World Series of Poker blogger tournament

Well, I'm a bit late on this one, but Bodog is running a World Series of Poker blogger tournament. It runs every Tuesday night, and has at least one pro join into the fray. This week, John-Robert (aka Bobby) Bellande and David Williams.

The tourney runs through June 10th and cap with a TOC. Here's the payouts there:

Grand Prize: $12,000 WSOP* Prize Package with Team Bodog
2nd place: T$540 to be used to buy-in to (2) World Series or Players Choice Semifinal
3rd place: T$379 to be used to buy-in to (1) World Series or Players Choice Semifinal and (1)
4th: T$270 to be used to buy-in to (1) World Series or Players Choice Semifinal
5th: T$109 to be used to buy-in to (1) $100,000 Guaranteed Tournament.

Not bad, not bad at all. I guess it pays to be a blogger :)

Check out the site with all the details: http://www.bodogbloggertournament.com/

Frustration

Hello everyone. Thanks for stopping by. Today's topic is dealing with frustration. We all are prone to this, and everyone has a different way to deal with it. Or I hope you do, because if not, it can be a HUGE leak in your game. Tilt happens, and frustration is probably the #1 cause of tilt.

Today I'm frustrated over the double stack guarantees on Full Tilt. I've been trying to play these whenever I can. Had a sick day from work today and figured I'd try to squeeze one in between naps. I have made it deep in a few of the 2pm, $24k GTDs, but I have yet to final table, mostly due to beats like this one:


Full Tilt Poker Game #6136526216: $24,000 Guarantee (46025201), Table 66 - 500/1000 Ante 125 - No Limit Hold'em - 16:46:43 ET - 2008/04/22
Seat 1: Tonyrwc1 (12,827)
Seat 2: zeban572 (18,199)
Seat 3: Sinkness (22,011)
Seat 4: IlliniFan (11,814) I'm in okay shape. There are 120ish left, I am in 94th. Top 108 pay. But I am the short stack at the table.
Seat 5: Little Ken (14,250)
Seat 6: Trap Gurl (26,326)
Seat 7: Dan_Germoney (14,393)
Seat 8: Dudeoflife (48,842)
Seat 9: poppiekimmie (24,932)
Tonyrwc1 antes 125
zeban572 antes 125
Sinkness antes 125
IlliniFan antes 125
Little Ken antes 125
Trap Gurl antes 125
Dan_Germoney antes 125
Dudeoflife antes 125
poppiekimmie antes 125
Sinkness posts the small blind of 500
IlliniFan posts the big blind of 1,000
The button is in seat #2
*** HOLE CARDS ***
Dealt to IlliniFan [Tc Td] Nice hand in the BB. I need to get it in early with this, hoping I have some fold equity. I'm in this to win it, not squeeze into the money.
Little Ken folds
Trap Gurl folds
Dan_Germoney raises to 2,800 Looks like A-T through A-K
Dudeoflife folds
poppiekimmie calls 2,800 Definitely is an A-Q or A-K. He'd push with any pairs here to get the raiser out.
Tonyrwc1 folds
zeban572 folds
Sinkness has 15 seconds left to act
Sinkness folds
IlliniFan raises to 11,689, and is all in So I'm up vs Aces or, maybe a smaller pair.
Dan_Germoney raises to 14,268, and is all in Not good.
poppiekimmie calls 11,468
Dan_Germoney shows [Ah Kd]
poppiekimmie shows [Qh Ac]
IlliniFan shows [Tc Td] Nice, they have each other's outs. I have about 45% equity here. Nice place to be.
*** FLOP *** [Js 2c 5c] Great flop for me. Now I'm up in the 65% range
*** TURN *** [Js 2c 5c] [4c] Yikes. Flush and wheel outs.
*** RIVER *** [Js 2c 5c 4c] [3s] Wow. How unlucky can I get? Runner runner wheel. I didn't even notice it until the pot didn't go my way. In fact, I was only worried about the flush and had a WTF moment when the pot got split to them.
Dan_Germoney shows a straight, Five high
poppiekimmie shows a straight, Five high
Dan_Germoney ties for the side pot (2,579) with a straight, Five high
poppiekimmie ties for the side pot (2,579) with a straight, Five high
IlliniFan shows a pair of Tens
Dan_Germoney ties for the main pot (18,346) with a straight, Five high
poppiekimmie ties for the main pot (18,346) with a straight, Five high
IlliniFan stands up
*** SUMMARY ***
Total pot 41,850 Main pot 36,692. Side pot 5,158. | Rake 0
Board: [Js 2c 5c 4c 3s]
Seat 1: Tonyrwc1 folded before the Flop
Seat 2: zeban572 (button) folded before the Flop
Seat 3: Sinkness (small blind) folded before the Flop
Seat 4: IlliniFan (big blind) showed [Tc Td] and lost with a pair of Tens
Seat 5: Little Ken folded before the Flop
Seat 6: Trap Gurl folded before the Flop
Seat 7: Dan_Germoney showed [Ah Kd] and won (20,925) with a straight, Five high
Seat 8: Dudeoflife folded before the Flop
Seat 9: poppiekimmie showed [Qh Ac] and won (20,925) with a straight, Five high


Such is life. I was pretty happy with how I played. I did everything right, but again lost when I was well ahead in the hand.

So, to deal with the frustration, I come here to vent. I used to post on other forums, but everyone hates a bad beat story. The one thing that I am sure that I do now, especially online, is to take a 20-30 minute break. The worst thing to do is to tilt off a bunch of cash right after a beat like this. It is worse online than live, as you can multitable and see a lot more hands.

So, my advice? Write it out. Sit out. Don't play. Decompress. If you don't, you might end up throwing in more money without even thinking about it. That's it for today.

I'll cya at the tables in 30 mins or so :)

Reason #527 I'll never be a pro

Hello again. Thanks for stopping by for a read. If you are a regular reader, you know that I'm a micro-stakes player. I'm also an amateur (thus the blog name). I have no aspirations to ever become a pro, there are too many things that I just don't do as well as a pro. However, there are aspects of a pros game that would make me much more successful. Today we will deal with one of these topics.

I had a leak that hit me square in the face recently. No, it isn't really #527. I guess some day I can make a list, but this one for some reason got me thinking, and therefore the post.

So what can a pro do that I can't? I think the biggest difference between a casual player and a professional is the pro's ability to play the same game no matter the distractions. Tired? They can play though, making no mistakes. Sick? Same.

They have achieved a level of concentration and experience that allows them to not make the blunders that most of us make when we start to wear down. I can't tell you how many times I have played (nearly) mistake-free poker for 4 hours of a MTT just to go out on the FT bubble (or, worse, money bubble) because I decided that my (AK, JJ, 45 suited) was good enough to shove on that flop of 9 8 2. After I had been reraised preflop. By the guy who was showing down premium hands. What is it that makes our brains short-circuit like this as we get into several hours of play? I think it is the lack of focus so many Internet players have. We are used to playing (usually multiple tables) while IMing, surfing, watching TV. We are multi-taskers.

Don't get me wrong. There are quite a few pros that make their bread and butter multi-tabling. But I'd bet that a slim majority multi-task and multi-table, especially not when they get deep into tourneys. And even if they do, they tend to not be as distracted as Joe Public.

I personally don't have a TV in the room where I have my computer. I think if I did I wouldn't be doing as well lately as I have. I have been trying to focus on the games more, and it shows. When I play live, I don't have the distractions and I have been crushing games. But online, I haven't had the same successes. And now I'm pretty sure I know why.

So for the first 3 months of the year, I did decent online. I have a ROI of about 4% across all of my games (SnGs, MTTs, various ring games). The next month I'm going to make a conscious effort to not multi-task. I'll multi-table (but for me this is 2-3 games. Maybe 4 if I have good notes on one), but I won't IM. I won't surf and read the forums. I'll concentrate on my games.

I'll let you know in a month if I can bump my win rate. In the meantime, I'll cya at the tables.