Seems like an insanely frustrating day.

On the 77 hand where the board ran out J94T6...Any thoughts on c/r that river? If villain has 2 pair or a set he's probably betting that turn since you have a handful of K/Qs in your range, the only hand I'd be scared about him having is KQ and not all villains are calling a flop c-bet there. I almost feel like you can more easily rep KQ than villain in that spot. Downside is you obviously don't rep much else.

I guess something like that would be villain dependent...I've just noticed that very rarely is that river sizing made with a hand that can withstand pressure. Part of this is also villain dependent as well as how villain views you, but just wanted to throw out a line that seems to consistently work for me when playing weaker players.

In game I didn't really think of trying it. Against good thinking players it's a pretty interesting idea. I'm just not sure what we're repping. I guess we can have KQ that thinks he's gonna bet river for value with a lot of stuff. But in these low buy in live tourneys trying to make people fold bigger pairs is a tough task. I like the inventiveness of the idea though and I do agree that he has weak value here almost always.

I Can Still Win!

Turns out heads up is a lot easier if you just lead the MTT the whole way:



Found a lot of light 3b's at FT, played very tight with, coincidentally, same villain on my left as from last post. I find it's pretty hard to play tight when you have a huge chip lead. It's tempting to just try to press every single spot, or at least a majority of spots that might work, but I folded a lot of buttons and just decided I didn't need to press things unless it made sense. It worked out, I ran very well, and never gave up the lead to win the tourney! Also took 2nd in the $50 6 max on Stars and 7th in WSOP 15r 5K. Made a little over 2K on the day and did a good job of just firing and making sure my screen was 6 tables full for a large part of the session. Key in the future is going to be to just keep firing and playing as many tourneys as possible. Playing live always straightens me out somehow when I go back to playing online, and I want to make sure I don't miss any more of the Parx/Borgata series, and hopefully start adding in Foxwoods series along with other casinos I've yet to visit.

I think you're better off in the 77 hand to do that vs weak players, or at least non station weak players. A thinking player will a lot of the time talk himself into a call because you theoretically don't rep much. I can see a lot of recs talking themselves into the fact that you only do this with KQ and never as a bluff because, quite frankly, people don't ever c/r bluff that river. It's not something you can be doing all the time but a line that you can take here a small % of the time. I've only got a limited amount of live experience that I'm basing that on, though, so take what I'm saying with a grain of salt.


@live straightening you out-you have so much more time live to make decisions and to process what lines you want to take. When you're forced to play 25 hands an hour that will typically force you into the thinking about hands instead of occasionally falling into making robotic decisions. Even though you seem to do an excellent job of that when playing online, I've always found I can think so much deeper in game when playing live.

sexy chip count graph

Been following your blog for a while, am a fan, so don't want to harp on one hand you misplayed out of many played well/standard. But, OOP as pfr you should be doing a LOT of checking on this board, and this is one of the nut worst hands to cbet. Honestly PIO probably would recommend checking this flop over 80 or 90% if I had to guess.

Played a live tournament with David Yan last week whos a complete sicko, and he checked a board very similar to this oop with AA vs a very good online reg. If there's one thing that we have learned from software, its that oop we should be checking a ton, even as PFR in single raised pots. Especially on single high card boards like Jxxr Qxxr Kxxr Axxr.

If you realistically think your edge is 1.2 in a $550 then you are talking about making $110 by playing the tournament. When you only have 55% of yourself, your EV is $60.50 minus the expenses, which probably makes it neutral to -EV.

If it's for entertainment value, glory, to vary it up etc. that's cool(and I have totally done it myself), but if you are "working," then manage your time better and play online.

Best,
Jason

Fair enough, appreciate the input and I definitely still have a lot to learn!

I probably should sell higher but decided to just go with the 1.2...a few things that I think make it worth it for me to play though:

1) It's a re-entry tournament, so theoretically I'd be making $60 every bullet I fire right? Is that how it works? Feels backwards since I'm essentially saying I'm making money every time I bust and re-enter lol but I think that is the way the math would go with that. So since I fired 4 bullets and can fire more than 1 each day the hourly is at least a little better?

2) I don't always necessarily miss online sessions due to playing live. On Thursday I bricked 2 bullets pretty quickly and went back to my parents' place and played online. Results shouldn't matter obv but it was nice to chop the Stars 10K that night

3) This is probably not a great reason since it should be factored into EV, but I sorta like the idea of going after that big 6 figure score. If I had the opportunity to play for a lot of money every day online than maybe I wouldn't feel like that, but given the most money I can realistically make on a weekday is under 5K and on a weekend is maybe 10-15K, the idea of winning one tournament for 100K is pretty irresistible. Granted I would only get 55% of that top prize in the $550 but it's still just such a big score, and the weak play I often see late in the Parx tournaments makes it feel that much more likely.

All in all I might make more money by staying home and playing online but there's no chance for me to hit that huge score that gives the bankroll a little jump start. I also enjoy the live format from time to time. Especially when Borgata has series and I can potentially play online while I play live

You also probably have a way better ROI than 20%. The Parx 3/500s are soooooooo insanely soft that any competent online reg should have an insane ROI.

Almost surely has higher than a 20% roi. Online still prob better hourly but nothing wrong with mixing it up and taking some high variance shots at a big score now and then as long as it's not too often and it's a tourney worth playing. I wouldn't think a random $400 50k guarantee or something would actually be worth the time. I feel like it'd maybe be better to just only fire 1-2 bullets though and keep all of yourself instead of 4-5 bullets with 40%

Yeah I'd have to imagine this is true. I probably should just be selling higher markup or listening to advice below.

I hate travelling a long way and then only firing 1 or 2 bullets but this does make sense. If that bink ever does come through it would be nice to have the lion's share of it. Even though it wouldn't fit my 1% rule, if I knew I'd only be firing 1/2/3 bullets then I think I'd be fine taking that hit. Guess I'll have to come up with a final decision with the Borgata $600 2M guarantee fast approaching! Maybe a middle ground is best; sell at high markup, 1.3-1.4, and only sell 25% or so, so that I can fire a bunch of bullets if needed. Maybe 25% at 1.33 so I'm in for $400 a bullet and I just fire 5 max or something.

Another Big Day

Despite stone bubbling the Party Tuesday $215, finishing 6th with 5th paying $500 and 1st paying $2000+, I had my 2nd straight good day and am up $4000+ in that time span. I'm happy with where my head is at but I need to continue working hard to make sure I don't have any lapses that lead to me getting lazy and slumping hard like I did for almost a 2 month stretch to start the summer. It's crazy when I think about the fact that I'm slacking off from my job for months at a time and still doing fine as far as paying bills and whatnot, but it's time to start thriving instead of just surviving, as tyman so wisely suggested earlier in this thread







Day got off to a rocky start with me firing $350 worth of satties to try to get into the WSOP $500, bricking them all including stone bubbling the last one. But I just kept registering and focused really well when things were going south. Also helps to win QQ>AA for a bunch early on in the Super Tuesday, and K7s>KJo on the stone bubble of it

Again, like where my head's at, but have to keep studying and improving. I run into a bunch of spots everyday that keep me humble and help me realize I just don't feel as comfortable as I need to in every spot I run into. I'm a professional so I might as well obsess about exactly what to do with my full range on a Q83r board vs a Q84r vs a Q85r vs a Q82 2 tone vs Q83 2 tone etc etc etc. I don't have an overall game plan for all flops and when you consider there are a finite number of combinations of them all I should at least have a basic idea of exactly what I want to do on each but I often feel unsure. Gotta keep working hard.

Just sell to bullets 3+ or whatever imo. Like ACR series for example, when it's unlimited reentry, like the $215 events I will sell
Bullet 1: 0%
Bullet 2: 15%
Bullet 3: 30%
Bullet 4: 50%
Bullet 5: 50%

Or something like that



Do you have any idea what your hourly is grinding MTTs online @ this low table count?

That's a good idea Josh. And no I have no idea what my hourly is. I assume it's pretty high though given my sessions almost never go more than 6 hours and I almost never play more than 5 days per week. Holdem Manager just seems to sort of suck at tracking stuff, a lot of the time it says I'm losing a bunch of the MTTs I'm cashing, so I don't think the info on there as far as tracking MTT results goes is reliable. Might have to try out Poker Tracker soon.

I'm curious as to the live tournaments: you said there's a 600 2 mill gar coming up at wpt borgata. How do you know about this/keep up with when tournaments happen at borgata or parx? Is there a centralized source that has all info? Or more so you just are already aware of when they are

cardplayer>poker tournaments>schedule

Yep this works. There's also just like 5 Borgata/Parx series each year so if it's been a while since the last one I just google it and it pops right up. I also follow a bunch of poker players on Twitter and hear about it on there sometimes.

Ah thanks good point to both ^^

Hopefully you don't play that live bird that Pokerstars is trying to do. They are failing massively by not offering a larger tournament with a large guarantee.

Just thought I would give you my thoughts, but your reasons seem cool.

With regards to the ROI, your hourly or EV of the trip(whichever you prefer) would be yearly sum divided into smaller parts. For example, broken down, you would say in a rebuy tournament on average you buyin 2x and win $120. So your EV for the trip/tournament would be $120, regardless of whether you buyin 1x or 4x in a particular tournament. You don't get more EV or less from buying in more often, just the same ROI from doing what you do over time.

Eh, might check it out just for the fun of it, possibly play online while I play live.

This makes a lot of sense and seems obvious after reading it, thanks!

Sunday



My only cash. Made $127 on the day. Yisssss

Gottem

Curious to hear your thoughts (too soon?) on your bustout of the party/borgata 40k from yesterday. Always find it difficult to navigate those spots where you're shortish on the bubble. Never know the best way to weigh how much a spot must be +cev before risking busting in that spot.

Yeah that Party bubble is always pretty dumb. Pretty routinely see guys with 8bbs folding down to 1bb and I just can't justify killing my chances of winning the tournament to lock up a mincash. For anyone else reading, I 3b shoved 13 or so BBs from the BB vs a CO open with 44 with 29 left in the Party 40K with 27 paying. He called with KK to bust me.

A few factors I think about when weighing spots like that:

--Mincash compared to buy in. It was <2x in this tournament so I felt more comfortable gambling than in the WSOP 40K, which was 2.5x. I also bubbled that one

--How likely I think it is the opener is abusing the bubble. The opener in this spot had pretty tight numbers but given he had more chips than the 3 players behind him and was in the CO, I decided it was fairly likely he'd be lighter than usual.

--How likely it is the bubble is going to end soon. It's one thing to fold a few close spots because there are 2 guys with 1BB and you know you're going to go into play after the bubble bursts with the same stack you have now. But if there are 8 stacks at 10BBs and no one's shorter, you can be pretty confident, at least in NJ, that this bubble is going to take some time. If you lose an orbit's worth of blinds/antes and the level goes up during H4H you've now gone from 10bbs to less than 6 and it's going to be very difficult to mount a comeback, whereas taking a spot here and there that seem reasonably +chipEV will see you get eliminated once in a while, but will also have you chipping up so that you're not dead post bubble.

All in all my shove still might not have been good, but I definitely don't hate it.

Last 48 Hours

I've done quite a bit since my post from Sunday night / Monday morning. For starters, I did not go to sleep after that post. Given it was 1:30am and I knew I had to be out the door by 6:15am to leave for a wedding, and given the fact I always take at least an hour to fall asleep after a session, I decided I'd just stay up through it. This was definitely a ridiculous decision and not a good one but somehow it didn't kill me.

At 6:15 Monday morning I got into my car and drove an hour to New Brunswick where I picked up my buddy Kyle. We hung out a bit then were on the road to the very southern portion of Delaware for our friend Eric's 12:30PM Monday wedding. Not sure why that was the time and date but what do I care I'm a poker player. We get to the Airbnb we're staying at with a bunch of people around 11:40, only to learn that this place is actually 45 minutes away from the church. We get dressed as quickly as possible and head out, getting there around 12:35 and feeling awkward about having to walk in late. Luckily bride showed up late so there was no problem. Somehow I didn't fall asleep at the wheel for any of that and I wondered how I'd hold up the rest of the day.

I didn't know many people there as we stood outside the church after the wedding but I do have great advice in the form of an icebreaker the next time you're with a group you're unfamiliar with. Have a pair of solar eclipse glasses while a solar eclipse is going on! We were still a little north for totality or whatever they call it but most of the sun got blocked out and it was awesome. From about 2:00-3:00 we were driving to the reception which was located on the 8th floor of a hotel overlooking the ocean, and Kyle and I decided to take full advantage of a law Delaware has that most other states do not. In Delaware it is legal to have open containers in the car, so long as the driver isn't drinking. So we stopped at a liquor store, grabbed a couple of tall boys, and I drove while Kyle drank his and then we switched. It worked out that we switched around 2:40, when the sun was most covered by the moon, and pulled over on the side of the road and viewed the eclipse while sippin on some beers.

The reception was amazing, 3 incredible speeches, 2 by Eric's siblings and 1 by my friend Anthony, amazing food, good music, nice people, it was all just really enjoyable. I drank and danced a ton of course, danced with a cute little 4 year old girl, flirted with her hot German mom, and certainly would have closed the deal if it wasn't for her pesky husband.

Anthony's brother drove Anthony, Kyle and I back to our place to change after the reception since we were all obliterated and then we headed over to Eric's place for the after party. Around 10pm my body started telling me it was all over. I almost fell asleep on the spot a couple times and at that point I realized it was over 36 hours since I last slept. I said my goodbyes and headed back to the Airbnb to crash.

Woke up this morning and had some breakfast then headed to the Dogfish Head Brewery in Milton, Delaware. We got some lunch and drank some beer. I decided to go all out and get steak to go with my 17%, 2015 Higher Math Vintage beer. It was strong. After that we headed out and I made the 3 hour trek back to New Brunswick before making the hour drive back to Fair Lawn from there. I got back to Fair Lawn around 6:30pm with an upset stomach feeling pretty tired as well. I think I literally drove more hours on that trip than I slept, and that's coming off a sleepless night. BUT THE GRIND DON'T STOP!



Feeling quite good about my game but am realistic about how I'm running. Just like in the 10K I won on Sunday, I won a big pot with AA>AK with 9 left to propel myself up the leaderboard. From there I lost QQ<AA, TT<JJ a couple hands later, and a couple hands after that rivered the winner with QJ>A8 for a vital pot. I started heads up with a 2:1 disadvantage but am feeling good about my heads up game lately. I was no doubt smacked by the deck in some good spots but also threw in some light 3b's, got a lot of bluffs through, and eventually went on to win. I'm up over 9K in the last 2 weeks without a day over $2300 in profit, for perspective on how I'm just binking the dailies each day. Earlier this year I did my damage by running hot in the biggest tournaments on Sundays; this month I'm running hot in everything that's not on Sunday and breaking even on the big day. Not complaining by any means; at the end of the day it doesn't matter how well you run so long as you play well.

I'm overdue to watch some RIO videos so that should come tomorrow. I'm also gonna DM Kevmath or somebody to see if they will count the WSOP 10K from Sunday as a leg of the triple crown or not. Officially it had 78 entrants, but it had 34 "rebuys" which are exactly the same as re-entries on WSOP in that tourney. Triple crown requires you to win 3 tournaments that each have at least 100 runners and a prize pool of at least $10K on 3 different sites in a 1 week span. Since the WSOP 10K is now an 8K, that's going to be incredibly difficult to attain, but I now only need to win a Party 10K (assuming 100 people) in the next 4 days to do it, so if they count WSOP I might not take any days off this week just to chase it for the bragging rights. If they don't count the WSOP score, then it's off to the city on Thursday!

In any case I feel hungrier than I ever have before. I don't feel that lull I usually get after success, that feeling of "I have plenty of money to last me for a few months, why work too hard when I can just be enjoying this lifestyle!" Instead, I'm feeling greedy and want to get it all. I feel confident that downswings aren't going to devastate me anymore and I'll be able to grind through them. I'm ready to actually start making some real money playing this game.