March Madness

Well, the final four is set. This is absolutely ridiculous, as my bracket is for the first time dead from here out, with my only final four pick UCLA I had going down to Duke. Who the hell is George Mason anyway? I’m slightly behind in my pools which means it is officially over since nobody has any team advancing farther. If you had picked LSU, Florida, or George Mason to advance to the championship game you obviously sold your soul the devil because there is no way any rational basketball fan who doesn’t attend those schools to take them to the big one. A $20 bet for George Mason to win this tournament would cash at $8000 if they finish the deal this coming Monday. As much as I’m pissed off about George Mason, I do give them a lot of credit for the poise they’ve had in all the games in this tournament and the way they have handled themselves off the court thus far.

In the past few years I’ve done well in brackets, and have won 3 times out of 8 years I’ve been pools. No such luck this year. Duke letting me down hurt me the most, along with Iowa making its early first round exit. But this year is special in one regard, I officially started sports betting. Here were the stats:
Games bet: 7
Games won: 1
That’s right, 1 and 5 until Villanova capped my pipe dreams yesterday with their 62-75 embarrassment against Florida. At least they gave me an excuse to drink myself belligerent last night.

My sports betting bankroll is almost officially gone, but I’ve got an early idea how to save it. See, I take all my picks, and just reverse them. Millionaire in no time, like Biff in Back to the Future 2. As for poker, it’s on hold for just a few more days while I finish the daily grind of school, particularly with this Philosophical bastard Giorgio Agamben and his Homo Sacer. Stay tuned.

Another Makeover

After 3 weeks of solid, uninterrupted losing, and 1 week of reflection, I think I'm finally ready to get back in the saddle. I've come across several articles online which have helped me know where I'm at as a poker player, student, and a person. How successful I am or my happiness level is only what I make of it. That goes for anyone, whether they believe it or not. From here, although I'm not sure what I really want to do yet (besides some type of management) I realized that poker is going to play a large role in my life in the next 1-2 years. I've gained too much experience in it to just put it aside.

That being said, I realized that if I continue to book wins followed by periods where I simply spin out of control, don't care about losses, and in general don't keep good statistics and let me life in general go south, I'm not using my knowledge, skills, and discipline to be successful at poker, let alone life. Some adjustment policies are going to involve me posting on here more regularly, helping release some of the frustration I find from the world of variance. That's step 1. Adjustment 2 is going to be planning out exactly what I am going to play for the day before I play it, no matter how good or bad it goes. So if I wake up and say I am going to play $27 turbos from 9-midnight, that is what’s going to happen no matter what. More or less, I've found in the past that if I play games I told myself I was going to play I don't tilt significantly as opposed to if I reverse bankroll and play games bigger and bigger to try and make it back. I think this should help with that.

As for games, I'm going to try to stick to a pretty restrictive diet. As for as pokerstars goes, $27 turbos are tried-and-true and am planning on booking about 400 of them on stars before I stop and reevaluate. As for cash games and multi-tournaments, the $3 and $5 rebuy tournaments I will try to get in once a week and cash games are going to be avoided unless I really feel boredom and the need to switch it up. If I want to play cash games, I'll probably be doing it in conjunction with Wyll on either Party or PokerRoom.

Some of the articles I said I had read at the beginning are still available. There's a great blog post about starting out at poker here. It's some advice I wish I read anytime with in the two years of playing. Dutch Boyd talks about tournament poker here. Lastly, Josh on twoplustwo has a great article about variance and bankroll requirements if your a large variance player or you are trying not to go broke right here.

Soon I will post a more detailed outlook on the stats I'd like to achieve and what I want to accomplish before the Turning Stone annual poker classic in May.

Turning Stone Report

Longest 4 days of my life. Literally. Probably a net of 14 hours of sleep from thursday until my arrival at home today. Feels good to be back.

March Madness was truly that at the Stone, all the action I've come to expect. 183 players for the main event Saturday ($1060 NL Freezeout) was a nice little tournament. Here's a day by day breakdown from my rise, and to the fall.

Day 1 (friday)
After two hours of sleep in the past 2 days in the car ride from Cleveland to Rochester, you would think I wouldn't be able to even function let alone win at poker. Science worked for a second -- I drove the hour and a half from Rochester to Turning Stone to get knocked out the first hand of my $125 shootout into Saturday's $1060 dollar NL Hold'em main event. Ugh. Back to battle, right? I go down to get on lists -- the 1/2 nl list is 110 names deep, 15/30 is bad as well. The only thing I even had a shot of playing was another shootout. Last $125 to launch for the night. Get to heads up, against the worst player at the table, come in with about 6500 of the 18,000 chips. Take chip lead, and he begins to use such phrases as 'getting tired' and 'giving up' as he calls my all in with K3 against my J5s (he wins that race). But low and behold, I win it. Playing tomorrow, should be exciting. Sleep for now, hopefully 8 hrs will be enough for tommorrow.

Day 2 (Saturday)
Hour levels were very nice, but took a while to adapt. Missed the first half hour, slept in. Oops. Absolute manaic to my left made it hard to be able to limp into pots in the first 2 levels to try to crush some flops. Came out of the first level just slowly increasing. By the second break I brought my chip stack to about 4400 from the starting 3000, without seeing a group 1 hand. Just before the 3rd hour ended I was dealt AKs in the sb. UTG+2 limps, 2 limpers behind him, blinds 50/100. I make it 650 -- bb folds, UTG+2 player calls, fold, fold. Flop is J 5 3, I bet out 1500, he's all in. I figure him for QJ but my last 1050 is donked in when I figure 1050 to win 4600 with 6 outs isn't all that bad. He's got KJ -- nhja.
Off to 300 max NL, tilting a little. Absolutely crushed it for the majority of the day, buildling a starting 240 into around 1300 when we took a dinner a break. Lost two large pots, AKs to 88 for 700$ all in preflop, and another where I folded 88 on the board of 8 5 5 A, the horrible laydown that led to my tilt and departure from the table. 1 2 NL to mess around for a time, dropped the 300Max profit having every group one hand twice, and having just QQ and AA hold on, once each.

Day 3 (Sunday)
More frustration -- slept right through tournament registration for the 200+30, although they only had 135 people. 300Max got bloody fast, getting stucky quickly, in 1000. Build up and get to about 1300 when the hand that makes or breaks my trip comes along.
99 in first position, I make it 15 straight (blinds are 2 and 5). Behind me immediatly calls, 2 late position players call, the bb calls.
Flop: 8 9 Q, 2 diamonds and a club
Check, I bet 25, behind me raises 75 more, 3 folds. At this point, although he hasn't played long, I figure him for J10 or top 2. After a while I decide I need to raise to really see, but I didn't bother really evaluating the stack situations before I did this. I make it 150 more, which he immediatly stacks off 200 more. I'm calling 200 to win just under 800, which prices me in roughly. Call. He's got J10.
Turn: 3
River: 4
Nice hand.

Day 4 (Monday)
Played 5/10 mildly drunk at 5 AM, killed it for about 400 in an hour and half. Decide to play the 500 max NL game to see if I can win a few hundred and take my slowly growing roll to the 30/60 game to start a serious run. Dreams are cut short when the 500 max game breaks when it becomes me and Hassan playing heads up with my 300 vs. his 3000 he had built up.
Whatever. Watched Justin at 30/60 for a while, then went and took a nap before checking out of the tower. Returned and got in the $60 Limit Hold'em touranment at noon, Stood a shot when we got down to the final two tables but couldn't get AQ to hold on against A8, and I was out. More 1/2 nl following, which races were lost and draws were missed again and again. Got another room, went to bed at 5.

Day 5 (Tuesday)
Trying a last second shot to win even a little back, played 3/6 starting at 2 AM, only game going really. We played well, I just couldn't find or get a hand to hold on and broke psuedo even.

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I'm very tired of Hold'em and think I may take a break for several days. Leaving for a lesiure Vegas trip tommorroww -- just there for the sun really, since I'm not 21. We will see where Hold'em and Omaha fit into my life when I get back.