russ the vast majority of us love the fact that you're here.

just ignore the haters man.

Having you post on here has added so much to watching the show. It really brings a huge element of interaction that is rarely found anywhere else on Tv. Also you played really well all week, amazing if you consider the situation.

KJoff, shut the **** up you disrespectful *******.

Anyways, this week has been very interesting. I'm simply amazed at how much Veldhuis single-handedly changes the dynamic of the entire table. I'm glad he got unstuck and I was shocked at the terrible play by Doyle.

Veldhuis seems a lot like a young version of Sam Farha.

Anyways, I'm hoping that Russ makes good $ by the end of the week.

Just registered to say thank you for making this poker show just a bit more interesting by posting your own experiences. Liked the decision you made to come back. It must be an amazing experience.

Concerning you're other handle (don't intend on starting a guessing game here) but it would be so awesome if you'd also be posting from the KJoff account.

agree completely, tune them out - know that many love hearing your thoughts on the hands, and welcome the other players commenting as well, learning is a never ending process in this game

I'm not sure where you are getting at here. But the LC clearly stated that he is not a professional player nor a perfect player --- so calling the LC idiot was very uncool and unnecessary (it's like kicking a defenseless guy below the belt). LC just wanted to have a good time and his decision to go for an additional week suggested that he just wanted to play with all the pros for fun. It was never about the money in the first place.

Economically, yeh, LC would have been better off playing tight around the $80K+ mark. But he had the balls to play aggressively throughout the game.

Makes complete sense Russ. I apologize for my assumptions.

To be completely honest, this side of poker is really foreign to me. I absolutely love the game, but I am just a casual player who plays for fun when the opportunity arises. I would guess that I am the only LC who does not play poker for money (another assumption, but I think I have a firmer take on this based on the LC profiles on the website...notice that mine is the only profile that doesn't say anything about my typical stakes).

Ultimately, I am hoping that this experience motivates me to become more committed to improving and learning about all aspects of the game. Hopefully becoming an active member on this forum is the first step towards reaching that goal.

The commentary and insight provided by Russ, Lex, BG and DN here have made this show 100X more compelling, imo. It's kind of refreshing to see a regular standup guy who likes to play and think about cards emerge as a mini forum hero, and doing it with class, respect, modesty makes him a lot easier to root for.

I've been enjoying the past two weeks shows so much I'm ignoring PAD with Dwan, Kaplan, Antonius, etc.

Amen to this. This has been one of the best threads on 2+2 that I've ever read. I've mostly lurked here (reference my low post count), but threads like this make me want to contribute more.

Russ - You obviously did your homework before going to the taping, so I'm wondering if you thought about what you'd do if the pros wanted a round (or more) or straddles. Obviously, you love to do that if you're stuck and need to gamble, a la the last part of week 1, but what about when you're not?

To me, agreeing so readily to straddle was one of your biggest errors, because the straddle bloats every pot and makes the game play much larger. So, even relatively small mistakes are magnified. Let's face it, you're in the shark tank, and on average, you'll make more mistakes then they will. So, to me, putting the straddle on seemed like a -EV move and wonder on your thinking/motivation for so readily agreeing to it.

That said, I still say you've done a heck of a job on the show, and I'm riveted to the TV and rooting hard for you. And, yeah, I know it's already been taped!

I wasn't taking offense - sorry if I came across that way (more playful than anything)

The forums are a great place to learn - there's a ton of great information and most folks are willing to help.

It was a calculated risk - I didn't want to come off too nitty - I agreed to a round hoping to make a monster and have a nice pot already brewing.

Hey,

Been following this thread the last week and enjoyed reading posts from Russ and getting his insight into the game.

Is it just me or has week 8 vanished from the Pokerstars.tv website?

Lee.

They never heard of capital letters in Germany?

i think that german guy played pretty well but he ran insanely cold.
nadia magnus was impressive too imo.

and to end the other discussion,
the only thing i wanted to say is that i dont understand his decision to come back for the reasons stated.
but if he can take it and doesnt regret his decision in case he loses it all and his family supports it then its their choice as it is their money.
if the fun and the chance for some big money is worth more to him than the few k he won, thats cool.
i wouldnt have done it if i was him but im not, so who cares?

i also didnt want to insult him or anything, its not that easy to look good vs these pros and he was far from being the worst cannon, but the consensus in here that he was the best so far just tilted me bc there were one or two cannons that really played extremely well but didnt get as lucky as him.

i think its very cool that russ comes in and provides some inside, but i dont like it when people degrade the other cannons by saying hes the best just because they chose not to post here.

Makes sense enough. Please ignore the haters, Russ. You did yourself proud and made the most of it. Memories of a lifetime, man, no matter what.

Help help Pokerstars TV is not allowing me to see week 8 at all.The last episodes are of week 7,anyone else with this problem?

You must have some sort of Internet funkiness. It's on there right now. Try clearing all of your browser's cache. Or, are you accessing the Internet thru a proxy server, such as at an office environment? If so, that proxy server might be caching the page and not showing you the latest one.

Anyways, sorry for the techie talk, boys/girls... back to the Big Game thread!

Nah it's also gone for me too. Tried clearing cache and still missing for me.

If there was one time in which Russ really needed to shove, it was when he held TT on the AA7 flop vs. Bonomo's KK.

Bonomo's pre-flop action was clearly AA, KK or maybe QQ, but I doubt he would play AK that strongly. It's not likely that he flopped quad AAs and so I would have just shoved.

I thought Russ needed to bluff more, and Lex needed to bluff less.

Did you not see his wife on the show "approving" of his choice to continue. Obviously his family isn't strapping for cash, and this is a once in a lifetime opportunity, and this was a decision that he was able to make with his family's blessing.

And he's definitely not attention whoring (these episodes were recorded prior to his posting here, so his attention ITT is only after he made the decision to return) but instead trying his best to make the best of a potentially life changing opportunity.

I love when Doyle talks about "small ball" in that old man humoury way.

I don't blame Russ for playing the second week. Not only has he played great, the experience of a lifetime is far more important than a little money.

This can be compared to winning a ME sat. Some people would take the money but others who know its a long shot want the experience of a lifetime.

No one blamed Russ for playing the second week, hell i think 98% of people asked would say he had to take the shot, he has a solid enough game. Just one guy that isnt even allowed to speak english (german) is concerned about the well being of Russ's family.

The accidentally burned all their grammar books back in '33

/nazi comments

the last two comments really just show how classy this forum has become.