Last Friday has been a rather weird poker night for me as I was playing with my friends. Believe it or not, for approx 80% of the hands I played, I flopped some kind of big draw; open-ended straight draw, nut flush draw, straight flush draw.. and yes, a royal flush draw which finally killed my bankroll.
At the beginning, I tried to avoid fishing too much. Most of the guys played aggressively so I had to be conservative and fold several drawing hands. To my disgust, running cards would have made me a strong hand.
Therefore, as the game progressed, I decided to shift my style and fish more especially against the few tight players. Even more, I tried to bet these draws, trying to confuse the oppenent and make the pot bigger.
Frankly, it didn't work out. I often ended up looking at the river card and realising I am holding J high. Bluffing worked a couple of times, however I had to admit defeat in many big pots because of my failed drawing hand.
Close to the end of the night, I received K(h) J(h). I was on the button, and raised it 4 times after taking a look at one semi-tight and one loose player to play behind me. Unsurprisingly, both called. Flop is Q(h) 10(h) and 8(c). What do you say, a straight Read More »
Altough I did not get organised in noting my results of the tournaments I play, from time to time I like to sit down and take a look at my perfomance over a particular time.
Naturally, this curiosity mostly arises when I suddenly realise that either my bankroll has shrinked almost to nothing or as happened this time, my bankroll grew fatter.
The S&G I like to play are at the majority $5 Buyin 6 seater, however noted down here are some exceptions:
Nothing is more frustrated in poker then to have to leave the table because of a donkey.
It seems like the donkey spell is working magics on me, because this is happening more and more often. Let me explain myself.
I find myself with a massive hand, something like pocket rockets, K K or AK. I love to play these hands aggresively as I tend to be very selective especially in S&G tournaments. At the exact same time, I find out that a 'donkey' in my table is practicing his newly developed style (!), or else just being plain stupid.
I raise 3-5 times the big blind, according to the situation at the table, and get called by a random player, or even better raised all-in by a short stack.
The flop is nearly always the perfect one for my hand. I continue my aggressive style of betting more then half what there is in the pot. For some reason, which I cannot explain, the 'donkey' calls. Knowing nearly for sure, I am holding the best hand, I feel confident I'm finally going to eat some chips out of this sucker.
However, runner runner cards are bad news for me, and awesome news a stupid grin for my opponent. Loosing against an underdog hand because of running cards which will miracoulusly make my Read More »
Barry Greenstein said in his book Ace on the River:
"I wasn't the best player on the tables. The only difference between me and the others was, that while men used to come and play poker and have a drink after a day of work, I was sleeping all day. And that was the reason why I was winning."
I never had the chance to analyse this statement, until now. As from two months ago, I started an experiment, which confirms what Barry Greenstein explains in his book.
Having started my summer holidays, finding that I have so much more time for poker and other activities, I commited myself to play as much S&G as possible, playing the majority of them first thing in the morning.
The results of my performance, clearly indicates that Barry is onto something. I won 3 out of 5 'first thing in the morning' short handed (6 handed) S&G on various poker rooms with buyins ranging from $5 to $12. Furthermore, my experiment showed, that the other 2/5 of the tournaments i didnt win, I didnt even place 2nd or 3rd, and this is the result of early bad beats or running out of cards.
What have I concluded? I was in a better position to make 'make or break' decisions that most of the other player Read More »
I registered to the MPA Freeroll Launch Tournament with excitement. I have been playing live and online poker for some time now, but was never really into a particular event. I wanted to be there at the Academy's Launch.
Being exited, doesn't mean I was feeling I'm going to win. To be honest, after a long and wealhty run, this week I feel I'm the abyss again. A 'bad-beat' seaon I'm calling it. A run where I'm loosing lots of chips by holding the second nuts.
It happened to me on several occasions in online S&G and even Heads Up tourneys and this even effected my performance in live poker. I'm just not concentrated enough, or not thinking positive enough.
To summarise my perfomance at the tourney, I can say that I played only 4 hands, 3 of them winning a medium pot with one pair. The 4th hand was my deadly one. I receive pocket Js, by which I raise pre-flop and an instance call behind me. Flop is 5 8 10, rainbow, I'm good. I bet the pot, and an instance raise 'all-in' behind me. This got me thinking, however, playing an online MTT freeroll, doesnt take much time to think. I called the All-in, realising I'm in the lead with my Js against a 56 offsuit. Before I could even clap my Read More »
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Joined: 2008-06-22
