Subscribe to my feeeeeds here http://www.mypageofmanythings.com 2010-02-08T23:39:10+01:00 http://www.mypageofmanythings.com http://www.mypageofmanythings.com/images/M_images/rss.png text/html 2010-02-02T11:48:51+01:00 http://www.mypageofmanythings.com http://www.mypageofmanythings.com/my-blog/poker/wbcoop-final-post.html Well, my WBCOOP this year was a disaster !Not a single deep run and to be honest, none of the events were even FUN to play ! 80% of the table was on sitout in each one of them and the few players at my table that were actually playing didn't seem to have a clue what they were doing. This was definitely different last year. Somehow I found myself at the table with people who had just recently created a Pokerstars account and had played 5 tourneys with an average buyin of $0.05 ! Obviously freeroll whores who probably 'cheated' their way into this tournament. You are supposed to have a poker blog thats regularly updated .. I'm willing to put money on the fact that none of these players had an actual poker blog, maybe just a poker post or 2 on their general blog or something.I hope Pokerstars does something to make this tournament better next year ... text/html 2010-01-28T00:02:14+01:00 http://www.mypageofmanythings.com http://www.mypageofmanythings.com/my-blog/poker/wbcoop---round-3---nlh.html Well here we go another day another freeroll....Signed up just in time, close to 2k runners this time (around 1800 actually). Again a lot of people sitting out at my table. 2 guys are sitting in, they seem to want to steal the blinds every hand so I'll let them while the blinds are low and build a tight imageRepopped it with AQ from the SB and he folded :)Took down a decent with AJ vs 45. Stack now 2680. Lost a pot .. thought he was bluffing and I had an open ended straight draw .. back to 2k.Down to 1200 now ... I am not playing tight enough I guess, but there are only 3 others at the table not sitting out, can't really keep folding. Ok, I'm out. This was not even enjoyable ! I only played a few hands but they called me every time and they raised my blinds every hand, I shove on him and he shows up with AQ ! He was playing every hand, where does he get AQ from ?Sigh ...another chance tomorrow I guess. text/html 2010-01-26T23:09:08+01:00 http://www.mypageofmanythings.com http://www.mypageofmanythings.com/my-blog/poker/wbcoop---round-2---plo.html Pot limit omaha time tonight.Plenty of people at my table are sitting out, but 1 guy is calling everything... Very hard to play against. Will have to hit something. Had 2 nice hands but the flop was nasty both times.I raise AKQQ and the flop came T22, I bet in position he called.I figured he probably had a 2 and when he bombed the turn I just folded... he showed a total rag hand with a 2 in it..The next hand I had a flushdraw and called a few small bets .. this has already brought my stack down to 1120 :( Not looking good. (Someone PLEASE hit my boomswitch !!) Ok, he is finally folding to some bets and I split 1 pot withhim ... and finally got a boat and worked my stack back up to 2739 !Lost a small pot when I made the nut straight on a paired board .. Check called the river and down to 2379 now. Yess... flopped a boat and got it all in against aces. Up to 5k now. The very next hand I flop a Q high flush and get it all in against another guy with aces ! Up to 8673 now... Niiiice. I'm in position 31 of 1179 now. I get AA89 double suited and repop it HUGE.. he still calls and calls a full pot bet on the flop withjust top pair. He turns a flush draw and hits it on the river. Back to 4k now. This guy is tilting me pretty bad now. I filled up on the river to make my boat, 9700 now. 50/967.Guy put me on full blown monkey tilt now. He's calling 3 bets pre flop with total garbage and just hitting miracles. I'm back down to 3500 ... break now. Breathe in .... breathe out ! Ok busted against the same guy obviously. My KKxx against his JJxx, he hits the J and im out. What pisses me off to no extent is this was one of those eastern european freeroll leeches that seem to have infected all the online freerolls. I'm pretty sure he has no poker related blog since he has played 5 online tournaments for 5c buyin each. Nice to see the WBCOOP is also infected with these leeches. text/html 2010-01-25T22:06:38+01:00 http://www.mypageofmanythings.com http://www.mypageofmanythings.com/my-blog/poker/wbcoop---round-1---nlh.html Tonight, the WBCOOP is starting. This is an awesome event organised by Pokerstars for all poker bloggers. All of us are provided with tickets to 6 events that are running in the next few days. Here is the schedule of the events :No Limit Hold’em January 25 17:00 ETPot Limit Omaha January 26 17:00 ETNo Limit Hold’em January 27 18:00 ETNo Limit Hold’em January 28 18:00 ET8-Game Mix January 29 19:00 ETNo Limit Hold’em January 30 15:00 ETThey are awarding entry to various SCOOP events as prizes. Value of these entries varies from $11 to over $3000 ! I will be reporting live during my (hopefully long) run in the WBCOOP tonight in this post. Instead of doing a series of posts, I will just update this post with my stacksize, position in the field and maybe if I have time, some key hands. It's a freeroll, but I'm not expecting very crazy play, last year people seemed to be taking it pretty seriously.... The first tournament is No Limit Holdem and is starting in 2 hours from now. Right now there are about 1500 players signed up ... stay tuned folks ! Start of round 1 :Some players at my table are sitting out. Will be nice to steal their blinds later on :)2 people have already moved in pre flop for 100 bb, so seems like a weak tablePlayed 1 hand with K9o, flopped a K and called a bet, turn check check, called river bet and he turned a straight. Small pot though, lost 100 chips. Lost a pot for most of my stack with KQo, against AK ... Opponent flatted the raise pre, then called a flop bet with a gutshot and bombed the turn and river which I called coz the line was so weird :) Shoved 20bb with AKs, got knocked out by AT .. Better luck tomorrow. text/html 2010-01-25T21:59:32+01:00 http://www.mypageofmanythings.com http://www.mypageofmanythings.com/my-blog/poker/beating-the-3---90-mans-on-ftp.html In this post, I'm using hands from a 90 man turbo MTT on Full Tilt Poker. These 90 mans have double starting stack and knockout bonusses, which add some different dymanics to the hands.Especially the double starting stacks (3000) makes a HUGE difference how you should optimally play these in the early levels. They are turbos though, so eventually you'll find yourself with a regular 10 to 30 big blind stack most of the time. Having the bigger starting stack basically increases the value of hands like small pairs and suited connectors, because of the implied odds of these hands. Especially at the $3 level, people will stack of very, VERY light, so if you flop big with your hand .... you're often going to get paid off.Here are 2 example hands taken from a Sunday session. It seems on Sunday people are willing to stack off even lighter than usual :http://www.gutshot.com/replayer.php?id=2455 (http://www.gutshot.com/replayer.php?id=2455) This is the very first hand of the tournament, I'm not involved in the hand, but it illustrates several important points : People tend to limp a lot, or make pointless min-raises. On the other end of the spectrum, people will shove all in for 100 big blinds pre flop for no apparant reason. And finally, a lot of players will call you down very light if you make these kinds of shoves. The shoving player shows AQ here, but often they will show up with even weaker hands like AT or 66. You can easily call these weird shoves with 99+ and AQ+ and find yourself ahead enough of the time to make it profitable.http://www.gutshot.com/replayer.php?id=2456 (http://www.gutshot.com/replayer.php?id=2456) I'm showing this hand because I make a play here that is 100% tweaked to the level of play here. I limp with hands like 99 and TT when I'm in early position like this and if it gets raised and gets back to me I evaluate whether I want to see the flop before I get it in. I'm really looking to get it all in, even 100 big blinds deep this early in the tournament. If it would have gone, raise - reraise, then I just muck the 99 because a reraise like that is either AK or a big pair, which means im far behind. But my thought process during this hand was as follows :I limp in and see what happens behind me..Some players limp behind and suddenly a huge raise from Perroud ... The raise size here tells me it is NOT likely to be a big pair like AA, KK or QQ but much more likely to be a middle pair type of hand where he is just trying to take it down right here.Now when the other player flat calls the bet, he is also most likely holding a pair, but definitely not a pair higher than mine as he would reraise 100% of the time (he is the player that got all in on the first hand with AQ). This is the most important point in the hand, if I can put this player on a smaller pair my equity in the hand increases greatly ! I'm pretty confident he would reraise any bigger pair and also AQ and AK he would probably reraise.So my hand is up against what is likely 1 smaller pair (The player on the big blind) and either another pair or maybe 2 overcards.If I shove here, its possible that one of them will fold (not often though) putting some extra money into the pot. This means if I get into a coinflip, it will still be a good flip because of the extra money.If they both call, the equity my hand has against their 2 hands is high enough to make it profitable. To show this, I will put the possible ranges in pokerstove and show you my equity here : equity win tie Hand 0: 47.123% 45.65% 01.48% Hand 1: 16.631% 15.87% 00.76% Hand 2: 36.247% 35.34% 00.91% I have 47% equity in the pot and I'm putting in less than 33% of the chips. And in this pokerstove example I have actually given them some better hands than what I was really expecting them to show up with. My actual equity is probably somewhere between 40% and 65% (!!).So these hands should give you a good idea of the level of play at the $3 level. It's my first strategy post like this, they will probably get better and more easily readable as I do more of these. Coming next, tonight, live reporting from the WBCOOP !!