Gotta pay that man his money with the AQ

5* thread

Really enjoyed this. Read it in one sitting.

If you are clearly a tourist in a touristy part of Mexico you are much more likely to get some sort of street hustle, then be the victim of an outright crime.

If you are clearly a tourist in a non touristy part you are more of an oddity then anything else. The stuff that makes the news (kidnapping, extortion, narco stuff) makes the news because its interesting to read and gets views but would be incredibly rare for you to see as a foreigner unless you were specifically seeking it out. Certain states and cities are worse than others but for the most part those fall outside of places that people visit.

Give it a go! Mexicans are amazingly warm people and the culture overall is quite hospitable

November in review.

This is what a really bad month looks like




Essentially Back to Back to BACK -10k sessions to end the month.

On the entire trip I really only played 2 sessions and was -$8200 playing all in San Diego for a 2 day stretch and then catching up with some friends. I played the 5/T PLO which was basically 5/10/20 game and a little bit of 5/5 NL.

Notable hands in 5/T PLO:

Game played pretty straight forward, pretty awesome game with 5k cap and a nice mix of business type guys and some younger pros. Randomly I sat down in the game and a guy from home was on my direct right. He doesn't speak any english but was having a blast playing PLO, which doesn't get played as often in Mex.

First hand
Roughly 5k effective with villain.

Folds to LJ who opens to $30, we 3b to $100 on the button with AJQT
Folds back to LJ who calls.
LJ is 50 something nice guy, nice Rolex. Lose pre and relatively sticky post, haven't seen anything too wild.

Flop HU ($210)
K98
Chk/ we bet $140/ call

Turn ($690)
Q
He leads pot. 500 BB deep PLO is not something I'm playing a ton but I'm pretty sure just putting as much $ in as possible is best and ended up potting/calling his shove which and we ran two boards. When I repotted he kind of just looked at his stack and shrugged and said ok and put the last bit in. Those are usually good spots to be in.

First River ($9600)
2
Second River
7

Nice little insurance binks if we were up against the JTxx We scoop and are off to an awesome start. I showed first when the club came in. He just showed me the AKss but based on his reaction I'm fairly certain that was the extent of his hand.

Feeling good, off to a nice start, order dinner and am settling in for a long grind when the following hand happens about 30 minutes later. We lost back a little but are sitting with around 9k.

Second Hand
I was about to write out a hand history for the next hand but not really super interesting and not all that amazing to relive either

I flat KKxx on button flop comes K99 all the money in by the river to 99xx. 15k pot. Felt so standard for the last few months I was pretty numb when he rolled over his hand.

I proceeded to rebuy to the cap twice, blast off some combo draws and brick. 1 ill advised bluff. (-$8200) Completely lost motivation to play and only booked about 10 hours total and ended up spending the rest of the time seeing friends.
Really disappointing to go on trips and not make money.


Came home and got absolutely smoked in the 10/20/40, called off in a pretty marginal spot with AA incorrectly (8.5k pot) and then laid down a 9hi flush to what turned out to be a 7hi flush in a 4k pot

Another 10k down

Thank god for family obligations because I took a 2 day thanksgiving break, amazing food and wine, we hosted for 22 people (friends and some of my wifes family) and had a blast just completely forgetting about poker.


Finished the month with 2 small winning sessions at 5/10 and rolled that into a great start to December.

Thoughts:

Live poker is VERY much alive and well. Don't want to name the casino but the 5/T PLO game that I played was exceptionally good and played like 5/T/20 for about half of the time. For a small casino not in LA thats pretty cool.

In retrospect after losing 8k I could have easily just played 5/5 NL and most likely printed (those games were good too and 1k cap) but I was looking for a bigger + swing and the PLO game seemed quite soft and obviously much bigger so not really disappointed in my game selection.

After having very few losing months and mostly crushing here at home for the last 3 years its pretty interesting to see how some of the players are viewing/adjusting to me after the roughest stretch I've ever had. I think its a subtle thing but some people used to just stay completely out of my way. I really did have a little bit of an aura of invincibility against certain players. But I have noticed that some of that "invincibility aura" is gone. I've been bluffed by some players that haven't ever really bluffed against me, been called down lighter by some of the more passive players in the game etc. I sat and thought about my image before my first session this month and realized that it's not as good as it was even 3 months ago and that I would need to adjust a little bit for the first time in a long time.

I also realized in the grand scheme of my life the money problems will pass, if I have to take $ from my bankroll and play smaller for a little bit then I have to play smaller, it is not the end of the world. I love poker and all that it has given me, this is undoubtedly a nasty part of the story but I will feel even happier when I blast out of this stretch.


Off to a great start in December, playing in a 5/5 $1500 cap game tonight with some of the "famous" Mexican tourney pros that are in town visiting and some very VIP local players so should be fun.


Challenge Stats: October 1- November 30th, 2019

Live: -$24,651
Online:$3,602
Total: -$21,049
Live Hours: 254

Hey man, sorry to hear about your downswing. Live poker can be pretty brutal at times.

I think that live PLO is a very interesting and under-researched subject. On one hand, the games tend to be really good, on avarage significantly better than their NLHE counterparts. However, they can also be insanely swingy, especially in some formats.

Unfortunately, the game I played in a lot last year was an "omaha dealer's choice", with most popular format being 5-card, 2-board (!) Omaha. When I played there, I went on a massive upswing over a span of few months, and then essentially lost back every penny I won within like 14 or 15 losing sessions in a row (!).

So, yeah, I now have doubts if a game like that can be beatable for reasonable amounts of money over a sample achievable live, or is it just gambling with super marginal edges. This is especially true when more fringe formats are included - straight 4 card PLO can be more managable when people keep calling dominated hands pre.

Oh, and I just remembered that you asked where I live/play, it's Poland, so pretty close to the opposite end of the globe Live cashgames are illegal here (and live tournaments are taxed beyond profitability), but the underground live scene is thriving, with some pretty big games being played all over the country.

Good luck!

I would be surprised (assuming similar skill level) if live PLO isn't the same or more profitable then live NL at the same stakes. Definitely swingier but it seems like the average fun player at NL is going to have a little better idea of whats going on then in PLO and I see way more glaring mistakes made in 5/10+ PLO than similar stakes NL.

Games have gotten significantly better the last two weeks. Consistently bigger stakes and games running much longer. I have played multiple 10 hour + sessions and a marathon 20hr session.

I love to get in long games, I almost never quit when I am winning so this turns into playing with very stuck people and I think I can stay focused longer then almost everyone in this player pool the longer a game goes.

A couple of fun spots from the last week: Hand 1 against bad villain, Hand 2 against very good villain


Hand 1
Playing 4 handed about 8 hours into a session. This is my first time playing with all 3 players. Button is a raging fun player, manically aggressive who is betting literally 90% when checked to post, SB is passive and pretty straight forward.

We started playing 5/5 now everyone is quite deep and we are playing 5/5/15 on the button. $3,000 effective. We cover.

I am dealt KT UTG/CO
With a button straddle action starts on SB in this game. He calls 15, BB calls 15, I raise to $75.
Button cold calls, SB calls, BB folds

Flop $240
QJ6
chk/ I chk/ Button bets $100 / SB calls/ we raise $375/ call/ fold

Turn $1365
QJ6 6
Chk/ Button $500/ we call

River $2365
QJ6 6 K
We check/ Button $1500 / we ????

Live tell stuff that I don't really pay attention to but maybe should? Button didn't shove the river but left behind roughly $600 all in big chips. Bet $1500 by moving all the towers of smaller denomination chips out one by one.

Hand 2

5/5/10 on the button (6 handed)
In this game action starts UTG after the Button straddle (more similar to Vegas)

First time playing with BB but he is arguably one of the best players in Mexico, wont say the name but he is a well known tournament pro.

We have been really going to battle the last 15 hours across two sessions. In the first session I had direct position on him and he never moved even when better seats opened up. This session, he has direct position on me and I repaid the favor and haven't moved. We are insanely deep, both bought in for 300bbs and are both winning in the game.

Relevant history: Game is fun player heavy and its probably in our best interest to not go to war so much but we have really been battling and both enjoying it.
A lot of interesting hands prior to this one.
Cliffs: we have both made some light call downs, both gone for very thin value, and both run some large bluffs. More overbetting then you would normally see in a month in these games in the last two sessions.

He opens UTG to $40 we defend A8 in BB.
roughly 5k effective

Flop $ 90
78A
Chk/ He bets $30/ I raise to $110/ Call

Turn $310
78A 3
I bet $450/ he tank calls

River $1210
78A 3 3
I ???????

Hand 2 probably overbetting river
Hand 1 is pretty close, people give up a lot on river. would lean towards a call with your description esp if he has floated wide vs raises

Hand 2.
1.5x pot river. he tanked for over 5 minutes and folded AK no spade. Lot of fun chat about that hand later. Fairly happy with the line

Hand 1.
Called and got shown QJ which he was betting for value? Live poker is the best. I think my hand is a fold but the limited history with villain lead me down the call road.

Thought I would review the original goals for this blog as I am approaching the 1/4 mark.

Moving forward:

Poker
Game conditions continue to improve. I am + $10k halfway through the month on a relatively variance free smooth grind. (that is what I have been accustomed to for years in these games, so it feels really good to be somewhat back to normal)

So I am going to keep battling and really focus on playing my B+ game for as many hours as the games will allow. I won't get to the 160 hour mark this month, holiday parties, kid stuff, xmas, NYE. but I am going to put in max hours when the games go and I can play.

Finance
Spend less, pay down all debts like an animal until this burden is off my back and I can get back to BR building, saving and investing. The stuff that makes me happy and feel secure in what I'm doing.

Business
This is my busiest time of year for my rental business as well and despite all the capital investment headaches the core of the business is running like a well oiled machine. I'm putting less than 10 hours a week at this point and we are at 96% occupancy December/January across our 5 marina/downtown properties. That is an all time best, so at least with poker not going amazingly the business is.

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Trips:
Tentatively looking at a few trips and I plan on hitting it hard to start 2020.
5-10 days gone, two weeks back home, something like that.

Most likely trips will be:

Gardens early January
Fire a bullet or two in the $500 WPT and play a week of 5/10 + 10/20

Thunder Valley for 4-5 days Jan 15-20ish
Play the WSOP circuit main
30-50 hours of cash
I was really impressed with this room in the few days I played there. Games were decent too.

Puerto Vallarta Tour
Late January
Play the Main, the High Roller and a bunch of cash

Commerce Feb 10-20th
Play a few of the 1k's and 100 hours or so of cash


Definitely I am looking to mix in more tournaments this year then in years past and put in a lot of hours at the table on all of these trips. The family will probably only come to Vallarta so these are 100% work

Haven't played much the last few days, we had a white elephant party at the house + the requisite hangover day after. And I have been a little busier with some non poker stuff. But I have found some time during the day to get some serious study in.

Getting ready to play some tournaments so I have spent some time
1. going over past results and hands that I wanted to run
2. doing some MTT studying for the first time since pre WSOP mostly postflop 30bb< spots

I thought this would be a good spot to talk about my thoughts on tournaments and a pretty epic prop bet I had the last two summers involving them.

Tournaments

I don't have a lot of love for tournaments. I don't like the rigid structure, don't like holding in pee, don't enjoy the morgue-like atmosphere, don't like the idea of incessantly flipping, nobody talking etc.

But I find myself playing tournaments every single year. By my count I have played 133 live tournaments in my lifetime and cashed in 28 of them for 21% and have cashed for $102k on roughly $97k of buy ins for an ABI of $730 and a 5% ROI Obviously I think I am beating the fields that I am playing for more than a 5% ROI but it is pretty tough to prove unless you are really grinding a lot of volume.

I think this year I will get a slightly better idea as I plan on playing a higher ABI and more tournaments then I have the last few years. Since May of last year I am roughly -$20k in 30 some tournaments. This year I plan on playing 50 tournaments with a much bigger ABI than the last 4 years. (most of that will come around WSOP time).

When I first started playing full time I took a lot of swings and mostly misses at big field $150-$1000 tournaments. I obviously loved the idea of big scores and felt like I was a huge favorite against the field. I had some deep runs and "just misses" but no huge scores. I won a small tournament or two along the way but nothing over $12k. This would have been late 2016 and 2017. I could definitely see the appeal, getting deep is amazing, the glory aspect with friends and family is cool. And you definitely don't get trophies for having a great cash session.

My wife loves trophies and in her mind thinks I should only be playing tournaments She has always been a person motivated by recognition so for her that part of my job is missing. I think that is probably the appeal of tournaments for a lot of people, getting recognized.


This year (2019) will be the first year that I lost money in live tournaments, due mostly to bricking the main (my first main), and multiple bullets in 2k+ WSOP/Wynn/Venetian events and only 1 "score" of 11k in a 2 day venetian tourney.

However this year will be my most profitable tournament year ever despite not having any big cashes. I will explain.

The Prop Bet
I love prop bets, especially when I am the one that is the participant.

Part 1, 2018
The story starts sitting around in a home game in Cabo getting ready to go to the series (summer of 2018). We are making fun of a guy because he really loves to play the daily deepstacks tournaments at the Rio, he goes to vegas and just grinds them all day everyday. He literally does not play anything other than the Rio Deepstacks. I had played a lot of $100-500 tournaments at this point but the Deepstacks is just another level of self punishment. We're giving him a hard time and telling him to try a harder form of poker this year blah blah, just normal ball busting stuff.

We get to point in the conversation where he tells me that if I think they are so soft why don't I try to beat them. He says I don’t have enough patience, I would never be able to keep a stack etc. etc. This evolves into a bet. At this time I really did think they were soft but probably huge variance fests with bad structure and a ton of rake so I wasn't going to bet unless 1. It was for enough money to be worth the pain and 2. I got "generous" odds.

The initial guy we are giving a hard time doesn't have the $ but pools 2 other welloff guys from the game that like to gamble and convinces them he has the best side. We negotiate the following bet:

The Bet:
They lay 7-1 that I cannot win a Rio Daily Deepstack tournament in a 14 day span.
Rules:
I can play as many as I want, as many bullets as I want.
I cannot chop for the win. Have to win outright.
Thats it.
I bet an amount where if I win will make my summer a very good one and is enough where I will take the bet very seriously.
In retrospect I have no idea if I am getting the right price here, and would assume I’m a pretty serious dog at this number. I would estimate the average field size that year of what I was playing was probably 150 or so, big skill edge but a horrible structure.

What ensues is one of the most miserable 10 day stretches of poker ever. At first I decided to try to play every available tourney, then realized that the 1pm is just un-winnable. Too many people etc. I start putting focus on the 4pm then if i busted the 7pm or 10pm.

The day would go something like this:
Brick, brick, 2 bullet brick. , bad beat stories from a home game in Kentucky, brick, brick, poker coaching at the table from a guy wearing 4 harley davidson rings, brick "I only play this so I can learn how the fish think" brick, dealers mucking winning hands, brick, paying 25% rake, "can we get a god damn setup over here!" brick. Finish at 11-1am every night, zero desire to play anything else, Rio bedroom, goodnight. Wake up, rinse and repeat.



I finally cashed one on day 4. I made the final two tables on day 9, I quit and bought out on day 10. With 4 days to go I bought out for a measly 20% discount, I just wanted to be done with it and return to my normal Vegas grind and they knew it. I felt like a horrible prop bettor.

Part II 2019
Same syndicate of guys, offer me the bet again. I tell them I would rather never play poker again then go through that bet.

They up the offer from 7-1 to 10 -1. They are confident, last year was the easiest x$ they ever made.

After a little internal debate I accept. However this time I had a pain reduction strategy. I would only play 7pm and 10pm, these have field sizes of about 100. Sometimes the they have as few as 50 runners. I played insane. If I busted, it was a 1 bullet policy and then back to cash, no harm no foul, if I double or more I play for real.

4 days in 1 had played 3 deepstacks, I reg the 4th my soul beginning to cry as I slap down another $150 into the abyss (only $25 rake this year!)

Then something magical starts to happen.
I run well, I remember the feeling of hope, We build a pretty formidable chip lead. I final table!

We run into one of best opponents you will ever see in these tournaments, he was a legitimately good, and had kind of destroyed the final table so that we were about even in chips at the start of heads up.

He offers a chop, I have to decline per the terms of the bet.
I win a flip 3 hands later and we are the champions!! I literally wanted to cry, the good young kid probably thought I was crazy. He has never seen someone so happy over a 4k score.

Little does he know we just gave ourselves a guaranteed profitable summer, can free roll any tourney we want now and saved 10 days of our lives from the misery that is the Pavillon room white section.

As a follow up to the story, I truly am a horrible prop bettor for not having the money escrowed. The debt collection aspect of this bet was a misery in and of itself and just ended recently.

So even though we lost roughly 30k in tournaments on the year we more than made up for it in the sweetest money of all, prop bet money!

Other Thoughts
Big field live tournaments are pretty soul sucking. Almost always they have left me wishing I hadn't played and just spent the time doing something else.

But this summer, I was final two tables of a small bracelet event and I have never even come close to replicating that excitement and feeling in a cash game. It is a legitimately intoxicating feeling. Getting texts from friends who are following along on PokerNews, wife wanting constant updates etc. No matter how big the stakes have been, the excitement in this $600 tournament was in a completely different ballpark. I am a very calm and painfully logical person but I was sitting there imagining winning a bracelet the same way a kid imagines being an astronaut or something.

The pain when I lost an 80/20 for chip lead pot with 18 left was way more painful then any cash game pot as well. And I have never felt that pain from winning 4.5k in a cash game. Its a weird thing to win money generate excellent ROI and be disappointed but thats the game.

So in summary, tournaments are very soft overall although potentially hard to prove your edge in them? This year I will be taking more shots and hopefully never playing a daily deepstacks again.

Id ont get it, how much did you win from the bet?

Bet was for 100k pesos both times. I was risking about 5.2k USD getting 7-1 and then 10-1. The amount of BS I went through to collect reduced the hourly pretty significantly but still one of my best poker memories.

Just got home from turning a 2k winner into a $150 winning session by isoing a limp and triple barreling AhTh on KQ227r into the very fun players 66. When they know they know! Naturally that got him even on the night and he promptly said goodnight.

Sooo after sessions like that nice to have the good stuff to remember.

Fairly interesting spot came up tonight. Playing roughly $2/4 with the peso conversion, with straddle from anywhere to any size so the game is pretty big probably closer to 5/10.

In this hand there is no straddle and we are $2000 effective so about 500bbs deep which is the interesting part.

Relevant reads on opponent: Solid RFI and for this game actually quite disciplined preflop, horrendous hand reader and very weak postflop and really overvalues hand value.

Earlier in the session he called a 3b, chk/ called the flop and chk/ shoved turn on K22Jddx with KsTs.

Hand 1.

$2/4 7 handed.

EP limps, MP limps, CO (villain above) raises to $15, I 3b AK to $75 in the BB, EP folds, MP folds, CO calls

$2k effective with CO

Flop ($160)
AK6

I bet $70, CO calls

Turn ($300)
9
I bet $260/ CO quickly calls

River ($820)
J

We are still about $1400 effective at this point (350bbs or so)
I think there a few interesting lines on this specific runout against this type of opponent, curious to hear some opinions.


Booked an almost 2k loser in a relatively soft game to end a 8 session win streak . Will probably only get 1 maybe 2 sessions in before the end of the year. GL all, hoping to end the year strong

Quite an interesting spot.

I can see merits for a shove depending on dynamic but against these live weaker players they generally get scared off vs a 1.7x shove, even though in theory it might be better since we only triple AK+ for value.

I'd likely pot it (~750) and expect an A to call given the KT hh. Puke spot if he shoves

wtf is this poker playing impostor???

Lurker since your thread started. Currently on a gap year travelling with my partner. In Istanbul now, would love to visit Mexico at some stage but we are worried about safety.

Feel like you are beaten by 66, AQss, A10ss, KQss and Q10ss combos by river. Assuming other hands that beat you probably won't call the turn bet. So we are beating hands AJcc, A10cc, all other AQ. Also maybe AJo if he has history of calling 3bet with AJo.

As played, I think i would bet 550 and puke fold to a shove most of the time. Or sometimes check calling any bet up to 1x pot???

Sometimes would mix it up by checking-calling turn, or check raising turn.

This is a sick thread, really like some of the wisdom you've shared regarding mental game and the dynamics of live poker. Good luck.

Your line is probably better than what I took, I shoved and got snapped off by QsTs. Not sure he's calling with any worse value other than AJ.

Villain definitely overvalues hands but I don't think he is going to go crazy on this board vs a 70-100% pot bet. so we can pretty easily bet/fold and get max from Ax. I think your logic about the over shove is correct against this player type.

The only tragic case is if we bet non all in and he shoves AJ/A9 for value and we fold. But in this big of a pot I'm not sure if thats too big of a consideration.

I like bet 70%+/fold and in retrospect is probably a better line than what I took. He ended up having one of the hands you pointed out above.


Check calling with top of range hands in these kind of games is a recipe for missing a ton of value. The players just aren't aggressive enough and/or don't go for thin value often enough. For the most part the games are very call happy and so this is a line I try to avoid against most all opponents.

Thanks for reading and the large majority of safety concerns are overhyped. I feel like I am becoming the biggest shill for Mexico ITT but there are so many amazing places and coolest people in this country its a shame it gets the reputation it does. Don't buy drugs in the street and stay away from 3-4 of the 32 states and you are good to go!

Thanks for reading!

The month in pictures

I have been really curious about why I enjoy posting on this blog. I think it comes down to recording some part of my life. I deleted FB when i moved to Mex and haven’t used Instagram for 2 years+ so I don’t really have an outlet to share which I find generally healthy. I rarely talk about poker results with anyone I know for a lot of obvious reasons so this is pretty much the only outlet I have.
I was thinking it would feel weird posting results (bragging) but considering they have been primarily losing up until this point in the PGC that has not been an issue
It actually feels productive to post and address leaks which is the one positive of losing I suppose..

Anyways don’t feel like posting my normal wall of text so I will instead just do the month in pictures.




Always a sign the games are getting better when the 50k peso (about $2600) plaques start to come out. Cashing out after 11 hour session his was one of the better sessions of the month. We were in for 20k ($1100) and out for 105K pesos ($5700) playing basically a 2/5 game. The longer the games ran the better the quality seems to have been this month.



Brother came to visit. I took him to my favorite non fancy food place in Baja.
Awesome/weird tacos. Duck on blue corn tortilla seems to be the consensus favorite.

And they do really cool mezcal tasting flights served in those little coconut half shells. They do the flights by the state they are produced in so you can really see the difference of say Oaxaca vs Guerrero.
La Lupita in San Jose is the name of the restaurant.




Mariachi jukebox on the boat all night. A very debacherous affair.



Ugly sweater season. Somehow this beauty took 3rd place.



End of a session with the morning sun starting to come in
5k, 1k, 25k plaques. I love plaque games, makes it feel bigger and more special for some reason.




Had to get creative to fit more panels on the roof of one of our rentals. Getting daily updates from the solar guy and we are actually going to be able to get almost 100% off the grid which is phenomenal considering the lack of roof space. He built a pergola extension which provides shade on the deck and also gave us space to put 4 more panels you see in this photo.




A little Airbnb weekend getaway with wife/kids and another couple in Los Barilles on the Sea of Cortez side of Baja. Our sunset ritual was to grill dinner and then go for a long walk and bonfire in front of the house.
For me being able to take short mental breaks with 0 poker is invaluable. It completely resets my brain and I come back to the games hungry. For obvious reasons not a huge fan of showing my/families faces in a public blog.




The Cape, home to two of the best bars in Cabo.






Walking a friends new parcel. We might build something fun up there depending on how a current project goes.



USD games are finally back!



A phenomenal $20 bottle of Mexican wine, Vueltabajo. Holds up against any of the good Napa counterparts and is probably the best Mexican wine I have ever had. From the Valle de Guadalupe which is kind of our Napa valley.

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I will post a year in review and a month end post with results (finally a good month) in the next few days when I have time. Happy New Year to all and good luck in 2020!

Best blog on the forum. Thanks for the content. Here's to crushing in the new year!