Happy New Year!

Happy 2008 people!

I'll be back home tomorrow, and will write up an entry of my experience at the beautiful Commerce Casino in L.A.

2BA

Going to LaLa land for the holidays

Mrs 2BA thinks we are going to see the family.....har har har....little does she know, I'm already signed up for tournaments at Commerce! Woo Hoo

I'll attempt a trip report for the Friday noon tournament, and probably will be able to play in some of the 'donkaments'.

Until then, I leave you with this gem of a hand I played while waiting at DFW gate 21:

TOC

Congratulations to Jec for taking down the BBT2 Tournament of Champions, and earning the 1st prize Aussie Millions package!

I think he manifested the #1 quality of winning tournament poker player. Patience.

We were seated at the same table for most of the tournament. He plays a tight game, peppered by very well timed moves. He played the short stack as good as I've ever seen anyone play it. I mean, I didn't track it, but he was the 'on the morphine drip' for 2/3rd's of the tournament, basically just waiting and picking his spots treading water....'just hanging around'. Even when it got 3 handed, he was still the shorty, and was able to prevail. I think without a doubt he was the MVP of this tournament series, and very fitting that he emerged as the champion. So good luck, congrats, and have a great time down under!

As for me, I went out first at the final table. I was the shorty going in, and had to make a move quickly. On my bustout hand, I moved in after Lucko raised, and he called me with K3 vs my AQ. A 3 on the board and that was that.

All in all, I had a great time playing with the poker bloggers, and hope to play many more times with them all in the future.

2BA

Full Tilt's Employee #45

To protect his identity, we'll just refer to him as Mr. "Really Nice Guy'.

Obviously, this was an important hire for FT, since this guy was going to be working 24 x 7, and his job would be to deal cards. Of course, this is a very boring job. So, as a form of entertaining himself, he sets up some really fun hands, for his personal enjoyment. Over and over on Full Tilt, you'll swear you see hands that statistically shouldn't come that often, well, come up quite often. So yeah, it's #45 just having a little fun to break the monotony of his job. Hec, last week in a matter of one day, he found it amusing to deal me quads, get me all excited about it, only to give my opponent his 1 out rivering a straight flush. Then a mere 20 or 30 hands later, deal me quads again, and once again, giving my opponent another 1 outer for higher quads. Very entertaining to all, except probably me. I could just see the little fucker laughing his ass off too.

At any rate, I'm sure everyone has been victimize by #45's cruel sense of humor at some point in time. But just think if you had to deal a few hundred thousand hands a day, you'd have to do something to help you get through the day too!

Oh yeah, I understand he's got a brother who deals at Stars too. The sense of humor definitely runs in the family. Haha!

I leave you with a little sample of #45's humorous dealings, brought to you courtesy of last night Blogger's Mookie event:



2BA

"Getting there"...it's an art

"If your going to make it deep into tournaments, and you must trust me on this, you must learn HOW TO GET THERE!" - Adanthar

This is a skill I have yet learn to master, but one that many of my opponents have perfected.



2BA

Monday's at The Hoy Blogger tourney

The BBT2 is over, and the TOC will be on Thursday. I was lucky to earn a seat in the last MATH last week. I'm looking forward to playing with the poker bloggers, I think the field is a strong one, and I'm sure I'm a heavy underdog against these guys. Nevertheless, I'll give it my best shot, it should be a lot of fun.

In Monday's Math (I took 3rd of 27), a 6 handed NL format, I had the honor of sitting and playing with the great Dr Pauly. It was his blog that let me to this crew of bloggers, and I even got a little chat with him, mentioning my old stomping grounds in L.A...aka The Commerce Casino. Here's a shot of the Doc taking me to school:



I remember being at work and searching around for somewhere on the net which was giving updates on the WSOP, and I came upon the Tao of poker. What a great job he did reporting, and I absolutely think he's an awesome writer. If you ever stumble on to this little blog Doc, let me say thank you for all the years of great writing!

2BA

SNG comeback

I played a $55 sng and had the following hand take me down to about 200 chips:


I made a nice little comeback and wound up winning the darn thing 'in style':



I wish I would have saved the chat, because the first guy who sucked out on me was just going on and on about what a great hand he played. The action went like this:
Preflop - He limped,I raised, he reraised I called.
Flop - I checked, he potted and I shoved he call.

Well played buddy....always nice to comeback and win after being down like this.

2BA

Sunday Results

I cashed in the Sunday Million Guaranteed on FT last night. I finished somewhere around 290ish or so. I was pretty card dead, so I treaded water by making some calculated steals, and a few re-steals. When the blinds get high, that really makes a difference. Of course, I also caught quads, which is always nice.




I also played in the Blogger Big Game, and the new Blogger Skill game. The latter being a $30 Horse event, which of course I am complete dead money in, but nevertheless played. It started while both the Million and Big game was going, so I wasn't paying much attention to it as I should have. Hopefully I'll get better at the other non holdem games with time.

In the Blogger Big game, I fizzled out in 28th spot. Again, no cards to speak of, and the few times I raised, I was repopped by someone in late and was forced to fold. At my opening table, Kaja put a big red X on my back, by offering a $20 bounty for knocking me out. I guess he considered me a bigger threat than jeciimd, who actually made the final table. At any rate, it's all cool, and we'll see how the TOC goes.

2BA

First Post

Let's see if perhaps writing about my poker playing, will in some manner help me improve. I've read many other poker blogs over the years, starting with Guinness & Poker and Tao of Poker.

I play largely for the fun of it, although I secretly wish to win a big tournament some day. I started playing about 3 years ago on Party Poker. I loved it from the start. I'm sure I help contribute to many bankrolls back in the day, as I had totally no clue about how to play. Some may argue I still have no clue, but thats ok, I really enjoy playing the game. So much so, that in the beginning, I basically played any two cards! Especially if they were suited! those were my favorites. And when I was in a 3 bet pot with 34 suited, and felted the guys with their big pocket pairs, well....let's just say I took major abuse in the chat boxes. In fact, I kept hearing over and over...'Twoblackaces, what the fuck are you doing in a raise pot???'. LoL

At any rate, I think I'm a little more selective now, and still have a ton's more to learn. I've recently started playing other poker games as well, and will track progress in those as well.

Today I'm playing in the Full Tilt Million, which I satellited in to earlier today. I also will be playing in the blogger big game, and the skill game I saw posted on one of the other poker blogs.

I have some comments to make on the bloggers in future posts, but suffice it to say that I really enjoy playing with those folks. Most of them are excellent players, and very good poker teachers.

2BA