the Pacific and most of America to come back for school, find a place to stay for this academic quarter and sort out other annoying little matters. Now I just need to sort out the classes that I'm taking and finish unpacking and I'll be all set for school and poker.
Ok, here's one random thought that popped up in my mind while I was taking a piss at the LA airport.I realized that it would really suck if I had to sneeze while pissing. It would be tough trying to control a stream of urine while sneezing and there exists a significant possibility that I might direct the stream away from the urinal. Now, if this happened in my own home, it's just a minor inconvenience for me to clean up. But if someone was using the urinal next to mine in a public bathroom, he might be a victim of my sneeze-induced misdirected piss. What would he do then? Would he just glare at me and say wtf? Or would he take revenge and return fire? And how do I react? Surely I'll apologize but do I apologize while shaking my willy dry, zipping up and wiping my nose dry? Or do I delay my apology for a few awkward seconds whilst I finish up my stuff? I guess I'll have to hope that this never happens to me. If it does, I'll report how it turns out.
Ok, before I leave, here's one hand from the $22-180 SNG on Stars. Villain had lost some chips a few hands before when he raised preflop and had to fold on the flop was his c-bet was checkraised all-in. Ok so my preflop limp with ATs was weak and part of me hates this line. On the flop, I'm kinda uncertain about how I played it. The hands that I beat are basically any Ax where x is not 4 or 8. I could very easily be up against 44, 88, AJ+ or A4 or A8. Villain's raise was so small that it could either be a sucker bet or he's weak. I figured that I should call and then re-evaluate on the turn. So 9 came on the turn and I checked to Villain, planning to fold to any serious bet. He now shoves all-in. A lot of good players do this with strong hands, hoping to get a call from a weak Ace but at this point, I didn't know enough about this player to give him credit for making this move. So I narrowed his range to a weak Ace. My only concern now would be if he had AJ but I figured since I had already doubled up earlier, I could easily take this gamble and still have a healthy stack if I lose. True enough, my hand was good, but I was surprised to see that he only had a pair of 8s. Honestly, if he had raised more on the flop, I would probably have folded, knowing that his big raise commits the rest of his stack.
Any thoughts?
Poker Stars
No Limit Holdem Tournament
Blinds: t15/t30
Hero: t3270
UTG+1: t1350
MP1: t1367
MP2: t1365
MP3: t3040
CO: t1055
Button: t1525
SB: t2018
BB: t4070
Pre-flop: (9 players) Hero is UTG with :Ad :Td
Hero calls t30 (pot was t45), 2 folds, MP2 calls t30 (pot was t75), MP3 folds, CO calls t30 (pot was t105), Button folds, SB calls t15 (pot was t135), BB checks.
Flop: :4d :8c :Ah (t150, 5 players)
SB checks, BB checks, Hero bets t100, MP2 raises to t240, 3 folds, Hero calls t140 (pot was t490).
Turn: :9s (t630, 2 players)
Hero checks, MP2 is all-in t1095, Hero calls t1095 (pot was t1725).
River: :4c (t2820, 1 player + 1 all-in - Main pot: t2820)
Results:
Final pot: t2820
MP2 showed 8s Js
Hero showed Ad Td
Anyway, it's not as if I've been slacking in the past few days. Instead of playing poker, I've managed to hang out with my friends, fly across the Pacific and most of America to come back for school, find a place to stay for this academic quarter and sort out other annoying little matters. Now I just need to sort out the classes that I'm taking and finish unpacking and I'll be all set for school and poker.
Ok, here's one random thought that popped up in my mind while I was taking a piss at the LA airport.I realized that it would really suck if I had to sneeze while pissing. It would be tough trying to control a stream of urine while sneezing and there exists a significant possibility that I might direct the stream away from the urinal. Now, if this happened in my own home, it's just a minor inconvenience for me to clean up. But if someone was using the urinal next to mine in a public bathroom, he might be a victim of my sneeze-induced misdirected piss. What would he do then? Would he just glare at me and say wtf? Or would he take revenge and return fire? And how do I react? Surely I'll apologize but do I apologize while shaking my willy dry, zipping up and wiping my nose dry? Or do I delay my apology for a few awkward seconds whilst I finish up my stuff? I guess I'll have to hope that this never happens to me. If it does, I'll report how it turns out.
Ok, before I leave, here's one hand from the $22-180 SNG on Stars. Villain had lost some chips a few hands before when he raised preflop and had to fold on the flop was his c-bet was checkraised all-in. Ok so my preflop limp with ATs was weak and part of me hates this line. On the flop, I'm kinda uncertain about how I played it. The hands that I beat are basically any Ax where x is not 4 or 8. I could very easily be up against 44, 88, AJ+ or A4 or A8. Villain's raise was so small that it could either be a sucker bet or he's weak. I figured that I should call and then re-evaluate on the turn. So 9 came on the turn and I checked to Villain, planning to fold to any serious bet. He now shoves all-in. A lot of good players do this with strong hands, hoping to get a call from a weak Ace but at this point, I didn't know enough about this player to give him credit for making this move. So I narrowed his range to a weak Ace. My only concern now would be if he had AJ but I figured since I had already doubled up earlier, I could easily take this gamble and still have a healthy stack if I lose. True enough, my hand was good, but I was surprised to see that he only had a pair of 8s. Honestly, if he had raised more on the flop, I would probably have folded, knowing that his big raise commits the rest of his stack.
Any thoughts?
Poker Stars
No Limit Holdem Tournament
Blinds: t15/t30
Hero: t3270
UTG+1: t1350
MP1: t1367
MP2: t1365
MP3: t3040
CO: t1055
Button: t1525
SB: t2018
BB: t4070
Pre-flop: (9 players) Hero is UTG with :Ad :Td
Hero calls t30 (pot was t45), 2 folds, MP2 calls t30 (pot was t75), MP3 folds, CO calls t30 (pot was t105), Button folds, SB calls t15 (pot was t135), BB checks.
Flop: :4d :8c :Ah (t150, 5 players)
SB checks, BB checks, Hero bets t100, MP2 raises to t240, 3 folds, Hero calls t140 (pot was t490).
Turn: :9s (t630, 2 players)
Hero checks, MP2 is all-in t1095, Hero calls t1095 (pot was t1725).
River: :4c (t2820, 1 player + 1 all-in - Main pot: t2820)
Results:
Final pot: t2820
MP2 showed 8s Js
Hero showed Ad Td
# posted by SmuCox @ 2:36 AM 
