Do you know the feeling when you’ve played a lot of poker and then you suddenly take a break and you don’t have the urge to come back? I feel like that these days and while recent results both online (WCOOP satellite) and live (home game tourney win) have been good, I still find myself not playing. Now don’t get me wrong, I’ve played a little a headsup match here and there, won the last x ones without a single loss btw, but I still don’t feel like playing more….I guess I need a new goal in poker as the same old “boring” grind isn’t cutting it anymore, at least not these days. Maybe I should check back to see what my goals were at the start of the year, it seems that it’s been ages since then and I didn’t have a second look. Or maybe I should just set a new goal without going back…hmmm….meditate on this I will…until then gl at the tables everyone…

It’s been ages since we had our last home game and it was about time that we got together again to sling some cards. It didn’t feel like the old home game though as some of the long-standing members lost their drive and didn’t show up for tonight’s game (or the last few home games for that matter). We were still able to get 7 players and so we started off our regular tourney format, but only with a single table. Oh well, could be worse. In the beginning a mate of mine ran like the poker god himself. Every other hand he had a monster (either preflop or on the flop) and found someone who had a decent second best hand. So he took the chiplead early while I looked down at abysmal hand after abysmal hand. Oh well, sit tight until the blinds go up and then start some action. So that I did and I slowly chipped away at the others winning small to medium pots in the process.

Before long I was the chipleader having the early chipleader (aka mr. running like the poker god himself) covered by a lot. Then the clinching hand went down. We’re four handed, 3 in the money (don’t ask), and I look down at AhTh. The estimated chip counts are me 45% of the chips in play, early chipleader 25% of the chips in play and the rest divided between the shorter stacks. Early chipleader is in the small blind. UTG folds and I pop it on the button with my AT s00000ted. Early chipleader in the SB calls, BB folds. Flop comes down A89 rainbow. Early chipleader pushes. I instacall…putting him on a pair, def not a set – he would try to milk it – def not a straight draw – he would lowball that as well (good to have reads on your opponents, lol). So we flip up our cards and he shows pocket tens. Nice…he’s drawing to one out or runner runner straight for a chop. I like my chances here. Turn bring a 7. Ooooh the tension. River is the often called for deuce and I’m the monster chipleader with 70% of the chips in play and we’re in the money. From there it doesn’t take long for one of the shorties to bust the other and we’re headsup. As my opponent is a rather inexperienced player I decide to go with a small-pot-strategy. It works out to perfection as I win small pot after small pot. I won some medium pots too as I connected to the flop sometimes, sometimes even really hard: I’ve got 96 s000ted on the button and I raised to 4BB. I get a call and we see a flop of 9d6h9h. Yatzee! She checks, I check. Turn bring another diamond and I’m thinking, please have a flush-draw and let the flush get there one time. River is a total blank and I try to milk it a little, but don’t get a call. Boooo! But oh well….soon enough I’m up 12:1 in chips and the end comes as I push in on a flop of 234. I hold 25o against A8. Turn is a blank and river is another deuce and I take it down. Nice!

After that another player arrived and we started our “second chance” tourney (with half the buyin of the main game). I didn’t catch any cards and the action was crazy. So I decided to go with my first real hand I would get. That happened in the third blinds level. I look down at JJ on the button. Jacks are okay, right? Nah…but let’s not get ahead of ourselves. So…and MP player limps, LP player limps, I pop it, all but the two limpers fold and we see a flop of T88 with two clubs. Checked to me. Hmm…I bet two thirds of the pot. MP player calls. LP player pushes. Bummer. So I got the nagging feeling that I gotta be beat here. Someone’s gotta have the eight or a bigger overpair. Hmm..I look down at my chipstack, then at the chipstack of the LP pusher, then at the chipstack of the MP caller that is yet to act. Oh brother, I should have checked my stack and the others earlier.

I’ve got the pusher covered by a longshot, but the MP player yet to act has me covered. Caught in the middle. What if the MP player has got a ten here…then I can bust him and lose the smaller pot to the pusher if he’s got an eight. What if it’s the other way around. Honestly, I didn’t even think that hard and long…after all the pot was that big and one way or the other I felt like I had commited myself (mathematically I had done it by my cbet after the flop checked to me) – but honestly, even if you’re commited mathematically, is it right to throw in your last chips with a feeling that you’re almost dead? Not really, but I did it anyway…it’s the home game second chance tourney after all and hey, maybe they’re out of line anyway. So I push and get instacalled by the MP player. So we turn up our hands and they’re: MP – AA….yikes….LP – 82o….lol…nice call preflop :p …me JJ…turn brings a deuce to give mr 82o a boat…still need a J…river is a blank and I’m busto. Oh well….can’t win ’em all 😉

So…I’m outta here…maybe I’ll be back with some online poker stuff next week as I doubt that I’ll get in some hands during the remainder of the weekend…so, until then…gl at the tables everyone…

After winning a satellite to the 2008 WCOOP, deciding not to play in a two day 530$ tourney after all and selling the W$ at a good price, I thought I’d do something that I hadn’t done in a long time – withdraw some dough. So I jump into PokerStars cashier and try to request a withdrawal…all good there…what isn’t good though is that the withdrawal option is somewhat limited: as I did some of my deposits via Neteller back in the day and getting money out to MasterCard isn’t an option the cashier window tells me that amount x will automatically go to my Neteller account and that I can redistribute the rest of the withdrawal to other options.

Not so good, after all I stopped using Neteller a while ago. But wait, the cashier window also tells me that I should get in touch with support if any of the withdrawal options was outdated (e.g. due to closing an account, e.g. Neteller). Okay, sounds good…so I contact support, they get back to me asking for confirmation that they should mark my Neteller account as outdated (and hence unusable in the future)…I tell them to do just that and I’m free to request a withdrawal to whichever other option they offer. So, I settle for the very convenient offer to transfer the dough via Direct Bank Transfer….and bingo four days later my bank account does the little ka-ching sound and the money is there. Now that’s what I call customer service. Now, I think it should be normal for the (paying) customer to have his/her money whenever, whereever he/she pleases, but we all know that’s not the norm – at least not with all the sites, not even the “major players”. So I can only applaud PokerStars for doing it’s name proud…praise where praise is due…

I’m out of here…no real new poker content here…had no time to play a single hand in the last few days and honestly didn’t feel the urge to play either…maybe I’ll get some playing time in during the week and/or this upcoming weekend…we’ll see….until then, gl at the tables everyone…

…especially if you’re in the middle of the worst session in ages: priceless. I’m still too irritated to even grasp what just happened to me and I won’t even dive into telling bad beat story after bad beat story as I don’t want to pay all my readers extra dollars adding insult to injury. All in all I stop playing at least four SnGs too late…still should have won some of those, but it was not to be…these days no pair no draw and being dominated is virtual gold…so I’m off to clean out my mouth as I puked in it just now…and I can guarantee you that I won’t be back for a few days…it’s reached the point again where I just can’t take it anymore…it’s one thing that the donks get insanely lucky in consecutive matches against me, but then starting to talk trash? Not my cup of tea…especially not if I’m in the middle of bad beat city where even a 90+% advantage is enough to win a decisive hand….I’m outta here…best of luck to the rest of you…and you’ll see me when I’m back (don’t know when that’ll be…but don’t expect me back this week)…

….pretty ugly. After almost a week of no poker I jumped back into the aquarium today and I did my best no to tap the glass. In the end I got steamrolled by the donksquad. Maniacal game – no dice, aggressive game – no dice, passive game – no dice. Somehow all the matches lasted long enough to either see the blinds get huge or me getting it in on a coinflip. I think I don’t even need to tell you that I didn’t win a single race tonight, not one. 44 vs AJ, JJ vs Q9 (yeah…not exactly a raise, I still lost), AK vs 66, etc etc….so sick. In total I played one DS to the sunday million, lost in third at my starting table on a flip, then I lost 7 NL Hold’em headsup matches, won one and won one Razz headsup match. Pretty fucking sick. Honestly…but oh well, what am I gonna do…yeah, you’re right…log off and forget about it…and that’s what I’m going to do…Holden’s Bigger Deal is waiting as a good-night read…so I’m outta here…gl at the tables everyone….

The joker says thank you :

1. “Script kiddies” who think it’s neat to exploit servers…
2. Hosters that think it’s a good idea to have crappy standard reinstalls with ridonkulous settings (e.g. firewall blocking dns requests)…

Dr. Pauly’s poker blog, the famous Tao of Poker turns 5 in August! Woohoo! To celebrate the fact, the good doctor pulled something out of his head: A special celebration tourney running at PokerStars on August 5th 9pm ET…all readers of Tao of Poker welcome. Read all about: here.

Congrats to the good doctor for kicking butt for 5 years!!! All the best…rock on man!

Due to a major computer blowup, which is still not 100% solved…I wasn’t able to play a single hand of poker. The good news is that I could save basically all my poker related data…although I’m not totally sure how I will get all the tourneys into tourneymanager again. Hmm…I’m sure I’ll find a way…until then, it’s no poker playing…just poker watching. I can only repeat my recommendation: If you have missed this week’s poker after dark so far…go to nbcsports and watch it online…it’s an instant-classic! Alrighty…I’m outta here…gl at the tables everyone…

So…after a long wait, it’s finally here….PokerTechReviews launched today. The official press release can be found here. Check it out.

Side note: Poker-Tastic.com’s feed is one of the feeds featured on the main-page…so if you’re one of the users coming in from PokerTechReviews – welcome to my humble place on the interweb!

Played another DS to the sunday million tonight…patience at the first table is key, the donks are more than willing to hand you their chips, just gotta have the patience to wait for the right spot and you’ve got a good shot. I took out 4 out of 5 at the first table, even after being down to 500 chips early (losing a coinflip against a pushmonkey). The final table was brutal then. I was playing tight tight tight…just like everyone else, I for one didn’t do it on purpose though. Usually I would try to run over such a tight table in that spot, but it’s hard to do if you’re looking at 53o etc all the time. So I sat back and relaxed a little…once the blinds got bigger I finally had to resort to some all-in steals etc. The worked…but I couldn’t get anything going, not a single decent hand…once we were down to three I pushed…ran into a crap-flip 40/60 shot and lost…out in third…oh well…can’t complain here.

After that I donked around a little in the HU SnGs…and the game was brutal…I won my first match within 5 hands when my KJ on a KJx board was more than enough against my opponent calling a re-reraise-shove on that flop with K4o…well played sir….TPNK totally gold there…lol. In the next three matches it was cooler time. Flush into bigger flush…boat into bigger boat…nut flush into small boat…two pair into bigger two pair…you name it, I ran into it. Oh well, that’s how it goes sometimes…so I finish the session down, but down less than the rake…so I can live with that…

On another note: I finished reading Johnny Hughes’ book “Texas Poker Wisdom” yesterday…I gotta say a really good read, it made me smile a lot of times along the way with all the gamblers’ / poker players’ references by Old Cardslinger Matt…I can really recommend it…and I wonder if there’s going to be a sequel…

I have to check my shelf now as the poker reading material is starting to get slim…after all I have read a lot of stuff so far…I guess my next must read will be Doyle’s new book (autobiography?!)…if it is only nearly as entertaining as Amarillo Slim’s I will be a happy customer…alrighty…enough babbling…I’m outta here…gl at the tables everyone…