Hi everybody! My name is Tim and I guess at this point I am a professional poker player. I have been playing 2/5 full time for about 7 months now with a little 5/10 sprinkled in. I play in Vegas, and moved here somewhat on a whim to play poker and date a girl. I love poker and had been posting about it on facebook but not really getting the responses I wanted, so I decided to post here after being a long time reader of some other good threads on here.

I began playing poker online pretty regularly on Absolute Poker and pretty quickly was hooked. I played almost exclusively 6 and 9 max cash games playing 9 tables of whatever the highest stakes games I could find, almost always nothing higher than 5/10. My bankroll management was horrible and I busted a few times and would simply start the game over by depositing 100 and opening 9 tables of 10NL and adding in bigger games with each double up. After a few $100 investments and a lot of insane shot taking I landed comfortably at some high stakes games and never looked back.

Then black Friday happened and I had a very large amount of money for a kid my age trapped in some fantasy bank account never to make it back to me. I did a bunch of other stuff and never really thought about poker much beyond that, I had friends that played and I would play once in a while at Foxwoods or Mohegan Sun but mostly just to go do something for a day or weekend.

Fast forward a few years and a friend was getting married in Vegas and I flew out for the wedding. I ended up meeting a great girl, and did well playing cards and decided to ignore my return flight to stay and chase the easy money and reluctant girl. The next few months saw me playing a bunch of 1/3 at the Wynn and occasionally flying home for a few days or weeks.

Anyways fast forward a bunch and I have been writing up mini notes on facebook and getting really lame responses, or lack of responses and I thought I would try here. I love the game and am always trying to get better. The truth is everybody sucks at poker just like most things with ridiculous ceilings for play. Nobody shoots 100% in basketball and nobody plays every hand right. I **** up when I play all the time! I think I am one of the better 2-5 players in Vegas, but I still have a ton of **** to improve on. Hopefully this thread will help me decompress from playing and get some different view points on things.

Anyways played a short session tonight and here is the most interesting hand:

I raise 79 in MP in a straddled pot to 35. Tightish ABC reg calls the button as does the old man who straddled. The flop is 289. Old man checks, I bet 60, buttons folds and he reraises to 135 with about 450 behind. This raise really looks like he has a scared hand, usually 9x but sometimes something like 67 maybe. I elect to call and see what he does on the turn. The turn is the K. He leads for 65 which looks as weak as can be to me. I raise to 135. I like this sizing because it lets me shove most rivers if he just calls with a hand like 9x. He thinks for a minute shakes his head and folds.

I finished up playing pretty quick to go to dinner with a friend, but session was good and I finally dug out of the hole that I was in to start the month.

GL! How do you rate the 2/5 games in Vegas outside of the series from 1-10? I was there for 6 days in June and almost never returned home as well.. Do you find that you are able to easily balance the 35+ hours weekly along with the overwhelming amount of hot women and urge to party all the time? Long-run profitability in LV specifically on the 2-5 level?

So far so good. I'm still with the same girl that I moved out here with and have always been somewhat of a homebody. I love to go out drinking and dancing, but that got a lot less exciting when I already knew who I started dating somebody. The hours is usually pretty easy, I have no problem most of the time. I will often observe the table for the first two hours or so and then bust out my Ipad and watch whatever and pause it when I get in a hand or a interesting hand is playing out. This lets me play super long, I have a lot of 10+ hour days. Still not a big enough sample, but I really think it is not that hard to beat the game for over 12bb/hour with good play and a lot of exploitative play.

i will ride with you dog...subbed!

Boo iPad. Thanks for ruining games.

Played for about 5 hours yesterday to break even. Had a large amount of premium hands and lost with most of them, but cracked another guys aces with jacks to salvage the session at the end. Not many interesting hands, every time I had a big pair the flop would have overs and be multi-way with lots of action before me. I think I am getting better at picking good spots to bluff. The 200bb games let you threaten stacks a lot more. Generally speaking you want to attack the preflop raiser on paired boards, they just can't do much when you check raise 993 unless they suspect you are bluffing.

"Boo iPad. Thanks for ruining games."

I agree that stuff like this is bad for games, but welcome to the disconnected social times. Everybody has their head down on the phone at all times already. I'm happy to engage in good conversation most of the time, but far to often I hear random strategy talk at the table and have no interest in contributing. I'm happy to listen for a minute to see how they think, but after that hearing that a flush draw is 50/50 because it either happens or it don't gets old and I would rather watch starcraft or watch a tv show. As much as they like it I would be in favor of banning Ipad and phones from the table as I do think it makes the game worse, but as long as they allow them I am going to keep using it.

Pretty horrific 3 hours tonight. Got run over by the deck pretty badly. Most of the big losing hands are just cooler that I am not worried about as they go both ways. Had a interesting dynamic come up that had me 4betting AQo for value tonight. The villain had been pretty active in raising preflop, and I had been fairly active lately in 3betting him to put him in line a little bit. I had 3 bet him preflop 4 times in the past hour, and the last one was me 3betting the button with 88's and it getting checked down on an ugly runout. He announced 5 high I tabled my 8's and you could see him visibly upset that somebody would reraise 8's. Obviously way ahead of his range and a good spot, but clearly not what he was used to.

I open AQo UTG at a 7 handed table, get two calls and he makes it 80 out of the bb. I had around 1100 to start the hand, and am pretty sure this is light (or just plain old payback) so I bump it to 260, it folds around and he calls. I cbet 350 on a ragged flop and he folds. Really weird to be 4betting a hand like AQo, I'd normally fold to a 3bet as most people are super tight but I was just sure this guy wanted to get me back. Anyways pretty happy with how I played tonight, would have liked to stay longer but after the last cooler I thought better of it. Will be getting my gaboool on tomorrow.

Subbed, gl

Cool to see another Vegas grinder's thread. Wheres your usual spot?

Usually Venetian but I tend to whore myself out a lot. Going to try some other places tomorrow I think. On pace to have my first losing month since moving here Hoping to right the ship tomorrow with some run good, or at the very least not run into monsters with my slightly smaller monsters.

Weren't you concerned about the hand being declared a misdeal if it got to showdown?

My bad 8d9h sorry for the mix up Took me a second to figure that out.

MISDEAL!

Subbed.

Good luck! You'll be out of the hole in a day or two. I bring out the run good.

Found a little run good last night. Played a little over 8 hours. The first two I spent at a good 5-10 game, and when they moved me to an awful main game I quickly jumped down to 2-5. The most interesting hand I played at 5-10 was this:

We are playing 6 handed, and the new guy who bought in for 5k and has a lot of gamble is using his big stack as a weapon. He straddles and I open up in first position to 70 with 88. It folds around to him and he 3-bets to 240. I'm about 3k deep and elect to call, I'm not giving him much credit here and think 88's are very likely to be the best hand. The flop is T92 rainbow, a pretty safe flop for me. He continues for 300 and I call. The turn is another ten. He bets 500. I can't imagine if he had a real hand like JJ+ he would want to bet this turn card very often, and I was pretty sure I had the best hand the whole time. This means we can either call, which is reasonable since we think we have the best hand or raise and turn it into a bluff. I think even if he has a real hand its very hard for him to continue on that turn card. Also by bluffing we fold out all his overs which is likely at least 2 overs given we only have 8's which means he has 6 outs at the very least. I make it 1000, which I think makes my hand look the strongest. He insta mucks and I guess he was just dicking around.

I talked about another interesting hand with the guy next to me. A good loosish reg opens to 40 UTG and a tightish asian kid calls him. He makes it 200 in the sb with AK with the ace of hearts. Only the asian kid calls. Effective stacks are 3k. The flop is 457 all hearts. He leads for 300 and the asian kid calls. The turn is the Ac. He bets 700, the asian kid folds. We talked about it briefly and I think betting here is pretty awful. You can't really expect to get called by worse that this point unless he has something like AKh or AQh. He will also bet those hands. I really like checking and shoving or raising depending on how he sizes his turn bet. By betting all we do is announce not folding and offer to play for stacks. It is a great spot to check and let him maybe value bet QQ or JJ or hope the river is a heart and improves him if he does not bet.

I played almost no interesting hands at 2-5, but this one I liked.

TAG asian kid opens to 20 (this means he has a non premium as premiums he makes it 25) and a lady that also has massive sizing tells calls. I raise it up to 80 on the button with A5s hoping to just pick up the dead money. He folds and she calls. The flop is A68 rainbow. She checks and I check back. If I bet here I think I only get called by better for the most part, and checking disguises my hand. She is a capable hand reader and I don't want to only get called by better here and I want to pot control some since I have gotten myself into a really weird spot. The turn is a 7. She checks and I think betting here is totally fine, but I also don't hate checking. I opt to check one more time. The river is a J, and she checks. I bet 100 and get snap called. I table the Ace and she goes off to her boyfriend/husband about how I should never have an Ace and check twice. Felt pretty good about that one, though I guess I should have bet bigger. Anyways gonna go play some more soon.

ya still got some digging to do, and likely going to record my first losing month unless tonight goes good but it is what it is. Hoping for a big July, but gotta work around a lot of people visiting.

i imagine july 4 weekend in vegas gets pretty tourist-y

GL crushin!

I have a few tourists here with me actually. Thankfully they are also interested in pokering. I sat at a 1-3 table for an hour yesterday and enjoyed hanging out with one of my friends and folding a bunch. I won the biggest pot at table by limping jacks over 4 other limpers, knowing that the sb was leaving (he told his friend hey let me dump the rest of this really quick and moved all in the last hand). He made it 15 without looking, everybody called and I dunked it for 105 and called of his shove and random old man who kept looking at the dead 15's and saying "mmmm very temping"". I folded AA an orbit later when I raised a limp and called the flop and turn on K579 and folded the river when he potted it on a T. Somewhat weird line, but the dude liked to fold and I didn't wanna raise flop and thought the line made sense for the same reasons on the turn.

I played some 5-10 for a while as well before people arrived at Venetian. Had a very very good table, including one huge whale and two lesser whales. I need to play better. I can think of 4 hands that I could have done something better or different. I played some more at the Rio later and lost a little bit back, but overall I was up a good bit for the day. Not really happy about it, I felt like I should have been up at least another 1.5k if I had played better, but can't really complain about not playing great and profiting I guess.

Great job making the best of a bad playing day! Getting away with days like these often lead into a nice run.

One of my friends has been playing a lot on wsop and grinding this multitable madness bonus they have. Basicly you open up 10 tables and play for a while and during 6-11 one table gets hit once and you get a big bonus. Well tonight I binked it:

Congratulations for playing at our chosen table in the Multi-Table Madness drawing on 07/06/2014. Because you were involved in the winning hand, you will have $550 credited to your account within 72 hours.

Feels really weird playing online again, but I like it. I miss having a HUD, but I already prefer it to going to a casino most of the time. That being said the games are quite a bit harder. You have to work harder to get value from good hands, and you have to be more aware of people bluffing you which is borderline non existent at the 2-5NL. I have played some live this month, and mostly 5-10 which has gone ok. I plan on playing a lot more after this bonus thing goes away.

I had a whole mess of friends visiting so I had been real bad about playing almost any poker. I played online here and there but mostly have been visiting with people and also being somewhat lazy. Thankfully its back to work until Tuesday when my mom comes to visit. Here is a writeup/recap of tonight.

I just got done playing a 8-9 hour session mostly at Aria. I was very very very card dead for almost the entirety of the time. Often when I did pick up a premium hand like AK I would be in the small blind facing a raise and a hefty reraise and would be forced to fold rather than get involved out of position. I think in cash games people really overvalue AK, especially in 3 and 4 bet pots at the lower stakes. Most people would just think sweet AK the third/fourth best starting hand, lets shovel money into the pot. People don't call or get it in with AQ, their playing for stacks range most of the time is QQ-AA AK and sometimes JJ. This is real bad news when the pot gets real big if you have the AK, as you don't really beat much.

Anyways I managed to flop a set when I got 3-bet holding 66 on TT6 two tone. The asian lady continued trying to build the pot with a bet of 85 into 130, I made it 200. She calls pretty quickly. The turn is a Qd I rejoice at the flush not getting there and tank shove 669 into the pot. I really like this line as it makes my hand look as much like a bluff as possible. If I bet something like 300 I think it looks way more valuey and she is a capable hand reader so I think this is the best way to extract the maximum (its also entirely possible that she is just never folding her KK/AA). Anyways she starts tanking, and trying to talk to me. She ask what my name is, desperate for any information. I just stare at the Queen of diamonds like the creepy dude at a bar states at the hot girl they have no chance with. She continues to try to engage me in a conversation asking if I really liked that flop and while I can here her int he background I am busy trying to mentally undress the Queen in my head (no such luck, my imagination went away when I was a little kid I guess). Eventually she calls and the river is a very safe 3 and she mutters nice hand. And that ladies and gentlemen is how you make a thousand dollars real quick.

For a real long time I did a lot of calling/raising and missing flops in multi way pots and check folding off 15-25 here and there with the occasional cbet and take it down. I was in the sb with AQo and a competent younger aggressive player makes it 30 with a straddle. I flat and so does the straddle. If I had been playing almost any hands I would normally 3bet but I don't really wanna just take it down and force out the fishy dude that straddled. The flop is AT6 and it checks around. The turn is a Q and I bet 65. The fishy dude folds and the other guy tank calls. The river is a 8. I really like bombing it when you have a big hand, but you also have to figure out what you are trying to get called by. This kid does not have many aces in his range when he checks back the flop. He might and I stress might have a real weak one like A3s or something. I think his most likely holds are a weak ace, KK, or KQ/QJ. I think the KK/KQ are the much more likely hand so we want to bet an amount that those hands can call. With the pot being 230 I put out a meager bet of 120 and after much deliberation he called. Gotta get that value!

I ran one bluff when a good spot presented itself. I was in the sb and a guy opens up for 20 and gets two calls. I have been super tight up until this point as I have been totally card dead (though people don't often pay attention so trusting that they could recognize you're image is not usually worth what you think it should be) and I squeezed to 100 with K4o. I earn two fold and the loose old man calls on the button. The flop is 962 and I fire a one and done shot of 140 and he quickly folds.

I didn't win another pot over 200 the rest of the night and still finished up close to up a buyin when it was all said and done. The big thing to focus on is just letting other people make big mistakes and not punting yourself. Everybody gets the same number of cooler hands and the same number of bad beats. Some people are just better at folding them sometimes, and other just can't bring themselves to fold AK preflop when the old man that never plays a hand let alone 3 bets is now 5 bet shoving. The other thing that I think really helps is having a friend that plays. Latley I have been talking a lot with general good guy Tannon Grace and it helps you stay a lot more balanced. Getting feedback is always good, that a big part of the reason I write these and just having somebody say "ya that sucks dude" who understands it helps a lot. I've still got a long way to go in improving but I think I can continue to make a good living and hopefully move up to more 5/10 and even 10/20 at some point.

GOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOLD!!!!!!!

gold goal goal goal gooooold...>>>>>>>.I just stare at the Queen of diamonds like the creepy dude at a bar states at the hot girl they have no chance with. She continues to try to engage me in a conversation asking if I really liked that flop and while I can here her int he background I am busy trying to mentally undress the Quee
n in my head

"states" was an odd choice tho....

glgl

ession which is real short. I almost always feel bad leaving that early, but the game was not very good and I don't think staying just to put in the hours when you are fairly tired and much more interested in playing Starcraft is better than playing in a sub par game. I do feel bad because this is supposed to be a job, and I think one of the main reasons people fail at poker is they just don't treat it like a job. So few grinders put in a 40 hour work week. It's just way to easy to take time off, stay in one day, do whatever. I love poker because it lets me do that, but if I don't have a real reason I feel guilty for not putting in good volume. Anyways I drowned my guilt in a sandwich from subway and now I want to do this write up to purge the information from my head.

I bought in for my usual thousand and don't get involved in much for the first 30-40 minutes. I chip down a little bit here and there but feel I have good reads on the rest of the table. The guy to my right is super active and has been raising over limpers and raising all the time. He is also deep at well over 1k. I plan on 3betting him pretty light to see how he reacts and 3betting all value hands like 77+ KJs+. He ends up opening from late position and I make it 60 with QJs. Everybody folds and the flop rolls out KT9 with two diamonds. He checks I bet 90 and he makes it 215. I have 800 in front of me and don't know much else about this guy but I do know he can bluff from two previous hands. I elect to call pretty much never fold. I think calling is better than raising because if I raise I think he will fold a lot of hands. I have been real tight up until this point and I think he might even fold a hand as good as KQ. Anyways the turn is a 9 and he bets and I call. The river is a 3 and he shoves and I call and he has....... QJ :/ not the worst result but I can tell he was annoyed that I would 3bet QJ.

I got owned pretty hard when I 3bet TT in the sb to 110 over a raise to 20 and 3 calls. The super spazzy/bluff asian kid called me. The flop was 888 and I lead for 140, he called. I'm loving my hand at this point, he never has a pocket pair bigger then TT as he would have 3bet before the flop. The turn is a 4 and I decide to check, I'm not getting any more value from his pocket pairs I think, so a check here and a river card under a Q and I think I can bet like 200-250 and get looked up by a hand like 66. Anyways he bets 300 and I opt to stuff it all in rather than just call. He snap calls and flips over T8s :/ Good beats I guess. I actually think calling here might be a little better and then leading the river super small like 200 or something might get more love from small pocket pairs.

I chip back up in a few spots and the whales are getting close to leaving. I raise 87s UTG to 15. Normally this would be a fold but with so many bad players and time ticking down on them leaving I want to play as many hands as possible with them. Anyways the drunk guy to my right calls as do 3 other people. The flop is 633 giving me a flush draw and two overs. I lead when the blinds check to me for 40 into 75. The drunk guy announces I have none of that and calls. The turn is a 7, giving me likely the best hand. I raised UTG so we are really targeting small pairs like 44,55 and naked 6's at this point so I bet pretty small 65. He calls and gives me the drunken stare downs. This type of look is usually reserved for my drunk friends staring longingly at another persons greasy food, but I guess he has decided I am the fish. The river is a offsuit Q, not a great card as it hits me a lot harder then him. I fire 80 hoping he has something good enough to look me up and he announces I missed the flop so he calls. I see an A when he mucks his cards and he announces how lucky I am to have hit the turn when he knew I missed the flop. He then berates me for not betting the turn, someone points out that I did and then he says well he didn't get a dime on the river to which I just smile and finish racking up. The other fish have left and this guy has a sub 100 stack and is either going to lose it or get kicked out shortly.

I played another six hour session Friday night/Saturday early morning. I had a fair number of interesting hands to get into. I sit down to the right of a good asian kid who I have played with a fair amount and he bemoans his luck since I guess I have made it a habit of 3betting him. I think he is just not used to people 3betting worse then JJ+. Not much happens for the first hour. Anyways a few people fold and he raises to 20 and I make it 60 with 99. It folds back to him and he calls. The flop is 832 with two spades. He checks and I fire 80. He calls. The turn is a 3. He checks again and I bet 120. He calls. The river is a 6 and he checks. I check behind and he tables AK. I think he kinda leveled himself on the turn with thinking that I might have worse, and maybe a small percentage of the time I do. I also wonder if I could have gotten some value on the river as this runout is about as dry as the desert I live in.

This somewhat active macho dude raises to 15 and gets 2 calls. I make it 65 in the sb or bb and he makes it 120 more. I make the easy fold.

An orbit or two later he makes it 15 gets 2 callers and I make 65 in the sb with JJ. He calls and the super loosey goosey asian old man calls. The J93 rainbow flop looks pretty sexy to me. I lead for 90 and get two calls. The turn is a Q which is a pretty good card, as it gives them a lot of pair straight draws that can call or bet the turn. I lead for 300 and Mr. Macho tanks for a long time before folding and the asian dude jams less then 300 and clearly prays for a good river. The duece on the river is as safe as it gets and the goose has been busted.

I raise a little while later and Mr. Macho who is now sitting with Ms. Macho calls. The flop is KT3 with two spades. I check and he fires 30. I call but he seems happy with his hand and I am a little worried. The turn is the Qs. I check and he bets 60, I make it 150 and he calls. The river is another K which is the sexiest card in the deck. It gives me a boat, which means I am beating any flush draws he might be slow playing though I think this meat head just jams real hard if and when he has it. It means he very likely has made 3 kings! I bet 250 and he tanks for ever, after much deliberation he says he can't fold and calls and mucks KT with the K of spades. I like the way I played this hand a lot, I think the turn and river bets are a bit tiny, but I know at the time I was worried he would fold as he had made some pretty good laydowns correctly earlier.

This hand was the one I was most annoyed with myself for. I open with QJs and a straight forward ABC old man calls. A drunk asian kid makes it 40 and we both call. The flop is J72 and I check. Old man leads for 60 and the asian kid postures a bunch looks like he is going to make it 300 and then giggles and mucks. I call. The turn is a 5 and I check call 100. I think against an ABC old man this is pretty bad. We are just hoping he has JT and nothing else. If I had a hand like KJ or AJ I'm all for it, but QJ is just to weak a hand and while we do beat JT we just don't really beat enough to justify calling a second time. The river is a 9 and we c/c and he tables KJ. I muck and think of all the cool things I could do with the hundo I just wasted. This is the type of spot that I think most people just call the hundo and bemoan their misfortune at flopping a worse top pair. It's the type of spot I usually don't pay off...... and this time I just plain old punted.

I'm on pace to have an amazing first year of playing full time. I couldn't have dreamed poker could be this good just starting out and playing these smallish stake games. If I had been told a year ago I would be on pace to make what I am now I would have started sooner. Hell I probably should have been doing this from the time they shut down the internet poker age. With how good and profitable it has been it still blows my mind to think about how many bad calls and few hundred here and there I have gifted away. I can't control the cards, I can only control my decisions and when I make bad ones like this it hurts. That being said it is also inspiring to think that I can see very easily things that can be improved upon. These mistakes usually just make me want to play more, just like losing a basketball game always made me want to run it back.

Our table broke eventually and after a few minutes of haggling with the drunk Asian kid and trying to get him to play heads up I am moved to a different 2/5. The game looks pretty awful and if I don't find a few good spots I'm ready to just call it a night or try Bellagio or another casino. The first hand I watch shifts 1k from one player to another, I think I might have found a reasonable table after all. A few hands in a kid who seems somewhat tight from the orbit I have witnessed opens UTG (we are 7 handed) and I call with KQo. The flop is Jh9c7c. He checks so I bet 40. The other guy calls and he folds. The turn is a Ts BINGO! I bet 110 and he tank raises to 350. He has about 550 behind and I stuff since I don't have another other options and I don't think he folds an 8 anyways. He calls I table my hand and he says he has outs. The As is not going to be one of them and I rake in a juicy pot. He leaves and I end up picking up after a few more orbits as the game is not very good without him.

Overall this last night had a lot of interesting spots, due to some strange out of the ordinary villains. I'm going to try and play longer tomorrow. I'm up almost 4.5 buyins from the last 3 sessions and for the most part have been really happy with my play. The QJ hand irks me a little but you just have to accept that you are going to screw up sometimes and try to not do it in the future. Playing good and winning is about as good as it gets, and when things are flowing like this I really can't wait to get back to playing the next day. The games are actually decent lately and I have been taking full advantage of them when I have been playing. As always please post comments, thoughts, questions or encouraging words.