That's my quarantine lineup, getting started for the game grind now and supermario kart in the cartridge but that I already played too much...

Nice. I'd love to try Breath of the Wild, but not enough to buy a Switch.

Wrap Up

Thursday was my last day in Las Vegas. I was due to take the redeye out at 12:30am on Friday morning. I went to the noodle place in Harrahs' food court to use my Caesars' points on a last lunch, but they had removed their counter seats, likely due to a Covid law that appears to have forced some establishments to remove their counters while allowing others--probably those with wet bars--to keep them. The noodle "bar" now only has a pair of four-person tables as their entire seating layout, and being a singleton, I didn't want to hog one of them. I don't see them lasting long under these conditions.

So I spent my Caesars points elsewhere.



For food I opted once again with Ellis Island, this time for their $21.99 prime rib special.



They've bumped their beer prices up to $4.00 a pint, but that's still cheap relative to the $10+ pints on the Strip.

The redeye flights back were uneventful, and here I sit at home, contemplating my return to work on Monday.

You can get a shot and a beer for playing bartop video poker, should’ve saved comps for food.

I kind of like the bbq at EI. Wouldn’t eat it everyday but it’s nice once a year. It’s like $12 for half a rack, half chicken.

Did you play any poker Wednesday or Thursday. Hook up with any Taiwanese work connections in town for various conventions?

I did not play Wednesday or Thursday. I had reached my gaming budget for the trip. I'll have to rebuild my roll and try again next year.

I might start playing at MGM Springfield. One of issues that's stopping me thus far is that the highway route to the casino is annoying and often jammed up, but google maps has shown me a complicated but viable back road route that I might try soon.

Ah damn if your are at an advantage, shouldn’t be considering any bankroll considerations.

Akane Hirose is the drummer in this band, and she lays down a sick track here.

She's for real.

Trying to figure out why so many of the pics have her with a guitar. Or maybe it is an all female band, what do I know. Not bad for a one time listen. Also I think I am totally missing something here. Right now, I am obsessed with the song Progress by John Rich. Note, do not look that song up if you like Joe Biden.

They're an all-girl band, and they all dress the same: as hotel maids, thus their band name, all of which is weird to be sure, but no weirder than--say the Osmond brothers all dressing up as Evel Knievel.

Some Thoughts on Daniel Negreanu's 2022 WSOP

Those of us who followed Daniel’s vlog this summer were shown a study in medium term variance and its effect on the human psyche, as Daniel steadily lost $1.1 million; cashing in a dozen events, but making only one final table, and averaging around $21,000 per cash in a WSOP season where we saw him fire multiple bullets per event into several $50,000-$250,000 High Rollers.

What happened? Daniel ran bad, is all. We know this because he vlogged his all-in hands. And while I don’t have a statistical analysis of the results, it was easy to see that he won significantly less than half of his coin flips; also, he did not seem to win even half the time when he was ahead, and he did not suck out enough on the few hands where he was behind.

Being an effective and enduring ambassador for poker, Daniel did not take his frustrations out on his fellow tournament players. In public he was his usual upbeat self, chatting and joking with other players and standing in for selfies with fans; although towards the middle of his long ordeal, after a particularly sick runout, he let his composure slip, and he smashed up his selfie stick.



For the most part, Daniel saved his venting for when he was by himself, hanging out with his phone camera, along with around 175,000 impending YouTube vlog watchers, a small proportion of whom left comments.



When someone we care about complains to us about a problem, a lot of us—especially us guys—like to try to solve the problem, rather than just empathetically listening to the complaint. YouTube commenters, well meaning and otherwise, chimed in with suggestions, and Daniel’s response to them was as follows...



Some of you may know that I lived in Las Vegas for 3 years, alternately playing poker and avoiding playing poker, and I left that city as a failed $1/$2 and $1/$3 cash game promo player. I may return to the tables one day and wipe away that designation, but for now that is a complete and accurate description of my abilities and results. So, far be it from me to try to offer any sort of advice to Daniel Negreanu on how to play poker tournaments.


My Advice to a Hypothetical Player Who by Coincidence Possesses the Same Extraordinary Level of Talent and Experience as Daniel Negreanu...on Playing Poker Tournaments


Let’s make this hypothetical poker player a man, for no better reason than I'd rather not display my ignorance regarding the challenges faced by women who play poker professionally. Let’s make him one of the best players in the world: like top 5 in lifetime earnings. Let’s give our guy an intelligent, funny and beautiful wife, a nice house, and a couple of cute dogs—in short, he has a good work/life balance.

Now let’s put him in the 2022 WSOP, playing a wide slew of events, and running bad and getting knocked out over and over and over again. We wonder, has he been playing any worse? Nope. He’s been playing great, same as always. In fact, he might be playing better than ever, given that our guy has picked up a lot in the past year through studying the new GTO solvers.

We wonder if the live tournament field has gotten better in general. Neeaaaaaah…with the exception of the highest level of pro players, it doesn’t seem like that's the case.

So, can anything be done to mitigate this medium-term run of bad luck that’s seeing our hypothetical player getting stacked over and over again with his all-ins? Well, it turns out that—purely by coincidence—our hero shares a certain metagame habit with Daniel Negreanu, one that arises from having a good work/life balance. And what is that habit?









Is that it? Show up on time for work? That all I got?

Surely a master craftsman like our hypothetical guy has a lot to gain by setting his own hours, and fostering a better work/life balance, and showing up well rested and with a healthy mindset.

Granted, but let's talk about what he's missing. Firstly, he's missing a lot of deep stacked hands, and these are hands where a great player has the tools to realize a tremendous advantage over the field.

Deep stacks are where our hero can tell a convincing story, across all three streets if necessary, and consequently these spots are where his opponents can unwittingly gift a great player with accurate, detailed and actionable information across three streets.

Contrast that with much later on, when players have short stacks. Here the master can't employ as many of his best tools. Nowadays live tournament players know how to play push/fold. There's little advantage to studying the charts and being slightly more accurate. It's true that a great player can mix in some limping and min-raising pre, but even with those tricks, the action devolves to one street, or two at the most.

Jump back in time a bit and we'll find our hypothetical great player still enjoying an advantage with his late-regging when stacks are 30-75bb, but that edge is diminished compared to the deep stack phase; no matter how well he plays here, he's not getting to that lucrative third street as often as he would have during the early levels.

Secondly, what kind of players get knocked out of tournaments during the early levels, while our hypothetical player lounges away the hours, sunbathing around his pool, chatting up his wife, and playing with his dogs, or napping in his rented conference room?

Bad players tend to get themselves knocked out earlier than good players, making them a scarcer resource for our hypothetical player to exploit when he arrives. Mind you, there are some good players who push small edges to build a big stack early, and they can get themselves stacked early, but they tend to rebuy, so they're still in the tournament when our hero shows up.

Thirdly, the great player is missing a certain class of recreational player who, in most cases, is still there for the later levels. But that rec player is still there because he or she has spent their vacation time, flown all the way out to Las Vegas, and plopped down $5k on a single tournament, one in which they have no plans to fire a second $5k bullet, and thus at the early levels do not want to get themselves knocked out of under almost any circumstances.

By the time our hero shows up, though, the same rec player may be sitting on a 40bb stack and feeling more like he or she has gotten their "money's worth" from this tourney, and they'll be a lot less easy to push around than during the earlier levels.

The final edge our great player misses by regging late is the chance to start that level with an average or a better than average stack.

When the tournament director says "Shuffle up and deal!" every player at that tourney looks down at an average stack. The first player knocked out slightly increases that tourney's average stack size, which permanently reduces the starting stack to a less than an average amount. The math of the tournament makes it so our hero will always start with a worse than average stack when he late regs, assuming at least one player has been knocked out before he arrives.

What's the big deal about an average tournament stack? I've seen poker writers and coaches advise players not to pay much attention to it. After all, as long as you have chips, you're in the mix. One of the principles of ICM theory is that any amount of chips is infinitely better than no chips.

But let's say that our hypothetical hero has been running like dog doo on his all-ins. We know there's no way to predict when this bad streak will end, but there is a way for our guy to survive his bad all-in runouts, and that is to have a bigger stack than his opponent or opponents when the money goes in.

If, say, our hero shows up on time and uses his exceptional advantage during the deep stack levels to build his stack early, he now goes into these later all-in spots with a larger than average stack, and when he loses, he will look down upon some chips more often than he looks down on no chips.

Some chips: so much better than no chips. Now he has a second chance to win a flip. He doesn't have to rebuy, because rebuying is infinitely more expensive than having some chips left, especially when our hero happens to be down over $1.1 million in tournament buy-ins this summer, and when a significant proportion of that pile of lost money has been spent on rebuys, rebuys which restart him with a smaller than average stack every time, and which if not immediately increased leave him—on bad all-in runouts—with no chips more often then they leave him with some chips, necessitating another rebuy, and god damn so forth.

In conclusion, we've seen that Daniel doesn't want any advice, and that in any case I am someone who is not fit to offer it. But, if in some other universe say, I was as amazingly talented and experienced of a player as Daniel is, I think that I would show up for work on time more often, for the same reasons that I stated above.

What a great post. I followed Dnegs the entire time. I like him. He is a likable narcissist, IMO. Here is why I don't play poker any more, except on rare occasions:

-people late regging, especially late regging to the max.

-People playing multiple bullets, my bankroll supports one buy-in, my loss, I guess

I played online a lot up until literally the day Black Friday happened. I made some good money. Back then, most tourneys were freeze-outs and late reg was a couple hours. I was and am always a rec who played for fun AND to make money. When I say I made good money, I never made a living at it, but a nice supplement. Getting Western Union wire cashouts from some guy in the Philippines I never heard of at the grocery store was weird and I figured they and my bank thought I was totally shady. But those checks always cleared.

So, I really should hate Dnegs and every player like him. But, he is entertaining and these days I watch poker rather than play it (living 5 hours from a casino helps with my not playing, plus when the WSOP Circuit comes there, there are no freeze-outs and I can almost never make that trip positive even with cash games due to expenses. My state sucks.

I agree that the late reg stuff did not do Dnegs any favors, but he does have cute dogs and wife. The dogs are super cool, the wife looks extremely high maintenance.

But, the late reg/multiple bullets/high rake ship sailed a long time ago.

Thanks carolinabay! Back in the pre-Bitcoin era I tried the Western Union to Filipina lady online poker deposit. I think it was to Merge. I gave up after the 3rd rejection, and then my debit card randomly worked after it had been declined earlier.

I like Dnegs. I think his gregariousness is good for the game, and I really enjoyed queuing up his vlog every day. I'd like to see a hard number population study on the EV of late regging vs early regging. If any of you run across one, please post it here.

Good poast as usual Mr. suited. I agree that this would need moar hard math, subjectively I'd agree that late regging is prolly not quite as favorable as some seem to think it is but I don't have the numbers to prove it.
One often underappreciated thing that works in favor of late regging though is when you have a WSOP-like tourney grind and late into day 1 it really makes a difference whether you have played for like 12-13 hrs or only 8-9 hrs already. But that is only if there is still play left, when it's shallow enough to be basically push/fold then obv it doesn't make too much of a difference. There is also tons peeps mess up there, but if you have a basic idea how to play that then for yourself not so much, borderline decisions are not going to be too different wrt EV...

Thanks Fire! I think if you're playing multiple tourneys every day, then you can't avoid late regging given the overlap in the schedule. The question is how late? How much rest do you need in between tourneys? In the end I think there needs to be a balance, some sweet spot of time between taking care of your mindset and getting in hands while the stacks are big and you have the bigger advantage.

Bored at work meow so I'm going to cross post my Dnegs ramblings into the NV&G Dnegs thread. Those boys will likely burn it to a crisp, but I'm an old BBV reg so I ought to be able to take it.

I mentioned in my Dnegs post that I am a failed $1/$2 and $1/$3 cash game promo player. I can think of a couple of healthy ways to handle this sort of setback. The first is to work my way through the various Kübler-Ross stages of grief, and eventually to accept and come to terms with the loss, and then to move on. The second way to deal with this failure is to get back on the horse: maybe not full-time at first, but I've always had the option to start playing again part time, and to see where that takes me.

Springfield MGM

I've posted about my local poker room before, but it's been a couple of years, so here's a listing of the pros and cons of the property.

Pros:

The $1/$2 max buy-in is $500. That's good for trying to maximize ones hourly and fade the rake. 250bb is a better place to start than the 150bb max of some other rooms.

MGM has a fairly regular $2/$5 game running. If I decide to play full time again, I will have to play $2/$5, given that my cost of living is higher here in New England.

Self-serve water, coffee and soft drinks are available to all.

A great way for Old Man Coffee to save a few bucks in tips per session. I was afraid that MGM would use the pandemic as an excuse to get rid of these loss leaders, but they kept them.

It's possible that they've offset the free drink station loss by indulging the scratch ticket addictions of so many southern New England players.

Believe me: I worked at convenience stores in MA and CT when I was a lad and people in these two states buy a shitton of scratchies.

Cons:

Springfield MGM merged the cashier cage and the players card rewards center into one understaffed kiosk. I wanted to stop by the rewards center to change my address on my players card, but a long line persisted the entire time I was there, so I skipped it.

The poker room staff makes players buy chips first before they'll sign them up for a game. I suppose that helps keep waiting players from wandering off and delaying the seating process, but it's annoying. When I asked the cashier the max buyin amount for $1/$2, she had no idea at first what I was asking. Surely I could not have been the first person to ask that question.

Rake is 10% up to $6.00, with an additional $2 promo drop, which seems steep for a single high hand promotion that only pays out $300/hour. And I'm not even sure that it pays off once an hour. I haven't been able to clarify the conditions for making a high hand.

The Mississippi straddle. That straddle can be done from any position, but players mostly straddle on the button, which forces the small blind to act first preflop, instead of second-to-last. Your preflop range as the SB, in this case, should be near lockdown tight, and that costs EV.

Last night the player on my right straddled the button every chance he had, and that cost me my dollar on every orbit. That may seem like a nitpicky complaint, but that kind of **** adds up over time.

Finally, if you want a cocktail, the waitress will be around...once an hour, it seems. I'll be driving home from these sessions, so I won't be needing drink service any quicker than that, but when I was ready for my first and only drink of the session last night, I had to wait a long time for it.

These are the pros and cons of the MGM Springfield poker room. There are a few more of the latter than the former, but it's the only poker room anywhere near me. It will be adequate for what I'm trying to do.

My table last night was splashy as hell; people were not afraid of sticking chips in the middle, and that made for a high variance session. I called or pushed all-in 3 times in the first hour; the largest all-in was for a loss, then I had a win after a rebuy for less, then I had an all-in push with a Villain where both of us held the stone nuts.

I uninstalled my hand logging app, so I don't have detailed hand breakdowns from last night. I'll have to find that app again. On the big losing hand, I had a set of 7s on a 3 flush board vs a very aggro player whom I'd already seen betting huge on 3 separate rivers, and getting folds, so there was no way I was folding my middle set vs him when he made his pot-sized shove on the river.

And that time he had the flush.

Springfield MGM: 3 hours
(-$120.00)

Running Total: 3 hours, (-$120.00)

The thing that really puts me off playing live (and my only option is Harrah's Cherokee 5 hours away, so I have hotel expenses) is the rake AND promo drops, which happened more recently. These make playing 1/2 pretty much a waste unless you are really running hot. Not to mention tips. It all bleeds chips. I would opt out of the promos if I could. I like to play poker, not play for a jackpot, etc. I also like the chance to make money. I am not rolled for 2/5, but from what I have seen, that isn't much better. They make it very difficult to win, so I guess their theory is that people play for fun only. I do have fun playing poker, but part of having that fun involves the chance I win some money. They have largely removed that last option. Sad.

Now I feel lucky having a casino within 30 minutes. If I were in your spot, I might look into the availability of a home game near me; on the other hand, I'm a bit of an introvert, so it would be a big step to make that phone call or send that email or text to try to get in the game, but I'd like to think that I'd eventually get around to it.

There's the online option, but I think that the online game will eventually be ruined by Real Time Assistance programs giving players GTO solved hands. True RTAs currently take too long to provide solved hands in time for online players to use them for live decisions, but it's only a matter of time before increases in processing power and more efficient programming catch up to where they can do this, and there are programs today which use pre-solved hands that can give instant results for the more common spots, as long as effective stacks are around 100bbs.

GG poker claims to have banned a number of players for using RTAs, but who's to say if some of those players weren't just good at GTO play through old-fashioned study and memorization?

Also, solved hands often give probabilities instead of definite instructions. The RTA will give a player a result like: Bet 0.6x pot 60% of the time, bet 0.25x pot 30% of the time, check 10% of the time. How can a security program quickly catch someone cheating like this when the perfect play for a given spot comprises three possible actions instead of one definite one?

Tl;dr: online poker is going to suck in the not very distant future.

You can also find poker in organizations like the VFW, Moose Club, Elks Club and so forth. Not all of them do it, but it's definitely out there. Often it's small tournaments with turbo levels, but the fields have been very soft at the few places I've been to.

My air conditioner broke down and the property's maintenance hasn't been around yet to fix it, so I drove off to the air conditioned casino after work to keep cool and play some poker.

The table was soft: loose passive. The only TAG with any aggression level was on my right; which is nice, as they're typically to be found on my left. I made his night tough with a few preflop 3-bets instead of vice versa.

Now, I've written about poker cosplayers before: guys who dress and act the part of professional players but who play like your drunk cousin on Thanksgiving. I had a Brad Owen lookalike on my left last night. If you don't know who Brad Owen is, he's a popular mid/high stakes YouTube poker vlogger, and he's good enough to make a living at the game without the vlog.

This guy on my left was--nice guy by the way--white, early 30's, short brown hair well but unremarkably cut, clean cut, good posture, thin and fit, quiet and controlled in his movements, and listening to tunes with his AirPods. I'm not implying that the young man was making an effort to look like a pro, I'm saying that he was succeeding. I sat down and immediately put him into the good-until-proven-otherwise category.

I updated my assessment in less than one orbit. Brad Owen II limp/called 75% of hands, stuck around with middle pair on wet boards with multiway action, chased bad draws to the river, tried to trap or induce with good hands when he should have been value betting, and made every other rookie mistake in the book. I got some of his money, and everyone else got the rest.

The table was very friendly as well, which you don't always get in New England, and along with winning, that made for a good time.

Springfield MGM: 3 hours
+$480.00

Running Total: 6 hours, +$360.00

I wrote some text accompanying the above video, but I was high as a loon when I wrote it, so I deleted it, knowing that I would be distraught later when it was too late to get rid of it.

I always love the stuff I write when I'm on the cannabis, and consequently I hate it the minute I start to sober up. My high writing is invariably distracted, stilted, pretentious, and it dances around whatever point I'm trying to make or feeling I'm trying to convey, so into the bin it goes.

The video; though, is a lovely version of a lovely song, so I kept that.

Good result Mr. suited, yeah 6+2 isn't the greatest but still doable esp when you have 500 max and Mississippi straddle. I heard Wynn Boston has 12 max rake, not sure if that is correct.
Tbh on the issue of the straddle I completely disagree, that's pretty much the best you can have for your game, anything that entices recs to put in money in the pot with trash hands is good for the game and is good for your EV. Yeah maybe there is small number of hands now that you have to fold pre from the SB that you could play before but that is a tiny effect, this is much outweighed by the former effect.
Actually not sure about you, I haven't played with you enough for that, but for many peeps this is actually a good thing, many peeps, even otherwise decent-ish players tend to play too much from the SB cos of the apparent fallacies, "I am getting a discount, I already put money in, there is already so much in the pot, I am getting great odds" etc. whereas the truth is, SB is a terrible pos, esp in multiway pots and you should tighten up a lot from it. So if you have something that entices you to fold more from the SB this might actually be +EV for you, ofc don't know specifically about you...

Sounds like a dream session, congrats. And, I absolutely love the Rain Song! That is a nice arrangement.

About home games, I agree with you and have asked around, but I am also an introvert and am not really plugged in in my small city having moved here in retirement. I think I need to try harder. I never thought about VFW, etc. In my state, home poker games for money are illegal, so one has to be discreet. Hell, I would be thrilled to find some $50 tournaments or small cash games. If it was open here, I would be all over it. But, there have to be games around. I have asked around, but I am the only person I know who plays poker. LOL. I stopped playing online on Black Friday. I have looked at it and thought about it over the years, but things have just gone down the tubes in the US for online. I have played sporadically and have no open accounts now. Back in the day, I could build a bankroll up from free rolls. Those days are gone. Plus, from what I have seen, it is way harder now than then. LOL. I know I could play online if I really wanted too, but these days I would so much prefer live. That is a function of my age and station in life today versus pre-Black Friday plus I trust online a lot less than I did back then.

Regarding the cannabis writing. Never delete, just keep it and look at next day to edit.

Here is another great Zeppelin tune, maybe my favorite, but so many great tunes:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=79JcPZNLCTY

I play the SB tight, with a mix of 3-betting and calling when I do play, prolly more of the former than the latter--I don't mind taking it down pre from the SB.

Anyways, back to bitching about the straddle. In general, I like it. People defend their straddle too widely, especially if it's a UTG straddle, and the rec players often fail to adjust for the smaller SPRs that it creates.

I just don't like this particular straddle. The correct and fair way of straddling the button is starting the action UTG, then going around, skipping the button, then coming back and letting the button go last. This order, however, can be confusing to players, so casinos like the Springfield MGM just start the action on the straddler's left.

When I played there a few years ago, soon after they opened the room, you could straddle any position for $5, and action started on your left. I actually forgot to ask or to find out if this is still the case, so next time I go, I will look into it. The implication is that the CO can straddle and turn the button into a preflop über-small blind every orbit, then they can do it next hand from the HJ to the same opponent in the CO, and so forth.

The only recourse the for the victim on the left would be to take the straddle away from the player on their right, as only one straddle is allowed, and the latest position gets precedence. But that would force the victim to straddle every hand and unwillingly put the screws to the player on their left, and so forth.

You can imagine the pissing contests the players can get into over this, especially if the original CO is just a rec player who likes to straddle and doesn't fully understand what they're doing to the player on their left.

Anyways, I'll look into it. I predicted years ago that the straddle wouldn't last under those rules. Let's see if I was right.

Edit: The more I think about it, the more I realize that there's no way they could have set it up that way. Action likely always starts with the SB in straddled pots, regardless of the straddler's position, but why not just start it with UTG and stop punishing the blinds? I mean, the BB suffers a lot here too. Remember that you can call fairly wide in the BB preflop in single raised pots, as you're closing the action, but you're very far from closing the action in straddled pots.

Ooo I love that song, and Jimmy was in his much imitated double-neck guitar and rock bellbottoms stage.

Sorry to hear about the harsh poker laws in your state. Are charity games allowed? I think the VFW and the old boys clubs might get in under that radar.

Wrong. The Springfield MGM's straddle is set up exactly how I feared. $1/$2 players can straddle for $5 from the button down to UTG. So if I have an opponent on my left, I can take away his or her button, cutoff, hijack, MP2, MP1 and UTG2 spots and turn them all into über-small blind spots preflop, unless he or she takes the straddle away from me--there is no double straddle--but that forces them to straddle when they don't want to.

I asked two dealers if anyone got into pissing matches over the straddle, and I got a pair of "eh, maybe" answers in return, so I might be making too much of this. Time will tell.

If I have a serial straddler on my right, I'll have to put in for a seat change and a table change, and take the first available option. Consequently, if I have an annoying serial 3-bettor on my left, I now have a passive aggressive play to strike back with.

Last night the table was again nice and soft. I was card dead through more than half of the session, though I did turn quad 8s to take the lead in the hourly high hand promotion...for 30 seconds, until someone else picked up a K high straight flush...only to have it beat by a royal flush 5 minutes later, which is pretty wild.

I haven't made a live royal flush yet. Online, I've played around 400,000 hands, and I have two royals that I recall. I have one in online PLO as well, and I've played less than 1000 hands of that.

Variance.


Springfield MGM: 3 hours
+$76.00

Running Total: 9 hours, +$436.00