TQB!!

Hated to do this to one of our Nation's finest but it was one of the few things that went my way today. I won overall and am getting back to even after several days of losses (losing again to the rivered straight for the millionth time this week). This sure helps get you back in the black.

Still losing but ready to turn it around

I found a couple more ways to lose today but I am ready to turn things around. The biggest problem I am having is that I am playing microstakes and no one is respecting my raises. From now on I am going in with 5 times the Big Blind Raises instead of 3 times. That should root out those who are willing to call with 4/6 suited and stay in until they get their flush (this happened a couple of times today). If they call me after I go in with 5 times the BB then I must respect their hand. If everyone folds then I'll just add up the blinds and hopefully that will build my bank roll.

From now on only premium hands and I am not going to limp again but go in with a raise. We'll see how they like them apples.

I still can't believe how much the cards are going against me. I raise preflop with A/Q and get called by K/J and two kings come on the flop. I seem to be on a roll to see how many ways I can lose to a straight. I go in with A/Q and get called by K/Q and the villain gets Broadway and GG me. I go in the with A/K and get an ace on the flop and a king on the turn but lose to the Wheel on the river and GG me. I bet to take away the odds for trying for a gutshot or for a flush but some players have money to burn and they stay in hands no matter what and have been hitting way too often.

I was really looking forward to this Christmas break so I could play hours and hours of poker but I never expected to get beat by so many donkeys in so many ways.
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Today's brew is Old Rasputin Imperial Stout brewed at North Coast Brewing Company of California. Their sites describes this brew as:

Produced in the tradition of 18th Century English brewers who supplied the court of Russia's Catherine the Great, Old Rasputin seems to develop a cult following wherever it goes. It's a rich, intense brew with big complex flavors and a warming finish.

Beer Advocate gives it an A- in its review and describes it as:

This put the stout in stout. WOW!!! Very black beer with a nice, dark brown head that left nice lacing on the sides of the glass. Smelled mostly of coffee and dark malts. Taste started with strong coffee with a bit of alcohol, followed by lots of hop bitterness. The mouthfeel is very smooth and creamy. This is a very good, strong, sipping beer. A few of these and you will be wrecked so watch out.

How many ways can you lose?

I still have 5 days to go before I can start whining about bad beats but I do have to ask, "How many ways are there to lose at this cursed game?" I had a very bad couple of days at PokerStars and Absolute on Christmas and the day after but I have started to turn it around today. I lost twice preflop when my all-in pocket Queens fell to A/K, once with a King on the river and the second time with an Ace on the flop. Can't fault either play by me or the villains. I lost to runner/runner straight where the river card was the gutshot he needed to beat me. Money was all in after the flop when he only had three cards to a straight at that time.

I lost twice to a really apologetic opponent that couldn't believe that he rivered the winning card both times after we were all in after the flop. Almost every loss I experienced was after I got my money in with the best hand.

I began to turn things around today when I happened upon a table that was the creme-de-la-creme of No Limit Holdem all-in races. Won big with my Pocket Rockets and my A/K suited all in preflops. I figured A/K owed me some wins after cracking my Queens twice so I didn't hesitate to go all in and they held up with Ace and King showing the board for top two pair.

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Santa brought me a 12 pack of Beers of America from theWorld Market store and yesterday's beer of the day was Avalanche Ale from Breckenridge Brewery of Breckenridge, Colorado. Their sites describes this beer as:

Subtlety. That's what makes our Avalanche amber ale such a treat. We blend pale and caramel malts -- and just a kiss of bittering hops -- to create a refreshing-but-flavorful, any-time beer. Aromas of pale grains, a semi-sweet middle and a clean-as-Colorado-snow finish make this our best-selling beer.

It gets about a "C" rating at most of the Beer Blogs like Brian's Belly and Beer Advocate and Beer Find It (at the bottom of the page. He loved it!).

TQB!! Again!!

New Strategy for increasing my Bankroll

I am fortunate to have the job I do where starting tomorrow I will be off of work until January 2nd. I hope to play a lot of poker during the next 12 days. I am still going to continue to work on my microstakes No Limit Game and I really think I am going to see some considerable gains. I am pretty sure I have the ability to win some nice change. I just have to be patient and pick my spots where my all ins will give me the best chance to win. There are still a lot of players at the microstake levels that like to donk it up so I know that patience and waiting for the right cards will give me the best chance to increase my bankroll.

I am going to try to use the style that Ed Miller, Noted Poker Authority advocates in his Poker Made Simple series where he goes through multiple stages:

Early Position Standards
Play in Early Position
Middle Position Standards
Playiing in Middle Position
Cutoff Standards
Playing in the Cutoff
The Button
The Blinds

Grinder has taken the above information and started to create hand charts.

I am going to give this strategy a try and adhere to it as best as I can. I'll let you know how things work out for me after a week or so.

Righting my Sinking Ship

I managed to play quite a bit of poker yesterday and today and I was able to right my sinking ship some. I got stacked a couple of times but I kept at it and managed to overcome my losses and record a nice winning session. I am still buying in short and building my stack from there. Right now I am just more comfortable playing that way as my bankroll is not big enough to take getting stacked with a full buy-in.

One of the things that I see at the microstakes is when a player makes a min-preflop raise. Just 2 times the Big Blind. When I first started playing Microstakes No Limit Holdem, I thought, “Oh, oh. This guy has a monster hand.” It took quite a while of playing at these takes to figure out that that wasn’t necessarily true. Many players will bet 2 times the BB if they have a small pair and they hope that they can get everyone to fold and take down the blinds. Usually the opposite happens and everyone calls as they figure another dime doesn't make that big a difference.
A lot of times I don’t know what the players are thinking when they make the min-raise and then there are the times when they do have a monster hand. That happened to me today. A player UTG led out with a min-preflop raise and with A/rag on the button I just called his raise. The flop was rag/K/rag and he checked and I checked. The turn brought the Ace and I bet about ½ the pot. UTG called. The river brought a rag and then UTG bet out a pot size bet. I pretty much knew I was beat then. No flush draws, no apparent straight draws. I figured he had a bigger kicker than me. I made the crying call because you never know at these levels what the other player is doing and he turned over pocket Kings and his set beat my pair of aces.

In retrospect I should have raised PF to see how serious he was about his hand but I fell into his trap of just calling and paid for it when he made his set. I can honestly say I have yet to stoop to those tactics when I have monster hands but still continue to raise preflop 3 or 4 times the BB.

Overall I was pretty happy with how I played and hope to continue with some of my new found success.

TQB!!

Good! Good! Bad!!

GOOD!! My beloved Michigan Wolverines have a new coach! We stole Rich Rodriguez away from the West Virginia Mountaineers. Last year we stole their Basketball Coach, John Beilein away from them. I hope Rodriguez does a better job in his first year than Beilein is doing.

Rodreiguez fulfilled the two requirements I had for a Michigan coach. He has been a headcoach and he is in his 40's. He should bring a new and exciting offense to the Big House next year.

I feel bad for him that he probably won't get to coach West Virginia in their bowl game against Oklahoma. He earned that but, c'est la vie. It will be interesting on what he does with our current team members, namely quarterback Ryan Mallett. He is not the most mobile quarterback and Coach Rodriguez prefers a quarterback more like Vince Young or Troy Smith. I think Mallett can be a lot like Missouri Tiger's Chase Daniel. He is not the most mobile quarterback and he still runs the spread offense.

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GOOD!! We had our first big snowstorm of the year and I have already been out cross-country skiing. I broke some trails back in the woods behind our place and today I even kicked up a nice little White Tail deer. Amazing how many deer tracks there are in our little woods. I have been out two days now and hope to keep doing it as long as we have snow to ski on.
I am really looking forward to continueing to ski as I think it will help me with my weight loss program. Mrs. Wolverine has put herself and me on a low cholesterol/low carbohydrate diet. I will miss a lot of the foods I love but I will really enjoy getting back into some of my clothes I have outgrown and living a healthier lifestyle.
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BAD!! My poker. 'Nuff said.
I do have a plan to turn around one of my worse losing streaks ever. PLAY BETTER!!

Flush the Sets!

The twist on words that is my title about sums up my Poker day. I hadn't played any online poker for 6 days so I was really looking forward to sitting down at my computer and getting immersed into some good No Limit Holdem. The trouble was the Poker Gods weren't ready to reward my tight play on this day.

I managed to lose about every way possible to a set or a flush. My set of 5s beat by a bigger set of Queens. My Pocket Aces beat by a set of 7s. My two pair Aces and 10s beat by a four flush. My A/K beat by flush on the river. My pocket 10s vs. pocket 7s? No problem until the river card completes the four flush with diamonds and guess who had a diamond? Very next hand my pocket 9s lose to pocket 5s when the third 5 comes on the river to complete their set.

That's the type of day I had. I dropped over 4 buy-ins in just over 90 minutes. Sure I won some but gave back my winnings plus more. Probably one of the worse days I have had in a long time and the worse I have had since starting my microlimit No Limit Holdem challenge.

The sad thing is I was playing well. I didn't play crappy hands. I didn't go on tilt. The only thing I couldn't do was raise enough preflop to get anyone to fold their A/rag or small pocket pair. I was raising 5 times the BB and still would get two or more callers.

Fiddle dee-dee! After all... tomorrow is another day.

Bump Jumpers

Growing up in Northern Michigan we would go sliding after school almost every day. We had the Flexible Flyer type sleds with runners and one Christmas Santa brought us an aluminum toboggan but the one sled we used as much or more than the others was one we called a Bump Jumper (or Stump Jumper).

Our Bump Jumper was simply a single ski with a seat on it. You would ride by balancing yourself and holding on the seat and lifting your legs up and away you would go. You could steer by touching the snow with the right or left foot and you could shift your weight on the seat to slalom the Bump Jumper around.

The Bump Jumper was a very simple sled that any family could afford, it was easy to carry back up the hill and would go very, very fast down the hill but still allow you the ability to steer it some. The longer the ski, the faster the Bump Jumper.

We has a couple of store bought Bump Jumpers and then we began to make our own out of old wooden skis. It was a great time and great place to grow up.

Them's Quad B*******!! - Part IV

I have turned things around at Absolute and Full Tilt today. I won some big hands on Absolute to finish up over 2 buy-ins. I am still playing short stacked but getting more comfortable playing with the larger stacks after I have doubled up.

I did suck out on Absolute when the board paired on the river so my two pair beat the two pair of the villain because I had the Ace kicker. Needed something to go my way so I'll take it.
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My beloved Michigan Wolverines are having a bit of trouble getting a new coach. The Les Miles thing was just really unfortunate as I really think Les wanted to coach Michigan. The Rutgers coach is holding out for Penn State so I thought it was a long shot we would get him. They aren't even considering Brian Kelly of Cincinnati so it makes me wonder what bridges he has burned.

My biggest criteria for a coach is that he has been a coach, not just an offensive or defensive coordinator and that he is young, in his 40's and not someone in his mid-50s. That's all. Maybe Brady Hoke of Ball State. Urban Meyer was a Bowling Green and Bo Schembechler was at Miami of Ohio and Brian Kelly was at Central Michigan so there are good coaches in the Midamerican Conference.

Maybe by this time next week we will have a coach.

Feel Like a Punching Bag

This post is a whiney, self-pity post so read at your own risk. It is cathartic to me to get it out of my system so bare with me as I wallow in my sorrow.

I feel like a punching bag lately when playing poker. Variance finally caught up to me at Absolute Poker when none of my good hands seemed to hold up and I was always finishing second best. Then I go back to PokerStars and win some nice hands only to have it come and bite me in the butt when the Fish pairs the board on the river with one of only six cards left that will beat me and that's the one he gets, full house over my nut flush.

I am still playing short stacked because I don't have the bankroll to survive losing to the chasers that predominate the microstakes No Limit games. I was going to start buying in with the max buy-in but when I see these Fish chasing with nothing and hitting on the river, it reinforces why I buy in short.

I'm not sure financially or emotionally I can take losing on the river time after time to some donkey that won't or can't fold his cards. The thing is that I think I am playing pretty good. Sure, I have some lapses when I may chase a flush when the odds are borderline or feel my TP/TK is best but for the most part I am folding a lot and trying to aggressively play my good hands. Overall I am winning but the losses set me back quite a bit and I have to grind away to make up for them.

Okay, I feel better. Better posts and better times are ahead.

Chip Reese (3/28/51-12/4/2007) & Short Stack Concerns

David Edward "Chip" Reese (3/28/51 - 12/4/2007) was an professional poker player. The three-time World Series of Poker bracelet winner, longtime cash-game star, and member of the Poker Hall of Fame, has died of pneumonia. He was 56. (Cardplayer.com
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Grinder says he is going to discontinue his Short Stack Experiment. He says "I think I am done with The Great Short Stack Experiment. I found out that, yea, in the long run I can make 3BB/100. But the problem is it just is not very entertaining to play 6% VPIP."

I think he is playing differently than I am. Much tighter and going all in when he has a monster hand. I am playing mostly 6-max in my Short Handed Challenge and am actually playing about 20% VPIP. I only go all in when I feel I have the best of it after the flop or if 3 bet into when I have a monster hand, i.e. Aces or Kings. I was able to double up my buy-in again today on Absolute Poker when I hit some nice hands.

I am running into another problem in my Short Stack Challenge and you will probably laugh at me but it is a real problem. When I am able to double up my buy-in playing Short Stack I am having trouble playing with the larger stack. I just keep thinking I don't want to lose my hard won profit. I should be thinking about how I can continue to grow this stack with my newly earned profits.

Again, don't laugh as this is a real concern of mine. I am going to either have to start increasing my buy-in or continue to keep playing with the larger stack and try to grow it even more. That is the only way I am going to earn any real money at this game. Any suggestions will be greatly appreciated. Anyone else have this problem??

PokerStars + Variance = -EV

Variance is still kicking my butt at PokerStars and, reading a multitude of other poker blogs, it looks like I am not alone. I still have another month to go before I can whine about bad beats but I was in a low buy-in 2 Table SitNGo at PokerStars and was doing well and made the money by taking out the 5th player to burst the bubble. I then managed to take out another player to put me well into the chip lead and ready to take down the whle shebang with just 3 of us left. Alas, it was not to be. My A/K gets rocked vs. A/9 when the villain hits his 9 and then my A/K goes down to K/J when the villain hits the Broadway Straight. From First to worse in just two hands. I ended up finishing 3rd.

I am still winning at Absolute Poker. If they are cheating at my level I hope they continue because I have done well there. I am still buying in as a short stack and today I happened to be playing two tables and both tables had one ATM playing that I was able to double up on before they lost all of their money and left.

There was one ATM that was reraising anyone that raised preflop and was getting quite a few to fold to his bigger raises (myself included) until a couple of players decided to call his raises and play their hands only to find that he was raising with absolute shit (no pun intended). And he didn't stop even after we had figured him out. I was fortunate to get pocket nines and raised preflop and, as I hoped, he reraised about 5 times my raise so I went all in. He didn't hesitate to call and my nines easily beat his 6/4 offsuit. Ship it!! He left soon after that when another player busted him with pocket Kings.

Them's Quad B*******!! - Part II

This is about the only thing that went right for me on PokerStars today. This helped me to finish in 30th place out of 600 + players in a 6-Max Tourney.

This was my worse day yet playing Shorthanded $10 NL Holdem. I was getting all in with best hand and lost to a few pretty bad beats. Everyone came on the river.

Variance I guess but I always wonder why I lose so much more than I win. Curious. It will take me a few days of good poker to get back to where I was but I feel I can do that. I'll just tighten up and keep getting it in with the best hand and it should hold up in the long run. I can't always lose to runner/runner straights, runner/runner flushes and the freaking 2 outer on the river.