An NJ Grinder's Journey as a Pro
08-24-2017
, 03:13 PM
Quote:
Yeah that Party bubble is always pretty dumb. Pretty routinely see guys with 8bbs folding down to 1bb and I just can't justify killing my chances of winning the tournament to lock up a mincash. For anyone else reading, I 3b shoved 13 or so BBs from the BB vs a CO open with 44 with 29 left in the Party 40K with 27 paying. He called with KK to bust me.
A few factors I think about when weighing spots like that:
--Mincash compared to buy in. It was <2x in this tournament so I felt more comfortable gambling than in the WSOP 40K, which was 2.5x. I also bubbled that one
--How likely I think it is the opener is abusing the bubble. The opener in this spot had pretty tight numbers but given he had more chips than the 3 players behind him and was in the CO, I decided it was fairly likely he'd be lighter than usual.
--How likely it is the bubble is going to end soon. It's one thing to fold a few close spots because there are 2 guys with 1BB and you know you're going to go into play after the bubble bursts with the same stack you have now. But if there are 8 stacks at 10BBs and no one's shorter, you can be pretty confident, at least in NJ, that this bubble is going to take some time. If you lose an orbit's worth of blinds/antes and the level goes up during H4H you've now gone from 10bbs to less than 6 and it's going to be very difficult to mount a comeback, whereas taking a spot here and there that seem reasonably +chipEV will see you get eliminated once in a while, but will also have you chipping up so that you're not dead post bubble.
All in all my shove still might not have been good, but I definitely don't hate it.
A few factors I think about when weighing spots like that:
--Mincash compared to buy in. It was <2x in this tournament so I felt more comfortable gambling than in the WSOP 40K, which was 2.5x. I also bubbled that one
--How likely I think it is the opener is abusing the bubble. The opener in this spot had pretty tight numbers but given he had more chips than the 3 players behind him and was in the CO, I decided it was fairly likely he'd be lighter than usual.
--How likely it is the bubble is going to end soon. It's one thing to fold a few close spots because there are 2 guys with 1BB and you know you're going to go into play after the bubble bursts with the same stack you have now. But if there are 8 stacks at 10BBs and no one's shorter, you can be pretty confident, at least in NJ, that this bubble is going to take some time. If you lose an orbit's worth of blinds/antes and the level goes up during H4H you've now gone from 10bbs to less than 6 and it's going to be very difficult to mount a comeback, whereas taking a spot here and there that seem reasonably +chipEV will see you get eliminated once in a while, but will also have you chipping up so that you're not dead post bubble.
All in all my shove still might not have been good, but I definitely don't hate it.
08-28-2017
, 01:03 PM
Absurd Sunday
So I did a bad job of being a professional this week, going to the city on Thursday with the intention of coming home Friday to play Friday-Sunday and instead found myself there for 3 days. I had an insane amount of fun those 3 days, so at least it wasn't a waste in that sense, but if I want to truly be a professional and take myself seriously, I can't be doing that stuff, even when my poker results are going well enough that I can afford it. But damn it was fun lol.
I got back to Fair Lawn late Sunday night and woke up the next morning feeling a little groggy but ready to play. I ended up napping from 3PM-5:30PM and after getting up and getting some food I sat down to play at 6. I ended up firing 5 bullets in the WSOP $215, 3 bullets in the Party $215, and 2 bullets in the Stars $200, along with another 10 or so bullets in other $100 events, and sprinkling a few $50 events in there, leading to my total buy ins being around $3300. I haven't ran as bad as I did the first few hours of the Sunday session in a long time. I busted QQ to KK on bullet 1 in the Party 215 after a guy flatted an open pre and then back 4b shoved, then lost QQ to AA and JJ to AA pretty quickly to bust bullet 2. The WSOP $215 was just insanity, losing back to back flips on the river to bust 2 bullets, then losing a bunch of standard hands for the next 2 bullets, and finally losing most of my stack on the 5th bullet with AQ vs KQ after finally having found some traction.
The $100s did not go well, and sure enough with 1 tournament remaining, the Party $215, I had cashed once on the day, in the only tourney I played that was <$50 buy in, and it was in the $10 Sunday Storm where I finished 30th or something for like $28 lol. So I was staring at a big losing day, but that was sort of to be expected. I have been sun running in the month of August, and really over the course of the entire last 5-6 weeks. In fact, looking at my spreadsheet right now shows some insane statistics. Going into yesterday's session, my last 4 figure losing day (and it was less than $1200) was July 23. Since August 1, I have 4 losing days, and 2 of them are for $20 or less when I clearly didn't play a session but just fired up some spins while I was bored. The other 2 losing days are both under $500. I am up $21K since July 16th, which was the day I came in 2nd in the Party 40K to bust out of the $13K losing streak I'd had going. So I was due for a bad day yesterday.
I made the money of the tournament, the Party $215 40K, after having a much bigger stack earlier, hanging on to a 15bb stack. We had locked up about $300 with 36 left. In order to make money on the day I would need to finish 4th or better, but I was ready to make good decisions and disregard that type of thinking, only worrying about ICM and making the proper decisions for this specific tournament. I lost A9 to AQ to a 5bb stack, knocking me down to 10bbs, and then I found some heat. With blinds at 1200/2400 I was in the BB with 18.8K to start the hand. UTG opens min, CO calls, SB calls and I elected to defend and go with it on any decent flop. I could just shove pre but I decide to peel and if I totally whiff in this 4 way pot, I think it's safe to assume I have the worst hand. I'll have 6bbs back if I have to x/f flop and will hope to find something later! Flop comes A62dd and I decide this flop is good enough that I'll check and get it in if someone bets, or just shove every turn if it checks through. It checks through, turn Qx, I shove 14K into 21K, 1 caller with QTdd and I somehow fade all the outs to jump to 50K.
A couple orbits later I get 53K in at 2400bb with AK vs TT. Board runs AK6TA and we get the double in crazy fashion. A couple orbits later I think I played the pot that sort of ends up defining my tournament. There are a bunch of bigger pots I played later on that I'm sure were worth more in equity, but not being afraid to pull the trigger here is the difference between how I play when I'm on point and how I play when I'm scared to lose. It doesn't always work but I can at least hold my head up and say I went for it. Active player opens UTG at 7 handed table and 2800bb to 5600 with 95K to start the hand. I 3b to 15K from the next seat with AdKh and 105K to start, he flats. Flop comes JT6cc he x's, I bet 15K into 36K. I normally would only go about 11-12K here but I wanted to set up a pot size turn shove if I decided on turn I was going to go for it. He calls and the turn is Tx. He checks and now has 65K back with 66K in the middle. I shove. Having played with this player a bunch I just don't think he's going to have a ton on this board, and it wouldn't shock me if he's called flop with 77-99. I have decent equity vs those hands and they should probably be folding anyway, so I rip it in. Sometimes I'll run into the JT but I think he only has suited combos of that, meaning he literally only has one JT, and even if he has a hand like QJ it's hard to call off (though I think he might). He takes some time and then folds and I'm up to 142K.
I stalled out around 120K with 12 players left before finding a fortunate double with JJ>TT. After a flurry of eliminations I found myself 5/7 at the final table with 30bbs. We played a few orbits where I moved up a bit before busting a shorty QQ>A3s to move up to 3/6 with 45bbs. The rungood continued a few orbits later when I won KK>AJ for 160K each at 10Kbb to move to 567K and get up to 2/5. After running good and winning a bunch of pots I found myself 1/5 with 735K at 12Kbb when the following hand occurred. CO opens to 30K with 490K to start, I 3b SB w AdKc to 91K, he calls. I cbet 67K into 202K on J42cc and he calls. Turn is the 5c and he now has 334K back with 336K in the middle (I'm good at setting up potsize shoves). His 334K stack is right in the middle of the pack here if he folds. I wasn't sure if I was going to rip it in when I bet flop, but on this turn it seems like a no brainer. It's going to be very hard for him to call with less than a jack, and a decent amount of his overpairs are going to have 4b pre. I rip it in and get a pretty quick fold to move over 900K. 2nd has 445K at this point.
When we get down to 3 handed I have 1.4M of the 2.3M in play with the other 2 stacks about even at 450K, and I'm hoping to really lean on both of them for ICM considerations, but that was going to be tough to do in this format. 3rd place was to get $4500, 2nd $6100, and 1st $9200, but because of a perk Party/Borgata have going, 1st place is to also receive a $3500 WPT seat to the upcoming Borgata series. So with this $1600 jump from 3rd to 2nd but a $6600 jump from 2nd to 1st, ICM can be all but ignored for the other 2. One knocks the other out and I have a 1.4M to 880K lead starting heads up. We decide to talk deal.
I offer ICM, $7900 to $7100, leaving $100 and the $3500 seat to play for. He seems ready to accept at first then at the last minute says he's not interested. So we play on! Our deal talks started at 1:35AM, ended at 1:40, and the tournament would not end for another 90 minutes!! We played 163 hands heads up. The first big swing came when I defended 75dd at 10K/20K. He had 800K to start and I covered. Flop Qd7c4h, I x/c a 38K bet into 85K. I x/c 107K into 161K on the 8c turn, and then x/tank call 271K into 377K on the 4c river and beat the ol 52hh. I now have a 1.9M to 350K lead.
He chips back up to 640K when I open Q5hh on the button to 40K. He 3b's very small to 101K and I call. Flop Q44r and I call a 69K cbet into 207K. Turn 8x goes x/x, before he shoves the 6d river for 470K into 345K. This player is just too spazzy for me to be folding top pair here I think, especially when I block the straight (though I don't think he ever has 75 here anyway). Maybe it's too wide a call but when he's picking hands like 52hh as bluffs above, he can just have so much air here. The only concerning thing is he pretty much triple barreled every hand he opened pre in this match, which is just insane, but the check on the turn might have been indicative of strength. I lose to AA and now trail by a small amount in the match. I drop as low as 450K at 24Kbb before getting a 3b shove through with 33, then chip back up over 1M and into the chip lead once again.
Next big hand comes when I defend 8h7d at 28Kbb. He has 830K to start and I cover. Flop 8s3d2h and I x/c 41K into 119K. I x/c 128K into 202K on the 9d turn, and am faced with a bet of 305K into 458K on Kd river. Once again, maybe I should just find a fold here, but this kid just tripled almost every single runout. It was incredible. With the 7d blocker, one of the stronger pairs I'm gonna show up with here, and the fact that he's really repping 2p+ with this size on this board imo (he'd have to have some random K high that got there to be betting that here), I make the call and lose to A2dd. He now leads 1.4M to 900K.
I get a few 4b shoves through in the next few hands before playing one of the biggest pots of the match. I open T5dd and 28Kbb with 1M to start the hand, he covers and defends. Flop 8d7c6d, I continue 45K into 119K, he x/r's to 127K, I 3b 275K, he goes 630K, I shove 936K, and he calls with Q4dd! Oh no! I only have 27% equity! Turn 9x river Qx and the 2M chip pot goes my way. Very very fortunate.
I jam K5o on the button for 10bbs, he calls with A3 and holds on the Q9872 runout. 1.6M to 670K now. We go back and forth a while now with me at a 2:1 lead and him floating around 20bbs. I introduce a limping strategy when he's under 20bbs, sometimes open shoving but often limping a somewhat polarized range. He starts to shove pretty much every time I limp, before finally I limp A9hh at 32Kbb with him at 500K to start the hand. He shoves, I call, he wins with Q5cc when it runs Jd6c2c8c5s. My lead is now 1.25M to 1.05M.
We play smallish pots the next 30 hands or so but he chips me down to 500K at 36Kbb. I open shove QJss on the button and he calls with A4o. Board runs K957...J! Not over yet! He now leads 1.3M to 1M. I win the next pot to bring the match to 1.15M to 1.13M.
In typical poker fashion, the next hand ends the match in a completely unavoidable spot for both of us. After 90 minutes of heads up play, in a tournament that has lasted over 10 hours, I open the button with TT to 72K at 36Kbb, he 3b's really big to 252K, I shove and he calls. The difference between our stacks is 28K at this point as he turns over AQ. We're effectively flipping for $6600. Board runs Q7352 and I finish the tournament in 2nd place for $6100.
What a wild ride that heads up match was. We both held 5:1 leads multiple times. We both sucked out on each other for match and we were both all in more than once needing to win the runout to stay alive. I would have really loved to win this one, as this might have been the biggest heads up match I've ever played dollarwise, but when you put everything in perspective, yesterday could have easily been a $3K losing day and instead was a $2700 winning day. Despite a horrible day otherwise I hung in there mentally and 1 tabled the tournament for--no joke--over 5 hours.
Over the weekend P5s rankings updated and I'm back into the top 10, ranked 8th in NJ and 580th in the world, my highest worldwide rank ever. This tourney will give me a ton of points towards that and while I don't put nearly as much stock into those rankings as I used to, it's nice to have some bragging rights and show that I still at least have some clue what I'm doing in this state. The grind continues tonight, and I'll most likely play Monday-Thursday as I need to leave for Chicago on Friday for a wedding. Not sure if I'll be back in time for the Sunday session but I'm definitely gonna try.
So I did a bad job of being a professional this week, going to the city on Thursday with the intention of coming home Friday to play Friday-Sunday and instead found myself there for 3 days. I had an insane amount of fun those 3 days, so at least it wasn't a waste in that sense, but if I want to truly be a professional and take myself seriously, I can't be doing that stuff, even when my poker results are going well enough that I can afford it. But damn it was fun lol.
I got back to Fair Lawn late Sunday night and woke up the next morning feeling a little groggy but ready to play. I ended up napping from 3PM-5:30PM and after getting up and getting some food I sat down to play at 6. I ended up firing 5 bullets in the WSOP $215, 3 bullets in the Party $215, and 2 bullets in the Stars $200, along with another 10 or so bullets in other $100 events, and sprinkling a few $50 events in there, leading to my total buy ins being around $3300. I haven't ran as bad as I did the first few hours of the Sunday session in a long time. I busted QQ to KK on bullet 1 in the Party 215 after a guy flatted an open pre and then back 4b shoved, then lost QQ to AA and JJ to AA pretty quickly to bust bullet 2. The WSOP $215 was just insanity, losing back to back flips on the river to bust 2 bullets, then losing a bunch of standard hands for the next 2 bullets, and finally losing most of my stack on the 5th bullet with AQ vs KQ after finally having found some traction.
The $100s did not go well, and sure enough with 1 tournament remaining, the Party $215, I had cashed once on the day, in the only tourney I played that was <$50 buy in, and it was in the $10 Sunday Storm where I finished 30th or something for like $28 lol. So I was staring at a big losing day, but that was sort of to be expected. I have been sun running in the month of August, and really over the course of the entire last 5-6 weeks. In fact, looking at my spreadsheet right now shows some insane statistics. Going into yesterday's session, my last 4 figure losing day (and it was less than $1200) was July 23. Since August 1, I have 4 losing days, and 2 of them are for $20 or less when I clearly didn't play a session but just fired up some spins while I was bored. The other 2 losing days are both under $500. I am up $21K since July 16th, which was the day I came in 2nd in the Party 40K to bust out of the $13K losing streak I'd had going. So I was due for a bad day yesterday.
I made the money of the tournament, the Party $215 40K, after having a much bigger stack earlier, hanging on to a 15bb stack. We had locked up about $300 with 36 left. In order to make money on the day I would need to finish 4th or better, but I was ready to make good decisions and disregard that type of thinking, only worrying about ICM and making the proper decisions for this specific tournament. I lost A9 to AQ to a 5bb stack, knocking me down to 10bbs, and then I found some heat. With blinds at 1200/2400 I was in the BB with 18.8K to start the hand. UTG opens min, CO calls, SB calls and I elected to defend and go with it on any decent flop. I could just shove pre but I decide to peel and if I totally whiff in this 4 way pot, I think it's safe to assume I have the worst hand. I'll have 6bbs back if I have to x/f flop and will hope to find something later! Flop comes A62dd and I decide this flop is good enough that I'll check and get it in if someone bets, or just shove every turn if it checks through. It checks through, turn Qx, I shove 14K into 21K, 1 caller with QTdd and I somehow fade all the outs to jump to 50K.
A couple orbits later I get 53K in at 2400bb with AK vs TT. Board runs AK6TA and we get the double in crazy fashion. A couple orbits later I think I played the pot that sort of ends up defining my tournament. There are a bunch of bigger pots I played later on that I'm sure were worth more in equity, but not being afraid to pull the trigger here is the difference between how I play when I'm on point and how I play when I'm scared to lose. It doesn't always work but I can at least hold my head up and say I went for it. Active player opens UTG at 7 handed table and 2800bb to 5600 with 95K to start the hand. I 3b to 15K from the next seat with AdKh and 105K to start, he flats. Flop comes JT6cc he x's, I bet 15K into 36K. I normally would only go about 11-12K here but I wanted to set up a pot size turn shove if I decided on turn I was going to go for it. He calls and the turn is Tx. He checks and now has 65K back with 66K in the middle. I shove. Having played with this player a bunch I just don't think he's going to have a ton on this board, and it wouldn't shock me if he's called flop with 77-99. I have decent equity vs those hands and they should probably be folding anyway, so I rip it in. Sometimes I'll run into the JT but I think he only has suited combos of that, meaning he literally only has one JT, and even if he has a hand like QJ it's hard to call off (though I think he might). He takes some time and then folds and I'm up to 142K.
I stalled out around 120K with 12 players left before finding a fortunate double with JJ>TT. After a flurry of eliminations I found myself 5/7 at the final table with 30bbs. We played a few orbits where I moved up a bit before busting a shorty QQ>A3s to move up to 3/6 with 45bbs. The rungood continued a few orbits later when I won KK>AJ for 160K each at 10Kbb to move to 567K and get up to 2/5. After running good and winning a bunch of pots I found myself 1/5 with 735K at 12Kbb when the following hand occurred. CO opens to 30K with 490K to start, I 3b SB w AdKc to 91K, he calls. I cbet 67K into 202K on J42cc and he calls. Turn is the 5c and he now has 334K back with 336K in the middle (I'm good at setting up potsize shoves
). His 334K stack is right in the middle of the pack here if he folds. I wasn't sure if I was going to rip it in when I bet flop, but on this turn it seems like a no brainer. It's going to be very hard for him to call with less than a jack, and a decent amount of his overpairs are going to have 4b pre. I rip it in and get a pretty quick fold to move over 900K. 2nd has 445K at this point.When we get down to 3 handed I have 1.4M of the 2.3M in play with the other 2 stacks about even at 450K, and I'm hoping to really lean on both of them for ICM considerations, but that was going to be tough to do in this format. 3rd place was to get $4500, 2nd $6100, and 1st $9200, but because of a perk Party/Borgata have going, 1st place is to also receive a $3500 WPT seat to the upcoming Borgata series. So with this $1600 jump from 3rd to 2nd but a $6600 jump from 2nd to 1st, ICM can be all but ignored for the other 2. One knocks the other out and I have a 1.4M to 880K lead starting heads up. We decide to talk deal.
I offer ICM, $7900 to $7100, leaving $100 and the $3500 seat to play for. He seems ready to accept at first then at the last minute says he's not interested. So we play on! Our deal talks started at 1:35AM, ended at 1:40, and the tournament would not end for another 90 minutes!! We played 163 hands heads up. The first big swing came when I defended 75dd at 10K/20K. He had 800K to start and I covered. Flop Qd7c4h, I x/c a 38K bet into 85K. I x/c 107K into 161K on the 8c turn, and then x/tank call 271K into 377K on the 4c river and beat the ol 52hh. I now have a 1.9M to 350K lead.
He chips back up to 640K when I open Q5hh on the button to 40K. He 3b's very small to 101K and I call. Flop Q44r and I call a 69K cbet into 207K. Turn 8x goes x/x, before he shoves the 6d river for 470K into 345K. This player is just too spazzy for me to be folding top pair here I think, especially when I block the straight (though I don't think he ever has 75 here anyway). Maybe it's too wide a call but when he's picking hands like 52hh as bluffs above, he can just have so much air here. The only concerning thing is he pretty much triple barreled every hand he opened pre in this match, which is just insane, but the check on the turn might have been indicative of strength. I lose to AA and now trail by a small amount in the match. I drop as low as 450K at 24Kbb before getting a 3b shove through with 33, then chip back up over 1M and into the chip lead once again.
Next big hand comes when I defend 8h7d at 28Kbb. He has 830K to start and I cover. Flop 8s3d2h and I x/c 41K into 119K. I x/c 128K into 202K on the 9d turn, and am faced with a bet of 305K into 458K on Kd river. Once again, maybe I should just find a fold here, but this kid just tripled almost every single runout. It was incredible. With the 7d blocker, one of the stronger pairs I'm gonna show up with here, and the fact that he's really repping 2p+ with this size on this board imo (he'd have to have some random K high that got there to be betting that here), I make the call and lose to A2dd. He now leads 1.4M to 900K.
I get a few 4b shoves through in the next few hands before playing one of the biggest pots of the match. I open T5dd and 28Kbb with 1M to start the hand, he covers and defends. Flop 8d7c6d, I continue 45K into 119K, he x/r's to 127K, I 3b 275K, he goes 630K, I shove 936K, and he calls with Q4dd! Oh no! I only have 27% equity! Turn 9x river Qx and the 2M chip pot goes my way. Very very fortunate.
I jam K5o on the button for 10bbs, he calls with A3 and holds on the Q9872 runout. 1.6M to 670K now. We go back and forth a while now with me at a 2:1 lead and him floating around 20bbs. I introduce a limping strategy when he's under 20bbs, sometimes open shoving but often limping a somewhat polarized range. He starts to shove pretty much every time I limp, before finally I limp A9hh at 32Kbb with him at 500K to start the hand. He shoves, I call, he wins with Q5cc when it runs Jd6c2c8c5s. My lead is now 1.25M to 1.05M.
We play smallish pots the next 30 hands or so but he chips me down to 500K at 36Kbb. I open shove QJss on the button and he calls with A4o. Board runs K957...J! Not over yet! He now leads 1.3M to 1M. I win the next pot to bring the match to 1.15M to 1.13M.
In typical poker fashion, the next hand ends the match in a completely unavoidable spot for both of us. After 90 minutes of heads up play, in a tournament that has lasted over 10 hours, I open the button with TT to 72K at 36Kbb, he 3b's really big to 252K, I shove and he calls. The difference between our stacks is 28K at this point as he turns over AQ. We're effectively flipping for $6600. Board runs Q7352 and I finish the tournament in 2nd place for $6100.
What a wild ride that heads up match was. We both held 5:1 leads multiple times. We both sucked out on each other for match and we were both all in more than once needing to win the runout to stay alive. I would have really loved to win this one, as this might have been the biggest heads up match I've ever played dollarwise, but when you put everything in perspective, yesterday could have easily been a $3K losing day and instead was a $2700 winning day. Despite a horrible day otherwise I hung in there mentally and 1 tabled the tournament for--no joke--over 5 hours.
Over the weekend P5s rankings updated and I'm back into the top 10, ranked 8th in NJ and 580th in the world, my highest worldwide rank ever. This tourney will give me a ton of points towards that and while I don't put nearly as much stock into those rankings as I used to, it's nice to have some bragging rights and show that I still at least have some clue what I'm doing in this state. The grind continues tonight, and I'll most likely play Monday-Thursday as I need to leave for Chicago on Friday for a wedding. Not sure if I'll be back in time for the Sunday session but I'm definitely gonna try.
08-28-2017
, 03:28 PM
08-29-2017
, 11:37 AM
I ran 3.25 miles yesterday, outside of a run with my buddy Aaren a couple weeks ago it's my first run in probably over a month. My foot had been bothering me and my eyes have been bothering me and I don't like running with glasses on, but yesterday I sucked it up and that aspect of it wasn't that bad. I ran like an idiot though and finished in 21:50, 6:42/mile, and was pretty exhausted the rest of the day. But I got some food and laid down in bed around 6PM, ready to take a short little nap and start my session.
3 hours later I woke up with all the good tourneys over 2 hours in
I shook the sleep off and hopped in the Party and Stars 10Ks, having 14-16bbs in each. I busted the Stars 10K twice before getting it up to 3 starting stacks, and busted Party twice without much traction. Unfortunately I played a weird one in the Stars 10K to bust before the money, but began to build stacks in the smallish $100 2K on WSOP and the $100 3.5K on Stars. I finished 4th on WSOP for $330 or something, and ran/played well in the Stars $100 to win it for $1500, making about $900 on the day. I really love the way I just keep registering everything even when I bust tournaments in tough ways. I'm running incredibly good to close my last couple tournaments each day in the last month so it will be a good challenge to keep regging everything even when I have a few losing days in a row, but this is definitely a good start.
I was happy with how I played that Stars $100 yesterday. I found myself 3/9 going to the FT with 7 paying, having about 60K in chips with 2nd at 100K and a good reg in 1st at 180K, and I think 4th had like 40K. The disparity was pretty wild. I was happy with the patience I showed knowing I needed to be careful on the bubble, but the combination of that with being aggressive in the right spots to make sure I didn't dip too far down was good.
After the session I had a great HH review of the Party 40K with a good reg who actually final tabled it with me. We talked for over 3 hours about it and other general MTT concepts, among other things, that I found really useful and enjoyable. I love having those talks and realizing there are so many more things I can be doing to improve despite the success I'm seeing now. If you get complacent with your ability in this game you're not going to continue to succeed; humility is so important in consistent improvement.
Back to the grind tonight, Tuesdays can get expensive so here's to a good session.
3 hours later I woke up with all the good tourneys over 2 hours in
I shook the sleep off and hopped in the Party and Stars 10Ks, having 14-16bbs in each. I busted the Stars 10K twice before getting it up to 3 starting stacks, and busted Party twice without much traction. Unfortunately I played a weird one in the Stars 10K to bust before the money, but began to build stacks in the smallish $100 2K on WSOP and the $100 3.5K on Stars. I finished 4th on WSOP for $330 or something, and ran/played well in the Stars $100 to win it for $1500, making about $900 on the day. I really love the way I just keep registering everything even when I bust tournaments in tough ways. I'm running incredibly good to close my last couple tournaments each day in the last month so it will be a good challenge to keep regging everything even when I have a few losing days in a row, but this is definitely a good start.
I was happy with how I played that Stars $100 yesterday. I found myself 3/9 going to the FT with 7 paying, having about 60K in chips with 2nd at 100K and a good reg in 1st at 180K, and I think 4th had like 40K. The disparity was pretty wild. I was happy with the patience I showed knowing I needed to be careful on the bubble, but the combination of that with being aggressive in the right spots to make sure I didn't dip too far down was good.
After the session I had a great HH review of the Party 40K with a good reg who actually final tabled it with me. We talked for over 3 hours about it and other general MTT concepts, among other things, that I found really useful and enjoyable. I love having those talks and realizing there are so many more things I can be doing to improve despite the success I'm seeing now. If you get complacent with your ability in this game you're not going to continue to succeed; humility is so important in consistent improvement.
Back to the grind tonight, Tuesdays can get expensive so here's to a good session.
09-09-2017
, 03:19 AM
09-12-2017
, 08:12 AM
09-15-2017
, 10:50 AM
09-21-2017
, 07:03 PM
10-08-2017
, 12:15 AM
Still alive, just in that downswing depression that makes me not wanna update 
Have been running a bit this week which is good, have not been studying at all which is bad, complaining a lot which is bad, big Sunday tomorrow so hopefully I'll pop out of this little funk and get a nice post in on here Monday.
Have been running a bit this week which is good, have not been studying at all which is bad, complaining a lot which is bad, big Sunday tomorrow so hopefully I'll pop out of this little funk and get a nice post in on here Monday.
10-20-2017
, 02:09 AM
Positive Update!
Been struggling quite a bit lately and I hate coming on here and just whining, so the updates have been few and far between. Finally some good news to report though! Guess I'll just go chronologically with how the last 2 weeks have been.
Sunday the 8th
The day after my last post. Didn't put in a proper session, just 4 tabled on laptop while laying in bed. I remember building a few stacks in some good MTTs and then losing 4 straight flips in 3 different MTTs, all for very large pots and not cashing anything. Lost 1k on the day. Was feeling pretty miserable in general and losing sessions never really help with that.
Monday the 9th
I lay in bed again and this time 1 table the $300 4 max NJCOOP event. I'm pretty depressed as my Boston Red Sox have just had their season ended by the Houston Astros. This year was easily the most attention I've ever paid to the team and they were a lot of fun to watch and just ran into a better team. I run pretty good throughout the MTT and make the money (top 20) with a pretty good stack. I falter a little bit and end up in 7th of 8 or so but still have a prayer with 15bbs. 8th will cash for $1300; the winner will get $15K. I shove 77 in the SB and get called by 44. Flop is clean, turn is a 4, and I smack my laptop hard enough to make the crack in the screen get bigger. I win 1K on the day and feel completely awful about the result and about how I handled myself afterwards.
Thursday the 12th
I take Tuesday and Wednesday off, I honestly can't even remember what I did those days, other than going on a run each day. After going 3.1 miles on Friday the 6th and 3.2 on Saturday the 7th, I decide I'm going to attempt a pretty silly challenge. I'll add 0.1 miles to my run each day and see how many days in a row I can go. So Tuesday was 3.5 and Wednesday was 3.6. I can tell that, as it's gone in the past, running every day will be a good way to get myself out of the funk I've been in, and I don't mean the poker funk. Running every day just helps me to feel better about myself and my situation in general and allows me to realize that things are way better than I feel that they are when I'm feeling depressed.
The session isn't going great until I catch some heat in the Thursday Thrill. I find myself heads up with a big fish, down slightly in chip count. For those unfamiliar with progressive knockout MTTs, the difference between 1st and 2nd is massive because whoever wins not only gets his opponent's bounty but also his own bounty. In this case, the difference between 1st and 2nd combined with each of our bounties was something like $1600. I think it was $1600 to 1st, $1000 to 2nd, and $1000 in total bounties on our heads. I finally find a great spot against this guy, who often just bombs 2x pot and doesn't find folds when he should. I 3b JJ pretty big and he flats; he also calls a pretty big bet on 973hhc. The turn is the 5c and I shove for pot; he thinks a bit and calls with T9. Winning the hand would give me a 550K to 175K or so lead; the river is a 9 and I finish in 2nd. After recording my bankroll on each site into my records, I find that I've made $4.38 on the day. I once again feel pretty ****ty.
Sunday the 15th
I lose $300 on Friday and make $70 on Saturday before firing up arguably the biggest session of the year for NJ sites. PokerStars NJCOOP main combined with GSSS starting on Party Poker led to a lot of decent MTTs. I make a good run in the $215 WSOP 40K before making a questionable play to bust 15th. I fire 3 bullets at the $500 main on Stars and do not cash. I end up losing over $2000 on the day and feel bad about it, but somehow less bad than usual. I was kind of excited about the fact that I wasn't afraid to fire 3 bullets into the main. I don't know what it was but it was like I realized it's okay to just go for it in these MTTs sometimes and stop being such a bankroll nit; the worst case scenario is my roll goes from 20K to 18K. I'll live as long as I'm not firing those every day, which isn't even possible in NJ since $500s only run twice a week.
Monday the 16th
The run good hits me for the first time in a long time. I absolutely pure the last NJCOOP event of the year, taking 2nd in a $100 6 max hyper for $2600 or so. In fact I cash all 4 tournaments I play (once again 4 tabled on my laptop in bed) and make $2700 on the day since I fired a bunch of bullets at each event. The last MTT of the day sees me lose AA to T9o with 9 left in a $320 on Party which sucked with 5K+ up top, but I managed to look at the bright side and realize a hyper turbo got all my losses back and then some from the previous day.
Tuesday the 17th
I fire the Party $535 6 max GSSS event, a couple bullets in the Stars $250 Super Tuesday, all the 10Ks, etc, no luck. But the Party $215 that runs each Tuesday goes well for me and I end up in a very weird spot where a player on my direct left has double my stack while I have triple 3rd place's stack with 6 left and 5 paying. He leans on me pretty hard but I do a decent job of being just careful enough to not get run over but also not punt it off and get in an ego war. We end up heads up with about even stacks.
Heads up goes on forever and I find myself getting really tired, especially with all the running I've been doing, but do a good job at staying focused. I make several correct hero calls on rivers and end up chipping him down quite a bit. The first all in comes with his 98 vs my 55; flop comes 998 and that's that. I maintain a small lead after the hand and chip him down again, this time getting my A6s in vs his A4o. 4 on the turn and he doubles again. Back and forth we go before I lose a decent pot where I open K4cc he calls, flop Q32cc and he donks. I call, turn is Jx he bets again I call, river 7x check check and I lose to 97o. That pot got to me a little bit; if he can literally just click buttons and beat me anyway how am I going to win this match! I chip down now and eventually my A9o gets in vs his 55 and I brick out to finish 2nd. I make $1000 on the day. The difference between 1st and 2nd was only $800 but I look back and realize I have not outright won an MTT since September 7!! I did chop this exact $215 a few weeks ago heads up and got slightly more so it was recorded as a 1st, but other than that, 6 weeks since my last win.
Wednesday the 18th
Around 4:30 I get on a Skype call with a very good poker player (shout out to Sean!) and we go over this $215 I played the day before. We only go over the final table, and when it gets heads up we only look at the big hands, and we talked for 3 hours!! Breaking down hands is amazing for confidence and game play. I'm often anxious to do reviews; I'm very selective of who I want to talk to about hands. I fear that I'll talk to someone who will give me bad advice and I'll end up going backwards without realizing. But this particular player doesn't give me any of those worries and not only is very good at the game but does an amazing job of talking about the intangibles. He seemed to relate very well to the sort of depression I've been feeling. I've never talked to someone before about the feeling of accomplishment I have when I get out of bed and drive to the bank to deposit a check, probably because I didn't even realize that was a feeling I get. But he described it perfectly as to how little things like that can really make you feel better.
He also did an amazing job of describing another way to feel better about things. Often you'll feel good or bad based on results, which is an obvious thing to point out. So the next step is disregarding results and feeling good or bad about how you're playing. I've thought of this before and was grateful he brought it up but it wasn't new to me. HOWEVER, you can go one level deeper, because often it's hard to tell if you're playing good or bad. Did I get coolered a bunch of times or did I make mistakes? Did I have 10BBs at the end of that MTT because I ran bad or because I missed spots? It's often hard to tell. So instead of being happy/sad based on how you're playing, look at something else you can control. How am I preparing? Did I wake up at a reasonable hour? Did I do something productive? In my case, did I get my run in? Did I eat properly today and have enough energy? So if you do all of your steps before playing well, you can feel good about that regardless of how well you do in poker, results-wise or game play-wise.
Some other non-strategy topics we talked about that I thought were interesting included how a win can just get your spirits up so much. Any sort of win really, the psychology of just having every chip at the end is a feeling so amazing that it's hard to describe. Not having that in so long has been hard for me, which made this latest heads up loss that much more painful. We talked about not outright ignoring ICM but considering it much less. The value of winning the MTT and feeling better might be worth sacrificing a few dollars if a spot is at least +chip EV. All the spots I faced when CL had 140K, I had 80K, and 3rd-6th had 30K were great opportunities to talk about that idea.
We talked from 4:30-7:30 at which point I went to get food. I wasn't ready to play until about 9:00 and I decided to consider those 3 hours of review as good enough for the day and hung out with my roommates the rest of the night.
Thursday the 19th (Today)
I got up and went on my run, which today was up to 4.4 miles and completed the 2nd week of this challenge. I tried a new pizza place afterwards which was good, took a shower, and then started my session. I've been 9 tabling recently instead of 6 tabling and I've liked how it's been going. So to start I had the $250 Thrill, the $100 10Ks on Stars and Party, the $55 turbo on Party, $20 1500 on Stars, $20 satty on Party, $100 second chance on Stars, $100 WSOP MTT, and $50 6 max on Stars. I had to fold top set early on in the Thrill which was ridiculous, and by the time I was down to 6 tables I decided I wouldn't be adding anymore and would just focus on them.
Eventually I found myself with only 2 games left, the Stars $20 and the Party $100. I was short with 9 left in the $20 but after winning A4s>77 for 40K each at 5Kbb, I went on a tear and won a ton of hands in a row, before winning KK>TT to get to 300K and a huge lead. I kept my foot on the gas and just went for the win, and ran good enough to get it done! It was only for $470 but exactly what I'd talked about with my buddy the day before, that feeling of winning is amazing!
So I was left with the Party 10K where I was 13/13 at one point with 12 paying. I got a few shoves through, the bubble lasted a long time, and by the end of it I was able to start shoving to put pressure on shorter stacks. After the bubble burst I won QQ>QJ to double to 120K at 4Kbb and have some breathing room as we reached the final table of 9.
One of the best regs in NJ just took off and found himself with 500K of the 1M in play with like 6 left. I was in 2nd with 200K and no one else had over 100K, so a dynamic similar to the one I had just discussed in depth with my friend formed once again. How do I make sure to give myself a chance to win the MTT without going overboard and finding myself busting 6th?
We got to 4 handed with the disparity even bigger, the solid reg at 600K on my direct left, me at 200K, the other stacks at 100K each. The 3 short stacks fluctuated a bunch; I believe I was 4/4 at one point but with blinds at 3K/6K I was never really in panic mode. I knocked out the shortest stack with AJ vs an ambitious T2o shove blind vs blind, and then raise/called 55 for like 28bbs my button vs a crazy spaz's BB shove. I'm not sure if it's good honestly; I opened to 17.5k at 7k bb and he shoved like 190K. I do think though that not only does he have 22-44 but also has pretty much every Ax and might even find some random K2-K5. He had ATs and I won the flip! I was down something like 600K to 400K to start heads up and we were very deep at 3500/7000 blinds.
I love how I played heads up to be honest. I think I did a very good job of deciding exactly where I was in my range in each spot, bluffing when I was at the bottom and value betting when I was at the top. At one point I bet A6 on KQ2KQ and got called by worse. I also went big on a river with K3 on 883QK in a spot where I felt confident he had a queen and would put me on an 8 or nothing in a spot where I didn't have much 8x. He tank called Q6.
He 3b me a decent amount and I actually found a ton of 4b's. I think I just had good 4b hands. A few times I had value, a few times I had hands that I didn't want to call or fold with (A5o, QTo, etc). I'm not sure if these are actually good 4b bluffs but it's what I thought was best. Eventually I have a 2:1 lead and 3b AKs; he shoves somewhat large with QQ and wins the flip. I'm now down 2:1 again.
We battle a lot more and I continue to make good enough hands to value bet river and get paid a few times to take the lead back. Eventually I make a somewhat hero-ey call on river with 2nd pair on a 3 flush board vs a triple barrel and beat a missed flush draw/gutter to take a 900K to 120K lead at 10Kbb. Each of us get a few shoves through before I jam K2o, get called by T9s, and hold! What a relief to win an MTT like that. $2900 for the win giving me a winning day of $2500 and taking my bankroll from $18K after Sunday to $24.5K. For the first time in months a winning session will allow me to withdraw money.
TL;DR Recap
Tough stretch lately but great last 4 days, results-wise and just in general. Great review session on Wednesday, over $6K profit in the other 3 days. I'm back to running and it feels good.
Running Log:
Party 10K Win:
Stars Big 20 Win:
Been struggling quite a bit lately and I hate coming on here and just whining, so the updates have been few and far between. Finally some good news to report though! Guess I'll just go chronologically with how the last 2 weeks have been.
Sunday the 8th
The day after my last post. Didn't put in a proper session, just 4 tabled on laptop while laying in bed. I remember building a few stacks in some good MTTs and then losing 4 straight flips in 3 different MTTs, all for very large pots and not cashing anything. Lost 1k on the day. Was feeling pretty miserable in general and losing sessions never really help with that.
Monday the 9th
I lay in bed again and this time 1 table the $300 4 max NJCOOP event. I'm pretty depressed as my Boston Red Sox have just had their season ended by the Houston Astros. This year was easily the most attention I've ever paid to the team and they were a lot of fun to watch and just ran into a better team. I run pretty good throughout the MTT and make the money (top 20) with a pretty good stack. I falter a little bit and end up in 7th of 8 or so but still have a prayer with 15bbs. 8th will cash for $1300; the winner will get $15K. I shove 77 in the SB and get called by 44. Flop is clean, turn is a 4, and I smack my laptop hard enough to make the crack in the screen get bigger. I win 1K on the day and feel completely awful about the result and about how I handled myself afterwards.
Thursday the 12th
I take Tuesday and Wednesday off, I honestly can't even remember what I did those days, other than going on a run each day. After going 3.1 miles on Friday the 6th and 3.2 on Saturday the 7th, I decide I'm going to attempt a pretty silly challenge. I'll add 0.1 miles to my run each day and see how many days in a row I can go. So Tuesday was 3.5 and Wednesday was 3.6. I can tell that, as it's gone in the past, running every day will be a good way to get myself out of the funk I've been in, and I don't mean the poker funk. Running every day just helps me to feel better about myself and my situation in general and allows me to realize that things are way better than I feel that they are when I'm feeling depressed.
The session isn't going great until I catch some heat in the Thursday Thrill. I find myself heads up with a big fish, down slightly in chip count. For those unfamiliar with progressive knockout MTTs, the difference between 1st and 2nd is massive because whoever wins not only gets his opponent's bounty but also his own bounty. In this case, the difference between 1st and 2nd combined with each of our bounties was something like $1600. I think it was $1600 to 1st, $1000 to 2nd, and $1000 in total bounties on our heads. I finally find a great spot against this guy, who often just bombs 2x pot and doesn't find folds when he should. I 3b JJ pretty big and he flats; he also calls a pretty big bet on 973hhc. The turn is the 5c and I shove for pot; he thinks a bit and calls with T9. Winning the hand would give me a 550K to 175K or so lead; the river is a 9 and I finish in 2nd. After recording my bankroll on each site into my records, I find that I've made $4.38 on the day. I once again feel pretty ****ty.
Sunday the 15th
I lose $300 on Friday and make $70 on Saturday before firing up arguably the biggest session of the year for NJ sites. PokerStars NJCOOP main combined with GSSS starting on Party Poker led to a lot of decent MTTs. I make a good run in the $215 WSOP 40K before making a questionable play to bust 15th. I fire 3 bullets at the $500 main on Stars and do not cash. I end up losing over $2000 on the day and feel bad about it, but somehow less bad than usual. I was kind of excited about the fact that I wasn't afraid to fire 3 bullets into the main. I don't know what it was but it was like I realized it's okay to just go for it in these MTTs sometimes and stop being such a bankroll nit; the worst case scenario is my roll goes from 20K to 18K. I'll live as long as I'm not firing those every day, which isn't even possible in NJ since $500s only run twice a week.
Monday the 16th
The run good hits me for the first time in a long time. I absolutely pure the last NJCOOP event of the year, taking 2nd in a $100 6 max hyper for $2600 or so. In fact I cash all 4 tournaments I play (once again 4 tabled on my laptop in bed) and make $2700 on the day since I fired a bunch of bullets at each event. The last MTT of the day sees me lose AA to T9o with 9 left in a $320 on Party which sucked with 5K+ up top, but I managed to look at the bright side and realize a hyper turbo got all my losses back and then some from the previous day.
Tuesday the 17th
I fire the Party $535 6 max GSSS event, a couple bullets in the Stars $250 Super Tuesday, all the 10Ks, etc, no luck. But the Party $215 that runs each Tuesday goes well for me and I end up in a very weird spot where a player on my direct left has double my stack while I have triple 3rd place's stack with 6 left and 5 paying. He leans on me pretty hard but I do a decent job of being just careful enough to not get run over but also not punt it off and get in an ego war. We end up heads up with about even stacks.
Heads up goes on forever and I find myself getting really tired, especially with all the running I've been doing, but do a good job at staying focused. I make several correct hero calls on rivers and end up chipping him down quite a bit. The first all in comes with his 98 vs my 55; flop comes 998 and that's that. I maintain a small lead after the hand and chip him down again, this time getting my A6s in vs his A4o. 4 on the turn and he doubles again. Back and forth we go before I lose a decent pot where I open K4cc he calls, flop Q32cc and he donks. I call, turn is Jx he bets again I call, river 7x check check and I lose to 97o. That pot got to me a little bit; if he can literally just click buttons and beat me anyway how am I going to win this match! I chip down now and eventually my A9o gets in vs his 55 and I brick out to finish 2nd. I make $1000 on the day. The difference between 1st and 2nd was only $800 but I look back and realize I have not outright won an MTT since September 7!! I did chop this exact $215 a few weeks ago heads up and got slightly more so it was recorded as a 1st, but other than that, 6 weeks since my last win.
Wednesday the 18th
Around 4:30 I get on a Skype call with a very good poker player (shout out to Sean!) and we go over this $215 I played the day before. We only go over the final table, and when it gets heads up we only look at the big hands, and we talked for 3 hours!! Breaking down hands is amazing for confidence and game play. I'm often anxious to do reviews; I'm very selective of who I want to talk to about hands. I fear that I'll talk to someone who will give me bad advice and I'll end up going backwards without realizing. But this particular player doesn't give me any of those worries and not only is very good at the game but does an amazing job of talking about the intangibles. He seemed to relate very well to the sort of depression I've been feeling. I've never talked to someone before about the feeling of accomplishment I have when I get out of bed and drive to the bank to deposit a check, probably because I didn't even realize that was a feeling I get. But he described it perfectly as to how little things like that can really make you feel better.
He also did an amazing job of describing another way to feel better about things. Often you'll feel good or bad based on results, which is an obvious thing to point out. So the next step is disregarding results and feeling good or bad about how you're playing. I've thought of this before and was grateful he brought it up but it wasn't new to me. HOWEVER, you can go one level deeper, because often it's hard to tell if you're playing good or bad. Did I get coolered a bunch of times or did I make mistakes? Did I have 10BBs at the end of that MTT because I ran bad or because I missed spots? It's often hard to tell. So instead of being happy/sad based on how you're playing, look at something else you can control. How am I preparing? Did I wake up at a reasonable hour? Did I do something productive? In my case, did I get my run in? Did I eat properly today and have enough energy? So if you do all of your steps before playing well, you can feel good about that regardless of how well you do in poker, results-wise or game play-wise.
Some other non-strategy topics we talked about that I thought were interesting included how a win can just get your spirits up so much. Any sort of win really, the psychology of just having every chip at the end is a feeling so amazing that it's hard to describe. Not having that in so long has been hard for me, which made this latest heads up loss that much more painful. We talked about not outright ignoring ICM but considering it much less. The value of winning the MTT and feeling better might be worth sacrificing a few dollars if a spot is at least +chip EV. All the spots I faced when CL had 140K, I had 80K, and 3rd-6th had 30K were great opportunities to talk about that idea.
We talked from 4:30-7:30 at which point I went to get food. I wasn't ready to play until about 9:00 and I decided to consider those 3 hours of review as good enough for the day and hung out with my roommates the rest of the night.
Thursday the 19th (Today)
I got up and went on my run, which today was up to 4.4 miles and completed the 2nd week of this challenge. I tried a new pizza place afterwards which was good, took a shower, and then started my session. I've been 9 tabling recently instead of 6 tabling and I've liked how it's been going. So to start I had the $250 Thrill, the $100 10Ks on Stars and Party, the $55 turbo on Party, $20 1500 on Stars, $20 satty on Party, $100 second chance on Stars, $100 WSOP MTT, and $50 6 max on Stars. I had to fold top set early on in the Thrill which was ridiculous, and by the time I was down to 6 tables I decided I wouldn't be adding anymore and would just focus on them.
Eventually I found myself with only 2 games left, the Stars $20 and the Party $100. I was short with 9 left in the $20 but after winning A4s>77 for 40K each at 5Kbb, I went on a tear and won a ton of hands in a row, before winning KK>TT to get to 300K and a huge lead. I kept my foot on the gas and just went for the win, and ran good enough to get it done! It was only for $470 but exactly what I'd talked about with my buddy the day before, that feeling of winning is amazing!
So I was left with the Party 10K where I was 13/13 at one point with 12 paying. I got a few shoves through, the bubble lasted a long time, and by the end of it I was able to start shoving to put pressure on shorter stacks. After the bubble burst I won QQ>QJ to double to 120K at 4Kbb and have some breathing room as we reached the final table of 9.
One of the best regs in NJ just took off and found himself with 500K of the 1M in play with like 6 left. I was in 2nd with 200K and no one else had over 100K, so a dynamic similar to the one I had just discussed in depth with my friend formed once again. How do I make sure to give myself a chance to win the MTT without going overboard and finding myself busting 6th?
We got to 4 handed with the disparity even bigger, the solid reg at 600K on my direct left, me at 200K, the other stacks at 100K each. The 3 short stacks fluctuated a bunch; I believe I was 4/4 at one point but with blinds at 3K/6K I was never really in panic mode. I knocked out the shortest stack with AJ vs an ambitious T2o shove blind vs blind, and then raise/called 55 for like 28bbs my button vs a crazy spaz's BB shove. I'm not sure if it's good honestly; I opened to 17.5k at 7k bb and he shoved like 190K. I do think though that not only does he have 22-44 but also has pretty much every Ax and might even find some random K2-K5. He had ATs and I won the flip! I was down something like 600K to 400K to start heads up and we were very deep at 3500/7000 blinds.
I love how I played heads up to be honest. I think I did a very good job of deciding exactly where I was in my range in each spot, bluffing when I was at the bottom and value betting when I was at the top. At one point I bet A6 on KQ2KQ and got called by worse. I also went big on a river with K3 on 883QK in a spot where I felt confident he had a queen and would put me on an 8 or nothing in a spot where I didn't have much 8x. He tank called Q6.
He 3b me a decent amount and I actually found a ton of 4b's. I think I just had good 4b hands. A few times I had value, a few times I had hands that I didn't want to call or fold with (A5o, QTo, etc). I'm not sure if these are actually good 4b bluffs but it's what I thought was best. Eventually I have a 2:1 lead and 3b AKs; he shoves somewhat large with QQ and wins the flip. I'm now down 2:1 again.
We battle a lot more and I continue to make good enough hands to value bet river and get paid a few times to take the lead back. Eventually I make a somewhat hero-ey call on river with 2nd pair on a 3 flush board vs a triple barrel and beat a missed flush draw/gutter to take a 900K to 120K lead at 10Kbb. Each of us get a few shoves through before I jam K2o, get called by T9s, and hold! What a relief to win an MTT like that. $2900 for the win giving me a winning day of $2500 and taking my bankroll from $18K after Sunday to $24.5K. For the first time in months a winning session will allow me to withdraw money.
TL;DR Recap
Tough stretch lately but great last 4 days, results-wise and just in general. Great review session on Wednesday, over $6K profit in the other 3 days. I'm back to running and it feels good.
Running Log:
Party 10K Win:
Stars Big 20 Win:
10-20-2017
, 07:24 AM
Found this 2day 
(better late than never).
Gl on your efforts! Will be following this!
(better late than never). Gl on your efforts! Will be following this!
10-24-2017
, 05:09 PM
I think I'll try to start updating weekly on each Wednesday. Lost a bunch back on Sunday, had a chance to make up for it in a big way in the Party GSSS Main but wasn't able to complete the run. Didn't play yesterday, running's been going well though. Will get more detailed about it all tomorrow.
10-25-2017
, 05:24 PM
10-26-2017
, 04:16 PM
Quote:
If you don't have a quality mattress it could be causing you to wake up feeling less rested/energized than you could be. It's worth spending the $800-1000 for a firm memory
Foam mattress, my quality of sleep has been amazing over the past couple years since replacing the old mattress I had with a better one (novosbed)
Foam mattress, my quality of sleep has been amazing over the past couple years since replacing the old mattress I had with a better one (novosbed)
) I went out and bought a nice mattress. It's comfortable and I don't think it's the problem. Definitely on the same page as you though, it's one of the only big purchases I've ever made.
Quote:
No one want to see the flop cheap anymore especially you see all day the hand you dominated either out flop or suck out on you all day, only in online poker
I watch you play I thought you way too tight but when I play some of those NJ site I think every one play tighter than you, lol, rarely see any light 3 bet or 4 bet bluff going. They just fold way too much mid/late stage, I just look at my shove chart and do exactly the same and winning more pot than I deserve
If I see anyone will 3bet me with K4s around bubble time I will take note immediately, because that's very rare and he is capable doing so, then I just focus on this guy next time I see him, not very concern every one else because I know exactly what they shoving, raising range, easiest game ever
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I watch you play I thought you way too tight but when I play some of those NJ site I think every one play tighter than you, lol, rarely see any light 3 bet or 4 bet bluff going. They just fold way too much mid/late stage, I just look at my shove chart and do exactly the same and winning more pot than I deserve
If I see anyone will 3bet me with K4s around bubble time I will take note immediately, because that's very rare and he is capable doing so, then I just focus on this guy next time I see him, not very concern every one else because I know exactly what they shoving, raising range, easiest game ever
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