Alex Michel's Blog

Future plans, poker, miscellaneous

2009-07-03T17:33:00.005-04:00

A lot has happened since I last blogged. Let’s see…I went to NE and interviewed at Madison and didn’t get it. It would have been a pretty sweet job for me where I would have probably earned an exceptional $38k or so my first year (including stipends) which is unreal for a first year teacher. They called me two days later and said it was a really tough choice (blah blah) and they chose one of the other three interviewees. I was in NE then for about two weeks where we put on our Concordia basketball camp during one of those weeks.

I knew that Concordia’s head coach, Coach Schmidt, wanted me to come back and serve as an assistant, so I decided that I was going to become a Graduate Assistant and start on my Master’s at Concordia. I love being an assistant coach there and the graduate assistant job has some good benefits (free Master’s classes, free apartment, and $4,000 for the year). That is not a bad deal at all, so I decided that I was going to do that. It took us a while to get the paperwork figured out so I hadn’t signed anything yet when I received an unexpected call on the Thursday during camp from the Athletic Director at Broken Bow (NE) high school wanting me to possibly be the head boy’s basketball coach for them. He said they have a full-time para job with it as well as assistant coaching jobs. He wasn’t sure how much they would pay me, but he said the principal would talk to me about that when I came out. I asked Coach Schmidt for permission to explore this as I had a verbal commitment to him. He, without hesitation, told me to check it out. So I scheduled an appointment on the next Tuesday where I would just stop there on my way home to MT.

Before leaving, my good friends Marcus Nathan and Jill Pfeiffer were married in none other than Madison, NE (where she grew up). So after never being in Madison, I was there twice within a few weeks. The wedding was a ton of fun and Leah was a gorgeous bridesmaid. Congrats Marcus and Jill!

Then next day, Sunday, I had to move out of my apartment because Brad had found a roommate for July and I wasn’t going to be back before then. I moved all my stuff to my friend and the head women’s basketball coach, Drew Olson’s, basement. I didn’t realize how much stuff I had. It took all afternoon to move a few blocks.

I spent Monday with Leah’s family in York before taking off Tuesday morning for MT with the stop in Broken Bow, NE. Broken Bow turned out to be more in the middle of nowhere than I thought but the town is about as nice as a town of 3500 people gets. I interviewed there and I was told that I would get $9.10 an hour as a para plus assistant coaching cross country and middle school track. In total, I would have made only 16K a year without benefits. They offered me the job and I told them I would deliberate, but there wasn’t much to deliberate. As cool as it would have been to be the head boy’s basketball coach at a decent sized high school, it just isn’t worth it to move to the middle of nowhere for 16K and coaching all year long. I declined it called coach Schmidt back and said that I would love to be his grad assistant. So it’s nice to have that finalized!

I made it back to MT Tuesday night just in time for my good friend from high school, Colin Gerstner’s bachelor party. We went to a Billings Mustangs (rookie league team for the Cincinnati Reds) game and then went to the bars in downtown Billings. It was a really good time where we spent a lot of the night singing karaoke. The best song of the night was probably when my friend Ryan pulled out “The Thong Song” for his karaoke. Classic… After words, the DJ gave us burned CDs of our performances.

The next three days, I had a bunch of wedding stuff to do for Colin and Jacki’s wedding as I was an usher. Leah and her sister Cammie (who is my sister’s age, sophomore in college) flew into MT the morning of the wedding. The wedding itself was fantastic! It was great to see all of my high school friends all together once again. What an awesome group!

Congrats Colin and Jacki! Thanks for the great time!

After the wedding, I tried to give Leah and Cammie as much of a Montana experience as I could. We went to Ryan’s house where he had a pool party for us all the next day where the music of choice was Ryan’s Thong Song Karaoke. Then I took them on the rims (the 200 ft. cliffs that span the north side of Billings):

I took them to a casino where I had $10 of free machine play that I had saved for them to use at one casino. They send me $5 at a time on Christmas and birthday’s as well as $20 free poker chips when I buy in for $50. They played on the machines for about 90 minutes while I played poker. I made $61 playing 3/6 limit and they made $2.25 after losing their initial $10 of free money. They were pumped to say the least:

I then took them to do one of my favorite free time activities…folfing.

They went and watched me and my church league softball team defeat the best team in the league after we had only one win on the season. This team was sick good as they had all 25-35 year olds who were muscular and athletic. In only my 2nd game that I have been here for, the other outfielders and I must have caught six balls at the fence and watched two go over the fence. We withstood the two homeruns and came back down two runs in the bottom of the last inning to win. It was sweet!

My dad works with a guy that offered to take us white water rafting the Stillwater River, so we did that on Tuesday. This was such a blast! The girls and my family loved doing this. We were able to stop at a spot on the river and cliff jump. That was a cool experience that I’m glad the Nebraska girls were able to do it.

Leah and Cammie then flew out yesterday morning and I decided to get in a good day of poker. I had a bunch of cashes including maybe the biggest collapse in poker in history as I was chipleader by 2 times second place with 10 to go in a 180 man $8 tourney on full tilt. I took 10th and didn’t make the final table…

The night then culminated with a 20th place finish in the daily double A on ftp for like $50 bucks and nice 4th place finish in the $10 8K guaranteed on stars with 1200 people in it for $870. Here are some hand history’s as I got deep in the tourney:

With 32 left, this hand gave me the chip lead:

PokerStars Game #30041544490: Tournament #175253444, $10+$1 Hold'em No Limit - Level XXV (2000/4000) - 2009/07/03 1:48:53 ET
Table '175253444 78' 9-max Seat #6 is the button
Seat 1: aless_84 (137133 in chips)
Seat 2: Budha95 (33767 in chips)
Seat 3: Conductor69 (128939 in chips)
Seat 4: PhigNootin (137078 in chips)
Seat 5: jpg1963 (8222 in chips)
Seat 6: missfroggy (99396 in chips)
Seat 7: jarekk (107434 in chips)
Seat 8: CU_bball (193345 in chips)
Seat 9: Mattazz (98208 in chips)
aless_84: posts the ante 500
Budha95: posts the ante 500
Conductor69: posts the ante 500
PhigNootin: posts the ante 500
jpg1963: posts the ante 500
missfroggy: posts the ante 500
jarekk: posts the ante 500
CU_bball: posts the ante 500
Mattazz: posts the ante 500
jarekk: posts small blind 2000
CU_bball: posts big blind 4000
*** HOLE CARDS ***
Dealt to CU_bball [7s 3s]
Mattazz: raises 8000 to 12000
aless_84: folds
Budha95: folds
Conductor69: folds
PhigNootin: folds
jpg1963: calls 7722 and is all-in
missfroggy: calls 12000
jarekk: folds
CU_bball: calls 8000
*** FLOP *** [8s 2h As]
CU_bball: checks
Mattazz: checks
missfroggy: bets 12000
CU_bball: calls 12000
Mattazz: folds
*** TURN *** [8s 2h As] [Jc]
CU_bball: checks
missfroggy: bets 16000
CU_bball: calls 16000
*** RIVER *** [8s 2h As Jc] [4s]
CU_bball: bets 152845 and is all-in
missfroggy: calls 58896 and is all-in
Uncalled bet (93949) returned to CU_bball
*** SHOW DOWN ***
CU_bball: shows [7s 3s] (a flush, Ace high)
missfroggy: shows [8c 8d] (three of a kind, Eights)
CU_bball collected 186626 from side pot
jpg1963: shows [Qh Qs] (a pair of Queens)
CU_bball collected 37388 from main pot
*** SUMMARY ***
Total pot 224014 Main pot 37388. Side pot 186626. Rake 0
Board [8s 2h As Jc 4s]
Seat 1: aless_84 folded before Flop (didn't bet)
Seat 2: Budha95 folded before Flop (didn't bet)
Seat 3: Conductor69 folded before Flop (didn't bet)
Seat 4: PhigNootin folded before Flop (didn't bet)
Seat 5: jpg1963 showed [Qh Qs] and lost with a pair of Queens
Seat 6: missfroggy (button) showed [8c 8d] and lost with three of a kind, Eights
Seat 7: jarekk (small blind) folded before Flop
Seat 8: CU_bball (big blind) showed [7s 3s] and won (224014) with a flush, Ace high
Seat 9: Mattazz folded on the Flop

I was getting incredible odds the entire hand. 73 sooted is gold!

16 left

Table '175253444 78' 9-max Seat #5 is the button
Seat 1: aless_84 (81508 in chips)
Seat 2: THENUTSSTL (168616 in chips)
Seat 3: Conductor69 (247771 in chips)
Seat 4: PhigNootin (263165 in chips)
Seat 5: FireRover (190868 in chips)
Seat 7: jarekk (87684 in chips)
Seat 8: CU_bball (410838 in chips)
Seat 9: JZ777 (335628 in chips)
aless_84: posts the ante 750
THENUTSSTL: posts the ante 750
Conductor69: posts the ante 750
PhigNootin: posts the ante 750
FireRover: posts the ante 750
jarekk: posts the ante 750
CU_bball: posts the ante 750
JZ777: posts the ante 750
jarekk: posts small blind 3000
CU_bball: posts big blind 6000
*** HOLE CARDS ***
Dealt to CU_bball [Ks 9s]
JZ777: folds
PhigNootin said, "gg"
aless_84: folds
THENUTSSTL: folds
Conductor69: folds
PhigNootin: raises 12000 to 18000
FireRover: folds
jarekk: folds
CU_bball: calls 12000
*** FLOP *** [9h 4d Ah]
CU_bball: checks
PhigNootin: bets 18000
CU_bball: calls 18000
*** TURN *** [9h 4d Ah] [8d]
CU_bball: checks
PhigNootin: checks
*** RIVER *** [9h 4d Ah 8d] [Qs]
CU_bball: bets 45000
PhigNootin: calls 45000
*** SHOW DOWN ***
CU_bball: shows [Ks 9s] (a pair of Nines)
PhigNootin: mucks hand
CU_bball collected 171000 from pot
*** SUMMARY ***
Total pot 171000 Rake 0
Board [9h 4d Ah 8d Qs]
Seat 1: aless_84 folded before Flop (didn't bet)
Seat 2: THENUTSSTL folded before Flop (didn't bet)
Seat 3: Conductor69 folded before Flop (didn't bet)
Seat 4: PhigNootin mucked [Jh 9d]
Seat 5: FireRover (button) folded before Flop (didn't bet)
Seat 7: jarekk (small blind) folded before Flop
Seat 8: CU_bball (big blind) showed [Ks 9s] and won (171000) with a pair of Nines
Seat 9: JZ777 folded before Flop (didn't bet)

12 left

PokerStars Game #30042126491: Tournament #175253444, $10+$1 Hold'em No Limit - Level XXIX (4000/8000) - 2009/07/03 2:25:57 ET
Table '175253444 78' 9-max Seat #3 is the button
Seat 3: Conductor69 (426171 in chips)
Seat 4: PhigNootin (151415 in chips)
Seat 5: FireRover (192743 in chips)
Seat 7: jarekk (372783 in chips)
Seat 8: CU_bball (422588 in chips)
Seat 9: JZ777 (220378 in chips)
Conductor69: posts the ante 1000
PhigNootin: posts the ante 1000
FireRover: posts the ante 1000
jarekk: posts the ante 1000
CU_bball: posts the ante 1000
JZ777: posts the ante 1000
PhigNootin: posts small blind 4000
FireRover: posts big blind 8000
*** HOLE CARDS ***
Dealt to CU_bball [Ah Qc]
jarekk: raises 16000 to 24000
CU_bball: calls 24000
JZ777: folds
Conductor69: calls 24000
PhigNootin: folds
FireRover: calls 16000
*** FLOP *** [Kd Ac 5c]
FireRover: bets 32000
jarekk: folds
CU_bball: raises 48000 to 80000
Conductor69: folds
FireRover: raises 87743 to 167743 and is all-in
CU_bball: calls 87743
*** TURN *** [Kd Ac 5c] [Qs]
*** RIVER *** [Kd Ac 5c Qs] [9c]
*** SHOW DOWN ***
FireRover: shows [Ad Jc] (a pair of Aces)
CU_bball: shows [Ah Qc] (two pair, Aces and Queens)
CU_bball collected 441486 from pot
*** SUMMARY ***
Total pot 441486 Rake 0
Board [Kd Ac 5c Qs 9c]
Seat 3: Conductor69 (button) folded on the Flop
Seat 4: PhigNootin (small blind) folded before Flop
Seat 5: FireRover (big blind) showed [Ad Jc] and lost with a pair of Aces
Seat 7: jarekk folded on the Flop
Seat 8: CU_bball showed [Ah Qc] and won (441486) with two pair, Aces and Queens
Seat 9: JZ777 folded before Flop (didn't bet)

I made it to the active final table 2nd in chips. This hand came up with 8 left. I would have been chip leader had I won.

PokerStars Game #30042600264: Tournament #175253444, $10+$1 Hold'em No Limit - Level XXXII (7000/14000) - 2009/07/03 2:58:41 ET
Table '175253444 78' 9-max Seat #9 is the button
Seat 1: gvemeaset (937993 in chips)
Seat 2: zendoc9 (208728 in chips)
Seat 3: Conductor69 (384921 in chips)
Seat 4: PhigNootin (213415 in chips)
Seat 5: sgs shep (295522 in chips)
Seat 6: GAKler1983 (512495 in chips)
Seat 8: CU_bball (612831 in chips)
Seat 9: JZ777 (317095 in chips)
gvemeaset: posts the ante 1750
zendoc9: posts the ante 1750
Conductor69: posts the ante 1750
PhigNootin: posts the ante 1750
sgs shep: posts the ante 1750
GAKler1983: posts the ante 1750
CU_bball: posts the ante 1750
JZ777: posts the ante 1750
gvemeaset: posts small blind 7000
zendoc9: posts big blind 14000
*** HOLE CARDS ***
Dealt to CU_bball [Qs Qc]
Conductor69: folds
PhigNootin: folds
sgs shep: raises 28000 to 42000
GAKler1983: folds
CU_bball: raises 108000 to 150000
JZ777: folds
gvemeaset: folds
zendoc9: folds
sgs shep: raises 143772 to 293772 and is all-in
CU_bball: calls 143772
*** FLOP *** [As 5h 4c]
*** TURN *** [As 5h 4c] [Td]
*** RIVER *** [As 5h 4c Td] [6c]
*** SHOW DOWN ***
sgs shep: shows [Ac Kh] (a pair of Aces)
CU_bball: shows [Qs Qc] (a pair of Queens)
sgs shep collected 622544 from pot
*** SUMMARY ***
Total pot 622544 Rake 0
Board [As 5h 4c Td 6c]
Seat 1: gvemeaset (small blind) folded before Flop
Seat 2: zendoc9 (big blind) folded before Flop
Seat 3: Conductor69 folded before Flop (didn't bet)
Seat 4: PhigNootin folded before Flop (didn't bet)
Seat 5: sgs shep showed [Ac Kh] and won (622544) with a pair of Aces
Seat 6: GAKler1983 folded before Flop (didn't bet)
Seat 8: CU_bball showed [Qs Qc] and lost with a pair of Queens
Seat 9: JZ777 (button) folded before Flop (didn't bet)
I only played 5 hands at the final table because it was so active. There was rarely a steal that did not get resistance. I eventually pushed KQ as the short stack over a raiser and he had AK to eliminate me. I’ll take it though.

Future plans (I’ll try to make this quick)

This next week, lots of poker and softball post season tourney. I am going to Nebraska early next week where on the 15th I am going to help move the new weight room equipment into our new weight room at Concordia. Our new athletic facility is sick!

The 16th I will most likely move into my new apartment in Seward (I’m dreading moving my stuff again).

The 17th, we have a team camp to put on.

July 27-30, I am going to work the University of Nebraska basketball camp for the 2nd year in a row.

I will then probably leave the 31st for Cleveland where I will stay with my friend, David Jabs until the 2nd. I will then drive to Bethlehem, PA to see Dave Anderson and work the Lehigh University basketball camp that he is in charge of August 3-7.

On the 7th then, my friend Brandon flies into Atlantic City. Dave and I will meet him there for hopefully four successful days of rounding and having fun.

I will then return to NE and start school!

Happy 22nd birthday today to my awesome girlfriend Leah! Congrats to her for getting a K-5 PE teaching job in Grand Island, NE! We will be about an hour away for each other this year which will be tough but doable.

Congrats Ben and Ashley, MT trip cut short

2009-05-27T17:24:00.000-04:00

I just got back to Montana last night after Ben and Ashley’s wedding in Denver. It was an extremely fun and elegant wedding. The reception was off the chain as I danced the whole night while getting extremely sweaty. They are going to have a great life together.

I just got a phone call from Madison, NE asking me to come there and interview. It is a small town of about 3,000 people in northeast Nebraska. They wanted me to interview on Friday, but I asked if we could do it Monday so I will at least have a few days here in Montana. It is a K-12 PE job as well as Head Boy’s Basketball coach. I look forward to interviewing for it. I’ll leave Sunday and interview Monday at 9am.

I haven’t been called by Pius X high school in Lincoln, so I’m assuming I didn’t get the job. So the look continues. Hopefully this Madison interview goes well.

The rest of the trip in Montana involves going to Buffalo Wild Wings with some of my high school friends to watch game 5 of Lakers/Nuggets, lots of laundry, Texas Road House with the family and grandparents, two church league softball games tomorrow night, and may try to make some money playing poker. It should be a fun few days here.

Big tourney score (detailed)

2009-05-17T20:56:00.001-04:00

I had a lot of success in poker tournaments yesterday. My biggest score was a 2nd place in the $3 rebuy on stars. I was in for $9 total. I didn’t have to add on because I had 30,000 chips after the rebuy period was over and adding on for 1500 chips was obviously pointless. I do not remember much about the early stages in the tournament as I was playing 8 tourneys at once during the first 3 hours or so of it. I played really tight throughout the early stages. I am finding that I am making it closer to the money in a lot more tourneys if, believe it or not, I play a lot at once. I just play solid poker based on my chip stack and position. I am more effective early on when I don’t try to get too tricky and not take many risks. Anyway, I remember using a lot of my time bank trying to get into the money as I had only 10bbs on the bubble. I remember that people at my table were actually stalling for me lol. The people at my table kept saying that they will help me make the money even though I never asked for it obviously. So I got into the money (675 people get paid out of the 4600 entrants) with about 10 bbs. From there, I just grinded. There was a period in time where I was getting really good cards and there was no action. I went a whole 3 hours stretch without showing down a hand. Finally, we got down to the final 27 and I started copy/pasting the important hands. Here they are with brief explanations:

27 left:

PokerStars Game #28288160801: Tournament #162034192, $3.00+$0.30 Hold'em No Limit - Level XXXVII (20000/40000) - 2009/05/17 2:37:05 ET
Table '162034192 233' 9-max Seat #7 is the button
Seat 1: Beppejoe (1540278 in chips)
Seat 2: sharktales1 (1734948 in chips)
Seat 3: leH1ens (765946 in chips)
Seat 4: GILTADRA (1160578 in chips)
Seat 5: johnmer (1615607 in chips)
Seat 6: guy river (1851966 in chips)
Seat 7: BckDoorFlux (640477 in chips)
Seat 8: 01Dave01 (389875 in chips)
Seat 9: CU_bball (862311 in chips)
Beppejoe: posts the ante 5000
sharktales1: posts the ante 5000
leH1ens: posts the ante 5000
GILTADRA: posts the ante 5000
johnmer: posts the ante 5000
guy river: posts the ante 5000
BckDoorFlux: posts the ante 5000
01Dave01: posts the ante 5000
CU_bball: posts the ante 5000
01Dave01: posts small blind 20000
CU_bball: posts big blind 40000
*** HOLE CARDS ***
Dealt to CU_bball [As Ac]
Beppejoe: folds
sharktales1: folds
leH1ens: folds
GILTADRA: folds
johnmer: folds
guy river: raises 80000 to 120000
BckDoorFlux: folds
01Dave01: folds
CU_bball: raises 180000 to 300000
guy river: calls 180000
*** FLOP *** [6d 4h 7s]
CU_bball: bets 300000
guy river: raises 300000 to 600000
CU_bball: calls 257311 and is all-in
Uncalled bet (42689) returned to guy river
*** TURN *** [6d 4h 7s] [2h]
*** RIVER *** [6d 4h 7s 2h] [Qd]
*** SHOW DOWN ***
CU_bball: shows [As Ac] (a pair of Aces)
guy river: shows [Kd Tc] (high card King)
CU_bball collected 1779622 from pot
*** SUMMARY ***
Total pot 1779622 Rake 0
Board [6d 4h 7s 2h Qd]
Seat 1: Beppejoe folded before Flop (didn't bet)
Seat 2: sharktales1 folded before Flop (didn't bet)
Seat 3: leH1ens folded before Flop (didn't bet)
Seat 4: GILTADRA folded before Flop (didn't bet)
Seat 5: johnmer folded before Flop (didn't bet)
Seat 6: guy river showed [Kd Tc] and lost with high card King
Seat 7: BckDoorFlux (button) folded before Flop (didn't bet)
Seat 8: 01Dave01 (small blind) folded before Flop
Seat 9: CU_bball (big blind) showed [As Ac] and won (1779622) with a pair of Aces

I don’t know what this guy was thinking, but FINALLY I got action on a big hand. I’m so glad that I didn’t play this differently. I usually wouldn’t make AA look so much like AA, but this guy must not have believed me. Thank you for the minimal sweat sir!

26 left:

PokerStars Game #28288271886: Tournament #162034192, $3.00+$0.30 Hold'em No Limit - Level XXXVIII (25000/50000) - 2009/05/17 2:44:27 ET
Table '162034192 233' 9-max Seat #1 is the button
Seat 1: Beppejoe (1021207 in chips)
Seat 2: sharktales1 (1667448 in chips)
Seat 3: leH1ens (1586142 in chips)
Seat 4: GILTADRA (1143078 in chips)
Seat 5: johnmer (711577 in chips)
Seat 6: guy river (2035560 in chips)
Seat 7: BckDoorFlux (491727 in chips)
Seat 8: 01Dave01 (221125 in chips)
Seat 9: CU_bball (1684122 in chips)
Beppejoe: posts the ante 6250
sharktales1: posts the ante 6250
leH1ens: posts the ante 6250
GILTADRA: posts the ante 6250
johnmer: posts the ante 6250
guy river: posts the ante 6250
BckDoorFlux: posts the ante 6250
01Dave01: posts the ante 6250
CU_bball: posts the ante 6250
sharktales1: posts small blind 25000
leH1ens: posts big blind 50000
*** HOLE CARDS ***
Dealt to CU_bball [Ah Ks]
GILTADRA: folds
johnmer: folds
guy river: folds
BckDoorFlux: folds
01Dave01: raises 164875 to 214875 and is all-in
CU_bball: raises 185125 to 400000
Beppejoe: folds
sharktales1: folds
leH1ens: folds
Uncalled bet (185125) returned to CU_bball
*** FLOP *** [9d 9c 8s]
*** TURN *** [9d 9c 8s] [Td]
*** RIVER *** [9d 9c 8s Td] [Js]
*** SHOW DOWN ***
01Dave01: shows [Ts 9h] (a full house, Nines full of Tens)
CU_bball: shows [Ah Ks] (a pair of Nines)
01Dave01 collected 561000 from pot
*** SUMMARY ***
Total pot 561000 Rake 0
Board [9d 9c 8s Td Js]
Seat 1: Beppejoe (button) folded before Flop (didn't bet)
Seat 2: sharktales1 (small blind) folded before Flop
Seat 3: leH1ens (big blind) folded before Flop
Seat 4: GILTADRA folded before Flop (didn't bet)
Seat 5: johnmer folded before Flop (didn't bet)
Seat 6: guy river folded before Flop (didn't bet)
Seat 7: BckDoorFlux folded before Flop (didn't bet)
Seat 8: 01Dave01 showed [Ts 9h] and won (561000) with a full house, Nines full of Tens
Seat 9: CU_bball showed [Ah Ks] and lost with a pair of Nines

Took a hit here, but I was still okay.

21 left:

PokerStars Game #28288412501: Tournament #162034192, $3.00+$0.30 Hold'em No Limit - Level XXXIX (30000/60000) - 2009/05/17 2:53:56 ET
Table '162034192 233' 9-max Seat #9 is the button
Seat 1: wingmanf5 (2750903 in chips) out of hand (moved from another table into small blind)
Seat 3: leH1ens (1872392 in chips)
Seat 4: GILTADRA (2516003 in chips)
Seat 5: johnmer (2024404 in chips)
Seat 6: guy river (2364310 in chips)
Seat 8: 01Dave01 (213500 in chips)
Seat 9: CU_bball (1130497 in chips)
leH1ens: posts the ante 7500
GILTADRA: posts the ante 7500
johnmer: posts the ante 7500
guy river: posts the ante 7500
01Dave01: posts the ante 7500
CU_bball: posts the ante 7500
leH1ens: posts small blind 30000
GILTADRA: posts big blind 60000
*** HOLE CARDS ***
Dealt to CU_bball [7h 7c]
johnmer: folds
guy river: folds
01Dave01: raises 146000 to 206000 and is all-in
CU_bball: raises 916997 to 1122997 and is all-in
leH1ens: folds
GILTADRA: folds
Uncalled bet (916997) returned to CU_bball
*** FLOP *** [As 5s 8c]
*** TURN *** [As 5s 8c] [7d]
*** RIVER *** [As 5s 8c 7d] [6d]
*** SHOW DOWN ***
01Dave01: shows [Ad Jd] (a pair of Aces)
CU_bball: shows [7h 7c] (three of a kind, Sevens)
CU_bball collected 547000 from pot
*** SUMMARY ***
Total pot 547000 Rake 0
Board [As 5s 8c 7d 6d]
Seat 3: leH1ens (small blind) folded before Flop
Seat 4: GILTADRA (big blind) folded before Flop
Seat 5: johnmer folded before Flop (didn't bet)
Seat 6: guy river folded before Flop (didn't bet)
Seat 8: 01Dave01 showed [Ad Jd] and lost with a pair of Aces
Seat 9: CU_bball (button) showed [7h 7c] and won (547000) with three of a kind, Sevens

I know this happens rarely to anyone, but I honestly can’t remember the last time I did this to someone. I guess it doesn’t matter the order that the cards come out. A coin flip is a coin flip.

I went completely card dead and just blinded away down to 12 bbs until this hand came up with 13 left:

PokerStars Game #28288656367: Tournament #162034192, $3.00+$0.30 Hold'em No Limit - Level XLI (50000/100000) - 2009/05/17 3:11:02 ET
Table '162034192 233' 9-max Seat #9 is the button
Seat 3: leH1ens (2224841 in chips)
Seat 4: GILTADRA (3103503 in chips)
Seat 5: johnmer (3851904 in chips)
Seat 6: guy river (102574 in chips)
Seat 7: Just4Omaha (1814258 in chips)
Seat 8: 82die4 (2945972 in chips)
Seat 9: CU_bball (1203997 in chips)
leH1ens: posts the ante 12500
GILTADRA: posts the ante 12500
johnmer: posts the ante 12500
guy river: posts the ante 12500
Just4Omaha: posts the ante 12500
82die4: posts the ante 12500
CU_bball: posts the ante 12500
leH1ens: posts small blind 50000
GILTADRA: posts big blind 100000
*** HOLE CARDS ***
Dealt to CU_bball [Qd Qc]
johnmer: folds
guy river: calls 90074 and is all-in
Just4Omaha: folds
82die4: calls 100000
CU_bball: raises 1091497 to 1191497 and is all-in
leH1ens: folds
GILTADRA: folds
82die4: folds
Uncalled bet (1091497) returned to CU_bball
*** FLOP *** [Ah 5c 2s]
*** TURN *** [Ah 5c 2s] [8h]
*** RIVER *** [Ah 5c 2s 8h] [4c]
*** SHOW DOWN ***
CU_bball: shows [Qd Qc] (a pair of Queens)
CU_bball collected 29778 from side pot
guy river: shows [Kd Qh] (high card Ace)
CU_bball collected 497796 from main pot
*** SUMMARY ***
Total pot 527574 Main pot 497796. Side pot 29778. Rake 0
Board [Ah 5c 2s 8h 4c]
Seat 3: leH1ens (small blind) folded before Flop
Seat 4: GILTADRA (big blind) folded before Flop
Seat 5: johnmer folded before Flop (didn't bet)
Seat 6: guy river showed [Kd Qh] and lost with high card Ace
Seat 7: Just4Omaha folded before Flop (didn't bet)
Seat 8: 82die4 folded before Flop
Seat 9: CU_bball (button) showed [Qd Qc] and won (527574) with a pair of Queens

That was nice for QQ to hold up and ship me the 527K pot risking only 100K. Then a few hands later with 12 left this hand came up:

PokerStars Game #28288839641: Tournament #162034192, $3.00+$0.30 Hold'em No Limit - Level XLII (62500/125000) - 2009/05/17 3:23:56 ET
Table '162034192 233' 9-max Seat #9 is the button
Seat 3: leH1ens (909216 in chips)
Seat 4: GILTADRA (5851628 in chips)
Seat 5: johnmer (2442529 in chips)
Seat 7: Just4Omaha (1473633 in chips)
Seat 8: 82die4 (2574097 in chips)
Seat 9: CU_bball (1995946 in chips)
leH1ens: posts the ante 15625
GILTADRA: posts the ante 15625
johnmer: posts the ante 15625
Just4Omaha: posts the ante 15625
82die4: posts the ante 15625
CU_bball: posts the ante 15625
leH1ens: posts small blind 62500
GILTADRA: posts big blind 125000
*** HOLE CARDS ***
Dealt to CU_bball [Kd As]
johnmer: folds
Just4Omaha: folds
82die4: folds
CU_bball: raises 165000 to 290000
leH1ens: raises 603591 to 893591 and is all-in
GILTADRA: folds
CU_bball: calls 603591
*** FLOP *** [6h 2h 6c]
*** TURN *** [6h 2h 6c] [Qc]
*** RIVER *** [6h 2h 6c Qc] [3h]
*** SHOW DOWN ***
leH1ens: shows [5s Ad] (a pair of Sixes)
CU_bball: shows [Kd As] (a pair of Sixes - Ace+King kicker)
CU_bball collected 2005932 from pot
*** SUMMARY ***
Total pot 2005932 Rake 0
Board [6h 2h 6c Qc 3h]
Seat 3: leH1ens (small blind) showed [5s Ad] and lost with a pair of Sixes
Seat 4: GILTADRA (big blind) folded before Flop
Seat 5: johnmer folded before Flop (didn't bet)
Seat 7: Just4Omaha folded before Flop (didn't bet)
Seat 8: 82die4 folded before Flop (didn't bet)
Seat 9: CU_bball (button) showed [Kd As] and won (2005932) with a pair of Sixes

It was nice to find AK on the button and looking like a steal situation. Thank you for holding up! Two hands later this hand:

PokerStars Game #28288855994: Tournament #162034192, $3.00+$0.30 Hold'em No Limit - Level XLII (62500/125000) - 2009/05/17 3:25:02 ET
Table '162034192 233' 9-max Seat #5 is the button
Seat 4: GILTADRA (5961003 in chips)
Seat 5: johnmer (2348779 in chips)
Seat 7: Just4Omaha (1317383 in chips)
Seat 8: 82die4 (2542847 in chips)
Seat 9: CU_bball (3077037 in chips)
GILTADRA: posts the ante 15625
johnmer: posts the ante 15625
Just4Omaha: posts the ante 15625
82die4: posts the ante 15625
CU_bball: posts the ante 15625
Just4Omaha: posts small blind 62500
82die4: posts big blind 125000
*** HOLE CARDS ***
Dealt to CU_bball [Tc Td]
CU_bball: raises 165000 to 290000
GILTADRA: raises 335000 to 625000
johnmer: folds
Just4Omaha: folds
82die4: folds
CU_bball: calls 335000
*** FLOP *** [4c 2h 5s]
CU_bball: checks
GILTADRA: bets 5320378 and is all-in
CU_bball: folds
Uncalled bet (5320378) returned to GILTADRA
GILTADRA collected 1515625 from pot
GILTADRA: doesn't show hand
*** SUMMARY ***
Total pot 1515625 Rake 0
Board [4c 2h 5s]
Seat 4: GILTADRA collected (1515625)
Seat 5: johnmer (button) folded before Flop (didn't bet)
Seat 7: Just4Omaha (small blind) folded before Flop
Seat 8: 82die4 (big blind) folded before Flop
Seat 9: CU_bball folded on the Flop

This guy is capable of making a play here as he was very aggressive with his chip lead. He knew that people were trying to get to the final table. I was one of them. I just didn’t want to end my tourney here. I could have very easily been good. If this was any earlier in the tourney, I would have gone with it, but we were getting so close to the big money jumps. I just didn’t want to make a bad call, or make a good call and get sucked out on. So I let it go.

I made the final table and about the 4th hand there, this hand came up:

PokerStars Game #28288978503: Tournament #162034192, $3.00+$0.30 Hold'em No Limit - Level XLIII (75000/150000) - 2009/05/17 3:33:28 ET
Table '162034192 280' 9-max Seat #6 is the button
Seat 1: GILTADRA (9931657 in chips)
Seat 2: CU_bball (2942662 in chips)
Seat 3: RunIt2wice (2002987 in chips)
Seat 4: Beppejoe (3922956 in chips)
Seat 5: Just4Omaha (926758 in chips)
Seat 6: bigrabclark (2812954 in chips)
Seat 7: Lushed (3966570 in chips)
Seat 8: 82die4 (1933472 in chips)
Seat 9: Backflowjoe (1772984 in chips)
GILTADRA: posts the ante 18750
CU_bball: posts the ante 18750
RunIt2wice: posts the ante 18750
Beppejoe: posts the ante 18750
Just4Omaha: posts the ante 18750
bigrabclark: posts the ante 18750
Lushed: posts the ante 18750
82die4: posts the ante 18750
Backflowjoe: posts the ante 18750
Lushed: posts small blind 75000
82die4: posts big blind 150000
*** HOLE CARDS ***
Dealt to CU_bball [As Ks]
Backflowjoe said, "K J sooted"
Backflowjoe: folds
GILTADRA: folds
CU_bball: raises 175000 to 325000
RunIt2wice: folds
Beppejoe: folds
Just4Omaha: folds
bigrabclark: raises 425000 to 750000
Lushed: folds
82die4: folds
CU_bball: raises 2173912 to 2923912 and is all-in
bigrabclark: folds
Uncalled bet (2173912) returned to CU_bball
CU_bball collected 1893750 from pot
*** SUMMARY ***
Total pot 1893750 Rake 0
Seat 1: GILTADRA folded before Flop (didn't bet)
Seat 2: CU_bball collected (1893750)
Seat 3: RunIt2wice folded before Flop (didn't bet)
Seat 4: Beppejoe folded before Flop (didn't bet)
Seat 5: Just4Omaha folded before Flop (didn't bet)
Seat 6: bigrabclark (button) folded before Flop
Seat 7: Lushed (small blind) folded before Flop
Seat 8: 82die4 (big blind) folded before Flop
Seat 9: Backflowjoe folded before Flop (didn't bet)

You hardly ever see somebody make a play like this putting in a quarter of their chips and then folding, but sure enough he made a good lay down.

We finally got down to 6. I felt like every time two people got it all in, the smaller stack would win. It was frustrating, but I kept on playing smart. This play may not have been smart though.

PokerStars Game #28289438032: Tournament #162034192, $3.00+$0.30 Hold'em No Limit - Level XLVI (150000/300000) - 2009/05/17 4:05:43 ET
Table '162034192 280' 9-max Seat #9 is the button
Seat 1: GILTADRA (2125309 in chips)
Seat 2: CU_bball (3742662 in chips)
Seat 4: Beppejoe (4452959 in chips)
Seat 7: Lushed (10588608 in chips)
Seat 8: 82die4 (5111526 in chips)
Seat 9: Backflowjoe (4191936 in chips)
GILTADRA: posts the ante 37500
CU_bball: posts the ante 37500
Beppejoe: posts the ante 37500
Lushed: posts the ante 37500
82die4: posts the ante 37500
Backflowjoe: posts the ante 37500
GILTADRA: posts small blind 150000
CU_bball: posts big blind 300000
*** HOLE CARDS ***
Dealt to CU_bball [Ah 5c]
Beppejoe: folds
Lushed: folds
82die4: folds
Backflowjoe: folds
GILTADRA: raises 1787809 to 2087809 and is all-in
CU_bball: calls 1787809
*** FLOP *** [Kh 6d 8s]
*** TURN *** [Kh 6d 8s] [3s]
*** RIVER *** [Kh 6d 8s 3s] [Qh]
*** SHOW DOWN ***
GILTADRA: shows [Ad 9c] (high card Ace)
CU_bball: shows [Ah 5c] (high card Ace - lower kicker)
GILTADRA collected 4400618 from pot
*** SUMMARY ***
Total pot 4400618 Rake 0
Board [Kh 6d 8s 3s Qh]
Seat 1: GILTADRA (small blind) showed [Ad 9c] and won (4400618) with high card Ace
Seat 2: CU_bball (big blind) showed [Ah 5c] and lost with high card Ace
Seat 4: Beppejoe folded before Flop (didn't bet)
Seat 7: Lushed folded before Flop (didn't bet)
Seat 8: 82die4 folded before Flop (didn't bet)
Seat 9: Backflowjoe (button) folded before Flop (didn't bet)

GILTADRA is pushing all in here with any two. He was the most aggressive guy at the table. So I made a loose call with A5 crippling me down to 5 bbs. I then stole blinds once then this miracle hand came up when I was utg with 6.5 bbs.

PokerStars Game #28289472599: Tournament #162034192, $3.00+$0.30 Hold'em No Limit - Level XLVI (150000/300000) - 2009/05/17 4:08:02 ET
Table '162034192 280' 9-max Seat #8 is the button
Seat 1: GILTADRA (5825618 in chips)
Seat 2: CU_bball (1992353 in chips)
Seat 4: Beppejoe (3065459 in chips)
Seat 7: Lushed (11376108 in chips)
Seat 8: 82die4 (4474026 in chips)
Seat 9: Backflowjoe (3479436 in chips)
GILTADRA: posts the ante 37500
CU_bball: posts the ante 37500
Beppejoe: posts the ante 37500
Lushed: posts the ante 37500
82die4: posts the ante 37500
Backflowjoe: posts the ante 37500
Backflowjoe: posts small blind 150000
GILTADRA: posts big blind 300000
*** HOLE CARDS ***
Dealt to CU_bball [Qd Td]
CU_bball: raises 1654853 to 1954853 and is all-in
Beppejoe: folds
Lushed: calls 1954853
82die4: folds
Backflowjoe: folds
GILTADRA: folds
*** FLOP *** [9d Jh 8c]
*** TURN *** [9d Jh 8c] [2d]
*** RIVER *** [9d Jh 8c 2d] [7c]
*** SHOW DOWN ***
CU_bball: shows [Qd Td] (a straight, Eight to Queen)
Lushed: shows [Qh Ac] (high card Ace)
CU_bball collected 4584706 from pot
*** SUMMARY ***
Total pot 4584706 Rake 0
Board [9d Jh 8c 2d 7c]
Seat 1: GILTADRA (big blind) folded before Flop
Seat 2: CU_bball showed [Qd Td] and won (4584706) with a straight, Eight to Queen
Seat 4: Beppejoe folded before Flop (didn't bet)
Seat 7: Lushed showed [Qh Ac] and lost with high card Ace
Seat 8: 82die4 (button) folded before Flop (didn't bet)
Seat 9: Backflowjoe (small blind) folded before Flop

After he called, I remembered how much I hate pushing with QJ and Q10. Every time I get called, I’m dominated. The flop came and I stared motionless. I was now on a freeroll. Unbelievable! I stole a million more chips when this hand came up:

PokerStars Game #28289551001: Tournament #162034192, $3.00+$0.30 Hold'em No Limit - Level XLVI (150000/300000) - 2009/05/17 4:13:21 ET
Table '162034192 280' 9-max Seat #8 is the button
Seat 1: GILTADRA (5150618 in chips)
Seat 2: CU_bball (5522206 in chips)
Seat 4: Beppejoe (3740459 in chips)
Seat 7: Lushed (7121255 in chips)
Seat 8: 82die4 (4474026 in chips)
Seat 9: Backflowjoe (4204436 in chips)
GILTADRA: posts the ante 37500
CU_bball: posts the ante 37500
Beppejoe: posts the ante 37500
Lushed: posts the ante 37500
82die4: posts the ante 37500
Backflowjoe: posts the ante 37500
Backflowjoe: posts small blind 150000
GILTADRA: posts big blind 300000
*** HOLE CARDS ***
Dealt to CU_bball [8d 8c]
CU_bball: raises 500000 to 800000
Beppejoe: folds
Lushed: folds
82die4: folds
Backflowjoe: folds
GILTADRA: calls 500000
*** FLOP *** [Kc 5h 6c]
GILTADRA: checks
CU_bball: bets 950000
GILTADRA: calls 950000
*** TURN *** [Kc 5h 6c] [9c]
GILTADRA: checks
CU_bball: checks
*** RIVER *** [Kc 5h 6c 9c] [4s]
GILTADRA: bets 300000
CU_bball: calls 300000
*** SHOW DOWN ***
GILTADRA: shows [Ah 6d] (a pair of Sixes)
CU_bball: shows [8d 8c] (a pair of Eights)
CU_bball collected 4475000 from pot
*** SUMMARY ***
Total pot 4475000 Rake 0
Board [Kc 5h 6c 9c 4s]
Seat 1: GILTADRA (big blind) showed [Ah 6d] and lost with a pair of Sixes
Seat 2: CU_bball showed [8d 8c] and won (4475000) with a pair of Eights
Seat 4: Beppejoe folded before Flop (didn't bet)
Seat 7: Lushed folded before Flop (didn't bet)
Seat 8: 82die4 (button) folded before Flop (didn't bet)
Seat 9: Backflowjoe (small blind) folded before Flop

I am so glad he bet a little amount on the river. I don’t know if I could have made a big call. However, the easy river call vaulted me into the chip lead! Time to dominate. Two hands later, the roller coaster continues.

PokerStars Game #28289609376: Tournament #162034192, $3.00+$0.30 Hold'em No Limit - Level XLVII (200000/400000) - 2009/05/17 4:17:22 ET
Table '162034192 280' 9-max Seat #1 is the button
Seat 1: GILTADRA (2363118 in chips)
Seat 2: CU_bball (9259706 in chips)
Seat 4: Beppejoe (4552959 in chips)
Seat 7: Lushed (7483755 in chips)
Seat 8: 82die4 (3486526 in chips)
Seat 9: Backflowjoe (3066936 in chips)
GILTADRA: posts the ante 50000
CU_bball: posts the ante 50000
Beppejoe: posts the ante 50000
Lushed: posts the ante 50000
82die4: posts the ante 50000
Backflowjoe: posts the ante 50000
CU_bball: posts small blind 200000
Beppejoe: posts big blind 400000
*** HOLE CARDS ***
Dealt to CU_bball [As Ts]
Lushed: folds
82die4: folds
Backflowjoe: folds
GILTADRA: raises 1913118 to 2313118 and is all-in
CU_bball: raises 6896588 to 9209706 and is all-in
Beppejoe: folds
Uncalled bet (6896588) returned to CU_bball
*** FLOP *** [7s 8c Kh]
*** TURN *** [7s 8c Kh] [Js]
*** RIVER *** [7s 8c Kh Js] [7c]
*** SHOW DOWN ***
CU_bball: shows [As Ts] (a pair of Sevens)
GILTADRA: shows [Jd 3d] (two pair, Jacks and Sevens)
GILTADRA collected 5326236 from pot
*** SUMMARY ***
Total pot 5326236 Rake 0
Board [7s 8c Kh Js 7c]
Seat 1: GILTADRA (button) showed [Jd 3d] and won (5326236) with two pair, Jacks and Sevens
Seat 2: CU_bball (small blind) showed [As Ts] and lost with a pair of Sevens
Seat 4: Beppejoe (big blind) folded before Flop
Seat 7: Lushed folded before Flop (didn't bet)
Seat 8: 82die4 folded before Flop (didn't bet)
Seat 9: Backflowjoe folded before Flop (didn't bet)

Ouch. I’m fine though. A few hands later:

PokerStars Game #28289633357: Tournament #162034192, $3.00+$0.30 Hold'em No Limit - Level XLVII (200000/400000) - 2009/05/17 4:19:01 ET
Table '162034192 280' 9-max Seat #7 is the button
Seat 1: GILTADRA (5226236 in chips)
Seat 2: CU_bball (7696588 in chips)
Seat 4: Beppejoe (3802959 in chips)
Seat 7: Lushed (7633755 in chips)
Seat 8: 82die4 (2936526 in chips)
Seat 9: Backflowjoe (2916936 in chips)
GILTADRA: posts the ante 50000
CU_bball: posts the ante 50000
Beppejoe: posts the ante 50000
Lushed: posts the ante 50000
82die4: posts the ante 50000
Backflowjoe: posts the ante 50000
82die4: posts small blind 200000
Backflowjoe: posts big blind 400000
*** HOLE CARDS ***
Dealt to CU_bball [Kd Kh]
GILTADRA: folds
CU_bball: raises 600000 to 1000000
Beppejoe: folds
Lushed: folds
82die4: raises 1886526 to 2886526 and is all-in
Backflowjoe: folds
CU_bball: calls 1886526
*** FLOP *** [9s 7d 4s]
*** TURN *** [9s 7d 4s] [7c]
*** RIVER *** [9s 7d 4s 7c] [3h]
*** SHOW DOWN ***
82die4: shows [Js Jc] (two pair, Jacks and Sevens)
CU_bball: shows [Kd Kh] (two pair, Kings and Sevens)
CU_bball collected 6473052 from pot
*** SUMMARY ***
Total pot 6473052 Rake 0
Board [9s 7d 4s 7c 3h]
Seat 1: GILTADRA folded before Flop (didn't bet)
Seat 2: CU_bball showed [Kd Kh] and won (6473052) with two pair, Kings and Sevens
Seat 4: Beppejoe folded before Flop (didn't bet)
Seat 7: Lushed (button) folded before Flop (didn't bet)
Seat 8: 82die4 (small blind) showed [Js Jc] and lost with two pair, Jacks and Sevens
Seat 9: Backflowjoe (big blind) folded before Flop

This was huge!!! I was then able to play tight and watch Lushed take down the next two guys and we were heads up with him having a 2:1 advantage. We were heads up for $2,000. 9 hours into the tournament at 5 am, my adrenaline was flowing. HU there were 3 significant hands of our 8 total and they were actually the last 3 we played:

PokerStars Game #28289842970: Tournament #162034192, $3.00+$0.30 Hold'em No Limit - Level XLVIII (250000/500000) - 2009/05/17 4:33:36 ET
Table '162034192 280' 9-max Seat #7 is the button
Seat 2: CU_bball (10145614 in chips)
Seat 7: Lushed (20067386 in chips)
CU_bball: posts the ante 62500
Lushed: posts the ante 62500
Lushed: posts small blind 250000
CU_bball: posts big blind 500000
*** HOLE CARDS ***
Dealt to CU_bball [2d 5c]
Lushed: calls 250000
CU_bball: checks
*** FLOP *** [3h 7s Qs]
CU_bball: checks
Lushed: checks
*** TURN *** [3h 7s Qs] [Th]
CU_bball: bets 650000
Lushed: calls 650000
*** RIVER *** [3h 7s Qs Th] [Ac]
CU_bball: bets 1600000
Lushed: folds
Uncalled bet (1600000) returned to CU_bball
CU_bball collected 2425000 from pot
CU_bball: doesn't show hand
*** SUMMARY ***
Total pot 2425000 Rake 0
Board [3h 7s Qs Th Ac]
Seat 2: CU_bball (big blind) collected (2425000)
Seat 7: Lushed (button) (small blind) folded on the River

I thought for sure that he was on a draw. Then the next hand:

PokerStars Game #28289855237: Tournament #162034192, $3.00+$0.30 Hold'em No Limit - Level XLIX (300000/600000) - 2009/05/17 4:34:27 ET
Table '162034192 280' 9-max Seat #2 is the button
Seat 2: CU_bball (11358114 in chips)
Seat 7: Lushed (18854886 in chips)
CU_bball: posts the ante 75000
Lushed: posts the ante 75000
CU_bball: posts small blind 300000
Lushed: posts big blind 600000
*** HOLE CARDS ***
Dealt to CU_bball [Kd 5h]
CU_bball: raises 600000 to 1200000
Lushed: calls 600000
*** FLOP *** [8h Jc 2h]
Lushed: checks
CU_bball: bets 1500000
Lushed: calls 1500000
*** TURN *** [8h Jc 2h] [8c]
Lushed: checks
CU_bball: checks
*** RIVER *** [8h Jc 2h 8c] [Jd]
Lushed: bets 2400000
CU_bball: calls 2400000
*** SHOW DOWN ***
Lushed: shows [8s Js] (a full house, Jacks full of Eights)
CU_bball: mucks hand
Lushed collected 10350000 from pot
*** SUMMARY ***
Total pot 10350000 Rake 0
Board [8h Jc 2h 8c Jd]
Seat 2: CU_bball (button) (small blind) mucked [Kd 5h]
Seat 7: Lushed (big blind) showed [8s Js] and won (10350000) with a full house, Jacks full of Eights

I thought he could have been huge but most likely on a draw. When he bet the river, I was planning on folding, then I looked at all the draws he could have been on. I thought he would have raised with a J or an 8 on the flop. I thought to myself, what would Dave Anderson do? He would have made the hero call. I call! Ouch…

The next hand was the end of me.

PokerStars Game #28289872689: Tournament #162034192, $3.00+$0.30 Hold'em No Limit - Level XLIX (300000/600000) - 2009/05/17 4:35:40 ET
Table '162034192 280' 9-max Seat #7 is the button
Seat 2: CU_bball (6183114 in chips)
Seat 7: Lushed (24029886 in chips)
CU_bball: posts the ante 75000
Lushed: posts the ante 75000
Lushed: posts small blind 300000
CU_bball: posts big blind 600000
*** HOLE CARDS ***
Dealt to CU_bball [Ah 4c]
Lushed: raises 1200000 to 1800000
CU_bball: raises 4308114 to 6108114 and is all-in
Lushed: calls 4308114
*** FLOP *** [5d 8s Kd]
*** TURN *** [5d 8s Kd] [6c]
*** RIVER *** [5d 8s Kd 6c] [Qc]
*** SHOW DOWN ***
CU_bball: shows [Ah 4c] (high card Ace)
Lushed: shows [4h 4d] (a pair of Fours)
Lushed collected 12366228 from pot
*** SUMMARY ***
Total pot 12366228 Rake 0
Board [5d 8s Kd 6c Qc]
Seat 2: CU_bball (big blind) showed [Ah 4c] and lost with high card Ace
Seat 7: Lushed (button) (small blind) showed [4h 4d] and won (12366228) with a pair of Fours

Lushed played very well throughout. I can’t be disappointed one bit. I’ll take the $4800 for sure.

I had other success in the night cashing in a $7 turbo and $2 2K guaranteed on stars as well as a $2 rebuy on full tilt. I also made it really deep in the daily dollar tourney on full tilt finishing 59th out of 8300 people for $15. Weee. I had a good poker day to say the least. I have now cashed in my last 4 out of 5 rebuy tournaments on stars. I guess that is my best game right now.

In other news, I had an interview at the Catholic high school in Lincoln on Friday. I thought it went really well. My perfectionist mind though is second guessing things since then and wishing I would have said other things. I thought the superintendent, principal, and vice principal really liked me. Am I the best candidate though? I’ll find out toward the end of the week. I auto-accept the job if offered to me. Updates to come on that.

Finally an update. I'm sorry for the length.

2009-05-04T18:58:00.001-04:00

Let’s see, what’s happened since my monster night at the card room…

I went on that trip to Denver then picked up my sister in Fort Collins and went home for Easter. I surprised my mom pretty good. Easter weekend was fun. It was good to see the family. My sister and I had to leave on Sunday after church because she had to be back in school on Monday. I stopped in Denver once again to see Leah and we had a good time for a few more days before I headed back to NE.

I got back to NE and continued to sub. I have been getting about three days a week, which is nice. I am always keeping busy even in my off days applying for jobs and doing random stuff for the basketball team. I have applied for over 20 jobs and still have not had an interview. It is pretty frustrating, but I know that others are in the same boat and are probably in a tougher financial situation than me. So I can’t complain too much.

Two weekends after I came back from Denver, I returned for Ben Ahlman’s bachelor party. Ben is in Denver now working at an electrical distributing company after graduating in December with me. I caught a ride with a couple girls from Concordia’s soccer team who were going out there for some fun of their own. On Saturday, for the bachelor party, we played golf and I kept score the first time ever. I wanted to play completely by the books without ever picking up a ball. I ended up shooting a 132 and amazingly only lost one ball. Now I have something I can improve upon. Golf has never been that fun for me, especially when we walk the course, but this time it was because I was playing to see what my score would be. Usually I have had enough after walking 9 holes, but I was fairly fresh after 18 even after my 132 shots haha. The 132 score was with women’s clubs, but I don’t think playing with my own would have saved me that many more shots to be honest. Our 4-some was Ben (like a 12 handicap), my other buddy Jake (like a 35 handicap), me, and this guy from England (6 handicap) who hopped in our group. In the biggest shock of the century (at that time, I’ll explain the new biggest one later), I won a hole. I pared a par 3 when the others all bogeyed (Jake may have tripled). Having some success makes golfing a lot more fun. I think I sunk the longest put of the day with like a 30 footer just off the green. My short game isn’t that bad, just my long game really really sucks. My goal was to par a par 4 once in the day. My opportunity came on 18 when I had a 40 footer for par. I told myself that I was going to give it a chance by not leaving it short. It ended up going right over the top of the hole with too much speed. I had like a 10 footer for bogey that I sunk. Overall, it was a great day of golf. I can’t wait to get back on the links and improve on my 132.

After golfing, we went to the Colorado Rockies game vs. Man Ram and the Dodgers. It was freezing by this time of the night, so we had to drink a lot of beer just to stay semi warm. The Dodgers ended up winning 6-5 even though Man Ram went 0-5 with 3 strikeouts. We had a good group of about 10 of us including a Ben’s brother and cousin, Jake, me, and a bunch of Ben’s co-workers. After the game, we went to this bar across the street from Coors field and drank some. Ben’s cousin started buying rounds of shot of Petron. He racked up a pretty large bar tab as you can image. Ben ended up embarrassing us all by puking all over the bar. I don’t know how he didn’t manage to get to the garbage can, but he didn’t. So we left immediately after that and called it a night. I have since forgiven him for that.

The next day, I went and hung out with Leah. We went to this silent/live auction fundraiser for the two Lutheran high schools in and around Denver. (Leah student teaches at Lutheran High Parker). I bid on a few things in the silent auction (mainly gift certificates) and I ended up getting a $50 gift certificate to Colorado Baggage Co. for $20. I gave it to Leah and she says she bought this sweet $80 bag that was on sale for $49. I can’t complain with a $20 donation to Denver Lutheran high schools and received an $80 bag! The live auction was crazy as this guy who is supposedly worth $260 million refused to quit bidding for a few of the items including an, at most, $80 bucket of beer. He easily donated over 10K in the night including over 4k for that bucket of beer. The auction was pretty fun and a new experience for me.

The soccer girls picked me up on Monday morning and we headed back to Seward. It is pretty nice to be flexible like I am and able to make random vacations whenever I want. I am definitely enjoying the flexibility while I have it.

Poker news: I have had two losing sessions in a row going to the Horseshoe (my only two), but I knew they were going to happen. Last week, I won a $5 ante-up tourney on Stars where only the antes go up. It is funny because 80% of the players don’t know how to play them. They pay huge antes and then don’t call the 5 chips it takes to see a flop. You can never fold for the 5 obviously until it gets raised. Limping with AA and KK in early position was key to me winning because people were always trying to steal the antes. I don’t think I ever even raised preflop until the final table. I was just try to see cheap flops compared to the pot size and try to bust people. Then I ran over the final table for the $333 winner. Weeeeeeeeee. And now for the biggest shock of the century:

My buddy, Noah Enke, had been begging me to go play in a real poker tournament. He had played maaaaybe 5 small unstructured home games. So yesterday he went. I decided that I would stake him, because $40 is a lot of money for him to lose. So I told him I get 50% of his winnings, even though there was no way he would cash. I gave him a few pointers. I pretty much told him not to call, pretty much raise or fold. He has no clue though about pot odds, fold equity, that pushing all in and calling an all in are two different things, etc. etc. etc. Anyway…

We played in the tourney 80 person $40 buy in tourney at the horseshoe yesterday and amazingly we were at the same starting table. In about the 3rd level, he gets KK and raised 5X even though I told him that 3X is good. A guy with A10 pushes all in and Noah busts him. A little later, Noah raises 5X again. The bb calls and they see a flop of K54. The bb leads out (obvious King) and Noah pushes all in (Noah has him barely covered I think). The bb auto calls and flips over KQ. Noah flips over A10 for A high. Turn X. River Ace to give Noah a bunch of chips and angrily knocks out that guy. I look at Noah confusingly. It’s like he just loves getting all his chips in the middle and that proves to be the case later on. I get knocked out a few levels later and I decide to just leave Noah alone and go play some cash games. We had another friend there named Drew who busted from the tourney in 2nd to last. Drew watched Noah the rest of the tourney and gave me updates from time to time. He came over for the next 2.5 hours a bunch saying that Noah just took down a pot with KK or he just put a brutal beat on somebody. Usually the latter. Noah makes it to the final table and makes the money. He folds and bad beats his way to 4 handed. When they got 4 handed, I left my cash game and went to watch even though I knew it was going to drive me crazy. Noah is like 2nd in chips with 4 left. It is folded to him in the sb. Noah completes the bb and then announces all in which is totally illegal (string bet). The dealer tells him he can only call. Even after Noah did that, the bb STILL raised obviously having a monster hand. Noah then fiddles with his chips nervously (like he did the whole tourney. I honestly thought he was going to have a heart attack.) Then Noah announces all in!!!! The bb autocalls and turns over TT. Noah turns over Q3hh. I’m about to lose it. I was like “Noah, do you have a date tonight or something you have to get back to?” Anyways, the flop comes 367. Turn 3! River X to give Noah the chip lead. Unbelieveable! Noah then beats a guy with A2 against AJ aipf when a 2 flops to knock a guy out of 4th. Then Noah makes a good call with Q10dd when another guy pushes all in from the sb. Q10 holds against 9 10. So Noah is now HU with like an 8:1 chip lead against a really good player (the TT hand earlier) who was next to Noah at our first table. The same guy who I predicted at our first table was going to win the tourney before he eventually knocked me out with 99 vs my KJ. He is a very solid player who was as shocked as I was about Noah’s run. They play HU and get closer to even though Noah still has the chip lead when this hand comes up. Noah about mucks his cards, then decides to call. The bb raises. Noah then says all in. The bb snap calls with AQ. Noah flips over T6. This time Noah couldn’t suck out on a QTX flop. Now the good player has like an 8:1 chip lead with the blinds being monstrous. Noah then won a 40/60 with like Q6 vs. K7. Then Noah held with AJ vs A4 to take the chip lead barely. Then this hand came up. Noah completes the bb. The bb pushes all in. Noah snap calls with A2cc. The bb flips over 77 and we all knew it was over for the guy. The board comes Kd Qc Qs Tc Jd to ship Noah with $700 first place prize. 2nd was $400 and Noah and I felt a little bad for him. The other guy handled it really well and is truly a class act. It was the sickest display of bad plays followed up by luck that I have ever seen. Thank God Noah knows this. He is not about to call himself a poker player by any means. It couldn’t have happened to a better guy. I collected $200 from him and called it good. Good job Noah!

That is loooooong update. My parents are coming in Friday because I am going to walk at graduation on Saturday even though I have already graduated and received my diploma. It should be a good week!

Wow!

2009-03-17T19:25:00.000-04:00

I just can’t believe what happened last night. Not too much is going on here in Seward and I am not getting many sub jobs, so I am trying to find ways to keep busy.
I decided to head to Council Bluffs at around 9pm last night to play some poker. Before tonight, I believe I have been to the Horseshoe Casino around ten times and I cannot remember ever having a losing session. One day I remember only making $35, but just like Vegas, I don’t think I have ever left with less than I came with. I have definitely had losing sessions in MT though live. Anyway, each time I drive to CB, I tell myself that this could be the day where I take a brutal bad beat or I get coolered. I am bound to have a losing session. I just prepare myself mentally so that when it happens, I will react better to it. Well, a losing session didn’t happen last night for me. In fact, I had the best session I have ever had, and arguably, the best session anyone has ever had playing 1/3 NL at CB!

So I get to the poker room and there are two games of 1/3 going on. One of the tables had mostly old people and the other table had mostly young people. I obviously wanted to play at the old person one. Both the tables were full though and I was the 10th person on the waiting list, so they decided to start another table. As I sit down, all of the people look like they know the game of poker fairly well as it is a similar people to the young table already going on. Oh well. Then, right as the dealer sat down, I saw that a guy just left the old person table. I immediately took my $200 in red chips over to that table to play. This was the decision that made it all happen.

The night started off bad as I soon found out that I was playing with nine of the nittiest postflop players I have ever seen. I was bummed from the start when I had 77 on like my 3rd hand. Everyone limped and saw a flop of T72 rainbow. I bet half pot and everyone folds! This just doesn’t ever happen! I’m thinking to myself that I am never going to get paid off. And really, the rest of the night I didn’t get paid off with a lot of my monsters. A few hours later, a guy raised pf and I called with 78. The flop came A88. He bet, I raised and he autofolds AK face up! What the heck! These guys can’t possibly have a read on my like this can they? I started taking advantage of this tight play and built my stack up to $500 really quick. Another fun hand is when I get have AQ in the bb. Another guy raises pf and I call. Flop comes AQ7. I check, he bets, I raise, and he folds AK face up! What is with these guys? PS. I was hitting cards like crazy tonight.

Here are my three favorite hands of the night:

It’s about 1am (a few hours into the session). A trucker guy in his 50’s has like $600 that I have been eyeing and I have about $500. By the way, I am the only person at the table that raises without AA or KK. Okay, so said guy raises to $22 in mp. I call on the button with K4hh. Flop comes Ah Qs 5h. He bets out $50. I know he is huge so I was going to call and not raise. I took a long time to call hoping he would not think that I am on a flush draw. Turn 7h giving me the nuts. He bets $120. I finally decide on moving all in. He thinks for only a few minutes. He says that he knows I have a flush! Honestly though, these players just hate putting money into the pot. Eventually, he folds AA face up! Wow! I am not too disappointed with the fold. I’ll take the pot right there if he has top set. I wanted him to go with AQ, but I was sure he had AA or QQ. Anyways, first huge pot of the night for me was nice.

Next hand was maybe one of my favorites. As you might have noticed, I almost never fold to a preflop raiser if they have a lot of chips behind because I feel like I can outplay them or get paid if I hit a monster. So this hand came around 3pm and my image is starting to loosen up even though they still keep folding to my continuation bets and bluff raises. A guy limps in early and I limp in middle with 84off, another guy limps and the sb makes it $25. He had a lot of chips and I knew the others were calling, so I got in on that action. Sb is noticeably disgusted with the three callers. Flop comes JT5. The sb who raised pf open folds! He then says that J5 is going to win this hand. Early limper checks and I bet $26. Both guys fold and I show my 84off to ship the nice pot. The sb starts to lose it after that. He is so mad at me for calling his pf raise with 84off. Oh well though.

Finally this last hand came up around 4am. We are 5 handed with the said trucker guy is back up to around $600 and I am around $1000. Everyone else is at $200 or under. He is the only reason I have stayed there because I thought I could get all of his chips. He starts racking up his chips and keeps playing though he is clearly going to leave at any minute. He raises utg to $22 and I call on the button with K2off. Once again, he has never raised all night without AA or KK. So I was pretty sure what he had even though he could have had a bigger range with this being the end of his night. Flop comes KcQc2c. He bets $25 and I make it $100. He double checks his cards and calls. I am confident he has the Ac now. Turn comes a gross 10c. Luckily he checks, and I check behind. River comes my gin card in the Kh. Trucker bets out $100. I think and push all in. He eventually calls while saying, “you can have the rest of my chips, show me your boat.” I flip over K2 for the full house. He mucks AcAh and I ship the around $1200 pot.

So we sat there after 4am and I have over $1800 in front of me and the other 3 guys have no more than $400 combined. We play a few more orbits and I call it a night. The dealers said that they have never seen anyone leave the 1/3 game with more than two racks ($1000). Also, I only bought in for $200 and never had to rebuy.

So it turned out to be an epic night with some guys that were extremely tight. There is no doubt that I hit a lot of huge hands tonight, but I also took down a lot of pots with nothing. Honestly, I can’t remember even being put to a tough decision all night. I was always the one putting the pressure on and keeping it on. It was a dream table that I will never forget and probably never be able to enjoy something like that (pokerwise) again.

I am leaving for Denver tomorrow. It should be a fun vacation!

Another day at the poker room

2009-03-16T16:57:00.001-04:00

So yesterday I went to the poker room at the Horseshoe Casino in Council Bluffs and had another good day to say the least. I got there around 11:30 again and played 1/3 NL until the 2pm tourney. I only really remember two big pots I won so I’ll describe those. I make sure before I sit down that there are fish. There usually are at this time because the people bust out of the 10am tourney on Sundays go and play cash games and they aren’t good. I also like to make sure there are fish with a lot of chips. This helps me decide which table I want to sit at as I usually have a few options. Sure enough, this table had a lot of old people and one woman in her 30’s with a lot of chips. I bought in for the maximum $200 and got up to $300 really quick. Now I was at the point where I want to get involved in pots with the woman in hope that I can double up. She doesn’t raise without a good hand, so every time she raised, I would call with the hope of hitting something and double up through her. I knew she would pay me off. This hand came up that I was pretty fortunate on. She raised utg her standard $13. One guy called, and I called in late position with K2hh. The flop comes 852 with the 5 of hearts. She bet $20. Other guy folded and I called. Turn was a Qd. She bet $20 again. I thought she looked really weak, so I raised to $60. She beat me into the pot with a call. I knew she was extremely strong now and I was done. River 2! She checked to me and I knew she would call almost anything. I decided on betting $100. She snap called, I showed, and she mucked in disgust. I probably could have gotten more out of her, but I wanted a call for sure.

The next hand was is without a doubt my most memorable live hand I have ever played. I have about $500 in my stack to start the hand. I have QTdd utg. I limp. Other people limp and we see a flop 6 handed. Flop comes Jd 8d 7c. Checked to me and I bet $10. The guy right after me quickly calls and the guy after him makes it $25. Others fold and I call. The guy after me then pushes all in for $97 total (he bought in for $100 a few hands earlier). The flop raiser is disgusted and thinks about it for two minutes before finally calling the $72 with about $215 behind him. I then pushed all in with the thought that this guy was going to fold and even if he didn’t, I had a lot of outs (I thought he KJ, AJ, or maybe even QJ or JT). After I pushed, the guy goes into the tank. He starts talking how he knows one of us has T9. I am sitting over thinking why he is taking so long to fold. Finally after over 5 minutes, he calls and flop over 77 for bottom set. The other guy, to my delight, then flips up J7 for two pair. So I have all of my outs plus the board will have trouble pairing if I hit. Before I could even think about how much money was in the pot, the dealer turns over the fabulous 9d to give me the straight flush. The river was an uneventful King. I shipped the over $700 pot. Also, I won a high hand jackpot that they have for all 4 of a kinds and straight flushes. My Q high diamond straight flush was good for $245. Some of the jackpots are low, for example, the Q high diamond jackpot went to $0 after I hit and, and some of the jackpots are high (the Ten high diamond straight flush is at $2200 because no one has hit it in a long time). So I was in cloud nine after that pot, which was only 15 minutes before the tourney started.

I entered the tourney and built a huge stack early again winning most of the pots. Then in the middle levels after the first break, I lost some pots, lost some flips, and had to push with 6 bbs with 98hh. I was called by A10 and A9. Flop came 976, but I missed my draw and was eliminated. Nothing could ruin the day though! After that I found at seat at a 1/3 table with an old fish that had $900 in front of him. I decided to sit down. The other players there were pretty solid, but I had to stay with the fish. He left after one orbit and I decided to leave a $15 winner in the game and a $850 winner on the day. Woohoo!

I went home to watch Duke take down the ACC championship and selection Sunday. What a day! This week I am going to pick up my sister at the Denver airport when she gets back from visiting our brother in Pensacola. I’ll then hang out with her at CSU in Fort Collins for a few days before going back down to Denver to see Leah and other friends for a few more days. It will be nice to take a little vacation! I filled out my bracket. Duke won’t win it, but I still have them going all the way haha. We’ll see.

Basketball Season Over, Poker, and Applying for Jobs

2009-03-10T00:35:00.001-04:00

We made a push to go to the national tournament when we won our first two games on the conference tournament. Our second game was without a doubt the craziest game I have ever been a part of when we beat Briar Cliff University in OT. We started the game down 26-5. We took a 6 point second half lead and a 4 point lead with 16 seconds. Then they tied it up with a shot that was clearly after the buzzer. We went to OT and got a 4 point lead 29 seconds left! After a layup, a turnover, and a layup, they tied the game with 8 seconds left. We got the ball out of the net and pushed the ball. Our freshman backup point guard, who had the game of his life (26 points, 6-6 from three) drove to the hole and threw it up. It missed, but our other freshman Kendal Bender was there for the tip in. It was a crazy game to say the least! We then got crushed next game L

So Leah left for her 2nd 8 weeks of student teaching in Denver on Friday. The weekend was as good as it could get without her around. Saturday I slept in and then played in some tourneys. I was unsuccessful in all the tourneys but one. It was a regular $10 buy-in with 400 entrants on full tilt. I went into the bubble with an average stack, had three different people call me a moron because I was not checking down with a player all in, and left the bubble with 2X the average stack. I picked up some big hands and ended up going to the final table with 250,000 of the total 600,000 chips. 2nd place had 100,000 chips. So I was in good shape. Though I had some resistance from the guy on my left, who liked to go over the top of me a lot (for good reason), I eventually shipped the tourney for 1K. So that was nice.

Sunday, I decided to go to the Horseshoe casino in Council Bluffs. They have two $40 buy-in tourneys every Sunday at 10am and 2pm. I slept through the first and showed up at 11:30 so I could register for the 2pm tourney at noon when they open registration. While I was waiting for the tourney to start, I played some 1-3 NL. I have never had a losing session playing NL there in around 5 times. Once again, I had a nice +$350 session. I just love live poker. I love how much easier it is to read people. Also, the competition is much softer than the internet. Live is just so much more profitable for me even with the higher rakes. I don’t even play cash games on the internet anymore.

So I went into the 2pm tourney with a lot of confidence. I ended up winning the first 4 hands of the tourney without a showdown and 6 of the first 8 when this hand came up. Keep in mind my already crazy image. One guy in seat 6 just lost a pot for basically all his chips to a lady in seat 9, so he put his last 50 chips (one bb) in blind in mp. So here is how the hand went. I am the bb in seat 10. Seat 2 makes it 300 (25/50) of his roughly 2500 starting stack. Seat 5 calls. Seat 6 is all in for 50. Seat 7 calls. I squeeze KK in the bb. I make it 1200. Seat 2 could not get all his chips in fast enough. Seat 5 then goes all in. Seat 7 (the lady who is only person who can knock me out) calls! I go all in. The lady tanks before finally calling with AKhh. Seat 3 has JJ, Seat 5 has 88, and seat 6, who I don’t care about if he beats me, has my last King with K6. The flop comes 579 rainbow. Turn 9. River 10 to ship me the 12000 chip pot and knock out 3 players. Getting lots of chips early in this tourney is vital as they raise the blinds every 20 minutes and it only last about 4 hours total. From there, I was a part of at least 1 out of every 3 hands, if not more, until I busted. I got to the final table (10 paid out of 60, which is a joke) as still the chip leader in the tournament. Eventually with 4 left the blinds were at 4000/8000. I had like 65000, guy on my left had 55000, next guy had 12000, and the next guy had 27000. The guy on my right folded, I have KQdd on the button and push. SB makes a questionable call with A10 because he is almost guaranteed a 2nd place finish with the two short stacks having to go through the blinds next. Anyways, he calls and the bb folds even though he has 4000 left. He said he had KQ as well. So I’m in trouble. The dealer teased me with a flop of Ad 10d 4c. I blanked out to put me down to 10000 chips. The next hand, the sb survived and I was all in the following hand in the bb. I had KQ and lost to the sb’s 65 on a 78T85 board. So I was out in 4th place for a $151 payout. I was bummed that I missed out on the $550 first place, but I did leave the casino up $470. It was a good little excursion for me.

Enough poker…I have been applying for a bunch of jobs lately. The middle school health teaching position is open here in Seward and I am confident I am one of the top candidates since I already know most of the school’s faculty and think I am well liked. However, there is not a coaching position to come along with it, so that is a downside. The Grand Island High School head coach just resigned and he is also a PE/Health teacher, so I am in the process of submitting an application. This job would be unbelievable if I got it because it is a big school and a great fit for me. Though I do not believe a school of 2200 students would hire a 23 year old to coach their boys’ basketball team, all I want is an interview. Also, there are some PE/Health and coaching jobs open in Colorado, but I cannot even apply for them until I get a Colorado teaching license, so I am working on filling out an application for a license.

I have tomorrow and Wednesday lined up to sub this week. Then Thursday, Friday, and Saturday is the boys’ state basketball tournament in Lincoln where I will be recruiting. We have not signed any recruits yet, so things need to start getting done!

3rd in $5 tourney. Basketball regular season over.

2009-02-23T15:05:00.000-05:00

Yesterday I finished 3rd in a tourney with 528 people in it. I made a mistake early at the final table limping with AA. The big blind flopped two pair and I didn’t catch up. With three left I got it in with 66 against A5 and the guy in 2nd rivered an Ace. I played a really good tourney though as I was never all in behind. Here is one hand early that propelled me:

Full Tilt Poker Game #10783085041: $5 + $0.50 Tournament (81039153), Table 47 - 30/60 - No Limit Hold'em - 12:53:37 ET - 2009/02/22
Seat 1: ThePictureDude (1,713)
Seat 2: Charmin200285 (1,655)
Seat 3: K Freeman (2,145)
Seat 4: samanthapug (3,680)
Seat 5: 1106leah (3,510)
Seat 6: fergg1234 (4,598)
Seat 7: yo vic 7 (2,480)
Seat 8: rudi_18 (681)
Seat 9: lazarus714 (998)
lazarus714 posts the small blind of 30
ThePictureDude posts the big blind of 60
The button is in seat #8
*** HOLE CARDS ***
Dealt to 1106leah [Js Jc]
Charmin200285 raises to 180
K Freeman folds
samanthapug calls 180
1106leah calls 180
fergg1234 has 15 seconds left to act
fergg1234 folds
yo vic 7 folds
rudi_18 folds
lazarus714 calls 150
ThePictureDude calls 120
*** FLOP *** [Jh 6c 5c]
lazarus714 bets 818, and is all in
ThePictureDude folds
Charmin200285 raises to 1,475, and is all in
samanthapug raises to 3,500, and is all in
1106leah calls 3,330, and is all in
samanthapug shows [Kc Ks]
1106leah shows [Js Jc]
lazarus714 shows [6d Td]
Charmin200285 shows [Ah As]
Uncalled bet of 170 returned to samanthapug
*** TURN *** [Jh 6c 5c] [2d]
*** RIVER *** [Jh 6c 5c 2d] [6s]
samanthapug shows two pair, Kings and Sixes
K Freeman: woooow
1106leah shows a full house, Jacks full of Sixes
1106leah wins side pot #2 (3,710) with a full house, Jacks full of Sixes
Charmin200285 shows two pair, Aces and Sixes
1106leah wins side pot #1 (1,971) with a full house, Jacks full of Sixes
lazarus714 shows three of a kind, Sixes
1106leah wins the main pot (4,172) with a full house, Jacks full of Sixes
lazarus714 stands up
Charmin200285 stands up
*** SUMMARY ***
Total pot 9,853 Main pot 4,172. Side pot 1 1,971. Side pot 2 3,710. Rake 0
Board: [Jh 6c 5c 2d 6s]
Seat 1: ThePictureDude (big blind) folded on the Flop
Seat 2: Charmin200285 showed [Ah As] and lost with two pair, Aces and Sixes
Seat 3: K Freeman didn't bet (folded)
Seat 4: samanthapug showed [Kc Ks] and lost with two pair, Kings and Sixes
Seat 5: 1106leah showed [Js Jc] and won (9,853) with a full house, Jacks full of Sixes
Seat 6: fergg1234 didn't bet (folded)
Seat 7: yo vic 7 didn't bet (folded)
Seat 8: rudi_18 (button) didn't bet (folded)
Seat 9: lazarus714 (small blind) showed [6d Td] and lost with three of a kind, Sixes

The basketball regular season is over and we finished horribly with five straight losses. We finished with a 18-11 record and 10-8 in conference for 6th place. We host Mount Marty of South Dakota in the first round of the conference tourney. We need to win the conference tournament to go to the national tournament. Good luck us!

Busy Month

2009-02-09T16:22:00.001-05:00

It’s been a while once again since I have posted. For a basketball coach, January is by far the busiest month of the year. The basketball team is now 18-7 overall and 10-4 in conference. We have to make a big run in these last three weeks if we want to make the national tournament. Our chance at winning the conference regular season was all but erased when we lost at Northwestern on Saturday. Still, we are having a good season with a really young team. I am 2-12 as a JV head coach. We have underachieved all year, which is disappointing to me. At least our Varsity is doing well though.

I have substitute taught five days so far. I was hoping to get 3-4 days in a week at Seward High School or Middle School, but it has only been 1 or 2 days. My best day was the first one where I subbed for the upper level Spanish teacher. She had me put in the movie National Treasure 2 with Spanish subtitles. It was a pretty easy day. Another day of note was when I subbed for the upper level PE teacher. My good friend, Ashley Smith, is his student teacher, so I got paid to watch her teach and hang out with her. That was a fun day!

Two weekends ago, we hosted the annual Concordia Invitational basketball Tournament (CIT) this year in Seward where four Concordia’s duke it out to see who has the best girls and guys teams. A few of my best friends that have graduated came back for the tourney along with my dad. So we had five people staying in my two person apartment for a week. It was a great time! Concordia-Nebraska took down the men and women’s championships to make it even more of a fun weekend. After I took my buddy David Jabs to the Omaha airport on that Sunday, I stopped by the Horseshoe casino and played for two hours. I played the 1-3 NL game and made $40 before leaving to get back for intramurals.

This last Saturday was the first day in weeks that I had time to play some online poker. Once again, the break from poker proved to be huge for me as I took 4th in a $3 rebuy on Cake for $300. I did my usual waiting until the first break to buy in and add-on, so I was only in for $6. I think my ROI on days where I have not played in at least the previous week are off the charts. The refreshing and focus of my brain is obviously extremely important for my poker game.

Yesterday, Sunday, I won my 5th intramural championship of the year as we took down the 5 on 5 coed basketball championship. Before that, two of my friends and I took down the 3 on 3 championship. Those two, along with mixed doubles, kickball, and flag football make up my five championships. 5 on 5 men’s basketball is under way and there are some teams with football players that will pose a huge threat to our team full of coaches.

Well that is my life during these last five weeks or so. I still don’t know what I am going to do next year. The clock is ticking though and I am starting to feel a little stressed.

Out of the $1 Million Turbo Takedown in 59th place out of over 9500 people

2008-12-28T19:31:00.000-05:00

I sniffed some life changing money today but had to settle for a $625 payday. I can’t complain because I got into the tournament for a little over 100 frequent player points. Here is a funny hand that kept me alive with about 130 people left.

PokerStars Game #23346183008: Tournament #200801228, 5000FPP Hold'em No Limit - Level XXII (5000/10000) - 2008/12/28 18:21:48 ET
Table '200801228 703' 9-max Seat #6 is the button
Seat 1: PsYcOsNiPeR (475888 in chips)
Seat 2: fearcepearce (124885 in chips)
Seat 3: knusper (81775 in chips)
Seat 4: CU_bball (124004 in chips)
Seat 5: JohnFR (159928 in chips)
Seat 6: Fighter (167049 in chips)
Seat 7: sean4040 (406182 in chips)
Seat 8: tercet (206964 in chips)
Seat 9: Cubits (249678 in chips)
PsYcOsNiPeR: posts the ante 1000
fearcepearce: posts the ante 1000
knusper: posts the ante 1000
CU_bball: posts the ante 1000
JohnFR: posts the ante 1000
Fighter: posts the ante 1000
sean4040: posts the ante 1000
tercet: posts the ante 1000
Cubits: posts the ante 1000
sean4040: posts small blind 5000
tercet: posts big blind 10000
*** HOLE CARDS ***
Dealt to CU_bball [9h Th]
Cubits: folds
PsYcOsNiPeR: folds
fearcepearce: folds
knusper: folds
CU_bball: raises 113004 to 123004 and is all-in
JohnFR: folds
Fighter: folds
sean4040: calls 118004
tercet: folds
*** FLOP *** [8h 3d Jh]
*** TURN *** [8h 3d Jh] [7h]
*** RIVER *** [8h 3d Jh 7h] [Kc]
*** SHOW DOWN ***
sean4040: shows [Ts As] (high card Ace)
CU_bball: shows [9h Th] (a straight flush, Seven to Jack)
CU_bball collected 265008 from pot
*** SUMMARY ***
Total pot 265008 Rake 0
Board [8h 3d Jh 7h Kc]
Seat 1: PsYcOsNiPeR folded before Flop (didn't bet)
Seat 2: fearcepearce folded before Flop (didn't bet)
Seat 3: knusper folded before Flop (didn't bet)
Seat 4: CU_bball showed [9h Th] and won (265008) with a straight flush, Seven to Jack
Seat 5: JohnFR folded before Flop (didn't bet)
Seat 6: Fighter (button) folded before Flop (didn't bet)
Seat 7: sean4040 (small blind) showed [Ts As] and lost with high card Ace
Seat 8: tercet (big blind) folded before Flop
Seat 9: Cubits folded before Flop (didn't bet)

I also shallow cashed in the 3 of diamonds PL Holdem event for a free $3.40.

Poker Update??!!!!!!

2008-12-25T02:52:00.000-05:00

Just played in two random fpp satellites for the fun of it and won both! I played in a 8 fpp R&A and finished top 2 out of 378 people. So I qualified for the 5,000 fpp buy in $1 Million Turbo Takedown on Sunday on Stars. I hovered just above one big blind for it seems like an hour after the rebuy period. Then just played push/fold poker until I shipped it. I put a lot of bad beats on people, but I was always the one pushing, not calling :) I used a little over 100 fpp of my 250 fpps because I like to rebuy I guess. The second tourney was a 200 fpp buy in to the 2,000 fpp Extra Holiday 100K. I finished in the top 17 out of 175 people. Both these tourneys will be on Sunday, so I guess I have my day planned out. I also plan on playing in the 100K Holiday on Saturday for the 2,000 fpp buy in. I’ll be a baller and just buy-in directly because I have like 3500 fpps on there. Now I need to make these satellite wins worth something. Good luck me!

College Graduate; Back Home in MT

2008-12-24T19:06:00.000-05:00

Once again I’m slacking when it comes to blogging. So I apologize to my thousands of avid readers :) So I’m a college graduate now and I can’t even describe the feeling. I’m going back to Seward soon and I won’t have to stress out about homework. It is going to be great!

Basketball is going really good even though I am now 0-7 as a head JV coach. However, our varsity is 10-1 and still #17 in the country (new polls haven’t come out yet). I look forward to going back to Seward around New Year’s to continue with the basketball season.

Montana has been crazy busy but also really fun. I drove the 12 hours here and didn’t hit that much bad weather, which was a huge relief. Before I got home, I stopped by Best Buy to buy a laptop. I knew that I wanted the 15 inch Acer with the keypad ($500) going in. When I got there Saturday night, the only one they had left was the floor model. So I said I’d take it. I notice a few scratches on the lid, so I talked them into giving me $40 off. So I have nice, basic laptop for $460. I have no complaints so far. Also, while I’m here, I wanted to at least look hard at buying a new car as mine is becoming less and less reliable with 128,000 miles on it. So I went to our family friend’s car lot and he had some nice ones. I really like his 2007 Ford Focus SE. This car dealer is unlike any other I’ve met as he is a strong Christian guy who tries to give us a great deal. I ended up getting the $12K Focus for $7300 plus my car. It was as good a deal as I am ever going to get as it is a great time to buy a car with the state of the economy. Also, the last two nights have been fun hanging out with my old high school friends. On Monday, my friend and ex-teammate Keil had a Christmas party at his house. Then last night, a bunch of us went to Old Chicago and another bar for some drinks.

I am thinking about heading back to Seward on or before the 1st depending on what my friends here are doing for New Year’s.

I have my eye on some gold card tourneys on cake as well as the 2K points buy-in 100K guaranteed on full tilt in the upcoming week. Hopefully I have time to play them and make some free money.

Well I’m off to church to celebrate Jesus’ birth tonight and then once again in the morning. Merry Christmas to everyone! God bless!

Month in Review

2008-12-08T22:46:00.002-05:00

I can’t believe its been a month since I last posted but it has been. I have a lot of good news to report. I am in my last week of student teaching and then I am a college graduate. Also, our basketball team is an incredible 9-1 beating every team we have played this year. We bounced back and beat St. Mary’s pretty handily at home after our 2 point loss to them. We are now 3-0 in conference and ranked #17 in NAIA II after beating the formally #10 team in the country on Saturday. On a sad note, I am 0-5 as a JV head coach, but oh well. I’m just glad that our varsity team is doing extremely well.

Leah and I had a good run in 2 on 2 volleyball. We lost in the semifinals in a close fought 3-setter to an ex-volleyball player and a 6’8 football player. Playing 2 on 2 volleyball with Leah was so fun though I can’t even explain. We just started dodgeball (6 on 6) as we try to avenge our loss in the championship match last year. We are 4-0 without losing a game much less a match (best 3 games out of 5) so far. Hopefully we roll this week and win it all.

On a sad note, my computer has broke on me and I don’t think I am going to be able to fix it. So for the last two weeks, I have been “renting” a computer from Walmart that I am going to take back tomorrow because I have 15 days to return it. I’ll probably have to buy another computer in Montana where there is no sales tax. So, I need a new computer, a new car, and have to start paying off student loans when I graduate in a week. Money is kind of stressing me out right now for the first time since my freshman year of college. But I am not complaining as I have it really really good for a guy about to graduate college!

I have actually been playing some weekend poker! Brandon will be happy to hear this. Over Thanksgiving weekend, Cake poker did a promotion where they were giving out 4 times as many gold cards during ring games. So I started grinding 4-6 tables of 3/6 limit cash games last weekend and this weekend and I guess I have it back. The money has rolled in pretty well and the last two weekends and I made 140 gold cards and over 50 gold chips that can be used for tourney buyins. So that’s my poker news. Thank you rental computer!

I’m excited to go home to Montana next week to see my family and enjoy Christmas with them! Hopefully my car makes it there!

Alright, time to win another dodgeball game.

I'm a Liar

2008-11-10T02:00:00.001-05:00

So I lied about two things: updating my blog the weekend following the last post and that I hate intramural football. I apologize for not updating more but life is packed full of good stuff and writing has not even been in the back of my mind until now.

Since my last post, life has been great to say the least. We ended up winning the intramural football championship in dominating fashion. We ended the regular season with an undesirable 2-2 record. The intramural coordinator made some poor decisions in the format of the single elimination playoffs. First of all, all nine teams made the playoffs. So normally, a nine team playoff would include a play-in game for the 8 and 9 seeds to get in the eight team tourney and play the 1 seed in the first round. Well this coordinator just advanced the 1 seed (a team that includes a bunch of different coaches from different sports including football. I still have friends in school, so I chose to play with them instead) to the championship game and had the other eight teams play a tourney to get to the championship. We cruised through the first two games while improving drastically. Then we squeaked by a really good team to get to the championship against the coaches. The coaches were really ticked off at the format of the tourney because they just wanted to play games. So after us having played three playoff games and the coaches having played none, we proved that we had become a unstoppable. We had played them in the regular season and lost pretty bad (we didn’t have two of our better athletes for that game, but still). This was a different story though. We jumped out to a 35-0 lead and just owned them. We were not stopped the entire game from scoring a touchdown. In fact, I think we were only stopped twice the entire playoffs. Our quarterback, Ben Ahlman, was a 4-year starting QB for his high school and he was extremely poise in the clutch. Maybe he should have played three sports here at Concordia instead of basketball (1 year) and baseball (3 years- he is graduating in 3 and half years so couldn’t play his 4th season). Then, two other guys and I made up the receiving corps. The keys though were the three guys on the line that blocked well and then caught dump off passes if they blitzed. We were definitely a well oiled machine by the end of the season that couldn’t be stopped. I love intramural football now!

We have started the basketball season 4-1. Our one loss was a 2 point loss to St. Mary’s in Kansas where we were up nine with 3 minutes left. So that was heartbreaking. We have a chance to get back at them at home on Wednesday though, which we will be ready for. I made my head coaching debut with the JV team on Wednesday and jumped out to a 17-7 lead before turning the ball over an absurd amount and losing by 8. So that was disappointing. I absolutely love coaching though right now and am just praying that I can find the right spot to continue my coaching career next year. I can’t remember if I talked about this or not, but I am going to look for a different place to go to graduate school and be a Grad Assistant on the basketball team there. I want to get a Master’s Degree in some sort of PE/Coaching/Health/Human Performance subject. So the look is underway even though coaches won’t look to hire GA’s until probably February or March.

Student teaching continues to fly by as I believe there is less that five weeks left. Every day I find out something new about my kids. Some of them have it really rough. I think I can make a difference though as a health teacher as we talk about all types of topics. Even though I am in a public school, there are definitely times when I can get the class to bring up God and/or what happens after you die. Also, I can tell them who I turn to in times of high stress or unhappiness. I think that being a high school health teacher can definitely be a fulfilling life, but for now I want to give coaching college basketball a try.

Half way done

2008-10-16T22:53:00.001-04:00

Well, I’m half way through student teaching. Eight more weeks and I’m a college graduate. I’m really really excited. I have a four day weekend because Seward High does not have school Friday or Monday, so I’m going to have a lot of relaxation time. I won my second intramural championship when we owned kickball. Believe it or not, kickball is all about strategy. We just started intramural flag football. It is not flag football at all. It’s pretty much full contact. We won our first game and lost our second even though we were up two scores with a minute left last night. It was stupid! Clock stops after EVERY play the last two minutes of the game. So the last two minutes take longer than the first 18 minutes of the half. Anyway, we are 1-1.

I called a bunch of recruits tonight and now I think I’m going out. I’ll try to update again this weekend.

Horrible play + Luck = $$$

2008-10-06T02:38:00.000-04:00

After shallow cashing in 4 out of 8 small buy in tourneys on Saturday, I played 11 tourneys today and struck out in the first 9. Then I played in the $6 early daily doubles on full tilt and I ran incredible. I double cashed in them for an unusually high prize of $15. Normally, I thought it was around $10. There were obviously fewer double cashers this tourney. Anyway, I was hoping for the best overall finish until I was knocked out of B in 72nd place. I remember I was down to one big blind in B with like 400 people left and had a huge comeback to an average stack. I really don’t remember any significant hands in either until I was down to about 18 people left in A. This interesting hand came up:

Full Tilt Poker Game #8365341224: Early Double - A (63515970), Table 38 - 4000/8000 Ante 1000 - No Limit Hold'em - 20:42:09 ET - 2008/10/05
Seat 1: Oketee (53,308)
Seat 2: 1106leah (207,635)
Seat 3: thebirdman84 (154,858)
Seat 4: AZUR (151,105)
Seat 7: brendan61 (273,520)
Seat 8: ClaRoyal (140,258)
Seat 9: JohnyFilpo5 (123,877)
Oketee antes 1,000
1106leah antes 1,000
thebirdman84 antes 1,000
AZUR antes 1,000
brendan61 antes 1,000
ClaRoyal antes 1,000
JohnyFilpo5 antes 1,000
Oketee posts the small blind of 4,000
1106leah posts the big blind of 8,000
The button is in seat #9
*** HOLE CARDS ***
Dealt to 1106leah [Qd 7c]
thebirdman84 folds
AZUR folds
brendan61 calls 8,000
ClaRoyal folds
JohnyFilpo5 folds
Oketee calls 4,000
1106leah checks
*** FLOP *** [3s Ad 8d]
Oketee checks
1106leah checks
brendan61 bets 8,000
Oketee folds
1106leah raises to 28,000
brendan61 calls 20,000
*** TURN *** [3s Ad 8d] [7d]
thebirdman84 has been disconnected
thebirdman84 has reconnected
1106leah has 15 seconds left to act
1106leah checks
brendan61 bets 8,000
1106leah has 15 seconds left to act
1106leah raises to 50,000
brendan61 calls 42,000
*** RIVER *** [3s Ad 8d 7d] [Qs]
1106leah has 15 seconds left to act
1106leah bets 90,000
brendan61 calls 90,000
*** SHOW DOWN ***
1106leah shows [Qd 7c] two pair, Queens and Sevens
brendan61 mucks
1106leah wins the pot (367,000) with two pair, Queens and Sevens
*** SUMMARY ***
Total pot 367,000 Rake 0
Board: [3s Ad 8d 7d Qs]
Seat 1: Oketee (small blind) folded on the Flop
Seat 2: 1106leah (big blind) showed [Qd 7c] and won (367,000) with two pair, Queens and Sevens
Seat 3: thebirdman84 folded before the Flop
Seat 4: AZUR folded before the Flop
Seat 7: brendan61 mucked [Kd Qc] - a pair of Queens
Seat 8: ClaRoyal folded before the Flop
Seat 9: JohnyFilpo5 (button) folded before the Flop

This was the first time this guy ever limped, so I felt that he would not have an Ace in this spot unless it was AA. But I don’t think he limps AA in middle to late position after all the previous raising he had done. So I tried making a play on him and should have taken it down on the flop. But he had other plans. Then I tried making a play on the turn, but he still wouldn’t let me have it. Then I valuetowned the river when it turns out my gin card hits on the river. I’m glad no diamond came. Nice call on the river sir…and flop for that matter.

A little while later, I had these 3 out of 5 hands. I’ll give explanations to try and defend my horrible plays after each.

Full Tilt Poker Game #8365559194: Early Double - A (63515970), Table 38 - 6000/12000 Ante 1500 - No Limit Hold'em - 20:57:52 ET - 2008/10/05
Seat 2: 1106leah (329,235)
Seat 3: thebirdman84 (180,133)
Seat 4: AZUR (190,413)
Seat 5: dinhba86 (556,601)
Seat 6: spooling (96,030)
Seat 7: brendan61 (75,245)
Seat 8: ClaRoyal (91,258)
Seat 9: JohnyFilpo5 (93,877)
1106leah antes 1,500
thebirdman84 antes 1,500
AZUR antes 1,500
dinhba86 antes 1,500
spooling antes 1,500
brendan61 antes 1,500
ClaRoyal antes 1,500
JohnyFilpo5 antes 1,500
thebirdman84 posts the small blind of 6,000
AZUR posts the big blind of 12,000
The button is in seat #2
*** HOLE CARDS ***
Dealt to 1106leah [9s 8s]
dinhba86 folds
spooling folds
brendan61 calls 12,000
ClaRoyal folds
JohnyFilpo5 folds
1106leah has 15 seconds left to act
1106leah raises to 35,000
thebirdman84 folds
AZUR folds
brendan61 raises to 58,000
1106leah has 15 seconds left to act
1106leah raises to 327,735, and is all in
brendan61 calls 15,745, and is all in
1106leah shows [9s 8s]
brendan61 shows [Jc Tc]
Uncalled bet of 253,990 returned to 1106leah
*** FLOP *** [Jh Ac 4c]
*** TURN *** [Jh Ac 4c] [7s]
*** RIVER *** [Jh Ac 4c 7s] [Th]
1106leah shows a straight, Jack high
brendan61 shows two pair, Jacks and Tens
1106leah wins the pot (177,490) with a straight, Jack high
brendan61 stands up
*** SUMMARY ***
Total pot 177,490 Rake 0
Board: [Jh Ac 4c 7s Th]
Seat 2: 1106leah (button) showed [9s 8s] and won (177,490) with a straight, Jack high
Seat 3: thebirdman84 (small blind) folded before the Flop
Seat 4: AZUR (big blind) folded before the Flop
Seat 5: dinhba86 folded before the Flop
Seat 6: spooling folded before the Flop
Seat 7: brendan61 showed [Jc Tc] and lost with two pair, Jacks and Tens
Seat 8: ClaRoyal folded before the Flop
Seat 9: JohnyFilpo5 folded before the Flop

The last 15 minutes, Brendan had totally changed it up from before the previous hand and just was limping every hand and then folding to a raise. Impatiently on my part, I decide that this is my spot (I suck so bad that I can’t just fold suited connectors). So I try to steal the pot and he tries to represent AA not knowing that his hand is much better than mine haha. I decide to go with it (probably wrongly). I runner runnered him to send him to the rail.

The very next hand this came up. This guy (dinhba86) had been owning me (we were at the same table since late in the first hour if not the entire tourney, I can’t remember). Since we made the money, this guy had been going over the top of my raises EVERY time. He must have done it 6-10 times. This is the only time where I have ever thought to myself that someone is a super user. It seems he knew every time I had a hand and every time I didn’t have a hand. I know he isn’t a super user but man he picked his spots well. Anyway, I had had enough obviously even though I was 3RD in chips and he was 1st. I should have let me ego go and just gave him the pot. Here is the hand:

Full Tilt Poker Game #8365588997: Early Double - A (63515970), Table 38 - 6000/12000 Ante 1500 - No Limit Hold'em - 21:00:03 ET - 2008/10/05
Seat 2: 1106leah (400,980)
Seat 3: thebirdman84 (171,133)
Seat 4: AZUR (169,413)
Seat 5: dinhba86 (599,101)
Seat 6: spooling (93,030)
Seat 8: ClaRoyal (88,258)
Seat 9: JohnyFilpo5 (90,877)
1106leah antes 1,500
thebirdman84 antes 1,500
AZUR antes 1,500
dinhba86 antes 1,500
spooling antes 1,500
ClaRoyal antes 1,500
JohnyFilpo5 antes 1,500
dinhba86 posts the small blind of 6,000
spooling posts the big blind of 12,000
The button is in seat #4
*** HOLE CARDS ***
Dealt to 1106leah [7s 7d]
ClaRoyal folds
JohnyFilpo5 folds
1106leah has 15 seconds left to act
1106leah raises to 29,000
thebirdman84 folds
AZUR folds
dinhba86 has 15 seconds left to act
dinhba86 raises to 76,000
spooling folds
1106leah has 15 seconds left to act
1106leah raises to 399,480, and is all in
dinhba86 calls 323,480
1106leah shows [7s 7d]
dinhba86 shows [Jh Jd]
*** FLOP *** [9h 5c 6h]
*** TURN *** [9h 5c 6h] [Kd]
*** RIVER *** [9h 5c 6h Kd] [7h]
1106leah shows three of a kind, Sevens
dinhba86 shows a pair of Jacks
1106leah wins the pot (821,460) with three of a kind, Sevens
*** SUMMARY ***
Total pot 821,460 Rake 0
Board: [9h 5c 6h Kd 7h]
Seat 2: 1106leah showed [7s 7d] and won (821,460) with three of a kind, Sevens
Seat 3: thebirdman84 folded before the Flop
Seat 4: AZUR (button) folded before the Flop
Seat 5: dinhba86 (small blind) showed [Jh Jd] and lost with a pair of Jacks
Seat 6: spooling (big blind) folded before the Flop
Seat 8: ClaRoyal folded before the Flop
Seat 9: JohnyFilpo5 folded before the Flop

I have never been owned more playing poker (except probably HU against Dave when he’s trying). I was kicking myself at this point as my comfortable stack should have been gone. Also at this point you would guess that the people at this table are pretty pissed at me because I have the chip lead in the tourney purely because of suckouts. But still, three hands later the main guy that is pissed wants to take his 34 up against my AQ…way to make your stand there.

Full Tilt Poker Game #8365623820: Early Double - A (63515970), Table 38 - 6000/12000 Ante 1500 - No Limit Hold'em - 21:02:38 ET - 2008/10/05
Seat 2: 1106leah (818,460)
Seat 3: thebirdman84 (166,633)
Seat 4: AZUR (164,913)
Seat 5: dinhba86 (195,121)
Seat 6: spooling (70,530)
Seat 8: ClaRoyal (94,258)
Seat 9: JohnyFilpo5 (102,877)
1106leah antes 1,500
thebirdman84 antes 1,500
AZUR antes 1,500
dinhba86 antes 1,500
spooling antes 1,500
ClaRoyal antes 1,500
JohnyFilpo5 antes 1,500
JohnyFilpo5 posts the small blind of 6,000
1106leah posts the big blind of 12,000
The button is in seat #8
*** HOLE CARDS ***
Dealt to 1106leah [Ah Qs]
thebirdman84 folds
AZUR folds
dinhba86 folds
spooling has 15 seconds left to act
spooling calls 12,000
ClaRoyal folds
JohnyFilpo5 folds
1106leah raises to 816,960, and is all in
spooling calls 57,030, and is all in
1106leah shows [Ah Qs]
spooling shows [3c 4c]
Uncalled bet of 747,930 returned to 1106leah
*** FLOP *** [Jc Ks 7s]
*** TURN *** [Jc Ks 7s] [2s]
*** RIVER *** [Jc Ks 7s 2s] [3s]
1106leah shows a flush, King high
spooling shows a pair of Threes
1106leah wins the pot (154,560) with a flush, King high
spooling stands up
*** SUMMARY ***
Total pot 154,560 Rake 0
Board: [Jc Ks 7s 2s 3s]
Seat 2: 1106leah (big blind) showed [Ah Qs] and won (154,560) with a flush, King high
Seat 3: thebirdman84 folded before the Flop
Seat 4: AZUR folded before the Flop
Seat 5: dinhba86 folded before the Flop
Seat 6: spooling showed [3c 4c] and lost with a pair of Threes
Seat 8: ClaRoyal (button) folded before the Flop
Seat 9: JohnyFilpo5 (small blind) folded before the Flop

This gave me the chip by 3 times second place with 13 left. After losing a decent sized pot to start the final table to that stupid dinhba86 (who owned me and would go away) where I was ahead for once, I went back to my old ways of getting it in bad:

Full Tilt Poker Game #8365841409: Early Double - A (63515970), Table 38 - 10000/20000 Ante 2500 - No Limit Hold'em - 21:18:33 ET - 2008/10/05
Seat 1: JHenrikK (220,966)
Seat 2: 1106leah (684,490)
Seat 3: bergsonite (288,016)
Seat 4: AZUR (223,669)
Seat 5: dinhba86 (531,879)
Seat 6: SNOWMANN99 (143,529)
Seat 7: Get Derty (293,208)
Seat 8: SxyDadMk (316,489)
Seat 9: JohnyFilpo5 (205,754)
JHenrikK antes 2,500
1106leah antes 2,500
bergsonite antes 2,500
AZUR antes 2,500
dinhba86 antes 2,500
SNOWMANN99 antes 2,500
Get Derty antes 2,500
SxyDadMk antes 2,500
JohnyFilpo5 antes 2,500
SNOWMANN99 posts the small blind of 10,000
Get Derty posts the big blind of 20,000
The button is in seat #5
*** HOLE CARDS ***
Dealt to 1106leah [As Qs]
SxyDadMk folds
JohnyFilpo5 folds
JHenrikK folds
1106leah has 15 seconds left to act
1106leah raises to 46,000
bergsonite folds
AZUR folds
dinhba86 folds
SNOWMANN99 raises to 141,029, and is all in
Get Derty folds
1106leah calls 95,029
SNOWMANN99 shows [Qc Qh]
1106leah shows [As Qs]
*** FLOP *** [9s 7s 5d]
*** TURN *** [9s 7s 5d] [5h]
*** RIVER *** [9s 7s 5d 5h] [Ac]
SNOWMANN99 shows two pair, Queens and Fives
1106leah shows two pair, Aces and Fives
1106leah wins the pot (324,558) with two pair, Aces and Fives
SNOWMANN99 stands up
*** SUMMARY ***
Total pot 324,558 Rake 0
Board: [9s 7s 5d 5h Ac]
Seat 1: JHenrikK folded before the Flop
Seat 2: 1106leah showed [As Qs] and won (324,558) with two pair, Aces and Fives
Seat 3: bergsonite folded before the Flop
Seat 4: AZUR folded before the Flop
Seat 5: dinhba86 (button) folded before the Flop
Seat 6: SNOWMANN99 (small blind) showed [Qc Qh] and lost with two pair, Queens and Fives
Seat 7: Get Derty (big blind) folded before the Flop
Seat 8: SxyDadMk folded before the Flop
Seat 9: JohnyFilpo5 folded before the Flop

After that nice pot, dinhba86 finally gets eliminated. Amazingly, we were in the same seats from the first hour until then. A little later with five left, I had to put one more beat on someone:

Full Tilt Poker Game #8366235464: Early Double - A (63515970), Table 38 - 15000/30000 Ante 4000 - No Limit Hold'em - 21:47:19 ET - 2008/10/05
Seat 1: JHenrikK (280,916)
Seat 2: 1106leah (1,084,261)
Seat 3: bergsonite (212,032)
Seat 4: AZUR (1,123,302)
Seat 8: SxyDadMk (207,489)
JHenrikK antes 4,000
1106leah antes 4,000
bergsonite antes 4,000
AZUR antes 4,000
SxyDadMk antes 4,000
AZUR posts the small blind of 15,000
SxyDadMk posts the big blind of 30,000
The button is in seat #3
*** HOLE CARDS ***
Dealt to 1106leah [Jc Td]
JHenrikK folds
1106leah raises to 63,000
bergsonite folds
AZUR folds
SxyDadMk calls 33,000
*** FLOP *** [5c 7s 2d]
SxyDadMk checks
1106leah bets 161,000
SxyDadMk calls 140,489, and is all in
1106leah shows [Jc Td]
SxyDadMk shows [5s Qs]
Uncalled bet of 20,511 returned to 1106leah
*** TURN *** [5c 7s 2d] [Th]
*** RIVER *** [5c 7s 2d Th] [9h]
1106leah shows a pair of Tens
SxyDadMk shows a pair of Fives
1106leah wins the pot (441,978) with a pair of Tens
SxyDadMk stands up
*** SUMMARY ***
Total pot 441,978 Rake 0
Board: [5c 7s 2d Th 9h]
Seat 1: JHenrikK folded before the Flop
Seat 2: 1106leah showed [Jc Td] and won (441,978) with a pair of Tens
Seat 3: bergsonite (button) folded before the Flop
Seat 4: AZUR (small blind) folded before the Flop
Seat 8: SxyDadMk (big blind) showed [5s Qs] and lost with a pair of Fives

I got down to HU against AZUR with I believe a 6:1 chip lead. He grinded to a 2:1 lead. I grinded back and then with another 6:1 lead, I finally put him out with 22 against Q3 all in pf. Board came X2XXX to ship me daily double A. I’m fortunate. I am extremely pumped! I never honestly believed it until to day, but sometimes it’s better to be lucky than good.

Funny hand from the other day

2008-10-02T01:38:00.002-04:00

I forgot to post this hand I got a small chuckle out of about 4 or 5 days ago.

PokerStars Game #20720232318: Tournament #109332343, $2.00+$0.20 Hold'em No Limit - Match Round I, Level II (15/30) - 2008/09/26 20:24:32 ET
Table '109332343 253' 4-max Seat #3 is the button
Seat 1: CU_bball (4650 in chips)
Seat 3: zizzzzz (1350 in chips)
zizzzzz: posts small blind 15
CU_bball: posts big blind 30
*** HOLE CARDS ***
Dealt to CU_bball [2s 3c]
zizzzzz: calls 15
CU_bball: checks
*** FLOP *** [Ac Td 7s]
CU_bball: checks
zizzzzz: checks
*** TURN *** [Ac Td 7s] [9d]
CU_bball: checks
zizzzzz: checks
*** RIVER *** [Ac Td 7s 9d] [As]
CU_bball: checks
zizzzzz: folds
CU_bball collected 60 from pot
CU_bball: doesn't show hand
*** SUMMARY ***
Total pot 60 Rake 0
Board [Ac Td 7s 9d As]
Seat 1: CU_bball (big blind) collected (60)
Seat 3: zizzzzz (button) (small blind) folded on the River

Ship the 60 chips with the nut low. Thank you very much. I can't believe this wasn't on Cake Poker.

Halfway through the week. I'm working for the weekend!

The Past Week

2008-09-30T11:20:00.001-04:00

Last week was pretty different. I had Monday off which ended up being sweet with the relaxation/poker time. Poker truly is what I do to relax. I love just having at least one day each weekend to just sit on the couch and play some poker with football on in the background. Having that day kind of rejuvenates me. Anyway, Tuesday I taught I went to school and taught. I was talked into being a reader at the quiz bowl the next day. So Wednesday, I read questions from 8-2 for like 24 different schools here at the Seward Civic Center. It was actually a blast. My reading skills definitely improved. Some of the schools there were schools that other Concordia student teachers teach and the other student teachers said that the kids really enjoyed when they had their competition in my room where I was the reader. The questions were extremely hard. I would guess that only 15% of the questions were answered correctly by either team. Rarely did one team out-buzz the other team. Only one person would know the answer, if any. The quiz bowl was a good time though. Thursday I taught again. Thursday night and all day Friday I had teacher workshops at Concordia, which were kind of lame but oh well. I learned a little.

This weekend was fun. Saturday I went into Lincoln with some friends and enjoyed the bars. I met up with my buddy from the Nebraska basketball team, Nick Krenk. Lincoln was sure jam packed after the Nebraska/Virginia Tech game. Most of the bars had absurd cover charges because it was game night ☹ But we found a good place called Woody’s were there were a lot of people I knew from Concordia.

I played in some tourneys Sunday night and struck out in all of them. I am really streaky. It seems I either cash in a bunch or I bust out of all of them. I think I make some bad plays out of frustration after I get eliminated in one. I need to stop that.

Last night we were eliminated in the first round of the ultimate Frisbee tournament by one point, which was disappointing. We played well though as we were probably a 6 point underdog. Kickball and flag football are next!

I was observed in my health class just an hour ago by my university supervisor in what was my first health lesson taught. It went okay even though I was a little nervous. We talked about the circulatory system, which I know fairly well, but I was definitely not an expert on the parts of the heart. So I struggled through that part. I wish I wish I would have studied up more about it before I taught it. It would have went a lot more smooth.

I don't know what is going on the rest of the week besides teaching and basketball.

Nice Score

2008-09-24T01:25:00.002-04:00

Yesterday, I played in some tourneys and had a nice score in the $32,000 guaranteed, $22 buy in, on stars. I finished 4th for a nice little payday. It is amazing what the thought of money does to a person. Even with the big score, all I think about is that if I outlasted one more guy, I would have made $1K more. If I would have won, I ship 4K more to the bank. Oh well though. I just need to thank God for the skill and luck involved with grinding through 1900 people for a 4th place finish.

I know I have said this before, but I don’t think I have played better poker than I did yesterday. The tournament lasted nearly eight hours and in the final four hours, I literally showed down only three hands. I did not show a hand during the fourth and fifth hours while increasing my stack. In the sixth hour, I had about 15 bbs and I pushed in the sb with Ks7d. The bb with 9 bbs auto calls with Kh9h. The flop comes KJ9 all diamonds. Turn X. River 5d! This put me above average. That would have almost crippled me. In the 7th hour, this crazy hand came up:

PokerStars Game #20615062726: Tournament #109499628, $20+$2 Hold'em No Limit - Level XXIV (8000/16000) - 2008/09/22 18:25:12 ET
Table '109499628 60' 9-max Seat #1 is the button
Seat 1: HotKarlMC (658413 in chips)
Seat 2: 52tigerback (399306 in chips)
Seat 3: CU_bball (165032 in chips)
Seat 6: St@r-K (457406 in chips)
Seat 7: NoKidding (333598 in chips)
Seat 9: moglie81 (278801 in chips)
HotKarlMC: posts the ante 1600
52tigerback: posts the ante 1600
CU_bball: posts the ante 1600
St@r-K: posts the ante 1600
NoKidding: posts the ante 1600
moglie81: posts the ante 1600
52tigerback: posts small blind 8000
CU_bball: posts big blind 16000
*** HOLE CARDS ***
Dealt to CU_bball [Ac As]
St@r-K: folds
NoKidding: raises 32000 to 48000
moglie81: folds
HotKarlMC: raises 107555 to 155555
52tigerback: raises 242151 to 397706 and is all-in
CU_bball: calls 147432 and is all-in
NoKidding: folds
HotKarlMC: folds
Uncalled bet (234274) returned to 52tigerback
*** FLOP *** [Ts 4s 8d]
moglie81 said, "wow"
*** TURN *** [Ts 4s 8d] [7d]
*** RIVER *** [Ts 4s 8d 7d] [Qh]
*** SHOW DOWN ***
52tigerback: shows [Kd Ks] (a pair of Kings)
CU_bball: shows [Ac As] (a pair of Aces)
CU_bball collected 540019 from pot
*** SUMMARY ***
Total pot 540019 Rake 0
Board [Ts 4s 8d 7d Qh]
Seat 1: HotKarlMC (button) folded before Flop
Seat 2: 52tigerback (small blind) showed [Kd Ks] and lost with a pair of Kings
Seat 3: CU_bball (big blind) showed [Ac As] and won (540019) with a pair of Aces
Seat 6: St@r-K folded before Flop (didn't bet)
Seat 7: NoKidding folded before Flop
Seat 9: moglie81 folded before Flop (didn't bet)

I went from the short stack at the table to chip leader at the table in that hand with 12 or 13 people remaining. I was up to 4th overall because the other table had a ton of huge stacks. Then I just grinded. I picked great stealing spots and made it all the way to four left. I was the short stack with 6 or 7 bbs. One person had just a little more than me (he ended up winning it) and no one had more than 20 bbs if I recall correctly. So it was anybody’s ballgame. It was folded to me in the sb and for the 3rd straight round of it folding to me in the sb, I had an easy push with 10 10. BB, calls with QJc. He flops a Q and I’m out in 4th. It was sweet to have a huge score, but to leave 4K out on the table is disappointing. Anything short of winning is a disappointment in poker…unless you suckout through an entire tournament and donk your way into a decent to big score, which we have all done in the past haha. I am extremely happy though overall and am ready to get on with my week.

I also shallow cashed in 3 out of 6 other tourneys yesterday including a 48th out of 1500 for a $10 win in a $3 tourney.

Edit: I played a $12 turbo and took 4th... I love those 4th's. I need to improve my 4 handed and smaller games.

September 21, 2008

2008-09-21T23:45:00.001-04:00

This last week went by really fast which is good because that usually means things are going well. Life is going pretty good as teaching is becoming easier and easier. The kids are starting to get used to me being their teacher and I haven’t really had any problems. My day is pretty nice. Seward High has block scheduling, which is 4-hour and a half periods. I really like this for PE as we can do some sort of fitness activity followed by a game. In high school, I felt like I was spending half the time changing clothes in PE. Anyway, I teach health first which can seem like a long period (I couldn’t imagine having to sit in a math or English class for an hour and a half at a time as a student). That class isn’t that bad though. I’ll probably take over for that fully this next week. After that, I have a prep period. I can easily get everything I need to done during this time. I even leave to get my allergy shots during this time some days. My cooperating teacher says that he never really has to do anything outside of the school day to prepare for class because this prep period is so long. After my prep, I have a PE class followed by lunch and then another PE class to end the day. So my schedule is pretty good.

Leah said something the other day that really hit home. She said that PE and health education are really the only subjects that every student will use the rest of their lives. I already knew that our society really needs good health and PE teachers, but that statement makes me think of them as even more important. Promoting lifetime wellness is extremely important to me and I need to emphasize that in my teaching. I do not want my students to stop being physically active or quit making healthy decisions after they are done with my class. I’ll never forget three summers ago in Vegas when I was at a buffet with Mats Iremark of Sweden and took a picture of a fat person in a motorized scooter. He then put it in his blog with a caption of a “typical American.” That’s sad, but it’s becoming true.

Intramural volleyball ended in a sad note as we lost in the championship game to a team that is unbelievably good. On a good note though, we improved a ton throughout the season as I would guess that we were maybe the 5th best team going in because we had really never played sand volleyball. When you have good guy athletes and some good girls that have played volleyball in the past, the improvement goes up exponentially. By the end, we were right there with the best team. We won the first set, but lost the last two sets devastatingly to keep me from winning my first intramural championship. It was my 3rd second (coed dodgeball and men’s ultimate Frisbee were the others last year).

Saturday, however, I finally got my first intramural championship as Leah and I paired up for coed mixed doubles. We played a tournament and we played well. It was the first time we had played doubles together and it was so much fun. We played some good teams with ex-tennis players and the current tennis coach. We won the championship match 8-3. I really want to play in more tennis tournaments with Leah. I need to get a lot better, though, because the male tennis player needs to be sickly good in order to have a good mixed doubles team.

I get tomorrow off from school because it is a teacher meetings and work day. My co-op is the man as he told me I should just stay home. So I will try to get some random errands done. It should be nice.

Update

2008-09-09T01:07:00.002-04:00

Well we are two weeks into school and it is going well. My morning classes are tough only because they are early. I just can't get myself to go to bed early. It's past midnight as I write this haha. I seem to remember my old roommate Dave Anderson going to bed around 10 during his student teaching semester...what a party pooper! jk Dave. I am lacking on sleep but I'm surviving. I did my final undergraduate presentation this morning and it went well. Now I just have to sit through three more days of other peoples' presentations. After that, I will be student teaching the full day at Seward High.

I taught my first classes today in PE. We are starting our basketball unit, conveniently. The classes went fairly well. My cooperating teacher gave me some good pointers after the first class period which I used in the second. Unbelievably, the kids seem to like me and we have a good time.

Preseason basketball is under way and it is pretty exciting. Besides the fact that our guys are not in great shape, we have a lot of talent. We, as coaches, are going to have a lot of options and a lot of experimenting to do before our opening game. We have a 6’8” Serbian transfer from Montana Tech. He scored 20 points against Boise State last year. I think he will easily be top five in the conference in scoring, if not first. It is weird to say that we have a lot of depth at our big positions. Not too many teams at any level can say that they have too many big men. Our situation is kind of the other way around. I have no doubts that it is going to be a better season than the two previous ones in which we won 10 games each.

We started our Intramural 4 on 4 sand volleyball last night and crushed our opponents. I think we have a good chance of winning the whole thing. It kind of depends on how our weakest link, me, comes through in the clutch. Our team includes Leah and me, our good friends Ben and Ashley (engaged- Leah is maid of honor), the women’s basketball coach Drew Olson, and Ben’s sister Faith. Our girls have all played a lot of volleyball in the past and our guys are just good athletes. I hope we can come out on top of the other 21 teams.

Intramural mixed doubles tennis is coming up and I am pumped for that. Since Leah is foregoing her senior year of college tennis because of student teaching next semester, we are able to team up for intramurals. I am 99% sure that we are the two best non-collegiate tennis players on campus. So we should roll. This summer I lost to our men’s number one player 6-2, 6-4, 6-4 and I have improved a lot since. I am just loving tennis right now. I bought a nice new racket on ebay after breaking a string and wearing the grip away. I am waiting anxiously.

I have been missing my friends that have moved on from here even though I haven’t had much free time anyway. Between teaching, classes, basketball, Leah, intramurals, playing tennis here and there with Dusan (the Serbian transfer) and homework, I barely have had time to watch the US Open (Federer is the man!), Football, and Prison Break. I don’t know when I am going to fit in The Office, South Park, and Entourage, which all start up in the next few weeks.

Poker news: I play in very few tourneys when I’m watching football and putting off going to sleep. While I was watching football Sunday afternoon, I took 7th in a $12 180 person sng. I was chip leader with 30, 20, and 10 people left. So that was kind of a disappointing finish. Then that night, I saw that Jon Little (along with Moneymaker, Orel Hershiser, and other online pros that I am familiar with) was still in the 10K WCOOP event with 25 left, so I decided to watch and play another one and I took 3rd. I was chip leader once again with 4 left and lost a huge coin flip. I hate not winning, but profit is profit I guess. It seems that I always do well in those after not playing them for a while. Whenever I just decided to grind in a bunch of those $12 sngs, I suck.

Jon took 7th when he made an interesting call against the chip leader (he was still 2nd or 3rd in chips if he folds the river) with A5 on a 245TQ board. The chip leader had 45. Congrats though to Jon for profiting over 90K.

Well, this was going to be short, but I hate going to sleep. So I rambled.

Back in Nebraska, ready for school

2008-08-23T22:12:00.002-04:00

Well I’m back in Nebraska and I’m ready to finish up school. I had a good last week with my family as we got my sister ready for her first year of college. I went and played two nights of the 10/20 game and lost $600. Luckily I was being staked by the table owner who also plays in the game. The second night I was there, he was on the most amazing heater I have ever seen. After buying in for $500, he had over $3500 in front of him after only a few hours. He was getting so cocky that he started playing blind for fun and he was just winning everything blind too. Some hands he would wait until after the river to look while saying, “I must have a flush.” Sure enough, he would flip over a runner runner flush to bad beat Aces. It was just hilarious. Some of the other players were getting so pissed and leave, but I’m sure they came back though the next night. I just have never seen a rush like that, he didn’t even get paid off on many of his hands. He flopped at least trips every other hand it seemed. I ran horribly those two nights. For example, I ran 88 into 22 on a flop of 822. Thankfully, there was a $300 cap to the pots in Montana and there were two other guys in the hand so I didn’t even lose $100 on the hand. Even though the offer is always available, I don’t think I’ll have him stake me again. I just feel awful when I lose someone else’s money. I’ll probably just avoid that game all together.

I took my car in for a random check up on Friday of last week after I blogged and found out that my brakes were worn into the rotor (whatever that means…I don’t know cars). Also, my cooling tank is leaking. I have had problems with my car overheating when I go warm places such as Las Vegas and South Padre Island and have had to continually add coolant. Finally, a car shop told me what I already knew in that my cooling system was leaking. Others have said that there are no problems :( This place also said that it is using oil too. So yeah, the end is in sight for my car. My family and I decided that the best solution is to fix the breaks and then just keep an eye on my fluid levels and temperature gage and try to get my car to Nebraska. So we spent the over $500 to fix the breaks I drove to NE on Wednesday.

I stopped at Leah’s house for Wednesday and Thursday night before leaving early yesterday morning to meet Dave and Rebecca in Lincoln for breakfast. Nate and Nick joined as well. The Anderson’s were driving through because Dave got the job as the new Director of Basketball Operations at Lehigh University. This is a huge gig for him as he wants to be a Division I college basketball coach! Congratulations and best of luck Dave!

I spent the rest of yesterday unpacking and running errands. I wrote my last check to Concordia which is a great feeling! Last night then, some of my buddies came over and we watched some Olympics. I am going to be sad when they end tomorrow. Our basketball team needs to finish the deal over Spain! I am pretty confident.

Today I played some poker, I won a few small satellites and had a few shallow cashes for a positive day. Congrats to my friend David Jabs for double cashing in the early daily doubles today and may have the best combined finishes with I believe a 42nd and 45th finish. He is still waiting to see if he did have the best finishes. Tonight, some of my old college friends are in town playing in the alumni soccer game, so we are going to hang out tonight. It should be a fun one.

Tomorrow I am going to watch the USA basketball team win gold, help Leah unpack, and then who knows? School starts Monday. I have to be in class at 7:30 ewww!!!

Last Two Days

2008-08-15T04:01:00.002-04:00

Yesterday afternoon, my family went tubing on a different section of the Stillwater River that we have never done before. This was the most intense tubing ride I have ever been on. It turned out to be an hour and a half ride of almost all rapids. Some parts were fairly dangerous. I think the few rafters we saw thought we were crazy trying to go down that river in single inner tubes. This is definitely something I would love to do with a group of strong friends who can swim well. It was a way bigger adrenaline rush than any rollercoaster I have ever been on. However, I was not that comfortable with my parents and sister on the river, but they handled the rapids really well.

Today, I watched the USA basketball team play pretty well against Greece which really made me happy. I am just so nervous going into those games because the other countries have nothing to lose and we have everything to lose, being the big favorite. As recent history has shown, you just never know what can happen when a loose team with no pressure takes on a huge favorite whose country will crush them if they do not win. Anyway, we are on the right track and I hope we finish it off.

After the game I made my daily trip to my grandparents’ house. I then came home and watched some more Olympics before going to the 10/20 game card room to talk to the owner of the 10/20 table. I know this guy fairly well and I thought there was a chance that he would stake me if I asked. I thought it wouldn’t hurt, so I went and asked. He agreed immediately on a 50/50 chop of my winnings. So I was ready to play when I realized that Thursday nights I guess are 5/10 Omaha nights. So that will have to wait until tomorrow night. Hopefully I can win some money for him tomorrow and the staking continues. I just don’t feel comfortable playing that game under rolled even though I know I’m by far the best player at that table. I left that card room wanting to play some poker and I remembered that I had this free $20 in chips coupon to this other 3/6 game in town. I must have signed up to be a VIP player or something in May because I received this coupon in the mail for my birthday. I bought in for $130 for $150 in chips. I grinded for the two hours required to use the coupon and cashed out for $171.

After playing, I called up an old high school friend, Zim, who I haven’t seen in at least three years and went over to his place for about an hour. We talked for a good hour before I headed home.

I came home and immediately hoped onto Cake. I barely was able to register for the $5 rebuy and the $1500 guaranteed $6 buy in 6 max turbo. I failed to cash in what would have been my 4th straight Cake rebuy tournament cash when I busted about 10 short of the money. I played well in all but one hand in the $6 tourney though and took 4th out of 284. I think I must love having the chip lead with 4 left and taking 4th in these turbos. I made a bad play 4 handed when the BB lost connection. The very next hand as the BB was sitting out with 4 left blinds 4K/8K. UTG was 2nd in chips and he raised to 30K because I thought he was trying to steal the BB chips as he was sitting out. He raised very fast and I just thought he wasn’t strong. Button folds and I push for 300K with Q2. He autocalls with AK and the board comes AKXXX to put me down to 40K and the shortstack. I busted 2 hands later when I pushed with 810 and same guy calls out of the SB with A5 and the board comes another AKXXX to send me to the rail. In hindsight of course that Q2 play by me was completely unnecessary because the guy on my right was very tight and the other guy was sitting out, even though it was only for like 3 hands. There is no need for me to sacrifice my chip lead to take down a 42K pot with Q2. I don’t know though, I took down pots making plays like that throughout the tourney that got me to that point without showing my hands. I’m just going to have to live with my decision I guess. 4th paid $128.

Alright time for bed.

Update

2008-08-12T22:15:00.002-04:00

Yesterday, I went and played some cards with my grandma. Then my sister and I went shopping. I love TJ Maxx and Ross! We are getting a Kohl’s here in Billings in the next month or so also. Along with Gordman’s, those four department stores are my favorite. They have good brands and they are fairly inexpensive. Anyway, I improved my teaching wardrobe some yesterday. Last night, I played 4 2-table sngs on tilt and took 4th in one. My parents and I went to a Billings Mustangs game at 7 as I was able to see Billings’ new baseball field. It was a huge step up from the previous one. The Billings Mustangs are the Cincinnati Reds Rookie league team. Yes, that is one below A league. Surprisingly, the Mustangs have had their share of stars play for them. Some examples are Paul O’Neill, Trevor Hoffman, Bret and Aaron Boone, Adam Dunn, Jay Bruce, George Brett, and more that I can’t remember at the moment. Even though the Mustangs lost, it was a good time though.

Today, I went and played cards once again with my grandma and then came home and watched the USA basketball game. I then played in 4 tourneys. I shallow cashed in 3 of them (one was another rebuy on cake where my strategy didn’t fail me once again). Another tourney I cashed in was a $5 6 max tourney on stars where this funny hand came up.

PokerStars Game #19572774656: Tournament #100867838, $5.00+$0.50 Hold'em No Limit - Level IX (200/400) - 2008/08/12 - 20:35:01 (ET)
Table '100867838 101' 6-max Seat #3 is the button
Seat 2: TooPoorToPay (11438 in chips)
Seat 3: titilijia (3070 in chips)
Seat 4: mmmmmmMike (6670 in chips)
Seat 5: CU_bball (20347 in chips)
Seat 6: gyppo pikey (11150 in chips)
TooPoorToPay: posts the ante 50
titilijia: posts the ante 50
mmmmmmMike: posts the ante 50
CU_bball: posts the ante 50
gyppo pikey: posts the ante 50
mmmmmmMike: posts small blind 200
CU_bball: posts big blind 400
*** HOLE CARDS ***
Dealt to CU_bball [7c 5c]
gyppo pikey: raises 800 to 1200
TooPoorToPay: folds
titilijia: folds
mmmmmmMike: folds
CU_bball: calls 800
*** FLOP *** [6c 8c 4c]
CU_bball: checks
gyppo pikey: bets 1200
CU_bball: calls 1200
*** TURN *** [6c 8c 4c] [9c]
CU_bball: checks
gyppo pikey: checks
*** RIVER *** [6c 8c 4c 9c] [6s]
CU_bball: bets 3200
gyppo pikey: raises 5200 to 8400
CU_bball: raises 5200 to 13600
gyppo pikey: calls 300 and is all-in
Uncalled bet (4900) returned to CU_bball
*** SHOW DOWN ***
CU_bball: shows [7c 5c] (a straight flush, Five to Nine)
gyppo pikey: shows [8d 8s] (a full house, Eights full of Sixes)
CU_bball collected 22650 from pot
*** SUMMARY ***
Total pot 22650 Rake 0
Board [6c 8c 4c 9c 6s]
Seat 2: TooPoorToPay folded before Flop (didn't bet)
Seat 3: titilijia (button) folded before Flop (didn't bet)
Seat 4: mmmmmmMike (small blind) folded before Flop
Seat 5: CU_bball (big blind) showed [7c 5c] and won (22650) with a straight flush, Five to Nine
Seat 6: gyppo pikey showed [8d 8s] and lost with a full house, Eights full of Sixes

I just plan on watching the Olympics tonight and maybe play a little. I’ll blog if I have a big score. Thanks for reading.

Heater over

2008-08-11T03:05:00.002-04:00

Well, my heater is over. I played in 5 small buy in tourneys today and just shallow cashed in the early double A. I got knocked out on this funny hand.

Full Tilt Poker Game #7595409553: Early Double - A (57652686), Table 8 - 800/1600 Ante 200 - No Limit Hold'em - 19:22:01 ET - 2008/08/10
Seat 2: sputneck (17,515)
Seat 3: KandD (32,197)
Seat 4: zibra (17,083)
Seat 5: hennerz0 (34,000)
Seat 6: nemo636 (18,529)
Seat 7: Bobber32 (43,226)
Seat 8: yzt777yzt (19,150)
Seat 9: 1106leah (11,305)
sputneck antes 200
KandD antes 200
zibra antes 200
hennerz0 antes 200
nemo636 antes 200
Bobber32 antes 200
yzt777yzt antes 200
1106leah antes 200
1106leah posts the small blind of 800
sputneck posts the big blind of 1,600
The button is in seat #8
*** HOLE CARDS ***
Dealt to 1106leah [Qc Qh]
KandD has 15 seconds left to act
KandD raises to 4,200
zibra folds
hennerz0 folds
nemo636 folds
Bobber32 folds
yzt777yzt folds
1106leah raises to 11,105, and is all in
sputneck folds
KandD has 15 seconds left to act
sloppy zoppy sits down
sloppy zoppy adds 38,303
KandD has requested TIME
KandD calls 6,905
1106leah shows [Qc Qh]
KandD shows [Qd Kd]
sputneck: 55
*** FLOP *** [4s 2d Kc]
*** TURN *** [4s 2d Kc] [Qs]
*** RIVER *** [4s 2d Kc Qs] [Kh]
1106leah shows a full house, Queens full of Kings
KandD shows a full house, Kings full of Queens
KandD wins the pot (25,410) with a full house, Kings full of Queens
1106leah stands up
*** SUMMARY ***
Total pot 25,410 Rake 0
Board: [4s 2d Kc Qs Kh]
Seat 2: sputneck (big blind) folded before the Flop
Seat 3: KandD showed [Qd Kd] and won (25,410) with a full house, Kings full of Queens
Seat 4: zibra folded before the Flop
Seat 5: hennerz0 folded before the Flop
Seat 6: nemo636 folded before the Flop
Seat 7: Bobber32 folded before the Flop
Seat 8: yzt777yzt (button) folded before the Flop
Seat 9: 1106leah (small blind) showed [Qc Qh] and lost with a full house, Queens full of Kings

Haha what a rollercoaster!!! I wasn’t too disappointed as we all have taken way worse beats and I wanted to go play the 10/20 live game in town anyway. I was thinking about playing this game most of the nights this week and make a couple grand, but maybe I should reconsider as I lost $400 today. I mixture of bad plays by me and horrible beats, my stack dwindled fairly quickly. I was at an ideal table with the crazy aggressive “gypsy,” as they call this darker skinned guy, on my right and the tight guys on my left. I 3 betted this guy a ton to isolate. But he seemed to have my number today. Just one of the multiple similar examples would be when I three bet him with KJ and we see a K high flop. Turn would be a 6 and he would check raise. He check raised complete bluffs many times before, so I called him down. He turned over K6. Like I said, this was just one example. I am going to take a few days off of live play and then decide whether or not I want to take one last shot at that game before I head back to Nebraska. I am without a doubt positive EV, but I feel too uncomfortable when I get down $100 right away. I should never feel that uncomfortable playing poker. It was a lot easier when I was playing this game and then going home and 4 tabling 20/40 online. The next option down though in Billings is a 3/6 game with one single $2 blind, which I do not like that much. So we’ll see.

After I blew that money, I met up with my buddy Colin. We went to the Montana Fair to meet up with his fiancé and sister. (I am going to be an usher in his wedding next June). I think tonight was a contest to see which girls could dress the skankiest. Last time I went, I was in high school and I just don’t remember it being that dirty. Sadly, I couldn’t look right or left without seeing a pregnant teenager. I noticed a new type of food they were selling…deep fried pepsi. This was just a head scratcher. I came home and googled it and I found this short clip about it. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fTAOBQmFdNk
What will they come up with next? Maybe something healthy?

USA basketball team put on a decent performance with a 101-70 victory. They still have many flaws, such as 3-point shooting. I saw some of the Spain/Greece game the other day and Spain really scares me. I also saw the most incredible swimming race tonight. We snuck by favored France in the 4X100 freestyle relay. We were down the whole race and the anchor had an unbelieveable last 30 meters or so to win by .08 seconds. I still can’t believe it! Phelps still has a chance at 8 gold medals. Go USA!

Great Saturday, Lots of Poker

2008-08-10T01:38:00.000-04:00

I woke up and went to my grandparents’ house for lunch. I then played some rummy and this game called “casino” with my grandma. I grew up playing a lot of different card games with her as well as a lot of pinochle with our extended family. Anyway, it was great to see my grandparents. They are always so thankful when I come over because, sadly, they do not do too much throughout the day.

After playing a few games with my grandma, I came home and played 6 tourneys. Here’s how they went:

$40 Cake poker satty that I freerolled into- Busted right before the first break.

$5 turbo on Stars- 4th out of 2206 for $661. This was a really good score for me. Sadly, I the chip lead with 4 left. I made what turned out to be a bad call with A10d in the bb after the button pushed all-in with AK. He held. I then was 4th in chips and I pushed with 7 10 and was called by KQ. He won. The $2300 for first would have been nice, but it didn’t happen. While I was focusing on this, I was grinding away at the early daily doubles on full tilt. Amazingly I was close to the money and I did not remember any previous hands.

$5 Daily double A- grinded into the money (216 get paid in each). Was down to 4.5 big blinds when the cutoff min raised. I pushed on the button with KJd and he of course called. He had 89 and the flop was 88X to knock me out. $9 was the payout.

$5 Daily double B- grinded into the money. I do not remember many hands but I patiently worked my way to a 13th place finish for $57. I received $13 for cashing in both after chopping 3% of the jackpot with the other double cashers. I was hoping to ship the best double finish for 2% of the jackpot for $385, but some guy finished 32nd and 67th for an average of 45th. I only averaged 70th.

$11 satty to the Sunday million on Stars- busted early.

$10 rebuy on Cake- I always join these Cake rebuys at the end of the first hour. I buy in and add on every time. So I received 4000 chips (close to average stack with around 25% of the entrants gone [lol at Cake players]) with the blinds at 75/150 for only $20. I have had a lot of success in the past doing this. Others use this strategy on Cake so I like to wait until there is a number divisible by 10 in entrants remaining before I register. This then puts me at a new table with only new entrants as well. So I am only going against guys with 4000 and 5500 (if they rebuy and add on) chips. I won this tourney in April using the same strategy. This strategy paid off once again. I ended up finishing 31st for $50.

I am playing some of the best tournament poker that I have ever played. It helps to have most of dominating hands hold up and to win a flips. So it looks like I invested $49.50 in buy-ins (excluding the fact that I had tourney chips on stars) and I cashed for $790 for a profit of $740. Great day online for me these days…and I wasn’t done with poker yet.

After going for a run and showering, I decided to ride the heater and go play a 10/20 game on one of the card rooms here in Billings. The same regulars were still there that played two years ago. They are all friendly as they asked me where I had been. I walked away after 3 hours up a nice $245. Needless to say, it was a great day of poker!

The USA plays China in basketball tomorrow. I’ll DVR it so I can go to church. They better not disappoint.

Had a good week. Back home in Montana.

2008-08-09T01:13:00.003-04:00

I'm getting better at the 12 hour drive from Seward to Billings each time. Surprisingly, I wasn't really tired at all when I arrived in Billings around 8:30 tonight. It is great to see my family for the first time since early June!

It was a fun and productive week. I worked the Nebraska basketball camp Mon-Thurs from 8:30-5:00 each day. It was tough getting up at 7am every morning but I guess I'm going to be a teacher and have to start getting used to it. The camp was great. I thought it was well organized and well ran. However, there was not much talent at the camp and I have never seen a group of more unmotivated campers. I had to remind the kids multiple times that their parents paid for the camp and they should at least hustle a little haha. I don't think it helped that there were seniors in high school playing against 7th graders. On a positive note, I met some awesome people who helped out with the camp including some of the Husker players. I hope to build on some of those relationships in the future. One can never know too many people in the basketball and coaching worlds. I have learned that many division I basketball coaches started out as just team managers. If I ever decide to pursue a division I college basketball coaching position, connections will play a vital role. I do not see that being realistic for me at this point however. Overall, Huskers camp was a great experience. Getting paid well (in my opinion) made it even better :)

Each day after camp I would drive back to Seward and play some online tourneys until around midnight. Monday, I won an $11 satellite into the Sunday Warm-Up. I cashed out $215 in tourney chips for future use. Tuesday, I made top 20 out of over 3000 in a freeroll on cake and qualified for the $40 buy-in “freeroll into millions 250K semi-final.” I will play that on Saturday at 2:00 mst. GL me! Wednesday, I took 13th in my favorite tourney in the world (the $15 buy-in 5K guaranteed that I won over a month ago) in my 2nd time playing it since for $60. Other than a few shallow cashes, I struck out in my other tourneys.

After camp was over on Thursday, I decided to head to the Horseshoe in Council Bluffs. I played in the $70 bounty at 7pm. I have a history of being an awful bounty player and I stayed true to form as I last a little over an hour and a half collecting zero bounties and finishing in like 60th out of 90 people. Fine. I hopped in one of the 3/6 limit tables after a few hands, I found the beautiful J5h in the cutoff after everyone limped. I make a suspect limp and we take a family pot to the flop: Kh Js 9h. It is bet and raised before it gets to me. Two people behind me call the $6 before I act lol. So I make it $9 trying to build the pot. No one folds. Turn 6c. Checked to me. I bet to build. Everyone calls. River 2h. Checked to me. I bet. Every one calls haha. I saw a two pair and a lower flush out there. I ship the monster pot. I sit for a while longer, lose some pots and I decide to play some $1/3 no limit. I left the 3/6 up $66. Almost even on the trip. I sit down at the NL table and the first hand I see as I’m sitting down, the guy on my left bets $150 into a $60 pot and I start licking my chops. It turns out we never get in a hand together the rest of the night. I play tight for a few rounds and feel out the table before this hand came up. Everyone folds to an aggressive player in the hijack who raises to $15. I make it $45 in the cutoff with AJo. The bb, an older guy whose was playing his second hand (he posted utg haha) flat calls. That scares me. Flop comes A83 rainbow. Checked around. Turn J. BB bets $45 with what has got to be AK or AQ. Hijack folds and I just call leaving him with $70 more to give me on the river. River 7. He bets $45. I put him in and he calls and shows AK. I ship the $250 pot. I keep on building from there for another hour and a half or so before I decide to call it quits when the blinds get to me.

As I’m racking my chips, I find 88 utg and limp. A 30-year-old dude raises to $13 from the cutoff, button calls, sb calls, I call. Flop comes 10 5 2. Checked around. Turn 5. Checked to me. I bet $25. The preflop raiser makes it $75 and the others fold. I go into the tank for the longest time that I have ever taken in my limited live poker experience. I know we are only on the turn, but as I think it out, he just wouldn’t play AA, KK, QQ, JJ, or even 10 10 like that. The only hands he possibly could have had was either AK, AQ, or AJ and he was making a play. He had $100 behind. So I decided I was going to either push or fold (comments for how I played this hand are welcome). So it was a $150 decision. I’m trying to get some read on him and I was 99% that he had AK, AQ, or AJ. But I just couldn’t pull the trigger. I am embarrassed to say this, but after more than 5 minutes of me changing my mind in my head whether it was worth it or not. I finally decide to fold, up $240 at NL. I folded face up and told him that he had AK and that I was too much of a tight wad. He shows AK and I tell him nice play. I was so mad at myself for not going with my gut. I asked him if he would have called an all in on the turn and he said yes (debatable) because he had half his stack in there and he might have been good since it took me so long. So in retrospect, I could have been 6 outted. Still, drove home to Seward so mad at myself for not just following my gut instinct and making the correct and pretty obvious play of pushing because he really only could have had those hands. So I ended up $230 on the night which I can’t complain with at all.

I woke up Friday morning, packed and hit the road. I made it to Billings and had a good talk with my parents. I’m going to sleep in tomorrow, go see my grandparents, and then play my Cake tourney that I qualified for. After that, I will probably get together with one of my best friends Colin, who I haven’t seen since New Year’s. That will be good. I have no other plans for the rest of my trip here so I will update as things happen.

Side note: In the last three days, two people have said that I look like Jon Heder from Napoleon Dynamite. One of my players I coached said that I look and talk like him. A guy at one of the poker tables said that I look like him from a certain angle. I don’t really see the resemblance as Jon Heder probably has girls flocking him, but I do have one of those faces that people always ask, “Do I know you from somewhere?” or “Have we ever met before, you look familiar?” Anyways, thanks for reading. Updates to come.

My year in review

2008-07-29T13:14:00.000-04:00

Well it has been over a year now since I have blogged and I have decided I am going to start writing again. It is probably not going to involve too much poker but I’ll try to add whatever poker content I can think of.

It has been a great year! I finished my senior year of college classes and man I am relieved! It is so good to be done with two teachers in particular who I could not handle for too much longer. My first year of coaching was pretty good. I mainly just sat back and learned as I tried to help in any ways possible. I think I want to eventually be a college basketball coach. I loved the recruiting aspect of coaching, however, we were unable to sign a few of our biggest recruits because Concordia was just not the place for them in their opinion or we didn’t have enough to offer them. We did sign some good kids though that may play a big role for us this next year. I will be back as an assistant coach at Concordia for my last year as I finish up my degree and I hope to play a bigger role as an assistant coach. I am really excited for this next and final semester for me. I will be student teaching at Seward High the whole semester. It is the ideal place for me as it is just 4 blocks away from my apartment. The gas prices shouldn’t be too much of an issue…thank God! I will be teaching freshman PE and Health and my co-op is Mr. Opfer who I have teacher aided for before. He is a really cool guy and it should be a great experience. After school every day, I will head over to Concordia to help with the basketball team.

This summer has been fun and fast so far. After school, I went to Montana for a few weeks. I kinda got bored because all of my high school friends were either still at college taking summer classes or moved away into the real world. I spent some nights playing church league softball, which is awesome, as well as played some poker. Online was horrible in May. I was mainly playing tournaments with buy-ins from 2-20 dollars. I think I struck out in every single one. I don’t think I cashed in more than 2% of them as I ran horrible and obviously must have played bad too. I would take breaks from online play a few nights and go play a 3/6 structured game at a card room in Billings. I never lost money in the like 4 nights I played there, but it so hard to win a lot because the rake makes it almost impossible. I was starting to really dislike the game of poker.

Also while I was in Billings, my sister graduated from high school. She was one of the 11 Valedictorians of her class of around 550. She did a great job on her graduation speech. I’m so proud of her. She is going to be attending Colorado State where she is going to study Biochemistry (whatever that is) next month.

June came around and I drove down to Nebraska. I picked up Leah and we went to my great friend Dave Anderson’s wedding in Minneapolis. That turned out to be three of the best days of my life…and I didn’t even get married. Dave had two main groups of friends there. There were the old college friends and the poker player friends. There were so many great guys in the wedding party; it was a true honor to be the best man in the wedding. Both groups got along so great though, it was like they all had known each other for years. Being the best man, I was pretty nervous because I had no clue what to do for the bachelor party because I had no familiarity with Minneapolis and I had only been to two weddings in my entire life. Dave bailed me out though and kind of set everything up. The first night there, the whole wedding party and girlfriends/wives went to PF Changs for dinner. After that, the guys and girls split up and went their separate ways. Dave had suggested Dave and Busters and man was that a good choice. Dave and Busters is like a Chuck E Cheeses for adults. There was a bar and a ton of arcade games. This just fed the poker players’ gamble and the non-poker players had a blast with it too. There was this basketball shooting game that was just fun as heck. Seven of us put down $20 in a pool with the best score take all. I was very confident, so I decided to gamble a little. Only 4 of us really had a legit chance of winning…thank God for fish like Shannon Shorr. I ended up shipping the dough with a score of 30. I think 24 was the next closest. Anyways, after giving the groom back his buy-in and buying shots for everyone, I ended up leaving Dave and Busters up a little. We combined all of our tickets to get Dave some things that were ridiculous, I don’t really even remember exactly what they were (maybe a shirt and Titlist Dave and Busters golf balls?). We ended up going back to hotel where we all went straight to the hospitality suite where there was a bath tub full of beer. This was just a great time! After 1-2 hours of sleep, the guys got up and played a tough round of golf. There were (if I remember right) four teams of 4-5 people where we scrabbled. In the 18 holes, our five-some used just two of my balls and they were both putts…I suck at golf. I quit teeing off after the 13th because I was sick of losing golf balls. Dave and his uncles ended up winning the contest. After golf, we went and made sure our tuxes all fit and then went to the rehearsal and dinner. The dinner was awesome as it was catered by Famous Dave’s. Haha just noticed Dave’s wedding had Dave and Busters and Famous Dave’s. Anyways, the next day we had pictures followed by the wedding. It just went so well. Everything from the colors of the wedding to the pastor was just excellent. The reception followed where we ate an amazing dinner, I gave my speech, and we danced a lot. It was awesome! I’m so glad Leah could come because we got to show off some of our dance moves we learned in dance class. PE teachers have to learn how to teach dance lol. As you can tell, I had a great time at the wedding and God bless Dave and Rebecca!

The day after the wedding, Leah and I drove back to Nebraska and I had to work basketball camps for the next week. After the camps, my friend Jon Whitson and I went one day to Council Bluffs, Iowa (right across the river from Omaha) to play in a few poker tournaments. The Horseshoe Casino had a $60 buy-in at 10am and a $35 buy-in at 2pm. We had been wanting to do this for a while. When we got to the casino and I could not talk Jon into playing in the $60 because it was too expensive, so I just played in it while he just hung out and watched. There were 25 people in it and I just grinded my way to the final table never really having more than the average stack. 5 people get paid, which is kind of a joke, but whatever. I doubled up with KJ against 77 with nine people left. This was the only time I had my money in and a call really the whole tournament without the nuts. We made it to the bubble and I had taken down tons of blinds because people wanted to make the money. Finally with 6 left, I’m 2nd in chips and I raised with J5 off in the hijack (I had been raising every pot). I turned to Whitson behind me and whispered, “I love Detroit”. Small blind who hated me because early on in the tourney, I limped with AA, he raised right behind me, I thought for like 2 minutes and pretended I was trying to get a read on him before finally pushing all in. He snap called with 99 and I shipped the pot. He really wanted to get me back since then. Anyways, he called in the sb and the chip leader (a over 60 year old nitty woman) called as well in the bb. The flop came A55 dink! The sb bets out 2K into like a 4K pot. The old nitty lady min raises to 4K. I call. Sb pushes all in for like 10K. bb snap calls. I am actually kind of nervous at this point. I decide on calling. Turn was an 8. She checks…phew. Now I know I’m good and I push. She calls and they both flip over AJ. I fade the one remaining ace on the river and I collect 80% of the chips in play with 5 people left. All the other people thanked me for getting them into the money. I ended up blind raising every pot from then on when I had any fold equity because they all wanted to keep moving up the pay scale. It was funny because every time they would push all in, I would have a good hand like 10 10. I think I had that hand four times at the final table. I knocked every one out and the guy who folded to a second place finish thanked me multiple times haha. When we got HU he had 2 big blinds left and I woke up with AA lol. I put him in and he calls with A8. The board comes XA8X8 lol, to ship me the $480 first place prize.

Jon and I played in the next $35 buy-in tourney where there was I think 42 players. I busted out around 30th and Jon amazingly wins the thing for $490. We swapped 10%, so I got a little more than my buy-in back, so that was nice. Two guys drive together from over an hour away to play in the only two tournaments that the Horseshoe Casino had that day and we ship them both. Jon made a great lay down at the final table where he folded JJ preflop to an under the gun raise and the other guys showed QQ afterwards. Well done Jon!

After Council Bluffs, I went to Hastings for Leah’s 21st birthday…finally. It was a good time as a few of her close college friends also came from out of town. Leah and I have now been dating for over 2 and a half years now. I can hardly believe it.

After Leah’s birthday, I then decided to head out to Vegas because Dave was being staked in the Main Event by Nick “Ahh Snap” Van Newkirk who happens to be one of the coolest guys I have ever met. So I went out to Vegas and I get there as Dave is in the middle of Day 1. I mainly just watched him the whole first day alongside Rebecca as he ended the day with a well above average stack. We stayed that night in this sick 1.2 million house that the guys who live there pay $12K in rent a month. It was probably the nicest house I will ever stay at in my life. However, I did not have a bed nor did Dave and Rebecca. So we decided to get a hotel room and chop the $30 a night cost at the Stratosphere. It actually wasn’t as awkward as one would think rooming with a newly married couple. The Stratosphere has 4 $60 buy-in tourneys a day, so Dave and I decided to hop in the remaining 3 after we checked in. We had no luck in the first two, and then we played the final tournament that started at midnight. I guess every first Monday of the month, the stratosphere doubles the first place prize. Since it was now Monday, we were playing for a lot more money. First place was $2400 and 2nd place was $600. They ended up paying I think 7 people with over 60 entrants. The fact is that I was dead tired throughout the whole tourney as we had started drinking and stopped drinking at least three times that day while playing. I was down to a big blind and a half with 13 to go and I was sitting at Dave’s table. I ended up shoving with Q6 and got 3 callers. The flop came KQX, checked around. Turn X, checked around. River 6, one guy bet, the others folded. He showed Q9 and I quadrupled up. It was a nice little 3 outer. I ended up cruising from there. Dave busted just short of the money at the final table when his 72o was bad beat by AA. After he got knocked out, everyone was begging for a chop. I was sitting around 4th and Dave said that there was no way I was chopping with those guys. It is actually common to see 9 way chops in these tourneys where everyone splits evenly because the blinds are so big lol. Still, I don’t know how the chip leader ever lets that happen. At this point, I can hardly think, so Dave is doing the math after each person is eliminated and they keep begging for a chop. Dave keeps telling them to give me first place money or no deal as my chip stack kept growing lol. We end up getting down to 2 handed as I win a few 40/60’s and 60/40s The other guy only has like 2 big blinds left, but 2 double ups and he’s chip leader. Dave suggested we give him $800 and he snap agreed as he wanted a chop the whole time lol. So I ran off with $2200. I tipped the dealers a hundred and gave Dave some bills for not letting me chop and we called it a night at 4am.

I went to bed extremely exhausted and incoherent. However, I could not sleep for like 45 minutes before it hit me that I hadn’t eaten since breakfast at the house at 10am. No wonder my brain couldn’t function. I can’t sleep on an empty stomach so I got out of bed and went a grabbed a sandwich. I quickly fell asleep after.

The next day I was thinking about all the live tournaments I have played in and I counted them all up. I had won an amazing 3 out of 9 live tournaments I have ever played in. I blogged about my $180 40 person tourney I had won in Billings last summer. That was a $1600 score I believe. I had also cashed in another one of those 9 tourneys. Those stats can only go one way from that…and they did. I played in all the “freeroll” tournaments (as they called them) that first Monday of the month and stuck out on the other three. I then played in two $65 buy-in tourneys at the Sahara (with a better structure than the Stratosphere and many more fish believe it or not) and I struck out on those the next few days.

Dave played his Day 2 on Wednesday and he was right next to the rail, so I could follow the action well. Rebecca and I watched him the entire day. We both loved it. He played flawless in all but one hand where he bad beat KK with AJ. Despite that hand, Dave played the big stack to near perfection though. He had a juicy table until high stakes online player David “Raptor” Benefield was moved to his table halfway through the day. Dave was no longer chipleader at his table. Then Dave started to go to work on Raptor though, defending every one of his blinds. I don’t remember Raptor winning a pot against Dave and they played a lot of them. Dave ended Day 2 with another comfortable, larger than average stack.

The next day Dave was at a table in the middle of all the other tables and I could not really stand watching from the rail so I went to the Bellagio to watch Shannon at the final table of the 5K and play some as well. I finally got in a 4/8 limit game and ran like God while taking breaks to check on Shannon here and there. Shannon was down to the final 5 so I cashed out my chips. I profited $190 in no more than 2 and a half hours of 4/8. I told you I ran like God. I cheered Shannon on as he played great poker. He ended up goating Jimmy Fricke into pushing all in with KQ and Shannon quickly called with AK. Flop came QXX and Shannon couldn’t catch up. It ended up being a 300K bad beat as he would have had 90% of the chips in play if he had won the pot and surely would have won the tourney. Shannon handled it with class though as always. We talked and I congratulated him as he’s cashing out for 127K before we parted ways. I went to play my second tourney at the Sahara and busted in the 3rd hour. I heard Dave had busted out of the Main Event so I headed back to the Stratosphere to talk to him. I decided I was going to leave the next day because I thought it would be good to caravan with them through the desert as my car had overheated that day. I played a little 1/2 no limit that night at the Stratosphere and profited $130. I had four short cash game sessions in Vegas (-$9 4/8 limit at the Venetian, +$2 1/2 no limit at the strat, +$190 4/8 at Bellagio, and +$130 1/2 no limit at the strat.) Maybe I should have played more cash games. I didn’t spend more than 6 hours total in these. We left the next day and apparently refilling my coolant was good enough to get my car back to Nebraska. Vegas was short, but it was so much fun. It is so nice leaving there with more money than I came with for the second straight and only times. Congrats to my friend Nate Hays for cashing in the main event for 41K and also to Dean Hamrick (a good friend of Dave’s who we had dinner with on day 2) for finishing 10th just short of the TV final table for 591K.

I got back to Nebraska and went to Leah’s house for a few days before I had to be back in Seward to work team camp. Team camp was on the 17th and the coaches went to Verdigre, NE the 20th-22th to put on an on-site camp there in northern Nebraska.

I got back to Seward and my brother stopped through town to stay with me for a few nights on his way down to Pensecola, FL, where he is moving to. We had a good couple of days before he took off on the morning of the 24th.

I decided to play in some online tourneys that day. I played well throughout the day (as I always seem to do after taking breaks). I cashed in multiple tourneys and ended up taking down the Cake 5K guaranteed $15 buy-in for over $1100. I was pretty pumped as it was the best online poker that I have ever played. I was chipleader with 28 left (30 got paid) with 250K in chips. Second place had 100K lol. I was chip leader barely and I got into a nice pot with the second place guy. He limps for 2K in early, I raise to 8K with AA, everyone else folds. Flop comes Q62 rainbow. He bets out 10K, I raise to 30K. He calls. We each had around 120K behind us going into the hand. Turn 7. He checks, I bet 45K, he calls. River K. He checks, I push all in for about another 45K, he auto calls with Q9o. I ship the 240K pot. I love Cake players! I surrendered my chip lead for one hand with around 8 left when the 2nd place guy knocked out the 3rd place guy. I reclaimed the lead the next hand with a blind steal and go on to win the tourney. I like online poker again! I have also been dabbling in some $.25/.50 Stud Hi/Lo and I think I want to start getting good at it. So we’ll see.

The next day I went to Hastings to work concessions stands with Leah for a nice $10 an hour. I worked 23 busy hours for the three days. So it was nice to pocket that cash.

The rest of the summer, I plan on working the University of Nebraska basketball camp August 4-7. Then I’ll head back to Montana following that for a little while before school starts. I plan on writing every week or so check it out if you desire.

In other news, three sets of my good friends have all gotten engaged within the last two months. Congrats to all of them! It is going to be a busy summer next year, but I am looking forward to it!

Sorry this was so long. It was a year recap though so forgive me.

Summer update and plans

2007-07-22T00:42:00.000-04:00

Things have been going okay. Last week, I went on a great trip to Mexico as a chaperone with my former high school youth group. It was a servant event in which we built a house for a family who lives in a tiny shack. We flew to El Paso, Texas on the Saturday the 7th and drove across the border to Juarez on Monday. We worked all the daylight hours from Monday through Thursday to finish the house. It was a lot of hard work, but it was well worth the feeling of accomplishment and seeing the family's faces after it was completed. We got back this last Saturday and I haven't really done much since then. I've played in the casinos a few nights and have had no success. I don't really get bored, but I have been a little lonely this week. I haven't seen Leah in over 3 weeks and all my close friends are not currently in Billings. One is fighting fires in California and the others are all interning in other cities.

Tomorrow, though, I am going on my first family vacation in a long time. We are going to head west, stay one night in Missoula to hang out and then continue on without my brother. Then we will go to Pullman, Washington to visit my uncle for a day. Finally, we will end up in Auburn, Washington (suburb of Seattle) to visit my grandma for another 6 or so days. It will be nice to have a change. I haven't been to Seattle in 3+ years and I am excited. Another positive is that my close friend, Duncan, is interning at Boeing in Seattle and I will be able to see him. We will probably catch a Mariners game as well as maybe go to their nice water park (if it is not raining too much).

We will return to Billings around the 30th and I don't have much planned for the next week or so other than trying to defend my Red Door tournament title on the 5th. Leah will be flying up on the 7th. I am very excited for that! We will hang out here for a week or so before driving down to Nebraska a week or two before school starts on the 28th (I think). This has been a pretty productive and relaxing summer so far. I am getting close to being refreshed enough to continue toward my degree and move on with my life.

Pictures of the building of the house are following.

Pictures of house in Mexico

2007-07-22T00:38:00.000-04:00

Starting with the frame

Pouring concrete

Walls

My sister working hard on the chicken wire (which the stucco will stick to).

Final pictures of house in Mexico

2007-07-22T00:09:00.000-04:00

Nice view of the unfinished house

Rich, Ben, and I. I hate dry wall!!!

Chris plastering on the stucco

The family

Everyone

First live poker tourney win!

2007-07-01T21:54:00.000-04:00

Wow, I don't think I have ever had so much fun playing poker. The tourney was a $75 + $25 (including a steak dinner) for 2000 chips. It also had 3 rebuys for 1000 chips each for $20 a piece that can be used at anytime. Finally, if you make it to the dinner break, you can buy a 2000 chip add on for $20. It is a weird and confusing structure, but I don't mind it anymore. There were 40 entrants. I didn't win a hand for the first two levels. Surprisingly, my table was very good and experienced. I just couldn't get anything going. I just kept dwindling down and kept using my rebuys when I thought I was too low. Anyway, we got to the dinner break, which was 3 hours in, and I had just under average stack without ever showing a hand. My table broke at the break and my rush began. I was at a perfect table with the aggressors on my right and the tighties on my left. I was getting good hands to raise with even though I was going to raise anyway. I got no action with JJ or AA. I probably stole blinds 6 times within the next hour and a half...and blinds were getting high. I got moved to the one other table with 20 people left and once again, the aggressors were on my right and the tighties were on my left. The 3 guys on my left were all under average stacks and only played premium hands. I took full advantage. Remarkably, 10 people get paid (10th - 6th get $75). With 12 people to go, I am chip leader and was raising every pot. A guy finally pushed all in after I raised and he had KK and I had to call with 10 3. The board came a sweet 10 3 6 X X to ship me the pot. The guys claims I didn't have the pot odds to call but, I raised to 6,000 and he had 10,000 total, so it was an obvious call. I just never looked back.

The final table was just glorious, the only two guys that could put a chink in my chip stack were on my direct right and once they folded, I was dominant. I raised every pot where the blinds weren't pot committed and I had fold equity. I probably only knocked out 4 of the final 13 people because I was fortunate never to run into a real monster other than that KK. We got to 4 people and I had 80% of the chips, and every hand that was unopened, I would pretend to look at my cards, then announce all in. (The blinds were monstrous, and pushing all in every hand was the correct play) It was great because they were just trying to out last each other and they pretty much handed me the tourney. I knocked out the 2nd chip stack in 4th, two hands later I knocked out the new 2nd chip stack, and the next hand I won the tourney when the guy didn't even have enough for the blind lol. It was just so much fun. I hate to sound cocky, but I thought I was 80% to win the tourney with 12 people left and 99.9% to win the tourney with 6 left. It was that easy. I love playing poker when I am not nervous for once second. I lost only two small pots the whole time after supper break when I raised without looking out of the sb and the bb was committed! Also, I was never all in the whole tourney. So I invested $180 and came away with $1624 after tipping the dealers $50. To top it off, all of the final tablers acted like gentlemen at the table to make it even more of a blast. I wish all tourneys could be that fun.

Life and summer plans

2007-05-25T02:38:00.001-04:00

It is good to be done with another semester and back home in Billings. I now have three more semesters left in school. Hopefully those will fly by so I can get on with my career. I am also really looking forward to coaching next year. It will be a great experience for me.

As for back home here, my mom underwent a successful major neck surgery today. I just got back from visiting her in Intensive Care. After hearing what they all had to do to her, I have been really nervous the last couple of days. Thankfully the surgery went well and she should only be in Intensive Care tonight and she could possibly be home tomorrow. She said the numbness in her hand was gone and her shoulder was no longer in pain so hopefully the operation fixed everything. I feel so awful for her because she has been through more physically than any other person I know: cancer that had reached her lymph nodes which doctors gave her a 3% chance of living, a disease that makes her constantly tired, and this problem with her spinal column that was gradually making parts of her body numb and weak, not to mention her awful allergies. God has definitely been with her throughout all of these troubles and I can not thank him enough. Heck, if she didn't survive cancer, I wouldn't be born. The doctors still don't know how she survived it since she chose not to do chemotherapy or any type of treatment because she was pregnant with my older brother at the time. I just thank God that he has kept her in my life.

In other news, my 21st birthday is coming up here on May 31st. Dave is flying in from Seward to celebrate and hang out in Montana for a little over a week. There is going to be a live poker tourney on the 3rd that we will probably play in. Other than that, I'll try to give him some sort of Montana experience. We will be driving back to Seward on June 6th, because he has to be back on the 7th and I am going to work basketball camps at Concordia from the 10th through the 23th. After that, I will probably spend a few days in Hastings with Leah before returning to Montana.

On July 7th, I will be chaperoning my high school youth group on a servant event down to Juarez, Mexico. We are going spend a week building a house for a family in need down there. It will be a pretty simple house, but hopefully we can help them out as well as spread our faith to them and other Mexicans. We will fly back to Billings on July 14th and I really have no idea what my plans are after that. That is the plan for now. I'll update once again when something interesting happens.

Live Poker

2007-05-21T03:16:00.000-04:00

I went to the casino today for the 3/6 limit game and it turned out to be a drunken NL game which was fun. I got there and everyone had overs chips which meant that if everyone in the pot has an overs chip, they are playing NL instead of 3/6. Anyway, I looked around at the table and saw a couple guys with $300+ so I decided to buy in for $200. The game (which has one $2 blind) immediately wakes me up when I sit down and see the guy on my left push all in for $100 with 35o after a raise and a reraise on a A4QT board with less than $50 in the pot. He got called by both and surprisingly his 4 outs were good, but he missed. Anyway, I sit down and play tight and watch the action. At this time we are 6 handed and 4 out of the other 5 guys were slurring when they talked. Let me tell you about this guy on my left (the 35o guy). He is a guy with 3 fingers on one hand and was wearing a Nascar hat. Every time something a bit odd happened at the table, for example, a flop all of the same suit, this guy would get up and yell in a hickish voice, "Only in America...Viva Montana!" I mean just when I thought Montana's reputation couldn't get any worse, I run into this guy and realize why we have that reputation. Anyway, it doesn't take me long before I realize that two of his brothers are at the same table with us and they are not quite as bad, but still big time hicks. I found out that they are work construction together. I need to set the scene a little more.

We get down to four handed... me and the three brothers. Seat 1 (really drunk guy who doesn't fold), seat 2 (sober brother who was awful), seat 3 (me), and seat 4 (Nascar drunk who doesn't fold and never misses an opportunity to splash $40 into an $8 pot or to push all in). So I sat back and waited and waited. I get AsAc and beautifully get it all in preflop (pot is capped at $300 in Montana) against KdQd and Kh9h. Board comes 8h6h8d4sTh and I lose the pot and my $100 in it. Oh well... I must continue. A little while later I get in a hand with seat 1 with KJ. I raise preflop to $7, he min raises me to $12, and I call. Flop comes K73 rainbow. He bets out $10 and I call. Turn comes a J. He bets $20 and I push for around $80 more and he autocalls with 66. LOL. River blanks and I ship the pot.

The night continues and amazingly the two guys get more drunk. Every pot for the next two hours had minimum of $150 in it. For example, everyone would limp and then the flop would come and Nascar dude would push all in for $200 into the $8 pot. Sometimes he would get called by second pair and they all took turns passing $150 to each other. It was insane to say the least. God, please give me a hand! Then this hand came up... Nascar raises to $10, Seat 1 min raises to $20, Seat 2 calls, I squeeze QQ out of the blind and push all in for $200 with the guaranteed best hand and not really wanting a call from Ace rag. Nascar frustratingly folds, Seat 1 folds, then they talk their brother, the sober one, into calling and he flips over AhTh. NO ACE!!! I faded the ace and ship the max $300 pot.

Alright, one last hand to tell about and it is probably the craziest hand I have ever seen, even crazier than the three guys with 56 all flopping two pair on the internet. It is getting late and Seat 1 takes a bathroom break. So we are playing three handed and Nascar has been playing blind for the past hour and a half, only looking at his cards when someone pushes all in on him (yes, he was pushing all in blind based on his stellar "reads" on his brothers). Oh crap, that reminds me of one more hand where he pushed all in blind on his sober brother on a board of A24J ($40 pot) and his brother finally called the $130 after 5 minutes of thinking with Q5. Nascar flips over 92 for the winner. River 9 for good measure. Anyway, back to the crazy hand. Nascar limps blind, Sober limps on the button, and I check with Qh8h out of the blind. Flop comes Jh6h3h, I check. Nascar bets $20 blind into the $6 pot, Sober raises to $60, I push all in 100% sure that I have the best hand. Nascar decides to peek at his cards and he repushes all in and sober calls fast. At this point, I still think I'm golden... probably up against the 7 high flush draw or pair of Jacks of Nascar and the K high flush draw of Sober. My heart sinks when Nascar flips over Kh5h for the King high flush. Then sober flips over Ah7h for the nuts. I then start chuckling and asked the dealer if he even shuffled. I said that the first burn was probably a heart and sure enough, it was the Th. Haha what a cooler! 3 handed and we all flop the nuts, 2nd nuts, and third nuts. The dealer and room manager were in awe, they took pictures of the board and the three hands. Oh well, I only lost $100 from that because of the $300 cap.

So I played for about 4 hours and made only $75 but it was the most exciting time ever. I have never been in a game where implied odds played more of a factor. I told the poker room manager to give me a call whenever those guys come back to play because I guess they come there every now and then. Enough is enough, I'll post some other time about my life.

Spring Break Pictures

2007-03-30T18:08:00.000-04:00

The best college basketball player in the country, Kevin Durant, at Big XII Tourney in OK City.

Flooding in Brownsville, Texas.

More flooding

Bridge from mainland to South Padre Island.

Arizona's best players, Chase Buddinger and Marcus Williams, against Purdue.

Joakim Noah jumping against Jackson State.

Brandon, Dave, and I at a Cajun food resturant on Bourbon Street.

Spring Break wrap up and other good stuff

2007-03-30T16:51:00.000-04:00

After the Big XII Tourney, we went to South Padre Island, Texas. Our hotel was on the mainland in Brownsville. We drove in rain most of the way from Austin to Brownsville. So we took the exit to our hotel and we found ourselves in a flood. The water was going over the hood of the car and we could feel the water hit below our feet. It was craziness! We had to park our car a block away from our hotel and wade the rest of the way to the hotel. Finally, the rain slowed down and we could get our car to the hotel. That was a fun little adventure. South Padre ended up being pretty cool. In retrospect, we should have forked over the extra money and stayed on the mainland because we would have met a lot more people and had an overall better experience. Oh well though. We learned for next time.

The Thursday of Spring Break we drove all the way to New Orleans from Brownsville. It was a long drive, but we made it. Nothing much happened that night other than walking Bourbon Street for the first time. I did not think that Bourbon Steet was anything special. It reminded me some of Amsterdam's red light district. It just isn't a very moral place. Anyway, I have experienced it and, like Amsterdam, I am in no hurry to return. New Orleans was fun though because of the NCAA tourney and I got to see my friend, Brandon, who drove down from Alabama.

The tourney was a great experience. We had upper level seats for all the sessions, but there were empty seats below. So at halftime of the first game of each session, we would move down to the the first or second row behind the benches because the ushers quit checking tickets at that point. We saw some good teams: Florida, Memphis (who Dave and I were unimpressed with), Creighton, Nevada, Purdue, and Arizona. We were kind of disappointed because the only really good game was the Nevada/Creighton game and our team, Creighton, ended up losing. We still had a great time seeing big time teams as well as maybe the repeat National Champions. During the Florida/Jackson State first round game, Dave was having some fun yelling at some of the Florida players as well as the coach, Billy Donovan. Dave was jokingly criticizing Donovan loudly, and Donovan turned around and glared at Dave. I will never forget that funny moment. Experiencing the NCAA tourney live was a cool experience.

That Friday night, we met up with Brandon and we went out and walked the streets and just had a blast hanging out. It was good to see him for the first time since the Party Poker cruise, where I met him, two years ago.

We left New Orleans immediately after the Sunday bball games. We drove alllllllll night long and ended up getting back to Seward at 11am. The 17 hour drive sucked and we decided we will probably never do that again. I didn't get much sleep at all when I wasn't driving but I finished out the trip fine. Overall, Spring Break was awesome!

Back at school, I finished up my exegetical in the two days after we returned. It is such a relief to not have that on my mind anymore. I have literally done less than one hour of homework in the week and a half since that paper was due.

Finally, in some fantastic news, I went to talk to Coach Schmidt about not playing basketball next year. I had a nice talk with him. I told him everything that was on my mind: the stress it caused me this year, how I have too many people ahead of me at my position, and just my loss of desire to improve over the summer. I told him how much I still love the game of basketball and that I still intend on being a coach when I take my first coaching job. Then, in maybe the shock of the century, he said, "Well Alex, I feel unfinished with you and we need guys like you in our program. What do you think about being our JV coach next year?" My jaw dropped to the floor. He then told me to think it through and get back to him next week. I was just in shock because I didn't think this guy cared about me at all being on his basketball team, much less ask me to be on his coaching staff. Anyway, this is a pretty easy decision because I won't have the stress of playing ball anymore and I will still be around the game and the team. Probably the biggest plus of this is that I will be able to put on my resume that I coached college basketball. So I told him yes this week and we will get all the details of the job figured out soon. I am really excited for next year now because I am ready to start my coaching career.

Sorry for such a long post, but I had a lot to catch up on. I'm going to try and get some pictures up.

Big XII Tourney

2007-03-10T21:49:00.000-05:00

Well, we went to the second round of the Big XII tourney on Friday and it was awesome. We bought upper level seats for both sessions but we were able to move down to the first couple rows for the games, which was sweet! Dave and I got to see Kansas, A & M, Texas, and probably the best of all, Kevin Durant. Today, we went and tried to get tickets for the Semis, but they were way too expensive, so we just went to a bar and watched the games. When we got back to Tulsa, where we are staying with Dave's aunt and uncle, we folfed a little at the park across the street. It has been a great start to our spring break. Hopefully it gets even better as the time goes.

Life

2007-03-04T23:41:00.000-05:00

I didn't think anyone read my blog, but I was wrong. So upon request, here is what is going on...

Basketball ended last week and I haven't been happier. It was a rough year that caused a created a ton of stress for me. Because of this, I am like 99% sure I am going to call it a career and forego my senior year. This last week without basketball has been great. I have had a lot of time to get on top of my homework and get ready for spring break. There is a chance that next year I will have too much time on my hands, but it will be worth it to not have the stress and frustration of another long, grueling season. The season was a rollercoaster ride for me. I was in the rotation, out of the rotation, in the rotation, and finished the season playing sparingly on defensive possessions. During this stretch, some of the younger guards proved to be better than me and earned their playing time. So it looks to be a very bleak chance that I would see playing time next year unless I become a lot better between now and then. The fact is, I have lost the drive that it takes to playing college basketball. I will still play a lot of basketball, but it is just going to be for fun. I still love the game so much and I have a desire to be a great coach. I am really excited for my first coaching job when I become a teacher. I have weighed all the positives and negatives to playing basketball next year and it is an obvious decision to not play. Just some of the positives include getting to see more of my brother's senior year of football at Montana and I get a Christmas break to go home and ski and see my high school friends. Though it is a really crucial decision, it is the correct one to call it a career.

Spring break...man I am excited! Dave and are going to have some fun. We are going to go down to Oklahoma City on Thursday and watch the Big XII conference tourney on Friday and Saturday. Tickets were sold out, but we are set on going, so hopefully we can get a reasonable price on tickets from a scalper. On Sunday, we are heading down to stay with a friend in Austin, TX on our way to South Padre Island, TX. This is supposedly a fun spring break destination so we are going to try it out for three days. From there we will drive all day on Thursday to New Orleans. Now here's the fun part. We have tickets to the first two rounds of the NCAA tourney on Friday the 16th and Sunday the 18th. Hopefully we will get to see some great teams play some classic games. I love March Madness! My friend, Brandon from Alabama, may be joining us for the Saturday in between. Hopefully we can find some fun stuff to do on that day in New Orleans. We have a hotel in the French Quarter, so hopefully we will be entertained. After the games on Sunday, we are going to drive the 17 hours back to Seward, hopefully making it back in time at least for classes on Tuesday, maybe Monday. But I don't really care. I am really excited, if you can't tell, for Spring Break. But things have to get done before that...

The Exegetical... yuck! This is a 25 page research paper on nine verses of the Bible that I was assigned. We have a 10 page packet that explains everything we have to do with the verse. We have to break it down word by word and analyze it. It is not really my favorite thing to do, but it needs to get done. It is due the Wednesday after Spring Break, so the plan is getting it done before I leave. Hopefully this is realistic. I am working on it slowly but surely. I have four more days... wish me luck.

Poker... I am distraught because the government has seized a lot of my money. All the money I have in Neteller has been frozen. All I can do is pray that I will get that money back sometime. For now, however, I have opened an epassporte account and have continued to play on Full Tilt. I have been making money, so I will continue to play. I only play when I have time, I don't make time for it like I used to. It is just something to due when I am in for the night. I try to just play weekend nights because those are by far the most profitable times to play.

Well, that's what going. If you have anymore questions or comments, feel free to say something.

First week of school and some poker

2007-01-13T04:55:00.000-05:00

Well, the first week of school went fairly well. It is nice to have some new classes. Hopefully I will be interested in them for the whole semester instead of just the first couple of weeks like last semester. I like my schedule because I do not have any night classes and I don't have class until 1 pm on Fridays. So that is pretty nice.

Tonight I decided to play some poker. My roommate and I played in a $5 double stack, 90 person multi tourney on full tilt. I was 3 tabling 10/20 and 15/30 while playing that tourney. I was grinding away on the cash games when I reached the first break of the tourney. I then realized that I hadn't even won a hand yet. I was just under 2k in chips and we started at 3K. By the next break, I was chip leader in the tourney and had almost double the stack as the second place guy. I didn't even steal any blinds. I just played my big hands and got action from at least one or two guys on each. At this point, I was still just focusing on the cash games and just playing good hands in the tourney. All of a sudden, we were down to the final 15 players and I decided to close all my cash games except for one 10/20 HU game that was going well. As I was pwning this guy heads up 10/20, I played the final table. I knocked out 6 of the 7 players at the final table before getting HU with the last guy. I had a 4:1 chip advantage and not surprisingly, I blew it and took second. The main hand I remember was when we got it all in preflop when I had 200K and he had 50K. My 66 lost to his A9 on a XXXAX board. From there I just got pwned. Luckily we were only playing for like an extra $50. I ended up cashing in a nice $72.50 from my 2nd place finish and a good $1500 from the cash games (about $1000 of it came from this one guy heads up). So a pretty good night pokerwise for me.

Exciting note: My dad is driving down here for the week to watch three of my basketball games. He should be getting here sometime before my game this afternoon. It will be good to spend some time with him. Maybe I'll have him do some of my homework so he won't get bored staying here in Seward for a week :)

Tourney

2007-01-05T01:50:00.000-05:00

I decided to play in a tourney tonight. It was the 30K guaranteed, $100+9 buy in, 6 person table deep stack tourney on Full Tilt. This was my first 6 person table tourney that I have ever played in and I really enjoyed it. I started off really strong when I was dealt AA in the bb. I ended up getting all in preflop against KK and doubled up. Another guy laid down QQ preflop that hand which is crazy, especially in a 6 handed game. I was in the top 10 in chips the whole first hour. Then I got nothing going in the second hour though I was chip leader at my table the whole time. I ended up busting near the end of the 3rd hour just outside the money. I probably spent only 20 minutes in the whole tourney not as the chip leader of my table. However, my last table had a bunch of big stacks and there was a ton of action. A few suspect plays by me lead to my losing of the chip lead, before I had to start pushing. I ended up 62nd out of 408 people, which is nothing to be proud of, but I thought I would write some poker stuff today.

I have two basketball practices today before we head to Sioux City, Iowa for a game on Saturday. Then school starts back up again on Monday. uggh!

Bad choice of words

2007-01-03T01:41:00.000-05:00

I want to apologize for the choice of words in my last post. I shouldn't have used the word "freeroll." I just meant that it is nice to know for a fact that I will be in heaven after death and that I do not have to worry about that. However, I still have a lot to accomplish on earth as far as witnessing my faith to others and helping out people who are less fortunate than me. As a Christian, I try to do good things because God commands it, not to get to heaven. I can't say that I am a Christian and then not act like one. Anyway, I apologize for using the word "freeroll" because it sounds like I am just coasting through life, doing whatever (good or bad) I want to do. That is definitely incorrect.

I have been playing some cash games here and there since that last tourney. There have been a lot of ups and downs. I have been about even since the tourney.

I have a big game tonight against Hastings College that will hopefully go well. Wish me luck. Thanks.

Merry Christmas!

2006-12-25T03:57:00.000-05:00

Today (Christmas Eve), I hung out with my family all day. We went to church...twice (since it was a Sunday)! But that is cool with me. We then had some family and friends over after the Christmas Eve service. I ate a lot of cookies and my favorite, chips with chili cheese dip. We are skipping Christmas morning church because I leave at 1:30pm tomorrow. So we are just going to have dinner at 11am in the morning before I have to go to the airport. I'm excited to get back on the basketball court with my teammates, but I am not excited to see how bad of shape I am in after nine days off. I have playing basketball almost every day, but I guarantee I lost a lot of my cardiovascular stamina. I don't know, we'll see I guess. Hopefully my flight isn't delayed tomorrow. Please pray for good weather. I'll update later.

P.S. I just want to thank God for sending his Son to die for us so that we can live forever in heaven with Him. As a Christian, it sure is great freerolling through life (because of Jesus) knowing that it is only a matter time before I, along with all believers, will be joining God in heaven. Please remember the real reason we celebrate CHRISTmas. With all that said, have a Merry Christmas!

4th in Tourney

2006-12-22T06:12:00.000-05:00

I just finished 4th in the $7K guaranteed deep stack $75 buy in on Full Tilt for a profit of a nice $1378. I am very happy with the 4th place because I bad beat my way to the final table. I did make some really good plays throughout the tourney, but man I put some brutal beats on some people :) I got to the final table 2nd in chips, however, I felt like all of the other players were much more experienced tournament-wise than me. To be honest, I thought that I was the worst player at the final table. So I will definitely take a 4th place finish. I really like this deep stack tourney. I played it once last week and took 12th in it for such a little profit. I want to play in this tourney more often in the future but the problem is that it doesn't start until 1 am Nebraska time. So Montana is the only realistic place I can play it because starting a tourney at midnight is not too awful, I guess. Alright, it is almost 4:30 so I am going to get some sleep.

Back in MT

2006-12-16T17:50:00.000-05:00

It sure feels good to be back home. My mom made a nice pot roast for the family last night. That was the first good meat I've had in a long time. Since most of my good friends don't come home until tomorow, I will probably hit up the casinos tonight. Should be a fun week.

Random note: When I looked up my grades on the internet, I expected anywhere from a 2.6 to a 2.9. I looked at my grades and somehow I ended up with a 3.51 GPA. Unbelievable! I must be naturally good at this thing called school. Sorry for bragging.

Montana on Friday

2006-12-12T16:40:00.000-05:00

Unfortunately, Montana lost their semi-final game so I won't be going to the National Championship game in Tennessee. That's okay because I am really excited to get back to Montana and see my family and high school friends. I have ten days off before I have to return to Seward on Christmas Day. In Montana, I plan on going skiing, hanging out with my friends and family, and playing some live poker in the casinos. It should be a nice, relaxing ten days without school and mandatory basketball. I have one final left tomorrow before I will be finally done with this semester. I am ready for a change of classes, but not before I have a good break from school. I will be flying out of Lincoln on Friday because we have practice up until that morning. I'm excited!

Sooo close

2006-12-07T02:34:00.000-05:00

Disappointment is all I feel right now. I played a huge role in the game tonight which was exciting for me. Yet I am very disappointed because I could have ended up with the game-winner. I saw minimal playing time in the first half, but the second half I played a ton. I am mainly in the game for my defense. I can't tell you how much I love playing D. It is so much fun flying all over the court, getting steals and taking charges. That is how I love to play. Anyway, we were up seven at half and very confident. Second half come around and our starters started to get into foul trouble. I was then subbed in. Soon after, Garrett made a nice pass to me for a three pointer which was a boost of confidence for me. That ended up being my only shot attempt for the game (as I look at the stats online, however, they have me for a missed layup and a turnover when I wasn't even in the game...lame). We grinded through the second half missing free throw after free throw and watching them hit all of theirs. With 16 seconds left we were down by one and they were bringing the ball up the court. I decided to jump the guy with the ball and trap him. I somehow got a steal and was fouled. So I step up to the line absolutely loving it and very confident. I live for this situation. In high school, many times I was called upon to hit big free throws in key situations. I play the game for these moments. However, tonight I missed one and I'm really pissed at myself. I missed to first attempt long, but regrouped and made the second to tie it. Doane then missed their game winning shot attempt and we went to Overtime.

We lost in OT due solely to missed free throws which is extremely disappointing. Our team was an absurd 13-29 from the line compared to their 27-36. A team is not going to win many games when they lose by 14 in the free throw category and lose the rebounding war by 18. We have a lot to work on. Hopefully we can regroup and finally get our second "W" on Saturday. I am starting to enjoy basketball a lot more these days. Tonight was the first time in a while that I actually had fun playing the game and competing.

Brothers

2006-12-06T02:57:00.000-05:00

Me: 6'1" 175 lbs. My bro, Eric: 6'6" 290 lbs.

Yes, we are brothers! He's going to be pissed when he sees this. haha.

School, basketball, and Grizzlies

2006-12-06T01:24:00.000-05:00

I have been pretty stressed out lately since ALL of my big assignments have been due in the last two weeks. The stress will continue until next Wednesday when all my finals will be over. I can't believe I am stressing out of school, when I really do not care that much about my grades. Anyway, I am trying to get everything done and time is not on my side. I also think I have ADD. Like now, instead of writing my blog, I should be starting my 12 page paper that is due on Tuesday. I also have other stuff that is due this Thursday that I should be doing. I always just find myself reading people's blogs or watching highlights on espn.com. I just need to focus and actually do some work for once and the stress should go away. I can't wait to be done with this semester and go home. This is by far the most homesick I have been in my three years. You would think that my freshman year would be the worst, but I wasn't this homesick back then.

We play a huge game against one of our biggest rivals, Doane, tomorrow. Basketball has been a rollercoaster ride for me so far this year. I thought poker was a bad...I went from starting the first two games to playing garbage time to not playing at all and now to playing quality minutes off the bench. It has just been a weird year for my teammates and I. This is a program that year in and year out wins a minimum of 20 games (my freshman year we were 32-6). We have started out the year a dissappointing 1-7. eww. We close out the semester with the game tomorrow and then we go to Morningside in Iowa on Saturday. Hopefully we can get another win before Christmas.

The best part of my life right now is consisting of my brother's life. That's how good things are going. But seriously, my brother has won the starting spot at right guard for the Montana Grizzlies who dominated the first two rounds of the Division 1 football championship (formally 1AA). They will now host UMass on Friday night and it's going to be on ESPN 2! I am so excited to get to see my brother flatback some UMass players in HD. The game is at 7:30 EST if anyone wants to watch. My brother is #78.

If they win that game, I will be changing my plane tickets next Friday to Chattanooga, TN instead of to Billings, MT for the national championship. I don't want to talk about it too much because I do not want to get my hopes up. But if the Grizzlies play like they have been playing, they will not be beaten.

Alright, time to get studying. Please pray for me so I can get all this work done; and my brother too if you so desire. Thanks.

Funny hand

2006-11-26T19:07:00.000-05:00

I decided to just mess around playing some 3/6 with my friend Garrett on full tilt and this hand came up.

Full Tilt Poker Game #1309789245: Table Dendrite (6 max) - $3/$6 - Limit Hold'em - 18:45:20 ET - 2006/11/26
Seat 1: MrNickel ($27)
Seat 2: CU_bball ($248)
Seat 3: LeverageCT ($123)
Seat 4: WGRH ($42.50)
Seat 5: kormis ($82.50)
Seat 6: tastetastic ($96)
LeverageCT posts the small blind of $1.50
WGRH posts the big blind of $3
The button is in seat #2
*** HOLE CARDS ***
Dealt to CU_bball [6c 5c]
kormis folds
tastetastic calls $3
MrNickel folds
CU_bball calls $3
LeverageCT calls $1.50
WGRH checks
*** FLOP *** [2c 6h As]
LeverageCT bets $3
WGRH calls $3
tastetastic folds
CU_bball calls $3
*** TURN *** [2c 6h As] [5s]
LeverageCT bets $6
WGRH raises to $12
CU_bball calls $12
LeverageCT calls $6
*** RIVER *** [2c 6h As 5s] [Qd]
LeverageCT checks
WGRH bets $6
CU_bball calls $6
LeverageCT calls $6
*** SHOW DOWN ***
WGRH shows [6s 5d] (two pair, Sixes and Fives)
CU_bball shows [6c 5c] (two pair, Sixes and Fives)
LeverageCT shows [5h 6d] (two pair, Sixes and Fives)
LeverageCT ties for the pot ($24) with two pair, Sixes and Fives
WGRH ties for the pot ($24) with two pair, Sixes and Fives
CU_bball ties for the pot ($24) with two pair, Sixes and Fives
*** SUMMARY ***
Total pot $75 Rake $3
Board: [2c 6h As 5s Qd]
Seat 1: MrNickel didn't bet (folded)
Seat 2: CU_bball (button) showed [6c 5c] and won ($24) with two pair, Sixes and Fives
Seat 3: LeverageCT (small blind) showed [5h 6d] and won ($24) with two pair, Sixes and Fives
Seat 4: WGRH (big blind) showed [6s 5d] and won ($24) with two pair, Sixes and Fives
Seat 5: kormis didn't bet (folded)
Seat 6: tastetastic folded on the Flop

I thought it was funny anyway.

Friday and Saturday

2006-11-24T22:50:00.000-05:00

Today was a fun day. I had a basketball practice at from 8:00-10:15 this morning which went pretty well even though it was early. Then Leah and her family picked me up to go to the Nebraska/Colorado game. Leah has been trying her hardest to turn me into a Cornhusker fan and she's starting succeed a little. It is just sooo much fun though to see these Nebraskans when the Huskers lose because that is all they care about. I don't know, I might have to eventually take one for the team and become a fan just so Leah and I will not get into unnecessary arguments. The game was more entertaining then the Iowa game I went to earlier in the year. Still neither of them top a Montana game, but this may be because I am such a die hard Grizzly fan and I am somewhat biased. Anyway, the game was still a lot of fun to be at.

I have an exciting day tomorrow. Shootaround at 10, watch my brother's football game on the internet at 1, and then play a game tomorrow night at 5:30 against a top 10 team in the country. I am really just excited for my brother's game. They host McNeese State in the first round of the Division 1AA playoffs. Montana is the #2 seed in the 16 team field and has homefield throughout until the National Championship game, if they continue to win. Hopefully they can turn this 10 game winning streak into a 14 game winning streak and bring home another National Championship to Montana. As you can tell, I'm a little excited and I wish I was in Missoula.

Happy Thanksgiving!

2006-11-23T11:39:00.000-05:00

Well, I had no success in my the FTOPS main event on Sunday and I haven't really played poker since. Poker is slowly slipping out of my life. I just don't ever feel like playing anymore. This week, I have just been chilling here in Seward and playing basketball. Today, my girlfriend has family here in Seward with whom they are going to be celebrating Thanksgiving. I am going to be joining them. This is going to be a great day because I will focus more on giving glory to God and thanking him for all that he has done in my life. Have a happy Thanksgiving!

Poker update

2006-11-16T01:46:00.000-05:00

Cash games went really well this last weekend and then not so well after Sunday. I need to start writing down numbers so I can tell you how much I am up or down, but honestly, I have no idea where I was at last Friday. I know my Full Tilt roll has increased and my Doyle's Room roll has decreased. Anyway, I decided to take a day off from cash games today. It was going to be a day without poker, but I decided to procrastinate my homework even more and play in a FTOPS Main Event qualifier. It was a $75 buy in and top 4 qualify for the $535 buy in tourney. I grinded my way through it, showing very few hands. I ended up getting top 4 and then we all went all in and I lucksacked my way to the victory :) I am pretty excited for this tourney on Sunday. I have yet to have a big score in a tourney and hopefully Sunday will be the day.

Thanksgiving break is next week. Unfortunately, I will have to hang around Seward because of basketball. I am really anxious to get back home for 10 days during Christmas break. Basketball in going really rough for my team and me right now. Hopefully things will turn around. I'll update for sure after the FTOPS tourney if not before.

Montana update: My brother's team is now 9-1 overall and number two in the nation in IAA. Their only loss is to Iowa. They have a huge game this weekend against number two in the Big Sky Conference and arch rival, Montana State. "The Brawl of the Wild" should be a great game this year. Hopefully the Griz will come out on top.

First tourney in over a month...

2006-11-08T02:59:00.000-05:00

Tonight for some reason I decided to take a break from homework and play in a tourney. I cannot remember the last tourney I played in. It has been at least a month though. Anyway, I played in the $69+6 $16,000 guaranteed on full tilt tonight and I played really well. I doubled up really early with AQ against JJ after a flop of QXX. Then I was got down again and really just grinded the shortstack all the way to the money. The best hand I saw all tourney was QQ and I stole with it. I just picked my spots and won a bunch of small pots when we hit the money. I then became an average stack somehow and I found myself at a table with the three biggest stacks of the tourney, and they were all on my left. That was mega-lame. I finally was moved to a new table and I started being aggressive. I was open raising a lot of hands before I finally decided to change it up a little and limp on the button with K10d. Anyway, here is my busto hand. I am really disappointed because I would have been 3rd in chips after this pot if it would have been shipped my way. In retrospect, I should've just raised and taken the blinds.

Full Tilt Poker Game #1213137428: $16,000 Guarantee (8194544), Table 22 - 500/1000 Ante 125 - No Limit Hold'em - 2:48:38 ET - 2006/11/08
Seat 1: Karls_Hungus (6,105)
Seat 2: cowboylou (27,607)
Seat 3: stan2005 (21,234)
Seat 5: dmkai3 (17,902)
Seat 6: chadmat (13,367)
Seat 7: CU_bball (19,794)
Seat 8: popinstl (11,992)
Seat 9: Mardani (34,533)
Karls_Hungus antes 125
cowboylou antes 125
stan2005 antes 125
dmkai3 antes 125
chadmat antes 125
CU_bball antes 125
popinstl antes 125
Mardani antes 125
popinstl posts the small blind of 500
Mardani posts the big blind of 1,000
The button is in seat #7
*** HOLE CARDS ***
Dealt to CU_bball [Kd Td]
Karls_Hungus folds
cowboylou folds
stan2005 folds
dmkai3 folds
chadmat folds
CU_bball calls 1,000
popinstl folds
Mardani checks
*** FLOP *** [Ks 6h 7s]
Mardani bets 3,000
CU_bball raises to 7,000
Mardani calls 4,000
*** TURN *** [Ks 6h 7s] [3d]
Mardani checks
CU_bball bets 11,669, and is all in
Mardani calls 11,669
CU_bball shows [Kd Td]
Mardani shows [9s 5s]
*** RIVER *** [Ks 6h 7s 3d] [8c]
CU_bball shows a pair of Kings
Mardani shows a straight, Nine high
Mardani wins the pot (40,838) with a straight, Nine high
CU_bball stands up
*** SUMMARY ***
Total pot 40,838 Rake 0
Board: [Ks 6h 7s 3d 8c]
Seat 1: Karls_Hungus folded before the Flop
Seat 2: cowboylou folded before the Flop
Seat 3: stan2005 folded before the Flop
Seat 5: dmkai3 folded before the Flop
Seat 6: chadmat folded before the Flop
Seat 7: CU_bball (button) showed [Kd Td] and lost with a pair of Kings
Seat 8: popinstl (small blind) folded before the Flop
Seat 9: Mardani (big blind) showed [9s 5s] and won (40,838) with a straight, Nine high

I thought for sure he was just on a flush draw until he called over 11K on the turn. Too bad for me that he was on a gutterball draw as well.

I took 23rd out of 356 entrants for a grand profit of $60. Ship Ship! It was nice to play in a tourney for a change and maybe, time permitting, I can fit a few more in here and there.

Boo-ray and some poker

2006-11-03T04:02:00.000-05:00

I played boo-ray again for the second time ever tonight and pwned again. I started off cold and was down a quick $70 before I won a $90 and $160 pot in the next ten minutes. I ended up the boo-ray session up a nice $140. The game is so much fun.

I then came back to my dorm and grinded out a nice little session. I have had so many ups and downs at poker over the last few weeks, but I still keep making some money which is good enough for me right now. Poker always seems to be in the back of my mind these days. I remember the days where if I had 10 minutes in between class, I would get a couple rounds of a cash game in. Now, naps have become more of a priority and poker has been struggling to fit into my schedule.

It's pretty sad how excited I am already for summer vacation. I need a break from all of this responsiblity with school and basketball. It sucks because my girlfriend has tickets for her and me for this weekend's Nebraska/Missouri game AND the Nebraska/Colorado game on the day after Thanksgiving. But basketball conflicts with both and it really makes me mad because I have yet to attend a Cornhusker game. I miss the summer times when I can just do whatever I want at any time I want. If I wanted to wake up one morning and go on a road trip, I could've. I don't know, I'm sure all this responsiblity is good for me. I guess it is all a part of God's plan. I'll just try to keep trucking along.

Plans for Friday: Sleep in then grind a homework session because it has been piling on lately. Basketball at 5:00 and then hopefully something fun after that.

Weekend

2006-10-30T01:57:00.000-05:00

Well, the weekend was disappointing. I started both games this weekend, but I didn't play my best. Our team struggled the first game and lost by 7 to a team that we should dominate. We then won our 2nd game by 15 to a team that we should beat by literally 50 points. Coach was displeased with our whole team. Very few of us played decently and none played exceptionally. I feel like I just blew a huge opportunity for me to see quality playing time in the future. With our guys coming back from suspension, I have a lot of work to do in order to stay in the rotation. I am not excited for practice this week because coach was not very happy with our weekend.

I played a some 15/30 here and there this weekend on Full Tilt and broke about even. Poker just hasn't been big on my mind lately. I don't know what is in store for the week. I'll update if anything remotely exciting comes up.

St. Louis

2006-10-26T16:59:00.000-04:00

I am taking off for St. Louis in about a half an hour for the first two basketball games of the year. We had our first scrimmage this last Tuesday and I was really happy with how I played and I am almost never pleased with my own play. Our team, as a whole, has a lot of work to do in order to be able to compete in our conference. I am pretty excited for this weekend because there is a decent chance that I will be starting (two of our guards are suspended for the first two games). Hopefully I can prove myself and become a regular part of the rotation throughout the season. Alright, time to head over to the gym. Wish me luck.

Our team picture is now up on the internet and our player biographies should be up any day now. http://www.cune.edu/show.asp?durki=1546

Been a while

2006-10-20T02:45:00.000-04:00

It's been a while since I've posted because frankly, I haven't played much poker lately. I did however grind for the first time in five days tonight and made a nice $1600 on Doyle's Room. The last few days I have taken a much needed break from poker and just did other things. Looking back on it, however, I didn't really accomplish much. I got a C on my Motor Learning test and a D on my School Health test. Looks like I'll have to study a little more for my next tests :) I told myself that during this poker break I was going to get ahead with my homework and stuff. The fact of the matter is that I just didn't get anything done. I've probably watched five movies, caught up on the three new South Park episodes, watched each new episode of Lost, as well as watched football and the baseball playoffs in the past week. It sure sounds like I have been pretty lazy, but I feel like I'm keeping busy with basketball, school, and the gf. I am pretty disappointed in myself because I didn't used to procrastinate with my school work this much. Oh well, I guess I will just have to do more later on in the semester.

For my Community Health class, I have to do 15 hours of community service, so a friend and I have been going to the local nursing home and playing cards with the old folks. So that's what I'm doing tomorrow and I haven't decided what I'm going to do after bball tomorrow. In fact, I have no idea what's in store for me this whole weekend so I guess I'll just go with the flow.

Life

2006-10-06T02:22:00.000-04:00

Well, the last couple of days I have focused my effort on cashing out all my poker accounts. Amazingly, it turns out I had money spread over 15 poker websites, some with small amounts of money though. Anyway, I cashed all them out. I had fun logging into different sites that I haven't been to in a while and finding a couple hundred dollars on some. I am pretty bummed about the banning of online poker. I am going to miss the ability to just sit down in a night and make 2K or more. I'm not going to miss the bad days though. I have however kept money in a skin of Doyle's Room where I will continue to try to pwn until they stop me from it. I won't keep too much money in the site though.

This weekend is our Fall Break here at Concordia and it pretty much sucks for me. Everyone gets Friday off, but I didn't have class on Friday in the first place so I get no break. On top of that, I have basketball practice on Friday morning at 9:30 (8 hours from now). So can't even sleep in on my "break". I think I am going to Leah's tomorrow and watch her sister's dance performance. Then at some point, I'll head back to Seward for Sunday night's bball practice. That's an update of my life. Time to sleep.

Note: On Wednesday, I received my brother's football game on tape in the mail and I watched it. My parents record the games on TV in Montana then send me them in the mail the next Monday if I didn't get to watch it on the internet live. Anyway, they beat a very good opponent in Portland State to improved their record to 3-1 (only loss was to Iowa). I then checked the rankings and I saw one poll that had Montana as number 1 in the nation in Division 1AA. Hopefully they keep on cruising and run the table. Go Griz!

Weekend

2006-10-01T23:55:00.000-04:00

Late Thursday night, Dave invited me to go to Iowa City to watch the Iowa/Ohio St. game. We were going to meet up with Donny and Tony and then try to get tickets. We ended up going, but finding tickets turned out to be a fantasy. Instead, we all decided to watch the game in a bar/club. Luckily, they let people 19 and older into the bars in Iowa City which is nice for me or it would have been a boring weekend. We ended up have a lot of fun... probably too much.

Dave and I amazingly woke up this morning in time to drive to Lincoln and play in some of the Sunday majors. I played in the Party Poker Million which I qualfied for and was knocked out trying to resteal in the second hour. I also played in the Pacific Poker 50K guaranteed. I started off well and built my stack to 6K in the first hour. I then had 10 10 run into quad queens which knocked me down to 127 chips with the blinds at 75/150. Good tourney me. But wait, I doubled and tripled and quadruple some way and got my stack up to 7K only to have KK taken down by AQ twenty minutes later. False hope. That was my weekend. I have a lot of school crap to do this week so whatever happens happens.

Cards

2006-09-29T03:37:00.000-04:00

Ever since I started playing pinochle with my family on holidays, my dad has told me that God has blessed me with a knack for cards. I always doubted this theory of his until tonight. I am now certain that my dad was right after I made $254 playing a fairly low stakes game called Boo-Ray tonight. I came to this guy's house having no clue how to play the game, just thousands of hours of cardplaying background. I was given a few helpful hints and off I was playing this game that they said was all about luck. The longer I played, the more and more I disagreed with the idea that this was mostly luck. I don't really want to explain the rules of the game, but it is all about only playing when you are positive that your hand is going to at least take a trick. Anyway, I was never in any real danger of losing money tonight because I never really took a chance and gambled. It was a great night because I was doing something that I have a passion for, playing cards, and making money doing it.

Sometimes I think I should just quit online poker and just have card nights with my friends and other acquaintances. This summer I made quite a bit of money playing 3 handed pinochle in Billings, but I would have made a lot more if I wasn't playing with a pinochle shark (Dr_Kaufman) every time. The 3rd player was the "fish" who made playing worth while. Also, playing NL cash games with my friends is just rediculous. Sometimes I feel bad how easy it is to take their money. I also consider myself a pretty good Pitch (a card game that is popular in Nebraska) player and I am starting to get the hang of Euchre, though I have yet to play either of them for money. I know I am playing against "bad gamblers" and I shouldn't get a big head about all this. But I just thought that I should take this chance in my blog to thank God for giving me card playing skills and a love for them. I'm not going to deny it, cards are a huge part of my life. Over the last year and half, they have overtaken basketball as my favorite hobby. There is nothing better than just getting out a deck of cards and chilling with your friends and family. If we play for money and I win some, fine, but the social interaction is what I love the most about cards.

Some Poker

2006-09-27T02:55:00.000-04:00

Last night a bunch of my teammates got a 1/2 NL cash game going. I was really licking my chops when they wanted to get together and play. I bought in for $200 and their jaws dropped. They all bought in for $40 or less (usually $20). I started off strong, raising every pot I entered. I would throw in $7 like it was nothing and they would be pissed because it was too much to call without AA lol.

Anyway, I built my stack to about $330 when this disappointing hand came up. I sat to the left of Garrett (the only other guy that sits with some real money at the table). Garrett has one goal in mind when we play these home games. That goal is to bust me with whatever cards possible. So with this in mind, he calls every single one of my preflop raises and then he tightens up after the flop. Usually a continuation bet will ship the pot to me unless he hit. Alright so here is the hand. Garrett limps utg and I squeeze AA. I make it $8 (though I could have made it $20 and there was a 80% chance that he would've called). He calls and everyone else folds. Flop comes 2c 5d 7d. He checks. I bet $16 and he quickly calls. Turn As. dink! (or is it). He checks and I bet $20 with practically the nuts. He min raises me to $40. I think for a bit and I decide that he has an under set even though I wouldn't be surprised if he had 43. So I raise $60 more and he thinks a bit then pushes for $70 more. I quickly call and he turns over 43off. I have outs! River is a Kc. Dang. I lose a $400 pot at a 1/2 home game. That sucked.

Though I still had $90 or so at the table, I rebought for another $100 and began to grind again. There was just too much easy money at the table to leave and I wanted to bust Garrett. We grinded and grinded for 5 hours longer! Eventually Garrett and I busted everyone and all their rebuys. I had taken quite a bit from Garrett too. We decided to call it quits at 4:15 am. I cash out with $562 which is +$262. So I can't complain. I almost guarantee that if I ship that pot with AA, I would clear that whole table of a little over 1K which would have been nice. But oh well. It was fun taking all the freshman basketball players' money.

I played some NL cash on Party today and broke even. Then I played in the $109- 2K added and busted in the middle of the pack. At the same time I played a $11 Sunday Million Satty with the top 2 out of 60 qualify. I cruised into the final table with over double the chips as the guy in second place. I ended up winning the thing but it definitely wasn't handed to me. So I am pretty happy that I am in the tourney on Sunday because I hate buying into them even though they are +EV. Hopefully I'll get some more poker in tomorrow.

Back in Nebraska

2006-09-25T15:34:00.000-04:00

I had a fun weekend in Missoula. Montana showed that they are legitimate National Championship contenders with a 59-14 win over conference opponent Sacramento State. We were just clicking on all cylinders. If I could fly back for every game, I would. They are just so much fun.

I want to get in a lot of poker time this week and hopefully satellite into a lot of the Sunday tourneys. My goal is to make over 5K this week. We'll see what happens. Wish me luck.

Bad beat story that no one wants to hear...

2006-09-22T04:57:00.000-04:00

...but I'm going to write it anyway. I decided to pull an all nighter before I leave for the Omaha airport so I played some poker. On the 5498349th set I flopped playing NL cash, I finally got action. Here is the hand.

** Dealing down cards **
Dealt to HeDiedForAll [ Tc, Td ]
foofyter calls (4)
MarlexutH folds.
nail29 folds.
kmenkewhite calls (4)
HeDiedForAll raises (14) to 14
arjunm21 calls (14)
pkrplayr23 calls (14)
dher5501 folds.
daytonick folds.
foofyter folds.
kmenkewhite folds.
** Dealing Flop ** : [ 3d, 5h, Th ]
HeDiedForAll checks.
arjunm21 bets (44)
pkrplayr23 calls (44)
HeDiedForAll raises (120) to 120
arjunm21 raises (113.20) to 157.20
arjunm21 is all-In.
pkrplayr23 calls (112)
pkrplayr23 is all-In.
HeDiedForAll calls (37.20)
** Dealing Turn ** : [ 7c ]
** Dealing River ** : [ 9h ]
Creating Main Pot with $520.50 with pkrplayr23
Creating Side Pot 1 with $2.40 with arjunm21

** Summary **
Main Pot: $520.50 Side Pot 1: $2.40 Rake: $3 Jackpot Contribution: $0.50Board: [ 3d 5h Th 7c 9h ]

arjunm21 balance $522.90, bet $171.20, collected $522.90, net +$351.70 [ Ah 8h ] [ a flush, ace high with ace kicker -- Ah,Th,9h,8h,5h ]
pkrplayr23 balance $0, lost $170 [ Jh Qh ] [ a flush, queen high -- Qh,Jh,Th,9h,5h ]
dher5501 balance $236.30, lost $2 (folded)
daytonick balance $392, lost $4 (folded)
foofyter balance $29.26, lost $4 (folded)
MarlexutH balance $204.76, didn't bet (folded)
kimae balance $33.99, sits out
nail29 balance $1331.76, didn't bet (folded)
kmenkewhite balance $459.64, lost $4 (folded)
HeDiedForAll balance $222.80, lost $171.20 [ Tc Td ] [ three of a kind, tens -- Tc,Td,Th,9h,7c ]

I guess I don't want action with my sets :(

Montana

2006-09-22T01:03:00.000-04:00

Finally, the 22nd has come so I can do something different. Seward is getting really boring and every week seems repetitive. Leah and I are leaving for Omaha in four hours and then flying to Missoula. It is going to be great to change things up a bit and watch my brother play live. I hope they donkey stomp Sacramento State.

Anyway, basketball is pissing me off lately. Looks like it is going to be another year of working my ass off and never seeing the court. Poker has been blah lately. Not really any notable days. Up a few hundred here, down a few hundred there. School is retarded... dominated one test this week and then bombed another. Not really a big deal though as long as I pass. Well that's my thoughts for now. I'll update and tell how the trip went.

More NL Cash

2006-09-15T23:55:00.000-04:00

I played some more 1/2 and 2/4 NL cash last night and it went okay but not great. I ended up $700 but I played a ton of hands. So it was more even of a day than it sounds. I think I'm doing a lot wrong. I flopped literally one million sets today and got paid off on less than 10% of them. The players just play sooo tight post flop that it hard to get paid when I flop a monster. I flopped multiple top two pairs with rags in the blinds with 7 players in the pot. I would lead out at the pot and everyone would fold. I would also bet with my sets and would get no action. I was running so good that it was bad for me. I would have AA on the button after everyone folded and the bb would call my raise. The flop would come AXX and I would continuation bet and he would fold. Is this the right play??? I just think it looks so obvious that I have a monster if I check the flop there. I don't know. I have to start figuring things out on how to get paid when I have big hands. Here on some hands from the day. Please comment on them.

Hockney1991 posts small blind (1)
Familyguy17 posts big blind (2)
** Dealing down cards **
Dealt to HeDiedForAll [ Ad, Qd ]
deadman339 calls (2)
Laurel3 raises (4) to 4
newc_united folds.
Mejefe22 folds.
Aceagent31 calls (4)
PalmsJunky folds.
GREGORYDR calls (4)
HeDiedForAll calls (4)
Hockney1991 calls (3)
Familyguy17 calls (2)
deadman339 calls (2)
** Dealing Flop ** : [ 9h, Qc, 2d ]
Hockney1991 bets (5)
Familyguy17 folds.
deadman339 raises (10) to 10
Laurel3 folds.Aceagent31 folds.
GREGORYDR raises (30) to 30
HeDiedForAll folds.
Hockney1991 folds.
deadman339 calls (14.05)
deadman339 is all-In.
** Dealing Turn ** : [ Tc ] ** Dealing River ** : [ Js ]
Creating Main Pot with $77.60 with deadman339
** Summary **Main Pot: $77.60 Side Pot 1: $5.95 Rake: $3 Jackpot Contribution: $0.50Board: [ 9h Qc 2d Tc Js ]
GREGORYDR balance $160, bet $34, collected $83.55, net +$49.55 [ Kh Qs ] [ a straight, nine to king -- Kh,Qs,Js,Tc,9h ]
HeDiedForAll balance $271.49, lost $4 (folded)
Hockney1991 balance $207.94, lost $9 (folded)
Familyguy17 balance $77.10, lost $4 (folded)
deadman339 balance $0, lost $28.05 [ 8s Qh ] [ a straight, eight to queen -- Qh,Js,Tc,9h,8s ]

With a bet, raise, and reraise, my hand sure didn't look too good.

lobo4 posts small blind (1)
Imabeast1 posts big blind (2)
** Dealing down cards **
Dealt to HeDiedForAll [ Kc, Ks ]
HeDiedForAll raises (7) to 7
Mr_Fuglesang calls (7)
King4484 folds.
Drdokka111 folds.
levatorani calls (7)
beund2A folds.
flidler folds.
sl999333 raises (37) to 37
lobo4 folds.Imabeast1 folds.
HeDiedForAll calls (30)
Mr_Fuglesang calls (30)
levatorani folds.
** Dealing Flop ** : [ Ah, 8s, 8c ]
HeDiedForAll checks.
Mr_Fuglesang bets (45)
sl999333 calls (45)
HeDiedForAll folds.
** Dealing Turn ** : [ 4c ]
Mr_Fuglesang bets (97.45)
Mr_Fuglesang is all-In.
sl999333 calls (97.45)
** Dealing River ** : [ 9h ]
Creating Main Pot with $402.40 with Mr_Fuglesang
** Summary **Main Pot: $402.40 Rake: $3 Jackpot Contribution: $0.50Board: [ Ah 8s 8c 4c 9h ]
sl999333 balance $450.15, bet $179.45, collected $402.40, net +$222.95 [ 3c Ac ] [ two pairs, aces and eights -- Ac,Ah,9h,8s,8c ]
lobo4 balance $145, lost $1 (folded)
Imabeast1 balance $344.15, lost $2 (folded)
HeDiedForAll balance $163, lost $37 (folded)
Mr_Fuglesang balance $0, lost $179.45 [ Qs Qd ] [ two pairs, queens and eights -- Ah,Qs,Qd,8s,8c ]
King4484 balance $239.46, didn't bet (folded)
Drdokka111 balance $70, didn't bet (folded)
levatorani balance $41.15, lost $7 (folded)
beund2A balance $192.36, didn't bet (folded)
flidler balance $165.35, didn't bet (folded)

A3?? I guess I should've pushed preflop and QQ would've called and A3 would've had to lay it down, right??

Those are just a couple of notable hands where I'm not exactly sure what play to make.

NL cash???

2006-09-13T01:21:00.000-04:00

Lately I've needed a break from limit cash games just to change things up a bit. Since tournaments take too long, I decided to try and learn a little NL cash. I played 1/2 ring games on and off all day. I started out really strong and got up about $400. I then got stacked by a guy who played top boat in the strangest way I have ever seen. The sb who called my standard cutoff raise bet $2 on the river into a pot of $100 with AA on a AQ5Q7 board. Anyway, I value raised (at least I thought I was value raising) the river with KQ only to be pushed all in. I probably shouldn't have called his all in, but figured I could beat a few hands haha. The moral of the story is that he had top boat and I got stacked :( I should have saved that hand history and the rest of my stack for that matter.

I then started pwning for a while and was up $750 at one point 20 minutes ago before I decided to call it quits when these hands occured.

Kruella1000 posts small blind (1)
HeDiedForAll posts big blind (2)
** Dealing down cards **
Dealt to HeDiedForAll [ 5d, Th ]
wiggum555 folds.
hamburglergt calls (2)
milval folds.slice517 calls (2)
ADkone folds.
suicide___king folds.
UPay4MyWeed calls (2)
ertha folds.Kruella1000 calls (1)
HeDiedForAll checks.
** Dealing Flop ** : [ Js, 5c, Ts ]
Kruella1000 checks.
HeDiedForAll bets (7)
hamburglergt raises (20) to 20
slice517 folds.
UPay4MyWeed folds.
Kruella1000 folds.
HeDiedForAll raises (63)
to 70hamburglergt raises (156.15) to 176.15
hamburglergt is all-In.
HeDiedForAll calls (106.15)
** Dealing Turn ** : [ Ks ]
** Dealing River ** : [ 6d ]
Creating Main Pot with $359.30 with hamburglergt
** Summary **
Main Pot: $359.30 Rake: $3
Board: [ Js 5c Ts Ks 6d ]
milval balance $204.35, didn't bet (folded)
slice517 balance $56.90, lost $2 (folded)
ADkone balance $168.10, didn't bet (folded)
suicide___king balance $88, didn't bet (folded)
UPay4MyWeed balance $325.40, lost $2 (folded)
ertha balance $200, didn't bet (folded)
Kruella1000 balance $275.76, lost $2 (folded)
HeDiedForAll balance $21.85, lost $178.15 [ 5d Th ] [ two pairs, tens and fives -- Ks,Th,Ts,5d,5c ]
wiggum555 balance $150.37, didn't bet (folded)
hamburglergt balance $359.30, bet $178.15, collected $359.30, net +$181.15 [ Td Jc ] [ two pairs, jacks and tens -- Ks,Jc,Js,Td,Ts ]

I probably could have laid that hand down. Amateur mistake? I don't know.

This hand happened not two minutes later at another table.

St1ffPeter posts small blind (1)
hwjthoj posts big blind (2)
** Dealing down cards **
Dealt to HeDiedForAll [ Ks, Kh ]
Avada_Kedavra folds.
mmpokertime folds.
shadyg raises (4) to 4
Zlota folds.
milval folds.
cm33tdd calls (4)
HeDiedForAll raises (14) to 14
siggie2fly calls (14)
St1ffPeter folds.
hwjthoj calls (12)
shadyg calls (10)
cm33tdd calls (10)
** Dealing Flop ** : [ 5d, 8d, 3c ]
hwjthoj bets (20)
shadyg calls (20)
cm33tdd folds.
HeDiedForAll raises (75) to 75
siggie2fly folds.
hwjthoj calls (55)
shadyg folds.
** Dealing Turn ** : [ 5s ]
hwjthoj bets (37.50)
hwjthoj is all-In.
HeDiedForAll calls (37.50)
** Dealing River ** : [ Qc ]
Creating Main Pot with $313 with hwjthoj
** Summary **Main Pot: $313 Rake: $3
Board: [ 5d 8d 3c 5s Qc ]
siggie2fly balance $453.96, lost $14 (folded)
St1ffPeter balance $11.55, lost $1 (folded)
hwjthoj balance $313, bet $126.50, collected $313, net +$186.50 [ Qh Qs ] [ a full house, Queens full of fives -- Qh,Qs,Qc,5d,5s ]

That hand just sucked, so I had to call it a night.

I really want to get good at NL cash. There are juicy home games in Billings with over $20,000 on the table and players who muck their hand face up, not knowing that they have a straight and shipping the pot. Amazingly, scenarios like this happen multiple times a night. I ended the night still up $250 on the day, so there is definitely a lot of money to be earned if a player who has never played NL cash before can have that success at 1/2. I'm going to try to post more hands as I continue to learn. Please feel free to comment on them and have suggestions for me. Hopefully constructive criticism :)

Running good again

2006-09-11T01:38:00.000-04:00

Well, poker has been a rollercoaster the last three weeks and tonight was a good ride. I just played for about two hours and made $3400. I was playing some 10/20, 15/30, 30/60, and even some 75/150 on pacific. I like to find profitable tables so I bounce around quite a bit. I found a fish sitting with $578 by himself at the 75/150 game, so I decided to sit down and take his stack on the first hand. He ended up calling my T8 with 45 on a board of J87J8, which was kinda nice. Anyway, I am going to bed tonight feeling good about poker for the first night in a while.

In other news, it sounds like my brother is alright and he should be ready to go in two weeks against Sacramento State which I will be attending. The Griz have a bye week, so hopefully they will heal up their bumps and bruises.

Also, congrats to Shannon Shorr who has moved up to number 2 on Cardplayer's Player of the Year race. That guy is a class act and I'm really rooting for him to pass the "Grinder" for the Player of the Year award.

Good and then back to bad

2006-09-10T02:15:00.000-04:00

I got back to into cruise control on Friday night and worked my Pacific bankroll back up to where it was after the first week of school. Though I didn't feel like things were going well, donks kept sitting with $150 at 15/30 with me and I kept taking it. Slowly but surely, my bankroll kept on rising. I went to bed satisfied and confident once again.

Then this morning after basketball practice, I logged a session. I started off strong and was slowly winning for the first 45 minutes. I then decided to play some HU 30/60 versus nsid who I believe plays right into my strategy. It was too bad that I happened to catch him while he was on a huge heater. There was a stretch of four out of five hands where he hit a straight. Usually, I would be alright if he was hitting straights on me, but what lost me a lot of money is that I flopped huge hands as well. I had literally one million second best hands during this short half hour span against him.

The first hand, I had 47 on a flop of 347. We did our raising before I decided to slow down and he flipped over 56 for the nuts. The very next hand I find J9. Flop comes JJT. Turn comes 8...we do our raising...river X. I slow down, he turns over Q9 for the straight. Two hands later... I have AJ... flop J78...turn 6... river X. He turns over 54 for the straight. Next hand I flop a flush draw... I semi-bluff check raise the turn and miss, however the river gave me top pair, but it wasn't good enough to beat his straight. Anyway, you get the point. He was on a heater and I had a lot of second best hands which will usually add up to a big loss. Luckily, I was able to pick up some smaller pots against him and only ended up calling it quits at -$2,000 against him. That was just an unfortunate session that made me stop playing for the day. I will gladly play nsid HU again anytime as long as he isn't running like that.

After poker, I watched my brother's game on the internet. They had fairly easy 36-7 win over South Dakota State. I noticed that Eric wasn't in the game at all in the second half and I was wondering why. After the game I got a phone call from my grandma telling me that Eric suffered a concussion in the first half. Hopefully he is alright and will be ready to go in two weeks when Leah and I fly to Missoula. I don't really care if he's doing fine, all I care about is him getting back out on the football field... just kidding. Anyway, I haven't gotten a phone call from my parents so I guess it's not that serious.

I am not sure exactly what is on tap for tomorrow as far as poker goes. I guess I'll decide after church if I feel like playing in the big tourneys or not.

Tough Times

2006-09-08T01:33:00.000-04:00

I just haven't been able to get much going lately pokerwise. I've put in probably less than 15 hours since two Sundays ago and I've lost close to $4,000. I hate losing so whenever those bad runs happen, I force myself to take a break. So for that reason I haven't been playing much lately. Tonight, however, I entered in a $109 tourney on party as well as some small multi table qualifiers. I just busted out of the $109 with AA bad beating my AK fairly close to the money. I am pretty disappointed about that cold deck scenario. Oh well. Things will start to turn around again shortly and I will get back to pwning. But for now I need to get some confidence back. Tomorrow I have no classes so I'll probably play some. Aight, off to bed.

Iowa vs. Montana game

2006-09-03T01:52:00.000-04:00

I returned a few hours ago to Seward from the Griz game in Iowa City. Montana lost 41-7 in a game with a deceiving score. It was 17-0 at half time, but the Grizzlies scored their touchdown with 5 minutes left in the third to make it a 10 point ball game. Not too shabby for a Division 1AA team against the #16 1A team in the country. My brother was in on the one scoring drive for the Grizzlies. He also made some great blocks on the kick returns which were fun to watch. It was an awesome site to see my brother out there on a Big Ten field against one of the best teams in the country.

Overall, the new Kinnick Stadium in Iowa City was impressive, but I was a little disappointed with the atmosphere of the game. Iowa's stadium holds three times as many people as Montana's does, but the atmoshpere at Montana, in my opinion, is way better. The mascot made an appearance early on and then was never seen for the rest of the game. This compared to Monte who has been National Mascot of the Year for two of the last 6 years. Also, I thought the TV timeouts were extremely boring compared to the timeouts in Missoula. I don't know, I guess I just thought that the entertainment of a Big Ten game would crush that of a game in Montana. Oh well though. I hope to get to see a Nebraska game this year so that I can compare that to a Grizzly game because I hear they are incredible.

Well, my dad is staying in my dorm tonight with me and I'm not sure what is on tap for tomorrow. I doubt that I am going to play in any of the majors because we are going out to eat after church before he heads back to Billings. Above are some pictures of us at the game. Eric is #78.

EDIT: In response to the Iowa fan who commented, Montana did get dominated by Iowa on both sides of the ball. I was just stating the fact that it was only a 10 point ball game with 5 minutes left in the third quarter. Also, Iowa scored with a TD with 6 seconds left in the game which made the score even more out of hand. Anyway, Iowa dominated the game, which they should. I was just disappointed in Iowa's entertainment director because there was just nothing going on during timeouts. Someone who doesn't even like football could enjoy a Montana game, but I do not believe this is the case at an Iowa game.

First Week of School

2006-08-28T03:39:00.000-04:00

I had a fairly successful first week of school in many aspects. It looks like my class schedule is not too hard and I shouldn't have a ton of homework this semester. So classes are looking good. It was also good to get back out on the basketball court with my teammates and play some 5 on 5. This week was my first full court games I've played since I left Seward for the summer.

With all the classes, basketball, and hanging out with friends, I felt I did a great job of spending enough time with Leah as well as mixed in some poker here and there. As for poker this week, I had very few losing sessions and no losing days. When those things happen, the numbers obviously rise and I ended up somewhere between $8,000 and $10,000 this week. I am so excited to see those numbers because I have had so many other things going on this week. I definitely believe that when a poker player has other fun things going on in his life, his poker playing will improve. This is another reason why there is no way I could just play poker for a living. I know that I would make more money if my days are busy and I fit poker in here and there then I would if all I had was poker. I went all week without Leah even seeing me play at all which is pretty amazing considering it is one of my top five best weeks pokerwise. She had no idea that I had been pwning a lot. It is not that she minds if I play, I am just glad that poker hasn't gotten in the way of our relationship.

This upcoming week is going to be exciting. Preseason basketball officially begins on Monday. Also, my brother is playing football against the University of Iowa (who is #16 in the preseason polls) on Saturday. So my dad is coming through Seward on Friday to pick me up and go to the game. It will be an awesome site to see my brother play football in front of over 80,000 fans. The game will be on ESPN U at 12:00 ET if anyone wants to watch it on tv. Well, that is what's on tap for the upcoming week. It should be a fun one.

Great Summer!

2006-08-15T20:25:00.001-04:00

This summer was everything that I had hoped it'd be and more. The first month in Montana was sweet. Then Leah then came to Montana and she met all my crazy Montana friends. I am so excited that she liked them and they like her as well. My closest friends are here in MT and their thoughts mean a lot to me.

Then in June, Duncan, Colin, and I went on the trip of a lifetime to Europe. That was a trip that I will never forget. I am so glad that I was able to do something that many Americans will never have a chance to do. We saw a lot of famous European places as well as went to Wimbledon and saw Roger Federer play.

When I returned to the states, I went and saw Leah who I had missed a ton. I stayed at her house for a week and a half and then I headed to Las Vegas. I stayed in a house of about thirteen of the best young online players in the world. It was a such a great mix of guys. The tally of people and where they were from were : 1-Sweden, 1-Australia, 1-Florida, 1-Alabama, 1-Texas, 2-Illinois, 2-Nebraska, 1-California, 1-Michigan, 2- Minnesota, and me from Montana. That data is to the best of my knowledge. Anyway, I stayed there for a week and a half and had such a great time. I met and learned from some outstanding players including the current #3 player in the world. Vegas was sweet!

I returned back to Montana and the next weekend, my family went to Flathead Lake in Northwestern Montana. That lake is such an awesome lake, so we had a great time. Then this past weekend, I went to my friend Duncan's cabin with 12 other friends. That was also a good time to say the least.

Now I'm headed back to Nebraska to stay at Leah's for a few days before returning to Seward on Saturday. I can't believe I am already a college upperclassman! We start classes Monday so that'll be a change in lifestyle for me. It'll be different to actually have obligations again. Oh well. My class schedule should be pretty good considering I don't start until 11:00 am on Monday and Wednesdays, and I don't have class at all on Friday.

Anyway, that is a summary of my great summer and a look at my plans for the next week. I probably won't have much time for poker in the next week or so until I get adjusted to my schedule. That's all I got for now.

A lot of fun with some grinding on the side...

2006-08-11T14:29:00.000-04:00

The last couple of weeks I have been doing a lot of catching up with my friends because this is the last summer that we all could be back in Billings together. Today, about 15 of us are going to my friend Duncan's cabin which is located right near the Yellowstone National Park entrance at Cook City. This is going to be a great weekend and I am excited to get out there to fish and four-wheel. I won't be back till Sunday night. That should be a lot of fun.

The last week or so I have been putting in a lot of short online sessions and have done fairly well. I can't remember the exact numbers, but my bankrolls on each site have raised substantially. It is always a delight to see those numbers rise. School starts on the 21st and I think I'm going to leave this Wednesday for Leah's for a few days before we head off to school. It will be nice to have something different to do, but my poker time is going to become a lot less. Should be a fun next couple of weeks though and I am ready to start my JUNIOR year of college. I can't believe I am already a college upperclassman. Alright, I'm off of for the cabin. Hopefully we all will return alive, but there are no guarantees.

One Long Drive

2006-07-26T03:29:00.000-04:00

Well, I decided to go the whole way today from Vegas to Billings. It turned out only being a 15 hour drive and I did it with ease. The car worked excellent which was a huge relief. It is really good to see the family again for the first time since the end of May. On Friday, we are picking up my brother in Missoula and going up to Flathead Lake. Flathead Lake is located in north western Montana and is one of the most beautiful places I have ever been. I guess this is why many famous people have houses on the lake. Time to sleep for 12 hours then go play some basketball tomorrow.

Time to Go Home

2006-07-25T00:59:00.000-04:00

After a great nine days in Vegas, I think it is time to go home. I haven't been home since May and I am tired of traveling. My car overheated on Saturday and I just got it back from the shop tonight. I also had a rough online session at -$2200 playing 30/60 HU versus a guy who was hitting everything. I need a few days off from poker so I will use the drive home as the much needed break. Overall, this Vegas trip was awesome! I met a lot a great players and learned a ton from watching them. I have so much room for improvement and this week was great for me as a poker player. So tomorrow morning I will leave and hopefully my car will run well. Please pray for me and my long journey back to Billings, Montana.

Life is good

2006-07-20T22:05:00.000-04:00

Yesterday afternoon I played my fourth live session of the trip and was +450 at the 10/20 table at the Mirage when I called it quits. I then went to check on the guys at the Rio and none of them had any luck in the 2K pot limit holdem event. I went to find a different casino to play at later on. First, I went to the Treasure Island casino and the poker room sucked, so I got a $1 chip (I am collecting chips from each casino) and left. I then try Harrah's and that too was a small card room that played no bigger that 2/4. So I got a chip and left. From there I went back to the Mirage and sat at the 20/40 table. I had a few second best hands and I was down $550 before I knew it. I then noticed that the 10/20 table was shorthanded so I jumped over there. After another hour and my set of nines losing to 24, I was down another $300. I decided to call it quits and come back to the house.

Today I woke up and had an online session of +2,500. I decided to start playing 3 and 4 tables of shorthanded limit cash games at a time and I was able to handle it fairly easily. I hadn't had much success when I have multitabled more than two in the past. But it is getting a lot easier. After the morning session, I decided to go shopping at the outlet mall near our house. I found a nice pairs of dress shoes and flip flops.

After shopping, I came back and played an hour long session and ran really well for +$3,500. As we speak, we are looking at cardplayer.com's WSOP updates on the $5000 NL holdem event where, at the dinner break, two of our roommates are 1 and 2 in chips. Michael "Worldsgrtest" Banducci, and Jonathon "JCardShark" Little have great chances of reaching the final table. We will probably head over to the Rio tonight and cheer them on.

Vegas report

2006-07-18T23:36:00.000-04:00

Vegas is becoming more and more comfortable and I am enjoying every minute of it. Two nights ago, I decided to try playing live in one of the casinos. I ran into Mats and his two Swedish friends while I was walking into the Rio. They were headed to the Venetian so I decided to join them. Praying that they wouldn't card me, I sat down at the 6/12 game. I only had $600 on me and the options were either 6/12 or 20/40, so I had to choose the 6/12 game.
After a few hours, we decided to leave and I cashed out with an acceptable $260 profit.

Last night, seven of us from the house went to PF Chang's in the Alladin Casino. After the great meal, we asked the house if they would spread a 2/4 2-7 triple draw game . They set us up with a private table and we played that along with Crazy Pineapple for the next four hours. The guys were playing crazy and every pot was capped preflop. We finished the night with a little Pot Limit Omaha and had some monsterous $300+ pots with all $1 chips. It was a blast. Shannon ended up the big winner on the night. We got back to the house at about 3:30 and called it a night. (Mats has pictures of the night on his blog at http://poker.se/blog.php?bid=30928.)

Today, everyone in the house played in the $1500 NL event except for Nate and I. When we got up, Nate and I went down to the Bellagio and I played some 8/16. I got bored after a little while and walked away from the table a $150 winner. Nate, Adam, and Shannon all entered the daily tourney at the Bellagio. I didn't feel like waiting for them so I left and went over to the Rio and see who was still alive in the WSOP event. I didn't see any of the guys so I sat down at a 10/20 table. I played for a little while and again became bored so I cashed out a $200 winner. As I am cashing out, the WSOP event went on dinner break and I ran into Aussie J. We decided to go to the buffet in the Rio and had an outstanding meal. After dinner, Aussie J returned to his tourney. I drove back to the house and it looks like Dave, Adam, and I are going to Pirates of the Caribbean 2.

I am really happy that none of the poker rooms have carded me and that I have come out a winner in my first three live sessions in Vegas. Though none of the sessions have been huge wins, they are wins and that is all that I can ask for. Lots and lots of poker, this is sweet.

Sunday Tourneys

2006-07-16T21:51:00.001-04:00

I just played some of the best tournament poker that I have ever played. The first tourney I entered into was the 50K guaranteed on Pacific Poker. I ended up taking 73th for a profit of just $55. I was pretty disappointed after my tournament ended when I get all in with 88 on the flop of 7 9 10. AJ decided to call a whole bunch of chips on that flop and a 6 turned for my straight, but an 8 rivered to give him the higher straight. I was in control of this tourney for the longest time and am pretty disappointed.

I then decided to try to qualify for next year's WSOP on Poker Stars. With 7377 entrants, I sat at around average stack for most of the tourney and finally busted at 828th when 234 people get a seat. I got far enough to start smelling the $12000 WSOP package.

I also played in the Million dollar guaranteed on Party poker. I played really well in this tourney and had almost 100,000 chips at bubble time. From then on, I couldnt build my stack any more and eventually was knocked out with 10 10 against KQ. I took 213th out of 5482 for a profit of just $662. I went really deep in 3 tourneys and only profited $347. I am pretty disappointed with that. I will probably play mostly cash games tonight and try to make some good money.

Las Vegas

2006-07-15T22:22:00.000-04:00

After a little over a week at my girlfriend's house in Nebraska, I drove to Vegas and arrived today. I have met most of the guys and they seem really cool. I think this is going to be a blast. I am also excited to get back going with poker. Tonight we are going out on the town. I'll update later.

Wrapping Up an Experience of a Lifetime

2006-07-04T14:44:00.000-04:00

My final day in Europe has just about come to a close. After London, we went to Brussels for a fairly uneventful two days. It was a nice city, but there just wasn't much for people our age to do there. Overall, my favorite places were Munich, Nice, and the Wimbledon part of London. I feel that if we would have run into more people our age in the other places, we would've had just as much fun as we did in Munich and Nice. I am now in Amsterdam for the night and I fly out tomorrow at around 11:00 am local time and will arrive in Denver at around 8:00 pm. Colin and Duncan went from Brussels to Frankfurt to enjoy the World Cup finals atmosphere. If Germany wins it, I have a feeling that my friends will not return to the states because they will get trampled in the streets with all the rioting that will be going on. Even though I have had a blast here in Europe, I am ready to get back to the states to see my girlfriend and to remind the poker world that I am still alive. I'm not sure how much my girlfriend misses me, but I know the poker world misses my donations. Hopefully, I will start off on the right track when I get back to my computer. Well time to get a good night's rest before my 8 hour flight, 4 hour layover, and 3 hour flight tomorrow. It should be a fun one.

Unproductive Day

2006-06-29T15:48:00.000-04:00

Today was one of the more unproductive days of the trip. We got up at 9 again and we walked to a place where we could get on a bus tour. We rode the bus tour all over town...Twice! We got off a few places to eat, take pictures, and look around. We didn't end up going in any place though. Before we knew it, it was 7 in the evening and we realized that we didn't accomplish much. Well I now know London like the back of my hand as far as the outside of the buildings go and locations of them. Tomorrow we might check out one of the football stadiums than catch the quarterfinal matches on TV.

I've edited some of the Barcelona trip that I forgot about.

Wimbledon!

2006-06-28T16:59:00.000-04:00

Yesterday we came to London having no idea that Wimbledon was even going on and today we decided to go and watch. We woke up at 9 am, the earliest start to a day of the trip, and walked to the metro. We went across town planning on just getting tickets for the small side courts and just watch tennis all day and maybe see a few names we recognized.

The trip started out as a mess. We got to Wimbledon only to find the longest line I have ever seen. 3,000-4,000 people wrapped around the city blocks each without a ticket. We decided that we were already there so we would give it a shot. We waited in line and the line went surprisingly fast. After about one hour and 45 minutes of waiting, we got down to about 100 people in front of us when they shut down the gates that were in our sight. The grounds had reached its maximum capacity. They told us that they were going to let us in on a 1 out-1 in basis. So since there were two lines for the whole grounds and we had to sit there and wait for about 200 people to leave. The problem was that it was only about 12:00 and people were just getting started. So we waited and waited. We thought about calling at quits but then decided to continue. Two and a half hours later, we finally got up to the gates. When we got there, the ticket man said that they just got four tickets for the Center Court because those people left. We asked how much they were and they said they were 43 pounds, 26 pounds more than just the ground tickets. Then we asked who was playing on the Center Court and they said that Federer and Henman were playing the final match. That made our decision real easy. So we splurged and took the tickets for the Center Court.

We got inside at about 2:30 and there were courts everywhere. Twenty in total. We went to take our seats in Center Court and Nalbandian was playing some other guy. Nalbandian is ranked top 10 in the world. He finished his opponent in straight sets and then they announced that the next match was going to be forfeited because Kim Clijsters' opponent had a viral infection. So they skipped right to the Roger Federer-Tim Henman match. Henman is a successful player who is also playing in front of his hometown so this was supposed to be a really tough second round opponent for Federer. After a 6-4 first set win, Federer proved that he was by far the best player in the world by winning the next two sets 6-0 and 6-1. He pretty much made Henman look like an eleven year-old girl. Though it was not the most exciting match, it was sweet to see Federer play and watch him get into his unphaseable zone. We also sat only three rows above the families of the players, so we may get some TV time. That would be aight.

After the Federer match, we went around the side courts looking for other notable players. We watched American James Blake win and we also saw Justine Henin-Hardenne dominate her opponent. Overall, this has been one of the best, if not the best days of the trip so far with only one week left to go for me.

I decided to head back a week earlier than Colin and Duncan. I will leave Amsterdam on the 5th and head to Hastings to see my girlfriend on the 6th. I will probably stay there for about a week before I head off the Vegas to join Dave and his poker posse.

Nice, Barcelona, now London

2006-06-27T10:45:00.000-04:00

Nice was great. It was on the beach and we met a lot of cool American backpackers. We were also there for their huge June 21st party that was celebrating the beginning of summer. There were live bands all over downtown and they played a lot of great american hits. Colin of course had to go crowd surfing and we just had a great night.

We left Nice for Barcelona and I liked Barcelona but it was no Nice. In Barcelona, we went to the Picasso museum which we all agreed was a little bit of a disappointment. The other days, we spent most of our time wandering around the town and laying on the beach. The last day we were there, I was wearing my swim suit and I am pretty sure my wallet fell out of it when I sat down at waiting for a subway train. I dont think that I was pick pocketed because I had it 2 minutes before and there wasnt really anyone around us in that 2 minutes. Anyway, I lost my debit card, drivers license, my social security card, pictures, and about 180 euro. That was disappointing. Barcelona was still a fun time and I would definitely go back.

We just got into London after a night train from Barcelona to Paris and then an train from Paris to here. Our hostel is pretty cool because there is a bar in it as well as a few computers for the internet. Well thats all for now. Time to watch the Brazil-Ghana game...the game we should be playing in.

Edit: I forgot that in Barcelona we took a tour of Camp Nou, where FC Barcelona plays. We walked on the field that Ronaldinho plays on. It was a was pretty awesome. I have some good pictures. Thats it.

Summary of Rome, now Nice

2006-06-20T10:39:00.000-04:00

Rome was pretty cool. It was a lot like Paris in that it had a lot of famous places to see that I had only heard about and seen pictures of. Those places (Collosium, Vatican, Sistene Chapel, etc.), however, were not the highlights of Rome. One of the highlights was definitely watching the USA-Italy soccer game in a bar full of crazy Italians. My friends and I were going nuts after the Italians scored for us to tie it up and then after the Italian recieved a red card. We thought for sure we were going to walk out of the bar a winner when things started to change. The US proceeded to get two red debateable red cards and we were playing 9 on 10 for most of the second half. After we scored out second goal. My friends and I were jumping up and down screaming because we forgot who was around us. A few seconds later the goal was whiped off because of an off-sides call and all the Italians in the bar jumped up and cheered in our faces. haha serves us right I guess. It was sure a night to remember. After the tie, the Italians let us leave the bar in one piece and I guess that is all we can ask for. I have become such a huge soccer fan since I have been over here with my two friends who have always been huge fans. The World Cup craze is undescribable in Europe right now. That was our first of our two fun nights.

The next night, after touring more of the city. Colin, Duncan, and I went on a pub crawl with 120 other English speaking people. We drank for free from 9-10 and then we went from pub to pub the rest of the night. We recieved a free shot at each of the three pubs we attended as well. It was crazy. We probably drank a little too much but we still found our way back to the hostel. I definitely enjoyed the nights in Rome better than the site seeing, but it was all still cool.

The next morning after the pub crawl, we had to get up after only four hours of sleep and catch our train to Nice, France. The train ride was sweet because we rode on the coast of the Mediterranean Sea for most of it. It was just beautiful. Anyway, we got to Nice and we went to eat, watched the Spain-Tunisia game, and then called it a night.

This morning, we woke up and hit the beach. Colin and I swam in the Mediterranean for a few hours this afternoon and then we came here to the internet cafe to book reservations in Barcelona. We will be here in Nice for the next two nights then off to Spain. It should be a blast.

Munich then Rome

2006-06-15T09:38:00.000-04:00

After we saw all this sites in Paris. Duncan, Colin, and I took a night train to Munich. We got there at about 7 in the morning and we decided to go on a free walking tour. The town is amazing. I had no idea that Munich was the home base of Hitler and the Nazis. Hitlers revolution began in this city. Most of the buildings were destroyed in WWII but they are now rebuilt. Since the buildings are only 60 years old, the city is very modern. I just love it here. However, time is up and we will be hopping on a night train to Rome in a few hours. That should be a blast.

Congrats to my mentor, David Anderson, who won the 500 PL Holdem event in Tahoe. I am so glad to see him succeed. Everything I have learned about is a credit to him and I cant thank him enough for it. I am extremely excited to get back to the states and join him and others in Vegas for the World Series of Poker. I will have to be a railbird since I am only 20 but I will learn a tremendous amount hanging with some of the best poker players in the world. Ill update later. Peace.

Eurotrip is coming up...

2006-06-04T14:57:00.000-04:00

On Wednesday, a couple friends from Billings and I are going to embark on the journey of a lifetime. Colin, Duncan, and I are headed to Europe for five weeks of who knows what. We are flying out of Denver and landing in Amsterdam. From there we don't have many plans. All we have are our backpacks and our Eurorail passes. We have an idea of what cities we want to hit, but we have no clue when or for how long each stop will be. If we really enjoy one city, we want to be able to stay there for a few days. Hostels will be our home at each stop (no, I haven't seen the movie). We want to make it all the way down to Athens and then back over to Spain and Portugal with many stops along the way, one being a poker player's dream, Monaco. Anyway, I won't be playing much poker, if any, until I return back to the States.

When we get back, I plan on driving back to Nebraska to visit Leah for a few days. After that, I will drive to Vegas to join the Dave and many others in a rental house for the duration of the WSOP. I plan on playing in the cash games in Vegas as well as cheering those guys on in the WSOP events. The next two months maybe the greatest months of my now 20 year old life. I am so pumped, I can't even express it in words.

Well I have no idea when my next post will be, but I will for sure post pictures when I return.

What a Game!

2006-05-28T04:11:00.000-04:00

Well, I have found a new juiciest game in Billings, 3/6 Holdem at the Red Door Casino. I was hanging out with a few guys and they wanted to go play some poker at this casino. I decided that I might as well join them and just have fun playing poker just once this week. Sure enough, when I decided to enjoy myself, I run hotter than the sun. I sat down with $200 and ended up cashing out at $460 after only 2.5 hours and at least $50 in tips to the dealers and other players. That's a decent $3/6 hourly wage :). My strategy was just to raise and built monsterous pots with suited connectors and one gappers. Sure enough, the pots would become absolutely gigantic for a 3/6 game and I would wind up with at least the nut straight, but usually I had boats by the river. My best hand of the night was when I had 56s and I capped the pot with 6 others in. Flop came K56. I bet and others wanted to raise and I had no objection. Turn 6. Once again I get bet into and I raise. River 6, just in case :) And my friend has the King so he leads out again and of course I raise again. haha. He was pretty pissed when I turned over my quads with my "garbage hand." Anyway, that was one of the most fun nights I have ever had playing poker. I would raise with like 79 suited with 6 others in the pot, airball the flop, and then open fold because I knew I had no outs. Others thought that I was crazy, but my friends knew that my strategy was not stupid. Anyway that was a fun night that capped off a looong day.

I woke up this morning at 6:15. Yes, 6:15, amazing. That was 6 hours earlier than any other non-Sunday since summer began. I had to take a test called a PPST at 6:45. It is a standardized test that I have to take in order to get into Concordia's teacher education program. I have put it off for a whole semester, so I decided to finally get it out of the way. I finished after about 3.5 hours. The test wasn't too hard, but it still sucked.

After the test, I came home and took a three hour long nap and then I decided to play some online tourneys. I did fairly well in the 35K guaranteed, $33 buy in, on Party. Out of 1204 entrants, I grinded my way down to 29th place for a profit of about $200. I do not remember much about the tourney other than I ended up pushing for about 12 times the BB with QJo and 88 in the SB called me. Flop was JX8 and I was out. Oh well. I'll hit big in one of these sometime. I just love these $20 and $30 buy in tourneys. For me, they are way more profitable than all the major tourneys because the level of play is sooo much worse. Obviously though, I will have to hit top 3 if I want to make enough money to make these tourneys worth the time, but they are still good experience.

After I busted out of that tourney, I went to my grandparents' house to play pinochle with my aunt and uncle, who are in town. That was a good time, but the best fun was definitely yet to come. After pinochle, I went to a friend of a friend's house to watch the Ultimate Fighting Challenge on Pay-Per View. That was sweet! I couldn't imagine taking those massive blows to the face and having my arm almost twist off, all while being choked to death. Those guys are rediculously tough. After the fights, we went to the casino and enjoyed the fun 3/6 game. Well, I'm sure no one cares, but that was my crazy Saturday. Tomorrow, I'm excited because my girlfriend is flying in. It should be a fun time. That's all.

Time to Get Rolling again

2006-05-26T04:19:00.000-04:00

So after 2 days off, I decided to hit up the casino tonight and play some 10/20. I played for about 4 hours and just could not get much going. I had AA cracked once in a huge pot to a gutterball on the river and I had two lower flushes with 3 on the board. However, as cold as that session seemed, I only ended up losing $200. Yay, there is a bright spot.

After the casino, I get home and I decide to enter in some small online tourneys for the fun of it. I am flying my girlfriend up here to Montana on Sunday so I told myself that I am going to get sick of poker before she gets here.

I entered a $20 tourney on Bodog and took 10th out of 43 entrants. I played well early on but I don't remember much more about that tourney. 5 got paid so no $$$ :(

I was also in a $50 on Full Tilt and was doing really well until I pushed with AK and 88 called me. I lose the coinflip and am out in 21st out of 111. 18 got paid so no money there either :(

Now to the so-so tourney of the night. A $10 Headhunter tourney on Jetset Poker. 45 people entered the tourney. Since it is a headhunter tourney, every player has a bounty on them (the bounties are higher for the players who are ranked on this site). So, since I never hardly ever play on Jetset, my bounty was the lowest at $3.82:) We get down to 20 people and I am just above average stack. The bad part was that I had yet to knock a player out so I had no bounty money. Then I went on a huge heater. I knocked out 4 of the next 10 guys out of the tourney. I was raising with almost every hand and they were pushing on me every time I had a real hand:). So we get down to the final table and I have 34,000 in chips. The person in second had 11,000. I was just dominating and taking names. I knock out 2 more guys and we get down to 3 handed (40K for me, 14K for JOANJET, and 16K for thetalk). I was on my way to my first multitable win (if you can call it that, since there were only 45 entrants and it was a $10 buy in :) ). Eventually, JOANJET and thetalk get all in and JOANJET won the battle.

I get heads up with JOANJET (who is the highest ranked player on Jetset poker, she had a bounty of over $7). When we started HU, she had 40K to my 30K in chips (blinds were only 200/400 at the start, so there was a lot of play left). After about 20 minutes of play, she had grinded me down to 10K after I flopped second pair and the nut flush draw, but she flop top pair and I didn't improve. So I started to grind back. I doubled somehow and kept being aggressive with my button. I worked my way back to a chip lead and a 37K to 34K advantage when she bumped with AJ (blinds 500/1000) in the SB. I wake up with AQ in the BB and I push. She calls and I am 5 cards away from my first tourney win. Flop XXX. Two cards away. Turn X. One card away. River J. Greaaaat.

So I'm down to 3K in chips and the match is pretty much over. The VERY NEXT HAND I see A3 and push. JOANJET picks up K3 and of course calls because I am short. Once again I am in a dominating position, and I am still in that same position after the turn when the KING rivered. This site is reeetarded. JOANJET must own Jetset poker. haha. I know this sounds like its too unlikely to be true, but that is how it happened. Back to back hands AQ vs AJ and A3 vs K3. Oh well that was poker and I still gained valuable experience.

I collected $45.01 for 2nd place and $28.54 for my 6 bounties (tied for most in the tourney) for a grand total profit of $62.55 for that tourney and ended the night of online tourneys, after the other buyins, -$14.45. HAHA. I still feel that things are turning around and I am going to have a big day tomorrow. First I need a good nights rest...

Worst 30 minutes of my life!

2006-05-22T23:45:00.000-04:00

I just lost somewhere in the neighborhood of $2,000 in the last 30 minutes. I had more 2 and 3 outers hit on me in those 30 minutes than I have ever had in a day. It was rediculous how many 2nd best hands I had. I hadn't played since I lost out of the 50K guaranteed on Pacific Poker yesterday when I got all in preflop with AA against AKd. Flop was dXX and you know the rest. I guess I have to take a longer break than 2 days. Oh well. Sorry about the venting.

World Poker Exchange... I love you!

2006-05-19T04:01:00.000-04:00

Well I played a little over 2 hours today, mostly on WPX and a little on Pac. +$5,000. Life is great! Enough said, sleepy time.

Worst -$200 of my Poker Career

2006-05-18T04:16:00.000-04:00

So tonight I went to the casino to play the juicy 10/20 game and it was just as crazy as ever. I was just dominating and taking names for the first 3 hours and was up $1200 or so. It was getting late and the table was down to 4 handed.

I was sitting with two of the biggest fish that I have ever seen. One of them was admitably bad. He has said repeatedly, "I call because I suck at poker" and "I don't play for the money, I just like the action." The other guy was a crazy player who strattled every time he was UTG, but he did not know how to play the straddle. I cannot express how bad both these players are....

So we get 4 handed and someone says, "Let's make this a 20/40 game." I happily agreed because I was sitting in a donkey stable. So for the next 40 minutes we play 20/40 and I proceed to go as cold as I have ever gone. I never won a pot or, for that matter, HIT A PAIR in those 40 minutes. No lie, NOT A SINGLE PAIR. But the worse part about it, was that Straddle donkey and Action donkey would love to turn over 62o, 93s, etc. on the river for bottom pair. Luckily, I was able to save bets because they would have their chips over the pot showing me that they were going to call, so I would just check. After that 40 minutes, I reluctantly stood up with my last $300 and called it quits. That was extremely frustrating!

However...now that I think about it, I played my first session on WorldPX (a poker site with NO RAKE) and I made a little over a grand. So I am actually up for the day. Wow my life is crazy when I can make over $800 in a day and still end the day pissed. Well after putting things in perspective, I think I will be able to sleep tonight. Bed time.

Disappointed but happy at the same time...

2006-05-13T21:31:00.000-04:00

Today I played my first live tournament for more than $5. It was a $200 + $25 NL Holdem tourney with a $100 add on or rebuy. I decided not to waste anytime and I added on at the start of the tourney. Surprisingly, I was the only person out of the 48 entrants that chose to do this. Eventually, everyone ended up adding on the 3,000 chips which was the same as what we started with. They decided they were going to payout 6 places with first place being around $5,000. So I started the tourney with 6,000 chips, 3,000 more than anyone else...

My first table was crazy! I had a psycho aggressive Native American on my left who was 21 years old, a 35 year old black guy on my right (who lost out of the tourney after rebuying in less than 10 hands), and the rest were a bunch of guys in their 50's or higher. I won a nice pot with KK early without having to show it down. I was up to about 8K in chips when I was dealt 99 in MP. There was one limper and I decided to raise 4X. Button called, limper called. Flop Qc 4s 4c. I bet 3/4 of the pot, button calls, limper folds. I think to myself, "old guy, probably flush draw." Turn 5d. Pot is 1,500 and he has 2,000 left so I put him all in and he auto calls with QQ. Oops. River 9 just to laugh in my face. So I was down to about 4K in chips and still fine... My table is the first to break and I get moved to a table where there is no really big stack. I steal blinds and not much went on for the next hour before the break. A few a my friends came to root me on and we went out to eat during the hour break. I had 5,500 in chips with the blinds going to be 100/200. I needed to make a move. Shortly after the break my table was broken again. I was moved to the table with the biggest hee haw (we’ll call him Donkey) in the tourney on my right and two tight olds guys on my left. The old guy on my left was the casino owner who was fairly tight and was short stacked the whole time. The old guy two seats to my left (I'm guessing he was at least 80 years old so we’ll call him 80 year old) was the chip leader by far in the tourney. He loved to limp and then take down pots (usually because he was hitting the nuts every time). His chip stack was getting ginormous. So with 27 or so people left, I was still sitting around 5,500 in chips when I picked up 99 in the BB (blinds were 150/300). Cutoff, with about 4,000 in chips, pushed all in and I decided to call because I am starting to get desperate and there is a good chance I have the best hand. He flips over QJ. Flop XXQ. I’m crippled. Turn J. Nice life dealer. River NINE! I can’t believe I peeled that off. I NEVER DO THAT TO PEOPLE! So I’m sitting there with a slightly under average 11,000 in chips. I’m in decent shape now.

As we continue play, I get to talking with the casino owner on my left and he says that his son is sitting across the table from us. He also said that his son is a professional poker player. I think nothing of it and continue play. Let’s call them son and father for the future. I also found out there were 5 to 10 "pros" in the field, but I've never heard of them.

As we get down to two tables, I start picking up some big starting hands. I steal blinds and get up to about 14,000 in chips when I pick up AA on the button (blinds 300/600). Son limps UTG (I do not think that he is a very good player because of all the limping he does with his big stack). Anyway, I raise it up 2,000. Father, out of the SB, flat calls! Then son calls. Flop XXX. They check, I bet, they fold, and I take down a nice pot (once again not showing down my hand). Son gets knocked out by Donkey in a huge pot soon after.

A few hands later, I have AQd in EP and I raise my standard raise. Button, who I considered the best player at the table other than me (we’ll call him Decent), pushed me all. I decided that my tourney was not going to end here, so I laid it down and he showed AQo. Oh well, I’m still alive and kicking.

A couple hands later, I pick up AKh in MP. I raise standard and son flat calls out of the SB. Flop comes As Jd 10h. He checks I bet ¾ pot. He starts putting on a 3 minute show of agony. I am trying to decide whether he is acting or if I really have the best hand. After he just calls, I decided that I had the best hand unless any scary cards come. Turn Qh, giving me the nuts for the moment and the royal flush draw. He checks and I decide to check behind him. After looking back at this, I probably should’ve bet since he could’ve had J10 and I gave him a chance to boat up. River, the blankest of blanks, a 2c. He checks, I decide to bet almost all of my chips. I did this so it looked like I could get away from it if I was raised. He looks at me and angrily mucks his hand. The whole table starts saying “The kid just played you like a chump.” I started becoming known as the young kid who has skills. All the dealers were all impressed with my play and started cheering me on when they were on their breaks. The tourney director, who dealt when I played 10/20 at this same casino on Thursday, was my biggest fan. She told me that she’d give me $20 if I knocked out Decent. I agreed to the bounty and Decent and I continued to joke about it the rest of the tourney.

Anyway I was up around 23K in chips after that hand and I was still seeing good starting hands. I picked up AK suited the very next hand and stole blinds. A few hands later, I pick up AA on the cutoff (Decent’s BB). I raised my standard raise and the old guys fold over to Decent. I was just praying that he pick up a mediocre hand so that he could push on me because he was dying to go over the top of me once. He stares at me once with a fishy look before he looks down at his cards. He mucks and turns his 8 10 off over in disgust. He tells me that he was going to push on me with anything decent there. I then decide to show my AA so that everyone knows I am not raising with garbage every hand. So I didn’t get action, but at least I got some respect this hand that might’ve helped me in the future.

People start getting eliminating and I am sitting fine. There are 13 left and we are now 6 handed at my table. Decent was moved to the other table, so it was just me, Father, 80 year old, two other old guys, and Donkey. Since Father and 80 year old were tight, I raised every button where it was folded to me and they never defended their blinds. The game was getting easy.

I raised their button with nothing and stole. Next hand in the cutoff, I raised with nothing and stole. Next hand, I raised with 79s and stole. Then all of a sudden I was under the gun and I look down at KK. This was such a perfect spot because I had just raised the last three hands. The old guys were getting pissed…

With KK UTG, I standard raise and 80 year old calls. Flop comes Q57 rainbow. Beautiful. I knew that 80 year old was going to at least call, so I bet the pot. Sure enough, he calls. Turn 4, still rainbow. I bet big again and he calls. He was definitely in check call mode, so I knew he had a Q, probably QJ or Q10. River 6 making the board Q4567, kind of a scary card, but I wasn’t too worried. I decided to check and he decided to throw the rest of his chips in (which wasn’t that much) so I called. He flips over Q9 and I rake in the biggest pot of the tourney while knocking out 80 year old. I am now second in chips in the tourney, only behind Donkey on my right.

We get to the final table and I am still second in chips. Decent is short stacked in seat 1, another 80 year old is in seat 3, I am now in seat 4, Father is in seat 6, in seats 7 and 8 are two guys who are around 23 years old, and Donkey is in seat 9. Since 6 people are paid and I am big stacked, I was going to pick some good spots to steal because the blinds and antes were getting big and I am second in chips.

So we start playing nine handed and two guys get knocked out really fast. Then Donkey limps UTG with KQo (blinds 500/1000 antes 100) and the button picks up AQ and pushes for 18000 more. Donkey thinks for a while and of course calls because he is a donkey. He actually lost this hand though. Sorry that is an unneeded hand to mention but I just want to emphasize how much this guy sucks. Donkey still leads the tourney though in chips after this hand.

We are then seven handed at the bubble and I pick up 82o UTG. Fold Right? Wrong. I standard raise it (all of my standard raises were only like 2.5 times the BB because I was always able to steal for cheap, so why not?). Everyone folds to SB, Decent, who is the short stack. He thinks long and hard and finally mucks. BB folds, and I take down the pot with 82o. I live for this.

A few hands later, I am the cutoff and I pick up AJo (blinds 1000/2000 antes 200). Donkey limps UTG, Decent limps next to him, and I raise it to 9000. I really wanted them to fold but of course I knew that Donkey would call, but I still had position on him. He says out loud how he is so sick of all my raising and he is going to have to see a flop with his rags. He called and the flop was K94, yuck. I bet 11000 and he pushes all in on me because his 92 suited (that’s what I put him on anyway) hit second pair. I had to fold and was a little upset that he hit that flop. I absolutely KNOW he did, he is not capable of making that play with nothing. I was still sitting fine however, probably 5th in chips.

Soon after, Decent was knocked out as the bubble boy. However, I did not knock him out so I did not collect my $20. Oh well haha. After he got knocked out, they we had two small blinds and a big blind. Everyone folded to the button who was also a SB (blinds 1000/2000 antes 200). Button calls, I have Q10c so I call, and BB checks. Flop Ac 2s 4c. I check, BB checks, button bets 10,000 into a 7200 pot. This is a suspiciously huge bet, so I push all in on him for another 30,000. I did not think he had an Ace and could call, but if he did, I would still have a lot of outs. BB folds, and button calls and flips over A8. Turn Jd, giving me a gutty along with my flush draw. River X. I get knocked out of the tourney in 6th place for a whopping $620. Six and a half hours of tourney play for a net profit of $295. booo.

I am really disappointed because I was completely dominating the final table before that AJo hand. I was the best player there by far and I had the chips to take complete control. Throughout the whole tourney, no one ever went over the top of me without AQ or AK. I know this because I only twice did someone ever reraise me preflop and those two hands are the ones they showed.

There are also some positives as I look back. My last hand was the ONLY time throughout the whole tourney that I was all in. Another plus was that I was only in ONE coinflip situation and that is when my 99 held up against that guy’s QJ on the XXQJ9 board. My two 99’s and the final Q10c were the ONLY THREE HANDS in the tourney that I was showed other than my AA after stealing. I felt my reads we exceptional for my first live tourney aside from the 99 versus QQ boat early on. Overall, I am disappointed but excited at the same time because I know that I can play live now and that I still can improve a lot. My biggest accomplishment today was the compliments I received throughout the tourney. I received them because of my poker skills as well as my politeness. Those compliments made me feel a lot better after the small profit. I thank God for giving me the chance to play and do well in that tourney today.

Montana Casinos = Fish Ponds

2006-05-12T14:19:00.000-04:00

After playing a lot of online poker this week, I decided to go find a game at a casino. Nothing beats having the actual cards and chips in your hand. I hear about this 10/2o game at Doc and Eddy's casino. I go there for the first time and the game is being held way in the back of the casino. I walk in a every one greets me nice and they tell me to have a seat. So I buy in for $550. I sit down and start playing. The people seemed to be extremely nice. But there was not one good card player in the whole room. So we were 8 handed and I was playing fairly tight. For the first hour, every pot I entered, I was hitting every flop. I flopped a set with 77 and two pair with both A8d and 89s. Apparently, these people are not used to getting check raised and I was doing that all night. I would continually check raise the turn and all of a sudden I would hear the F-bomb from the person I raised. HAHA. This happened at least ten times throughout the night. They weren't necessarily mad at me, but they were mad at themselves for betting their marginal hands and allowing me to check raise them.

Anyway, I profited about $500 over the course of 4 hours or so. However, I was sitting in a horrible seat because the aggressive fish was on my left. I wish I could have been on his left so that I could three bet him and isolate him because he plays every rag possible. I guarantee that if I go there every night, $500 would be the minimum I would make in a 4 hour session. Overall, that was a fun night that I will have to check it out again.

I also found out that Doc and Eddy's will be having a $200 + $25 tourney on Saturday with a $100 add on. I am definitely going to have to hit that up. They said that there should be 100 people in the tourney which will make for a nice size prize pool. You start with 3000 chips with the add on being another 3000. So I will probably add on right away. Well, I am really excited for that tourney tomorrow. I'll update after I win it. Peace.

Sets Everywhere!!!

2006-05-08T02:50:00.000-04:00

Tonight was unbelieveable. I have never hit more sets in one week than I had tonight. With every pocket pair that I had, it seemed I would flop or turn a set with it and usually get paid off. For most of the night, I was playing a 30/60 table (Dave was at my table) and a 15/30 table. At one point in time, I had flopped top set with 10 10 on the 30/60 table and turned quad 5's at the 15/30 table. I was just on fiah. I was taking Dave's money left and right until he rivered a flush on me for a $700 pot. That fish! Oh well, I guess I deserved it after I turned a set when he flopped top pair. P.S. Thanks for capping the turn with me Dave.

Anyway, I played later on in the night on Pacific and Titan and I ended the day up around 4K. It was a nice way to come back from my two day break. I am now back home in Montana and I can't express how nice it is not to have any stress of work or school on me. This week, I am going to catch up with a lot of my high school friends and hopefully get a lot of poker playing in. It's great to be back!

A lot of poker...

2006-04-30T02:41:00.000-04:00

School is pretty much over with so I have been playing a lot of poker. Today, I played over 8 hours and did not profit a penny. However, I didn't lose much. I was multi tabling limit like usual and ended today down a little. Overall for the week, I lost somewhere between 1K and 2K. Not a problem since tomorrow I'll be final tabling a major tourney. Dave and I will play in all the majors tomorrow afternoon, hopefully putting in a 10 hour session. I am pretty sick of limit holdem right now and I need a break from it. I am excited to get up for church in the morning and then get started with the tourneys. This could be the day...

3 Finals Left till Summer Bay Bay!

2006-04-28T01:28:00.000-04:00

All I have left for this school year are three finals. They should not be too tough though. I am sooo ready for school to get out and get back to the beautiful state of Montana.

I have been playing some poker off and on for the last few days and things were going pretty good. I keep improving at my limit game, which is the most important. After that bad night that I last wrote about, I played for 30 minutes the next day and made everything I lost the previous day back. Since then, I have been grinding and was up a couple thousand until I just sat at a 50/100 5 handed table on Titan. I noticed a huge difference with the players. In the 15 minutes I played, it seemed that these guys knew what they were doing. I was 3 bet every hand I raised and did not catch a thing, so I ended down 2K. No biggie. I am proud of myself because I played 50/100 like I play 5/10. They are just bets, it is not money. This view allows me to have success because being the tightwad that I am, I would not be able to stomach the huge swings involved in shorthanded limit holdem.

I am excited to have a lot of time on my hands to start playing some more tourneys. I really need to improve my tourney game if I ever want to final table a major. I also want to check out some live games when I get back to Montana since the legal age to gamble is 18 and there are casinos everywhere in Billings. This next week, I should be able to play a lot of poker, but I want to spend as much time with my girlfriend and friends as possible since it is the last week of school. Oh, I guess i'll look over some notes for my finals once too. JUST ONCE THOUGH! I'll update again in a few days. Peace.

Frustrating!

2006-04-25T00:43:00.000-04:00

I have just found out that if you never hit a pair when playing heads up, you will lose a lot of money. I just played a total hee haww heads up 20/40 and lost about $1600 to him in less than an hour before others started to sit down. I decided to call it quits after after that blood bath. I was also playing another 20/40 table and lost another $800 at that table.

This player is usually the type of player that I profit so much from. He limped almost every sb and he called my raise out the bb every hand. The problem was....I COULDN'T EVEN FLOP A PAIR any hand, and the hands I did hit a pair, he usually had the nuts. 2 out of the last 3 hands I played, i was dealt QQ and KK in the sb. With QQ I raise and he calls, flop was KJ4, he check raised the flop and I called him down. He flips over K6o, nice hand sir. Two hands later I have KK in the sb, I raise he calls, flop A69, he check raises flop and I call down. He flips over A2o. Nice hand sir. I guess that is poker and that is when I need to call it quits for the night, if not for a few days. I hate to walk away from my money at a table, but when things are this cold, I have to call it a night.

Man, being a poker player can be frustrating! Time to count my blessings and go to bed.

Still Running Hot!

2006-04-23T02:07:00.000-04:00

Today was a nice little Saturday. I woke up at 10 to go watch my girlfriend's tennis match today. She played extremely well and won both doubles and singles. It was fun to watch. I then played tennis against a friend later on in the afternoon and was serving and hitting well. It is fun to take a break from basketball and play another sport for a change. After I played tennis, I came back to my room and played some poker on Titan. I had a pretty good session, up about a grand or so.

After the session, I ate supper and then Leah, my girlfriend, came over and we watched Face Off. What a great movie! After the movie, we called it a night and a I played a quick session that was less than an hour. I was just hot and played extremely well, making over 2K while playing two 20/40 tables. This week has just been great. I eclipsed the 10K mark for the week, my second in three weeks. Right now, I can definitely say, "I like poka, poka is fun."

Tomorrow, I will be unable to have my routine Sunday. Dave and I have kind of made it a ritual to play in all the big Sunday tourneys on five or six different websites. Tomorrow, however, we have basketball open gym at 8 at night due to recruits coming to visit. I am also supposed to host one of the recruits. So I guess I'm going to have to wait another week before I final table one of those tourneys and have a huge payday. My goal for tomorrow is to finish every single assignment that I have been given for the rest of the school year, so I can have a stress-free final two weeks of school. Life is Good!

Wow!

2006-04-22T01:39:00.000-04:00

Wow, I didn't realize how easy this game can be. This week, I have just been grinding at 10/20 and 20/40 on titan and 15/30 on pokerfantasy. Before tonight, I had been up about 5K on the week after a few sessions here and there. However, tonight was amazing. It has been one of those nights when I can do no wrong. I started out 2 tabling, 20/40 on titan and 15/30 on pokerfantasy. I made about 1K on each in less than an hour before the tables broke. I then sat at the heads up 10/20 table on titan and waited for people to sit with me. I love doing this because people like to sit with $100 with me because they don't like money or something. I usually bust these people in less than 5 hands (ok, sometimes it takes 10) and then they rebuy for $100 or leave. Tonight was different though. First a guy sits with around $600. I run pretty well just grind him down until I eventually bust him. That took around a half hour. Immediately afterwards, another guy named igrok33 sits with me with $1K. My first couple of buttons he 3 bets me so I think to myself that he is a decent player and may not be profitable to play against. So he starts off up about $200 on me. I decide to stick around for a while longer and then I discovered the real igrok33. I pick up a few tendencies from him.... HE LOVES TO RAISE AND RERAISE. The good part about it is this... he hardly ever has hands when he raises and reraises. So I start chipping away only playing pots when I have something. When I say something, I really mean ANYTHING. Anything was good against this guy. I could also do no wrong. When I call down with A high, it wasn't good some of the time, it was good ALL the time! I can not express in words how bad this guy was. It was only a matter of a minutes before I took IT ALL. I would look at the history of each hand to see what I was being called down with and he would continually call with J high or even worse. I came to the conclusion that this guy was either extremely drunk or extremely rich and stupid. I ended the day up about 3.5K. This session was just the epitomy of fun!

After I played this guy, I called it a night and went to play tennis under the lights with a few friends of mine. What a great night! Here is a screen shot of a hand in which a was capped out preflop and flop, 2 bets on turn, and capped out on river. Note that he called me on the river with 4 high and he didn't even have a draw the whole way. I mean this guy was GOOD!

The week starts on Tuesday

2006-04-18T01:50:00.000-04:00

It was great not having school today since Monday is my toughest day of the week. However, poker was pretty frustrating today. I woke up at noon after coming back from my friend's house last night and played in a couple of 10$ mtt qualifiers. I busted out of those without making any noise. I then decided to play some super qualifier sngs. Even though I had a freeroll for tonight's Super Monday, I wanted to build some more up. So I played in those 2 this afternoon and took 2nd in both! This is extremely frustrating, especially after having a 5 to 1 chip stack on one of the guys heads up. I guess 2nd is better than 3rd though because you get your money back.
After the qualifiers, I sat down with 1,000$ at 10/20 on titan. After a little while a guy sat down with 100$. So I decided that I wanted would take it. I take down the first 2 pots and he is soon down to 30$. I put him all in the next 2 hands. I had the best hand both times when we put all our money in, but he eventually caught up and started building a stack. So we started to play real poker with his chip stack at a decent level. This player is toughest player I have ever played against. His plays were soooo unorthodox and I had such a hard time putting him on hands. I think he preferred playing out of position in the bb because he loved betting into me. So for the first 45 minutes, I was running extremely cold and he had built his stack all the way up to close to 600 and I was down to under 500. There were multiple times that I would raise in the sb, which I do every hand, then he would call. Flop would come and he would bet, I would raise, and he would call. Turn. He bets, i raise, he calls. River. He bets, I raise, he calls. This would happen so often, but usually I would have to fold on the turn or river because I had nothing and could not really do anything with my nothing because he was sure to call down. I decided I was just going to play fairly tight after the flop and wait to have a decent hand. I just cannot emphasize enough how odd this person's play was. He would alternate every other sb by limping and raising. I think he just decides before he gets his cards if he is going to raise or limp, I don't know. Anyways, I was extremely cold the first 45 min. I could not flop a pair to save my life and he hardly ever let me get away with taking down a pot that I had nothing. Of course the only times he folded out of the bb were the times I had AA. After 45 minutes, I was tilting really bad and had to force myself to take deep breaths and concentrate. After doing this, I started hitting some hands and of course was getting paid off. Another 45 minutes later and I had finally busted him. I had 1,017$ when I left the table. The rake took 83$ from us in an hour and a half. That's sad.
After that stressful session, I went and shot baskets and had a good workout for about an hour and a half before I played in the Super Monday. I got back to my room in time to play some more Super Qualifier sngs. I played 4 and was knocked out while having a dominate hand in 3 of them. Oh well.
8:00 came along and it was time to start win the Super Monday. 8:12 came along and I was out. haha. What a waste. I suck at poker. I lost more than a quarter of my stack with a semibluff. The guy was not folding though and I missed my flush draw. A few minutes later, I pick up QQ and push on a guy who raised in late position. He called with AK and a K flopped and I'm out.
Though poker was bad today, it was still nice to not have school. After poker, I watched a couple episodes of South Park (I have them all downloaded on my laptop) and Fun with Dick and Jane. So not a bad day overall. Time to quit blabbing. Maybe tomorrow will be my day.

P.S. This is a bs email I received today from Pacific Poker. I'm pretty disappointed because I make a lot of money from bonus points.

Dear Alex, This is Russell M. from the Operations Department at Cassava (Gibraltar) Ltd. Cassava (Gibraltar) Ltd operates "Pacific Poker". I am contacting you in regards to your Pacific Poker account with username "CUbball". Our bonus point's scheme in Pacific Poker is a great benefit that we are happy to present to our members. This scheme is not targeted towards expert poker players but rather to help the average player overcome losing streaks. Please notice that our Bonus Policy states that we reserve the right at our sole discretion, to deny any bonus or promotion, or rescind any policy in respect of that user, either temporarily or permanently. Since you are a very successful poker player (as can be seen from your total winnings), we have decided to stop bonus points from being added to your account. The current bonus points that you have in your account, can be converted to money and placed into your bankroll until the 25th of April 2006. From this date onwards, although your points will keep accumulating, you will not be able to convert them. Please note that this by no means will hurt any of your other privileges as a successful player on our site - we congratulate you on all your winnings and we hope to see you continue to prosper in our poker community. Regards, Russell M.

Screw this Russell guy.