I didn't see you mention the cause for the problems. Was it related to your poker lifestyle or nothing to do with it at all.

Sorry about the breakup man, definitely tough. I had a similiar situation happen in college and it definitely takes awhile to "get over it"

Hopefully you can upswing hard to keep you distracted

Also, feel you on getting ravaged at SCOOP.

She was incredibly supportive of me when it came to poker. I think to an extent it made her nervous when she thought about a few aspects of it but after we discussed all of it, she never made me feel guilty about any of it. She always believed in people being happy and following their dreams and I think she realized this was mine so she let me really go for it. Out of respect to both me and Kelsey I'm not going to go to deep into what the issues were, other than to say they weren't poker related and the big one was something that any couple, poker players or not, will often eventually run into.

Jerrad, let's ****ing win some SCOOPs soon we are falling very behind in this competition lol

Sorry for your loss man

Today's Session

Today's gonna be a big one. Six SCOOP events, all the Sunday majors, I'm putting in a full schedule. Here it is, with the tourneys I'll definitely be in marked "Play" and the ones I'm going to feel out, based on how many games I have going and how I feel my mindset is, marked "Maybe." All told it's $2585 in entries, and this does not include rebuys or re-entries. And with SCOOP I'll be re-entering and rebuying as much as it takes.



Good luck to everyone playing today!

Non-Poker

Went to NYC last night. Was miserable the whole time. It was not a good idea. Definitely not doing that again for quite some time. Just gonna have to find fun stuff to do that doesn't involve drinking because I just feel completely miserable when I do that, and I HATE being the depressed drunk. I'm normally the guy making jokes and having fun and last night I literally sat in the bar all my friends were in and listened to the 2p2 Pokercast for an hour and a half. Didn't get good sleep, got smacked in the face a few times by drunk friends (somehow it was accidental lol), and just overall was hating life. That being said, I know my friends will be there for me and quite a few of them really did their best to give me advice (and a surprisingly high amount of it was actually pretty good). I'm sure this will pass but I'm just gonna be really mopey for a while and I kinda hate when I'm like that. Think I just gotta really dive into poker and commit myself even more to it. Make some more money, maybe get to travel a bit, get my mind off stuff. Today could be the day that really starts to get off the ground.

Chin up Dan. These stretches will benefit you in the long run.

Good luck today and more importantly, have fun!!

Sent from my SM-G900V using 2+2 Forums

Wow man, can get some really sick schedules going on sundays now with the 3 sites in NJ. Awesome, best of luck. Sorry to hear about the gf but sounds like it was/is inevitable and seems mature to try to figure everything out sooner rather than just pushing it off down the road like so many people do.

Thanks Ben. Really painful for sure because I still care about her so much so I feel a pretty high level of guilt for ending it but I think I had to do it.

I've got 10 games running right now and there's 3 more I wanna register at 7PM! I can fit 12 on my screen but I am feeling a tiny bit rushed playing 10 (which, to be honest, is the most I've fired at the same time in a long time). I imagine I'll be able to late reg these though as some of my other games start to break. I had the $200 $30K guarantee on WSOP up to 13K (5000 starting stack), 3b/called QQ pre, called Q42 flop, jammed over bet on 7 turn, called by AA, river A for 26K pot at 200bb!!! It left me with 895 chips though and I am back to 7300 now . Let's get it!! I told my roommate last night that I'm going to make 20K in the upcoming week so I got my work cut out for me

For sure Dan, apologies, didn't mean to come off as saying that the situation is/will be easy etc, was just commenting on the maturity. Hopefully making some deep runs will help to clear you mind/steal your focus!

I was hoping to have a MTT sunday but a recent PLO downswing suggested that I avoid tournaments for today while rebuilding haha. Running 10+ games sounds like the old days, have fun.

Alright boys time for some Sunday results

Second of Three NJ SCOOP Sundays

Not to my surprise, today was my 2nd biggest day in terms of buy ins, only behind last Sunday. We ended up buying in for $2536 over 16 tourneys. With 2 re-entries in there, that's 2536/18 = $140.89 average buy in. I played a $15 satty early in the day, a $30 Progressive KO, and one of the SCOOPs was a $10r, but aside from that all tourneys were $50 and up. It appears 9 of our 16 tourneys were $100+, and in reality I could have thrown a bunch more tourneys in there (such as the Stars $500 and $200 PKO, a couple other $100 tourneys on both Party and WSOP, etc).

The thing that slowed me down a bit midsession was when I entered the high and low 3 max hyper rebuy SCOOP events. Those move QUICK and since I was already 8 tabling I found my focus getting a bit off. The nature of hypers though are that they move fast so after about an hour of that we were approaching the money in both. I got close but as has been the theme thus far in this series, I didn't quite get there. 10th in the 3 max hyper high and 14th in the low. I also cashed the $15r SCOOP event, coming 19th of 322. Unfortunately that was all I could muster in terms of cashes in SCOOP. Not sure if I mentioned this earlier but I captained a team for a competition for this NJ SCOOP. I ended up picking Darren Elias despite the fact that he made everyone aware of the fact that he'd be playing ROW SCOOP until today so we'd only get him for the last week. So I was really hoping to bink a couple tourneys while he was away to keep us all in the running but unfortunately we are still 5 of 5. It's not for lack of trying though; I'm prob down $4K in SCOOP events now

Sessions like today's really help me to get a better grasp of variance. I know I talk about "understanding variance more" all of the time, but it really is true that the more you experience it the more it clicks. With 6 left in the "Sunday Warm Up" (it's just a $50 10K guarantee on NJ Stars) I got JJ in vs KQ for a 2nd place stack and to bust a player. I lost and instead busted 6th for $500 when 1st was getting $2400. If I'd won that tourney I would have paid for my entire day's session; instead the rest of the day I felt like I was playing catch up. Despite playing all of these buy ins for what is a meaningful amount of money to me, the entire stake of whether the day would be a winning one or a losing one came down to a flip. It helps me to realize even better just what a day's session really means. Despite playing 20 tournaments, one flip can change the course of the day!

I was happy with how I kept my head on straight early in the session. When I lost the 26K pot to the 2 outter in the 30K I felt like I got punched in the stomach (I'm sure you all know that feeling of excitement about having a ton of chips only to see the miracle get there!). I let it sink in, I took 10 seconds to let myself sulk, and then I moved on. When you've got that many games going you really really have to dig deep to not care about the beats. I came back to cash that tournament despite having 895 at 100/200 after that hand!

The final tourney of the day for me ended up being the Stars 10K. I got to the final table 6/9 needing 4th to break even on the day. 1st--$2400, 4th--$960, 9th--$230. So I'd locked up a 3 figure losing day at worst, with potential to still win 4 figures on the day. I ended up finishing 4th, losing a flip to bust for 20bbs each (think I would have been 2nd had I won that). Again, the flips late in tournaments can just straight up determine whether or not you have a winning day. That is why tournament variance is so insane; if you make a final table 10% of the tourneys you play, and then need to win 3 flips to win the final table, then you're only going to win a tourney like 1 out of 80 tries. But if you hit a swing where you final table 3 of 10 tourneys and then win those flips in 2 of those, now everyone's calling you the GOAT and you've all of a sudden got a lot of extra income! What a ridiculous game

Anyway, results of the day come out to $2536 in buy ins, $2504.01 in cashes, -$31.99 on the day. Here's the final spreadsheet for it all. Time to watch some Game of Thrones and get some sleep.

When you're trying to put in an online session and the fans won't get off your back...

A Strangely Similar Day

So on Sunday I ended up with just the Stars 10K, needing 4th to break even on the day. Last night the same circumstances arose, albeit a bit suckier since I bought in for much less yesterday and just bricked everything. In any case, I finished 4th both nights to cancel out the rest of the tourneys on the day. SCOOP was once again frustrating. Last night was the mix max tourneys, where we played 8 levels of 9 max then 8 levels of 6 max and then the tourney would finish as a 4 max. The high was a $300 buy in and the low was a $30 buy in, each with a 10K starting stack and the same structure. After falling to 2500 early in the high I was able to find a double and get it back over 5000 going to the 6 max portion. I grinded hard there and eventually found myself with 12K at 800BB. Button opens, I jam A9 in the BB and he tank/calls with A2. Flop is clean, turn pairs the board so he has 6 outs to chop. River is a 2 and I'm busto 15 from the money. SCOOP has just been a **** show where I seem to bust against marginal-to-bad plays consistently. It's one thing to get sucked out on, but it seems to sting extra when it's a SCOOP event and especially when people are calling off with hands that are dominated by a very large chunk of my range, are dominated by my exact hand, and then get there anyway.

We're still in last in the contest but I don't really think there's much more I can do about it. I think I'm playing pretty well in these events and just consistently running bad down the stretch. Tonight's a big night though. There are 2 pairs of events and the 2nd one is so big that I think I'm going to skip the first, a pair of PLO rebuy events, to make sure I have enough focus for the 2nd pair. They will be 6 max NLHE events, the high being a $1000 100K and the low being a $100 30K. A win in either of those would not only be huge for the contest but would be massive for my bankroll. After a -$4500 April I've only made $5000 this month, and I'm seeing 4 figure swings way more often than in the past. Today there will be a 4 figure swing in one tournament. This would be a good one to start running good in!

how many games per day do you get in on avg?
monthly avg?

When I'm really grinding and doing things the way I should be I'll normally get 15-20 tourneys in per day (not including re-entries).

I brought up the last 2 months to see how many games I played and I was pretty shocked to see just how much more volume I put in in March compared to April. In March, when I made $9K but was also dealing with a lot of IRL stuff, I played 219 tourneys for about 20K in buy ins. Last month when I hit a really tough stretch, lost $4500, and subsequently started losing interest in playing, I only played 114 games and about 15K in buy ins. That's pretty insane that I played half as many tourneys in April compared to March. So then I checked January expecting that I would have played way more games only to see I played 202 for 17K in buy ins (and January I was up 19K so I really figured the volume would have been incredibly higher). So far in May I've played 177 for 18.5K in buy ins, which I guess makes sense given SCOOP is running. Just to round this year's stats out, February saw 194 games and 17K in buy ins and I made 3K that month, the closest month I've had to even. So I guess the goal going forward should be to get at least 200 games and 20K in buy ins each month to make sure that volume stays up there even when things aren't going great.

Epic pic. Do you have a fav "big name" pro?

Damn... Great Picture.

Given that your monthly volume is about 1/5 that of an row mtter, and seeing how a ds can last ~500 games or more have you considered mixing in more lower buy in games, or adding bovada,act etc. I follow your thread to see the viability of inside the u.s grinding for if the day comes when online poker returns to my home state. But I know personally a 3+ month D's would drive me nuts and its basically gtd when getting in 200 p/month

The first person I ever really "idolized" when I was younger was Daniel Negreanu. I loved how friendly he was at the table and his incredible ability to understand exactly how his opponent was thinking.

It's tough now when you start to realize that all of that charm certainly is real, but isn't 100% genuine. It's all part of the game plan. Add to that the wild stances he takes on Twitter sometimes and that "hero" image has certainly diminished in my mind. That being said, I think it's very very admirable that he has been in the limelight for many many years now and is still beating the game and still has that incredible passion for it.

I think at this point, trying to be a pro myself and working towards being the best I can be makes it a bit silly to really idolize anyone. I definitely got a kick out of photobombing Carver's stream, and I think this picture is hilarious, but I didn't see any of these pros and get sweaty palms or anything. I felt pretty reluctant to introduce myself to any of them to be honest. I didn't want to come off as a fanboy. But I also can't pretend like I'm on any of their levels. But I also know that I have way more experience and knowledge than 99% of the other people there. So I just felt like it would be more uncomfortable than anything to try to have a conversation with anybody. Except Moneymaker, he's funny as hell and as down to earth as you'd expect. I beat him at Cornhole at Beerfest and then beat him in a mini bball contest at the VIP after party. He 4b me with K7s yesterday and got a fold though so maybe he's still got me at the pokers

Thanks man. The funniest part of it is that I remember them taking this, and it was supposed to be of the entire final table with these pros. I imagine that pic didn't come out well (half the table didn't seem to be aware they needed to turn around) so they just posted this one.

Yeah you're absolutely right. Unfortunately there aren't a ton of lower stakes games to add in, but I should certainly be adding the ones that are there. What sucks is that a $15 MTT in NJ is not like a $15 ROW MTT, in that the ceiling is so so low in NJ (normally <$500 up top) so it almost feels not worth it to fill up screen space with them. That being said, they've definitely upped my confidence in the past so it has to be worth throwing them in during downswings sometimes.

I also think you might be overestimating the likelihood of a 3 month downswing. Maybe with this volume in ROW play, but you have to remember how much smaller the fields are here. Winning MTTs is much easier with 100 man games than what you get in ROW. I also think the play here is much softer. 30 days really is the longest downswing I've had and I've now been playing professionally for over a year. It's certainly possible that the extended downswing is lurking but I think it's unlikely.

SCOOP 19L $100 6 Max "High Roller" Final Table

For the third day in a row I got down to one table and needed a very deep finish to salvage the day, and 3rd day in a row we got it! Needed 6th in this SCOOP event to break even and am now 5/5 with just over 20bbs. $2370 locked, $8650 up top. Let's get it!!

We're Not In Last Anymore!

For the first time the entire series my NJ SCOOP competition team isn't in the basement! My 4th plus an O8 FT by another team member has moved us up to 4 of 5!!!! lol That being said we've had 3 members for the entirety of the series so far and I am just waiting for our secret weapon to get back from Canada after taking 13th in the SCOOP Main High for $72K...

Competition Scoreboard:



Our Team's Breakdown:



Come back Darren we need you!

For perspective on how the points work, the winner of a tournament gets the square root of the prizepool, 2nd gets you about 2/3 of that, 3rd gets you about 1/2 of that, and everyone who cashes gets points (so winning a tourney with a $40,000 prize pool would get you 200 points, 2nd would get you around 133, and 3rd would get you around 100). So while we trail by 360 points, a win in say, the main event on Sunday, will be good for at least 447 points (it's a 200K guarantee), so just staying in striking distance always gives your team a shot.

I realize I didn't actually mention that I finished 4th for $3300 yesterday. Despite coming to the final table quite short I finally found some SCOOP rungood after winning K4>A8 for about 6bbs each bvb to bust the shorty early at the final table. I then won a few more hands, correctly calling down 3 streets with QT on a Q6586 sort of board where both flush and straight draws missed. He just had the J9o airball. With 4 left I got into a dumb spot vs a solid reg where he opened the SB, as he'd been doing every time it folded to his SB and I'd just been folding every time. This time with 30BBs I peeled Q8o and flop came A22. He led small and I decided to float with what could be the best hand. The turn was a queen and he bet again. I took a river and it was a brick and I had about a pot size bet left. He bets about 40% pot and I tanked for a long time. I'm just not supposed to have much Ax or 2x here since I didn't 3b or fold pre and I think he should know that. That being said, that might make bluffing all in a more appealing option than betting small so he might be more weighted towards value. I also thought he might not go for value with a weak ace given my line, so I thought big aces and 2x were most likely value candidates and there's not a ton of that he can have. At the end of the day I think I like how I played the hand until the river, where I should find a fold. I called and he had 62o for trips

That left me with 6BBs which I got in with AT only to run into KK. I saw an ace first on the flop but both of the other kings were behind it and I busted in 4th. With the 5K difference between 1st and 4th it was quite disappointing; a win also would have gotten me to +5 figures on the month and would have been my biggest score. But 4th did lead to me having a $1500 winning day instead of a $1500 losing day so I'll choose to look at it that way. Next up on the SCOOP schedule: A Zoom tourney!

I get stressed just reading your thread. Tourney grinding so siq

Just read the whole thing start to finish. Awesome posts man! Will be following along.

so seek so seek mau5. I don't think my swings are that big in comparison with a lot of players, but, to be fair, they are probably big compared to 99% of those who play poker. As long as you're playing within your bankroll the swings shouldn't affect you to an unhealthy extent.

Thanks a lot! Sometimes I'll post on here for weeks without feedback so it's always nice to get responses like these, glad you're enjoying


I bricked both SCOOP events tonight and decided to scrap the session and go to the bar with my roommate. It was nice to take a night off. I actually played 2 tourneys during the day and finished 2nd and 3rd in them for something like $350 in profit, then lost $240 back in the SCOOP events, so found a way to have a small winning day. Back to the grind tomorrow.

Quick Update Before Today's Wild Grind

Friday I went home and got my oil changed. The plan was to go to Belmar with my cousin but the oil change took way longer than expected and I wouldn't be able to get there early enough to get into the thing he wanted to do, so instead I went to AC to hang out with my buddy (and former college XC coach). His family has a house in Brigantine so he lets me crash there. We just watched the NBA game Friday night then went to the beach on Saturday. Around 2:00 I decided to go to Borgata and play their $300 Summer Challenge or whatever it's called. 25K SS, I was at 60K early after KK>QQ. With about 3 levels left in the day I jammed JJ for 49K over a 5500 open at 2400BB. I'd been joking all day that I only played KK (a woman I play often with online was talking about some hand I woke up with KK vs her online as soon as I sat down at live table, then I doubled KK>QQ and then I showed down KK to win and told the table it's all I play). The kid who opened seemed like a nice guy who was certainly a recreational player. He takes about 60 seconds, asks me in that half joking - half nervous voice rec players often use if I have that KK again (I'm like do not have QQ and tank here please), finally he calls, I turn my hand over and he turns over the QQ lol so that was that.

The Big Big Sunday Grind

Definitely potential for me to once again break my total buy ins record for a day today, since today is the NJ SCOOP Main Event!! $500 $200K guarantee should be a lot of fun. It's also the first time in NJ history that a 2 day tourney will be taking place. There's unlimited re-entry for something crazy like 4 hours so it could get very expensive. My team somehow still isn't in last despite Darren Elias not playing any tournaments, but we are 500 points behind 1st, so I guess if one of us wins the main we'll have a chance?

Here is my tentative schedule for the day. "Play" means I'm definitely in that event, "Maybe" means I'll be waiting to see how many games I have up and if I feel my attention span is on point for the day, and the numbers next to the maybes are how I am prioritizing which tourneys I sign up for that start at the same time and are a maybe.



For those keeping count, that's $3385 in buy ins, not counting any re-entries I might make. Yikes! It's going to be more important today than any other day that I stay focused regardless of what sort of variance I hit. I imagine I will skip the weekly Stars $500 but with re-entries on the main (which I am just going to keep firing regardless of bullet number, oh god lol), that $3400 total could go way way up. I think I will attempt to 12 table today but if that feels really uncomfortable I'll bump back down to 8-10. Gonna relax a little longer than start around 5:00. Good luck today everyone!

Dream Spot Defined



Not just the chip lead but 2nd-6th bunched up so closely with big pay jumps to consider. Let's close this out!