Following

Right on, I play mostly @ Hardrock $2/5... I've only played at Mardi Gras probably 10 times, not much. I live so close to Hardrock and the action there is good most the time. Hope to run into you one day, say hi if you recognize me.. Peace dude and good luck

Thanks mang, all the best 2 u...

Thursday, April 7, 2016
Started From The Bottom Now Were Here! Closing in on $20,000 Profit
With a wave of my wrist and flick of my fingers, "I'm All-In $650"...
"Call, I got you!" ---

This guy had his chips (all $1200) in the rack, playing his last hand at the table. I looked down in the small blind and see one of my favorites, Ace King of Spades. Villian is a regular and I have played with him many times. The first orbit I tried bluffing him on a QQ67A board and he had Q9. I had AJ and fired all 3 streets relatively strong. The river bet ended up being $185 by me and he just called with Q9. He got pretty confident after this and started to play more hands with me, mostly calling my raises. I started opening up more and was beating him around quite a bit at this point. I was punishing him by 3-betting and 4-betting him quite frequently.


He's a pretty solid player, but nothing special. He's pretty transparent with what hands he has. He plays them face up most the time. He's under the gun and has limped in. There were about 4 others who limped and I made it $35 from the SB with my AKs. He check-raised to $85 and my initial thought was to just jam all-in here and most the time take the pot down right here, as most people don't want to gamble all-in preflop and on their last hand of the night. He started talking when he noticed I was pondering what to do. He then, confidently splurted out, "This is my last hand, you know I am only getting involved here with the nuts". I knew he was super strong at this point after putting everything together. I figured I could possibly be dominated already and this is most likely the case here, but I'm never folding AKs to a single raise and not even that much more for me to call ($50 more). Even if I know for certain he has AA, 100% of the time, it's worth it to call because I know if I get a favorable flop, I can get all of his chips.

I decided to just call and see what kind of flop we were going to battle over. It came Qs9s3c -- I have the nut flush draw, with two over's... In my world, the virtual nuts, exactly what I'm looking for in this spot. I was pretty confident he had AA/KK/QQ/AK. This flop was just too good for my hand to consider folding and the way I have been raising and punishing his raises and 3-bets sets it up perfect for a check-raise. So, I checked it to him and he lead out for $50. Weird, I thought it was a bet designed to get me to check-raise him. Which is exactly what I planned on doing anyway. It was like he was setting himself up to get owned by me. Granted I had to hit to win the pot, but with this much equity in the hand, and with how deep we are, I'm getting it in here all the time vs this guy in this spot.

With a wave of my wrist, "I'm All-In, $650".
"Call", he said, while triumphantly flipping over AA and slamming it on the table. "I told you that you should have folded kid"
"Whatever bro, let's see the turn and river", I told him. There wasn't much of a sweat for me as the turn was the beautiful Jack of Spades and the river bricked out.

"You should never put your chips in the rack and then play another hand, dude", as I flipped over my Ace/King of spades. Dealer confirmed my $650 and had him count out the $650 and shipped it my way. "Oh, Tyler, Tyler, Tyler, I'm getting too used to doing this", Jean the dealer said while he pushed me the sea of chips. Villian was just so confident he had me crushed, it's always nice to double up off these guys.

Another cool spot I got into today was pretty interesting and had some wild table dynamics going on. This spot I'm about to tell you about was from my first session of the day, in which I was crushing my competition. I was absolutely running over my table. My good friend was also at the table, but wasn't much of a threat as he couldn't get much going. Myself, on the other hand was getting smacked in the face with the deck and I was also playing super aggressive. I had about $1300 in front of me at this point.

There was a new player that sat down, an older gentlemen, that was obviously a huge fish. I instantly knew he was a fish and was there to lose. We played a few hands and I observed him, shaking like a rag doll when he had big hands and had to showdown. It was a big tell. There was another player at the table, who's basically a whale. He knows what he's doing, but fishes so much. He will chase any draw, overplay top pair and just play real bad in general. He's in his mid-40's, going bald, looks stressed and tired, and looks like a degenerate gambler. To be fair, he may just be a normal dude --- Probably, but I like to speculate.

So, at this point, I'm owning it and I'm in the big blind and look down at JJ. There was a UTG straddle for $10. 4 people, including these two clowns (both have about $500 behind them), have limped in for the $10... "I raise, $70", I announced. Both of these clowns call the $70 and we go 3-way to the flop. 8c7c3h --- great flop for me, not the best, but we can work with it. I'm certain I'm ahead here, unless they hit a set on me, then so be it.

"$165", I throw 6 greens and 3 reds out to the middle of the table.
"Call, Call", the dealer says. Ugh, really? Both you clowns are calling me? Turn comes a 6c --- definitely not the best card for me, but it can also be a great card for me if they are both NOT on the flush/straight draws.

"I'm all-in, $1000", I said almost immediately after seeing the turn. Old man only had about $200 left and Mr. Bad only had $100 left, it was an easy shove considering their stacks. Old man, tanks for about a minute and folds with what seemed like he was letting his child go to the devil or something, I was super happy to see that he decided to fold. Mr. Bad on the other hand called and I was pretty confident I was good against Mr. Bad. I flipped over my JJ and don't even look at the river and he mucks his cards. Ship the pot my way. Old Man then stands up and slams the table. "I HAD QQ, THIS IS BULL****" ---

I stare at him, as he is getting more and more heated as he realizes he just folded the best hand. I can't help but laugh in these moments. "Sorry sir, bad luck for you", I remind him this is all about luck. "That's it, I'm tired of you idiots around here" --- He picked up the rest of his $200 and headed out the door, only to come back 1 minute later to lose the last $200 he had in his wallet within about 5 hands. I took the last $200. Savage.

Today was a good day overall. I took home a profit of $850 -- not too shabby. The day before I lost $650 though, so it evens out. April is looking good so far as I'm at 40 hours played, $2626 profit @ $68/hour. I need to be getting more hours in, 40 hours a week is just not acceptable. I really have to buckle down these next few weeks and put in every available hour I have at the tables. Especially since all the tournament donks are in town. I'm at $19,438 overall profit since starting in January with 386 hours total played, which comes out to $50.24/hour. I'm so stoked about these stats I have been able to put up. My dream is really coming true, to play poker professionally. I'm growing every day and I love (with so much passion) what I'm doing. It's honestly, my dream, come true. I've never been happier in the past 10 years.

Let's keep this train going my friends. Thanks to everyone for all the kind words and support you have shown me and continue to show me. It really means a lot to me when someone takes the time to comment on this blog.

As always, good luck in life and especially at the tables, but not mine!

Your logic in hand 1 is awful. With the table talk you described v never has AK. V always has AA/Kk/QQ. So your two overs are NEVER any good, plus even if you hit your flush v has a re draw to the full house a lot of the time. Best case scenario v has Kk and he is still a small favorite. You also have zero % fold equity. Don't be results oriented it will get you in a lot of trouble in the long run. You played it awful. V's range was super polarized.
You also played hand 2 pretty bad imo. With those stack sizes you get called 90% of the time. Honestly if I saw someone play those two hands the way you did I would bum hunt them every time I saw them in the poker room. You must play in a super soft room to be up 20k this year with that poker logic. I mean really go back and read it. Your thinking process in hand 1 is absolutely horrendous. Be careful op you are playing with too much confidence. Good luck, I think you'll need it.

Thanks for the reply. Villian is capable of doing this with other hands other than just AA/KK, although in this spot it is very polarized. If the flop bricks for me, it's pretty easy for me to get away from the hand. But in this case, I smashed the flop, I'm not going anywhere. I do agree with you though, the way I did explain my thought process was a bit butchered and pretty bad.

With those stack sizes I'd be more than happy to get it all in preflop with these two clowns.

I will check my high confidence level... Thanks for reminding me to come back to planet earth, thought I was flying around the clouds there for a bit.

Please come to my table and bum hunt me.

Fish on a heater in this thread.

Maybe

You didn't smash the flop against v's range. You are always behind. You got it in as as 2 to 1 dog.
Hand 2- you didn't get it in on flop. You shoved turn after the flush and straight draw come in. You will get called and be behind 90% of the time in that situation. You played both hands terrible.
JJ hand was ok until you shoved turn against two opponents.
I would love to be at your table over a large sample size and I'm sure v in hand 1 would too
If you can't see your flaws in these hands you have no chance of becoming a better player.
(Confirmed op is a fish on a heater)

I do see my flaws for sure. I'm only here to get better, that's why I post hands. I'm probably not doing a great job of explaining everything, but I'm trying. I know I will have a lot of haters doing this, it's part of it. Thanks for the encouragement!

In the post above on hand 2 I meant to say you didn't get it I pre- flop

I'm not hating. I'm really just trying to help. I've made the same mistakes in the past( playing too confident, over valuing hands against polarized ranges) and I don't want you to do the same. Look I played a hand of 2/5 a few years back. Me and v were both deep 1100 effective. V was a reg, competent player l had AK, flop comes A K 3 rainbow. V bets I raise, v rerarises I shove. V shows AA I chalked it up as a cooler. After thinking about the hand on the ride home it dawned on me ; what was v going to call off his stack with that I beat. AQ? AJ? A3? I don't think so. It was a terrible shove. It was not a cooler. Let's say I bet, Villian raises, I reraise, v shoves. Should I call ? Hell no!!! What can I beat?

These are the kinds of questions you should be asking yourself in hand 1 and 2.
You will come up with a lot more hands in villains ranges that have you crushed than you think.

Honestly, thank you. That example you just gave is pretty eye opening. You're right, it's not a cooler. In spots like that, I go broke every time --- I'd have an extremely hard time letting that go on a AK3 board, but against villian, you must know he has it (AA/KK), or at the worst AK? I'm going to keep a mental note to see if I get in any spots like this and go over them with you guys. Thanks again man and sorry if I came off as a little hot headed earlier. I appreciate your advice and taking the time to reply to me.

@Discipline12 thank you for sparking me to write this post, it's something that has been bothering me for awhile.

Thursday, April 7, 2016
Overcoming Fear... Fish on a Heater?
I have another topic I wanted to get off my chest. I was going to save this post for another time, but I have strong feelings about this subject and believe it will help myself and hopeful someone else.


I've been pretty self-conscious about this blog and what I write on it. I'm not sure who's reading. Sometimes at the table, I get this notion that certain people are just laughing at me from the inside. They might think of my game or myself as a joke to poker. They might read the blog and just laugh at how noob I come across. They might just be on a totally different level than me and I'm just the fish being hunted. I think these things, especially with a certain 'group' of players at Hardrock. I'm not going to get into specifics, but they are there, I think... *gulp* (this is my fear kicking in.. god damn it) I know it's all in my head, but it's a thought that does affect me. It also may really be happening and I'm just catching on to it. Who knows... Who cares, right? I shouldn't give two ****s about what this or that guy thinks of me or my poker game. If they don't want to get better at this game with me, then they should rent no space in my head.


I know I'm not that great at poker and I have a ton to learn and improve on. I like to think I have a solid foundation to the game. ****, I've only just recently started winning. I know I have a lot of room for improvement, but that's what I am enjoying so much. I'm enjoying the journey. I get joy when I see myself improve on the felt, it's a rush of adrenaline. I enjoy driving to the Hardrock, with the anticipation of what is ahead for the day. I enjoy getting out of bed, knowing what I'm going to be doing but not how it will turn out. I enjoy getting home at the end of the day and thinking about what I just accomplished, even if I lost. I enjoy talking and meeting others that share my love and passion for poker. I enjoy getting stacked and thinking about how I could have played it better. I enjoy cashing in a bunch of chips and recording a huge profit to see my graph line shoot up. I enjoy my heart racing when my opponent is staring at me after I 5-bet shoved on them. I enjoy telling others about my journey and helping them in any way possible. I enjoy sharing my experience!

I know the hands I post might not be the best. I might have taken bad lines on some or all of them. I might(am) be getting incredibly lucky in some spots. I might be really bad at this game and really am 'a fish on a heater'. I just so badly want to get better at this game and be in that upper echelon of players. I want to be in that damn 'elite' group!

I'm writing this, because it's a big fear of mine, being rejected by my peers. I always want to be accepted in the group and just 'fit in' with the group. If I don't, I become very self-conscious and start to question myself in many ways. I start doubting myself and my abilities. I start to retract and think down about myself and run away from the issues. It's not healthy and it's a big leak.

It's a major flaw and vulnerability of mine, it's a fear. I've overcome a lot of fear in my life, growing up. I'm used to dealing with adversity at this point in my life. I still struggle with fear, but I'm getting better. Getting better, in my eyes, is acknowledging it and accepting it. I know it's there, but I choose to not let the fear control my life. It's time to let go of all these preconceived notions of what people think of me. It's time to let everything go and continue on MY journey. It's time to not entertain these thoughts. It's time to not let this fear control me. It's time to shine, I have faith!

I can't be alone on this, right?

All the best out there guys and gals... Good luck in life and especially at the tables, but not mine!

You have a great thread going here, don't stop posting. But do yourself a favor and start posting hands in live low stakes NL. You will get a lot better feedback. Post or participate in at least 2 hands per day and you will make big strides in your game very quickly. If you think I'm wrong about hands I commented on post them also. Discussing hands with other thinking players in LLSNL is the best way to use this site to get better.

Im not going to say you are a "fish on a heater" like someone else did because your win rate over 400 hours is very impressive. Im sure you are playing some good poker a lot of the time but its also clear that you still have leaks when you post things like

"I figured I could possibly be dominated already and this is most likely the case here, but I'm never folding AKs to a single raise and not even that much more for me to call ($50 more). Even if I know for certain he has AA, 100% of the time, it's worth it to call because I know if I get a favorable flop, I can get all of his chips."

Do you know what the odds are to get a flop where AKs can bust AA? I can elaborate if you like, but you played that hand pretty badly against a limp/reraise.

Also read all the stickies in LLSNL, especially the one by dgiharris.

Fwiw I don't really think you are a fish on a heater. You are definitely doing a lot right to be up 20k. Fix a few leaks and it could be 30k.

His name is dgiharris.

Keep it up man ..... Enjoying / learning from your thread , as well as following you via your Blog Posts. Thanks for posting and sharing

Here's something to consider. If you really want to know how much of your winnings is you playing well and how much is you running well and / getting lucky / unlucky do this:

Every time you have a hand that goes all in before showdown, calculate your pot equity and compare that to what you won or lost.

For example: In your AKs vs AA hand that went all in on the flop. You won the $1300 pot but you only had 37% equity in that hand at the time of the all in, so you won $815 more than you "deserved".

Now recalculate your "adjusted" win rate with these pot equity numbers figured in. You will have a better idea of your true win rate. You may have won a lot more money than you should have if you've been running hot in more big hands like this one. This is the easiest way to lower the amount of time and hands it takes to get to a true win rate.

There is software that does this for you when you play online, but very few people do it by hand when playing live. They just remember the hands they got outdrawn on and bitch about them but forget hands like this one

His name is dgiharris.

His name is dgiharris.

Real talk... I may come off like a dick saying this, but know that I say this not to be mean but to help (plus writing **** down like this helps me look at myself too).

I subbed to this thread because I like a good story. Always interesting to see an obvious heater of an ego driven player at the beginning of their career. It is near impossible to see how to improve your game when you are this fresh and all the small -ev or break even plays in big pots go in your favor. Until one day your flush draws stop completing most of the time. And instead of running into tpwk with tptk you run into a set, or 2 pair and you just lost 300bb with 1 pair when a week ago you won a 3 way all in with the same hand. And the straight draw you bluffed all in with no fold equity didn't get there. etc.etc.etc.etc. You seem consumed with results and emotion. The best players don't care whether they win or lose big pots. No brags, no beats, just logic and math. They only care if they made the best decision. Winning is just a byproduct. If you continue on the path you are on, you will be busto within a year wondering why you were such a winning player in the beginning but now seem to have massive losing sessions and small winning sessions. At the risk of making this thread less interesting to read, i'll tell you that nobody cares about your big wins or losses or chip porn. If seeking the approval of others is what drives you, you will eventually start chasing your losses with worse plays to try to get that big stack to show others. I'm still gonna keep reading this thread because it's likely that these words will be read but not internalized. You like to write and I like to read. But if you took the time that you are writing your posts and blog to work on your game instead of informing everyone of your glory stories, you might fade the epic downswing that will come.

Inspiring. Best of luck man