BBT3 - Game #51-53 & WSOP 08

I have not been playing much poker at all since last Friday, as we had family in town, and therefore poker goes low on the priority list. I think I might have squeezed a late night sit-n-go, but other than that, nada or as my dad likes to say, Natinga de Coco!

So needless to say, I am pretty behind on the news, in both bloggerland and in the poker community in general. I did not play obviously in BBT3 Games #51 & 52, nor do I know who won them. I am sure they are happy campers though (unless they are a multiple winner), as the BBT3 is now down to the last 2 games. Riverchasers tonight, and Miami Don's Big Game on Sunday.

I did manage to play in the Mookie last night, however I'll use the term 'play' loosely. It's really amazing how just being off for a few days seem to have me off my game just a little. Ok, maybe alot! I just played plain stupid, and deserved to get summarily dismissed in the manner that I did. Hopefuly, I can get back in my groove, before the TOC, and at least make a good showing.
Mr Tuscaloosa John took it down, not only cementing himself in the #1 position for the overall BBT3 points leadership, but puts him in position to make a run at the May leaderboard as well. So congrats to him, he's a hec of a player to say the least.

Finally, the 2008 World Series of Poker starts tomorrow. I get pumped up every year for the series, as I am sure many other poker aficionados. I have yet to play in any event, and every year I tell myself this will bet the year.

Well, maybe this will be the year! :-)

I know many of our fellow bloggers are planning on going, and playing. I look forward to reading their adventures, and I hope and wish them all collectively the best of luck!

Again, Riverchasers tonight, here are the details:

Tournament: Riverchasers Online Tour
Where/when: Full Tilt, Thursday 21:00ET
Game: Bi-weely rotation of NLHE and non-HE games
Buyin: $10+1
Password: riverchasers
I think I read on Al's blog that the game will be Omaha H/L. Should be a good turnout again, with this being the penultimate BBT3 game.

See you all there!

2BA

BBT3 - Game #50 Riverchasers

Astin the chef won the Riverchasers Thursday evening. I donated to his cause when my AK couldn't catch up to his JJ. The hand went down where he opened for a raise in early position. I was next to act and decided to reraise him on this occasion. I don't know why really, but I'm sure the fact that the night before I had reraised him (being to his left also) about a dozen times (ok maybe like 4 or 5), and he folded each time, might have had something to do with it. Or then again, maybe I'm just a donk, since for that very same reason, I should have known his opening range was tighter, probably more like JJ+. At any rate, well done, and congrats on the TOC seat.

The big FullTilt 25K is HU is on later this afternoon, so if you have a chance to check out, it should be very entertaining. I have some family coming into town, so I don't know how much of it I will be able to see, but it really is a who's who of anybody who is anybody in the poker world. Blogger Rex55 won her way in, so the bloggers do have representation. For those that don't know her, check out her blog, she is an excellent player, with major poker chops!

Finally, I leave you with my bustout hand from last night's Donkament. I only post it, because it is entertaining to watch! (Yeah right! LoL)



Good luck everyone, and have a great 3 day Memorial Day weekend!

2BA

BBT3 - Game #49 Mookie & Dookie win

I think there were under 100 runner's for last nights Mookie IIRC. Unfortunately, I had to finish up some reports for work last night, and was not able to really play at my leisure. In fact, by the time I was down to about 500 chips or so, I realized I had only play 7 hands! and those were probably in the blinds. Congrats to PokerFool on taking it down. In fact, the final table featured a majority of TOC seat holders, so with PokerFool taking it down, we again have an increase in equity for all TOC seat holders.

Also at the final table was Anguila, an excellent poker player hailing from the country where my wife wishes for us to retire, Spain. I believe this was the first time I've seen him in the BBT3, but he is a blogger, and shares many thought provoking hand examples from his live poker tournament playing, of which he has had much success. So if you haven't check it out, be sure to pay him a visit, and wish him luck, as he is about to make the jump to poker pro! Suerte Anguila!

A nice consolation to the evening was my first ever Dookie win!



On my road to this victory, I hit a backdoor Royal:



Tonight is the Riverchasers. Only 6 more BBT3 games to go, and I believe tonight is back to NL holdem. Password is riverchasers, start time is 9EST.

2BA

BBT3 - Game #48 Skillz Omaha 8

I busted in 16th out 82 last night in the skillz Omadraw 8 BBT3 tourney. My bust out hand's action occurred on the flop when my opponent felt his flopped two pair was ahead of my very obvious flopped straight, and called my allin. But who am I to talk? I suck at omadraw, and even more when it's hi/lo...and NL to boot.

I noticed that resident FTOPS winner, and part time BBT3 participant Lilkimmer took it down last night. I believe this was the same game played (minus the NL) when he won his FTOPS. Good thing TOC is Holdem! :-)

One highlight of my donkery last night, was that I was dealt the double hammer! Albeit a traditional trash hand, but hec, it is a blogger tourney at the end of the day, right?



Tonight is Mookie night! See you all there!

2BA

BBT3 - Game #47 MATH

I finished 3rd out of 61 runners in the MATH last night, and picked up some points in the BBT3 standings. The (not sure by who) annointed 'evil wonka' took it down, for his 2nd BBT3 win, once again meaning one less person in the TOC, and an overall bump up in equity for all TOC seat holders.

After I busted, I went to bed about as tired as can be, after a full day of helping my folks move. Actyper had a pretty huge lead 3 handed, and when he busted me with TT vs 22, IIRC he had a pretty big lead on Wonka. So congrats to Wonka, that's always nice when you can come from behind for the victory.

That was pretty much it for poker me last night, so I'll see you all tonight at the Skillz game. I see it's NL Omadraw Hi/Low. I'm sure the Donkery will be alive and well, and I'm sure I'll be contributing.

2BA

Weekend wrapup

Friday night as I already posted, I managed a victory in the Blonkament. I haven't calculated how much the victory actually netted me, since I had a ton of rebuys again, but I'm sure I squeaked out a small profit. BTW - one of the nice things about this tournament, is that after the rebuy hour, most of the players are very deep stacked. So if you want to get some play in deep stack poker play, this is a very good tournament to hone your skills.

Yesterday, my plans to move my folks ran into some hiccups, so that left me open to play in some of the Sunday tournaments. Most notably the FTOPS main event. I played a whole bunch of satty's leading up to the tournament, and was able to grab a seat in one of the $75 multi's, which paid a whole bunch of seats. I also managed to nab a couple of seats in my fav SuperTurbo's, so it was a nice little profit.

That unfortunately was the highlight for me as far as the FTOPS ME is concerned. About 15 min, I got involved in a hand, which I got stacked on. This even though I had repeatedly told myself """DON'T GET STACKED EARLY WITHOUT THE FUCKING NUTS!!!!"

I may have to write that down a million times or so, maybe it will sink in. Here's the hand in all it's glory:



I definitely think I could have played it differently. I could have just called the Turn instead of raising for one, ESPECIALLY since I remember thinking " this guy could have bullets'!!!!!

I tell you, my play in the last 3 FTOPS ME have been horrible. Last FTOPS, I also busted 15 min, after flopping top Boat, only to get rivered by a straight Flush. Of course that was just a bad beat, but nevertheless, I was out early.

I don't remember the dudes name, but there is a pro who seems to always bust out of the WSOP main event in the first hour every year. So he took to reading a book, and not playing any hands for the first hour. Of course he got AA, and played it, and lost! So I feel like the equivalent of that guy when it comes to the FTOPS ME!

Incidentally, a player by the name of HALFREK won the ME. What is truly amazing, is that this guy took down the $1k FTOPS buyin also, so this dude won over $800k in one week. Pretty damn good. As an aside, I've played this guy heads up, and my notes are that he is a moron.....I may have to revisit that! lol

George aka Loretta8's Sunday heads up tournament debut last night. I hope he keeps it going, I really like the HU shootout format. There were 40 runner's, so it led to to some of the bloggers getting a bye in the first round. The downside was that these guys had to start with 1500 chips, to their opponents 3000. I see the reasoning, but I don't think it really makes for a true test of everyone's HU skills. The guys who were short, were obv at a disadvantage. I think the problem was we went over 32, so you have to make sure you get down to a number that will divide all the way down to 2. Not sure how to resolve this, maybe you got to cap it at 32? At any rate, some guy I don't recall seeing won the event, I think his SN was WarriorsXXX, so congrats to him. I managed to make it to the round of 8, and was lucky enough to draw the only other big stack in the host himself. We had a decent a match, until I decided to semi bluff into his nut boat, and that was the end of that.

Finally, this will be the last week of the BBT3. Tonight's game is Mondays at the Hoy. Last chances to win a TOC seat, so everyone come on out!

2BA

FTOPS Final Table recap Video's

Stumbled on to this today.

You can watch a little final table highlights for all the FTOPS final tables, the one in the link, is the one where lilkimmer77, won the Omaha 8 Event #10, with commentary no less from Ali Nejad.



2BA

I won the Donkament!

Good thing too, since I went nuts again with the rebuys! :-0

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BBT3 - Games #45 & 46 Mookie & Riverchasers and more FTOPS

BBT3 is winding down, with only 2 weeks left and 9 more tournaments to get your TOC seat. The latest champ of last nights Riverchasers is Julkeus.

In the Mookie, JD Schellnut took down his 2nd BBT3 tourney, and thus increasing everyone's equity in the TOC. Congrats to both of them on the win.

I played another (actually the last) Super Sat Turbo to the Razz FTOPS last night, and through sheer and masterful donkey-like play, I was able to win it. I did however chicken out, and unregistered, I know my limitations in Razz, and my overall impatience with Limit games. The Super Turbo was awesome though, and if they played the entire FTOPS in a turbo format, then perhaps it would be more interesting to me. Gambler at heart as I've said before. :-)

I also played a regular satellite to the FTOPS #20 6 max tonight, and won my seat. I have unregistered, only because I may have some work related conflict, which may prevent me from playing....else I will be there.

Finally this weekend is the big $2500 2 day FTOPS event which starts tomorrow, and on Sunday the FTOPS main event with a $535 buyin. I saw where Lucky Lucko was thinking about playing in tomorrow's event, and if so, good luck to him, that would be a huge score to take that tourney down. On Sunday, assuming I am done helping my folks move, I plan to play the main event, and I hope to see some of you out there as well. Plenty of satty's running all the time, and as Hoy has mentioned many times, picking the ones where 6+ seats are offered are the better ones to go after. Personally, I've had great success with the $20 rebuys. I usually don't invest more than the initial buyin, 1 rebuy and the addon, and only if I need to. The beauty of these things is that it's a Turbo! if you are observant, you can easily pick up blinds once they start escalating to stay ahead of the crowd. Always know your position, and how many seats are being paid, and don't get involve once you've accumulated enough chips, and can coast to the seat. If they are giving for example 10 seats, and your 2nd in chips, why go up against another top 5 stack which can hurt you, when your on the bubble, or a few seats from the bubble? You have so many short stacks at that point that have to push their crap cards, that there is no reason to take a chance. So give them a shot, sometimes they even run $8 and $10 satty's which are just as good, but may not get as many seats. Usually only 1-3.

Good luck to all this weekend on the virtual felt!

2BA

25K Fulltilt Heads Up Championship

Ok, I want to throw out a wild ass idea..... Is there enough cajones in Bloggerdome, to get one of us donkey's into this tournament???? Say 50 shares @ $500 ea?

Maybe multiple people can get in on one share for those who wish to invest less.

If we can do it, we can then all ""RAIL"" our guy to victory! Think about it!!!! :-))))

Ok, I woke up now. :-(

2BA

BBT3 - Game#44 Skills HOE

Decided to contribute as usual to the BBT3 last night in the Skills game, which was HOE. I erroneously thought it meant Holdem & Omaha 8, but it also included Stud 8. Oh well, didn't matter, I suck and have no patience for limit games, so I never expect much.

However, by being in tune with my inner Donkery, I somehow made the final table. I had just posted yesterday about how it's been a dismal BBT3 post the nice April start, so I suppose maybe I was just due, or something like that.

It was interesting that when we got 4 handed, someone noted we all had TOC seats already. Final four were TJ, RNallin, ChippyMcstacks and yours truly. Congrats to Chippy on the win, and his 2nd TOC victory, and thus reducing the overall TOC field by one less player.

I also played the Turbo FTOPS last night. I was able to muster up a couple of Super Turbo "crack' wins, so I decided to play it, esp since it would end fairly quickly, at least by midnight was my calculation. I lost half my stack within the first 10 min, but was able to double up, and then double up again. I then won a few more pots, and right before the 1st break, I was sitting around 7k in chips. My goal was to take chip us as much as possible, given the fast structure that are turbo's, so I was taking chances with some hands, where I normally wouldn't. So I was dealt AQ sooted on the button, and a guy with about 5k shoved from the CO. I certainly thought I was ahead of his range, and at worst a flip, so I called. He turns over Acey duecey, and of course he hits the runner runner flush, and I'm down to less than 2k. The blinds were so big, I think I pushed the last of it right after the break, and busted.

Mookie tonight, see you all there.

2BA

BBT3 - Game#43 MATH & Must See training vid

I don't know what it is lately, but I can't seem to get anything going in the blogger tournaments. After having a hot April at the start of the BBT3, I've tanked big time. I am running pretty good outside of the blonkaments, but I don't know what the reason is, nor have I put the time into analyzing my play. I guess I best do something about it before the TOC, else I'm going to be the big fish at the big dance.

Last night was no exception, I busted out early, and I must admit on a really bad play. My opponent had been raising by BB, and I finally decided to take a stand with QJ sooted, and of course he had Aces. The funny thing is that I could have gotten away from it, but in a very tilty like manner, I just put it all in, and of course didn't get there.

Tonight is the Skillz series, and I believe it's HOE, alternating Holdem with Omaha 8 or better. I'm on the fence, but I'll probably donate & play. Password is skillz, onFullTilt @ 9:30EST.

I also had another deep run in the nightly 32K. However as is always the case, when the big hand went down, I was on the short end of the stick. The one nice thing was that after I suffered a huge loss about 10 or so from the bubble, which left me crippled, I was able to stay patient, and worked my stack back up. I wound up finishing about 30th, so another nice finish, but of course, 30th out of 1200 is about a C-Note, where finishing 1st is 7k. Here's the hand I was referring to:



Ok, now on to some really funny shit. With all the training site's popping up, there was one bound to rise to the top. Well folks here it is, featuring top intructor Water Boat:



I dare you to try and keep a straight face....I know I couldn't! If you search his name on (gder01) on YouTube, you can get the rest of the collection. :-)

2BA

100th Post & FTOPS

5 month's since I started the blog, and now have reached this small milestone. Let's see how long it takes to get to 200th, as I think I've slowed down some.

I was kinda busy this past weekend, so other than a whole bunch of sng's, I didn't really play any MTT's, with one exception (EDIT: Oh, and I think I played the Donkament too). That would be Friday nights FTOPS #5, which was Stud 8. I got home from work, and of course had to play my fav crack games, the 100 chip super turbo's. Again, going with my lucky streak, it only took one, and I was in. Now every poker sense in my body was saying "UNREGISTER!!!!", since I am absolute dead money in any stud game, let alone FTOPS where presumably your going to have good stud players. Be that as it made, the devil on my other shoulder told me I have nothing to lose, and so I played. And as expected, I don't think I made it past the first hour. I didn't screen shoot it, but I lost the bulk of my chips when I had a made 6 on 6th along with a pair of aces, and my opponent was showing 54kq, and obviously rivered his wheel. I haven't run the math, but since it's limit, and there was alot of money in the pot, I assume drawing for one of his 4 outs on the river (assuming none where dead), is ok.

Yesterday there was limited poker action, as we were taking care of our mom's. :-) So I hope you all had a great mother's day, and that you did something special for them!

Before it dawning on me that it was Mother's day, I had plan to play in the FTOPS heads up event. Way to go Fulltilt to plan that event on Mother's Day! At any rate, I did chime in late last night, to see the results, and happen to catch the start of the final match, where the winner was getting something like 60K. Well it lasted all of 6 hands. The final hand incredibly was this:



As deep as they were, 40BB+, and although the hand was a cooler, I am wondering if KK couldn't have gotten away from the hand??? On the flop, Boondy leads, and then gets basically min raised. I don't know about you guys, and this is obv very big stakes that are being contested, but when someone min raises you heads up, you really need to pause and think about it. Boondy elects to smooth call, but obviously in his mind if that is committing him to the hand, then he probably should have just shoved. I don't know, I'm going to think about this more, it shows how deep stack poker is a whole other beast unto itself. If on the flop Boondy folds to the min raise, he still has 600K plus and plenty of chips to keep the match going.

BBT3 resumes tonight with the MATH, password as always is hammer.



2BA

I can dodge bullets baby!

2BA

BBT3 - Game #42 & FTOPS #3

I busted out of the Riverchasers last night in 11th spot. Congrats to Pokerfool on the win, and of course the coveted TOC seat. I noticed George came in 2nd, he's been pretty hot in the BBT3, and is probably close to the top spot in the overall standings.

By the way, George has setup a headsup tournament on Sunday. Check it out over on his blog.

Speaking of headsup tournaments, FTOPS #8 on Sunday will be a heads up tourny as well. It's $500 clams to buyin, so I plan to hit the satellite's. I hope they run the crack super turbo's, as I seem to be invincible in them. Yesterday, I unfortunately only had time to play 1 to the FTOPS #3. Of course I won it! :-)



So, life is good, and I went about my business I had to get done. Then with about 30 min until the start of the tournament, I notice this:



I had a genuine WTF moment!! A waiting list??? these bozo's had capped the tournament at 759, then oversold seats!!!! Then I noticed it was a shootout.....oh well, I unregistered off the waiting list, and took the T$.

Good luck to everyone this weekend at the tables, and especially to all FTOPS players, maybe one of us bloggers will have a breakthru 6 figure $$$! That would be sweet, eh!

2BA

BBT3 - #41 Mookie & FTOPS #1

So as has been my play in the BBT3 of late, I flamed out early. This time I got bounced when my opponent decided to call my jam, with 88 on a Q high board. I had QJ in the BB, and she rivered an 8, and that was the end of that. I did have 165 chips left, and interesting I outlasted her, as she went out a few hands later.




The FTOPS kicked off last night, and frankly I was not planning on playing. However, don't know if this was because they were short on the guarantee, but they started running those 100 chips Super Turbo Satellites. I don't know about you guys, but those flipping games are like crack to me. I suppose it's the ole gambler in me that gets that have some fun. At any rate, I played a total of 6 of them, and won 4 seats! So needless to say, it was profitable for a change. Unfortunately those rat bastards don't count those towards the satellite challenge, which really sucks, because it is a SATELLITE after all!!!

I almost unregistered, but at the last second I decided to play, figured I was freerolling. It was a bad decision. I already in the back of mind knew I was going to be able to stay up very late. Since it was 6 max, I definitely decided to splash around a bit. It was actually fun while it lasted. I finally pushed QJ in the blinds, on a guy who kept raising me from the button. He called of a large part of his stack with the might A9, and it held.

FTOPS 2 is PLO Hi, starts this afternoon, probably to accommodate the Europeans, and #3 is tonight. It's a $500 NL game, and I'll be looking out for some more of those turbo's.

Tonight the BBT3 game is the Riverchasers.

Riverchasers Online Tour
Full Tilt, Thursday 21:00ET
Buyin - $10+1
Password: riverchasers

See you all there!

2BA

BBT3 - Game #40 Skillz & 25k Final Table

Well, I made my weekly contribution in the Skillz game tonight, which was limit Razz. Needless to say, I sucked, and busted middle of the pack. I did have some distraction, albeit not much, since I suck at Razz anyway, but I did manage to make the final table of the 25K KO.



I ran decently, and picked up 10+ scalps along the way, which is always a nice bonus. Unfortunately for me, and as you can see, the final table was pretty sick. There were 3 pro's, and the absolutely 'hottest' (as in on a major heater kaja) blogger in Lucko at the final table.

The man can do no wrong, and as you can see, took it down for another 6k+ payday. Pretty impressive is all I can say. Live or online, he's got it going, so props to him, and hopefully he can ride it as long as possible.

2BA

BBT3 - Game #39 MATH

I bubbled the points last night, which was disappointing, as I thought I was playing well. My bustout hand occurred when the button open raised, and I pushed my last 4k or so, only to have the BB call all in. Oh well, I had the worst of it with AT, IIRC, Button had Q's and BB had J's...either way, I busted...nice setup #45.

In fact, #45 has been kicking my butt go with these hands. I've posted some brutal ones of late, but this one in the 35K yesterday, almost had me going to Best Buy this morning:



The kicker is that leading up to this hand, I had been dealt 17 small to mid pocket pairs, all without hitting a set. Then finally I hit a set, only to have my opponent hit his 2 outer. Thats poker I suppose.

Tonight's Skillz game is Razz, as the BBT3 continues. You all know my feelings on limit games, but then again, you also know I love the torture. 9:30 Est on Fulltilt as always, password is skillz.

2BA

Sunday 'Brawl' deep run

If you have 5000 FTP points sitting in your account, they will buy you into a 9 man SNG for a seat to the 750K. They run pretty much around the clock, but actually get filled on Sunday. I had notice this before but never attempted it, until yesterday.



I wish I can say that I put the seat to good use, but sadly I never was able to get anything going. However, I had also won a seat into the 'Sunday Brawl', which is a $240 buyin knockout ($40) tournament. It got 1554 runner's, and was the first time I've played it. I've won many seats in the past, but I've usually taken the T$'s. That was actually my intent yesterday, but I got happily sidetracked, and next thing I knew, the tournament had started. So it seems my little girl is already proving to be +EV:



I had been pretty card dead, right up until we were about 20 from the bubble. Then I got Aces twice in one orbit, and was able to get up to about 8k. I could have coasted (folded) into the $$$, however I got dealt KK about 8 places from the money in the BB. What gave me some pause for thought, was the action in front of me. The big stack open from middle for a raise, and the button moved all in. Both had me covered. However, I felt on the money bubble, the big stack's range was very wide, and although I thought briefly that the button could be moving in with aces, I felt it was more likely he was moving in with a good hand, but not aces, given who opened the pot in the situation. Nevertheless I went for it, had to dodge a few outs, and had good results for a change.



So that powered me to a nice deep run, although I felt short when I couldn't get my AQ past Q5 in a blind vs blind hand. A very constant theme late in tournaments seems to prevail. Namely, if you have the big stack, more times than not, you win if your in an allin hand. I have no numbers behind this, other than my experience. In fact, I have been on the recieving end of this effect. The guy who wound up winning yesterday's tournament, had a hand where he was all in with AK, was up against QQ. QQ flops a set, and he rivers a straight. I can't tell you how many times I've seen that! Oh well, maybe it's just me, but maybe I'll start snapping those, and see if it's just my imagination.

Ok, so to wrap things up, from the 'runner runner' file, here's a beauty from a headsup match;



Nice eh? I swear I had my mouth open for minute...aiiijaah!

BBT3 rolls on tonight, with Monday's at the Hoy. I hope our host is feeling better, as he has been under the weather now for the last week.



2BA

Beautiful....fawking beautiful!!!

That is all.

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BBT3 - Game #37 Mookie & WSOP news

The Mookie last night had a nice turn out, 100+ runners, in fact, I saw many new names I have not seen before. Big congrats go to the super hot Lucko, who took down his 3rd BBT3 tournament, amongst many other big tournament wins he's had lately. Heads up was between Columbo and Lucko, so no chop was going to occur last night.

I think enough has been written about the chops already, and clearly I support the group who are against them. I don't chop, regardless of the circumstances, unless I'm given a really sweet deal. For example, I heard (or maybe read) about a case where when they were down to 3, the 2nd and 3rd place guys went up to the chip leader and offered him 1st, while they chop 2nd and 3rd. Ok, I can live with that, but it's gotta be that good is my point.

Having said that, I don't begrudge anyone who has made a deal, more power to them for having pull it off. If you have the jennesequa (sp?) to negotiate a fantastic deal for yourself, then more power to you. I'd only ask that anyone who holds a seat already, think about the true value of the seat, not to mention that one less player, improves everyone's odds in the TOC.

Finally, in case you have missed the big announcement, Harrah's and the WSOP announce today that the main event final table will be played on Nov 9th. That will be 3 months after the final 9 players are decided, on July 16th. On the surface, it seems like a good thing. However, more than likely all it's going to do is open up a whole can of worms.

You can read all the details here.

Tonight the BBT3 game will be the Riverchasers.

Riverchasers Online Tour
Full Tilt, Thursday 21:00ET
Buyin - $10+1
Password: riverchasers

See you all there!

2BA