Sorry to hear Spike, good luck with the future.

FWIW, if anyone in the pen gets to 20 wins in a row I will wear G's donkeydouche as my avatar for a month, gogogo!

GcluelessmarriagenoobG


I'm in the same boat. Pretty sure the longest I've gone between poker sessions since getting married in 2010 is about 2 weeks (likely during my honeymoon). Christmas vacation I actually play more poker than usual (usually putting in a lotta holiday daytime sessions, especially if the wife is at work). And I also find folding for hours while nothing happens oddly relaxing.

Gcluelessthread-from-the-deadnoobG

Divorce sucks, but then I also hear that it's a lot better once it's over with. :shrug: Getting back into poker should help.

Local Update:
I haven't been in either of the local charity rooms in a long time, and I won't play there anymore. There are a bunch of other people that will not step foot inside anymore either. MGM seems to be the place to be now, especially with the $1/3 PLO game down there. The rooms in Westland / Livonia are pretty good, but if you're driving that far why not just go to the casino?

No more Home Games around anymore. At all. There's a hell of a story there that I won't put in a thread. It's also why some of the other players won't play in Ypsi. There is a little talk of starting up again, but I wouldn't expect anything until the fall.

Quick update: still in the life meat grinder. Starting to turn my attention back to the felt but not a lot to be done until the ex isn’t trying to take half of my bankroll. That’s a rake I’m not willing to pay so I wait.

Wow.

So this thing still exists.

Let me update the poker world on my life.

After nearly two years of pointless litigation, I am a single man. Ex-Mrs. Spike is a stubborn lady. I'm happy that it's behind me. I've got three super cool kids, my retirement is in tact, and I unexpectedly bought a house so that's taken care of as well. I'm pretty excited for life to calm the F down after two years of pretty consistent turmoil. I recently got a raise at work, and my settlement money just came in. I didn't play a lick of poker this past year, but I did build a recording studio in my basement. So, my music hobby has taken off. All of my old musician friends are coming into town regularly now to record everything we've ever written before we die and its lost forever.

About three months ago my poker mentor texted me saying that he'd been dabbling on Stars now that gaming is legal in Michigan again. He told me it was pretty soft, but I didn't heed it much. Finally, after a month, I checked it out. I noted that they had a first deposit match and dumped $100 on it.

The last time I was online, you had to sacrifice a goat to get money on a seedy site. Those were rock gardens and I struggled to beat 5NL. I was shocked to discover the play on Stars is insanely soft. In no time at all I've been able to grind $100 up to $500. I'm crushing $10NL and will likely move up to $30NL soon. Black Friday and the 10 intervening years effectively cleared out all the low level regs that had infested online poker. What's left is reminiscent of 2010 online poker except I have about 300k more hands under my belt now. This is easy money right now.

This past week my settlement money arrived and I got to thinking about what to do with it. I replenished my savings, paid some debt off etc. I still had some left over. It occurred to me that I could take some and seed a small bank roll and potentially come up with a sustainable side gig. I don't want to get too deep into it as it can take over your life pretty fast, but I also know that I have a winning track record and this could produce some much needed cash.

So, here we go AGAIN.

$1000 self stake. I've lost all of my stats from previous attempts, but I know lifetime I'm about $22/hr at $1/2. My ROR is small even with a small BR provided I don't go nuts.

This weekend I had two sessions. It took a little time to get used to plexiglass partitions at the table. It felt like I had received a misconduct penalty only I was getting paid for it.

Whenever I come back from a long layoff, I inevitably play well for an hour and then turn into a donk fish. It takes one session to work out the pent up OMG I have to be aggressive thing I have. That is exactly what happened.

I played extremely well for 90 minutes. Then ran KK<AA preflop against an unknown. 5 minutes later I flopped a set and stacked someone to be up ~$100. There was a spewy aggrodonk to my right and I made a couple of missteps against him.

He raises from the BTN over limpers and I have ATo in the blinds. This is not really a calling spot. I am ahead of his range certainly, but I can't really play it for a profit OOP 150BB deep. He's terrible but in the shoving chips in as fast as he can way. That's not going to be very fun for me. Because it was my first session back ,I 3bet anyway and he promptly 4 bet 50% of his stack. I folded and he showed KQs. The lesson from this hand is that you have to consider who you're up against, what your position at the table is, and the fact that much of our advantage at LLSNL is being able to fold fun to look at cards when it's not advantageous to play them.

I lost another pot to him involving him turning the nuts. I didn't lose a ton, but it was another spot where I raised a marginal hand in MP and just shouldn't have been in that spot.


The end of the night saw him realize his 20% equity against my all in and immediately get up to go play 5/T. I assume he got crushed there, but good for him.

Session #1 ended with a disappointing -$300.

BR=$700. It wouldn't be a Spikeraw22 0 to infinity BR challenge without a first session loss.



Session #2: I analyzed my session from the day before and decided that I just wasn't going to make any stupid preflop raises today. For the most part I accomplished that.


I managed to make a dude rage quit when I ran him down and then overbet the river. He viewed that as a bluff (I had gotten there once or twice vs. him in small pots already). He called that off, and immediately racked up and took off when I showed the nuts.



I'll close my first update in like a year and a half with two HH.


Hand 1:

I just sat down a few hands ago. I'm in LP with 77. I limp behind several people and BB makes it $19. So far, I've seen him involved in lots of pots, clearly happy to put chips in the middle. This raise is also way bigger than his previous bets.

With $200 effective stacks, normally this would be a fold. A couple things changed my mind.

1. There was one caller in between.
2. His splashy ways plus bigger than normal bet made me fairly certain he had a premium hand and would not ever lay it down.

So, I called. Of course, I flopped top set. Over the course of three streets we got all in and I doubled up within my first orbit and washed away the stink of my previous loss. THe lesson here is that you have to constantly evaluate the situation. That's about as much as I'm calling to set mine against anyone with that stack size, but in some situations I stretch the rules if it makes sense.


HH 2:

I'm up big. I have over $900 on the table. The table is mostly LP. There is one guy who likes to get aggro. He has ~$300.

Preflop:
In MP I raise Q8 to $12. There are 3 callers.

This is an iffy raise. The table was REALLY passive and I was still playing pretty tight. My raises were getting called by 1-2 players and I was controlling post flop pretty handily. When I'm going well I will mix in some raises with meh but not trash hands just to maintain control over the table and to keep people thinking I could have anything when most of the time I've got it. Show down Q8s once and that's all they'll remember.

Flop: 876 ($49)
Checks to me with potential aggro tard left behind.

I felt compelled to cbet as I have TP and probably the best hand and there are a gazillion draws out there. I figured people would call with their draws and let me know fast if I was beat. The only exception to this was the guy behind me. He was definitely the type to raise his draws. I cbet $35 and that's exactly what happened. He went all in. Now I'm looking at $170 to win $300.

I did some math on the spot and decided that it was probably a break even spot. He's doing this with his sets, 2P, 89, 8T, 9x, 5x, and every combo of hearts that exist. His body language made me lean towards draw FWIW.

Doing the math in Poker Cruncher later confirmed that this range is about break even for the money. So.... what do you do? Normally, I would call and gambool it up for fun and because it's good for my image. Today, I folded. In the long run, I am ambivalent as it's neutral EV. But, with a short roll it's unnecessary variance. Looking back, I probably should not have cbet as I had a strong suspicion that I would get raised. I just don't like giving free cards, but if you can't call that raise, then the free card is preferable. This is the first time in my life I've made a BR related decision at the table. He flipped over 35 like he was the hottest thing in the room. It confirmed my read which is cool. So, slightly -EV fold against his exact hand, but probably a good fold considering I'm sitting on 6.5 BI currently.





Finally, the same aggro guy got irritated when he raised AA to $16 and got no action. I didn't show, but I folded KQo.

1. That was a larger than normal raise size.
2. I was in the SB, and had vowed not to make that mistake pretty hands are relative. If the situation demands it, fold them. That's how we beat fish.

+$633.

BR: $1333.

Not a bad start for the new roll. I don't plan to play 5 days a week like I did in grad school. For one thing, the local games all got COVID so it's a longer drive now. Mostly though, I don't want poker taking over my life. For the first time in a long time I am free to do what I love, and I love a lot of things. I'll update here as I go and hopefully, you can watch me rise like a Phoenix for what is by my unofficial count a fifth trip from $0 to infinity (and beyond).

GL with the new roll!

My guess is the joy you get in playing/recording music with buds >>> the joy you get in poker? Course doesn't have to be a 100% that versus this situation, but just make sure you slot everything into your life appropriately.

Ggoodluckwithyournewlife!G

If I have to pick, I will always pick making music with my bros. The thing is that they're only hear once a month or so. The rest is just me practicing and editing on my own so there's plenty of room for a modest amount of poker. Especially, when you consider that I can eventually use the income to foster my other hobbies. I totally get what you're saying. Poker has a tendency to invade places it should not be. A lot like China and Russia.

On Sunday, I sat next to (with plexiglass in between) an old man who was there because he had driven a retirement home friend to the casino to play slots. I learned that he was about to turn 88 years old. He still has his driver's license and tootles people around town. He drives his 92 year old brother's car. He wants to sell it (it's 21 years old), but apparently it officially belongs to his brother's ex wife and he's afraid it will mess up their divorce agreement. He plays a few times a year and doesn't really care about the money.

I was rooting for him. He played like you'd expect an 88 year old to play. Nonsensically.

He mostly limped and folded anytime someone showed aggression assuming he was beaten. He was good about showing me his hole cards every time which was fun.

On the other side of the table was the table donkey. He was raising to ridiculous amounts and just trying to bully everyone. I elarned that he was on the PLO list which explains a lot. I doubled up through him early and he's been after me ever since.

An hour later, oldy looks down at KK and makes it $15. I know because he secretly showed me his hand after I folded. Donkey Kong 3 bet to $100. Oldy called. I was pretty impressed, because that was like, the perfect play in that spot. Now they only had $107 left.

The flop came down Qxx rainbow. Donkey Kong shoved his remaining $107 in the pot, and I whispered, "Yes! You got him buddy!" Quiet enough that he couldn't hear it, which meant I could have just yelled it through the glass. Astoundingly, he folded and said, "I know you have aces." Ugh. He busted a couple minutes later and was out of my life.

There is no lesson to be learned here. It was just a maddening scene to watch. He HAD him. HAD HIM. Donkey Kong looked completely sheepish as he raked in the pot. He knew he'd gotten away with one. He went on a lunch break right after and then immediately to PLO when he returned which is a dick move because no one else can take his seat, and also no one at the table can go to lunch until he gets back. More reasons to try to find him next time.


I hope Oldy lives to be 100.

Just played a quick 135 hands of 10NL. It was a good one. Online poker is currently not dead!

Bottom of his 5 bet calling range I assume



TPTK is a really good hand. Cooler




Frequent flyer stacking off for metagame purposes ldo




Been breaking even for a few thousand hands. This helps.

Lol, awesome. I guess all you can do is tap the table in front of Oldy and say "nice fold dude, he had you" to make him feel better.

I've seen enough stories similar to this (and the opposite) which makes me feel I should never fold a hand to anyone over 70 years old.

Gawaitingthefogtoslowlyenvelopmetoo,ohhowblissfuli twillbeG

This is going to be a good weekend. I had this evening free for my 1-2x/month long casino session. I packed my poker clothes (jeans, comfy shirt, and intimidating ball cap) into my back pack. I changed my clothes at work and went straight down town once I was done for the day. This way I hoped to avoid the 70 something person wait list you have to navigate if you show up in the early evening. It worked like a charm. I checked in and was given my choice of a seat at two separate tables.

I sauntered over to table #1 and saw deep stacks although the atmosphere was quiet and it didn't look like anyone was having much fun. So, I crept over to table #2 and saw that there were shallow stacks and the atmosphere was quiet and it didn't look like anyone was having much fun.

A reg from the charity circuit recognized me from my crusher days and hopped out of his chair at table #1.

"Don't sit at my table man. It's dead. It's really tight."

1. There didn't seem to be much difference between the two tables other than reggy's had more money on it.
2. "Figure out what a player is trying to get you to do and then disappoint him."

Reggy's sorry attempt to dissuade me from playing at his table was enough to push me to the seat at his table.


Reggy finished the night a few hours later having lost ~$400 of the stack he had built when I sat down. His final hand was what I assume to have been a failed set mining attempt as he slammed his cards into the muck on a K high flop as I happily raked the pot. I didn't actually take much money from Reggy but I did fleece most everyone else at the table.

Here's a couple example hands

Hand#1 Nonsensical feel play that I can't explain and is probably bad

UTG: The only really splashy player at the table. He's proven to be willing to get some chips in the middle. I would not venture to bluff him and I'd feel OK calling his bluffs as well. That being said, he's not crazy. He looks like fitty cent except there's no way he's a mother f'ing P.I.M.P. ~$200

BTN: Clearly novice middle aged Indian woman. Her bet sizes make absolutely no sense with relation to the pot so I don't think we can take much from her sizing. She's kind of just playing her hand but not in any kind of intelligent way. She's willing to raise with what she thinks are good hands and has made a few questionable calls. So far when she shows aggression, people just get out of the way. She looks like a malnourished version of this old bat I used to work with. No one liked her. She was one of those, "I've been doing this longer than you've been alive so you can't talk to me" types. We'll call her Rhandi. ~$350

Hero: SB dashing even though I have to wear this damn face mask (soon we'll be free!). Haven't been at the table for long. I've folded everything for an orbit and a half. $220


Preflop: Fitty limps. One other limp. Rhandi raises to $20. I see 99 and really don't enjoy any of my options. I decide to call, because at $1/2 you rarely can go wrong with a set mining plan with some real equity to back it up even at just 10:1 implied. Fitty calls. 3 ways to the flop.

Flop T23 ($64)

Here's where the feel comes in. I watched fitty when the flop came and he didn't seem too happy about it. I then sized up Rhandi. I didn't have much time in with her, but I just got a "meh" vibe from her. I can't point to anything and I might have been imagining it. Anyway, I decided that this flop didn't hit her so she needs an over pair to keep going. Fitty is more likely to have something and I'm not geting any strength tells from him. So...

I donk $30. Fitty quickly folds and Rhandi thinks for a second and then calls. Eh. Not super happy but I'm pretty sure I've confused the F out of her. Hell, I've confused myself.

Turn T238 ($124)
I'm not looking to play for stacks here and this is still a whiff for her aside from overpairs.

I check. Rhandi fumbles around with her chips and finally puts out $50. Again, I can't put a finger on it, but she just seemed like she was betting to bet. It felt different than her value bets for some reason even though the story she was telling was overpair. I called.

River T2383 ($224)
Still not really wanting to bet and get called so I check. Rhandi picks up a handful of chips and methodically counts out $50 and places it in the middle. Now I'm thinking that I have got to be in the middle of a blow up hand in my first 20 minutes at the table. However, I'm getting 4.5:1 and I still have this feeling that my 9's are good. She's still telling a consistent story of TT+, although now I think she would likely have put more in if that were the case. So, I decide that she's opened the door for me to follow my heart. I call.

She flips over AKo and my night is off to a weird but happy start.

I don't often go with a live read for 3 streets vs. a relative unknown, especially without a specific read. I don't know. It was just something.


I later misplayed KK on a Q694sss board against a pretty solid opponent. I 3 bet pre and cbet the flop. He called both. I almost checked the turn because I considered that he'd bet a lot of hands I beat, but not necessarily call a double barrel with them. He'd also maybe flat AA against me. Instead I just went all in for a reasonable 2/3 pot. He called out my exact hand on the second guess and folded. He later claimed to have QJ. If I had it back, I'd probably check the turn and give him a chance to bluff. Oh well. The mantra of "value bet value bet value bet" has been branded on my soul.

The same player caught a flush on the river and checked called my bet with a turned straight. That cut into my profits a little, but overall I was still way up due to hitting yet another set (5 in 14 hours), and getting all in with Ak vs. Rhandi's KJ and a rando's AQ. I realized my 54% equity and raked a nice pot.

I have been finding myself in a lot of SB 3 bet or fold spots with things like AQo. So far every time I've 3 bet, I've gotten a stack shoved right in my face. Tonight I would have considered folding or calling the original bet except I noticed a short stack behind me getting chips ready to call the original bet which would have made it difficult for me to be in a +EV situation post flop. Maybe it's a little weird variance. I'll have to pay attention. I'm not used to getting 4 bet light at 1/2 lol. I know for sure that it happened once. Hopefully, that's not now a thing at the lowest stakes.

My historic leaks are still there.

1. I occasionally will raise with trash just because I think I have a good spot to pull a pot with no showdown. Usually doesn't work.

2. I still have a hard time folding rivers when I don't have a compelling reason to believe I'm ahead.

3. I still have a hard time taking breaks.

4. Due to my limited hours to play, I reeeeally want to stay and see as many hands as possible, even if it means prying my eyes open and driving recklessly home due to lack of sleep.

Tonight, I had a handle on most of those things. Let's hope I can continue to stay disciplined.

Overall it was a >+$500 night which is always welcome.

Roll stands at $1840. Not out of the woods by any means, but it's a really great start to my new roll and I have a little bit of breathing room now. Since my comeback started I'm running $1/2 at a $60/hr clip. Obviously, there's room to improve. Hopefully, I'll stop running so bad.

Key to no limit: flop sets. I've gotten way way better at flopping sets since I took that year+ off from poker. It makes the game so much easier when you just flop a set and then people put all their money in for you.

My final session of the weekend was a rough one. I made a couple of classic mistakes. I'm not sure whether to chalk them up to a little rustiness from not having many hours in or if it's just something that people do sometimes.

I gave away a stack on my second hand by double barrel shoving the turn on a low board against an unknown who I perceived to be competent. It likely would have worked if he hadn't turned a set.

Mistake 1: Don't make aggressively optimistic plays early vs. people you don't know.

The same player turned out to be a huge donk. He made nonsense plays both pre and post flop. He kept hitting turn and rivers however and ran his stack up to >$1000. He was directly to my left which was pretty annoying because it didn't allow me to really do anything other than look for a hand and get my money back. That didn't go so well. The only hand I made ended up being a chop with another player.

Eventually, I was able to move directly to his left. There was also a whale that sat in my old seat. Awesome. Time to make some money. Nope. I had several chances to cheaply hit draws and get paid and none of them came in. I made one more light raise preflop and lost a chunk. I couldn't hit a flop and I wasn't getting any premiums.

This is the first good card dead session I've had since coming back. It was a good reminder of what you can usually expect. Hours of folding and trying to pay attention to the action despite being a spectator. In those situations, the game isn't poker anymore. It's a game with yourself to not give money away because you want to play. It's a mental challenge that few have the discipline to overcome. I have mixed results.

So, I found myself down ~$600 and not catching any cards. The senseless aggro kid gave away his ENTIRE $1000 stack to everyone BUT me. The other whale table changed because he was not having fun at my table and I had to decide if I was going to pick up and leave, give away a bunch more money, or stay and decide to grind. I decided to grind. I've been in the hole before. It's not as fun to grind back to even, but that money is just as valuable as when you get up early and are banking profits.

FINALLY, I flopped a set and doubled up. I then won my very next pot for a chunk and I was within a buy in of breaking even.

That's when my negative variance got creative.

A weak player raised on the button. I 3 bet with AK. He called and the flop came down low and . He was a MUBSY type so I checked to see what he thought of things. He had~$150 left so getting all in if he actually had something wouldn't be a problem.

He actually bet small, which made me happy. I called. I assumed he had something like TT-QQ with a spade.

The turn brought a 4th spade. Boo. I checked and he bet small again. If this was a scared bet then raising wouldn't really help me, but if he was trying to keep me in with a Q then I was going to get a bet out of him on the river too so I called.

He flipped his hand over, forgetting that there was still a river card to come. QJ

Erg. So, I immediately went all in hoping he'd think I was trying to bluff him. He thought for a minute and folded. That's about the only way I wasn't going to get his stack. It's also really unfortunate that 1 of the 6 remaining spades hit the turn. Otherwise, I think we get all in right there. That's $100 I'd never get my hands on.


Finally, I lost ~$200 on my last hand of the night on a Q56 A8 board with A8. It was a family limped pot and I was on the button. The flop checked through. The SB checked. The BB made a small stab and was called by CO. I raised and the SB flatted while the other two folded. This guy had been playing almost every hand and was willing to chase lots of stuff. He checked jammed the river and I had really good odds to call assuming he really only ever has 74 that beats me and lots of worse 2p. He turned over AQo for a bafflingly played top two. Good for him I guess.

At that point, I could sense that I didn't have the will to grind back plus the table had turned over and there wasn't a ton of easy money left.

-$462 for the day. Sigh.


I made some mistakes early in the session. Sometimes, I am too amped up when I start and I splash around before I know what is going on at the table. I settled down really well and almost got back to even but today it was not meant to be. Looking back, it was a good session to have lived through. I had a chance to really tilt away a lot of money and I didn't. That being said, I'd not say I played particularly well, and I also got run down a couple times. Such is life.

No live poker for a bit so I'll get some life stuff in order, and do some reading/online stuff. Time to practice keeping poker where it belongs!

It's funny, during this covid break (our casinos still closed going on 14 months now) I've been watching lots of poker vlogs just to try and keep my poker mind sharp. Pretty sure if I'm not careful they're going to do more harm than good, as I just have to remember that when I eventually do get back to the felt to simply play my game (the game I know works). But it is most definitely not a "cool" game to play.

For example, the A8o hand. I fold preflop. I also let the flop check thru. And I fold the turn. I actually probably would have folded to the BB donk alone (he's in EP on the flop, he could have been going for a check raise). But a donk into the world is still strong and the CO coming along too just makes this an easier fold for me, especially since we beat almost no Ax. And while I'm cool with a river value bet the way things played out, I'm folding to the raise; no one ever check/jams anything that we beat or turns a busted draw into a bluff against a turn raiser.

Gattemptingtorememberhowtoplaythemostuncoolmethodo fpokereverG

Ya, the lay off has done some strange things to the player pool.

Re: the A8o hand.

A lot of times I will fold it. This group was playing pretty passive collectively so I will widen my limp behind range some on the button assuming I can win more in position with a wide range than they can oop with probably even a wider range.

The turn play was very reads based. I was very confident that that would close down the bettor and caller. I was obviously not expecting the SB to call. In these particular games with that particular player type, it’s often a draw or optimistic ace.

River- you’re usually right. The fact that he plays so many hands preflop led me to believe that he could have every two pair ASIDE from AQ and think they were good. Chalk it up to COVID rust! At least I was right about the other two guys.

I'm also fairly wide on the Button as I'm playing 74o in this spot, but still passing on A8o.

I'm super worried about covid rust when I eventually get back to the felt. The other day I was reviewing a HH and for the life of me I couldn't remember if I play AJo in EP. Took a while to convince myself I don't.

Gbutthat'sme,andI'manitobviouslyG

Mostly agree. I am rarely playing a big pot with that hand. If I know that I have exceptionally trappy opponents at the table I won’t play it that way either. That was probably the only player at the table that I’d be willing to get all in with in that spot. I also get caught sometimes not accounting for just how badly some people play value hands. Ironically, it’s a quick way to get max value from me.

Wednesday was my big poker day this week so I did some chores etc and finally headed on down to the poker room. I sat down at 2:45 planning to play a nice long session and determined to rebound from my not so good previous work. We were starting new table and I looked down at a raising hand on my first offering. I threw a moderate raise out and the dealer pulled my chips back and put out a call. Apparently, the button had straddled at the last moment and the dealer never announced it. I complained that they couldn't hold me to that if it was never announced, and this beacon of competence said no. Not wanting to cause a problem on the very first hand of the day, I said fine. I flopped top pair, bet two streets and check folded when the flush got there. What an awesome start.

There was a guy there from last time who I remember for two reasons:

1. He sheds dandruff and other bodily pieces all over the table. It's disgusting.

2. He will pay any amount to chase any draw.

Over the course of the next 4 hours he rivered 3 straights against me, two of which I payed off since he also bluffs his missed draws frequently. He had hit two other straights against me the last time we played. I'm not sure what the odds are on hitting 5 straights, two of which are gut shots, on the river vs. one player in 6 hrs of play, but that's what I dealt with.

So, I found myself after 6 hrs, down $700, never having won a pot bigger than $30, and never having lost a pot bigger than $100. I just kept getting run down, kept betting while ahead, and ending up second best. It was pretty frustrating.

At about the 5 hr mark, our table broke. I had a choice to sit in two different seats. One of the seats was directly to the left of an older guy who is one of the better players in the room. He's the closest thing to a TAG I've seen in a while. I took that one. I had to decide if I wanted to go home down big, or suck it up and keep grinding. I decided that I was actually playing pretty well. I hadn't had any blow up hands, I wasn't raising nonsense. My only real mistakes were relatively small river calls against the dandruff guy when his straights go there. The only problem was that for only the second time in my 0 to infinity career, I was about to reach into my wallet for my last bullet. I still had some left at home, but I have rarely lost over 4 BI in one session. I was about to trust my self analysis and go for it. I decided to see if I could grind it back. No stupid plays. Just play solid and earn it.

My first had at the new table, I had my first raising hand in some time. It was a straddle pot so we had a nice pot preflop. I flopped 2nd pair and check called what I thought was a quarter pot bet. Nope. I misread the bet and accidentally called half pot. Check folding the turn was easy and I was now down $750.

I finally scored $100 by stacking a short stack when I turned a set with JJ. That led to this hand.

MP: Bad LAG. He apparently hit a high hand promo and was sitting on about $1000 but I've watched him donk off about $400 and based on what I've seen that will continue. He puts in a lot of chips whether he's ahead or behind. He looks like Chris Martin, but there's no way this guy could ever get within 100 yards of Gwyneth Paltrow. He looks like that high hand is the best thing to ever happen to him. ~$600

HJ:

The competent old man. I've played with him once before and he showed that he is tight, aggressive, and also able to lay things down. I sat to his left on purpose so that I'd be the one to put him in gross spots and not the other way around. I'm not LOOKING to play pots with him, but if I do, I can at least think along with him. He opens wider than a nit but I haven't seen anything out of line. He looks a lot like Walter White by about season 3. He acts like Walter White from about season 4. He is a cantankerous old bastard. ~covers

CO: Hero is aging gracefully. Like how George Clooney got way hotter in his 40's. This is obviously affecting the cards. $369

Everyone else was varying levels of bad with varying levels of chips.

Preflop Chris limps. Walter makes it $15. This is a normal size for him. I look at JT and decide to call. This is a questionable call. I will very often fold it. However, I was 185BB deep and I knew several bad players who had me covered were going to call and I'd likely have position. I'm not thrilled with it, but it's not the worst thing I've ever done. We end up surprisingly only going 3 ways with Chris closing the action.

Flop A78 ($48)
Chris checks.. Walter threateningly bets $10. I'm not one to chase gut shots, but when I do, it's in position. It's multiway. It's somewhat deep stacked. It's cheap. It's against people who I think will pay me off, and it's to the nuts. This fit that bill. Now I'm rolling the dice. Chris predictably calls.

Turn A789 ($78)
Cool! Chris lol donks $30. He has picked up something like 2 pair or possibly the same hand as me. He has donked into multiple players and the PFR several times. If he likes his hand, he just bets. Walter contemplates for a few seconds and calls. Now there's enough out there that a decent portion of the deck will scare them on the river, plus I need to start shoveling money in now if I want to get fully paid. So, I contemplate for a moment and throw out an extra $100 on top. Chris looks like he really wants to call with his garbage but eventually folds. That leaves Walter. I'm really hoping to get a call from Walt. After a few seconds he remembers that he doesn't need to be afraid of me. He's the one who comes knocking. He shoves all in for another $209. I happily call and dodge 10 outs vs. his 77.

A little while later, I ran a bluff against him that worked for another $75. By now, my short stack bad luck had turned and I was stacking off successfully for $100 at a time as well.


I got all the way back to <$100 down and looked down at KK. I raised a straddled pot and got called by a sponge calling station. The flop was very draw heavy and he called a full pot sized bet. The turn brought in the most unlikely of the draws and I bet large again because he's always chasing. He decided to shove on me and I realized that I was pot committed. Looking back, I could have folded and saved $120. If he hadn't gotten there yet, he would have just called. Therein lies my biggest leak right now. When facing aggression against this player pool you can almost always fold correctly.

Anyway, that knocked me back down. A few minutes later, I limped a suited ace knowing that there was a good chance Walt was going to shove his last 50BB lightly. He did just that and I called him lightly. I ended up showing as I spiked my ace and Walt took a break. I'd gotten a big chunk of my losses back. When Walt returned he bought in for 150bb and asked for a seat change to my direct left. I laughed out loud and racked up since I'd been playing for 8 hrs and he clearly had bad intentions. He looked really mad when I got up and that's OK with me.

Overall, it was a -$359 session but I largely consider that a success considering I ran into no less than 6 turned or rivered straights, lost with QQ 3 times and KK once. I'm running kinda baf right now. I've made a net of $19 on my initial stake. That's better than -$600 though!

Today's lesson is that this is a GRIND. There were long stretches where that wasn't much fun. I stuck at it and eventually had some good things come my way. When you're building a roll it's really really important to not spew off buy ins. You don't have any to spare.

In the words of Mike McD.- "Grind it out. Don't give anything away."

BR: $1019

We'll see if I get to play next week. Not sure.

Fun read. Most enjoyable HHs I've seen in quite a while.

They’re fun to write. I haven’t had one worth posting in the main forum in a while. I’m finding these days that the correct play is pretty evident most of the time although I don’t always execute very well :/

The next semi interesting AK hand I get, I’ll add to my “I never win with it” series. I could probably get a book deal off of those at this point.

Thanks for the read.

+1, no one writes up an opponent description better than Spike!

GRickMoraniswhohasnotagedwellatallandlookslikehema ybehomelessG

I haven't been able to play live at all but I've been going bananas online. After a fairly break even stretch of 10NL, I plugged up some leaks. This was accompanied by a couple of small shots at 1-2 table 50NL due to seeing some obvious whales swimming around. I played cautiously and got the moneyz. I took the run good back down, broke out of 10NL, barely even had to stop for a bathroom break at 30NL and am now rolled to play 50NL. Last night was my first fully 50NL session and it went really well. I don't think the run good will last of course, but it's good to ride it while it does.

Things I've learned:

The games really start to turn from stupid rec fat value only games to actually having to pay attention at 30NL. I finally met some decent regs at 30NL and one in particular who was actually probably better than me. At 50NL most of the stupid limping and stacking off with TP type stuff ends from the regs. I was actually having to really play at 50NL, and not just run the table over.

That being said, there are still PLENTY of fish sitting at 50NL. There have been people with stats like 56/7, 38/10 etc. at multiple tables so far at the bigger games. I haven't even seen stats like that at 5 and 10NL up until the state opened up online play again.

Here's some example hands.

Here fishy fishy fishy

This guy was VPIP 47 PFR 17 AF 6.5 3bet 10 in just 38 hands

These stats tell me he:
- is bad
-can have just about anything
-would have raised premiums preflop
-Is possibly aggressive although that's not enough hands to get a good aggression stat

He shows up with a boat once in a while, but he has worse way more often.





Thanks for the odds dude

This guy is VPIP 45 PFR 12 AF 2.1 3bet 10.9 in 118 hands

This tells me he:
- is bad
- would have raised premiums preflop
- is decently aggressive

He sized his bets so poorly that I'm never folding. One thing I recently read that has stuck with me is that when a player is indicating that they want to play for stacks, then don't push your draws, even your good ones. In this case, it would have been totally fine, but when you don't have any fold equity, there's no need to pump up the pot until you hit it. He gave me plenty of room to catch him. Happy times.



Like Pearl Harbor, I ignored my radar

This guy was 20/20 in just 11 hands so basically unknown. WHen an unknown cold calls a 3 bet, I usually assume it's a pocket pair and AK. That's pretty much it until I see worse.

The flop is bone dry and I think the bet is probably OK since MP can have worse kings and mid PP's. When the btn flats the cbet, I think I'm in a lot of trouble.

The river made it so that I'm beating 8 combos of AK and losing to 6 set combos. I guess you could add 1 more QQ combo that didn't want to 4 bet preflop and thought calling one flop bet would be OK. So, overall I'm beating 8 and losing to 7. I thn have to decide how elastic that range is. I think he's probably going to cry call AK no matter what size, so I go ahead and bet big. I knew when he raised that I was up against the other 7 combos, and it was almost like a spite "you deserve this" call on the end. Sigh.



Bink!

This is against the same player as above except now I have 200 hands on him. His stats are now:

IP: 37 PFR 27 AF 1.6 3 bet 17.5

Interestingly, I overbet shoved a pot a few minutes ago against him with a strong hand and he tank folded. He seems like a bit of an aggrotard with those stats. Not a good player, and for some reason seems to think I'm easy money due tot the set hand. He's coming after me lol.




Preflop seems standard. The flop also seems standard against this guy. The turn is actually a pretty good card for me, but I also want to be cognizant of the fact that there's a good chance he'll try to represent the ace and blow me off of a good show down hand so I check it back with the intention of calling a reasonable river that is not a J,Q,K, 9, or club. The river changes that plan obviously.

Since he had been after me and since I had overbet once already, I thought this would be a really good spot to overbet since he would not really consider a boat or trips given how the hand played out, plus he seemed ripe to suspect that I'd be trying to rep a flush. He also still had Ax in his range and that probably pays me given the previous thoughts. Let me know what ya'll think of that. I was obviously right in this instance given what he showed down.




Overall, I've been making a killing lately and my online roll is soaring. Once I play through my deposit bonus, I will consider pulling some out to fatten up the live roll although until I find my level online I'll just keep running it up. I have more opportunity right now online. As long as it's making money, I'll keep doing it.


I got a free month of CLP so I'm enjoying that. I may extend it. We'll see. It only takes one tiny pot won to pay for it, and I plan to win more than a few of those.

Last night was my next chance to head down to the casino to try to build this roll up. It was an entertaining trip to be sure.

I've been trying out Crush Live Poker. The last podcast I listened to they were talking about a couple spots where you can actually pull off a triple barrel bluff. It was interesting, but I remember thinking, "This is really dangerous." So far, I'm finding that the content is very much geared toward semi competent 2/5 games and above. If you try this in the quagmire of 1/2 you'll be broke very quickly. I knew there was a danger that this info would seep into my brain at the table at inopportune times. Despite my defensive thoughts, I managed to burn off $150 on a relative semibluff against what turned out to be a very bad person to bluff. Sigh.

Aside from that blunder, I played pretty well. About an hour in, I was down about $200 and looked down at AA on the button in a straddled pot. Cool. I made it $15 and got 4 callers.

Flop: 933 ($61)
Checks to me. I bet $45. Older guy who had tunred out to be an aggro monkey shoved for $135. I obviously called.
Turn: x
River: 9
Opponent shows 93. Arg.

Fine. Whatever. That happens. I can recover from that, but it's prety irritating when I'm on a short roll.


As the night wore on, I continued to mostly fold through some card dead hours being careful not to allow boredom to affect me. This is one area where I've massively improved since coming back. One of the players at the end of the table started up a conversation with his neighbor through the plexiglass about how I was way too tight and how could I ever make money like that. They proceeded to commentate on my preflop play for a few minutes to my great amusement. They were particularly peeved that i kept folding my HJ and CO in limped pots.

1. They didn't know what i was folding.
2. They failed to note that every time I did that the Btn was raising. He had a tendency to get fidgety before throwing $15 in to thin the field to 5 players and then check folding. No thanks.

I once again found myself down ~$500 and having to dig down and grind.


***LLSNL LESSON***

I read sometimes people talking about protecting their image at a low stakes game. "I don't want to be perceived as a nit." IT DOESN'T MATTER. Even if the entire table thinks you're a nit (we know you're not), it's better than making bad, even inexpensive bad plays. I'll show you why.

BB:

Older fellow that I foolishly tried to bluff earlier in the night. He is aggressive, but not in a way that makes sense. He just kind of indiscriminately fires at pots and doesn't have a lot of hand reading skill. He did fold one river to me when an obvious flush came in, but otherwise he's either betting or raising. I haven't seen him bluff raise a river yet, but based on his style I judge it possible that he's capable of it. He looks like Michael Moore if he'd lost a hundred pounds but not for healthy reasons. Like if Michael Moore got cancer or if he had Crohn's disease or something. ~$300

MP:

Hero and I'm oddly dressed. I forgot my poker clothes aside from my signature intimidation baseball cap and hoodie. Otherwise, I'm lol wearing dress clothes. Its OK though. Casino card rooms aren't really known as hot spots for picking up chicks. I have the aforementioned nitty yet losing image. Not that it really matters to these guys. They're going to play the same way anyway. I Cover.

Pre: I look at AT and raise to $10. Folds to Michael who calls.

Flop: T64 ($21)
Michale checks. I bet $15. He calls.

Turn: T64 4 ($51)
Michael checks. I bet $25. He calls.

River: T64 4Q ($101)
Michael checks. I bet $60. Michael raises to $140. Hero recalls that you should almost always fold to river raises. Hero starts to think.

OK so let's break this down a little bit. The flop and turn seem pretty simple. I'm not sure if anyone else would do anything different there.

Let's see if we can figure out what he might raise the river with.

sets/quads: understanding of blockers and combos really helps us out in this spot and really helped me out in the moment. When the 4 paired, it eliminated 2 combos of 44. Having a T in my hand eliminated 2 combos of TT. That leaves 77 as the only other realistic set. So, we'll say he has 5 set combos. However, this specific player almost always raises his sets on the turn or eve flop. Cool. I'm not too worried about sets.

2P: Again, when the 4 pairs, it actually helps me a lot. I don't think he'd play T4 or 74, and they're now rather unlikely. I can't tell if he understands that a low paired board counterfeits his QT and T7 if I have an overpair. I think at least part of the time it dissuades him from raising them.

busted draws: There is an OESD and several gutters that missed. There are gobs of back door flushes.

Against some players you can just forget about them because they'd never turn them into a bluff on the river. This guy might have raised them earlier too so I'm on the fence about how to discount them.

He's offering me a nice price to call. I only need to be good 27% of the time.

Anyway, it seems pretty unlikely that he actually has something that beats me. Am I up against a Tx that turned into a bluff or busted draw 27% of the time?

I decide to find out. I call and he looks disgusted and turns over 97. Whew. Now maybe we can actually complete a comeback.

I ground my way all the way to -$200. That's when this happened.


UTG: Pacific Islander looking younger guy sits down and immediately starts donking around post flop. He's VPIP'ing 100% but PFR is 0%. Once he sees a flop, if he likes it he just bets hard for three streets. He got a nice pot off of a calling station when he rivered a set after betting 3/4 pot the whole way. It took an orbit, but I now view him as a major mark. He looks like Duane the Rock Johnson's unspectacular 3rd cousin who tells people he met the Rock at a family reunion when he was 8, but really has nothing else to talk about. ($434)

HJ: Very weak passive player. I've seen him raise twice. I've seen him limp call a ton. He's a station postflop. He is the classic LLSNL player. He looks like Jeffrey Dommer with a baseball hat. You can't assume someone across the table is into eating people, but I can definitely see this guy eating his chicken in strange ways. Like enjoying it too much. It's just chicken. Why is he so enjoying that chicken so much? Creepy. (~$150).

CO: Michael Moore again. He's unpatriotically rebought several times and cursed his luck when he's been "unlucky." He's just a grouchy old dude with very likely idiotic political views. ($197)

BTN: Very loose passive dude who can't lose. At one point he was sitting on a $2k stack. That's the second biggest 1/2 stack I've ever seen. He's just calling preflop raises. Letting people bet into his over pair+ and collecting. He's a nice dude. He reminds me a little of Buddha if he had lived in America. (Covers).

BB: That's me. Still oddly dressed, but looking better now that I've got $495 in front of me.


Preflop: Couple limps to Michael who curses America and raises to $15. Buddha calls. I look down at 88. I'm not super deep with Michael. It's probably close to set mine. Buddha however might pay me off some if we both hit something. More importantly though, the table dynamic had changed recently with The Rock's cousin sitting down and I knew it would likely go multiway. I wouldn't need to make much post flop to get my return on investment. I call. The Rock's third cousin calls. Jeffrey quietly slides chips out and we're 5 ways to the flop.

Flop: Q87: ($77)
Interesting. Well, I'd hate for this to check around and these fellas seem like the types to chase draws so I donk $55. The Great One's third cousin gleefully calls. Jeffrey calls and I'm feeling good. Michael decides to deal a blow to fascism and goes all in for $183.

Important note: I was worried about the 200bb stack behind me. If he had a small flush, I could get into a drawing situation with my set. Luckily, Rock's cuz slammed the table disgustedly and was clearly annoyed that his draw got expensive. Thanks dude. You just made my decision so easy. Buddha gets out of the way, and I shove my whole stack right down hs throat like Mick Foley's sock and ask him if he can smell what I'm cooking.

Hilariously, he goes into the tank. He mentions something to his neighbor about how bad he wants to see the run out. He might ACTUALLY call this. OMG that would be awesome! after about 30 seconds, the Most Electrifying Man in Sports Entertainment's third cousin calls.

We now have a 4 way $1100 pot. Someone has to have a flush right? There's a small chance Michael has QQ and I'm in bad shape. Otherwise, I'm pretty much always drawing to live outs.

After twenty minutes, the dealer finally gets all 4 pots right and we get some results.

Michael: KK. Makes sense. Although he's in TERRIBLE shape, I can see why he would do that.

Jeffrey: AJ. He's probably in the best shape of the three as he is drawing to live outs for the main pot.

Rock's cousin: ..... T9. Yup. He called off 200+BB on a straight and flush draw none of which might be good outs. That's why this game is profitable.

To recap:

Michael has 6% equity and about 30% to win his side pot.
Jeffrey has 25% to win the main pot.
Rock's cousin has 14% to win the whole thing and 37% to win the side pot. What sucks for him is that only 2 of his outs win the whole thing. If he hits his flush for the side pot he still loses the main pot. His equity is really bad.

This was an interesting EV calc for me. It ended up being an all or nothing situation. 55% of the time I win $1100. 45% of the time I lose everything. I mean, I'll take it. This was a massively +EV set up for me.


And that's how bad variance can bust a short roll. The nice thing is that how it ran out, everyone got a little something except for me who got nothing.

I got up after that. I still had $61 and another $300 in my wallet after that happened, but I wanted to be able to function in the morning and I wasn't sure if my brain could handle playing my last few hundred dollars properly after that.

***LLSNL LESSON***

You don't have to go completely broke before you leave. I see so many people lose a big pot and then just mindlessly toss their last bits into the pot for no reason. $61 still counts. When you only have 180BB left in your wallet, 30BB is a pretty big deal.



So, I'm on life support. Luckily, my online game is still going swimmingly. Sometime next month I'll be able to cash some of that out and supplement the live roll. My day after analysis is that I'm playing well enough to win. I'm obviously running terribly right now. So, I'll continue to work on plugging leaks and getting better and trust that eventually it'll turn itself around. I'd love to not have to replenish my bankroll before it does. We'll see.

Well, I finally got back down to the casino tonight. My online game has gone so well that I pulled out my original $600 deposit and applied it to my dwindling live roll. It turns out I didn't need it.


My second hand of the night I got KK all in on the turn for $260 and held. Good start.

I proceeded to get hit by the deck. I must have looked like a maniac because I just kept getting raising hands. AA, QQ multiple times. AK. AQ. And they all held up. I've seen fish go on heaters when all their junk hits. I was that fish tonight except I was only playing good hands. Aside from KK, I had several highlights.

Raised KJ preflop and went heads up.

Flop: AT6
Bet. Call.

Turn: AT6Q
Bet Call.

River: AT6Q9
Villain goes all in for an amount that doesn't matter when the pot is >200bb.

I win vs. KK that played backwards on every street.


QJo turned broadway for another $200.

AQo flopped broadway and getting a clean run out vs. set of jacks. All in on the river for $250.

And my favorite.

Pre:
I raise 88 UTG to $10. One call and SB makes it $35. He's got $650 and I have him covered. I call.

Flop A98r.
SB bets $50. I call.

Turn:
A98Thh
SB bets $45. I raise to $150. MP folds and SB calls.

River: A98TA $580
He checks. I bet $350. He tanks for a few seconds and calls. I win.

He claimed to have had KK. I get no respect.



I won more good pots tonight that I can even recount. I haven't had a night like this in a long time. It was a personal record for 1/2 win. Just a shade under $2k profit.

Other highlights of the night were meeting a 2+2'er and a couple of other local pros. It was fun to play against a couple of good players. It's a different game when those types are at the tables.


Roll is magically now just shy of 15 BI. Combine that with the online winnings and we're looking healthy. Hopefully, I won't have to wait another 3 weeks before I can head down there again.

And now I'll leave you with a picture of 90% of my roll being on the table. Running good!

Mmmmm fistbump!!


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That's gold, Jerry. Gold!