The Road Less Traveled

bink!!!!!!!!!!!! and New Article Currently Up on p5's

2006-09-07T00:28:00.000-05:00

Sorry I haven't posted in awhile... Here you go...

PokerStars Tournament #30629165,
No Limit Hold'emBuy-In: $200.00/$15.00
Total Prize Pool: $118400.00
Tournament started - 2006/09/03 - 20:45:00 (ET)

Dear jeffbeesdat,
You finished the tournament in 2nd place.A $23,680.00 award has been credited to your Real Money account.You earned 309.71 tournament leader points in this tournament.For information about our tournament leader board, see our web site athttp://www.pokerstars.com/tlb_tournament_rankings.html

These last few weeks have been some of the most interesting "poker weeks" of my life. I hope to have some time to write in detail about them later.

In the meantime, please check out my newest article on the front page of www.pocketfives.com.

-Jeff

Math and Game Theory Behind Playing A,K Late in Tourneys...

2006-08-23T00:26:00.000-05:00

I apologize for not writing in awhile...

You are going to see a ton of posts... First of all, I met player X about a week and a half ago in the Stars 150. He wanted to ask my advice on a hand so we exchanged this email. I hope that you enjoy.

hey jeff... names XXXX.... i have a few scenarios i would like to run
by ya.... these actually happened to me in tourneys last few weeks.....
party super mon
im chip leader wit 30 players to go.... i have 365k and the next closes
player has 200k on my table....
the player wit 200k has been playin very badly reraisin wit aj and kq and
has been openin about 2 to 3 hands a round....
the blinds r 5 and 10 k ....
he raises to some bet like 29554 some thing like that because of party
raisin bar i guess
i pick up ak spades right behind him... i think there is some fold equity in
a raise so i pop it to 95 k...
he goes into tank for 5 secs and then pushes it in..... at that point i have
to call i the extra 105k...
he flips over QQ and i lose the flip....
the question i have i guess is deep in these tourneys wit my chips should i
just be seein flops and gettin off when i miss... i here alot of different
ideas from friends but they r live players and there is more info avail live
as u might know...... your insight is appreciated
to tell ya the truth that is how i am gettin knocked out deep in most my
tourneys lately...

My Response...

Hey Bro,
Good meeting you tonight. In the situation that you have described, I like your thinking in terms of Fold Equity and I like your play, but the only thing that I would have done differently is raise him all in. Sure, he will still call and you will have the same results with his Q,Q, but it will play out differently in other hands. If you are going to pot commit yourself with a 95K raise, why not just push? You are going to have to call off the additional 100K anyway, since you are getting 3 to 1 odds on the pot. As Doyle Brunson says, the key to no limit is putting a man to a decision for all of his chips. You may even be giving a player such as him some hope that he has fold equity in a possible re-reraise if you do not push. You could also run into a horrid situation where he miscalculates that he is halfway priced in to the pot and calls with something like 4,4, and you have to call off a flop of 2,3,5 where you are significantly behind.
As for the option of smooth calling the raise... The only thing that you have going for you with a call is the fact that you are in position. The problem is, with the range of crap that he has been raising with, it will be a very difficult task to outplay him post flop, because of the implied difficulties of putting him on a hand.
BTW...
Do you know what your odds are of hitting a flop with any 2 cards?
1 out of 3.
And that does not even guarantee top pair, except in the instance of A,K, and it definitely does not guarantee the best hand.
Push! Push! Push!
I am sorry that you have been losing your flips but this game is about decisions and not results. The results will right themselves.

-Jeff

Annette_15 PWNZ!!! (And She PWNed me too) : (

2006-08-10T12:10:00.000-05:00

A couple of weeks ago, I found myself sitting at the Stars $100 with Annette_15. IMO, Annette_15 is the best female Multi Table Tournament player online, and one of the top tournament players period. When I was playing more on UB earlier this year, I played briefly at a couple of tables with Annette but we never officially "met".
So hear I am on Stars, with a great player at my table and a less than average stack of 2250 with blinds at 75/150. I was sitting in middle position with A,K, when UTG+1 raised to 450. I made my standard push of all in, which is a very easy decision for me at this stage of the tourney, considering my stack size. The action folded to Annette who had a stack of about 3500 and she proceeded to use her time bank. She finally called the bet and UTG+1 folded their hand. Annette turned over A,K, as well, and I typed in the chat line "?", because I was not happy with this call as it was obviously cutting into my equity. Annette quickly typed right back "?". So I said, "I don't like the call with A,K, because even if you put me on A,K we are splitting a 675 overlay. And many times with a re-raise all in, you are potentially dominated." Strange enough, her only reply was, "I think that you are a very good player and I respect your opinion." Well, I told her that I respected her game a ton as well, and that I thought she was an outstanding player.
Anyways, we have started talking online a bit in the last couple of weeks and I have found o0ut more and more about Annette_15. Annette is a very cool, 23 year old Norwegian pro... The majority of her play is on UB although she has been dominating Full Tilt quite a bit lately, as well. Just to give you an example of how sick she is... Annette has FT'd the Full Tilt $200K Sunday major 2 times in the last 3 months. She wins so much on UB that she has people suggesting that they rename the UB $100, 2pm, the "Annette".
Anyways, she has been trying to get me to come over and play tourneys with her on UB, but I have been hesitant to do, since I am kind of semi-boycotting UB due to them withdrawing some of their tourney guarantees which has led to lower prize pools.
Well, she had private messaged me on p5's on Monday asking me to play tourneys with her on Tuesday, but since I was travelling to the Rio Grande Valley, I told her that I would probably not be able to do so. Well, late Tuesday night, I decided to jump on UB and check and see how she was doing before I went to bed. When I spoke to her via the chat box, she relayed to me that she was having a pretty rough day filled with coolers and bad beats. Right after this dialogue, she told me that she wanted to play me "heads up". I had consumed a few drinks so I really didn't want to play but after a bit of needling, I decided that I needed to put this girl in check. Long story short, she beat me so bad that we could not recall the score. I believe it was something like 9-2.
Sober, I think that I have a much better shot but she would still be a huge favorite either way. I realized that my heads up game as been suffering because all I do is play Multi Tables and many of the MTT's that I play, I tend to chop, because the difference in payout between first and second can go up to almost $10K. This led me to a decision to start mixing more S&G's and short handed cash cames into my schedule.
At the end of the day, I HATE losing, but there is something to be said for someone of the opposite sex handing your a$$ to you.

-Jeff

Hand History... How to Make it into the Money in a Tough Field Without Cards...

2006-08-10T11:51:00.000-05:00

Many of you know that the 100 rebuy is one of my favorite tourneys to play. My tables usually have a plethora of good players, but I since I have played so many of these, I usually don't even notice, unless an observer makes a comment about the table or I am very deep into the tourney. In the Stars $100R on Monday I had very tough tables throughout, and did not catch hands but still managed to make the money. I would like to attribute this to leveraging Harrington's open shove strategy in relation to Magriel's M ratio (proportion of blinds and antes to chipstack), coupled with position. This strategy coupled with the fact that my table image is viewed as "solid" allows me to go deep into many tourneys without showing down alot of hands.
The one mistake, I did make, was continuing my aggression, once I had to show down a very mediocre hand. At that point, I should have tightened up since my image was ruined.

At the risk of giving too much insight into my game, I am going to start posting more hand histories. If you are not a hard core poker buff, please do not read. This is a bit long.

http://www.jeffreywyatt.com/jeffbeesdat.txt

-Jeff

Why Do I Play on Party Poker?

2006-08-08T03:51:00.000-05:00

I was just telling Wyatt today that I don't even know why I play on Party. Well, I just remembered. 4th out of 1100+ in the Super Monday for $10K+.
Even with that cash, I am pissed off at my FT play. This tourney had some of the worst players that I have ever seen at this level at the FT. I should have just sat back and let them self-destruct, but I had to get involved. Hubris, is that you? Maybe, I should start paying attention to my own articles.
BTW... 1st was $34K.
Bleh.
Thanks x_kage_x, bbbbb33, gboro780 and Annette_15 for your support!

I also finished 16th in the Stars $100 rebuy, barely missing the big money. Bleh...

Striving to get better,

-Jeff

WSOP Main Event Down to 45... GO LIXIXME17 and RIZEN!!!!!!!!!

2006-08-07T11:17:00.000-05:00

On Friday July the 28th, 8700+ players entered the World Series of Poker Main Event with dreams of wealth and fame. As of today, the field has been cut down to 45 contenders all vying for the top prize of $12 million in cash and a lifetime of endorsements.
I am partial to 2 players in this field, Rizen and LXIXME17. Eric Lynch (Rizen) is currently sitting in 19th place with almost 2 million in chips (everyone started with 10,000), and a great shot at the final table. Rizen is one of the top only Multi Table tournament players, and has been exceptionally hot this year winning a number of large tourneys, including the Stars Million for over $160K. He has also had a very good World Series, with a third place cash in the $1,500 Pot Limit Hold 'Em event for $100K+. He is currently ranked by pocket 5's as the #2 tourney player in the world, right behind johnnybax, and has an excellent shot at taking this down. I have not played a ton with Rizen, as I believe that we may be on different poker schedules, but when I have, he has been nothing but nice and courteous. Good luck to you Mr. Lynch!

LXIXME17...
I have played quite a bit more with Brian Hanson (LXIXME17) and he is very nice guy and great player! Pocket 5's seems to agree with this opinion, as well, as they have him ranked 37th in the world.
I am not sure if you recall my post a few weeks ago, where I went deep in the Titan $1M guaranteed, but came up short and cashed for $2,500. Well, LXIXME17 ended up going on to chop this bad boy for a payday of $210K! 2 Days later, I was playing the $100 rebuy on Dise, and none other than LXIXME17 came and sat on the rail to support myself and PokerJoe9 when we reached the Final Table. If I had won $210K, two days before, I would probably be showering in some high end, aged wine, like Boone's '87 Strawberry Hill, but not LXIXME17. This gesture left an impression on me that I will not soon forget.
If you are trying to make sense of his screen name, drop the 17 and think Roman Numerals. (It took me a bit to figure it out, myself).
Anyways, Brian Hanson is currently sitting in 32nd in chips.
GO GO GO GO GO!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
Whatever happens, both Eric and Brian are currently guaranteed $250K, but I know that they have much higher goals with the top 12 guaranteed $1M, and 1st getting $12M as I alluded to before...
One more time...
GO GO GO GO GO!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Edit: I hope that my post was not the kiss of death.

GG LXIXME17
I hope that the $250K is somewhat of a consolation for this bitter moment... : (

From Cardplayer...
Brian Hansen Eliminated in 42nd Place ($247,399)
On a flop of 984, Jamie Gold bets $300,000. Brian Hansen raises all-in for $1,900,000. Gold makes the call. Gold shows AA and Hansen is in trouble with 1010. After the hand is shown, Michael Odeh, who is rooting for Jamie Gold and Paul Wasicka, shouts out for the ten of diamonds. Gold is confused and says, "Why do you want the ten of diamonds?" Michael O'Deh then says, "No. Turn a diamond." The rail is laughing as the turn and river come 75 and Hansen is eliminated in 42nd place. After the hand, Gold is up to $9,400,000.

Pretty standard play this late in the tourney against a very aggressive player like Gold. But bleh........

-Jeff

2 New CD's This Weekend

2006-07-31T01:17:00.000-05:00

These are a couple of cd's that I have wanted for a bit but had not had time to purchase.

The Fray
Gnarles Barkley

My 2 favorite songs are "Over My Head" (The Fray) and "She Must Be Crazy" (Gnarles Barkley). OBV.

That is all.

-Jeff

Coming Back to San Antonio... Rough World Series... Article Currently up on Pocket 5's...

2006-07-25T12:17:00.000-05:00

Hey all,

It was a disappointing World Series, overall. Unfortunately, I had a very sub-standard run of cards, and it is VERY difficult to play at this level without any cards. I am coming back to San Antonio today, and will write more a bit more concerning the WSOP at a later time.
My article is finally up on www.pocketfives.com. This was a very difficult article to write due to the fact that I was highly critical of myself. I hope that you enjoy...

-Jeff

Off to Vegas... And Pocket Fives Article Should Be Up Shortly...

2006-07-20T21:24:00.000-05:00

Hey all,

I am sitting hear in an airport waiting for my delayed flight to Vegas. My last trip to Vegas was alot of fun but slightly disappointing from a poker perspective. Well, I am going to give it one more run and the cool thing is, this time I have a great support team. Not only am I staying with Gmoneyrunner and AZ_Carlos, but I also have many more online friends who have migrated down in preparation for the Main Event. I am totally excited!!! My tentative poker schedule looks like this...

Tomorrow- $2,000 NL Hold 'Em Event
Saturday- $1,500 Razz Event
Monday- $1,500 Stud Hi/Lo

Also,
I finished my first article for www.pocketfives.com last night at 4 in the morning. They should have it posted on their home page either tonight or tomorrow. Its not the greatest piece of writing ever, considering my sleep deprivation and hectic schedule, but I hope that you enjoy it...

I am going to head over to the gate...

-Jeff

Decent Night... and Congrats Gmoneyrunner and pokerjoe9...

2006-07-18T02:18:00.000-05:00

Earlier this evening, I went to look at boats, but unfortunately the stores were closed. I found a couple that I was interested in, by just "window shopping" so if I get a chance, I will check those out tomorrow.
Anyways, after boat shopping, I picked up some food and decided to play 3 tourneys, the Stars $100+9, the dise 150+12 and the dise $100 rebuy. Unfortunately, I busted out quickly in the Stars tourney but made it pretty deep in the 2 dise tourneys. The $150 was a fairly small tourney with only 88 people entered so the Final Table was the only spot that paid. Well go figure, I ended up busting out in 13th. Fortunately, things in the dise $100 rebuy went a bit better for me. I ended up making the Final Table and started it off 2nd in chips. Unfortunately, a couple of hands in to the FT, I got all in with K,K vs. Q,Q and wouldn't you know it, a Q flopped. This would have given me a really nice chip lead to work with, but oh well, thats poker. Some time there after, I raised all in during a small blind big blind confrontation with J,10 on a board of 7,8,10, figuring that I had outs if I was behind. The small blind ended up having A,10, and I did not get any help. Short stacked and in the small blind, I pushed with A,9 and the big blind a good internet friend and great poker player, pokerjoe9 woke up with K,K. Flop, turn, and river provided no help to me.

Out in 5th for $2,700+. The payday doesn't sound bad until you realize that first was $10,800+.
Joe ended up taking down 1st. Congrats bro!

Also, Congrats Gmoneyrunner for going deep and placing 10th in the bodog $25K guaranteed!

-Jeff

Perspective...

2006-07-17T00:17:00.000-05:00

I had to be up in Austin on Thursday, which made it a very hectic day. When I returned home to San Antonio, I received a message from the Human Resources Department at a very close family member's work, explaining that this family member had not been into work for the last couple of days and had been unreachable. After numerous calls, a police report, and having security break into the respective appartment with no luck, I felt pretty helpless... I was planning on driving to Dallas on Friday and doing my own search, but fortunately I was able to get in touch with this person on Friday morning.

This person and myself have not always seen eye to eye on alot of things but I do love her very much...
Just remember to tell the ones you care for, how much you love them, because tomorrow is not guaranteed.

-Jeff

Arrgggggghhhhhhhhhhhh!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

2006-07-16T21:24:00.000-05:00

As many of you know, I put alot into poker, mentally, physically and emotionally. Whenever I play large tourneys where I have a high expectation to do well, and I tend to drain myself. After I busted out of the WSOP $1K rebuy last Saturday, I was spent. Strangely enough, the only other poker that I played on that trip was the $5/10 No Limit game at the Bellagio, where I cashed out after 3 hours of play, even though I was up and playing well, just because my heart wasn't into it. On Wednesday night, I decided to test the waters and jump online into some big tourneys. It had been over a week since I had played online, and I felt like I SHOULD be ready to play. Well, long story short, I played in about $800 worth of tourneys and did not money in one. The loss of buy ins do not concern me, as this is the nature of tournament poker, but my play was atrocious and that left me with a bad taste in my mouth. On Friday, I decided to play something that I could have fun in, so I jumped in a few $5 H.O.R.S.E Sit and Go's on Full Tilt with x_kage_x. We had a great time playing these and I started to feel better about my poker mentality so I made a big leap into the new $25/50 No Limit Cash Game on Stars. Fortunately, I was able to double up with this monster hand below. (and yes that is WSOP Main Event Champion Joe Hachem at the table)

PokerStars Game #5563726896: Hold'em No Limit ($25/$50) - 2006/07/15 - 01:39:26 (ET)
Table 'Gersuind' 9-max Seat #9 is the button
Seat 1: jeffbeesdat ($1975 in chips)
Seat 2: DaMadPotter ($12264 in chips)
Seat 3: JoeHachem ($3700 in chips)
Seat 4: ragu46 ($1750 in chips)
Seat 5: Empire2000 ($6029 in chips)
Seat 6: goldy18k ($4839 in chips)
Seat 7: Sublime8700 ($5000 in chips)
Seat 8: mMagic_cards ($1250 in chips)
Seat 9: bethcox4444 ($4314.10 in chips)
jeffbeesdat: posts small blind $25
DaMadPotter: posts big blind $50
*** HOLE CARDS ***
Dealt to jeffbeesdat [Qs Ac]
Empire2000 said, "sickkk keep it up"
JoeHachem: folds
ragu46: folds
Empire2000: folds
goldy18k: calls $50
Sublime8700: folds
mMagic_cards: folds
bethcox4444: folds
jeffbeesdat: raises $150 to $200
DaMadPotter: folds
goldy18k: calls $150
*** FLOP *** [Ad 7d 5c]
jeffbeesdat: checks
goldy18k: bets $100
jeffbeesdat: raises $400 to $500
goldy18k: calls $400
*** TURN *** [Ad 7d 5c] [6h]
jeffbeesdat: bets $1275 and is all-in
goldy18k: calls $1275
*** RIVER *** [Ad 7d 5c 6h] [3s]
*** SHOW DOWN ***
jeffbeesdat: shows [Qs Ac] (a pair of Aces)
goldy18k: mucks hand
jeffbeesdat collected $3997 from pot
*** SUMMARY ***
Total pot $4000 Rake $3
Board [Ad 7d 5c 6h 3s]
Seat 1: jeffbeesdat (small blind) showed [Qs Ac] and won ($3997) with a pair of Aces
Seat 2: DaMadPotter (big blind) folded before Flop
Seat 3: JoeHachem folded before Flop (didn't bet)
Seat 4: ragu46 folded before Flop (didn't bet)
Seat 5: Empire2000 folded before Flop (didn't bet)
Seat 6: goldy18k mucked [Ah 9h]
Seat 7: Sublime8700 folded before Flop (didn't bet)
Seat 8: mMagic_cards folded before Flop (didn't bet)
Seat 9: bethcox4444 (button) folded before Flop (didn't bet)

Not a bad cash game pot!!!!

Anyways,

My Dad called me on Saturday and told me about a great fishing trip that he had with a couple friends on his buddy's boat. I have been considering buying a boat for awhile now but have not pulled the trigger, so I told my Dad that if I hit a nice tourney this weekend that I was buying a boat. (Goals are always good to have in poker and life!)

I jumped into tourneys head first on Saturday, and started off the day just playing so/so, but as the day progressed I started to get pretty deep in the Stars $100 Rebuy and the Paradise $250K Guaranteed. The Stars $100 Rebuy had a first place prize of $13K+, so I figured that if I could take first in this tourney, I would have about 2/3 of the money for the boat that I have been considering. Long story short, jeffbeesdat out in 12th place for a whopping $550. Arrrgggghhhhhh!!!!
Thats ok... I still had the Paradise tourney going and it had a first place prize of $56K!!! Well after about 6 hours of play, I reached the Final Table!!! Then I lost a huge coinflip with A,Q to 9,9, and was out shortly after that in 10th place. 10th paid $2,300. Arrrrrrgggggggggghhhhh!!!!!!!!!!!!
Well, I had a few tourneys that I wanted to play today, but when I logged onto www.pocketfives.com, I found out about another tourney. A small internet poker site by the name of Titan Poker was hosting a $1 Million Guaranteed with a $1,000 buy in. About an hour before the tourney started there were only about 500 people registered to play, so I deposited money on the site and registered for the tourney expecting a huge overlay. Sure enough, we started the tourney with 568 people, meaning that the site had to subsidize $432K of the prize pool! First place in this tourney paid $300K!!! Thats alot of money! Well, I made it deep in this tourney, but it really turned into a crap shoot as their blind and ante structures escalated far to fast. Long story short, I busted out 47th for a $2500 pay day.
Everyone has been telling me how great of I have been playing and how its good that I am making it deep in these tourneys. I do appreciate all of the "pats on the back" but its very frustrating having a couple of really nice shots at Huge Payouts and falling short.
I played ALOT of tourneys again this weekend. The reason that I am saying this is because I don't want people to go and deposit a good amount of money online and expect easy results. Please, play within your bankroll, and work your way up to the next level.

Overall, I ended up with a nice profit for the weekend, but did not accomplish my goal.

PS.

Thanks to all of you who supported me... chuckdawg_00, monkeycowboy, blueboy, x_kage_x, apestyles, Dad, Ellen and anyone else that I missed...

Until next time,

Jeff

I Am Back

2006-07-12T03:05:00.000-05:00

Hey all,

I busted out of my $1K rebuy event at the WSOP. 10,10 is no good vs. A,K when an A rivers. I got back late last night and have been trying to catch up on work and sleep since. Hopefully, I will have some time to write a detailed post tomorrow.

Thank you for all of your support!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

-Jeff

Good Weekend and Off to Vegas for the World Series of Poker

2006-07-06T02:57:00.000-05:00

Hey all...

I had a very good weekend playing poker. Long story short, I played on Paradise Poker for my first time on Saturday. I decided to play under a new name, #1 Grampa and I definitely think that the name choice gave me some strategic advantages. The first tourney that I played was a small 37 man tourney with a $250 buy in. I went on to finish 1st in this tourney which was good for $3,300+. The very next tourney that I played on Paradise was their $100 rebuy. If you can believe it, I was able to go deep and overcome a 7 to 1 "Heads Up" deficit and went on to finish first in this tourney as well, which paid $10,600+. I have seen a lot of crazy things in poker, but winning my first 2 tourneys on Paradise amazed even me! On Monday, I also finished 4th in the Stars $100 rebuy which was good for another $4K. These wins coupled with a nice $2K profit in cash games, made this a very good weekend.
I do want to throw a disclaimer out there. I played a ton of tourneys in this 3 day period and my estimated buy ins were about $4K. Some of my friends have talked to me about depositing a large amount of money on the internet and playing bigger buy in tourneys like I do. If you are even thinking about doing this, please don't. Playing within your bankroll while taking an occasional shot, is a much better plan of attack.
Anyways,
I made a last minute decision to go to Vegas this upcoming weekend and play in the World Series of Poker $1K rebuy event. I am very excited and a bit nervous about this decision all at the same time. I will be spending $3K minimum to play since I will be definitely be purchasing the intial buy in and the double add on. I tend to play the larger online rebuy tourneys a bit more conservatively than the other top online players, and I plan to execute this strategy early in this tourney as well. People have been asking me, "How deep into your pockets are you willing to go during the rebuy period?" I plan on having about $10K on me but I do not foresee using all of it. Daniel Negreanu set the record 2 years ago by rebuying, something ridiculous, like 24 times. Personally, I think that players with this strategy add a ton of value to rebuy tourneys and I hope to be able to take advantage of this value.
So what are my chances?
Well, I am going to play to the best of my abilities and after that I can't guarantee anything. From a game theory perspective my chances are good and bad at the same time. The negatives are fairly obvious. I have not had the opportunity to play much live poker in the past year, this is only my second time playing on a stage of this magnitude, and the tournament structure will be different than the one's on Stars and Paradise. The good news is, there are some positives!!! I have had a great year in the high dollar rebuy events online. My ROI for Stars and Paradise in the $50 and $100 rebuys is over 200%. Basically, if I can carry out my online strategy into this tourney while making quick adjustments to compensate for live play and a new tournament structure then I should be getting great value out of this tournament.
After this tournament I will be going back to Vegas the weekend of the 22nd to play Razz and Stud Hi/Lo which I will discuss in a later post.
Do you want to know how I am doing in the tourney?
El Burro/Sack will be blogging my tourney on this site. I will be calling him on my breaks and giving him periodic updates. The tourney starts Saturday at noon (Vegas time).

My motto:

"There is always someone out there who is bigger, stronger, faster, smarter and better than you. Just not today!"

Confident yet humble.

Fortunate yet deserving.

Win or lose, I am a winner in the long run because I have great friends who support me.

-Jeff

Very Good Tournament Reviews from BeL0WaBOVe and shipitthisway

2006-07-06T02:13:00.000-05:00

Hey all,

As most of you know, I am a Tight Agressive NL Hold 'Em player. I do switch gears at different stages of tourneys as the table demands, but for the most part, my game is considered TAG. The players that personally give me the most fits are the very good Loose Agressive Players (LAGs). Currently, BeL0WaBOVe may be the best LAG Multi Table Tournament player online. He wrote a great post on p5's about his play in the $5K WSOP event. I love reading these posts because it gives me the chance to wander into the head of a great LAG player and get a view of his/her thought process.
Shipitthisway is also a LAG player who focuses on the $50/$100 cash game on UB. He also provided a recap to his $5K tourney which is pretty good, as well.
BTW... On a side note, BeL0W has one of my favorite online names on Full Tilt. GetPWN3D
Here you go...

http://www.pocketfives.com/494FC781-23EB-4AA2-A72A-7521598D7A10.aspx

http://www.pocketfives.com/57CF339F-A380-487C-852F-7C1C65BE12A8.aspx

-Jeff

Good Story

2006-06-28T02:32:00.000-05:00

I really enjoyed this post from dhubermex on p5's and I wanted to share it...
BTW... I have no idea how he and some of these other guys, 12 table! I would get a migraine!

http://www.pocketfives.com/A617D552-2CC0-463A-81CE-843305B9C12F.aspx

-Jeff

OFFICIAL ANNOUNCEMENT. I am Pursuing a New Line of Work.

2006-06-26T14:07:00.000-05:00

Many of you are probably thinking that I have decided to quit my day job and become a professional poker player...

Well you are wrong!

I am not quitting my job, but I did accept an offer to write a monthly article for www.pocketfives.com. The pay will be minimal but the experience will hopefully, be rewarding. I am expecting to have my first article published in the July 20th timeframe.

If you aren't a member of p5's, check it out.

That is all.

-Jeff

30/60 Omaha Hi/Lo Session with Greg Raymer and Johnny Bax

2006-06-21T02:51:00.000-05:00

Hey all,
I played a few NL Hold 'Em tourneys tonight and was NOT happy with the way that I played. Unfortunately, I was very impatient and my decision making was flawed.
I found out that Greg Raymer (FossilMan), JohnnyBax, and SamEnole were playing 30/60 Omaha Hi/Lo cash game and I thought that it might be a fun change of pace. While I have played with JohnnyBax and SamEnole on numerous occasions, I have not had the chance to play with the 2005 Main Event Champion. I probably should have asked him for a 5 million dollar loan. : ) I bought in for $1200 and cashed out for almost $1700 as noted in the bottom picture. While this was not a huge cash, and I did not play that long, it was a ton of fun. BTW, I am the player in the lower left. OBV.

Here is the hand history for the largest pot that I won.
PokerStars Game #5317811750: Omaha Hi/Lo Limit ($30/$60) - 2006/06/21 - 01:36:15 (ET)Table 'Andraimon II' 10-max Seat #10 is the buttonSeat 1: JohnnyBax ($3664 in chips) Seat 2: FossilMan ($957.50 in chips) Seat 4: yuanyuan ($348 in chips) Seat 5: countryace ($1908.50 in chips) Seat 6: sleaterx ($1983 in chips) Seat 7: jeffbeesdat ($1110 in chips) Seat 8: ALAS ($573 in chips) Seat 9: Dexter C ($1737 in chips) Seat 10: serena girl ($1032 in chips) JohnnyBax: posts small blind $15FossilMan: posts big blind $30*** HOLE CARDS ***Dealt to jeffbeesdat [Qd Qc As Ad]yuanyuan: folds countryace: folds sleaterx: folds jeffbeesdat: raises $30 to $60ALAS: folds Dexter C: calls $60serena girl: folds JohnnyBax: calls $45FossilMan: calls $30*** FLOP *** [Ks Ac 4d]JohnnyBax: checks FossilMan: checks jeffbeesdat: bets $30Dexter C: calls $30JohnnyBax: folds FossilMan: calls $30*** TURN *** [Ks Ac 4d] [9d]FossilMan: checks jeffbeesdat: bets $60Dexter C: raises $60 to $120FossilMan: folds jeffbeesdat: raises $60 to $180Dexter C: calls $60*** RIVER *** [Ks Ac 4d 9d] [2h]jeffbeesdat: bets $60Dexter C: folds jeffbeesdat collected $687 from potjeffbeesdat: doesn't show hand *** SUMMARY ***Total pot $690 Rake $3 Board [Ks Ac 4d 9d 2h]Seat 1: JohnnyBax (small blind) folded on the FlopSeat 2: FossilMan (big blind) folded on the TurnSeat 4: yuanyuan folded before Flop (didn't bet)Seat 5: countryace folded before Flop (didn't bet)Seat 6: sleaterx folded before Flop (didn't bet)Seat 7: jeffbeesdat collected ($687)Seat 8: ALAS folded before Flop (didn't bet)Seat 9: Dexter C folded on the RiverSeat 10: serena girl (button) folded before Flop (didn't bet)

I left the game with $1677, as shown below.

Port A Fishing Pics from Memorial Day Weekend...

2006-06-19T22:06:00.000-05:00

RANKED!!!!!!!!!

2006-06-13T12:54:00.000-05:00

http://www.pocketfives.com/1E54D586-3A39-4043-9D08-AD1C12E74D63.aspx

That is all...

-Jeff

Boom! cowbell... moRE COWBELL... BOOM!!!!!!!!!

2006-06-12T01:07:00.000-05:00

Hey all,

Sorry I haven't posted in awhile. I have been very busy. I was fortunate enough to have a very good poker weekend and I just wanted to share with you.
On Saturday, I chopped the Party Poker $300. Going in to the Final Table, I didn't recognize anyone at the except for a VERY good player by the name of Crazy Cypriot. First place was a whopping $22K, but Crazy Cypriot had 35% of the chips in play when we got down to 5 handed. At this point, all of us agreed to talk about a deal using Party's COOL new chopping tool. I was sitting in 3rd place, but with only 17% of the chips in play, my chip equity in regards to the money in the prize pool was about $8700 and change. Seeing as Crazy Cypriot was not likely to make many mistakes, it would have been very difficult to win this tourney unless I was able to catch some very big hands. Long story short, I told the table that I would chop if I was given $10K. At this point, the table offered $9800 and I didn't want to squabble over $200, so I took the deal. Subsequently, that evening, I came very close to FT'ing the Party $150 when I busted out in 14th. That would have been a VERY nice Final Table as well, seeing that first paid $15K.

Today, I played 3 majors on Stars, UB, and Full Tilt, and although I was not able to cash in these majors, I came up with a nice score in the Stars $100+9 Rebuy.
Long story short, I had the chip lead when we reached 3 players and taking into account the giant bumps in the payout structure, we all agreed to chop based on chip equity... After the chop was agreed to we just pushed all in on every hand.

Here you go...

Hello jeffbeesdat,
Congratulations on your finish in tournament #25838152!
You agreed to a deal at the final table to adjust the payouts as follows:
Official New
Player Payout Payout
========= ======== ======
Bry23 #1 $ 28270.00 $ 17720.16
jeffbeesdat #2 $ 17990.00 $ 20943.38
EnoBaLL #3 $ 11924.80 $ 19521.26
When the tournament ended, you were automatically credited with
the official 2nd place payout of $17990.00.
The difference between this amount and the amount to which you agreed
in the deal is $2953.38, and this amount has been credited to your account.
You will find this transaction in the cashier history at this time.
Good luck in your next event, and thank you for your participation.
Best Regards,
PokerStars Support Team

I have also had some very nice Final Tables in the last 3 weeks so I will include those as well... I hope that you enjoy...

PokerStars Tournament #25455618, No Limit Hold'emBuy-In: $150.00/$12.00520 playersTotal Prize Pool: $78000.00 Tournament started - 2006/06/01 - 21:10:00 (ET)Dear jeffbeesdat, You finished the tournament in 6th place.A $3,510.00 award has been credited to your Real Money account.

PokerStars Tournament #25061243, No Limit Hold'emBuy-In: $100.00/$9.00259 playersTotal Prize Pool: $103200.00 Tournament started - 2006/05/28 - 19:30:00 (ET)Dear jeffbeesdat, You finished the tournament in 6th place.A $4,644.00 award has been credited to your Real Money account.

PokerStars Tournament #24673758, No Limit Hold'emBuy-In: $100.00/$9.00108 playersTotal Prize Pool: $37700.00 Tournament started - 2006/05/20 - 23:45:00 (ET)Dear jeffbeesdat, You finished the tournament in 2nd place.A $7,540.00 award has been credited to your Real Money account.

Thanks for all the players who have been kind of enough to lend their support, including, MonkeyCowboy, Gmoneyrunner, chuckdawg_00, x_kage_x, durrtyd, gboro780, PSDollars
TMay420 and others. I greatly appreciate it...

Lastly,
I also finished 65th out of 5,265 players in the Stars Million last week and am planning on posting some hand histories from that tourney... I am just very tired right now.

-Jeff

myspace.com... I Hopped on the Bandwagon...

2006-05-08T10:01:00.000-05:00

I have had a myspace account for awhile just to look for people, but I had never done anything with my page. Well, now its up and functional. Check out my page at www.myspace.com/jeffg222

If you are out there let me know! We can be friends... : )

-Jeff

Congrats to My Bud bbbb33... aka Steve Jelts for Winning the Stars Million

2006-05-08T02:13:00.000-05:00

I met bbbb33 about a month ago late in the Stars $150+12 with about 4 tables to go. I had El Burro on the phone, and knowing that he was a big 80's baseball fan and card collector as I was back in the day, I asked him if "this dude's avatar" looked looked like Jeltz from the Philadelphia Phillies. Sure enough, bbbb33's avatar is a Steve Jeltz Donruss Rated Rookie Picture. Well, long story short, bbbb33 became friends at the table that night.
In that particular tourney, I busted out 17th and he went on to get A,A cracked and finish 6th in this tourney when first paid 19k.
Over the last few weeks, we have spent a good amount of time sweating each other. We even agreed to wear old school 80's, non power hitting, shortstop jerseys together if we both played in the WSOP Main Event. (I am leaning towards Alfredo Griffin.)
Anyways, Stars owed him big time for the gruesome suckout in the $150+12 and sure enough won the Million today.

Congrats Jelttttttttzzzzz.

You are a sicko!!!!!!!!!!!!

-Jeff

Tough Lay Down but Sometimes You Gotta Do It...

2006-04-23T20:19:00.000-05:00

PokerStars Game #4723399328: Tournament #23113885, $100+$9 Hold'em No Limit - Level VII (100/200) - 2006/04/23 - 21:13:59 (ET)Table '23113885 6' 9-max Seat #1 is the buttonSeat 1: stevestar (8120 in chips) Seat 2: muchakja (6544 in chips) Seat 3: apestyles (11485 in chips) Seat 4: jeffbeesdat (9605 in chips) Seat 5: J Conway (7425 in chips) Seat 6: haxxories (5005 in chips) Seat 7: traveller (11495 in chips) Seat 8: SL6767 (16608 in chips) Seat 9: Kung (8625 in chips) stevestar: posts the ante 25muchakja: posts the ante 25apestyles: posts the ante 25jeffbeesdat: posts the ante 25J Conway: posts the ante 25haxxories: posts the ante 25traveller: posts the ante 25SL6767: posts the ante 25Kung: posts the ante 25muchakja: posts small blind 100apestyles: posts big blind 200*** HOLE CARDS ***Dealt to jeffbeesdat [As Ad]jeffbeesdat: raises 400 to 600J Conway: calls 600haxxories: folds traveller: folds SL6767: folds Kung: folds stevestar: calls 600muchakja: calls 500apestyles: calls 400*** FLOP *** [4h 6s 3s]muchakja: checks apestyles: checks jeffbeesdat: bets 2800J Conway: raises 4000 to 6800 and is all-instevestar: folds muchakja: folds apestyles: folds jeffbeesdat: folds J Conway collected 8825 from potjeffbeesdat said, "laid down A,A"J Conway: shows [3d 3h] (three of a kind, Threes)

-Jeff

A Little Recognition Never Hurt Anyone...

2006-04-23T02:33:00.000-05:00

ExtremeTilt is a site that was created by a creative player named mindwise. On this site, he tracks all of UB's $100 and over buy in events and has created a point system and subsequent leaderboard. Since I have been playing more and more on UB this year with good results, I have been able to crack the monthly and yearly leaderboard. Mindwise also gave me a small mention in his last blog entry.
I have not had the best week playing poker (nor the worst), but maybe this is the pat in the back that I need to hit my next big one.
If you get a chance checkout www.extremetilt.com and read the April 19th entry.

Mindwise, thanks for the blurb.

-Jeff

miko77q = Impressive

2006-04-22T19:59:00.000-05:00

I have heard alot about a very skilled player on UB named miko77q, but I hadn't had the opportunity to play with him much. Here is a hand that happened about 15 minutes ago in our $100+9 six handed tourney... The kid is good! Nothing impresses me more than a great laydown.

Hand #31278398-55 at Sat801pm-020 (No Limit tournament Hold'em)Powered by UltimateBetStarted at 22/Apr/06 20:25:49 jayfleur is at seat 0 with 2530. miko77q is at seat 1 with 2415. WOOT WOOT is at seat 2 with 2455. jeffbeesdat is at seat 3 with 2480. sexygee is at seat 4 with 2650. Chez1 is at seat 5 with 2470. The button is at seat 3. sexygee posts the small blind of 10. Chez1 posts the big blind of 20.
jayfleur: -- -- miko77q: -- -- WOOT WOOT: -- -- jeffbeesdat: As Qc sexygee: -- -- Chez1: -- --
Pre-flop: jayfleur folds. miko77q raises to 70. WOOT WOOT folds. jeffbeesdat calls. sexygee folds. Chez1 folds.
Flop (board: Ah Ts 3s): miko77q checks. jeffbeesdat bets 100. miko77q calls.
Turn (board: Ah Ts 3s 5s): miko77q checks. jeffbeesdat checks.
River (board: Ah Ts 3s 5s 9s): miko77q bets 350. jeffbeesdat raises to 925. miko77q folds, showing Ks Kd. jeffbeesdat is returned 575 (uncalled).
jeffbeesdat opts to show As Qc. jeffbeesdat has As Ts 3s 5s 9s: flush, ace high.
Hand #31278398-55 Summary: No rake is taken for this hand. jeffbeesdat wins 1070.---

There are very few players who can lay down the second nuts!

I started talking to him after the hand and found out that he is only 19 and is playing professionally. Its crazy how good some of these under 21's are right now.

Here is a link to his UB $100 and over buy in tourneys for this year courtesy of www.extremetilt.com.

http://www.extremetilt.com/extremetilt/UB-ExtremeTilt/export/players/miko77q.html

-Jeff

Congrats to pOkerprO33 aka jcamby33 and durrtyD!!!

2006-04-20T17:08:00.000-05:00

pOkerprO33, as I have expressed before, has become a good friend and is a GREAT poker player! For those who aren't aware, he has been on an absolute tear this year.
Althought it did not seem possible he has dialed up the heat even further over the last couple of months to put up some of the best poker stats on the net. In late February, he accomplished the unthinkable by top 3'ing two major tournaments on the same night! He netted over $40K when he finished 2nd and 3rd in the Full Tilt guaranteed $200K and the UB guaranteed $125K, respectively. After this amazing feat, he has also chopped for first in the Stars $150+12, Final tabled the Stars $300+20, $100+9, $50 rebuy and $100 rebuy (multiple times) while also winning seats on UB to the World Series Main Event and World Poker Tour Aruba Event!
Last Wednesday pOkerprO and I found ourselves seated at the same starting table in the UB $200+15. Ironically, we played the majority of the tournament seated at the same table together and found ourselves at the Final Table together. For most of the tourney I led prO in chips, but at the Final Table he was able to win a monster, 3 way, all in pot with A,A, and after that, there was just no way that I could catch up to someone of his skill level. I eventually busted out 4th and prO took down the grand prize, good for $16K and change. On Sunday, prO was up to his old tricks again. He final tabled the Full Tilt $200K and took down second, good for a mere $29K. He should have placed first but his pair of Aces were counterfeited when his opponent pushed all in on a flush draw on the turn. You know the rest of the story. $16K bad beats are hard to swallow, but the fact that he made it so deep in this tourney, once again, is just phenomenal.
Congrats prO, you are an animal!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

The first time that I came across durrtyD, he was commenting about my blog and wishing me luck on my way to chopping for first in the UB guaranteed $125K. Well, over the past week and a half, durrty has really broken through. Last week he won the highly prestigious $11 rebuy on Stars for over a $10K pay day. A couple days later, he struck again when he won a $3 tourney on Stars for over $500. These impressive wins coupled with a Final Table in the $100+9 on UB, are truly spectacular.
Here is the funny part. durrtyD and I were seated together to start the $100+9 on UB, 2 nights ago. I asked durrtyD if he was playing the $150+12 on Stars and he said, "No, I just got home from work". Someone at the table asked him where he worked and he replied,"Company X". Go Figure... I work at the same Company X.
Company X has over 300,000 employees and I like to stroke my ego by thinking that I am one of the top players in Company X. Well, if durrtyD keeps on winning tournaments at this rate, my ranking within Company X, will have to go down one spot! : ) (If it hasn't already.)

Congrats durrtyD!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

As for me, I have had a couple of close calls lately. I finished 27th in the UB $125K Guaranteed on Sunday and 17th in the Stars $150+12 on Tuesday. These are nice finishes that paid a little bit of money, but when you consider that the top prizes were $31K and $21K respectively, you tend to view them in a "not so great light".

Hope you enjoyed!

-Jeff

It Happens to everyone... You just have to deal with it...

2006-04-14T00:27:00.000-05:00

J,J should be a hand that you can get away from when faced with a re-raise. My first thought was to lay this hand down, but as I continued to think about this re-raise, I decided that most likely, the best hand that he could have was A,K if that, otherwise he would not have priced me out of the pot. Even as well as things have gone lately, this still happens.

Hand #31061815-154 at Thu11pmB-003 (No Limit tournament Hold'em)
Powered by UltimateBet
Started at 14/Apr/06 01:21:12

teqbuster is at seat 0 with 5605.
maxEmus125 is at seat 1 with 11310.
deuce deuce is at seat 2 with 9705.
cobster316 is at seat 3 with 9840.
tgc1 is at seat 4 with 7415.
leonfish is at seat 5 with 6220.
Short___Stack is at seat 6 with 0 (sitting out).
jeffbeesdat is at seat 7 with 6645.
GilaMule is at seat 8 with 4135.
slorenzen is at seat 9 with 3535.
The button is at seat 0.

maxEmus125 posts the small blind of 150.
deuce deuce posts the big blind of 300.

teqbuster: -- --
maxEmus125: -- --
deuce deuce: -- --
cobster316: -- --
tgc1: -- --
leonfish: -- --
jeffbeesdat: Jh Jd
GilaMule: -- --
slorenzen: -- --

Pre-flop:

cobster316 folds. tgc1 folds. leonfish folds.
jeffbeesdat raises to 900. GilaMule folds.
slorenzen folds. teqbuster folds. maxEmus125
re-raises to 2950. deuce deuce folds. jeffbeesdat
goes all-in for 6645. maxEmus125 calls.

Tournament all-in showdown -- players show:

maxEmus125 shows Tc Kh.
jeffbeesdat shows Jh Jd.

Flop (board: Ks Kd 6s):

(no action in this round)

Turn (board: Ks Kd 6s Ts):

(no action in this round)

River (board: Ks Kd 6s Ts 5d):

(no action in this round)

Showdown:

maxEmus125 has Tc Kh Ks Kd Ts: full house, kings full of tens.
jeffbeesdat has Jh Jd Ks Kd Ts: two pair, kings and jacks.

Hand #31061815-154 Summary:

No rake is taken for this hand.
maxEmus125 wins 13590 with full house, kings full of tens.

-Jeff

Double Boom!!!!! Ka-Ka BOOM!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

2006-04-13T02:47:00.000-05:00

2 Final Tables tonight. The Guaranteed $50K on UB and the Stars $50 Rebuy. I finished 4th in the UB $200+15 which paid $5100 and change and then I FT'd the Stars $50 Rebuy about 10 minutes later where I busted out 3rd which paid $4100 and change. In the UB $200+15 I just couldn't get anything going 4 handed. A good friend and GREAT poker player pOkerprO33/jcamby took down the prize for $16K. Congrats pOkerpro!!!
In the Stars $50+5. I was second in chips when I went out against the chip leader. The chip leader bet out on a flop of 2c, 3c, 2s, and I pushed all in with Ac, 8c. He called with 4,4 and the turn and the river did not help me. I was really hoping for a fold there, but if I did win that race, I would have been the commanding chip leader. I am a little bit frustrated that I couldn't take one of these tourneys down but after a horrible night, yesterday, I can't complain!

-Jeff

Cold Tourneys but Nice Razz Session

2006-04-11T00:16:00.000-05:00

Well, I had a rough tourney run tonight. In the UB $100+9, I went out on K,K vs. A,A. In the Stars $150+9 I went out on A,K vs. J,J, and in the Stars $20 Rebuy, I went fairly deep, but I ended up overplaying 8,8... Funny how you can lay down A,A but you get all your chips in with 8,8. : )
El Burro and I decided to play some cash game at Full Tilt so we jumped onto a Pot Limit Omaha H/L $.05/$.10 table where I made a whopping $1.30. While were playing at this table, I bought into an $8/$16 Razz game for $200. I was doing very well in this game, and El Burro got the itch to play Razz so we jumped on a $2,4 table. I lost a little over $40 in the $2,4 game, partly because much of my focus was invested in the $8,16 game but I also found the players to be much more disciplined in the $2,4 game! A few minutes ago, I finally left the $8,16 game when I had worked my way up from $200 to $800. This is my first ever Razz cash game session. I hope that my following sessions are a bit like this one.

BTW... The Player to my left in this pic is Quiet Lion. Quiet Lion is the original author of Microsoft Word and also served as Bill Gates' personal, technical advisor. Now, he just plays poker. : ) One of these days, I am going to post about all of the smart people who are professional poker players. I don't think that the general public understands the academic and corporate achievements of some of these players.
-Jeff

Sometimes, You Just Got to Go With Your Gut and Fold!!!

2006-04-10T21:15:00.000-05:00

I am currently playing in the Stars $20 Rebuy and limped in with this hand...

PokerStars Game #4587607801: Tournament #22780285, Hold'em No Limit - Level VIII (200/400) - 2006/04/10 - 22:05:19 (ET)Table '22780285 57' 9-max Seat #5 is the buttonSeat 1: T0mBSt0nE (3185 in chips) Seat 2: 420nutznbolz (20000 in chips) Seat 3: klippen (8756 in chips) Seat 4: TheHotTuna (18200 in chips) Seat 5: GB2005 (42487 in chips) Seat 6: jltatty (28260 in chips) Seat 7: Victor V (5650 in chips) Seat 8: iguadala (12260 in chips) Seat 9: jeffbeesdat (22835 in chips) T0mBSt0nE: posts the ante 25420nutznbolz: posts the ante 25klippen: posts the ante 25TheHotTuna: posts the ante 25GB2005: posts the ante 25jltatty: posts the ante 25Victor V: posts the ante 25iguadala: posts the ante 25jeffbeesdat: posts the ante 25jltatty: posts small blind 200Victor V: posts big blind 400*** HOLE CARDS ***Dealt to jeffbeesdat [Ad Ah]iguadala: folds jeffbeesdat: calls 400GB2005 said, "but u could take is as a compliment that i am glad ur losing chips"T0mBSt0nE is disconnected T0mBSt0nE is connected T0mBSt0nE: folds 420nutznbolz: calls 400klippen: folds TheHotTuna: calls 400iguadala said, "lol"GB2005: folds jltatty: calls 200Victor V: checks *** FLOP *** [Kh 4s 8h]iguadala said, "i always lose chips =("jltatty: checks Victor V: checks jeffbeesdat: bets 2000420nutznbolz: folds TheHotTuna: folds jltatty: raises 4800 to 6800Victor V: folds iguadala said, "i didnt even know u have chat, u never talk"iguadala said, "lol"iguadala said, "gl sir"GB2005 said, "i put 300 into the dise 30r and only have 7k chips"jeffbeesdat said, "2 pair?"jeffbeesdat: folds jeffbeesdat said, "A,A here"jltatty collected 6225 from pot*** SUMMARY ***Total pot 6225 Rake 0 Board [Kh 4s 8h]Seat 1: T0mBSt0nE folded before Flop (didn't bet)Seat 2: 420nutznbolz folded on the FlopSeat 3: klippen folded before Flop (didn't bet)Seat 4: TheHotTuna folded on the FlopSeat 5: GB2005 (button) folded before Flop (didn't bet)Seat 6: jltatty (small blind) collected (6225)Seat 7: Victor V (big blind) folded on the FlopSeat 8: iguadala folded before Flop (didn't bet)Seat 9: jeffbeesdat folded on the Flop

Back From Fishing to Tame a Horse?

2006-04-10T00:18:00.000-05:00

Hey all,

I have had a crazy last couple of weeks, so when I saw how beautiful the weather was in San Antonio on Friday, I decided that it was time for me to head down to the coast to my parent's house and do a bit of fishing. For those of you who know me well, I love to fish... There is no other way around it. One of my good friends, Andres E. always tells people, "I am a fisherman by trade," and I can't think of a better way to put it.
Unfortunately, I didn't catch many fish but it was great to spend some time with my parents and get away for a bit. On Saturday, we were invited to a crab boil, which we headed down to late in the afternoon. The average age at the Crab boil was about 50, but age was no matter at all because the food, weather, and beer created a really great atmosphere. My one regret is that I did not bring a camera because there were about 4 guys there who truelly should be on www.menwholooklikekennyrogers.com.
This hilarious site lists AA meetings, monster truck shows, drag races, and feed stores as great places to spot Kenny look alikes, but they really need to contemplate adding "crab boils" to their list.
Anyways, I came back early today with the intent on playing some of the large "majors". Unfortunately, I didn't do as well as I wanted to, but "that's poker".
Last week, I posted about my big win on UB, but what I didn't post was my 15th place finish in the Full Tilt $200+15 HORSE tournament. For those of you who don't know what Horse is, its a combination of the following games: Limit Hold 'Em, Stud, Stud Hi/Lo, Razz and Limit Omaha H/L. In this day and time when the American population equates No Limit Texas Hold 'Em to Poker, HORSE is a refreshingly different kind of challenge that tests the skills of players across a broad spectrum of games. I still have some learning and fine-tuning to do when it comes to tournament HORSE, but I think that this has the potential to be my best game. There are so many people out there who can play 1 or 2 games well, but are deficient in others. Horse gives a definite edge to players who can play multiple games well. Doyle Brunson actually thinks that HORSE should be the Main Event of the World Series of Poker.
From a personal perspective here is how I would rank my skill in HORSE games.

A... Omaha H/L
A-... Razz
B+... Stud H/L
C+... Limit Hold 'Em
C-... Stud

Many of you are probably very surprised that I rank my Limit Hold 'Em game so low on the list. Much of this has to do with the fact that when it comes to Hold 'Em, I am a self taught player. I play mainly No Limit and Pot Limit Hold 'Em which are much more "feel" games than Limit Hold 'Em. Limit Hold 'Em is a much more technical game, and frankly, I need educate myself and apply this learning to some hard core practice sessions.

Anyways, Full Tilt is the only online site right that currently offers HORSE tournaments, although I am hoping that others jump on this "band wagon". As I expressed before I came in 15th out of 120 in last week's Full Tilt $200+15 tournament. To make a long story short, I was very shortstacked with 2 tables left, and I called a 3 way all in, preflop with K,K. The other players had 10,10 and A,K, and you can witness the outcome below.

Wouldn't you know it, I ended up busting out in 15th place again tonight! I went out in Omaha H/L on a very difficult hand. I was dealt K,K,5,10 in the big blind. Now, late in tourneys, I don't like to come into the pot without a hand that can scoop the pot (take the High and the Lo) and I don't like to come into the pot calling a raise. With blinds being 600,1200, a player in early position raised to 2400. The small blind Steve Zolotov (pro) called, and I contemplated my options. I could fold, and lose my small blind of 1200 which would leave me about 6600 left, I could call the extra 1200 leaving me about 5400, or I could cap the bet, raising to 3600 and leaving me about 4200. Normally, in No Limit and Pot Limit situations, the choice is much more simple in a potential 3 way hand, "fold or raise". Unfortunately, if I raised, I would most likely get called by both players and I wanted to see the flop so I just called the extra 1200. The flop was very good for me, Q,7,8 with 2 hearts. I now had an overpair and the second best flush draw. Zolotov. the small blind, checked and I went ahead and bet out 1200 leaving me 4200. Both players called. The turn, came Q of diamonds which was not a card that I wanted to see. The Q of diamonds meant that if someone was calling by flop bet with top pair on the board, then the turn Q counterfeited my overpair of K,K. This also meant that their was now a potential full house on the board which was a possible nullifier for my flush draw. The small blind checked, I checked as well, and the position player bet 2400. The small blind called and this is where I probably made a mistake. I only had 4200 left, which now made me a VERY short stack (3 and 1/2 bb's) and I was looking at a call of 2400 for a pot of 18K. Even though my flush draw might be "drawing dead", I decided that it was time to gamble and I made the call. The river provided a black ten. The small blind checked, I checked and the position player made it 2400. The small blind folded and I contemplated my options. I was about 95% sure that I was beat at that point. It was very possible that he missed a low or a heart draw but not very likely. Here was my dilemma. If I folded, then I would be down to 1 and 1/2 bb's and I would be getting tossed into the sb on the next hand. If I did call and potentially win, then I would have over 21K and chips and a legitimate shot at winning the tournament.
I made the call and the results were pretty much what I expected as shown in the second screen shot below. (The position player spiked the straight on the river.)
BTW... I apologize, if you feel like you are watching the Disney Channel, due to Full Tilt's graphics. : )

BTW#2... My Full Tilt screen name is GrampaJeff, which is a little social experiment that I am trying out.

Happy Birthday Sis!!!!!!!!!!!

2006-04-05T00:29:00.000-05:00

Michelle,

Sorry I couldn't ge ahold of you tonight!!! Your present is going to be awesome! (Luck has followed me lately.)

On another note... The Rascal Flats CD finally came out!!! I have been waiting for this since I heard, "What Hurts the Most" a couple of months ago.

The song makes me sad, but really rocks!!!

BTW... I had about a break even night at the tables tonght. Thanks to all who congratulated me this evening... I appreciate all of your support.

One lucky donkey,

-Jeff

Boom! Boom! GunPowder... BOOOOOOOM!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

2006-04-03T03:14:00.000-05:00

Hey All,

I have been neglecting my duties as a blog writer, but I hope that this makes up for some of it... I just got done chopping first place in the Guaranteed $125K on UB. $24K and change!!!!!!!!!!!!

Thanks monkeycowboy, craftycan, gmoneyrunner, pOkerprO33, durrty, and others for all of your support!!! You guys rock...

-Jeff

Sickest Hand That I Have Ever Seen...

2006-03-29T23:32:00.000-06:00

Anyone who says that Phil Ivey isn't the best player in the world right now is insane... I give the European a ton of credit here as well...

Check it out.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LEfLXr3eSxs

-Jeff

The Road Not Taken

2006-03-27T00:59:00.000-06:00

Some of you may wonder where I got the title for my blog. I am a big fan of biographies, novels, and historical pieces, but not so much a fan of poetry. With this said, there is one poem that I really enjoy...

Courtesy of Robert Frost...

Two roads diverged in a yellow wood,
And sorry I could not travel both
And be one traveler, long I stood
And looked down one as far as I could
To where it bent in the undergrowth.
Then took the other, as just as fair,
And having perhaps the better claim,
Because it was grassy and wanted wear;
Though as for that the passing there
Had worn them really about the same.
And both that morning equally lay
In leaves no step had trodden black.
Oh, I kept the first for another day!
Yet knowing how way leads on to way,
I doubted if I should ever come back.
I shall be telling this with a sigh
Somewhere ages and ages hence:
Two roads diverged in a wood, and I-
-I took the one less traveled by,
And that has made all the difference.

-Robert Frost

I hope that you enjoyed.

-Jeff

Mini-Boom?

2006-03-23T03:40:00.000-06:00

I am sorry that I haven't written in awhile. I haven't been writing or playing much poker due to the fact that I have been busy on the job and have also just returned from Dallas.

Well, I just took second in the UB $100+9, $15K guaranteed tonight for $2400...
I came into heads up outstacked 2 to 1, but I had been running the table to get to that point so I was pretty happy with my play. Some people believe that I should not have chopped (made a deal) in the Stars $150+12 last week, since I had been dominating 3 handed and heads up, but the following hand below is one of the major reasons that I struck a deal in the Stars tourney. There just isn't much you can do about this... This is the hand that I lost heads up on...

MarkesanMike: -- --
jeffbeesdat: Jh Ad
Pre-flop:
jeffbeesdat calls. MarkesanMike raises to 12000.
jeffbeesdat re-raises to 31000. MarkesanMike
re-raises to 93800. jeffbeesdat goes all-in for
117740. MarkesanMike calls.
Tournament all-in showdown -- players show:
MarkesanMike shows 3d As.
jeffbeesdat shows Jh Ad.
Flop (board: 4s 3h 8s):
(no action in this round)
Turn (board: 4s 3h 8s 2d):
(no action in this round)
River (board: 4s 3h 8s 2d 6h):
(no action in this round)
Showdown:
MarkesanMike has 3d As 3h 8s 6h: a pair of threes.
jeffbeesdat has Jh Ad 4s 8s 6h: ace high.
Hand #30523295-132 Summary:
No rake is taken for this hand.
MarkesanMike wins 236280 with a pair of threes.
----------------------------------------------------------------

I promise to write more about poker, life and my recent trip to Dallas, in the VERY near future. Right now, I need to sleep.

-Jeff

Boom! Boom! Fireworks! Boom!

2006-03-16T02:23:00.000-06:00

I am tired as crap, so I don't want to get into detail ragarding this tourney and the chop... Hopefully, I will have enough energy to write about it tomorrow... Lets just enjoy for now!

Hello jeffbeesdat,
Congratulations on your finish in tournament #21184659!
You agreed to a deal at the final table to adjust the payouts as follows:
Official New
Player Payout Payout
========= ======== ======
jeffbeesdat #1 $ 18600.00 $ 14950.00
LuckyLady519 #2 $ 11457.60 $ 15107.60
When the tournament ended, you were automatically credited with
the official 1st place payout of $18600.00.
The difference between this amount and the amount to which you agreed
in the deal is $3650.00, and this amount has been debited from your account.
You will find this transaction in the cashier history at this time.
Good luck in your next event, and thank you for your participation.
Best Regards,
PokerStars Support Team

The Anatomy of a Complex Call

2006-03-07T23:02:00.000-06:00

I have been wanting to write a post about a call that I made last week, but I have been to lazy to do so. : )
When I final tabled the UB $100+9 last week, there was a call that I made that spurred me on to the Final Table. I had a pretty nice stack of 15K+ which was above average mid/late in this tournament. The blinds were around 200,400 with an ante and I found myself in the big blind with a very modest 3,5 offsuit. The table folded around to the small blind who took some time and called.
Let me go back and preface the situation by stating that I had won the last 2 small blind, big blind confrontations with this player. The first confrontation was with a A,10 preflop re-raise, and the second was with a raise of A,5 on a nothing flop.
I felt that I had the following information on this player... He was a very tricky player (evidenced by his previous play) and he was also starting to get aggravated losing each confrontation with me.
After the table folded around, this player called, and I checked we saw a flop of 8,9,9. The small blind checked and I bet about 3/4 of the pot for 800. The small blind quickly called my 800, which did not make me very happy. I was ready to lay down my weak hand 3,5 to any bet on the turn, but a funny thing happened. Fourth street produced another 9, and I started to question the validity of his hand. A thought started creaping into my head, hinting that he might have just called my bet on the flop with a nothing hand in order to represent thrip 9's.
The small blind checked the 9 on the turn and I checked behind him. The river produced a 5, which gave me a very weak full house. The small blind proceeded to bet the pot for 2,900. Now, normally I would lay this hand down since there are so many hands that can beat me (the last 9, an 8, or any pocket pair higher than 5's). Risking almost 1/4 of one's stack calling with a weak hand is NOT a play that you normally want to make in No Limit tournaments, but there was something very fishy about this hand and I was trying to figure it out. If he truly had an 8 or a 9 which he represented by his call on the flop, then he should be pretty certain that he had the best hand. With this knowledge, he should want to make some kind of bet where he could extract chips from my stack. Why would he make a bet of 2900 on the river when I would most likely fold and he would get no additional value from his hand? Another piece of information that I thought about was the fact that I had bet the flop, then checked the turn, which showed a great amount of weakness. There was a very good chance that he recognized this weakness and was using this information to influence his large bet on the river.
After thinking about his bet for quite some time, I made the call and he turned over Q,3. This hand gave me close to 20K in chips which left me in great position to go deep into the tourney.
As I have said before, I strongly suggest raising in no limit tournaments vs. calling. Raising is much more profitable because of the fold equity involved. But in this case, my only option was calling. If I raised, I would only be called by hands that beat me.
I don't suggest doing this very often, but sometimes, late in tourneys, you just have to follow your read and make uncomfortable calls.
Here is an odds analysis of the profitability on that particular call. Since my big blind and my bet on the flop were already in the pot, I consider them to be a sunk cost, meaning no matter how much I wanted to get my money back, I could not. It was already "sunk" into the pot. (My former accounting professors would be happy to know that the only use of my degree is making poker analogies with accounting terms... lol).
So considering that the previous money was already sunk, in order to make an accurate odds analysis, you must consider the play on the river as an independent event. With 2,900 in the pot, and the other player making a bet of 2,900 on the river, the pot was 5,800 when the opportunity to call came my way. If I called the 2,900 bet, the total pot would then be 8,700. The odds are pretty simple at this point. I was getting 2 to 1 odds on my call, meaning in the long run, all I have to do is win this hand 1 out of 3 times to break even. With 1/3 as the break even point, any win rate over 33% would be positive expected value call.
In no means am I advocating making calls that are based ONLY on pot odds, but I do think that they should be taken into consideration, when an opportunity to call in a situation like this presents itself.
This is where one really needs to be honest with themselves. Instead of thinking, "All I need to do is get this right 33% of the time and I break even", the more intelligent thought would be, "Do I really think that I have the better hand, even if I am not completely sure?", knowing that even if you are wrong there is plenty of room for error in regards to long term profitability.

-Jeff

Women in Poker?

2006-03-05T19:41:00.000-06:00

Lately, I have been spending some time hanging out with a girl that I met named "AZ". AZ is one of the coolest girls that I have met in awhile. Although she is very liberal (not everyone is perfect), we have a lot in common, including fishing, politics, good conversation, and more... As many of you who know me can attest to, I am pretty relationship averse, but AZ is cool with this, which works out pretty well.
Anyways, AZ wants to learn to play poker and I have told her that I will teach her. She had wanted to play in the past but her ex-boyfriend and her brother would not allow her to play in their games because they stood firm to a belief that women canNOT play poker.

Honestly, this is one of the biggest lines of BS that I have ever heard. Personally, I think that women have certain innate qualities that men do not possess in terms of poker skill. First of all, most women are more sensitive than men. This allows them to get better reads on poker players and people in general. I also believe that the male decision process is sometimes driven by ego and testerone. For some reason, women don't seem to have this issue...

Taking into consideration these factors, I believe that women have the capability to be better players than men.

My other thought is this... If you are truly a serious poker player, then your goal should be to make as much money as possible... right? Here is my question... Why wouldn't you want someone who does not know how to play, sitting at your table? Isn't that positive expected value?
We used to have a guy who played in our home game named "H". H was one of the WORST players that I have ever come across, and I have come across quite a few. If the board read AAKKJ, H would call down to the river with 2,2 in his hand. When he eventually lost the pot, he would remark cooly, "I just couldn't lay down 2 pair." The great thing about H was that he lost constantly, but he never cried, yelled, or complained. He always justified his losses by calculating the amount of money that he COULD have spent at the bar that night. If we had a Wednesday night game at Casa De Gray and H wanted to play, but he was stuck in Denton without a car, I guarantee you that we would have found a way to pick him up and bring him to the game.
My point throughout this rambling is as follows... If you are a true poker player and you know someone who has no experience playing poker, but wants to play in your game (Male or Female), you let them. Why chase off dead money?

-Jeff

Party Poker New Upgrade Review... Rosencrantz and Guildenstern Are Dead?

2006-03-05T16:04:00.000-06:00

For those who don't know Party Poker has recently completed a massive upgrade to their site. In the past I did not play much on Party because they did not offer a good multi table tournament selection or favorable blind structures for the tournaments that they did have. I decided to play in their $33 Rebuy $35K guaranteed yesterday and here is my critique of "the new Party Poker". Starting the tournament, I was pleasantly surprised with the generous starting chip count of 3,000 and the user friendly interface. For the first couple of hours, I played very well and made my way close to the money that started at 50. With 60 people left, I started noticing the severe flaws in the site that really need to be fixed. First of all, the site does not give you information as to what place you are in at any time in the tourney, which should be standard information on every site. Second, with the money starting at 50, the site mandated hand for hand play on EVERY hand from 60 in. While the overall effort to eliminate slow play is good, it makes for a very slow tourney. Third, the overall blind structures at the beginning of the tourney were very good, but the blinds and antes go up so quickly late in the tournament that it causes a very unattractive "all in fest".
I ended up making it down to the last 20 very shortstacked due to the "turbo" blinds and antes. I got all in preflop with 9,9 against the chip leader's Q,J. A queen flopped and it was, "Night, Night Gray..." If I can win that coin flip, there is no telling how far I could have gone. First Place was over 10K, but it did not have my name on it...
Lately,I just haven't seemed to be able to win big pots late in tourneys where I have a slight edge or am in a coin flip situation...
This takes me back to High School English. Part of our Senior English curriculum was a study of the modern existentialist authors and playwrites. Beckett, Stoppard, Camu and Conrad to name a few... Some of these guys were extremely bright, but I just couldn't seem to buy into their pessimistic, lonely, and jaded view of mankind and the universe. "Rosencrantz and Guildenstern Are Dead" is a tragic comedy written by Tom Stoppard. Stoppard took 2 of the most insignificant characters from Shakespeare's "Hamlet", Rosencrantz and Guildenstern, and centered the Hamlet story around these two. At the start of the play, one of the main characters, I believe that it was R, was flipping a coin over and over again, viewing the results of each flip. At one point he flipped it over 100X in a row with all results being heads. No matter how many times that he continued to flip this coin, he could not change the outcome.
For those of you who understand basic probability, you know that an unbiased coin flip with a non- weighted coin is a mutually exclusive exercise, meaning, the first flip of a coin will not affect the 2nd, 3rd, 4th flip, so on and so on... The coin has no memory. Just because it may have flipped tails three times in a row, does not mean that it will flip to heads on the next flip. Each result is mutually exclusive of the next.
Some feel that Stoddard was trying to use the coinflip scene to foreshadow the tragic events that would later befall R&G. Basically, these unfortunate individuals were cursed by "bad luck" in this unfair and warped world and this "bad luck" would eventually lead to their untimely deaths.

Over the past couple of weeks, I have been feeling a little like R and G. The coin has been flipping "heads" over and over again late in tournaments even though I know that it HAS to flip "tails" at some point.
But, Here is the difference between myself and Stoddard...
I personally feel that in both poker and life you make your own luck. Short term negative results are only statistical outliers that should NOT reflect upon your long term goals and objectives.

Do I believe this? Yes
Do I implement this each and every day without letting emotion play a negative role? No
Am I striving toward doing this? Yes

My apologies, if I got a little deep.

-Jeff

Truly American

2006-03-02T09:49:00.000-06:00

I am making a last ditch effort to get one of my company's very high level execs to host one of my customers at the Masters. This reminded me of a conversation/debate that I had about 2 years ago with McAdoo. We were talking about the sporting events that are "Truly American".

Context... I am using the term "Truly American" in the sense of Baseball, Hot Dogs, Freedom Fries, Apple Pie, Blue Jeans and the Electoral College...

Here are my top 5 in no particular order...

1) The Kentucky Derby
2) Super Bowl
3) Masters
4) World Series (Baseball)
5) March Madness

Do you agree or disagree?

-Jeff

Walking Into a Sliding Glass Door

2006-03-02T00:31:00.000-06:00

Have you ever been at a party and where you witnessed someone who was inebriated attempt to walk outside, only to slam into the sliding glass door? Thats how I feel with poker right now... In this warped analogy Outside=Big Money. Each time I feel that I am getting close to making my way "outside" an imaginary sliding glass door pops up and smacks me in the nose. On Monday night, I was playing in the UB $100+9 guaranteed $21K. I weaseled into the money as a very short stack and was looking for an opportune moment to double up. As I looked down at my cards, I found 6,6 in the small blind. The table folded around to the button, a fellow short stack who raised all in. I proceeded to make a difficult call for all of my chips. The big blind folded and the button turned over A,6. Great! Awesome! Wonderful!!! I had this player basically drawing to 3 outs in the deck. An Ace flopped and it was "Night, Night Gray".
Last night I was playing in the UB $100+9 Guaranteed $10K. After a roller coaster ride, I ended up at the Final Table about middle position in chips. After a couple of players went out, I looked down to find Q,Q Under The Gun. I standard raised 3X the big blind to 9K. The table folded around to the chip leader on the button who called my raise. The small and big blind folded, leaving us heads up. The flop came 9,4,4 leaving me in a very favorable position. I checked the flop for value, hoping that the chip leader would bet out and I could move all in over the top of him. The chip leader did not bite and we saw a turn of 5. At this point, I did not want to see the river so I bet my last 26K at the 24K pot. The chip leader called and turned over 9,9. He had flopped a full house. I busted out 8th, paying me $650. Now many of you are probably thinking, Thats great! Take the $650 and quit whining!
But, Honestly, when 1st prize is $4400 and I get that close to the goal and get paid $650, I would rather punch myself in the face. Night, Night Gray
Tonight, I was playing in the Stars $150 +12 with a top payout of $19K+. I made my way into the money, but as the blinds escalated at their alarming Stars pace, I started to look for a spot to get my chips in... I think that I made a difficult but very good call here. I will let you decide for yourself.
PokerStars Game #4146173794: Tournament #20356668, Hold'em No Limit - Level XII (800/1600) - 2006/03/02 - 00:10:06 (ET)
Table '20356668 63' Seat #4 is the button
Seat 1: mdsmith (12026 in chips)
Seat 2: RJAYC (75299 in chips)
Seat 3: Chaulk (14565 in chips)
Seat 4: soupie (10311 in chips)
Seat 5: jeffbeesdat (10455 in chips)
Seat 7: urmyjob (27211 in chips)
Seat 8: kidzero (25378 in chips)
Seat 9: Roothlus (12103 in chips)
mdsmith: posts the ante 75
RJAYC: posts the ante 75
Chaulk: posts the ante 75
soupie: posts the ante 75
jeffbeesdat: posts the ante 75
urmyjob: posts the ante 75
kidzero: posts the ante 75
Roothlus: posts the ante 75
jeffbeesdat: posts small blind 800
urmyjob: posts big blind 1600
*** HOLE CARDS ***
Dealt to jeffbeesdat [6h Ah]
kidzero: folds
Roothlus: folds
mdsmith: folds
RJAYC: folds
Chaulk: folds
soupie: raises 8636 to 10236 and is all-in
jeffbeesdat: raises 144 to 10380 and is all-in
urmyjob: folds
*** FLOP *** [Qd Td Ad]
urmyjob said, "a3 i was callin"
*** TURN *** [Qd Td Ad] [9s]
urmyjob said, "glad u did jeff"
*** RIVER *** [Qd Td Ad 9s] [Tc]
*** SHOW DOWN ***
jeffbeesdat: shows [6h Ah] (two pair, Aces and Tens)
soupie: shows [Jh Th] (three of a kind, Tens)
soupie collected 22672 from pot
Roothlus said, "that was sick"
Roothlus said, "vnh"
*** SUMMARY ***
Total pot 22672 Rake 0
Board [Qd Td Ad 9s Tc]
Seat 1: mdsmith folded before Flop (didn't bet)
Seat 2: RJAYC folded before Flop (didn't bet)
Seat 3: Chaulk folded before Flop (didn't bet)
Seat 4: soupie (button) showed [Jh Th] and won (22672) with three of a kind, Tens
Seat 5: jeffbeesdat (small blind) showed [6h Ah] and lost with two pair, Aces and Tens
Seat 7: urmyjob (big blind) folded before Flop
Seat 8: kidzero folded before Flop (didn't bet)
Seat 9: Roothlus folded before Flop (didn't bet)

I ended up busting out in 32nd.

The sliding glass door has to open sometime, right?

-Jeff

Exploiting the Weaknesses of Your Opponents... The Arrogant Player

2006-02-27T10:45:00.000-06:00

Advanced Poker is not only about playing your cards but about playing your opponents.

I was playing in the $100 + 9 Rebuy on Stars last night and was seated at the same table as very well known poker player. This was no surprise to me as the $100 Rebuy usually draws the best players on the internet.

The formerly mentioned "well known internet player" has a massive amount of cash and does not mind rebuying numerous times in these tourneys in attempts to build a big chipstack before the break.
This is exactly the type of player that you want at your table in a rebuy event. Although it is annoying to have to constantly fold small pots to this type of player, they have a tendency to double you up when you do hit your big hands. I had already doubled through this player once, giving me a nice amount of chips to work with, when he made a snide comment toward me. I had limped into a number of unraised pots, where he proceeded to go all in and I proceeded to fold, which led up to the following exchange of words. I have substituted "PlayerX" for this player's real name in the following transcript, as not to publicly berate this individual.
I will let you know that he is a top 10 ranked player on pocketfives.com.

____________________________________________________________________
Dealer: Game #4110609771: PlayerX wins pot (450)
stallionh: he must be a millionaire
Dealer: Game #4110621456: PlayerX wins pot (350)
PlayerX: jeff how many times u gonna limp fold?
jeffbeesdat: until you double me again
____________________________________________________________________

Here is the deal, PlayerX basically took a verbal shot at me, implying that I was a tight weak player in an effort to get me to play his game. He probably spent about $1,000 on this event, and I am just not going to spend that type of money on a $100 rebuy. I will admit that it wasn't the best idea to respond to this comment. In hindsight, I should have let it go, but I decided to give him a little taste of his own medicine seeing as this was not the first time in a tourney that he had thrown a verbal jab my way.

_____________________________________________________________________

After the rebuy period ended and normal play commenced, PlayerX continued with his same tactics of raising, un-raised pots in late position. If I was in the pot, I would just fold, and he took full advantage of this by showboating and showing hands like 10,8 offsuit.

I have found that the trick here is...

Do not to get upset. Keep on playing your game, and capitalize on his arrogance when you get the cards.

Shortly thereafter I caught A,A, two off the button. In normal situations, I will advise beginners to always RAISE with this hand. Although this is the best starting hand possible, it is only ONE pair, and you want a heads up scenario with another player where you can properly protect your hand. The thing one needs to realize though, is poker is a situational game, where you need to play hands differently as the situation dictates.
The table folded around to me and I just limped in for 150. The next player folded and Player X raised to 600 on the button (go figure). The big blind (who was the chip leader at the table) called the 600 and the the action was back on me. I reraised to 1500. At this point, PlayerX had to have a good idea that he had fallen into a trap and was beat, but his pride would not let him fold this hand. PlayerX called and the Big Blind folded. Here is the transcript pertaining to the rest of the hand.

____________________________________________________________________
PokerStars Game #4110938127: Tournament #20002622, Hold'em No Limit - Level V (75/150) - 2006/02/26 - 20:50:18 (ET)
Table '20002622 26' Seat #9 is the button
Seat 2: Governator (5933 in chips)
Seat 3: aleadz (22230 in chips)
Seat 4: jrNinja2 (7990 in chips)
Seat 5: CT Kid (1121 in chips)
Seat 6: Mad Max 26 (10550 in chips)
Seat 7: jeffbeesdat (6485 in chips)
Seat 8: MVTh (11395 in chips)
Seat 9: PlayerX (8675 in chips)
Governator: posts small blind 75
aleadz: posts big blind 150
*** HOLE CARDS ***
Dealt to jeffbeesdat [As Ah]
jrNinja2: folds
CT Kid: folds
Mad Max 26: folds
jeffbeesdat: calls 150
MVTh: folds
sheets: raises 450 to 600
Governator: folds
aleadz: calls 450
jeffbeesdat: raises 900 to 1500
PlayerX: calls 900
aleadz: folds
*** FLOP *** [Jh 7c 3d]
jeffbeesdat: bets 1500
PlayerX: calls 1500
*** TURN *** [Jh 7c 3d] [8s]
jeffbeesdat: bets 3485 and is all-in
PlayerX: calls 3485
*** RIVER *** [Jh 7c 3d 8s] [7d]
*** SHOW DOWN ***
jeffbeesdat: shows [As Ah] (two pair, Aces and Sevens)
PlayerX: shows [Ts Td] (two pair, Tens and Sevens)
jeffbeesdat collected 13645 from pot
*** SUMMARY ***
Total pot 13645 Rake 0
Board [Jh 7c 3d 8s 7d]
Seat 2: Governator (small blind) folded before Flop
Seat 3: aleadz (big blind) folded before Flop
Seat 4: jrNinja2 folded before Flop (didn't bet)
Seat 5: CT Kid folded before Flop (didn't bet)
Seat 6: Mad Max 26 folded before Flop (didn't bet)
Seat 7: jeffbeesdat showed [As Ah] and won (13645) with two pair, Aces and Sevens
Seat 8: MVTh folded before Flop (didn't bet)
Seat 9: PlayerX (button) showed [Ts Td] and lost with two pair, Tens and Sevens.

jeffbeesdat: no limp fold on that hand
____________________________________________________________________

Now, I probably shouldn't have rubbed it in with my parting comment, and I will admit that pride is one of my weaknesses that I am trying to work on as well, but the moral of this story, is "Take advantage of the other player's weakness." Don't let them change your game, but proactively tweek your own game to take full advantage of the situation at hand.

As for the rest of the tournament... Unfortunately, the cards just did not go my way as shown below...

PokerStars Game #4111445210: Tournament #20002622, Hold'em No Limit - Level VIII (200/400) - 2006/02/26 - 21:28:21 (ET)
Table '20002622 26' Seat #8 is the button
Seat 1: bigegypt (6195 in chips)
Seat 2: Governator (9883 in chips)
Seat 3: aleadz (18776 in chips)
Seat 4: jrNinja2 (15063 in chips)
Seat 5: Maseratti (24425 in chips)
Seat 6: Mad Max 26 (3166 in chips)
Seat 7: jeffbeesdat (13320 in chips)
Seat 8: BodogAri (9295 in chips)
Seat 9: PlayerX (15245 in chips)
bigegypt: posts the ante 25
Governator: posts the ante 25
aleadz: posts the ante 25
jrNinja2: posts the ante 25
Maseratti: posts the ante 25
Mad Max 26: posts the ante 25
jeffbeesdat: posts the ante 25
BodogAri: posts the ante 25
PlayerX: posts the ante 25
PlayerX: posts small blind 200
bigegypt: posts big blind 400
*** HOLE CARDS ***
Dealt to jeffbeesdat [Qs Qh]
Governator: folds
aleadz: folds
jrNinja2: folds
Maseratti: folds
Mad Max 26: folds
jeffbeesdat: raises 800 to 1200
BodogAri: raises 7600 to 8800
PlayerX: folds
bigegypt: folds
jeffbeesdat: raises 4495 to 13295 and is all-in
BodogAri: calls 470 and is all-in
*** FLOP *** [Kh 7h 4c]
*** TURN *** [Kh 7h 4c] [6s]
*** RIVER *** [Kh 7h 4c 6s] [6d]
*** SHOW DOWN ***
jeffbeesdat: shows [Qs Qh] (two pair, Queens and Sixes)
BodogAri: shows [Kd Ts] (two pair, Kings and Sixes)
BodogAri collected 19365 from pot

This "bad beat" left me very low on chips and I busted out shortly thereafter. I have been running into way too many of these recently, but I hope to have a good story for you soon.

I will also write a post soon, depicting my personal weaknesses and how they relate to poker.

-Jeff

Avis = Ruff Ryder's Anthem?

2006-02-25T15:26:00.000-06:00

Has anyone seen the new Avis commercial with DMX's lyrics in the background? I think that its both funny and cool at the same time...

Brings back memories...

-Jeff

Stars Guaranteed 750K... Possible Flaw in the Payout Structure?

2006-02-24T11:06:00.000-06:00

Hey all,

I am sorry that I haven't written in awhile...

On Sunday, I played the Stars guaranteed $750K. There were 5300+ entrants and the prize pool was over $1M. I got off to a relatively great start and rolled into the money with relative ease. As the blinds and antes started to shoot through the roof in normal PokerStars fashion, I started to look for spots where I could make some steals and keep my stack halfway healthy. with about 415 left, the blinds folded around to me on the button where I looked down at A,4 with about 28K in chips. The blinds were now 1K,2K with a sizeable ante. I raised to 6K attempting to take the pot down righ there. The SB folded and the big blind contemplated for some time before just calling my bet. The flop came 7,8,J rainbow. This was obviously not a good flop for me seeing as a) I did not get any piece of the flop and b) the flop was somewhat coordinated. The good news for me was that the I had position on the other player so I could watch him act first. The other player came out with a very small bet of 6K. Why would he bet 6K out of position at a 15K pot? Why did he just call my initial raise instead of reraising? From these clues, I put him on a medium pocket pair, such a 6,6. Thinking that he was weak, I reraised him all in, about 16K more. He had me covered in terms of chip count but only by about 6K. He thought about it quite some time and then hit the time clock to get additional time. His time clock was close to expiration when he finally hit the call button, and turned over A,7, bottom pair! Ouch!!! Good Game me!
I busted out in 411th which paid about $500 and change. If I had just waited about 4 more minutes, I would have made an extra $120, but I wasn't playing for this bump, I was playing to go deep...

Nate and Mike sweated me during this tourney... After I busted, Mike and I talked for awhile and he brought up some very interesting points regarding the payout structure of the Final Table. His largest issue is the discrepancy in pay between 1st and 9th place...

Check out is his email... Very good analysis!
________________________________________________________________
Concerning the 750k, Pokerstars can maintain that
their payouts are similar to other sites. However,
with this number of entrants, there really isn't
another tournament to compare it to - other than the
WSOP main event. So let's do that.
Stars
1st - 173,990
9th - 11,012
10th - 5,506
WSOP
1st - 7.5MM
9th - 1.0MM
10th - 0.6MM
Now let's show it in %s to really compare....
9th/1st: Stars - 6.3% WSOP - 13.3%
10th/1st: Stars - 3.2% WSOP 8.0%
27th/1st: Stars - 1.4% WSOP 4.1%
So the guy who finished 27th in the WSOP got a larger
share than the guy who finished 10th in the Stars
tourney. Stars really needs to do something to reward
the people who make it deep into the tournament and
not just win. It's unreasonable that someone can weed
through 5500 people and finish 10th and only get $5506
while the guy who makes it another 9 spots gets
$173,990. Sure it looks nice to the guy who won, but
it is an awful payout structure for everyone else.

Team RamRod Falls Short in Mav's Tourney Bid...

2006-02-20T00:51:00.000-06:00

Team RamRod (appropriately named by Wyatt after the hilarious movie, Super Troupers) fell just short in our quest to capture one of the 9 Dallas Mavericks giveaways being offered in the $3 tourney hosted by PokerStars. We started off with a strong team of 8, ambitious with the thought of winning a Mav's skybox suite or an overnight party at the American Airlines Center.
Our first loss of the night occured when we could not find a working, Dallas area, PokerStars account for Joe Isbell to play on... For those who don't know him, Joe is a great poker player, whose play only improves when the game turns short handed.
(Swallowing my pride, I have to say that Joe is the only person who has a winning record in live heads up play against me for those I have played three or more tournaments against.)
Even with the loss of Joe, in my opinion, we had a very strong team going into this tourney, consisting of:

Centre86 (Chip)
x_kage_x (Wyatt)
chuckdawg_00 (Chuck)
gmoneyrunner (Nate)
MonkeyCowboy (Bilbo)
IFloptquads (McAdoo)
krammerdog (Nomad)
jeffbeesdat (your's truly)

Our strong team, coupled with the fact that the field was only 522 deep, left us giddy with high hopes and expectations. The general play in this tourney was some of the worst that I have seen in awhile as there were many first time and low dollar players enrolled. I decided early on that complex plays and bluffs were not going to work against this field and that I was going to have to just play very tight, get my money in with premium hands and hope that I didn't end up on the wrong side of bad beats. Most of our team played the same with the same strategy, unfortunately, we just got off on the wrong foot. Our first casualty of the night was Nomad when he busted out in 474th. Bilbo was quick to follow when his K,K got cracked with a horrendous beat. Nate succumbed to the wrath of the donkeys, as well, when he went out in 421st. The next casualty was Chuck in 372nd and things were not looking good. Half our horses were gone and we were not yet at the halfway mark of the tourney! Things did not get better when McAdoo and Wyatt busted out in 304th and 282nd respectively. We were down to 2 players, Chip and myself, and I was very shortstacked.
This is where we ran into a little bit of luck. Chip informed me that his friend from Kentucky, nofame4me (Nick), was invested in our hedge as well.
Shortly after this uplifting information I was able to double up with A,A, but being so short stacked it only bought me a small amount of time before I got knocked out. I had about 500+ in the chips with the blinds at 100,200 when I pushed allin with a flush draw in a small blind vs. big blind confrontation. The other player called my bet, with high pair on the board. The flush did not hit, and jeffbeesdat was out in 196th.
Chip and Nick now had the full burden of team RamRod on their shoulders. Chip had been playing great the whole tourney and had been able to hold a top 30 ranking throughout. Nick had been living on the shortstack for the majority of the tournament but every time it looked like he was about to be KO'd, he somehow found a way to double up or win a nice size pot.

Nick and Chip played for quite some time until Nick (nofame4me) finally busted out in 51st. This left us with only one bullet in the gun, Mr. Chip Battoe. Unfortunately, as I have stated before, PokerStars is my favorite online site, but the blinds and antes go up way to fast at the end of tourneys forcing people to make uncomfortable plays in awkward spots. Chip had a nice stack the whole tourney but was literally being blinded to death as we neared the end. Being down to 8,000 in chips, and one off the button, Chip pushed all in with A,7 and got called by A,K and 7,7 (DOH!). The flop, turn and river provided no help to Chip and he was out in 24th. He got paid $50 for his efforts, but did not get the prize that he was seeking.
All I have to say is, great job Nick and Chip!!! You played excellent.

Overall, it was a ton of fun playing as a team. I commend Stars for putting on such a good tourney and subsidizing the pool with awesome prizes. Hopefully, Team RamRod can do something like this again in the near future!

-Jeff

Mavericks Tourney!

2006-02-16T01:49:00.000-06:00

Hey all,

Centre86(Chip) and El Burro (McAdoo) sent this same promotion to me in the span of about 15 minutes today... This looks like a great deal...

Its only open to Dallas residents and the entry fee is only $3! Check out the prize pool!!! I definitely think that all of you in the Dallas area should play, and run a hedge to maximize your odds. I was thinking of playing on my "jeffbeesdat" account (because I still have a Dallas address listed) but it would be pretty rough on me logistically. If I was in Dallas I would do it, but it just isn't that feasible. What I am thinking of doing is playing for a friend who doesn't normally play poker. If you are a big Mavs fan, you don't play poker, are open to setting up an account on Stars, and you want me to play for you, let me know... I am in a generous mood tonight and even though I can't guarantee you anything, we might be able to work something out.

-Jeff

Check it out...

Note: Winner must be available to leave from Dallas and travel with the Mavericks from March 24 - April 1, 2006. If you can not travel at that time please do not choose the road trip package and let someone who is available to travel choose it. Any prize you choose is non-transferable and non-refundable. PokerStars is adding Mavericks merchandise and events to the tournament prizes. No matter what prize you win, this tournament could make any Mavs fan's dreams come true.
Mavericks Fan Poker Tournament Details
Date:
Saturday, February 18, 2006
Time:
7:00PM CST
Buy In:
$3
Location:
Click “Tourney” and then “Private” in your PokerStars game software. Scroll until you find the Dallas Mavericks Fan tournament and register using the password aj1b9qf. What you can winYou will be playing for incredible Mavs merchandise. Since we know that certain items may be more valuable to you than others we're doing something different for this tournament and making it a "Pick Your Prize" pay out structure.

Each winner from first to ninth place will take a turn "drafting" their prize from the list below. The first place winner will receive the first pick, second place will choose second and so on. Once we get to ninth the cash prizes will be awarded based on the overall entries in the tournament.
-->Take a look at all the incredible Mavs merchandise you'll be playing for:
Four game East Coast road trip for two
Travel with the team, stay in the team hotel and watch your Dallas Mavericks take on the Atlanta Hawks, Detroit Pistons, Cleveland Cavaliers and Orlando Magic from great lower level seats. * Winner must be available to leave from Dallas and travel for the entire road trip from March 24 through April 1. Click here for complete road trip details.
Catered suite game and golf package
Winning this prize will put you and 17 of your closest friends at a Dallas Mavericks home game in a fully catered suite. What's more, you'll get a Dallas Mavericks golf outing attended by star forward Dirk Nowitzki and a team autographed ball.
Catered Suite Party
Attend a Mavericks home game in style. Bring 17 of your friends and watch the game from a fully catered suite.
Meet the man and be the man
Winning this prize will put you side-by-side with Dallas Mavericks owner Mark Cuban. This prize night includes ten lower section seats, dinner with Mark Cuban, and a Mavericks goodie bag for you and your friends. You'll also get to see what it's like to be the man when you are brought courtside as a celebrity judge for a Mavericks dance audition.
Mavericks Sleep Over
The Mavericks will open their doors and let you and nine friends in to have full run of the Arena for an entire night. You will enjoy access to the Mavs practice court, big screen TV, locker room, food, beverages, and more. You'll also receive Mavs merchandise and goodie bag for your whole gang.
Hit the Links with Dirk Nowitzki
The winner of this prize will head out for a golf outing entry with along with Dirk Nowitzki. You'll also get a warm-up outfit signed by Mark Cuban, an autographed Mavs team ball, and PokerStars poker chip set.
Autographed Mavs team ball, signed Dirk Nowitzki jersey, PokerStars VIP chip set
Autographed Mavs team ball and signed Marquis Daniels jersey
Official NBA basketball and Mavericks warm up outfit
Additional prizes
Starting with the 10th place finisher, we will award a $50 cash prize for every 17 entries. In addition to the $50 cash award, each player will receive an entry into a drawing for 2 tickets to a Mavericks home game. Remember, the above prizes are winners' choice, so the higher you finish the better chance you'll have at scoring the prize at the top of your list. Download our free poker software and register now In order to play in the Mavericks fan tournament you must register with PokerStars. If you have any questions on how to register or fund your PokerStars account please email us at support@pokerstars.com. NBA and NBA member team trademarks, logos, identifications, statistics and game-action photographs, video and audio are the exclusive property of NBA Properties, Inc. and may not be used without the prior written consent of NBA Properties, Inc. C [2006] NBA Properties, Inc. All rights reserved. Dallas Mavericks Fan tournament prizes have no redeemable cash value. All prizes must be used by the winner. Prizes are non-transferable and may not be exchanged.
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A Little Bit of Vegas Humor...

2006-02-15T12:51:00.000-06:00

Whenever a trip to Vegas is on the Horizon, my good friends McAdoo, Damle, and myself try to put together a list of "tasks" to accomplish on the forthcoming adventure...

I will post a few... I hope that you enjoy.

- Swim across the Bellagio Channel.
- Walk into Slots of Fun and ask for directions to the High Rollers Area.
- Go to NY NY and ask to speak to the Mayor to inform them that the city is going to crap
- Go to The Mirage dressed as a pirate with an eyepatch and get loaded and then ask directions back to your ship
- Go to the imperial palace dressed as a samurai and just stand in a corner flipping a coin
- Challenge one of the Roman guards at Caesar's Palace to a chariot race.
- Go to Paris and slap every dealer in the face because you think they are French
- Visit the El Cortez wearing a sombrero, a colorful pancho, and bullets over your shoulders. Ask patrons how they are enjoying their stay.
- Ride an elephant into Caesar’s, claim that you are a direct descendant of Hannibal, and proclaim that you are here to redeem the pride of Carthage.
- Stand beside the gondola line at the Venetian handing out life jackets.
- Wear some ripped up shorts, a 1982 Daytona Spring Break shirt, a gas mask, and some flippers and walk into the Monte Carlo and ask them where your people are
- Walk into one of the luxury shops in Caesars and hand over a credit card that is cut in half and scotch taped together and ask if plastic is ok.
- Wear a "Dudes Gone Wild" shirt and carry a video camera and wait outside the "Thunder from down under" show.
- Wear a jousting uniform and ask the Valet at the Bellagio what the hell he did with your horse

Brought to you by "The Tainted Wager Clan"

Unfortunately, I was not able to accomplish any of these tasks being in Vegas on company business, but I hope that you enjoyed.

Not 1st but I Will Take it...

2006-02-14T00:13:00.000-06:00

I had a very rough weekend playing poker. I was on the bubble for a few large tourneys but I just couldn't break through...
But I was able to make a nice Final Table tonight! Here are my results from the UB guaranteed $10K. I wanted a first in this tourney tonight but I guess that I will have to settle for a third place. I was last in chips when I got knocked out on the final hand. Basically, I got all my chips in where I had a slight edge but the cards did not cooperate. Oh well... Next time I hope to give you a better story. If you can't read the screen shot, it looks like this:
First:
$4023
2nd:
$2384
3rd:
$1713.50 (Me)

I am to tired to give you details right now but I might write a bit more later.

-Jeff

My analysis of a hand played by Mike...

2006-02-11T15:28:00.000-06:00

Flapgreen (Mike) is a buddy of mine who I met playing on Poker Stars. He has only been playing for less than a year, but for an individual who has been playing for such a short period of time, I think that he has a very solid game, and is grasping many of the advanced principles that many never learn.
Mike sent me the hand below and asked for my opinion on his play...

I would also like to ask your advice about a hand I
> played in the 15+1 10k on Pacific. 21 people left
> and
> i'm in about 17th. I have 13k and the blinds are
> 1500/3000. I get dealt k9s on the button and it is
> folded around to me. The chip leader is in the
> small
> blind with 120k. I felt like this was a pretty good
> spot to push so I do. The cl calls and turns over
> jj.
> I hit my king on the flop but he hits runner runner
> straight and i'm out in 21st for a whopping $70. I
> felt good about how I played but it always hurts
> getting knocked out when you go deep. However, this
> was still another great learning experience as it
> was
> the 2nd deepest I've been in a mtt so far. I didn't
> really get a great run of cards but felt I did the
> best with what i had. I was 74/78 at one point but
> was patient and picked my spots and battled my way
> back. Just wondering if you would've pushed on that
> last hand as i did. Thanks and take care.
>
> Mike

Mike,

First of all, I know that it hurts when you devote so much time, energy, and emotion into a tourney and lose shortly before you reach the Final Table where the "big money" is... But let me say, it's quite an accomplishment to get as far as you did, and if you keep playing well and going deep, you will eventually hit those big pay days. That being said, I have to remind myself over, and over, again of this same principle.
As for your hand...
Here are the two pieces of information that I am not privy to...
a) Where was the next bump in the money?
b) Were there antes at this point in time in the tournament?
If the next bump in the money was relatively close (one or two spots away) and you were playing to make the next bump, then I think that you could have folded your way into the next bump. If you did not care about the next bump but were playing to go very deep in the tournament, then I would have played the hand exactly the way that you did, especially if antes were involved.
First of all, there was a very good chance that your K,9 was the best hand, being that you were on the button and there were only 2 people behind you.
Second, with 13000 in front of you and blinds being 1500/3000, you did have a small bit of fold equity. Meaning, you had enough chips (just barely) to scare the small and big blind off potential calls with marginal hands. Here are what the odds looked like:
Flapgreen raised to 13,000, SB has 1500 invested, and BB has 3,000 invested.
At the time of your raise (assuming no antes) there was 17,500 in the pot. If the SB decided to call your all in of 11,500 more (assuming the BB didn't call as well), he would be getting pot odds of roughly 3 to 2 (11,500 into a 29,000 total pot). Basically, he would need to have a very good hand to make this a + Expected Value play. The odds are only minutely different for the BB's potential call. You were a bit unlucky that you had the chipleader playing behind you and he "woke up" with a real hand, but I truly believe that you made the right play.
If you had a waited around for a monster hand, you would have, most likely, lost much of your fold equity, and the size of your potential double up would have been less and less as your stack became depleted.

This is just my humble opinion. I would like to hear some other opinions... Same or different...

-Jeff

I'm back...

2006-02-10T14:19:00.000-06:00

Hi all,

I am back from Vegas... Self admittedly, I have been neglecting my writing duties. But you should see quite a few posts in the next couple of days... I bought Flyleaf's new cd today. I had been looking for this CD in stores and have been unable to find it, so I was pretty stoked to find it today. I really like the the song, "I'm so sick...", and I hope that the rest of the cd is just as good.

I look forward to giving you a cd review, Vegas Recap, poker hand review, and more...

So, stay tuned...

-Jeff

Vegas Baby...

2006-02-06T19:52:00.000-06:00

Well,

I haven't had the chance to play a lick of poker since I placed second in the Stars $50+5 Rebuy last Wednesday...
I am in Las Vegas right now for my company's yearly kickoff, and they have put us up at the Venetian. I can't say enough about this hotel/casino. The rooms are, by far, the most beautiful and spacious rooms that I have ever stayed at in this town. I got to Vegas on Saturday Night and a few buddies and I decided to go to club Pure at the Bellagio. When we arrived at 10 pm, we found a line of people rivaling that of a new Star Wars release. $300 bucks and three beautiful girls, got us into the club after a 45 minute wait. The club was a lot of fun, and as we were leaving I recognized a familiar face standing outside the club. It was none other than Daniel Negreanu.
When I first started watching Daniel on tv, I wasn't sure if I liked him very much. He seemed to be one of those players that talked way too much at the poker table, and would, potentially, be very annoying to play with... I also didn't agree with his style of play; it seemed to be far too loose for my liking.
I have to say, my impression of DN has changed quite a bit. I met him about a year ago, and I found his approachability to be very refreshing. At this point in time, I started reading his blog and I was very impressed by his candor and honesty. He gets criticized a great deal for some of his posts, such as the time he went on a high dollar shopping spree, but I truly enjoy the fact that he does not let people influence the content of his writing.
Anyways, I walked up to DN and reintroduced myself. He was as approachable as ever. We talked briefly and I told him how much I enjoyed his blog, and he was very appreciative.
Its kind of funny that I am in Vegas and have not played any poker. Truth be told, I just don't have the time, and one of the key lessons that I have learned is, do not force yourself into a game if you are feeling pressured by the ticking of the clock.
Well, I need to go and get ready to go out. My company has rented out a portion of Club Tao, in the Venetian, and we are getting free entry, drinks, and food. A lot of people ask me why I don't go pro...
Its not easy to go pro when you work for a company like this!

-Jeff

Congrats Donator!

2006-02-04T01:20:00.000-06:00

In late 2004, I qualified for the 2005 World Poker Tour Carribean Adventure on PokerStars. When the event rolled around in early 2005, I was playing excellent poker, and had dreams of grandeur that consisted of going deep in this tourney and making a ton of money. Too make a long story short, I was knocked out on the first day of the tournament when a young World Series of Poker champion made a loose call, drawing to the inside straight, and hitting versus my set of 2's.
This was by far the most painful moment of my poker "life" and it took a bit of time to get over this beat. Gmoneyrunner accompanied me on this trip to the Bahamas, and after hearing my incessant whining over the afore mentioned bad beat, decided that it was best that we head downstairs to play in the $500 side tourney that Stars was throwing. There were quite a few people in this tourney and the top prize was over $20k, so this was not your ordinary "side tourney". Unfortunately, in my state of mind, I had no business playing this tourney after getting knocked out of the feature event earlier in the day.
Gmoneyrunner and I registered at the same time and were thus seated at the same table... Our side of the table looked like this...
Dealer, Seat1... Me, Seat 2... old man river, Seat 3... paraplegic in wheel chair, and seat 4... gmoneyrunner, seat 5... a dude that I went to high school with and hadn't seen since I graduated. When the tourney began, I was off and running. Any time that the table folded to me in late position, I was raising. Raise, raise, raise, raise, raise... Doyle would have been proud. Unfortunately many of my raises were falling on gmoneyrunner's blinds, but he, being the nice guy that he is, only gave me a halfway inquisitive look and did not play back at me. The rest of the table would not play back at me as well, and I was able to gather a pretty significant amount of chips in a short time. While I was hammering down on the table, gmoneyrunner struck up a conversation with the paraplegic in the wheel chair. The paraplegic said that his name was Stu, but most people knew him by his online poker name, "The Donator". Gmoneyrunner and I were fairly knew to the online scene and although I had been doing fairly well in Sit and Go's and Satellites, I had not played many Multi Tables and I had no idea who the big names were. To tell you the truth, gmoneyrunner and I were tired of hearing people introduce themselves by their online names and constantly asking us what our online names were.
This guy was different though. He was a super nice guy in his early twenties, who you could not help, but like. Soon enough, the Donator won a nice size pot and even though he was not a quadriplegic, he did have restricted mobility in his hands, which caused him to have some difficulty dragging the pot.
Gmoneyrunner immediately jumped in, and helped "The Donator" drag the pot, and stack his chips. It was a little bit of an awkward moment, due to the fact that there is an unwritten law in poker that says a person's cards and chips should not be touched at any time... But "The Donator" did not seem to mind and actually seemed very appreciative.
This was one of those cool moments that remind you, why you originally gravitated toward close friendship with a certain person. A lot of friendships are built on common interests, vocations, and goals, but many times the underlying foundation of the friendship is built on goodness of the heart.
To make a long story short, I was playing to go broke and I did, busting out somewhere in the "30 something" range. Gmoneyrunner and The Donator got very close to the money before bubbling out in the 20's.
Soon after I returned to the States, I began hearing many things about the Donator, and what a good player he was...
Well this week, "The Donator" final tabled the World Poker Tour Borgata, and will be on the Travel Channel sometime late this year or early next. I am sure that he is a bit upset finishing 6th when first payed $1M, but he can't be too upset about pocketing $110K.
Stu, if you get a chance to read this, Congratulations! You are a great poker player and a class act...

Here is to The Donator!!!

BTW... My biggest win in the Bahamas and poker, in general, was riding in the same elevator as Shana Hiatt...
: )

I like Courtney Friel but Shana is my girl!

-Jeff

Boom!!!!

2006-02-02T03:13:00.000-06:00

I wanted to give you a better story... Stars 50+5 rebuy... Invested $105

Its 3:15 am and I am too tired to write much... I played the dabest247 for the prize... dabest247 is Davin Anderson (Korean Kamakazi) who got a lot of tv time in the 2005 WSOP main event. He was much better than I thought heads up, but I can't believe that he called my preflop all in of A,J with K,5... I would have had him at about 3 or 4 to 1 in chips (brain is failing), but he sucked out...

New blog title... "Sleep when I die."

Thanks gmoneyrunner for sweating me this late.

I got 2nd.

PokerStars Tournament #18846485, No Limit Hold'emBuy-In: $50.00/$5.00155 playersTotal Prize Pool: $28100.00 Tournament started - 2006/02/01 - 22:45:00 (ET)Tournament finished - 2006/02/02 - 04:06:09 (ET)

1: dabest247 (elk grove), $7727.50 (27.50%)
2: jeffbeesdat (Irving), $4917.50 (17.50%)
3: Branizzle (albuqerque), $3259.60 (11.60%)
4: fit582 (kenner), $2248.00 (8%)
5: BinaryFinary (San Francisco), $1686.00 (6%)
6: lsn999 (egg harbor township), $1264.50 (4.50%)
7: SLY STONE (Folsom), $983.50 (3.50%)
8: bonvivant (Las Vegas), $730.60 (2.60%)
9: fumbo420 (Winnipeg), $477.70 (1.70%)
10: mattster24 (Brownstown), $393.40 (1.40%)
11: Chappel (Denver), $393.40 (1.40%)
12: GusNWoodrow (Orlando), $393.40 (1.40%)
13: #1PEN (Newport Beach), $393.40 (1.40%)
14: skier07 (mission viejo), $292.24 (1.04%)
15: caleb4316 (Beals), $292.24 (1.04%)
16: Arthur Wang (Ventura), $292.24 (1.04%)
17: TheHotTuna (Winnipeg), $292.24 (1.04%)
18: JCR327 (HOWARD BEACH), $292.24 (1.04%)
19: WizTrust (Wernersville), $196.70 (0.70%)
20: Maqaq (Iqaluit), $196.70 (0.70%)
21: ComaU (Stratford), $196.70 (0.70%)
22: callmeirish (wpg), $196.70 (0.70%)
23: floorsander (windsor), $196.70 (0.70%)
24: Marinersheep (Pullman), $196.70 (0.70%)
25: ambi (Sandnes), $196.70 (0.70%)
26: turntablist (north vancouver), $196.70 (0.70%)
27: EggBall (Dulong), $196.70 (0.70%)

Close Calls...

2006-01-31T20:16:00.000-06:00

I am taking a night off from poker, but wanted to write you a post...

Last night was a night of close calls from both your's truly and MonkeyCowboy...

The real loser last night was El Burro, who planned on going to bed early, but got stuck sweating Monkey Cowboy and I and didn't get to bed until after 1.

First of all... Congrats to MonkeyCowboy... He came within inches of winning a trip to play on FSN's Ultimate Bet Poker Challenge. The challenge would have been a single table tournament with a 1 person payout of 10K. The winner would then have the chance to play in a tourney with a prize pool of 200K.

You may ask, "How did he almost win this? Was it a $25, a $50, or a $100 tourney?"... No... He almost won this package on a FreeRoll!!!!! This particular Freeroll consisted of an enormous field of 1250+ players. Out of the 1250+, 3 players went on to play in LA on Saturday.

MonkeyCowboy arrived at the final table 2nd in chips, but unfortunately, ran into a couple of bad breaks... Great effort though, MonkeyCowboy!!! 8th out of 1250+ is not too shabby!!!
You actually saved El Burro and I quite a bit of money. We were ready to book a couple of last minute plane tickets to LA to watch you play.

For those of you who aren't into lengthy poker stories, I will post my results in the Stars $22 rebuy upfront...

PokerStars Tournament #18846307, No Limit Hold'em
Buy-In: $20.00/$2.00
458 players
Total Prize Pool: $37500.00
Tournament started - 2006/01/30 - 20:00:00 (ET)
Tournament finished - 2006/01/31 - 02:22:15 (ET)
1: legggggggggy (FT LAUDERDALE), $9375.00 (25%)
2: volch68 (Elizabethtown), $5775.00 (15.40%)
3: bocaorange ( delray beach), $3937.50 (10.50%)
4: woostma (Chicago), $2625.00 (7%)
5: KillahKev (Toronto), $2062.50 (5.50%)
6: PassDaShugga (Buffalo Grove), $1687.50 (4.50%)
7: willtom (london), $1312.50 (3.50%)
8: bassjada23 (Hope), $975.00 (2.60%)
9: MLCMG (Toronto), $637.50 (1.70%)
10: xiVexus (Firestone), $412.50 (1.10%)
11: JOEYTHEB (EGG HARBOR TWP.), $412.50 (1.10%)
12: jeffbeesdat (Irving), $412.50 (1.10%)
13: butch_dk (slagelse), $412.50 (1.10%)
14: B0NEYARD (Edmonton), $412.50 (1.10%)
15: ICuRaRook (Westland), $412.50 (1.10%)
16: Omoneyman0 (Westminster), $412.50 (1.10%)
17: flytrap (Clinton TWP), $412.50 (1.10%)
18: Lenny11 (Everett), $412.50 (1.10%)

I started last night off by jumping in the UB $100+9 and the Stars $22 Rebuy. There wasn't much to write home about in the UB $100+9 as I lost a huge pot with pocket K,K to a flopt 2 pair, and then proceeded to get knocked out when my A,Q couldn't hold against A,7.

The Stars $20+2 Rebuy was a little more interesting story. I decided to play a bit looser than normal in an effort to accumulate a large amount of chips during the rebuy period. Well, I was executing well on the "looser than normal" play, but the cards just weren't cooperating. I remember being about 5 Rebuys deep and thinking to myself, "This is just stupid", but in poker you have to brush aside those thoughts and move forward. The $122 already invested, can represent many things: a very nice dinner, some slick shoes, great tickets to a concert, or for someone like El Burro, a full service spa treatment, but to me, I had to think of it as only a sunk cost and put it behind me. I ended up $162 in the hole at the end of the rebuy period with only an average chip stack. The good thing was, this tourney now had my complete focus, almost to the point of a personal vendetta.
During the first hour after the rebuy period, I flopped 2 full houses in the span of about 5 minutes (I honestly can't remember the last time that occurred) and was able to bump my stack up to about 15K at the end of the break. I continued to play well at the start of the 3rd hour and ran my stack up to about 26K. Then an interesting event occurred. Stars in all of their brilliance, moved me to a table where I sat just to the left of leggggggy (guessing at the number of g's). Legggggggy is a well known poker player who pocketfives.com currently ranks as a top 10 tournament player. Unfortunately, legggggggy doesn't play much on Stars. He tends to play mostly on Paradise and UB. While I have been playing more and more on UB lately, I have never played on Paradise, and frankly, leggggggy and I may have spent a minute or two on the same table at UB but that is the extent of our shared experience.
Personally, I enjoy playing with very skilled players because I feel like I am in tune with their thought processes, but this situation was a bit different. I had heard alot about legggggggy, but the conflicting stories regarding his style of play stereotyped him anywhere from a tight player to a loose, aggressive player. Not knowing his style of play bothered me a little bit considering our close proximity at the table. Sure enough after a few minutes of play I looked down to see Q,Q in the Small Blind. The table folded around to Legggggggy on the button, who made the standard raise of three times the big blind to 1200. I thought about the bet for a moment and then decided to raise to 3K which would probably price him into the hand but make it a painful call. The big blind folded and the action went back to legggggggy who called my raise. The flop came K,X,X with 2 clubs (just the flop that I didn't want to see). Even though I was out of position (first to act), I decided to make a strong bet of 5,800 in an attempt to take down the pot. Legggggggy thought about the bet for a second and then came back over the top of me, all in. I couldn't call this bet, so I laid the hand down. After a couple of more orbits around the table, I was down to about 16K with a minute left before the break. On the last hand, I caught K,K in early position and raised. The table folded around to the big blind who just called. The flop came 10,5,3. The big blind checked to me; I bet, and he called. Turn came 8. I bet the pot, and he pushed all in, and I called. He turned over Q,10. The river provided no help for the big blind and I was up to 32K after the end of the 3rd hour.
Early in the 4th hour I quickly worked my way up to chipleader at the table with about 40K when I looked down to see 10,10 on the button. Blinds at this point were 1K, 2K and the second largest chipstack at the table, with 30K, raised to 5K in middle position. This individual had been playing very loose and had been quite lucky to accumulate the amount of chips that he had. I briefly contemplated a raise, but instead just decided to call and see the flop. My reasoning was this... If I raised to an amount such as 15K, I was fairly sure that he would either call the bet or just push all in, being that he had not yet found the fold button. If I pushed all in, I would be risking way to many chips for a smallish pot with a vulnerable hand. In my humble opinion, the best play here with a hand like 10,10 is to see a flop and then guage your next move. After I called his bet, the player in the small blind called, and the big blind folded. I was not happy to see the small blind call because I like to play my stronger hands in a heads up scenario, but there wasn't much that I could do about the situation at this point. I was fairly happy to see a 6,4,2 flop with 2 clubs. The small blind checked the flop to the loose player who made a weak bet of 6K at a 18K pot. I honestly thought my hand was best at this point, but I wasn't completely sure... I was much more worried about the small blind's initial check than the loose player's weak bet. Since the small blind only had 20K left and the loose player had about 26K left including his initial postflop bet, a pot size bet of 24K would essentially put both of them all in. At this point, I decided to push my stack in the middle. The small blind deliberated for a bit and proceeded to fold (he told me later that he had 9,9). The loose player took some time to think about the hand and while he was doing this, I pegged him for A,K. Sure enough he eventually called with A,K. Now, in the long run, I want this call... These are the calls that really make you money in poker. At this point in time though, I did not want this call. I had worked too long and hard to be crippled by a foolish call like this. Even though I was well ahead in the hand the loose player had live outs in the form of an A,K, or running 3,5 to beat my my 10,10. The turn came 3 of clubs giving the loose player the chance of catching an A,K, or 5 to beat my hand. The river came a sickening A... I was disgusted............ But wait, the pot was being pushed in my direction... I had been so intent on concentrating on the cards that could beat me, that I did not realize that I had backed right into the flush... This was a huge hand for me, and after this hand I quickly moved up to over 100K in chips with a few small pots and then to over 140K with a large bluff.
At this point, I was sitting in second place with about 50 people left.
At the start of the fifth hour, I caught A,K in late position. The blinds were now 3K, 6K with an ante, and I made my standard raise to 18K. The table folded around to the small blind who pushed all in, for about 70K. This was a tough decision for me... If the small blind had been at 50K or less it would have been an easy call, but at 70K, if I called and lost, I would be giving up a huge portion of my stack.
Unfortunately, Stars raises the blinds and antes at a very accelerated rate deep in tournaments, which almost forces you to take some chances in uncomfortable positions. Long story short, I called. The small blind turned over Q,Q and we had a coin flip situation. The flop, turn, and river provided me with no help, and I no longer had my comfortable chipstack.
Soon after, I made one of my best plays of the tournament. The player to my right, lost a huge race leaving him with only about 20K in chips. I could tell that he wanted to get his chips in the middle as soon as possible so that he would not risk being blinded to death.
I looked down to see A,6 on the button. The table folded around to this individual who pushed all in for his 20K. Knowing that this individual would probably push with anything halfway marginal, I pushed all in from the button with this less than stellar hand and the small and big blinds folded. This individual to my right turned over A,3. I caught a 6 and collected a decent pot putting me back over 100K. Shortly thereafter, I won a coinflip and jumped to over 200K in chips, putting me back in 2nd place.
Unfortunately, I did not win any big pots from there on out. I caught Q,Q and 10,10 but could not get action on either hand. Normally, I would try to steal a few pots in late position, but people were beating me to the punch with all in raises in earlier positions.
This is where I have a bit of a beef with Stars. Even though, I think that Stars is the best online poker site, I do believe that their blinds and antes go up too fast in their tourneys, taking much of the skill out of the game and creating an "all in fest". Too make a long story short (or medium), we got down to 2 tables where the blinds were 10K, 20K with a 1K ante. I had 64K in front of me and ventured into the big blind for 20K. I looked down to see a very mediocre J,6 offsuit. The table folded around to the button who raised to 60K. Knowing that he could be potentially be raising with any 2 cards in an attempt to steal the blinds, I had a tough decision to make. I did not put him on a high pocket pair and if he had something like A,K and my J and 6 were both live, he would be a subsequent 2 to 1 favorite. Seeing as I already had a 1/3 of my chips in the pot and I was getting a little bit better than 2 to 1 odds on the call, I went ahead and went all in for 6K more. The button, of course, called turning over A,J... Now this is just the type of hand that I DID NOT want to see. I now only had one live card and was basically drawing to the 3 sixes left in the deck. I did not get any help on the flop, turn or river and finished the tourney in 12th. Most people would say, "Great Tourney!", but I was awfully disappointed considering that the "real money" was at the final table...

I hope to have a better story next time.

-Jeff

Can't Complain...

2006-01-29T22:03:00.000-06:00

Good News!!!

The blog is up and running. I still have many changes to make, but I am happy with the start...

When I wrote my last email update, I had just finished final tabling the Stars $11 rebuy (guaranteed $45K) at 3:30 in the morning. This event was bittersweet for me. I have final tabled the $11 rebuy before, but not when it was a $45K guaranteed event. I was very happy with the way that I played, but 8th place was difficult to swallow when first place paid $16K. Unfortunately, my pocket Q,Q in the small blind ran into the pocket A,A of the second largest chip stack who was raising from late position. If you didn't get a chance to catch it, here were the final table payouts.

PokerStars Tournament #18044049, No Limit Hold'em
Buy-In: $10.00/$1.00
1574 players
Total Prize Pool: $72570.00
Tournament started - 2006/01/22 - 22:15:00 (ET)
Tournament finished - 2006/01/23 - 05:35:44 (ET)
1: Mariachi (Svelgen), $15965.41 (22%)
2: sachdaddy (Austin), $9434.11 (13%)
3: hickbone (Bel Air), $6168.46 (8.50%)
4: SoftwareTest (Covina), $4571.92 (6.30%)
5: Vingthor (Omaha), $3701.08 (5.10%)
6: WB123456789 (Skokie), $2902.81 (4%)
7: UnBr3aKabLe (Los Angeles), $2177.11 (3%)
8: jeffbeesdat (Irving), $1509.46 (2.08%)
9: equityhound (theodore), $994.21 (1.37%)

Unfortunately, I have been on the road for the last week and a half which hasn't left much time for poker, or sleep, for that matter.
My itinerary consisted of:
Houston last Wednesday, back to San Antonio on Thursday, Port Aransas on Friday, back to San Antonio on Sunday, Austin on Tuesday, then to Dallas, and back to San Antonio on Friday.
I did get to play in 2 tourneys on Wednesday night at gmoneyrunner's house, who, by the way, was a very gracious host. I finished 8th in a 2 table $50+5 S&G when my preflop all in of A,Q couldn't hold against K,Q and 9,10 (river spiked a K). (I obviously didn't money in this tourney as only top 4 paid.) But I was able to make up for this small loss when I won my seat to the $530 (which I cashed out) playing the $58 rebuy.
I got into San Antonio at 3:45 Saturday morning and woke up at about 10am looking for some action. I logged on to Ultimate Bet and registered in a couple of tourneys. The first tourney that I entered was the $40+4 (5K guaranteed). I was shortstacked for most of the tourney, but was able to weasel my way into the last 20. With 2 tables left, I played well enough to make it to the final table. I was at a very low chip count coming into the final table, but I was extremely happy with my play to this point, so I decided that I would not take it personally if I was knocked out early. Fortunately, I was able to double up and then win a few more hands to give myself some chips to play with...

Here is where things got interesting at the Final Table...

----------------------------------------------------------------
Hand #11432336-52 at Sat2pmA-Final (No Limit tournament Hold'em)
Powered by UltimateBet
Started at 28/Jan/06 17:45:14
bbkings is at seat 0 with 22670.
baronvonfro is at seat 1 with 29930.
vecino is at seat 2 with 28340.
The Piper 24 is at seat 3 with 41645.
milehi is at seat 4 with 30280.
matrix_31 is at seat 6 with 46610.
jeffbeesdat is at seat 7 with 43525.
The button is at seat 6.
bbkings posts ante (200).
baronvonfro posts ante (200).
vecino posts ante (200).
The Piper 24 posts ante (200).
milehi posts ante (200).
matrix_31 posts ante (200).
jeffbeesdat posts ante (200).
bbkings posts the small blind of 1200.
baronvonfro posts the big blind of 2400.
bbkings: -- --
baronvonfro: -- --
vecino: -- --
The Piper 24: -- --
milehi: -- --
matrix_31: -- --
jeffbeesdat: Jd Ad
Pre-flop:
vecino folds. The Piper 24 folds. milehi folds.
matrix_31 raises to 10500. jeffbeesdat calls.
bbkings folds. baronvonfro folds.
Flop (board: Qc 7d 8s):
matrix_31 bets 11500. jeffbeesdat goes all-in for
32825. matrix_31 folds. jeffbeesdat is returned
21325 (uncalled).

Hand #11432336-52 Summary:
No rake is taken for this hand.
jeffbeesdat wins 49000.

This is the hand that defined my tournament.
Let me preface my following remarks by saying, in most No Limit tournaments, you do not want to get into a big hand with the chip leader unless you are a short stack and need to double up. One of the reasons that I chose to get into this particular hand was the fact that I had been playing with this individual for quite some time and he had proved to be extremely aggressive. When this individual raised over 4X the big blind from late position, I sensed that he was on a steal, and I most likely had the best starting hand.

Here were my options...

A) Fold... I was second in chips and there was no reason to put myself at risk. This would not have been a bad play.
B) Raise... The pot was very large at this time and if I doubled his bet, raising to 21K, I would price him into the hand, giving him better than 3 to 1 on his money, leaving me at the mercy of the flop. If I raised to 30K, and he reraised over the top of me all in, I would have 3/4 of my chips in the pot. At this point I would be pot committed and priced into the hand, thus forcing me to call his all in with what was a decent but not great hand. I could potentially push all in, but this play would not allow me feel out the strength of his hand until it was too late.
***Note- If I had been shortstacked, I would have pushed all in, in a heartbeat.
C) Call... Normally, calling large bets in No Limit Hold 'Em is Negative Expected Value, but I had two things going for me here. I thought that I had the best hand and I had position on the player, allowing me to watch him act first.

When the flop came out and the matrix_31 bet out less than half the pot, I thought 1 of 2 things.

A) He has a very strong hand.
B) He has a weak hand and is trying to push me off the pot.

Besides his initial raise, there were no real clues leading me to believe that he had a strong hand at this point. There WERE many clues leading me to believe that he had a weak hand at this point.

A) He was an aggressive player.
B) Preflop, he made an abnormally large raise, leading me to believe that he did not want a caller.
C) Postflop, he made a weak bet at a very large pot with a non threatening board. Most players who flop a monster hand, heads up, will check the hand rather than betting small, unless there is a dangerous draw on the board.

Note***
Unless he was holding a pair in his hand, his odds of making a pair on the flop were only about 32%.

Even if he flopped mid or bottom pair, I smelled weaknesses and decided that it was time to represent strength, even with my meek A hi.

After I won this pot, I was rolling, and I cruised in to heads up with a little more than 3 to 1 chip advantage. I was whittling down by opponent with position raises in our heads match when I caught A,J once more ( a powerful hand in heads up). My opponent reraised me all in with 8,8 and I called giving us a coin flip situation. The flop, turn, and river provided no help to me and my opponent doubled up, making the game much closer.
I had some flashbacks of the Stars $109 rebuy, this summer,where I had the chip lead heads up and my opponent, Terpfan, doubled through me with 7,7 versus my A,J. This hand had left me shortstacked and I went on to finish second for $3,860 but left about $1,900 more on the table.
Fortunately, I was able to whittle away at this guy's chip stack until I finished him off when my all in with A,8 held against his Q,J. First paid $1,750!

This was my first win in a multi table tourney on UB!!! Very Happy!!!

The rest of my weekend didn't go as well. I did not money in any other tourneys. I got very close in a couple, but bubbled the Stars $109 rebuy, finishing in 11th when first paid $6K, and bubbled the UB $100+9 where first paid around $2850.

Overall though, it was a profitable and enjoyable weekend.

Hope that you enjoyed.

-Jeff

Don't Try This at Home...

2006-01-29T14:26:00.000-06:00

Here is a little bit of Offroading Craziness from last weekend in Port Aransas, Texas brought to you by myself and chuckdawg_00.

2006-01-29T14:25:00.000-06:00

Offroad

2006-01-29T14:20:00.000-06:00

Offroad

2006-01-29T14:18:00.000-06:00

Offroad