Gone

Hmmm.....

Last monday on the 13th I got a call from my hall. I will be working in greely for the next month or so. Took my laptop down there but there internet connection is completely fucking retarded. I log in for 3 seconds and then the internet times out and I disconnect for 30 seconds repeat. Anyways am back today for a day. Might go play some live poker but looks like a good time to catch up on some of the books I need to read or reread. So no poker maybe it will be a good break.

2nd week oct 08

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30,400 hands/ $63 profit/ 2722 FPP's
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"May the upside of variance be with you, always...."

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Don't know what to say really this week. I made my 100 buy in mark to start playing at nl10. I took a shot found out the players there were ten times worse than the previous level. It was mind blowing to say the least. Maybe it was just the adjustment to 100 big blinds. Or maybe it was the play was really worse. I had a seven buy in downswing which was not really that bad. But the hands I lost were retarded. So I broke rank again and played nl25 for a few thousand hands. Overall I was up marginal at this level. But managed to blow out a ton of fpp's and could easily be standing in gold level of the vip club. I could also see hitting one cash back bonus a week. But it is unknown at this time if I could remain winning at this level. The only reason saying this is I was not playing my A game this week when taking a shot at this level. I was a bit tilty and probably could have avoided some losses. I don't know why it urks me to watch some people do the stupidest shit and get paid for it. Calling %60 plus size raises of there stack out of position when you know you are beat. I also lost a crap load of coin tosses to short stacks. A3o just never looked so good to call an all in pref lop with????
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Anyways I feel a little lost this week. I am up for the week but I still feel like a loser for some reason. I took several shots. I also four tabled nl200 for a few hands. Which is were the large spike in my weekly graph is all about.
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I am not sure what I will be doing this next week. I might play the rest of this week at nl25 to see how I do. After that I will probably drop back down to nl10 and play there until I build my roll back up.

HOLY FUCKING FUCKITY FUCK!

What we have here is a 1500 bb heater that I got on today. Don't know if someone at pokerstars read my post in the 2+2 forum about getting set over setted 28 times in 5 weeks or not. But today I had a couple really good hands. But for some reason the players were the worse I had seen in a while. Don't know if the government employee's got there paychecks today or what. It didn't hurt that I got paid off when a couple over pairs wouldn't fold when I raised them flopping trips. Usually this doesn't happen as most players even at this level can fold an over pair to a raise. Today I made the best of my value bets even though I still messed up in a couple places. I was well above my stop point today early on but the cards just kept coming so I broke the rule and didn't quit. I got $3 shy of my 100 full buy in mark and then lost $5 so I quit. Just as quick as they were coming the cards stopped. Like someone turning the lights on at the end of the night at a strip club after your buzz has wore off. Anyway this goes down as the biggest single session win that I have had at .02-.05. This could be partially to the super long drawn out break even stretch I had for 20,000 hands last week. But all this really means is that the counter action is going to be a biatch!.

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But back to set over set situations.

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Although a few books have stated set over set situations are much like full house over full house situations. "if it happens its just not your day and put your money in". I think some of these statements must be in general and was wondering the amount of times you are in a set over set situation that you fold?

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I seem to be running into a set over set situation at least 1-3 time a session or every other session. So much to the point that in some instances that I am %90 sure I am in the situation. I play the player off and think I should be able to fold these. I have never breached the three mark in a sessions but I cannot shake these situation. Which brings me to my next question.

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Should I not be playing small pocket pairs as much as I do? Whenever I am getting usually 8-1 from a players bet vs there stack size I will go ahead and set mine. I know Harrington has a number from Harrington on cash somewhere in the 20-1 range. Could this be the problem and a big leak in my game?. I read although I believe in a tournament book that throwing away pocket pairs below 6's is a good idea but I personally think this is -Ev.I basically keep paying off the higher sets but I think I should be able to fold in SOME of these situations.

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This got me to thinking...

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So I went back into my recently purchased Hold em Manager that I picked up at the beginning of last month. From that point as I have not tried to transfer my previous poker tracker stats to this new database. So all hand history is new hand history. I went back and set my filter and picked out pocket pairs and then found my losses and counted my pocket pairs where through the re player i could see I was set under set situation. In just the hand history's where I saw the showdown since the beginning of last month which is roughly 114,801 hands I have had 26 set over set situations where I have had the under set. And 12 set over set situations where I have the over set. So I am running 2-1 roughly Is this not normal?????? This means that once every 4,415 hands I run into this situation where I am the underdog. I am not saying that every situation I should be able to fold set over set.

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I am just asking if others are able to fold or do they just not think about it and shove. As there are certain situations that I find I get that sensation. A player takes a line that reflects a possible set.

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For the amount of set under set situations that occurred to me within the last 5 weeks. If I lost my whole stack in each situation at the current level my losses (not that they could have been prevented) Could have boosted my winnings %77! This is a massive number. This of course would be if each situation was for full stacks. It would take some time to go back and actually add up the occurrences in bb amount.

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Still was just looking at a large hole in my numbers and thought this could be addressed. I know there is no way to eliminate these situations. But even if I could correctly identify and get away from %25 of these situations it might be help full. Even though every ones thoughts of the times I fold when I am indeed ahead. Would probably dwarf, and reduce my profit by more than it would. Had I simply called and or gotten my money in is correct.

Oct Progress

Progress so far in the month of October excluding last two days of sept

10/01/08 - .02-.05- $872-$850 *6200 hands -7/100 (6 hours)
10/02/08 - .02-.05- $850-$845 *6000 hands -1/100 (5 hours)
10/03/08 - .02-.05- $845-$830 *1300 hands -23/100 (1 hours)
10/04/08 - .02-.05- $830-$864 *3000 hands +22/100 (3 hours)
10/04/08 - .02-.05- $864-$860 *3200 hands -2/100 (2:45 hours)
10/05/08 - .02-.05- $860-$887 *3500 hands +9/100 (3:50 hours)
10/05/08 - .02-.05- $887-$917 *1500 hands +40/100 (1 hours)

Week 1

10/06/08 - .02-.05- $917-$992 *2500 hands +60/100 (2:30 hours)

1st week Oct review

32,850 hands/ $122 profit/ 644 FPP's/ +7/100

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Wow... I guess looking back at the week from start to finish things were not that bad. But when the month started on Tuesday. This weeks numbers include the last two days of last month the 29th, and 30th. I began a series of retarded beats, suck outs and runner runners. I figured this would be coming soon as near the end of last month. I seemed to be riding shotgun in the steamroller. Not that I was not losing hands and pots previously. But the winners were dwarfing the losers.

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Anyway somewhere around the 7500 hand range on Tuesday. I ran into a little 23,000 break even stretch. Speaking of which 23,000 hands in three days! This second monitor I picked up is the SHIT!. Now that it has been a week I am pretty comfortable playing 18 tables. Even more so, since I figured out the scroll button on my mouse actually controls bet sizing. Once you tap the bet bar to get it started. That alone cut my time occupied in a hand down by at least half I think.

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I think some of the problems with my break even stretch which basically had me loosing 10 buy in's then winning them back. I think was mainly because I have been trying to push my stats to more resemble 6 max. The coaches keep saying a good 6 max player will do well in full ring. But I think at this level of play. The amount of people calling you with any two cards plus the level one thinking of these .02-.05 micro stakes players. Leaves you with little room to two and three barrel with hands like AK and AQ with no draw. Maybe a good stat to have up on hold em manager is the percentage of folds to C-bets on the turn.

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Anyways to adjust for this as I continued to miss everything under the sun was to simply stop raising as much. This and returned to a more passive nut peddling status. This instantly changed my direction and put me back into a solid but less frequent winning pattern. I was also starting to raise with pocket pairs 6's-8's in late position. And raising from any position with pocket pairs 9's and T's. I had also added some suited connector and suited over card trouble hands. This was to help push my pfr percentage way up. With the more frequency of raising despite I was still short of the stats provided to "help plug leaks in your game at 6-max". I believe my general table image was starting to get a little reckless.

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Also the amount of gay betting, donk betting, and inducing betting started to stand out the more hands I got in at this level. Here is so far what I think of them.

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1:Gay betting or Donk betting

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Here this mainly applies when in position although it shows up out of position or oop. At some point is it more noticeable when a player limps and you raise in position and he calls. You have raise with a hand like AK, or AQ or KQs and you totally miss the flop. Say a flop like 3 5 9 rainbow. Basically he leads into you for a small bet something even as small as 2-3 bb's. Depending on how you react to this will depend on how the rest of the streets go down. A lot of the time I have caught myself when not paying attention folding or calling this bet. I guess neither are wrong as calling is usually fairly close to pricing you in on a 6-1 draw for having two over cards with the thinking you will get a little implied odds on a later street. Folding is OK but a gay better paying attention will easily take advantage of this. Most of these micro stakes players as well as a lot of players are not playing a large number of tables so they are paying closer attention then compared to a big multi-Taber ex me.

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The problem with calling is at that point the gay better puts you on exactly big cards. Hands like previously mentioned AK, AK, KQ and depending on your aggressiveness KJ, QJ, even. This allows him to take control of the action on further streets. On the turn he can more easily bet big if a scare card doesn't hit and take the pot away from you. The player could be doing this with any two cards that hit the board or a pocket pair or any two cards just basically outplaying you.

Counters to this bet. I have found that raising the gay bet on the flop roughly pot size takes away there gusto. As this is how I might play a large pocket pair. Whether or not this gay bet was as mentioned above or a blocking bet to a draw. I would generally raise the piss out of them to charge them. And to get them to fold so they don't draw out on me. The downfall to this move is how often you are doing this. I am not sure of the percentage of people who have tracking software at this level. But if you do this every time whether or not you do have a large pocket pair, set, over cards, two pair or whatever they will definitely start playing back at you.

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2: Induce betting

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This one is used by a player that bets usually a little more than a gay or donk bet. But not enough to seem like a full on bet for value and or protection. This is usually a bet by a player that has flopped a set or two pair and is hoping. If you are an aggressive player for a raise so he can re pop you with another raise. I haven't seen to many of this at nl10 so far. Though I will point out the amount of times people bet out with the nuts a lot of the time. I have found it really makes no difference other than slow playing will be the death of you unless you cripple the deck. Like flopping quads or flopping a straight flush. That betting for value at these lower levels is essential. Obviously you can tweak this for more value but more tweakage leads to being sucked out on more.

More Blaahhhh!!!!!!

%^$%^#$&^&(*@


I was getting a little tired of having my aces all in pre-flop against kings and losing %75 of the time so I thought I would get a little revenge and found a couple spots where I knew I was up against aces with my kings. But couldn't manage to crack aces with my kings???? Anyways I managed to turn off the doom switch a little bit after dealing at Ken's Friday night to keep the plane from nosediving at terminal velocity into the Indy 500 parking lot. Anyways here is some interesting hands

My hand 8 ,8
two limper's, I limp from mid a late position min raises all limper's call

6 8 5 rainbow a limper min bets I raise the pot the late min raiser calls

6 8 5 (J) I bet 24 bb's and the late position min raiser calls

6 8 5 J (6) gives me a boat I lead out 40 bb's 2/3 of the pot other players only has 15 bb's more he shoves I have to call 15 bb's to see 168 bb pot. I call he shows pocket jacks

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My hand 8s, 9s
I limp early one other limper a mid position player raises 5x bb I call oop and one other player calls
4 J T Myself and other limp caller checks to raiser who bets giving me 3-1 odds with a player left behind. I call and the other limper folds

4 J T (Q) giving me the straight. I don't put my opponent on K9 and don't know if he would C-bet with AK I pick betting into him 2/3 of the pot I did this hoping to define my hand betting once the third to the straight hit the board. He flat calls indicating that he didn't have AK I would think.

4 J T Q (K) I didn't like this card one bit and don't know if my bet indicated. I didn't want to not bet for value even though at this point there is not much I could beat. Pocket aces got there as well as any ace. I bet 1/3 of the pot and he flat shoves I fold.

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My hand AQo

A super fishy lag raises from utg I flat call

A 7 8 He leads out and I raise him a heavy pot I get another caller and he calls giving him 2.2-1 odds

A 7 8 (T) He just flat shoves for 30 bb's he is running 70/10 so I call and he flips over ATo for two pair and it holds.

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My hand AKo

pot has a few limper's I raise 6xbb on the button with AKo I get on caller

K 9 2 rainbow he checks and I bet 3/4 pot and he min raises me. This is a general line for a set but at this level a lot of players like to raise with top pair so I call the raise.

K 9 2 (8) He checks here? I don't know if he was worried about my call or was going to put it in over the top for another check raise. Since I am worried about a set I check behind as well to control the pot size.

K 9 2 8 (6) At this point he flat shoves. I have to put him on a set or something stupid like KQ or KJ thinking I didn't hit the K and have something like QQ maybe. He shoves for a little over 100 bb's. I don't think he would push that big of a stack in without a set so I fold.

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My hand 76o in the bb

it is limped around sb completes I check

5 8 9 basically sb bets out I raise he re raises I re raise he shoves I call with the nuts he shows 85 and rivers a boat when another 5 hits

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My hand 22

The pot is limped in 4 way

Th 9d 2h

UTg limper leads out the pot. I three bet him two others fold and he min raises me. On top of this he typed out in the chat box "sure". This should have immediately screamed a monster hand. No body talks about there hand in the chat box unless its the fucking nuts!. At this point I should have slowed down. Obviously I think I am ahead of someone who could take this line with two pair 9T could be in this players range here. So I go ahead and min raise mostly on accident. I am not happy with someone who could easily call here with say QhJh and be giving them super odds. He again min raises me and at this point I think I should have mucked my set. After all this raising I could see my raise indicating I was telling him I had top pair. His raise should have indicated at least two pair. My re raise should have indicated I had a set his additional min raise should have screamed a set. And considering I had bottom set there wasn't one I could beat. What actually happened was I only had 40 bb's over his third min raise that I just shoved to get it in while I thought I was ahead. He showed pocket Tens for top set.

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My hand 55

A super Lagtard opens under the gun for 9 bb's his stack is roughly 8x that so I call on the button. He is running 100/72 over 18 hands.

4s2d5s Is the flop and he leads out 15 bb's. I am not to happy about the two spades but this guys stats us uber donkey. So rather than snap him off on the flop I hold out for the turn to raise him there to get a little more of his money in.

4s 2d 5s (9c) He flat shoves at this point for 56 bb's and I call with top set not putting him on A3 or 36. He shows A6 for a gutshot and its gets there on the river with a 3 :(

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My hand AKo

Utg player raises 4 bb's I call on the button as well as the blinds. At this point I have to put the player who is running at 38/6 on AK or QQ -AA

K 8 6 Is the flop utg leads out and I 3-bet him the sb calls he has K5? and the bb calls with J8? It gets back to the utg raiser and he re raises. I muck turn and river is J J and the J8 takes it with a boat over the utg raiser who has pocket 6's.

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There are so many hands this week that I am just going to give up writing about all the stupid hands where people got lucky. Anyway considering how bad I have been running this week I decided to tweak my strategy a little. Verses bringing in a lot of hands with raises. I decided to stop raising with AK, AQo. Also I had begun raising with pocket pairs regardless of position with pocket 9's and 10's. And also was raising pocket pairs 7's and 8's in later position. These were causing me a lot of grief as well as no one ever folds. I would get called out of position. Over cards would hit and I would get check called down to the river every time. And if ever I gave up or checked a street the player or players would fire off some nasty big bet on the river. Perhaps I was just getting floated a lot but every time I called they would have some completely stupid like K2o and hit there king on the flop and wouldn't fold. So much of the time I am getting called by super inferior hands and I am missing the flops turns and river and no one at this low level is folding once they hit the flop. This is costing me considerable and has shaken my confidence a lot. Also not to mention beat after beat.

At some points I just turn off the monitor and stop for the day after unspeakableness. Today was exploding with retarded re raises and the two outers came on the river every time. Flopping boats? Might as well just fold. My final hand of today I just gave up on was a set over set hand when I actually had the higher set

my hand 9s9h

opponents hand 7s7c

flop 7d 9c 4c all the money goes in turn and river are clubs and his seven of clubs takes it with a 7 high flush.

Blaahhhhhhhhh!

Just couldn't seem to break the voodoo that was chained around my ankle today. Managed to get in a little over 6,000 hands and was a roller coaster ride. I played two sessions the first was only for an hour. And was most of my loosing's for today. Until my wife had our ultrasound appointment rescheduled for today. Was interesting watching the ultrasound on the screen. I really couldn't tell much of what was going on other than seeing the head, arms and legs. We got the thing on dvd kinda different. Though the doctor said he thought we were having a boy. Hopefully this is the way it works. He seemed pretty confident but he also said it wasn't %100 positive of the results. Anyway the later session was a break even with the same amount of crapola. Every time I had been playing smart and making all the right choices. The "Doomswitch" would get turned on and knock down all my pins. I think from now on I will be updating my blog with hand reviews mostly along with weekly reviews as well.

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Todays hands

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pot was limped in six way I was on the button with 22

flop is Qc3c2

There is a min bet two callers and a raise. I reraise three folds and the raiser shoves. I call and his Q3 hits his 4 outer on the river when another Q hits. Giving him a higher boat.

I have AQo from utg +1 there is one limper I raise 6xbb.

everyone folds but this player who calls oop with Q6o

flop comes Q85 rainbow he donk bets into me

I three bet him he shoves I see his stats are 77/23 I call

he picks up a 6 on the turn and then proceeds to talk shit to me.

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I have 44 in the bb

a player in mid position with 70bb's makes is 4xbb to go I call

flop comes 483 rainbow I have middle set I bet 10 bb's raiser calls

4 8 3 (A) on turn I bet 15 bb's raiser calls. At this point I am putting the raiser on an overpair trying to control the size of the pot.

4, 8, 3, A, (9) on the river I bet 31 bb's and this player shoves for 11bb's more I call and he shows pocket 8's for trip 8's

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the pot is limped in 4 way I have position w/ KJ

flop comes 9T9 giving me a gutshot and is checked to me I check to see the free card

9 T 9 (Q) The turn gives me a straight but the board is paired. And is checked around a player min bets and I raise. The sb min raises me the min better calls and I call. I didn't really like this min raise here as it shows a lot of strength but it happened on the turn when I hit my straight.

9 T 9 Q (J) On the river and he leads out for 43 bb's at this point I think with the way this hand went I could and should have folded here. Anyone usually raising you on a paired board has a minimum of trips if he is not a donkey. Anyways I call and he show 9T for flopped boat.

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utg and utg +1 limp I am in mid position with pocket T's and I raise to think the field

The button calls and so does utg and utg+1 the flop comes

9 T Q rainbow utg limps utg +1 limps I fire out 3/4 pot sized bet the button call and utg flat shoves. At this point I should have really been worried about KJ as it is a definite hand any of the three other players in the pot could have. But alas I was multi tabling and not thinking and snap called as did the button. The turn and river didn't matter as the utg had pocket Q's for top set and the button had pocket 9's for bottom set. I didn't have many hands on the utg but looking now seemed to be pretty passive. I guess I could have folded but could have just as well been up against QT or T9. But I have found that after a raise a flat shove for 175ish bb's usually means the nuts!

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Then I had my aces all in preflop to Kings. There was a raiser I re raised he re re raised and I shoved he insta called and I knew he had kings. Flop was KQJ and I knew I was instantly loosing. No ten for me for the outdraw. I went back and found that for some reason all in preflop I am loosing with pocket aces vs Kings seven out of ten times?

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I get involved in a three way raised pot with pocket 4's I have relative position

5cTc4h

the raiser bets the button calls and I pot raise the two players the raiser folds and the button calls

5ctc4h (8h) on the turn and the button donk bets into me again. Again I 4bet him or pot size raise him he calls again.

5c Tc 4h 8h (Qh) putting a back door flush out there. He again donk bets into me. At this point I should have just called but who in the fuck is going to stay around for a backdoor flush draw when I am raising him the fucking pot every street. Needless to say I reraise him putting him all in and he calls showing 7hTh for a ten high flush.