Up and Down Week-end

Up and Down Week-end
It was an up and down week-end this week-end on Absolute. I began using my more aggressive style with mixed results. I know it will take time to perfect and I was quite happy with my results in SitNGos and a couple of the MTT I was in. Overall, I was hoping to do better but will take this as a start. I was able to finish in the money on the majority of SitNGos I played. I am going to have to convince myself that I am ready to move up to the $2.40 dollar SitNGos. I should at least try 10 of them and then see how my results are. Right now I am playing a combination of .60 cent and $1.20 SitNGos and I know I am ready to move up to the $2.40 and quite possibly the $5.50 SitNGos.
The MTT I played in were just $1 and $2 dollar MTT’s. Out of 4 total, I finished in the money on two of them. Not real high up, 18th on one and 43rd on the other but enough to win back what I had initially paid to enter. I can almost always get into the top 10% of the MTT’s and have done better several times. I only play the $1 and $2 dollar MTT tournaments at this time so the payouts are quite low until you reach the final table where the first and second place finishers get the best return. Right now I am using these low buy-in MTT’s as practice to get better before moving up.
Remember I am still in my infancy when it comes to Hold’em Poker and, as stated before, am just now learning to walk. Hopefully my experience will grow exponentially and I will be running before you know it.
My question is, “Can you make yourself become a good Poker player?” I think you can. I think with practice, hard work, reading all of the information you can get your hands on and researching the subject, you can become a good poker player. Maybe not World Series of Poker, good, but good enough to make extra money for vacations or other things you like. My goal by the beginning of summer is to average $10 dollars per day playing poker. That would mean $3650 dollars per year and since I don’t play every day that means I would have to win about $30 dollars per session. To do that I know I have to move up in limits. I would only be able to average that per session by playing in $5.00 SitNGos or playing $1/$2 dollar Limit or No Limit Ring Games. I am going to have to settle on concentrating on one type of game to be the best but at this time, I am unsure which game I am the best at.
Tomorrow I’ll talk about if my bank roll is holding me back.

Changing My Style of Play

I played in a $2 Multi Table Tournament last night on Absolute Poker and finished 75th out of 577 players. I missed the money by a dozen places as 63rd place was the beginning of the money in this MTT. I had mixed emotions about my play. I felt I played well for the cards I was getting. I was card dead all night and felt good to finish in 75th place. I was able to steal a couple of blinds and played one good hand that doubled me up. Other than that it was fold, fold, fold. The part I wasn't happy with was my style of play. I am trying to work on being more aggressive when playing. I have read Phil Gordon’s Little Green Book twice and am trying to emulate his style. My question is, “Can you teach an old dog new tricks?” or maybe I should say, “Can a leopard change his spots?”

I am going to work on being what I term, “Smart Aggressive”. That means to play aggressive but by doing it the smart way with quality hands and making sure I am in position and have a good read on my opponents. I have to make sure I know my Pot Odds and that I don’t over commit to my hand and can throw away that top pair or set when I get a read that I am not the favorite in that hand.

I am going to work on my game by playing low limit SitNGo’s and with the low buy in Multi Table Tournaments. So far I have been able to finish in the top ten per cent of the MTT’s and get back my buy-in over half of the time. As for final table, I have two Second place finishes and a fourth and fifth place finish, but I want to consistently get into the final table. When I can do that consistently then I can move up in limits and, hopefully, develop may game even more by facing better competition.

I’ll keep you posted on how I am coming along with this plan.

AM I THE FISH

I cannot win at Party Poker. That leads to my title, “Am I the fish?” I play at Party Poker only sporadically because I don’t seem to be able to win there. I have lost eight $6 SitNGos in a row at Party, after winning the first two I played. I have lost at Limit and No Limit games. Am I the fish at Party or is just bad luck or simply a bad streak?
I don’t really like Party Poker but that may be only because I haven’t won there. I don’t like the set up with the same “people” or avatars at the table. I like individualism like on Absolute Poker where I can have a picture of me, my loved ones, my favorite pet or even favorite sports team. Where the person’s picture makes an impression on me and I remember it next time I play him whereas Party Poker I can’t remember anyone because they all are the same. Or else I get a bias against one of the avatars because in a previous session a Maniac was sitting there and raising and reraising with nothing and now I always think of that person occupying that seat.
I have told my daughter that the money at Party Poker is hers to play with. The money was free anyway from Poker Source Online via Dugglebogey (Go Be Rude). Started with $75 free money that had to have 500 raked hands. I had it up to $150 at one time but now is down to $45 due to bad streak on SitNgos.

DROPPING DOWN IN LIMITS

I have no trouble dropping down in limits on the games I play at Absolute. However, I only play the $2.40, $1.20, and .60 cent SitNGos that one has to wonder if I am really changing the climate much by dropping down in limits on such low limit games anyway. I can tell a difference between the three types of players at each level of SitNGo but is it really that big of a difference? Frankly I don’t have that answer and any comments will be greatly appreciated.

I believe it was DoubleAs who wrote a post about “A year in the making: the development of a poker player”. In it he goes on to describe what he feels is the progression of a poker player through one year of development. . I feel I am in the latter parts of Stage 2: Learning to walk (months 3-6) and I am tottering on two legs at this stage of my Poker ‘career’. My two biggest weaknesses at this time are falling in love with my hands too much and acting too fast and not slowing down to think about what my opponent could have or does have in his hand. I have many other weaknesses but those are my probably my two biggest ones. I think I am in the latter stages of Learning to walk because I can do pot odds and I play pretty tight but probably still play too many hands. I will continue on working on my development and see if I can’t improve at a faster rate than DoubleAs progression.

My start in Poker

POKER MUSINGS
I started playing serious poker (Texas Hold’em only) back in July of 2005. I had always played cards with my dad and brothers prior to that but it was just games like Five Card Draw – Jacks or better to open, Baseball, 7 card stud, etc. Never played Texas Hold’em. In Julyof 2005 my family and I were in Las Vegas for a five day vacation and my daughter, who is 23 years old, wanted to play Texas Hold’em live. She had been playing free rolls on line and felt she was ready for live play and since we were in Vegas, why not? I joined her so she would not be alone, even though neither her or I had ever played live poker of any type. We were at one of the Station Casinos and bought a rack of 40 chips for the 2/4 game (minimum buy-in). Rachel proceeded to lose her rack plus another buy-in while I double my rack of 40 chips to 80. What an easy game I thought. Famous last thoughts those were. We played a couple more times, once at Palace Station and at the Monte Carlo where I proceeded to lose everything I had won plus a few more dollars. I guess this game wasn’t that easy after all.

When we got back to Michigan, I immersed myself into Texas Hold’em. I began playing free rolls on-line and began reading every book I could find about how to play this game. The first book I read was Phil Helmouth’s book. For Christmas, Santa brought me Phil Gordon’s Little Green Book, Sklansky’s How to Play Texas Hold’em and a third book about Low Limit Texas Hold’em.

Now I am hooked and play almost every day. I'll continue to add onto my start in poker as this blog goes along.

GOLF MUSINGS
I have started getting ready for golf. Right now in southern Michigan, where I live, we have 4 inches of snow on the ground and the temperatures have been mostly in the teens and low 20’s for the month of February. Last year I made myself a weighted club along the lines of the momentus and I am able to swing it indoors as I have a vaulted ceiling in my Living Room. So far I am just working on stretching out my golfing muscles, trying to take the club back very slowly, start the downswing with my hips, and swing from the inside out. Nothing fancy, just a nice smooth swing letting the weight of the club do the work. I am working on getting a full turn and (the bane of every hacker) keeping my head down. I will continue to do this daily until the weather warms up. I have a net I can put in my garage and hit into and I will probably do that around mid-March, depending on the temperatures. I should be able to play a few rounds in late March or early April, weather permitting.

I play at a public course in my hometown called Briar Ridge. It is an 18 hole course where the front nine was built before the back nine so it is like two different nine hole courses. It is a nice test of golf as it has some good long holes and some tough par fours and a couple of easier par threes to go with some tough par threes. It has a driving range with a practice chipping green and sand trap to practice, too. All-in-all a nice little course.

Newby on the Block

This is my first ever Blog post. I just wanted to comment on Go to Be Rude Blog and ended up creating one of my own. I don't know how often I will post but I'll try to make my posts pertain mostly to poker and golf, my two loves. I will be learning this as I go so wish me luck and I hope you enjoy reading this and I welcome any comments.