Poker Strategy

Anna Nicole Smith posed naked for Golden Palace Casino

2011-12-09T12:58:00.001-08:00

Golden Palace online casino has always been known for outrageous marketing techniques and publicity stunts. Their latest is drawing mixed opinions from every corner of the globe. A nude, gold-painted Anna Nicole Smith.

Anna Nicole Smith was a spokesperson for Golden Palace prior to her untimely death in 2007. She had done a photo shoot with Golden Palace that featured her completely naked with GoldenPalace.com stenciled on her pregnant belly. She was pregnant with her, now, 5 year old daughter (Dannielynn). Right after the photo shoot, Anna Nicole's son died, and the planned release of the photos and a new online Anna Nicole Slot game was shelved.

While the release of the photos has brought as much negative opinion as it has positive, it is definitely bringing about what Golden Palace wanted. Lots of attention and traffic to their brand.

The nude photos are displayed at the Golden Palace Website

Related: Golden Palace Bonus

The New Poker Landscape - 2011 Comes to an End

2011-12-09T12:26:00.001-08:00

For USA poker players, 2011 is by far, the worst year ever. Many of us have money still owed to us by Full Tilt Poker, Absolute Poker and UB.com. Even worse, the events of April 15, 2011 and the months following cost many full time poker grinders their livelihood. Some estimate that as a result of the US Dept. of Justice moving against online poker, that over 50,000 professional online poker players were left without a job.

So where is the silver lining? For USA poker players, Bodog has been one of the most popular. They still accept USA players, though they plan to split the USA player base off of their main site at the beginning of 2012. That will likely result in a new USA poker brand. For now, USA players can still take advantage of a free Bodog Poker bankroll. $25 account, no deposit required.

AmericasCardroom (formerly Doyles Room) is another USA friendly site that is growing quickly. They are one of the best when it comes to speedy deposits and cashouts. They have launched some popular promotions to coincide with the time of year. Right now, players can participate in freerolls that award seats into huge guaranteed tourneys. The value of the freerolls come to a total of $45,000. Source: AmericasCardroom Holiday Freerolls

For poker players in other countries that do not have nanny-state governments, there are a host of options. Online poker continues as normal.

As 2011 comes to a close, USA poker players continue to hope for legal and regulated online poker. There is a great chance that 2012 might be the year. Many of the big name brick and mortar casinos are ready and waiting to enter the online poker industry.

So this blogger is crossing his fingers for a better 2012. May we all get our money back from Full Tilt, etc., and all have a nice, safe and regulated place to play cards soon!

USA online poker thoughts for 2011

2011-05-26T14:57:00.000-07:00

For anyone remotely involved in online poker, whether playing or affiliating, this has been a horrible year. Poker Stars, Full Tilt, Absolute Poker / UB.com all leaving the USA online poker market was a kick in the nuts. Doyles Room and TruePoker following on their heels, as well as the closure of Quicktender (the last 'good' deposit/withdrawal option for USA players), was equivalent to spitting on us while we were on the ground gasping from the aforementioned ball busting. A few quick thoughts in light of all this, come to mind.

What is our current situation? Not horrible if you are a recreational player. Carbon Poker, Bodog and Cake Poker all still accept USA players. Cake and Carbon (Merge network), all have a ton of skins with competing VIP deals, bonuses and rakeback to choose from.

For those of us with money on Absolute/UB or Full Tilt, we are still waiting and hoping to get our money from the sites. Absolute and UB.com look pretty bleak. They are doing their best to stay afloat, it appears, and can't afford to pay USA balances with what little bit of liquidity they have. Full Tilt is in much better shape, and if one believes "TonyG" (owner of PokerNews.com and one of Full Tilt's biggest affiliates), then we could all be seeing payments arranged within a week or two.

For affiliates, it all depends on how much exposure you had to the 'big three'. In our case, it was a LOT. I'm still working though, and the bills are getting paid, so I should count my blessings.

Where are we going from here? I had a conversation with an affiliate manager within just a day or two after 'black friday' and he said that according to his 'in the know' sources, strings are being pulled behind the scenes that will result in legal regulated online poker very soon. "Months", not "Years". Sure enough, Nevada has passed an online gaming bill that will allow them to be regulators if gambling is legalized on a federal level. A new pro-online gambling bill was introduced on the GOP side of the aisle this month. The brick and mortar casinos have all magically changed their opinions on online gaming to "yes, we think it would be good for our land based businesses". Finally, Jon Kyle himself, the biggest stick in the mud when it comes to online poker, seems to have softened his stance against online poker.

Final thought? Though the words "legal online poker in the USA" gives me an instant surge of excitement, it is immediately followed by a surge of throw up in my mouth at how this country is ran. I'm not usually the paranoid type, but it sure does look like there are a few power brokers in the country who pretty well pull the strings.

There is a thread on twoplustwo forums that prior to April 15th, I wouldn't have given the time of day. Neither would most of the people who have replied in the 18 pages of posts. It's basically investigating who is behind the April 15th shut down of the big three, and why. I've been eating it up of late. It's long and you won't be able to browse naked websites at the same time, but if you have time, it's worth reading and considering: Ceasers and Wynn ties to organized crime.

So bottom line, whoever is running the show (and it dang sure ain't Obama), should have some dirty poker games for us to play very soon. Yay.

Sports Betting - I got smoked

2010-12-03T12:27:00.000-08:00

So I was the first to lose my $100. Danno still has ~$50, and same for Bryan. I obviously did not follow my own bankroll management tips. After you get down to say, $50, then playing 5% per game is a whopping $2.50. Blah. I basically did a double or nothing strategy with my last $30 or so and lost.

That being said, I did learn a lot about odds, lines, and the sports betting industry in general. Fun stuff. I ended up loading some more cash on another sports site. (Carib Sports). The reason I didn't reload at Bodog is because they don't post their lines until Tuesday or later, and even then, they don't post lines for many games, no moneylines, etc. - It really bites to see a line that you feel you have a good edge, but you can't bet it because it's not listed. By the time Bodog lists it, the line has moved so that it's no longer a good bet.

The thinking is pretty simple. The sports book's goal is to have equal betting on both teams in the contest. So the opening line is set to do just that... induce betting on both sides. So if the game is a big mismatch in team talent or a very popular team vs an unknown, the line will usually be a bit inflated on the side of giving points to the underdog/unknown. If you can catch that line as soon as it comes out, you can usually take the underdog with points, and have a good shot at a winning bet.

Though sometimes the line can move favorably, in most cases this season, I would find myself annoyed at Bodog because by the time they had posted the game, the line had moved unfavorably, relative to the bet I wanted to make.

Anyway. Sports betting rocks. Maybe I'll get back to poker in 2011.

Sports Betting Race

2010-08-27T14:16:00.000-07:00

Bryan (bmetz), myself and Danno (atlantisdan) are going to do a sports betting competition for NFL / College. We will each deposit $100 to say, Bodog, and then bet as many college or NFL games as we want. Whoever has the biggest Sports bankroll at the end of the NFL/College season, wins. The two losers pay the winner $25 each, so another $50 for winning.

So what strategy to use? Obviously, there are the usual sports betting money management systems out there. The only problem is, small bets probably won't keep pace if one of the other two hit some lucky streaks with larger bets. The last thing I want is to be faced with dropping huge bets on any one game to catch up.

This almost reminds me of a blackjack tournament, where your bet size and position are the two main ingredients to success. Position won't matter here, because none of us will really know the games that the others are betting. We'll have to do a weekly bankroll report or something, so we know who is in the lead.

Should be fun. Betting horses, sports or playing craps is so much less stressful than poker. Casino games especially, you know you are behind on every bet and an underdog. You're just hoping to get lucky a few times. Compare that to say, consistently getting money in with a 60%/40% lead and getting sucked out on incessantly. Since you know you are supposed to win the majority of those, it's incredibly frustrating when you hit the run where every flip goes against you.

Moral? Play craps or blackjack at a 1% or less house advantage. You'll lose a buck for every $100 wagered, on average and if you win in a session, it feels great. If you lose, well, you expected to, so no harm done.

I'll get back to poker in the short term. I got top level Iron Man at Full Tilt in August (200+ points per day for the first 25 days), so I'm a bit poker burnt out.

Dinner with the Legend, Doyle Brunson!

2010-07-19T14:19:00.000-07:00

No, I didn't get to have dinner with Doyle, but I did think the promotion up, so I get creativity points right? Evidently it made an impression on the OFC guys. I'll make a special place for those creativity points, right beside my sklansky dollars. I've got quite a collection of both!

In all seriousness, I just wanted to give a thumbs up and welcome home to Mike (MJCACE), who took down our Dinner with Doyle promotion and won a weekend in Vegas and dinner with the legend himself. Besides Doyle, there were other pros there, including Todd Brunson, Pam Brunson, and some Brunson 10 legends. Mike even came back with more money than he took. Who leaves Vegas "up"? Impressive!

You can read all about it on MJCACE's Blog. The Vegas Trip report is just south of the Summer Trip Report. Ahh, the life of a guy who earns his bill money fishing at Full Tilt, Cake and Absolute Poker!

Congrats again Mike and hope to see you in our next poker promo!

Paradise Poker - Bonus Bump

2010-03-25T12:54:00.000-07:00

It's interesting to think back to 2002 when I first checked out online poker and Paradise Poker was the king. They and Pacific Poker were the sites I first downloaded and played the 'play money' tables. Over the years, Paradise really eroded as they didn't bother updating their software to include things like tournaments. Can you imagine a poker room not offering tournaments now?? That feet dragging plus events like the UIGEA really hurt their player base.

At any rate, Paradise is doing their best to reclaim market share. They joined the International Poker Network (IPN)a couple of years ago. This network is also referred to as the BOSS network by old timers. It's not open to USA players, but for non-USA players it's a good player population with loose games.

Their affiliate backend is undergoing some changes, and that is resulting in positive changes for the players. Paradise now offers our members and visitors a 200% up to €1000 plus 30% rakeback. That's a hard deal to beat on a network with such loose games.

If you haven't checked out IPN/Boss network rooms in awhile, they are growing. Start with the best bonus code: Paradise Poker Bonus Code

Bad Bankroll Management

2010-03-18T13:17:00.000-07:00

Oops. So I took my meager $700 roll to the $5/$10 7 card stud hi and hi/lo games at Full Tilt, simply because they were too good to pass up. Not to mention, bonus clears really well at that level, and I had $400 courtesy of a Full Tilt promotion.

Eh, well, donked through all $700 before the weekend was over and am playing on 'company money' right now. (We tend to always have a nice balance in our poker accounts to do rakeback prepayments and such). So bad bankroll management cost me.

I think Poker Stars $5/$10 game would better suit me because of the ante structure rewarding tight play. I'm a nit. The $5/$10 game at FTP has a $1 ante and $1.50 bringin. As you can imagine, if you can limp in and nobody completes, you can literally limp with just about any hand. This kills me in hi/lo because I'm still weak in that game, so limping with marginal hands end up costing me more money.

Good news is, I've got less than $100 left of bonus to clear and 2 weeks to clear it. Here's hoping I don't drop another $700 clearing that $100 bonus. :)

I've gotta say, it's interesting to play at the same tables as Keith Sexton, Cindy Violette, etc. - It also tells me that they obviously find something profitable in those tables. Maybe it's my bankroll? Hmm... I wonder if Keith and Cindy have FTP execs call them anytime I sit down at $5/$10. After last weekend, I could hardly blame them. Dinner was on me, for a LOT of players!

New "exclusive" bonuses at Poker-Strategy.org

2010-02-08T22:44:00.000-08:00

We picked up a couple of new exclusive bonus codes in the past month that I would like to share here. Both are non-USA sites, unfortunately, but these are good options for the rest of the world.

The first one is a PokerTime Promo Code. The bonus code gives you a $10 no deposit bonus. $10 cash, no deposit needed, free cash to check out the tables. Then if you decide to deposit, they will follow that up with a 150% up to $600 matching deposit bonus. That smokes the 100% up to $500 default code advertised on PokerTime.Com

Next up is a new site - Winner.Com. This is a new site that features a full casino as well as poker room, with plans for lots of other gaming action in the future. This is a great domain name to include all kinds of things including sports betting and skill games, bingo etc. Our Winner Poker Coupon Code awards a 100% up to $500 bonus, compared to the default 100% up to $200 that you get by going through their default bonus.

For more details on either, click the links above. These are straightforward bonuses. They're just much better than the default offers by the poker rooms. It's amazing the extra value one can get just by browsing a bit, eh?

The ol' poker bug bites me again!

2010-01-27T08:05:00.000-08:00

The last month I played poker was the last month I updated this blog. Surprise, surprise, surprise as old Gomer Pyle would say. I've been getting that gambling itch though, and have got in a few hands the past 2 nights. A few quick observations...

1. The 7 card stud games have really died at Absolute Poker. When I left, there were always several $1/$2 tables going and $2/$4 and at times $3/$6 during the prime hours. I have had to START full $1/$2 ring games both times I have played. Sheesh. If I had more time, I would contact Absolute about propping.

2. Though I had to start the tables, they did seem to fill fairly quickly. I recognized hardly any of the players. These are both positives. Once the tables filled, the pot averages were always 6 or 7 times the big bet, and 35% to 40% of players seeing 4th street. Ripe statistics!

3. The 7cs hi lo tables were massively profitable! Both the $2/$4 and $1/$2 tables were chock full of fishies. The $2/$4 hi lo table stayed at 40% or better fourth street percentage pretty much all night.

I made about $80 at the heads up table. The vast majority of that on one donkey who came in and pissed away ~70 bucks in under 15 minutes. Most of my other profit came from hi lo. I might start focusing more on hi lo stud. The more I play it, the more I am able to stay away from hands like 257 rainbow and just wait on the premium hands that have potential for the scoop. With almost half the players seeing 4th street each hand, and paying my premium hands off, it makes the tighty tight style even more attractive.

The only thing I was annoyed to see was the fact that Absolute seems to have fixed the stud tables so that we don't get credit for a raked hand unless we see 4th street. Used to the rule was that you just had to contribute to the pot, and since ante games you contribute every hand, we stud players got a nice shake when it came to the VIP program and rakeback earnings. No more gravy on that train though.

Maybe this will drive me to check out Poker Stars new VIP rewards program. That or those rush tables at Full Tilt. :)

oooo - the rake!

2009-08-06T08:29:00.001-07:00

For the few folks who read this now and again, you probably know my best game is heads up 7 card stud heads up. I recently had session that just shows you how the house just kills our bottom line.

I played a gent named "easymoney" with a few numbers at the end of his name. He played very solid hand values and would have been a very profitable full ring player I think. His only real weakness was he played a bit too tightly heads up.

By going with a loose aggro style, not only do I rob him blind, but he also pays off when I do have split aces and he calls down with a lesser pair since I'm an obvious donk bluffer.

The dealer, however, refused to cooperate. Combine that with my own frustrations and tilt and the numbers were not pretty.

He brought $40 to the table. I ended up bringing $150. When the smoke cleared, he was broke, and I had roughly $95.

That means our results were:

EasyMoney = negative $40
Donkey PSORG = negative $55
The house = +95 in rake.

Sick, sick, sick.

This just illustrates how important it is to bust 'em quick in heads up. Otherwise nobody wins but the house in those long drawn out battles where you are just see-sawing back and forth. I had this gent down under $20 about 5 times before he finally dropped the rest of his chips.

I'd play the guy again, because honestly, full ring TAGs are some of the easiest guys to beat heads up if they don't adjust. Hopefully I don't see more hands like AxA vs. his 222... blah.

Obligatory 'Every other month' post...

2009-07-07T09:51:00.000-07:00

So here we are, trying to make sure google doesn't kill my blog's value. I really like the juice we get for phrases like poker strategy, since that site is my full time job. :)

I think I've turned the corner on 7cs hi lo. My post a month and a half ago, my BB/hour rate was negative about 9. It's climbed to negative 2.62 and if I just run the numbers since June 1st, I'm actually a +2.42 BB/hour winner. Woohoo!

Expanding to 7 card stud hi lo is a very good thing, since it seems the stud games at Absolute and Ultimate bet are just getting tighter and tighter.

Heads up is still by far my best $$ maker at 2.78 BB/hour. My only problem playing heads up stud is that once I get locked in on an opponent I have a tough time quitting. It's not a pride thing. It just that as you play him, you are constantly feeling him out, learning his style and tendencies, etc. After investing 30 minutes and getting to a point where I feel I've got a great line on how to clean him out, it's just hard as heck to sit out and go change a diaper or grab a juice for my toddler. 90% of the time when I sit out, the guy is gone, especially if he's down to me. Blah.

Soooo.. google, if you are listening. I love you. I promise more posts. I am your slave.

Alive and well...

2009-05-30T02:51:00.000-07:00

It's been a busy month. It seems like I never play much early in the year. Maybe I'm a "summer time" player. I played less than 40 hours combined between February, March and April. I got a few more hands in this month, but not many.

I have GOT to stay away from 7 card stud hi lo, or do some boning up on my strategy. I'm a solid 1.5 BB per hour winner at hi, and that's been my bread and butter since 2003. Heads up 7 card stud hi, I do quite well. Almost 2 BB per hour.

7 card stud hi lo? -9 BB per hour. That's with only ~2000 hands in, but still, pretty sick. I think I have several obvious leaks:

1. I don't know what the $%^& I am doing in 7 card stud hi lo.
2. I play a hi lo table or two while playing a hi table or two. Multi-tabling stud isn't easy since a lot of your edge comes from reading cards on other players' porches. Trying to keep track of both hi/lo strategy and basic hi strategy makes my brain hurt.
3. The main reason I'm playing the hi/lo tables is to rack up FAME points faster. Meanwhile I'm losing more $$ from sucking than I'll ever make in extra FAME credits and rakeback.

I've gotta find me a good 7cs hi/lo book. Paying 9 big bets per hour for lessons, stinks.

Haha - Obama got your money!

2009-03-17T13:21:00.000-07:00

My wife linked me this and I just had to post it. I can't believe I went all of February with no posts. That does mirror my time at the tables though. I didn't even keep "Gold" status at Absolute Poker last month and that just takes a measley 500 FAME points.

Without further ado:

We got your money! Gonna print some more money! Gonna spend some more of your money!

While this is not a political blog, I think we can all agree that current money printing, spending spree going on in D.C. is getting a bit out of control.

Free Poker Tracking Tool

2009-01-29T14:35:00.000-08:00

Tracking your results is the ONLY way to know if you are a poker winner or loser. I can't tell you how many players I've met who are in denial. Even online players who should be able to do the math to figure out that deposits are greater than withdrawals. They just... don't do the math.

I digress. Here's a free poker tracking tool. I'm not 100% sure which poker sites it works with, and will update as I get more details. For now, you can just click the link below and check it out for yourself. :)

Poker Score

PPA Action Alert

2009-01-27T20:29:00.001-08:00

Stop browsing poker blogs and forums for a whopping 30 seconds and stick in a plug for online poker.

Click This Link to the PPA Action letter

No need to edit or even add to the letter unless you're just feeling wordy. In email campaigns, it's volume that counts more than substance of each individual message.

Fill in your name and address and click submit. It'll automatically ship your email to your legislators. If it takes you more than 30 seconds, it's because you are still a "hunt and peck" typer!

Online Poker has won a number of victories already in 2009. In the case of the Kentucky Governor attempting to steal 140+ online gaming domains, an appeals court has reversed the original hick Judge Windbag's decision, and made it clear that he is to not have more hearings on this matter. *Slap*

Three different court cases in three different states have resulted in positive results for the poker as a game of skill argument.

We are making headway, but that won't continue if we start laying down on the job. If you're reading this, it would have taken less time to send the email than it did to read my chatting about. :)

4 bucks might be dumb, but $2.50 for crappy coffee is dumber-er

2008-12-17T06:12:00.000-08:00

McDonalds had the nads to erect this sign within sight of the Starbucks headquarters. Nice. It makes me chuckle, but let's look at the facts.

I'm not a coffee snob. I drink coffee out of a plain ol' drip coffee maker most mornings with powdered creamer and sugar.

It was early a.m. a day or two back and I needed some coffee to keep me alert while doing the email inbox grind. I wanted something with a bit more flavor, and Starbucks closes at 10 p.m., so I hit McDonalds for some of their gourmet coffee. I ordered caramel flavored cappuccino. Simple right? Expresso, steamed milk, cream on top, and some caramel drizzle in there for flavor, all neatly placed in a coffee cup with a sippy lid.

What did I get? Coffee in a coffee cup, a frappuchino lid (the ones with domed tops and large hole for a straw) with whipped cream piled up to the top of the cone so high it was peeping out the straw hole. Errr - have you ever drank hot coffee through a regular straw? They'll be treating you for 3rd degree burns on your tonsils. We all know the stories of how hot McDonalds coffee is after all.

When she handed me the drink, she kinda shook it and said "hmm...that just don't feel right. Don't feel like theys 'nuff coffee in thar fo' a large"... I should've been tipped off then that she left the steamed milk out.

I got home and dumped it into a large coffee mug, took a sip and about choked on the sickly sweet caramel flavoring. With no milk to mellow it down, it was just a bitter black coffee flavor with caramel drizzle.

I drank it all. I needs mah caffeine.

Moral? If you want gourmet coffee, go to Starbucks. Go to McDonalds if you want a farkin' hamburger.

(Since this is a poker blog, let me toss in a bankroll update. Well over my $2000 goal, and still have a couple of weeks to pad it (or lose it!) before 2008 is finished. I'm happy. Small stakes hobby that entertains and gives me a year end cash balance. Sure beats stamp collecting.)

'Tis the season of giving...

2008-12-11T12:22:00.000-08:00

This wouldn't fit under the tree, but it's my gift!

2008 Honday Pilot SE 4wd

Our Blazer has ~180k miles on it, and it was becoming increasingly unreliable. After spending another $1500 this month to keep it on the road, we figured enough was enough.

FYI - if you're watching the news about steep cuts in car prices, they're not joking. We got between $7000 and $8000 off MSRP. Granted, we told them our next stop was Carmax for a 2006 Pilot if we couldn't get a great deal on a new one.

It was the perfect time to buy a 2008 Pilot for sure. Besides the troubles the car industry is facing, this is the time of year they're trying to clear the 2008 models off the lot to make more room for their 2009's.

I've never bought a new vehicle, since you lose a ton of the value as soon as you drive it off the lot. This deal was just too hard to turn down though, and it was kinda nice seeing "40" on the odometer.

Lest this post seem "selfish" rest assured that I don't normally ask for much or get much on Christmas. I really get a kick out of giving. We're making 3 Angel Tree kids very happy this year, and even bailed my mother in law out a bankruptcy fix. Maybe I'll post about that later...

November has come and gone...

2008-12-11T12:11:00.000-08:00

....without a single blog post. I kept meaning to swing over, but just never did find the time.

CEREUS rocks. CEREUS network was formed at the end of November, joining the player bases of Absolute Poker and Ultimate Bet. They also added heads up 7 card stud tables, which is wonderful.

On the webmaster end of things though, it was a huge headache. For over a week our rakeback stats were not able to be updated, while all the nickname changes, retracking of players, so on and so forth was muddled through.

With rakeback earnings from November, and barring a crappy run in the next few days, I'll have hit my $2000 goal for the year. It ain't much boys, but I don't play much either.

When I first went full time in poker marketing with our poker strategy site, I was able to play hours of poker each day "working from home". That's no longer the case. I barely have time to blog about, much less play poker. This is a good thing though. I'll have plenty of time to play after I retire. :)

I'm a 2 a.m. to 6 a.m. FISH!!

2008-10-29T20:11:00.000-07:00

I was playing around with my poker tracker stud stats, and pulled up my big bet per hour earnings based on days of the week and time of day. Turns out I'm horrible in early morning hours.

Between 2 a.m. and 4 a.m., I'm a 2.7 BB/hour loser.

Between 4 a.m. and 6 a.m., I'm an astounding 13.57 BB/hour loser. EEK!

This tells me two things. First, I suck horribly when I'm tired. Second, if I'm playing in the early a.m. hours, it's probably because I'm down, pissed off and tilting away more money trying to "get back to even".

I'll bet if I dug deeper I'd find that most of the $$ I've lost on downswings have come during those hours. I know for a fact that the only reason I'm up playing poker at those hours is when I've had a bad night and I'm just locked in, staring at the screen incredulously, waiting on another bad beat. Don't snicker... you've all been there.

I wonder if I could self exclude between the hours of 2 a.m. and 6 a.m.? I know some sites like Full Tilt and Stars allow you to self exclude and lock you out of the site for a set time period that you request.... hmm.

This is just another example of how Poker Tracker is worth a lot more than the sticker price. Sadly, I think most players just use it to track their bankroll, or to see which "symbol" they are. (I'm the taz devil, Loose Aggressive/Aggressive btw, mainly due to playing a lot of heads up).

Quicky plug: If you want, I can get you Poker Tracker 3 Free. Click that link and read the blurb, then contact me. At the very least I can pass along my discount and get it for $72 for you instead of the $90 sticker price.

HR 6870-Payments System Protection Act of 2008

2008-09-16T23:02:00.000-07:00

Barney Frank guided HR 6870-Payments System Protection Act of 2008 through its first step on the way to eventually (hopefully) becoming law with a 30-19 victory in the House Financial Services Committee.

Short summary - if this amendment is enacted into law, it will mean that the UIGEA only covers sports betting. Online poker and casino games will NOT be covered unless an Administrative Law Judge rules otherwise.

This is great news for the online poker community. Why? For those of you who don't know anything about the UIGEA, it is the piece of legislation that ran Party Poker, iPoker, Pacific Poker and host of other online poker rooms from the USA market. If this gets through to become law, I could see two very quick benefits:

1. Sites that moved out of the USA market in 2006 can come back. Welcome back Party, Titan, Pacific and a host of other fishy rooms. Welcome back the Party Poker jingle as one of the most popular ads on GSN and WSOP t.v. spots.

2. A poker/casino ewallet would be able to open and run without fear of prosecution. Tired of waiting 3 weeks on your Full Tilt Poker check? Epassporte could come back? Neteller maybe?

If you want to read it, here is a cut/paste of the legal jargon. My analysis is not expert analysis, but gleaned from some very knowledgeable posters on 2 plus 2 forums.

SECTION 1. SHORT TITLE.
This Act may be cited as the ‘‘Payments System Pro-
tection Act of 2008’’.

SEC. 2. PROHIBITION.

The Secretary of the Treasury and the Board of Gov-
ernors of the Federal Reserve System, whether acting
jointly or separately, may not propose, prescribe, or imple-
ment any regulation under subchapter IV of chapter 53
of title 31, United States Code, or otherwise give effect
to such subchapter or any such regulation, including the
proposed regulations published in the Federal Register on
October 4, 2007, except to the extent as any such regula-
tion pertains to wagering of the type that is prohibited
(as of the date of the enactment of this Act) under chapter
178 of title 28, United States Code (relating to profes-
sional and amateur sports protection) or except as pro-
vided in section 3.

SEC. 3. RULEMAKING TO IMPLEMENT SUBCHAPTER ON
PROHIBITION ON FUNDING OF UNLAWFUL
INTERNET GAMBLING AND DEFINE UNLAW-
FUL INTERNET GAMBLING.

(a) INGENERAL.—Notwithstanding section 2, the
Secretary of the Treasury and the Board of Governors of
the Federal Reserve System, in consultation with the At-
torney General, shall jointly develop and implement regu-
lations (which the Secretary and the Board jointly deter-
mine to be appropriate), on the record after opportunity
for agency hearing involving an administrative law judge
or similar official, under subchapter IV of chapter 53 of
title 31, United States Code, that shall include a definition
of the term ‘‘unlawful Internet gambling’’ for purposes of
such subchapter and such regulations, after conducting a
full economic impact study of the proposed regulations
under chapter 6 of title 5, United States Code (commonly
referred to as the ‘‘Regulatory Flexibility Act’’).

(b) COORDINATIONWITHPROHIBITION.—Upon the
effective date of final regulations under subsection (a),
section 2 shall cease to apply.

Politics and Poker

2008-09-10T00:20:00.001-07:00

If you don't want to read my opinions on politics, this video sums my feelings up quite nicely.

It's Time for Campaign'in

Despite the title, this post has very little to do with poker. My livelihood has been under heavy attack by my party of choice since at least 2006 (longer, in truth, since it took years for anti gambling legislation to pass). So as a poker player, I am a bit stuck when it comes to my feelings on the political races in 2008.

My political leanings come across as odd to some. My guess is that I'd be hated by both sides. In a nutshell, I'm a pro-life, pro-gambling, pro-capital punishment, anti-nanny state, fiscal conservative. I'm also a devout Baptist.

I just typed and then deleted about 4 paragraphs explaining why my belief system is not contradictory. Then I realized that I have nothing to defend, so what's the point? Everyone has their right to their own opinions and beliefs. Some people's are just wrong, that's all. :)

I think the candidate who would have most fit my beliefs would have been Ron Paul. I can't bring myself to vote for Obama, but I feel like going out and pushing all the Republican buttons in the poll booth will just be rubber stamping the nanny state decisions and stinking pile of crap that was the Republican controlled congress until 2006.

I think I'll vote for Ron if he's on the ballot. Both the Dems and Reps have got to come to the realization that they are losing the middle as they get more and more extreme. Maybe then we'll see some real change in government.

Voting for someone who has no real shot is not wasting your vote. The reason we have such crappy choices these days is because the sheep keep falling for that 'lesser of two evils' line. If enough votes start being cast for 3rd party candidates, the two main parties will realize they need to field candidates that appeal to these 3rd party voters. Think about it. Elections are decided by tiny percentages. If all of a sudden 5% of votes were being cast for a 3rd party, the two main parties would be falling all over themselves to try to pick up that 5%.

That's my .02 political thoughts.

1-outters don't tilt me!

2008-09-02T21:38:00.000-07:00

Losing back to back with AA dealt vs 2 small pair will tilt me. But losing to a 1 outter? One almost feels privileged to have witnessed the rare event. I received this blessing both on Saturday and Sunday (and yes, I went to church two services that day!)...

Two 1 outters in one weekend. I need to grab some lottery tickets while I'm out tonight.

A one outter is like catching a glimpse of a shooting star. Even in 7cs where you see more cards, it's still going to be something like 2.5% chance to hit. For you geeks out there, it's rolling a 1 on a 40 sided die, cleaving the ogre standing in front of you from head to crotch with a well crafted, but non-magical short sword, killing him instantly.

+150 XP.

Yeah. It's that rare.

Bankroll Update: After blowing $200 at the Fair and a crappy week at everything but NLHE cash games, ~1200. Blah.

Approaching 2k! Time to rob it!

2008-08-20T02:00:00.000-07:00

Bankroll at $1788.83 counting bonus earned. Wilson County Fair is this week though, and sounds like a nice family out'ing. Time to strike a match to a couple hundred.

When my 2 year old is downing cotton candy as fast as he can while we're watching the fireworks, I'll pause for a brief moment to think about those folks who have made this possible... Vladdy, ICOMINATCHA, DKNY333, etc.

Peekaboo!

TY!

Nice PPA YouTube Video

2008-08-19T18:20:00.000-07:00

I got a kick out of this, because I believe it captures perfectly, how absurd it is for the DOJ to be focusing on online poker. Congress: if the DOJ has enough budget to go after all the true issues + online poker, then they are overfunded. Please stop wasting tax payer dollars on goof ball stuff!

In other news, our bottomless bonus deal with Next Poker is getting pretty popular among non-USA players. It equates to 45% rakeback in ring games and 62.5% tourney fee rakeback. If you were ever searching for any of the following:

OnGame Rakeback
PokerRoom.com rakeback
bwin rakeback

Then please look over our Next Poker deal. It's hard to beat.

Bankroll at 1500+

2008-08-17T00:27:00.000-07:00

After tonights action, I'm at $1500+. A month ago after a withdrawal and a few crappy sessions, it was ~600, so that's solid growth. If I can keep it a secret, it might stay in the bankroll a while longer. ;]

The nice jump has been due to a couple of good HU sessions. The aforementioned Vlad match, and then tonight DKNY333 dropped about $160 before leaving. Funny.. usually when peole have their nickname as "donkey" or "fish" they're actually quite solid. Not the case for this guy. He's one of the most aptly named players I've seen.

Oh, and also a good run over at Stars. I started with a 0 bankroll there. We keep $$ on several sites to pay rakeback advances when they're requested, so I just have to keep careful records of plus/minus. I wanted to take a shot at a satellite to this years WCOOP 100k 7cs event. One of the regular satellites is a 3000 FPP buyin. I had a whopping 2400. Shows you how much I play there eh?

Anywhoo, figured I might as well earn 600 more FPP's and see if I could turn a profit at the tables and buyin for free to the satellite. Mission accomplished. +329 in ring game play there, and I've got just a tad over 3k FPP's.

The 5/10 game there looks soft. They and FTP are pretty much the only 2 rooms with populations large enough for soft 5/10 games in stud. If Stars had some sort of rakeback besides the VIP program, I'd jump on it. No way I'm going to play 99999999999999999999999 required to make the top level and earn 27% rakeback though.

Now to just find a few hours to play one of the FPP satellites to WCOOP 7cs event, and we'll be all set.

PSORG vs. VLADDYMOGUL

2008-08-16T13:23:00.000-07:00

Rarely do I make brag posts, but with blowhards like this I'll make an exception. Besides, ol' Vlad is the vain type, so I'm sure he googles his own nickname daily. Vladdy, if you're readying this... tx for the chips!

Vladdymogul - Absolute Poker, is the epitome of those wanna be players who are just good enough to ruin a good table. He's LAG, which makes him dangerous heads up. With a good run of cards, he can put a serious hurt on your roll. However, he has two glaring weaknesses which I won't mention here, in case he is reading. I like taking his chips.

For anyone who has played him, they know that he's has a penchant for calling anyone who beats him in a pot a "dumb lucky fish" for starters and then progressively worse from there. I got him so tilted yesterday that he was even calling our avatar pics names. Stuff like "your baby is so ugly, I'd wipe my a$$ with his face." Now, that really doesn't bother me. My babies are both Gerber baby quality. (Love is blind. If you have kids, you really do think you're babies are the cutest ever born). Another player sat, nick KOPE, who is a very nice social player, and one of my biggest donators. Unfortunately his avatar is his (or her) baby's pic as well. After about 3 hands of listening to Vlad's BS about 'ugly baby', Kope leaves. There goes my ATM. Back to me and Blowhard Vlad.

I went about +100 on him pretty quick, and then he got hot and won most of it back. The typical lines: "where did your luck go fish?! I own you!"... the usual. All caps tossed in to let me know he was shouting at me.

After his cards cooled off, I went back to taking his chips. I'm in the middle of reading Your Best Poker Friend by Alan Schoonmaker. He includes a great discussion on putting your opponent on tilt. So I broke one of my cardinal rules of not responding to jackasses, and started needling Vladdy. No cussing, no ALL CAPS, just little zingers. I even sang to him a bit:

It's just a matter of time...
You'll lose your chips...
And whiiinnnneeee....

(Sung to the tune of that old country song - Two Sparrows in a Hurricane).

It had the desired effect. For the longest space ever, Vladdy didn't say a word. I finally asked him if his chat had been banned and got the "lets move up a level! I'll pwn you!" response.

Anyway, final session stats:

87 minutes. 257 hands. PSORG +138.50 (23.88 BB/hour. Average players 2.5, so yeah, it was almost exclusively a heads up match).

Vladdymogul -209.75

He paid me, he paid all the rake, and he paid a few other players who sat for a few hands here and there.

Vladdy, if you're reading this, I'd be happy to teach you 7 card stud. I'd even give you a discount. $80 bucks an hour. That's currently cheaper than the rate you paid yesterday. (23.88 BB/hour multiplied by the 2/4 limit = $95.52/hour)

Like two aces get'n cracked by fives...
all you ever do is cry...
With a head full of dreams but no skills, you'll lose everythiinnggg

Man, I gotta get this up on YouTube!

90% rakeback at Absolute Poker?

2008-08-12T00:18:00.000-07:00

Wow. I just did some quick math. My rakeback stats show I'm generating about 11 cents per raked hand. If I'm playing 2/4, I get 1 FAME point and 4 credits for every raked hand. 60 credits clears $1 in bonus. Got a headache yet?

The skinny is, if I'm clearing reloads (which I am perpetually doing at AP!) I earn $1 bonus for every $1.60 paid in rake. That's 60% rakeback. Tack on the 30% I'm earning from our standard Absolute Rakeback deal, and I'm earning ~90% rakeback if my math is anywhere close to being correct.

At $1/$2, I only earn one FAME point every 2 raked hands, so that math would fall apart there. Roughly $3.30 rake paid for every $1 bonus earned. That's still what.. around 33% rakeback. Add on my 30% rakeback deal, and it's still a nice 66% rakeback at AP.

I haven't even started calculating the fact that I can spend those earned credits for merchandise or points for cash trades. I need to sleep.... I'll run those numbers later.

Here's hoping AP doesn't catch on anytime soon and change the way we earn FAME points at 7 card stud tables. Antes > Blinds in the FAME program.

Poker Pet Peeves

2008-08-10T14:07:00.000-07:00

I have two on my mind. If I wasn't so lazy, I'd make a top 10 list. I'll make them brief so I don't get bored typing them, and you don't get bored reading them.

1. "Gawd I hate playing with all these idiots. I'd rather play a small game with good players than a big game with a bunch of fish!"

Wow. That's a paraphrase of a post on our no deposit bonus forum. Some goober who think's he's solid got bad beat out of a tourney (if you're decent, that will usually be how you get KO'd! That or a coin flip loss.) He wanted to let everyone know that he quit the forum because of it. His post was titled "what a joke".

This goes beyond the "table coach" peeve (which would be on my top 10). From what I understand, this guy is decent at cards. He's just an idiot when it comes to the fundamentals of winning at cards. Little does he know that "joke" he's talking about is on him.

2. All the people still screaming rigged and posting 4 month old 'news' posts regarding the super user scandals at Absolute and Ultimate Bet. Let it die already. The players who lost money to the insider cheats were all paid back, and paid back with interest at Absolute Poker! Ultimate Bet, the new ownership repaid the players who were affected, even though the scandal happened under the old owners. That's pretty classy in my book.

High dollar players have a right to be upset and untrusting of AP and UB. Everyone has a right to be upset that Absolute tried to keep things under wraps instead of dealing with the situation in an open manner. The entire poker industry has the right to be ticked at the bad press this generated and the potential fishy's who got spooked away.

My peeve is the lifetime losers who keep pounding away at this on forums and in their own heads justifying their losses with the "AP is rigged" mantra. Please, try a new mantra. Slowly, thinking deeply upon these words: I suck. I suck. I suck...ooohhmmmm. I suck. I suck...

I gave a very polite rebuttal to one of these type posters and his reply was just to tell me I was "trying to cover up for AP". Ok. Better than trying to cover up my -10 BB/100 hands with a couple of "we wuz cheatered!" posts each day, eh?

Diamonds? Nice FAME change. AP/UB Merge soon?

2008-08-10T13:58:00.000-07:00

Kudo's to Absolute Poker for already making a change to the tiers of their loyalty program, FAME. When they first launched, the tables that I generally play (1/2 through 3/6 stud), you earned 1 FAME for every 2 raked hands. It wasn't until 5/10 level that you earned 1 FAME point per raked hand. They've moved that down so that now you earn 1 FAME point per raked hand starting at 2/4 on up.

I got to "platinum" status in July, but it took around 100 hours which is double what I normally put in during a month. I figured ahh, no way I'll do that on a regular basis. However, with this new change, and the fact that 2/4 tables aren't totally uncommon at Absolute, makes me think that earning the monthly 2500 points required won't be too difficult. Tack on the fact that Absolute and Ultimate Bet are merging into the Cereus network this month, and I see plenty of 2/4 and 3/6 action in my future at Absolute.

Who knows? Maybe I'll hit diamond status one month. You keep that status for 3 months once you've made it, whereas the plantinum status has to be earned monthly.

Rounders

2008-07-28T12:41:00.000-07:00

I recently rented and rewatched the movie Rounders. For those of you who don't know, Rounders is a great poker movie, maybe even one of the best made on the game. It features Matt Damon as a good card player with the ability to read what his opponents are holding. This got me thinking of some Daniel Negreanu videos I've seen on YouTube.

Daniel Negreanu, like Matt Damon's character in the movie, has the uncanny ability to predict his opponents pocket cards in Texas Hold'em. A tell when picked up will often give clues to the strength of an opponents hand. However, to be able to accurately foretell the exact hole cards as these two do is something else entirely. So how do they do it? Is it some kind of 6th sense as the commentators seem to claim, or is it through absolute observation and a knowledge of the game.

It certainly would be an excellent skill to have and would allow you to win many poker tournaments. However online poker is quite different from live poker games, as the person is not there to observe and pick tells from. Tells are only in the form of betting strategies, and time taken to bet. In addition to knowledge of their game play.

Check the Vids Below:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qv2C_m0D-gY&feature=related

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WO8k47_lP0M

That first one is my favorite poker clip of all time. They're playing 7cs, which is my game. Damon does a great job of deducing the hands and it is very realistic if you know how to play stud and understand the thinking that goes into reading hands. What is also cool is the fact that he makes his bets with 0 regard to what he holds himself. He's making the betting decision based on what the other players hold.

Now... this wouldn't work in the low limits vs. imbeciles. The guy with 2 pair would never fold! Ahh well... 10/20, this could happen though. Of course, at 10/20, you'll rarely have that many people seeing the river!

FYI - the big difference in these two videos is the game being played. Negreanu's ability to read people in holdem is much more amazing, IMO. But then again.. I'm a stud player, so reading stud hands is something that comes a lot easier to me now. I'm still a holdem noob.

Lightning Fast Update

2008-07-23T01:36:00.000-07:00

I need to sleep. This'll be short and sweet.

1. I'm trying to get to the platinum level in the Absolute Poker FAME program this month. It requires 2500 fame points. I'm at 2475, so should close that out during my next session. I generally only play about 40 hours a month, but this month it'll be well over 100 hours.

2. You'd think with all the extra hours I'm putting in, it would mean a big boost to the roll. Wrong. After bumping up to about $1100 and then dropping a bit, I've been treading water at about $800. I'm probably playing a bit fatigued with a newborn and doubling the amount I usually play. But I really feel it's just variance. Looking at my PT stats from today's session where I dropped about $100, I lost with AA, KK, QQ about 75% of the time. That's not normal. The problem was not catching that 2nd pair. I lost count of the times my split aces would go down to 88 66 or some such garbage. Frustrating.

3. After I get to the 2500 points, I may take a week off. I just wanted to do it to see how much of a pain it would be. Proves quite the pain at 1/2 and 2/4 stud. If there was a regular 5/10 game, it would be a cinch. The 5/10 7cs level would be perfect for FAME points. Rarely do you see a "good" 5/10 game going though. 2/4 does decent, but the games grow/die/grow/die all day. 1/2 is really the only constant.

4. Surprisingly, I've been able to work and play, even with the newborn. He's not got any of the issues that Dylan had that kept us both up practically every night 2 years ago. Muchas gracias Dios!

So that's about it. As testament to a warped month, my PT stats show me earning a big 1.27 BB's per 100 hands. Meanwhile, I'm minus $6 bucks for the month. Funky eh? Really crappy albeit short 5/10 session a couple nights ago is the main reason for that. My earnings this month have been bonus and rakeback. Blah. Here's hoping for a stellar final week of July (if I play much at all at the end of the month!)

New Arrival!

2008-07-08T00:59:00.000-07:00

Zachary was born at around noon today (7/7/08). 6 lbs 14 oz. Perfectly healthy, 10 fingers, 10 toes, etc. Mom is healthy too, so we're counting our blessings today. :)

Speaking of blessings, I'm coming home in the late evenings to get Dylan to sleep (he's our 2 yr old). He's watching Zoboomafoo, and I just finished a very good session of 1/2 and 2/4 stud. Over $200 profit. Played 3 tables and saw profit at all three. That's nice!

Bankroll counting bonus is back to over $1000 after tonight. I haven't got my June rakeback in yet either, so that'll bump it a bit more.

Sooooo...anyone up for a friendly wager on how long before another "gotta have it" expense pops up?

Man, Dylan is on a good poker schedule. Goes to sleep around 3 a.m., sleeps till noon. He gets his 9-10 hours of sleep daily, so I don't suppose it's a problem. It'll be interesting working in a 2nd little munchkin. He's laying his head down and reaching for my ear now though. For whatever reason, he loves to rub an ear lobe while going to sleep. We have some 3d ultrasound pics of him in the womb, and he always had both hands up on his ears, so it makes me think it's a comfort habit of sorts that started before he was even born.

Linus has his blanket. Dylan has daddy's ear lobe. We need to switch things around here.

Time for bed. Thank God for modern medicine, baby boys, and poker donks. They've made 7/7/08 quite a nice day.

WSOP 2008 - Pro's Revenge? + Bankroll Update.

2008-07-04T18:04:00.000-07:00

Bankroll is ~850 again, after withdrawing it down to under $400. Another good start to a new month. I'm liking the new FAME program at Absolute Poker. At the 7cs tables, I get points very frequently, so credits pile up quick. Still clearing bonus about the same rate, but the overall credits are good, and if I play as much as I think I can I'll probably be able to score a $100 gas card every month courtesy of AP's loyalty store.

Regarding World Series of Poker '08, I read that up to the main event, 7 out of 10 events were won by pro players. Wow. Big change from the past few years. Population at the WSOP is still very strong, but with a lot more entries from Europe I think.

I think it'll make for better TV. I had really lost interest in watching WSOP over the past couple of years, in favor of shows like Poker After Dark and High Stakes on GSN. One of the biggest draws to televised poker, IMO is the player personalities. It's like reality TV. You get hooked watching a 'character' either because you like them or hate them. Watching a bunch of no names at the poker table is interesting for some of us, but for most, watching card playing for card playing's sake is rather boring. Gotta have that storyline.

Kudos to the pros for lighting up the tables this year, and here's to some interesting WSOP on ESPN this year. Oh, and while I understand all the collusion concerns and stuff with the delayed final table, I do think it will be great for the entertainment aspect. It'll turn it more into a superbowl of poker. I think by the time the main event coverage rolled around in the past couple of years, everyone was about sick of watching from all the other events.

New Rakeback Deals

2008-06-26T15:35:00.000-07:00

Busy as bees at Poker-strategy.org . We have added several new rakeback deals that are worth mentioning here. I'll just give a quick list and benefits. If you are playing poker without rakeback, and you play any volume at all, you'd be surprised what you are missing out on. Good luck to folks who give these rakeback offers a shot!

Poker4Ever Rakeback is one of the best we've gotten a long time. Rakeback payments are weekly, paid every Monday. The rakeback rate is an above average 35%. Bonuses are not deducted from gross rake totals. Stats are available for P4E rakeback players right there in the poker room's software.

Habana Poker Rakeback is a new addition as well. Habana is one of our BOSS Rakeback deals (being on the Boss network). The most famous room on this network is Paradise Poker, so if you have a Paradise account without rakeback, you can sign up at Habana and play the same tables, and get 30% rakeback. Habana pays the rakeback totals directly to your player account on the 2nd of each month. Definitely another solid deal for rakeback hunters.

Poker4Ever is open to USA players!
Habana Poker is not open to USA players.

7cs heads up - Importance of Patterns

2008-06-22T01:26:00.001-07:00

There is no playbook for heads up poker, no matter what game. I've written some basic strategy on 7 card stud heads up poker, but there is so much more to it than that article, even though it is a long one and IMO has some good info for low limit heads up play.

Tonight I ran across a situation that I wanted to share because I think it really delves into how a heads up player needs to think, in order to see success.

I was playing greenmeans at the 1/2 7cs HU tables. He really didn't show a lot of weaknesses. He completed my bringin with Ace and King doorcards (in truth, he probably completed with any ace or king, even hidden). He bet his scary boards. He didn't get way out of line with weak hands. He didn't fold to a single bet on the river when the pot was large (not really much point in trying to bluff a missed draw against him). Blah blah blah... you get the picture.

After ~250 hands, I was +26.05 in less than an hour against him. That's a 5.2 BB/100 hands clip. I know, short term luck, yada yada, but I really think I would have cleaned him out had we played longer. The reason is that I picked up on a couple of exploitable patterns.

His first pattern was varying his forced bringin based on his hand strength. I'm not going to get into why this is generally a bad idea heads up. Just trust me... it is.

The most interesting pattern I found is a little deeper. As I noted earlier, he always completed with an ace or king doorcard. Obviously, he doesn't always have aces or kings. Early on, when I was dealt a small pair and he completed my bringin with an ace or king, I would limp raise him. If he just had the ace or king high, he would call. Then he'd call my bet on 4th and fold on 5th.

Ok....pretty boring right? But look how it can be exploited!!! Once I had established this as a pattern I could rely on, I could win 3 small bets almost EVERY time he was dealt an ace or king doorcard. It didn't matter if I had 444 or 462 rainbow. My 3 cards didn't matter. Here were the possibilities:

I bringin the half bet, he completes with an ace or king doorcard, I raise:

1. If he has nothing, he calls the raise (2 bets on 3rd). He calls 4th hoping to get some kind of value by 5th (another small bet). He folds on 5th with ace or king high. I win 3 small bets, regardless of my own holding.

2. He really has aces or kings and 3 bets. I fold. I lose 2 bets.

3. He calls my raise with ace or king high, then calls on 4th and 5th (meaning he's either picked up a draw, another pair, etc.) and I slow down and he wins showdown.

4. He calls my raise with ace or king high, then calls on 4th and 5th (again, meaning he has something, but not quite aces or kings), but I draw well myself and I win at showdown.

For simplicity sake, let's just say #3 and #4 will be roughly equal, that leaves us with figuring out the value of my losing 2 bets when he has the aces or kings he is representing vs. my winning 3 bets when he does not.

The odds against being dealt exactly AA or exactly KK are roughly 76:1 (according to my crappy math skills). That means if I did this EVERY time and he followed the same pattern every time, then I would win 76 x 3 bets that he had nothing for every 1 x 2 bets that I lost when he 3bet with real aces or kings.

You don't have to be a math geek to see the value there.

Gold mine right? Well...not really. This gent, as I noted was pretty decent. If a player is solid and you have to dig this deep to find exploitable patterns, you might be better off waiting on someone who will make more mistakes. I suspect that it wouldn't take many of these scenarios to occur before he would change up how he was playing to compensate. (What if he notices that I fold immediately when he 3 bets with his aces or kings? Now he can 3 bet even if all he has is ace or king high, I fold and now he's taking advantage of my pattern!)

What's my point? The key to heads up poker is identifying your opponents patterns. IMO, this goes for every poker game, not just 7c stud. Once you have established a pattern, it's just a matter of exploiting it and rake in the chips.

How about your own patterns? Pay attention to your own play, and try to avoid pattern ruts that you fall into. Better yet, establish an obvious pattern, when he picks up on it, exploit that. Here's an example. I complete with a lot of hands heads up. If I have nothing and he calls my completed bet on 3rd, I'll check and fold 4th. The next time I'm actually dealt my pair, say, JxJ, I'll complete his bringin, check 4th and then check raise him when he bets. Or maybe I'll wait 'till 5th for the check raise. Either way, it wins me some extra bets and confuses him as he can no longer count on the pattern he thought he'd picked up.

See how it works? Play fast and aggressive. Pick up their patterns. Setup false patterns/traps. Get 'em confused, and then tilted. Once they're tilted, they might as well mail you a check for their remaining balance.

CD Poker & TonyG

2008-06-20T11:56:00.000-07:00

Just a heads up. We've added a couple of new sites to our bonus code list recently. I like to mention these when we get a great deal. These are bonus codes that carry extra value, well over the default bonus deals you get if you just go to the poker site.

The first is our Tony G Poker Coupon Bonus Code. The bonus code is TONYCASH and it gives you a 150% up to $400 bonus. That's more bonus dollars than you'll get if you go straight to TonyG. On top of that, you will also get a $50 instant bonus. So if you deposited $300, you'd get the max $400 pending bonus plus another $50 in your account that you can play with immediately. Instant + Pending bonus deals are... very rare.

The 2nd bonus we've added is our CD Poker Coupon Code Bonus. The bonus code for this one is TOPBONUS. You get 150% up to $600 matching deposit bonus, which is the highest bonus on the iPoker network to my knowledge. You will also get free entry into the monthly $10,000 VIP freeroll. Very good value on this bonus code as well.

Both of these sites are on the iPoker network. There are no rules against clearing them both. If you're bonus hunting, you can hit them both. Rooms on the iPoker network do not accept USA players unfortunately.

Once our legal situation is clarified over here, I'll have a lot of bonus clearing to do myself!

Mikey and Sheikhan exchange some words...

2008-06-16T23:21:00.000-07:00

I know these guys crack on each other a lot on High Stakes Poker (GSN) and Poker After Dark, and sometimes it seems like good natured ribbing. I think this video shows their relationship is probably any thing but good natured.

For your viewing pleasure:

The Lord giveth. The wife taketh away.

2008-06-11T21:59:00.000-07:00

That's a bit unfair for the title. We've got baby boy #2 due July 7th, and we're working furiously to get everything ready and it's costing us some extra $$. We're going to be able to save about $4k if we pay up front (we're self pay), so it's a worthy cause.

Bottom line is, I pulled $1025 from the roll. Total after AP rakebacks hit is around $470. *sigh*.

Ahh well... let's start building again. It makes the 2k by the end of the year more of a challenge. Maybe I should just say "2k profit" and count what I bring home rather than have a set goal to reach.

Annoys me a bit to keep robbing the bankroll. I'd really like to get over to FTP 3/6 stud since the game is pretty loose there. Ideally I'd like to take at least $1000 over there to play it comfortably, and at the same time leave $600 or so at Absolute since the 1/2 game is the only regular game with 2/4 in the mix every now and then and a rare 3/6.

Better hush and start playing. Diapers to buy, bankroll to build.

MSOP Event #14 - Out in 122nd place.

2008-06-07T19:22:00.001-07:00

*pukes*

Perpetual short stack. Dealt good cards, ran into better (KK vs. AA hidden, JJ vs. AA, etc). Still had close to 3k chips at the 250/500 level, which ain't much, but FTP's tourney structure sucks compared to Star's WCOOP. Everyone was short stacked at that level. The top stack at our table had 12k. That's like taking $24 bucks to a .50/$1 table...

At any rate, last hand I had 3k chips w/ 99 and a AQxx 4 flush on 5th, and got all the chips in vs a no pair, king high heart flush. He flushed, I didn't.

The buyin was $109, and I was playing a ring game at Absolute and finished +114 there, so I suppose you could say I'm break even for the 2 hours play.

Looking forward to WCOOP! I thought the FTP tourney would be interesting since it's a super stack (5k chips to start), but the ante's are always 20%+ of the small bet and a tiny forced bring in bet. It's like FTP's low limit games (1/2 and 2/4). The high ante, low bringin rewards folks who play any 3 because the initial pot is huge compared to the bringin you have to call. Routinely 4 and 5 guys to 4th street. That's wonderful if your big pairs hold up and your draws hit. Unfortunately that didn't happen for me.

I'm not saying I wouldn't play the 7cs events at Full Tilt again. I feel like I've got a better than average shot at cashing in them. But the tourney setup certainly makes them more of a crapshoot than say, the WCOOP which features double stack (3k chips) and very slowly increasing limits/antes.

Suggestion to any tourney directors who are reading (estimating zero) - bigger stacks, slower limits, 10% ante compared to the small bet. It'll make for a little bit longer of an event, but your skilled players (the ones who are most likely to drop $100+ on a buyin)will enjoy themselves much more, since it will truly be a skill based event and increase the likelihood that they play future 7cs events.

I don't mean this to be a cry post. Heck, I feel fine, even going out 122/159. I didn't make any serious mistakes when I look at the few hands that I took to showdown. I played as well as I could.

Maybe I shoulda just called for a new dealer?

Time for some pizza. :)

Nice 3/6 session...

2008-06-06T20:51:00.000-07:00

Bankroll at $1450+ after a good couple of days, topped off by a great 2/4 session where ATL404 donated a good $140 or so to Dylan's college fund. (+200 for the session)

My BB/100 over 3.0 - Obviously on a good run. :)

+543 in May, in ring game play alone (not counting rakeback or bonus).
+459 in June, and we're not even through the first week. Here again, not counting rakeback or bonus.

If I keep getting to play 40 hours a month or so, the 2k should be a breeze, with proper bankroll management, etc etc... I doubt seriously I'll go above 3/6. The 3/6 game at Full Tilt is a pretty good one with a normal ante. The 5/10 at Stars can be juicy too, but with no rakeback, I'm probably going to just stick with FTP / AP.

Still no word back from AP/UB on propping. :( - I've been out of bonus for 2 weeks, and 100% rakeback or so woulda been nice as many 1/2, 2/4 and 3/6 tables as I've started.

Time for a milkshake, some PAD and bedtime.

Bankroll Update

2008-06-03T01:06:00.000-07:00

$1040 after tonight. Had it to $1080 last night after a great shorthanded session against my favorite HU 7 card stud opponent on Absolute Poker - Rolled. Poor guy... sometimes I just want to say "mistake #1 - always slow playing aces. Mistake #2 - ..." so on and so forth.

In all fairness, he's not that bad. Though the guy has a fish symbol on my PokerTracker, he's only slightly too loose and he's only slightly too passive. His two main mistakes are "can't let go of a pair" and tilt. Once he's tilted, just sit and wait for him to drop his bankroll in your lap.

Seriously, if he'd be a little more aggressive on 3rd (stop slow playing big pairs!), dump hands that he knows he's going steep uphill on, and step away from the table when he's been sucked out on a time or two, he'd be a solid player.

My luck, he'll google his AP nickname or TIGGERTHECAT and find this advice and spank me next session. :)

Do you ever find it hard to not help someone out who you are just beating into the ground or you can tell they're frustrated? I guess it's just the history teacher in me. It goes against common poker sense for sure.

So, halfway to the $2000 I was hoping to finish the year with so I could crank up Dylan's college fund. I'm happy. 7cs games at AP have been sparse this year with the main staple being 1/2, with a game at 2/4 and 3/6 every now and then.

I lost my hand histories when I reformatted my PC a couple months ago. My current poker tracker stats show +2.5 big bets per 100 hands, after ~10,000 hands (I know..small sample size, but bear with me). This is at 1/2 through 3/6. When I set it to just heads up, I'm roughly +6 big bets per 100 hands. I'm +5 BB/100 when I combine HU with 3 handed stats.

I need to start propping. :) I've emailed AP about it since my own account doesn't even get rakeback. We'll see what kind of reply we get.

TiggertheCat at Absolute Poker AP

2008-05-31T18:57:00.000-07:00

Just googled for this account and it didn't pull up anywhere. It's my wife's account at Absolute Poker. She smacks some folks down heads up in 7 card stud.

I'm proud to have a poker playing wife, that not only enjoys the game but wins at it!

If she's taken your money, feel free to raise H E double toothpicks in our poker strategy forum.

Current bankroll from 7cs at Absolute = $900+

Rounders Buzz

2008-05-27T14:23:00.000-07:00

I recently came across a new site that is interesting both for poker bloggers and interested readers, RoundersBuzz.com. It is a social voting website just for poker content. If you run a poker portal and are looking to drive traffic to your site, you can submit poker articles, stories or news at RoundersBuzz. If you are a poker player looking to improve your game, you can quickly sift through the best poker content voted up to the main page by the community at Rounders Buzz.

Besides the main page, there are five Category pages for specific stories. The most popular categories are the two strategy categories; Tournament Strategy and Ring Game Strategy. They also have categories on General Poker, Online Poker Tools and Poker News.

Happy reading!

Internet Isolation - Proven!

2008-05-25T13:29:00.000-07:00

Lot of studies have been done on how the evil internet tubes isolate and insulate us from the 'real world' and after a conversation with one of our mods at Poker-Strategy.Org, I am a believah!

The conversation in mIRC chat was about my sending TrulyRand0m some shirts and hats from our PSORG gear stash. I asked him for his address, and his response?

<TR-ChuddsCheerleader> well i'm sending you an email in about 30 seconds once i find my address on facebook...

I alternated between chuckles and outright belly jiggling for the next 20 minutes. It was late...odd things are funny when it's late.

In TR's defense, he just moved recently. Heh...let me check my facebook for my real life address. Long ago, people would have to dig through their wallet or purse to give you their email address. How quickly things change!

Oh, and poker - my Absolute bankroll is at ~600. It was down to ~150 there for a bit, so I'm pretty happy to have not busted, playing 1/2 through 3/6 with just $150 bucks.

Ahh! SNG Nirvana = FTP

2008-05-02T11:15:00.000-07:00

I switched over to Full Tilt to play some SNG's. It's a big difference compared to the rock garden at AP. I've only got a 2 SNG test here, so it's obviously not conclusive, but I've played two 9-seat SNG's at the $10 + $1 level, and they do remind me a lot of the juicy SNG's that I used to see at Party and Royal Vegas.

I've played two, and finished #2 out of 9 both times. (I need to work on my heads up play!). It's not my results that are really making me think FTP is a better place for SNG's but rather how many players are gone after the first few levels. At AP, it wasn't uncommon for there to still be 4 or 5 players left when the blinds got up to 'crap shoot' level. The last SNG I played at FTP, the blinds hadn't even hit 100/200 yet and it was heads up between me and the eventual winner.

NLHE SNG's aren't exactly my forte, but I do expect to see positive return on investment. So far I am, but it seems like it'd be much easier and more profitable at Full Tilt.

More players = more fish? I think that is generally true.

Being a USA citizen is costing me money!

2008-04-28T19:16:00.000-07:00

Being a poker player, I don't usually pay much attention to casino games or casino bonuses. However, I couldn't help but notice the value of an article that one of our PSORG mods wrote for another of our sites.

The article details how to take an initial deposit of $100 and take it to $1500+ in your bankroll by playing perfect blackjack that reduces the house edge to near 0, while clearing generous deposit bonuses.

Here's a link to the article if you are interested: Casino Bonus Guide

Again, it will only work for non-USA citizens. This is a great guide for anyone. Poker players looking to build a bankroll or just take a month or so to pad your existing bankroll. Casino bonus whores will jump on this as well. ;]

Bankroll Update (April)

2008-04-25T16:45:00.001-07:00

Looks like Dylan better get to crackin' on scholarship applications! Bankroll at ~400. No losses, just withdrawals. Every time I get it to $1k, there's always something to buy that we don't want to dip into our regular budget for.

Ah well. At least I've got 16 years before he graduations high school!

Absolute's 7cs population hasn't been wonderful lately. Generally just a 1/2 game going. Still easy enough to beat.

AP's NLHE sit n go's are pretty tight. Even the tiny $5 buyins seem to have some decent players. I miss Party Poker SNG's where 3 people were gone before the button made one lap around the table. :(

Poker Resolutions Update

2008-03-03T16:26:00.000-08:00

Can't believe it's been almost 2 months since my last post. Busy as a bee and sick with the flu when I'm not busy.

We got cable (have I already mentioned that?)... so wonderful!

I've made good progress on my resolutions so far I think. The cash games resolutions I've still yet to really get started on. Harrington on Cash Games came out very recently, so I'll be getting it from Amazon here shortly and that should kick start things a bit.

I have had no problems with tilt so far this year, mainly because I've been in a good run when I've had time to play. Even with some withdrawals, the bankroll is well over $1000. Getting 2k for a "Dylan college fund" looks like it'll be easily reachable provided I have more time to play and I don't hit a big skid.

I'm playing at AP and Full Tilt. I've been having really good success at the 3/6 and 2/4 tables at Tilt. Massive loose there compared to AP. AP's games have been a bit slow this year with not a lot of 2/4 or 3/6 tables when I was on. The 1/2 tables are good, but I'd much prefer to stay in the 2/4 - 3/6 range. I just don't get in enough hours to really make a 1/2 table pay much.

Freakin' SOCOM online is cutting into my poker time too. I'm not really addicted to it, but when I do sit down for a session of run and gun, snipe and move on Devils Road, I find that 4 or 5 hours is gone in what feels like seconds. Poker is better on our marriage too, since it's a money earning hobby and no doubt Leslie already has devious plans for the 'college fund'...

We'll see!

Poker Resolutions - 2008

2008-01-07T14:56:00.000-08:00

I don't really have many 'real life' resolutions for the new year, except the usual be a better husband, father, etc. We've got #2 on the way, as Leslie is 13 weeks pregnant. So here's a few poker resolutions.

1. Learn small stakes NLHE cash games. I feel confident in 7cs ring and 7cs tourneys, and even NLHE SNG's and MTT's though I haven't played either of the last two in a long time. Cash games are very popular now with shows like High Stakes Poker still getting great ratings, and it seems to be where the fish are heading, so I figure it wouldn't hurt to become adequate at it.

I've already picked up a book on it, and have read it. I'll start applying that to the tables soon. NLHE cash games shouldn't be difficult, since I'm already a tight wad, and without increasing blinds pressure, you really just have to bait your hook, toss your line in and wait for the bite.

My only concern is I really don't have much of a roll. I didn't play much in 2007, and we nearly drained my roll for a vacation in May, and then again in November/December for Christmas spending. I don't depend on poker for a living, but I don't like the idea busting or depositing. In fact, I guess you could say I'm still playing on the $10 no deposit bonus from Royal Vegas, from way back in 2003. NLHE cash variance can be big, especially those crazy low blind games.

2. Do a better job against the tilt monster. I don't tilt often, but when I do, I tend to go LAG and donk off a couple of hundred before I've fed him enough.

3. Start Dylan a college fund or some type of savings account with poker earnings. Since I'll be spending some to learn NLHE cash, I don't plan on a fat amount for this. Besides, I play probably 10 hours a week at best. I think a $2000 goal would be noble. Besides, he's not even 19 months old yet, so I'm getting a good head start. ;]

Someone call Goodlatte and tell him to legalize online poker. I'm playing it for the good of the children!

New Rakeback Deals!

2007-11-29T00:12:00.000-08:00

The season of giving is upon us, and there are a few new rakeback deals that I'd like to mention. First, let me explain that rakeback is a poker "comp" of sorts, available to online poker players. With the nifty computer tracking that comes with online poker software, sites are able to get a real value of how much rake each player is contributing to the pots. Rake back then, is the player earning some of the casino's take, right back to their own wallets. There are some players who earn more in rakeback each month than they do in earnings from their winning play. Fact is, a break even player offline can make a profit online via rakeback, not having to toke the dealer and of a good poker bonus. I digress. Here's a list of recent rakeback additions and some coming soon as well.

The first and most important, IMO is our new Pacific Poker Rakeback program. It is set to launch officially on December 1, 2007. It will be 25% flat rakeback, no matter how much you generate in rake, so it's a good program even for small limit guys. Bonuses are deducted. If you like casino games, you'll be happy to know that any losses in casino play will be rebated 25% as well. This program is ran by Pacific once the player has signed on through our link. Pacific will pay the player once per month. As of now the only drawback is inability to track your rake totals. Hopefully they'll add that ability soon.

We've had lots of players over the years ask if there was a rakeback deal at Pacific Poker, and we're very happy to be able to make this announcement!

Next on the list is Cake Poker Rakeback. This one has been around for several months, but many players had serious problems with buggy software at Cake and a lack of player population. Both of those appear to be addressed. I've messed around with the software a decent amount, and it seems to function pretty well now. The biggest improvement has been player population though. During prime time hours, there will be several thousand players on. If they would add 7 card stud, I'd be on this room in a heartbeat. They've got some unique promotions with the "cake" theme, and it's worth checking out.

The rakeback program at Cake Poker is 33% back to the player, paid by Cake Poker directly to the players' accounts by the 5th of the consecutive month. November rake is paid by December 5th, for example. Players are eligible for bonuses and reloads too, and they are deducted from gross rake. Rakeback tracking is available right in your Cake Poker account.

Finally, we've launched a Carbon Poker Rakeback program in the past month or so. Carbon is the old Poker.Com site. It's got a solid population, is open to USA players, and the rakeback is 30%. Just like the other two I've mentioned so far, rakeback earned at Carbon Poker is paid directly to the player accounts. It's a good promo on a good network. The only "con" in my mind is that players can't get bonuses if they get rakeback.

A couple of "coming soon" rooms are PokerNordica and Action Poker. PokerNordica is on the same network as Carbon Poker, so if you already have a Poker.Com or Carbon Poker account, you can get rakeback through Poker Nordica. Action Poker is a small room, but the fact is, fish can be found in just about any room, no matter how small.

Stay tuned! We're always looking for rakeback deals, promotions, contests etc., that make online poker a profitable experience for PSORG members.

Online Poker Legality

2007-11-17T23:34:00.000-08:00

It's been well over a year since Frist and company snuck the UIGEA (Unlawful Internet Gambling Enforcement Act) through Congress on the back of the Port Security Bill. Here are a few interesting articles that show recent gains and proven effectiveness of the Poker Player Alliance lobbying for our cause.

Congressional Hearing on November 14, 2007, featuring Annie Duke's testimony, among others. Our side really slammed the "do gooders" across the aisle. Here's a link to the PPA's page of resources on it, including lots of YouTube videos: Congressional Hearing Nov 14, 2007.

Here's an article picked up by google news noting that Congressional leaders are finally starting to get the picture as to what exactly happened last year, and the potential dangers we face from sanctions brought on by breaking WTO agreements.

Finally, when Harrahs and MGM head hanchos start making predictions about legal online poker in the USA, you know things are looking up. That article can be found here: Review Journal

Here's hoping legalized online poker in the USA results in poker boom part II.

Still playing at Absolute

2007-11-08T11:31:00.000-08:00

As most everyone knows from chat and discussions on our forum, I'm on a forced hiatus until I get a decent Internet connection here in the sticks. I'm able to get on and answer emails, but since a phone call kicks me offline, I just really hate to sit at a real money poker table.

I wanted to weigh in real quick on the situation that developed at Absolute Poker over the past couple of months. Here are a few random thoughts...

First, why is everyone so surprised that an industrious individual was able to crack a poker site's security and cheat their way to tens of thousands of dollars? Where there are big stacks of cash, you'll have people trying to get their hands on it, plain and simple. We live in a society that chugs down coke and popcorn while cheering on the smart/sexy cast of Oceans 11 / 12 and soon to be 13. Then we're horrified when someone breaks into our home and takes the family silver.

This goes way on back to Robin Hood. We're always happy when the thieves are targeting "the man", until we happen to be "the man" or at least we're somewhat involved with "the man".

My point is this. Don't get your panties in a wad over a couple of industry insiders using their unique positions and knowledge to make a few grand. Our culture is in love with this stuff! Cheats, thieves, ne'er-do-wells will always be with us. It just really sucks when it's your stuff that is the target.

Second thought is this. Absolute Poker's sin was not getting abused by a shifty employee. That can happen to anyone. The "rogue employee uses his position to cheat" situation isn't new by any stretch. In my opinion, Absolute's transgression was the really really bad way it was handled in the public's eye. Poker players aren't stupid...well, winning poker players anyway, and you can bet a large portion of the 2+2 posters who sniffed this out are winning players. Continuing to deny, deny, deny when everyone knows you're lying, just makes the problem worse. 'Fess up, fix the problem, compensate those affected, move on. Let's hope not only AP learned this lesson, but every other online poker site that watched it unfold.

Finally, I have never seen so many righteous .01/.02 players having conniption fits. If they all take their rake totals elsewhere, it might put a real pinch on AP's board of directors, as they consider whether or not to order extra cheese on their pizza at the next meeting. Actually the reverse might be true since most of the nickel dimers cost Absolute money, with all of the generous reload bonuses and rakeback.

I'm not trying to disrespect the low limit guys. I'm a low limit guy! It's just that I was so amazed by the players who raised the most cane. You had the guys ticked off who were affected and had a legitimate beef (high limit players and high dollar tourney players). Then you had this midget army of penny ante guys and gals grabbing ropes, pitch forks and torches. What the hey? I wonder if it was just their frustrations at the "cash out curse" and "rigged flops" finally finding a voice?

I got an email towards the end of October from a guy who was mass emailing poker portals requesting that we join together in bringing down Absolute Poker since we now have evidence that they rig games. Are you serious?

Humans are stupid.

FTOPS with no 7 card stud event?

2007-10-23T22:46:00.001-07:00

Unless they've added it since my alert email from Full Tilt Poker, I did not see a 7 card stud event. There was a 7cs hi/lo event, but not standard 7 card stud. So lame. I'd have driven to a local Internet hot spot and played it, most likely.

Just makes no sense. I know they're not the most popular in the world, but the 7cs event at Poker Stars WCOOP ended up with double the guaranteed prize pool, and I know Full Tilt has a very solid player base in the 7cs rooms.

Just doesn't make sense to me. Loss of money for FTP. If you spread the ring game, include it in FTOPS!

Movers = Gold

2007-10-23T22:34:00.000-07:00

Another life update. We've been in the new house for a little over a week now. We paid a moving crew to get us over here. All we had to do was box up the belongings. They loaded and unloaded everything, and even set our beds back up. Great service! The new house has an upstairs and we had some heavy arse furniture going up and I really wasn't enjoying the idea of hauling that up there with the aid of family members, especially since family members don't agree to pay for a wall if they take it out with a bed rail.

We're on day 9 out of 90 or so without cable internet and no T.V. I miss not being able to watch some football or poker shows. I hear the WSOP HORSE event is pretty darn interesting this year. Seems they barely even covered it last year.

I suppose I could always load up Madden on my playstation and run a demo game or two to get my football fix. Ya just never know how nice modern conveniences are until you are without them.

New Updates on PSORG

2007-10-07T20:54:00.001-07:00

We've been busy as bees on the poker forum lately. Here's a partial list of some of the recent updates.

We've added some skill games, including a Spades Rules and Tips section, and a Rummy Strategy section. If anyone reading knows good rummy or spades strategy, I'd be happy to pay you to write an article or three for us. We're also considering adding a Mahjong section. Any game that is skill, like poker, we'd love to add it.

We also added a texas holdem poker download section with the most commonly downloaded online poker software listed.

We kicked off a contest drawing, and anyone who is interested can win a free copy of Poker Tracker. Just look over the contest page by hitting that poker tracker link, and email me to signup.

Finally, we've added a couple of new rakeback programs. The first one is Cake Poker Rakeback. Cake is growing fast, and has some of the juiciest NLHE games around right now, not to mention some pretty nifty promotions. We also launched our Carbon Poker Rakeback program. Carbon is on the old Poker.Com network, and is the very first chance for players to earn Merge Gaming Rakeback. Even if you already have a Carbon account, we can still get you rakeback on this network. Just email me, poker [dot] strategy [at] gmail [dot] com.

Oh, and a finally to the finally. I wrote a long article on 7 card stud HU heads up strategy. I earn a solid win rate using this strategy in games through $5/$10.

That's about it. Comments and ideas are always welcome!

Life Update

2007-10-07T00:58:00.000-07:00

We're officially home owners. Woohoo. :)

This week has been a ton of work, cleaning and then painting every square foot of the place. It looks great though, and I'm lucky enough to have family and friends that are willing to lend a helping hand.

We move officially on Oct. 15th, and still have some packing to do. Updates here will probably be sporadic, as I haven't even had time to play poker, much less talk about it.

The only thing I don't like about this new house is that we'll have to wait 30-90 days for cable internet and TV. Comcast noted that the end of the wire was 500+ feet away, so they're going to have to go through the process of renting the poles on which to run the cable line.

I'm able to connect through my phone, and actually get a pretty darn good connection through it, relatively speaking, at about 200 KbPS. A bit pricey, but I've never had a phone that was more versatile than the Pocket PC 8525.

Anywhoooo. 200 Kb per second is plenty fast enough to play poker. Good thing I don't watch much T.V. though. Leslie will be going through Oprah withdrawals I bet...

To all the Absolute Poker 7cs players, good luck at the tables. The 4th street percentage should jump a bit with me not there. :)

Spectacular 565th out of 696.

2007-09-24T14:43:00.000-07:00

Yay. I had one of those creepy "not gonna be a good day" feelings when our final walkthrough for our house that we close on tomorrow ran over by 30 minutes and put me late for the start of WCOOP #15. Unlike Phil Hellmuth, I like to see every single hand if possible.

Upon sitting in about 30 hands into the tournament, I see that I have Gemany's top female pro, Katja Thater to my left. Hot dang.

Started decently well, hitting a flush and trips to build from ~2900 where the stack was when I arrived up to around $3300 at the early low limits. From there it went all down hill. I can't blame starting hands for sure. I got dealt AA, KK, QQ a great deal, but to save you the annoying bad beat stories, I'll just say that completing with KK, and getting raised by A5Q rainbow maniac, you expect to win some chips over time. Time just ran out too quick.

It was a wonderful table though. Two donks (TIJO and HlwdMike) were donating chips to everyone else but me. Just one of those days where the table tards bleed you dry with hands like the aforementioned A5Q rainbow vs. KK, and then donate those chips to players like Katja.

I'm looking forward to the next WCOOP. Satelliting in was pretty easy, and honestly, the table I was playing was easier than most 1/2 tables at AP. It's one of those where you expect to double or triple your money if you stay all day. Just can't do that in a tournament.... those pesky starting chip stack and limit increases, etc.

Time for a nap.

Should you ever fold AA preflop?

2007-09-21T19:40:00.000-07:00

I'm not off my rocker. I'm just considering the idea of folding in a +EV situation, when the edge isn't huge in a tournament. In a recent article written for us by Learn Texas Holdem, they give an example of a time when folding might be a tactically solid play.

In the example, you have 4 left in a large tournament field where #3 pays significantly better than the #4 finisher. Your are short stack with 10k. The two ahead of you have 11k and 12k respectively and the chip leader has 20k. They all 3 go all in ahead of you, and you look down at AA.

In a cash game, this is an obvious push. But AA against 3 hands that show decent strength is probably only about a 55% favorite to win the hand. If you fold, there are several good results you can look forward to. The big stack wins, knocking both the two smaller stacks out, putting you to #2 and a huge jump in payout. The 12k stack winning bumps you to #3 at worst, and the 20k stack is now short stack with 8k. Finally, the worst result is the 11k player winning, but even then, the 12k stack is down to 2k and the large stack is at 9k. Here again, you've moved to #2 in chip position with a very very short stacked player in 4th.

So do you fold the AA? If you call and win, you'll have a massive chip lead of 40k, with two tiny stacks (1k and 2k), and the previous tall stack will be cut in half (10k). If you call and lose your virtual coin flip you're out with 4th place money.

What to do, what to do. My opinion is, you'd need to check out the difference between 2nd and 1st place money. If it was a huge skew towards the person who wins it all, then calling with AA is obviously the best decision. On the other hand, if #1, #2 and #3 all have pretty even payouts, with 4th getting little, then folding might be the best choice.

Really a tough question, and I suppose depends more on personality.

Check out the full Tactics vs. EV in Tournament Endgames.

Lagging my way to WCOOP #15

2007-09-18T20:07:00.000-07:00

I earned a $320 seat in the WCOOP #15 at Poker Stars. It's the 7 card stud event with $100,000 guaranteed. By way of explanation, WCOOP = World Championship of Online Poker. It's put on by Poker Stars and is considered to be "the" online world series of poker, basically. The only other major online tournament event is Full Tilt's FTOPS.

I won my way in through a $48 satellite. About 10 minutes in, I lost my cable connection and had to play the rest of the way on a dial up connection. Laggy as everything and I'm sure the other players were none too happy! My nick is coachkf at Poker Stars, and is currently preregistered in WCOOP #15. Woohoo!

It was easier to qualify than I thought. I've never attempted to qualify for any of these events. Heck, I've only played a handful of 7 card stud tourneys for that matter. I stick to cash games generally.

I played two $27.50 turbo satellites and just missed a seat on each, but landing high enough to get my buyin back on both. I struck out in a $9 turbo stage one satellite to the $48 satellite. I decided to go ahead and cough up the $48, and definitely glad that I did. Only 40 players entered, and 5 seats were awarded. When #6 busted out, I was #3 in chips, I think.

So total spent to earn the seat came to $57. Not bad for a $320 seat. This WCOOP #15 is shaping up to be a lengthy affair. The starting stacks will be doubled to 3000, and antes/limits increase every 30 minutes. In the satellite we started with 1500 and increased every 15 minutes. The turbos were a sick 1500 starting stack and increases every 5 minutes!

Finally, the hand that really put me into this event was really a bit lucky. I was dealt TTT, and it was folded to me with 2 players behind me so I just called. Player to my left completed with a king doorcard, and again, I just smooth called. Heads up going to 4th street. He catches another king to show a pair, and possible KKK. I groaned, but this guy was super aggressive and I had fully expected the completed bet, even if he had deuce, seven, king rainbow to start. At any rate, I raised him on 4th to see his reaction and he just calls. Not really much info there. Could be slow playing trips or might have just KK and garbage.

5th street I catch another ten for quads. We cap 5th, 6th and 7th. His trip kings are pretty obvious now. Long and short is, I got all my chips in, and when the hand was over he had ~20 left and was out the next hand. I had ~3000 and the chip lead. I stayed in the top 5 from that point forward with more good cards and good breaks.

Here's hoping WCOOP #15 event will be as kind!

Quote of the Week

2007-09-11T23:35:00.001-07:00

Maybe the month, and possibly the year. Just depends on how long it takes me to see another paragraph that just nails a great thought.

We had a new member on our poker forum start a thread about tilting, and he made this observation after discussing a session that he lost $325 in just a couple of hours, tilting it away. In his own words:

The more poker I play, the more I begin to understand that what makes a poker player able to succeed and win in the long run is not understanding odds (though it helps,) having great luck (because it always ends,) or even being able to read hands (I wish I was better at that,) but having self control and discipline.

I guess the only thing he left out that players "over focus" on is bluffing. You ask a newbie what makes a successful poker player and they'll say something like "math geek" or "iron balls. He can shove it all in with 72o and take down the pot without flinching" or "uncanny reading ability. It's easy to play when you can see through the other guys cards"....

Hogwash. Those things do tend to separate the superstars from the rest of us, but what makes an every day, grind it out, winning player is self control and discipline. If a player can't master those two qualities, he'll never win over the long haul.

All of the poker strategy and bankroll management theory in the world won't help you if you don't have the discipline to apply it at the table, and the self control to stay on even keel when things don't go your way, (or at least enough sense to know when you've lost your self control and pack it up for the night).

I guess we're lucky that most players don't really listen to "discipline" and "self control" advice. They just keep donating to Dylan's Diaper Fund. :)

Learn Texas Holdem

2007-09-10T11:04:00.000-07:00

We recently had some articles written for us on our poker strategy and mastering holdem domains. These articles were written by Learn Texas Holdem. Good quality stuff.

The first article is titled False Tells. Many players confuse the "acting" tell as a false tell, and this article not only straightens out the misconception, but throws in some good examples of what a false tell actually is.

They wrote another article for us labeled Handling Large Sit n Go's. The multi table SNG's have become more and more popular, especially at sites like Poker Stars. This article just provides a few tips and thoughts to keep in mind next time you sit down to one. :)

We'll be having LTH write another article or two for us in the future, and review them here.

When it comes to growing as a poker player, I believe we're only limited by ourselves. Keep studying, reading and playing and just about anyone of decent intelligence can make a nice income from online poker.

PSORG Heads Up Competition

2007-09-08T20:56:00.000-07:00

We had a blast today, playing the PSORG Heads Up event. Out of the 10 or 12 active folks in mIRC chat, 8 had the time to devote to it, so we had 3 rounds of single elimination matches before crowning a champ. During the event, I had a moment to self reflect, and a few thoughts popped into my head.

First, I lack a killer instinct when playing with friends. It gets worse. Not only do I lack a killer instict, I'd almost rather them win. I was paired up with Drogo71 for round 1, and even though we'd agreed to do best 2 out of 3, when he won the first one I told him congrats, no need for a 2nd (he went on to win the whole event). Finally, I found that when involved in social poker events, I actually have more fun watching the games from the rail and taking part in the friendly banter that goes on. Good thing these are low buy in. I suspect I'm a total fish in "social events".

I've known about this weakness for some time, and it's one of the main reasons I don't engage in chat much, unless someone speaks to me first at the standard ring game table. Once I "make friends", I find it harder to play aggressively towards that player. I should make a distinction between "respect" and "friends". There are players like CChristyCC and ElToasto at Absolute who I respect and we do chat a bit, but I still play aggressively when we're in a hand together. It's totally different with members of our forum though, especially when playing Hold'em, which is not exactly a game I stay sharp on anyway.

Having players cuss at me is much better for my bankroll. Thankfully this happens pretty frequently, especially heads up!

Enough publishing my weaknesses. Time to get back to taking the hater's chips.

Out in the sticks...

2007-09-06T15:55:00.000-07:00

We're back from the aforementioned vacation. The picture from the deck of the cabin (picture is in the previous post below) is legit. That's the cabin we stayed at. I should've known to get that view you'll need a 4wd.

We videotaped the drive from the main road to the cabin, just because we were so amazed. We rarely even had a cell phone signal. We had running water and electricity though, and my parents had their doubts by the time we finally pulled up next to the cabin. To make a long story short, the last mile or so was a steep grade gravel/dirt road, and the two times we actually met someone coming the other way, we had to get out and decide which of us was to back up, since there were only a few spots that two vehicles could pass.

We had a blast though. A racoon got in our trash outside every night, and we finally caught him in the act on the last night, got pictures and everything. The little sucker was pretty tame. I suspect we're not the only inhabitants to have tossed him turkey sandwiches. :)

Regarding poker: I never hit that 2k mark, so after pulling out $1000 from the bankroll to help with the trip, I'm at ~840. Time to start working it back up for the next vacation I suppose.

$1870. $130 more to go...

2007-08-26T06:30:00.000-07:00

We leave tomorrow at noon, and making the 2k mark is seriously in doubt. I'm pretty happy with $1870 though. To go from ~ 400 in June to anywhere close to 2k with just playing 1/2, 2/4 and 3/6, 7 card stud, for 10-12 hours a week (according to Poker Tracker), aint shabby.

$8 per fun filled hour. Weeeee. I enjoy poker so much more when I'm playing for small goals as opposed to needing another $150 for the electric bill. I think Fall semester 2003 woulda been a lot better on my grades and my marriage if I'd just delivered pizza instead of playing poker for the bills.

Ah well...hindsight.

Let's go eat some funnel cake. For those of you who have never had it, it's basically a big flat donut, sprinkled with powdered sugar and drizzled with caramel, fruit toppings....whatever your heart desires. Good stuff. Especially when relaxing on the deck of our cabin.

Vacation coming up and a freebie for you!

2007-08-17T20:54:00.000-07:00

We're going to Gatlinburg again. Enjoyed ourselves when we went for our anniversary, and decided to take my parents. More funnel cakes - yum! I've been playing a good bit of poker to help with some spending money for the trip and worked it up from about $400 to a tad over $1600 the past 2 months. Looking to get to $2000 by the end of August when we go. That'll let me withdraw $1k, and still have plenty for playing $3/$6 stud at Absolute.

Oh, and the freebie. If you like your chances, go register to win a free copy of Poker Tracker. It's on us!

Hellmuth Crash Video -- Mad driving skillz!

2007-07-12T19:08:00.000-07:00

Did he lose control or was he just staring at himself in the mirror?

(Seriously, glad to see him walk away just fine!)

Hellmuth wins his 11th

2007-06-16T14:11:00.000-07:00

Hellmuth brought his "A" game to World Series of Poker event #15 (and probably a little extra whine -- sorry, couldn't resist!). The poker brat, as he is known, is for the moment, the all time leader in WSOP gold bracelets. Phil outlasted a field of 2628 to take down the $1500 buyin event which paid him a fat $637,254 for his efforts.

Scanning down the list of entries, I really didn't see many names I recognized, but winning any WSOP bracelet is a great accomplishment these days with thousands of entries.

Here's hoping either Chan or Brunson gets his 11th this year. Phil has never had the "lead" in this race, to my knowledge, so we can only imagine the extent to which his head will expand during the coming 12 months, if nobody ties him up in this WSOP.

Hellmuth catches a lot of flack, and some are even dismissive of his wins because he plays so many events. The guy has won in excess of $5 million at the World Series of Poker, and that can't be knocked.

He's great for T.V., and I suspect ESPN will cover the final table of this event here in a month or so. Put him, Matusow and "Sheiky" at the same table, and I'd sell tickets for a spot on the rail. He's entertaining to watch. Just like McEnroe.

Yahoo! Poker

2007-06-12T18:35:00.000-07:00

Pardon me if I'm wrong, but this has gotta be another coup for online poker. We seem to be on a roll lately. Have you heard about this? Yahoo has launched real money poker. They have had a play money poker game for the many thousands of Yahoo! members who play the various free games, but this is a huge step to go from freebie games for fun to plunking real money down on the tables.

Yahoo! Poker will be marketed to the millions of Yahoo members around the world, I'm sure and with their already famous brand, there will already be a degree of trust and confidence. A general public that might have considered online gaming to be mainly the realm of shady operators, will see it thrust directly into the light.

There is nothing shady about Yahoo, and in fact there was really nothing shady about your online poker industry these past few years. Just businesses looking to make a buck in the entertainment field.

Yahoo real money poker is not open to USA members yet. It should only be a matter of time though. We Yanks love freedom, and the ability to play poker at our desk in our underwear is a right that should not be infringed upon!

Barrel of Laughs

2007-06-06T23:37:00.001-07:00

Not poker related, but always good to have a brief chuckle to ease the pain of a bad beat here and there. My wife sends me jokes and such she gets in her email, and here is a list I thought I'd pass on. Funny stuff.

Amazingly Simple Home Remedies

1. If you are choking on an ice cube, simply pour a cup of boiling water down your throat. Presto! The blockage will instantly remove itself.

2. Avoid cutting yourself slicing vegetables by getting someone else to hold while you chop.

3. Avoid arguments with the Mrs. about lifting the toilet seat by using the sink.

4. For high blood pressure sufferers: simply cut yourself and bleed for a few minutes, thus reducing the pressure in your veins. Remember to use a timer.

5. A mouse trap, placed on top of your alarm clock, will prevent you from rolling over and going back to sleep after you hit the snooze button.

6. If you have a bad cough, take a large dose of laxatives -- then you will be afraid to cough.

7. You only need two tools in life: WD-40 and duct tape. If it doesn't move and should, use the WD-40. If it shouldn't move and does, use the duct tape.

I found #5 and #6 to be pretty good chuckles. #7...well, what's so funny about that? Gospel truth. ;]

Roller Coastin'

2007-06-05T18:18:00.000-07:00

As many of the folks know who frequent our poker forums, I don't have near as much time to play anymore with poker site projects and a baby nearing his 1 year birthday. It tends to make for short sessions at the poker tables, and more of a "roller coaster". Poker is all about long term results, and it's hard to get "long term" when you get just a few hours a week to play!

At any rate, after clearing out a large portion of my bankroll to support Leslie's spending habits in Gatlinburg (and mine of course), I've managed to donk away another $175 or so a few nights ago. I've since made back about $100 of it with a couple of small decent sessions.

I'm starting to like the 6 handed sit n go's at Absolute Poker. Top two pay, so only 4 ppl to beat to cash, whereas with 9 person SNG's you have to see 6 people out the door to cash, and 3rd place in a 9 hander isn't as good a payoff as 2nd in a 6 hander.

Anyway... I've played two this week. Won one, and finished 2nd in the other. I should really concentrate a bit more on NLHE sng's. I used to do pretty well with them, but with limited time, have tended to just play stud.

I'd really really really like to get into MTT's. I've got enough points at most of these sites to get free entries for a good number of large guarantees. Maybe I'll post a fat win here in a month or two. Stay tuned. ;]

Judgement Day for the Wireless Leechers

2007-05-31T17:35:00.000-07:00

I'm guilty! Good thing I don't live in Michigan, eh? According to a Fox News story, some poor gent minding his own business and accessing the internet on a coffee shops Wi-Fi during his lunch break, faced felony charge for his crimes.

The coffee shop owner didn't care. They provide the connection free to attract customers there. Seems Barney Fife (Police Chief Andrew Milanowski) got the call that there might be someone stalking a barber shop owner in the same strip. Grabbing his bullet and gun, "Barn" discovered Sam Peterson II of Cedar Springs, MI., answering emails *gasp* in his car, outside the coffee shop.

Lord knows that these young folks who use these here internet tubes, especially nefarious access from a parked car, have gotta be up to no good. (How do they do these things anyway? No wires? Gotta be illegal!)

Needless to say, this situation has been nipped in the bud. Faced with felony charges, Peterson opted for a $400 fine and community service.

Let's just take a moment to honor Police Chief Andrew Milanowski and the Kent County Prosecutors Office for their dedication to protecting and serving.

Back to the tables...

Vacation

2007-05-26T16:45:00.000-07:00

Spent the past week in Pigeon Forge / Gatlinburg, TN. It was nice to get away for awhile. I actually left my laptop here at the house, so my only connection to the "job" and poker was my cell phone.

One of the few downsides to being self employed is you could work all day, every day, stopping only to relieve the necessary things such as hunger and bowels, and actually enjoy it. It's almost as addictive as Ultima Online was back in our PvP glory days on the Atlantic Shard. At least as my life slips away with this, it's showing a profit. So needless to say, a vacation was in order according to my wife.

She was right.

It'll be wonderful if poker pays my bills for the rest of my life, I eventually own more classic cars than Leno, and get to rebuild the Freeman farm. I'll have a lot of regrets though, if I don't enjoy the trip. My kid is already spending his inheritance on diapers and Yo Baby. I better get my cut while I've got the chance!

Poker is fun. Blowing the earnings on Funnel Cakes and Helicopter rides is even "funner"...

Another Acorn!

2007-05-14T00:33:00.000-07:00

Please, no one else read this and join me at PitBullPoker. I've now played 5 of these little guarantees, winning two and finishing 3rd in another. Awesome ROI. Seems except for the prop players running around, just about everyone on this site flat out stanks....yes, stank is worse than stink!

In other news, we're heading to Gatlinburg in the morning. I promised to leave my laptop at the house so as not to do any work or poker for a week. When are some of these poker rooms going to get a mobile phone client? I already know of a few gambling sites that let you piss away your phone bill on slots and roulette. Why not let some degenerates help pay my phone bill by donating some chips in mobile phone poker?

I digress. Here's hoping the withdrawal symptoms aren't too bad.

A Blind Hog Finds an Acorn...

2007-04-14T14:07:00.000-07:00

I'm sure many of you have heard the old phrase "a blind hog finds an acorn every now and then". Maybe not. Could be just something you hear down in the South. Well, whether you've heard it or not, I wanted to just blog a bit about a nifty little poker acorn I found a couple of weeks ago.

PitBullPoker. It's a flash poker room, which means no download. The software isn't the smoothest in the world and the room is tiny, but therein lies the acorn! I help start their 7 card stud tables there and was browsing around looking for action in other games and lo' and behold, came upon a $300 guarantee for a measley $10 buyin. With just a few minutes till start time, there were only 3 people registered! That meant that if noone else registered, the #3 guy would win $60 for his $11 buyin, just for sitting down. Of course I sat and so did a few others. It ended up being 12 total sitting, and I won the thing for a $150 payout on my $10 buyin.

I looked further and found a $500 guarantee for $22 buyin. Same thing on that tourney, with start time very close less than 10 players registered. Sweet :) -- These are rebuys, but generally you only have a couple of rebuyers. In essence, you're getting into a $30+3 SNG for a $11 buyin or a $50+$5 SNG for $22. That's a good deal.

Once the site grows, it won't be near as good a deal, but for now, I may be spending a good bit of time there. ;]

I expect this room will grow at a decent pace as they do have some good bonuses going, including a no deposit bonus and an instant bonus where you get your bonus chips immediately without having to play hands to release them into your real money account.

Conclusion. The big sites are great, but there are lots of little gems out there to be found in these smaller poker rooms. Just gotta look around.

Epassporte

2007-03-02T20:53:00.000-08:00

Busy busy times these days! Neteller dropping out of the USA market just about put a big hurting on my beans and taters money. Thankfully, MadMat from over at PSORG bailed me out by taking my transfers to his UK neteller, depositing to Stars and then transferring to me there. So post- neteller, let me give my experiences with other e-wallets in the hopes that someone looking for deposit/withdraw methods, can use it.

Epassporte was my first new ewallet. Customer service was massively slow, as can be expected with thousands of people flooding out of Neteller and looking for a new service. I found that depositing to a poker room was a cinch. I created my Epassporte account, funded it with my bank issued Visa Debit card and then deposited to Absolute. The entire process took me 15 minutes? The trick though is getting your account setup to withdraw. This is a concern for winning poker players yes? :)

It took me a bit less than two weeks to get my bank account connected to Epassporte, and to get my physical visa card (called the Electron Card). This card cost $35, but it's very well worth it. I'm able to withdraw $600 per day from most any ATM, so getting my money from the poker sites is relatively easy, though I suppose I am putting in a lot of face time on the local bank's security camera. All in all, I'm very satisfied with Epassporte thus far. Their strongest point is the fact that they are accepted for deposit/withdrawals at every poker site I play (Absolute, UB, Full Tilt, Poker Stars and even PitBull Poker).

Pro's : Good ATM system if you pay $35 for the card. Widely accepted method by poker rooms.

Con's: Daily withdrawal from Epass to bank is $300. What the heck? Annoying if you need to get home a good bit fast. This can be overcome of course, if you have the ATM card. I can get $900 home per day now, between the card and the direct deposit to my bank.

War on the Bonus Whores?

2007-01-13T07:45:00.000-08:00

The Absolute Poker gravy train slowed down last month with new bonus terms, and will come to a complete halt Feb 1st if they go through with bonuses deducted from rakeback and a tighter contributed rakeback method. Too bad there aren't any other real gravy trains out there for US players. (Rooms that combine a good population, good bonus, fat rakeback with no deductions).

There does seem to be an effort on the part of the online poker rooms to slow down the bonus whoring movement. Makes sense. There was a time when every poker room for the most part had “party poker“ bonuses. The idea wasn't to make money off the player while they cleared bonus, but to draw them there with the bonus and make money later after the bonus was cleared. However, with the immense popularity of bonus whoring, you had players who just cleared bonuses, moved on, and only visited again when there was another bonus. The poker rooms were not making a dime off these players.

If a player is giving a net monthly loss to the casino (clearing more bonus than they generate in rake), why would the casino care if that player leaves? In the brick and mortar world, if a player is continuously making money off a casino, they get blacklisted and booted out of Vegas.

I've seen so many players venting their anger, pulling up stakes to move to another poker room, emailing Absolute to let them know they've just lost a customer, etc etc., when a closer analogy would be finally kicking that freeloading relative off your couch.

I'm not trying to be condescending to the bonus whoring population. We've even got a How To: Bonus Whoring formula on PSORG. I'm just trying my best to put all of this into perspective. I think bonus whores should expect the following in 2007:

Tougher bonus clearing terms across the board that allows the poker room to make money even as the bonus whore is clearing bonuses.
If bonus whoring is what keeps your bankroll afloat, expect to go broke.
Players who were satisfied with bonus and rakeback income at micro levels, to a point that they did not desire to move up and get better, will find that if they want poker to continue to be a nice side income, they'll need to take a shot at $2/$4, $3/$6, $4/$8 and on up.

I think #3 is good for players whose original intent was to become good at poker, not to become good at clearing bonuses. In fact, I've come to a firm conclusion over the past year and a half that bonus whoring has seriously retarded the development of potentially excellent poker players.

An old saying that I just made up says once you're happy with where you are, there's no need to keep looking at the roadmap. Time to break out those dusty roadmaps (poker books, critical thinking skills) and start charting a course for bigger returns.

New Year Resolutions

2007-01-02T03:33:00.000-08:00

Here we go again. Another clean slate, with a full year to screw it up! -- Well, how do you view the new year?

I was looking at our poker strategy forum, and was interested to read some of the New Year's Poker Resolutions that some of our members have came up with. From the lofty goals of trying to make 20k+ this year as a part time player to just becoming profitable, seems like poker players have lots of improvement on their minds.

For myself, I've got a resolution and a prayer for 2007. My resolution is simple enough... actually get good at 7 card stud 8/b. That's 7 card stud hi/lo, by the way. I've been a profitable 7 card stud player for several years now (how time flies!)... I've turned a profit at limit holdem, sit n gos, and the like, but 7 card stud being my favorite game, and currently being quite ignorant at hi lo variations, I believe it's time to enlarge my coasts.

The prayer? That the US government and banks will not rip us a new pooper this year.

Something else before I close. When you're looking forward to 2007, take a moment to look back at 2006. Resolutions won't get far if we don't look back on and correct mistakes.

2006 was awesome, marking the birth of Dylan, our first child. It was a bad year in terms of my "job" though, with the collective poker world's lack of concern or action, and the eventual passage of the Unlawful Internet Gambling Enforcement Act. Only time will tell if it's going to have any real effect.

I like eating, buying diapers (not really changing them though), and all the other stuff that money allows us to do. Online Poker's been doing that for me since Dec. 2004, and here's to keeping a good thing going!

UIGEA, Elections, and my $1000 goal.

2006-11-10T00:47:00.000-08:00

First the good news. I blew past my $1000 goal last month, though I had to finish it off at Absolute Poker as opposed to Titan. The brain trust at iPoker have determined that it's best for business to drop US players. Oh well... good to know Absolute is still accepting my rake dollars.

That brings us to the UIGEA, or for folks who like to talk in mouthfuls, Unlawful Internet Gambling Enforcement Act of 2006. What can I say that has not already been said? Bill Frist loopholed and gamed our government system to ram through a bill that negatively impacts millions of people around the world. The bill was against the opinions of a majority of Americans, and did not have enough support to pass on it's own merits, so he attached it to the Port Security Bill in the dead of night on the last day before Congress broke for the elections. Slimey.

Ahh, but sweet revenge on November 7th. With close elections all over the country, there is no doubt in my mind that ticked off poker players helped toss the bums out. As one poster put it over on the TwoPlusTwo legislation forums, "tell me what to do with my mouse, lose your seat in the House."

Where does poker go from here? Well, there is the simple law of supply and demand that trumps any law Congress has ever passed. As long as there are poker players in the States who want to play online, and as long as there are poker sites willing to accept them, we will most assuredly be able to play this game to our hearts content.

I look forward to the day that online poker is legal and regulated here in the USA, and we see Harrah's, MGM and others battling Party Poker for our business. Until then, I'll be playing for fishies chips and rakeback on any site that will take me!

Lawd have Mercy...

2006-09-19T04:57:00.000-07:00

Nothing hurts worse than sitting at a wonderful table watching everyone else clean up on the 2 or 3 suckers, and either you're getting no cards or when you do get 'em they're drowning in the river to 4's full of deuces.

I've hit a brick wall on my quest to go from $100 to $1000 at Titan for kicks and giggles. Stuck hard between $700 and $800. That while there has been a dreamy $2/$4 table going for a couple of nights this week.

On the bright side, I'm generating lots of rake for Titan, and moved up to "Silver" status this month and am just a couple thousand from Gold. What does that mean? Pretty much nothing... except my bonus only takes 500 hands for $10 instead of 1000 on average. Whoever is running the titan bonus promo is brain dead. I know lots... I mean lots, of low and middle limit players who would play there if the bonus was just a tad bit easier to clear, and having looked at many an affiliate report and statistics, I know that they could be a bit gentler on the bonus release and still make money.

If the suckers stay though, I suppose I'll stay. Nothing like playing against folks who raise you on the river with their straight when you've got 4 suited cards on your porch and have been betting since 4th street. ;]

PSOCoach, aka. House Shill

2006-08-26T23:02:00.000-07:00

Ran up over $800 at Titan last night, and got called a "house shill" in the process. Basically the guy was accusing me of working for Titan to create games and they repay me by juicing my cards because according to him I always get "so $%^& lucky"....

Chuckle, Chuckle, Chortle, Chortle.

Also got called a "true studder" and not by my wife. Another 7cs player at Titan issued that decree. Both were compliments and I've certainly been called worse... well, the "house shill" wasn't meant to be a compliment, but I'll take it.

Another "goofy mistake" to add to the list that I see so often here at Titan is "coming to the table with 5 big bets." Amazing how many peeps show up with $10 at a $1/$2 limit game, then proceed to play with a shortstack mentality... you know, where rather than play good aggressive poker with good cards, they just wait on any 3 suited, or connected or maybe just 3 big cards and shove all their chips in the middle and hope for the best? Works great for me though, especially if it's heads up and they keep rebuying. :)

Don't get me wrong. Not everyone at Titan stinks. There are some fair to good players there, but most fall under the "loose aggressive" or "loose passive" columns. This is usually the case at "new" poker rooms, I think, and especially at Titan where they just very recently added 7 card stud, so you've got a lot of holdem junkies who try their hand at it, get AK3 and are like "wow, AK!" bet/raise!

I digress. Here's hoping the good run continues a bit longer.

Truly Horrible 7cs Players at Titan Part II

2006-08-25T01:13:00.000-07:00

Happy to report that my first judgement was 100% dead on. These guys (for the most part) suck harder than Dylan on his pacifier.

After starting to play there just a few weeks ago, I've run the bankroll from just under $100 to over $750 (if I sit out of my game right now). This is almost exclusively at $1/$2, and I'm not playing tons of hours. The opponents are just...that...bad.

Some mistakes that I see very often:
Players betting their porches on the river.
Players calling with small pair, small kicker looking at a higher pair.
Getting married to draws w/few outs left...even inside str8 draws.

I even saw one guy call looking at AAA on another gents porch. When they flipped the cards over at showdown, the caller had jacks up. Beaten badly in sight, hoping that he would catch one of his 4 outs while AAA missed one of his 9? Wow. I mean, I know it's low limit poker, but my goodness. A buck still buys a coke at your friendly neighborhood walmart right?

Ahh well. I hope they don't read this blog and learn better. I'd much prefer they continue to donate to our diaper fund. ;]

Truly horrible 7 Card Stud players

2006-08-15T10:39:00.000-07:00

The headline says it all. Too bad the only active tables are up to $1/$2 limit! 60-70% "see 4th street percentages" and pot sizes averaging close to $20 (that's 10 big bets folks).

For all you high rollers, I know it's not much, but I've been playing for just a couple hours the last couple nights and scoring about $25-$30 per evening. Variance will be high with these loosey goosey rooms, but it's a nice change from some of the 7 card stud rock gardens out there.

I was able to play my 500 titan points quickly enough, and am now registered for the $2000 PSORG Vacation Cruise Freeroll. Sunny Caribbean here we come!

Titan Jackpot SNG's

2006-07-23T06:25:00.000-07:00

Got in a tournament tonight, really by accident. I was doing a transfer on Titan to friend, and noticed I had a free token to the Rio Jackpot sit n go's, worth around $20. The last day to play it was the 23rd (today!) so I went ahead and hopped in.

Ended up winning the thing, and felt very good about how it went. I didn't get the best cards in the world...never a hand better than JJ, but I did double up with the JJ giving me a good stack of chips. I was able to hit a few good flops and steal some chips along the way.

Word is, if you win 6 of these in a row, it's worth $25,000. Another guy in the same SNG who finished third, noted he had won 4 in a row. I actually hoped he would win, because I was in essence freerolling, and heck, it's always nice to see someone cash in on a big promotion. Well, obviously he didn't win... finished third.

Makes me wonder if one of the reasons I played pretty well was because I wasn't under any pressure? Actually pulling for another player? Odd.... --- Maybe shooting for second is the key to winning sit n go's? ;]

Disclaimer. Please don't take what I just said as legit strategy and lose your tail off, playing for 2nd play money. This is just a small ramble from an largely incoherent mind, after pulling an all nighter.

New Arrival

2006-07-20T02:11:00.000-07:00

At long last, we finally have a little boy out breathing oxygen. Dylan was born June 15th and this fact pretty well explains the month between posts here on the blog.

Amazing little creature, I must say and looks a lot like me when I was a month old. Almost spitting image in fact.

Needless to say, work and poker took a backseat for a few weeks. I'm really just now recovering to the point that I can keep up with the daily workload and get in a few hands of poker. Why didn't someone warn me that I would get zero sleep for the first several weeks? Or did someone warn me and I just wasn't listening?

Props to Middle Tenn. Medical Center. It's the best place in the world to have a baby!

Roots and other updates...

2006-06-03T23:31:00.000-07:00

Haven't had a lot of time to play recently, but the ol' Royal Vegas bankroll has climbed to $167, so that's +20 since my last posting.

Why don't I have much time to play? Leslie hit 38 weeks pregnant on Friday, June 2nd. We've been massively busy getting the finishing touches put on the nursery, and when we're not doing that, we're taking laps around the MTSU campus trying to help labor along!

I know you're probably not interested in reading baby stuff on a poker blog, but... it's real life, after all. ;]

Wish me luck at the tables. I suspect diapers are going to become a major expense soon!

Roots Update....

2006-05-24T22:19:00.000-07:00

Having withdrawn all by about $70 from my Royal Vegas account for baby expenses, I've doubled it again, in just 3 sessions to $147.

Why did I ever quit playing poker at Royal Vegas? (Oh yea...it was the constant reload bonuses and rakeback at Absolute Poker).

I'm seriously considering just dropping my bankroll here or another prima poker room with rakeback. One thing that I've always been proud of though, when looking back on the freebie $10 to $1000 bankroll that I built at Royal three years ago. It was completely devoid of rakeback or bonuses. I even screwed up my first time deposit, only depositing $20 for an $8 bonus when I could have deposited $100 for a $40 bonus. Doh!

Point is, a lot of "winning" players are only winners because of bonuses and comps. To grow a bankroll on strictly poker table earnings actually takes some work and study.

....that or someone at Royal likes me and is rigging the deck in my favor?

See you at the tables!

No Time for Poker...

2006-05-17T14:55:00.000-07:00

I tell ya, when I got into building poker tip sites, it was something I did while not playing poker. Now it seems I don't have any time to play poker! Not that I'm complaining. Working with poker portals is a lot less stressful.

Leslie (my wife) is 35 weeks and 5 days pregnant as of this posting, so looks like the prospects for extra time are on the decrease.

Ahh well.... a little time away makes the heart grow fonder no?

I certainly enjoy and value my poker time more, now that there is a serious lack of it. Oh 12 hour sessions, how I miss thee!

The Sunny Caribbean...

2006-05-16T13:24:00.000-07:00

Sounds like a nice place to be this Fall, doesn't it?

After giving away thousands of dollars in rakeback, running a World Series of Poker freeroll, and lots of other interesting events, we decided to look for something unrelated to poker.

Viola! Everyone likes vacations right? We've launched a Freeroll your way to a Cruise Vacation package this summer. Pretty simple rules and eligibility requirements too.

Play poker, win a cruise. Better yet, take that cruise when everyone else is firing up the gas heaters and winterizing their RV's.

Finally, a poker promotion that even our wive's can support!

Back to my roots...

2006-05-11T08:14:00.000-07:00

Having withdrawn the majority of our bankrolls to buy baby stuff, I'm back to nickel and diming it with about a $500 roll. While tooling around my old stomping grounds (Royal Vegas) I happened upon an active .50/$1 room. That's correct...quarters. Back when I first started playing 7 Card Stud online for real money, this room was no ante, but it's a dime ante now. It makes me wonder if I would have been able to turn the $10 no deposit bonus into $1000 a couple years ago, if they'd had that ante...

Interesting, the little twists of fate. It was after turning the $10 into $1000 that I got together with Bryan and really decided upon launching a poker tips website.

I digress. At any rate, I sat down with a gent heads up and had a very nice session. Cleaned him out twice, and finished the one hour session +25 big bets... (that looks better than + $25!) ... I think I'll play a little more at Royal. I've always had good success there and never had bonus or rakeback to inflate my earnings.

With a wife at 34 weeks and 6 days pregnant as of this posting, I'm playing for diapers!

Wanna play a quick game of HORSE?

2006-05-04T03:07:00.000-07:00

Leave it to the competitive poker world to turn one of the most popular backyard games into a poker tournament acronym.

We're not talking basketball here! The poker world spells H.O.R.S.E like this:
H= Holdem
O= Omaha
R= Razz
S= Seven card Stud
E= Seven card Stud Eight or better.

In essence, it is a single tournament but at different intervals, a different variation of poker is played. The World Series of Poker has added a $50,000 buy in event World Series of Poker 2006....(that's right, $50 grand to play).

If you plan to play a HORSE Poker Tournament, then make a point to bone up on the rules and basic strategy before plunking down fifty dimes!

Oh, and a good place...check that, the only place to practice HORSE Poker online? Full Tilt Poker my friends.

I hope more sites add it after WSOP 2006!

Sports betting...

2006-03-04T00:58:00.000-08:00

Ok, so I was off on my Super Bowl pick. Granted I still think I picked the right team, but that's the thing about sports betting, it's almost always a coin flip situation.

I've never laid a sports bet in my life. It's just so much easier to make money at poker (knock on wood! A horrible run of late!)...

Still, an intelligent sports better can eek out a long run profit, unlike blackjack (Just ask Bryan, co-founder of www.poker-strategy.org!)

Off-poker-topic of the day. Leslie is 25 weeks still pregnant. Maybe we'll have a kid after all! How will I ever be able to shield him from this dangerous online gambling, when it's my job?!? Bah...maybe he'll be the next Phil Hellmuth minus the man-boobs and attitude.

Super Bowl - A small wager...

2006-02-04T01:26:00.000-08:00

Pull your sorry butts away from the poker tables for just a few moments and consider another great American pastime -- Football. The one that uses the egg shaped ball? Seattle and Pittsburgh line up for the biggest game of the year... the Super Bowl.

From what I understand, the Super Bowl garnishes the most sports bets of the year. It's no surprise given the weeks of hype leading up to the big event. They've got bets on everything from point spread to who will win the coin toss. What's the over/under on how many lunatics will go streaking across the field? Or does that just happen in Baseball?

At any rate, here is my take. The line last I checked was Steelers -4, and the over/under was 47 points. For the folks in need of a quick sports betting guide, that simply means that according to the Vegas bookies, the Steelers are favored to win by 4 points or more, and the total points scored in the game should be 47.

If you chose to bet on Seattle, as long as they do not lose by more than a field goal, you win your bet. If you take Pittsburgh, not only do they have to win, but they have to win by 5 points or more. If they win by exactly 4, it's a "push" and noone wins anything. (Expect that line to move to 3 and 1/2 or something similar, before game time! This ensures that a push is impossible, since there is no way you can score a half a point!) If you wanted to make a bet on points scored, you just choose whether you believe they'll score more or less points than 47.

My take? I'd take Seattle and the points. Why? I believe they have a better running game, and that has been both teams strength most of the season. Both teams have excellent defense, which will minimize that run strength to some extent. I feel it'll then come down to two important factors. Whose quarterback preforms well and coaching. I've gotta give the nod to Seattle on both of those counts. Their QB is much more experienced and their coach has much more Super Bowl experience. Between that and a 3 points cushion, my bet would go for Seattle.

The over/under is a pretty easy choice for me. The teams averaged a combined 52 points a game during the season, while holding opponents to an average 33 points per game. That would logically lead us to believe that the point range would be 33-55. Given that both defenses are solid, I've gotta think that they'll score on the lower end of that range.

Finally, I believe sports betting should be done for pure entertainment. It takes alot...alot....of work to actually educate oneself on enough angles to beat the bookmaker on a regular basis and show a profit at sports betting. Trust me, I'm not willing to do that. Beating online poker is sooo much easier!

Best of luck with your wagers! Now back to the poker tables wid' ye!

And now it is 2006!

2006-01-20T17:13:00.000-08:00

Well, if I can get a post a month I'll be doing better than last year. So how about some updates on what's going on in poker, at our poker forum and in real life:

At our poker forum, the first public rakeback advocate, we gave out over a quarter of a million dollars in rake rebate in 2005! Holy cow! My goal was a tenth of that. Congrats to those big chip earners on all those extra chips. I hope you put them to good use. ;]

We have increased our private tournaments, and now have a monthly league tourney for members at Absolute Poker and Titan Poker and are even sponsoring a private freeroll to the World Series of Poker 2006.

Some major happenings going on! Just the way I like it...keeps life interesting does it not?

I'm currently spending my time at several poker rooms and am trying to find a happy medium between Dan Harrington and Eric Lindgren's tournament strategy. Amazing the difference, yet both have found major success. I finished final table 5 times in multi-table tournaments and won two. All online and all low buy in unfortunately, I don't have millions to show for it. I guess we have to start somewhere though, eh?

Finally, in me olde boring life, Leslie is over 19 weeks pregnant. That's 12 weeks longer than we've ever made it before. The last time we had an ultrasound (17 weeks) there appeared to be a "wee wee" growing on the little booger, so we may have a boy on the way. We'll know a little more definitely here in a few days. If it comes out healthy...even semi-healthy, I'm a happy camper.

On a side note, I now know about as much about bicornate uteruses and baby cribs as I do about poker. Time for another website and forum idea? Hmm...

Good luck in poker and most importantly, good luck in life!

Goodness it's almost 2006!

2005-12-11T12:05:00.000-08:00

Maybe my new years resolution will be to blog at least once a month! At least I got one of my '05 resolutions completed. We smoked the total for rebates to our forum members at www.poker-strategy.org, that I was hoping for. In fact, we hit our goal for the year after the first quarter!

A great year for poker is coming to an end. May we all have more time to play (and blog) in 2006, and may ye all have a wonderful Christmas and New Year holiday.

And in all of our wining and dining, let's not forget the reason for the season! Do something special for someone that isn't our family or friends and by all means feel free to darken the door of your local church (and tithe off your poker earnings!)... ;]

Oh, we're over 13 weeks pregnant. May that little heart keep on beating at 150+ beats per minute.

Cheers!

After a long hiatus

2005-04-15T00:22:00.000-07:00

Well, after a long hiatus, I do believe it is time for an update. I've not played a ton of poker over the past month, being massively busy with our page, www.poker-strategy.org . It's amazing how activity for every aspect of the poker industry has picked up as we move closer and closer to the World Series of Poker, 2005.

Leslie on the other hand has had loads of time to play and has made very good use of her time. She plays primarily at Absolute Poker and during the month of March posted a +1650 addition to her bankroll in the 1/2 and 2/4 7cs games there. Not too shabby. ;]

On other fronts, one of my original goals this year was to give away a high amount in rake back to members of our page. Off the top of my head, I believe the figure was $20,000 as the goal. I am happy to report that we've blown past that landmark in the first three months!

January 2005 - March 2005 total rake rebates paid to our players stands at $28,611.12 ...Holy Cow!

Last weekend, I got a chance to meet a couple of our forum members, when Brad (Undream) and Casie along with their two young children dropped by our corner of the world in southern middle Tennessee. Despite having trouble understanding my thick drawl, we had a very good time. Plans are in the works now to drum up some sort of PSORG convention as well. I'm looking forward to it, as our humble poker community takes yet another step in extending relationships past our intial common interests.

Now if I can just find some time to play a little poker so as not to embarrass myself when we all meet up at a casino!

A real life "bad run" comes to an end...

2005-02-21T14:31:00.000-08:00

Well, at least lets hope so. After having a 2 year old cousin die and dealing with our 2nd miscarriage in a year, all within the space a week, things might be turning the corner. I've went a solid week with no massive catastrophy...hot dang.

Real life just sucks sometimes.

On the poker front, I'm killing the 1/2 6-handed tables at Empire, 7 Card Stud, when I actually have time to play. Each one hour session I've played has been a good +15 BB's, which is way over the average I would expect...

On the bright side in real life, I'm more indebted than ever to our online community at www.poker-strategy.org . 7 or 8 of our regular members dug into their bankrolls and sprung for a brand new Dell Inspiron 6000 Laptop for me. Not exactly sure what I did to deserve such thoughtfulness. I was stunned not only that they did it, but that they (including my wife) could keep a secret for a week or 2 :)

We're not pro's; our forum is filled with low and middle limit recreational players, albeit profitable recreational players. You won't find as many posts explaining the use of game theory in making or calling bluffs, as you might in other poker strategy forums. I can also guarantee you won't find another poker forum with members who genuinely care about each others well being, poker and beyond like PSORG'ers do.

Props to the PSORG folks. They've turned a list of forums that Bryan and I created, into a truly priceless community.

Thanks for the thoughts, prayers and a butt kickin' laptop!

Empire Update

2005-02-06T02:51:00.000-08:00

Finally got around to depositing enough to play the 1/2 tables at Empire, and am enjoying myself thus far. The .5/1 tables are pretty much pointless to play in my opinion, as the rediculous ante structure make it so every fish is playing somewhat correctly by playing any 3 cards dealt to them. Inside straight draws have correct pot odds, etc.

I'm making a point to not rob the bankrolls. Between Leslie (my wife) and I we've got around $1600 split between three sites. Generally we would have made several withdrawals, keeping our totals under $600. My goal now is to keep enough in there to go from 1/2 to 2/4 and eventually 3/6 by years end. This will be a challenge, because I want to have enough of a bankroll to accomplish this for at least two sites, possibly 3. I'll prefer about $1800 at each to play 3/6 comfortably.

The sites I'm looking to have at this level are Absolute, Empire and Royal Vegas. Absolute is a cash cow, with reloads weekly, so I would be a dip not to take advantage of that. Empire is massively lucrative just because of the thousands of fools who deposit and play without even taking the time to learn the hand ranks. I'm quite fond of the 6 max tables as well...cuts down on the suckouts and rewards aggressive play. Finally, I want $1800 on Royal Vegas as well. Their loyalty bonus jumped to $40,000 split between the top 1500 players, and I used to be a perpetual top 100 there. Those bonuses were nice :)

Final thought, and I may make a new entry later on this. If you are married and haven't got your spouse involved in Online Poker, now would be a good time. Leslie's never read a poker book, but thanks to my endless boring chatter about 7 Card Stud strategy, she has turned a nice profit over the past 1 1/2 years, playing limits from .5/1 to 2/4 herself.

With 2 players solid players in the household, the bonuses and profit we'll make will double this year if we put our minds to it.

Notes and Bonuses

$10 No Deposit Bonus at Royal Vegas is still going, if you want to try your hand at real money online poker without risking any of your own money. Click Here and sign up.

Absolute Poker is not only famous for for weekly reloads, but also for being the first site to have automated rake rebates through an affiliate site, our very own www.poker-strategy.org . Earn 15% of your rake back each month on top of your other bonuses, and deposited directly back into your player account. Sign up through one of the Absolute links on this post, or visit www.poker-strategy.org and click the Rake Rebate tab for the scoop on online poker rake rebates.

Empire Poker, the other poker site mentioned above is a "skin" of Party Poker. Email me for custom rebate deals to Party Skin's, and earn up to 20% of your rake back each month. If you're in a hurry and not interested in rebates, go to www.empirepoker.com and sign up with bonus code POKER8, and receive a 20% matching deposit bonus up to $100 free on your first deposit.

Playing any 3

2005-01-15T02:26:00.000-08:00

After over a year away, I decided to load up at the Party/Empire tables the other night. The main idea being to be able to do player to player transfers to award rake commissions for our Empire players. Since they awarded me a pending bonus even though I didn't use a bonus code, and I had $100 left after paying rebates, I set out to clear it. Who can turn down free $$ ??

Nothing has changed. The ante structure is still awful, with .25 for the .50/1 tables, where I began clearing my bonus. A 50% ante??? It's almost correct to play any three cards for the .25 forced bet, since by the time the other 7 call stations have tossed in their two bits, the pot odds will be roughly 15-1.

The players are still awful. Any 3 cards to start and inside straight draws are monster hands. At first you would think this would be profitable, but when you consider the odds they're getting for suckout hands, the fish are almost playing correctly.

Anyway...halfway through the bonus hands and practically dead even overall, I've decided to deposit a bit more so I can at least move up to 1/2. The ante is a quarter there as well, which is still high, but at least the call stations will be making a bigger mistake by playing any 3 cards.

I can't wait till Absolute's 1/2 and 2/4 tables are going 24-7. I love that place and have about $300 in bonus money I need to release.

The pitfalls of multi-tabling 7 Card Stud

2005-01-09T03:10:00.000-08:00

Play one table, make money! Play 2 tables and double it! Hmm...when much of the strategy of a particular poker game involves reading and remembering other players' porch cards, this might not be such a good idea. Especially given my wife's assessment of my memory...

I've had success playing 2 tables of 7 card stud, but tonight wasn't pretty. At one point I was -50 BB's at each. I finished the evening -$50, so I was pretty happy with that. Also cleared $20 in Absolute Poker pending bonus money, so that helped to ease the pain.

On other fronts, I'm very much looking forward to our private tournament satellite, Sunday, 1-9-05, at 2 p.m. CST. Our rake rebate program has drawn some excellent players and site members, and the social aspects of this thing are more rewarding for me than anything else...especially since it's my money sweetening the prize pool ;] Nothing like playing for the goal of only losing half the prize pool eh?

I should add a resolution to my list: By the end of 2005, I'd like to see our Absolute Addict Tournament grow into a nice private multi-table tournament with poker-strategy.org being able to add hundreds of dollars added to the prize pool ...