Busted out of the 460,000 omaha hi low WCOOP tourney. Tourney had a good structure...blinds went up every half hour and were relatively small to start so there was plenty of play and not the luckfest shoving you see in the turbos. Here are the two hands that ultimately weakened and then killed me. Not getting at least half here dented me a bit...looking to get up with tourney chip leaders here.

PokerStars Game #12266010231: Tournament #70000016, $300+$20 Omaha Hi/Lo Pot Limit - Level IV(50/100) - 2007/09/25 - 16:50:48 (ET)Table '70000016 135' 9-max Seat #5 is the buttonSeat 1: ETcattle (712 in chips) Seat 2: Deal 'em22 (9206 in chips) Seat 3: bigbrains (6827 in chips) Seat 4: DirtyTowel (1485 in chips) Seat 5: strolg (3547 in chips) Seat 6: jducky (6347 in chips) Seat 7: Tutnik (5762 in chips) Seat 8: loosejuice (5348 in chips) Seat 9: tatco (6328 in chips) jducky: posts small blind 50Tutnik: posts big blind 100*** HOLE CARDS

***Dealt to Deal 'em22 [2s Ah Qh 5s]
loosejuice: calls
100tatco: folds
ETcattle: folds
Deal 'em22: calls 100
bigbrains: calls 100
DirtyTowel: folds
strolg: folds
jducky: calls 50
Tutnik: checks
*** FLOP *** [Jc Ks 8h]
jducky: bets 300
Tutnik: folds
loosejuice: calls 300
Deal 'em22: calls 300 - gutshot with backdoor draws galore and position
bigbrains: folds
*** TURN *** [Jc Ks 8h] [7h]
jducky: checks
loosejuice: checks
Deal 'em22: bets 1400 - nut flush, nut low, and broadway draws, trying to pick up pot here. Too aggressive? Maybe...looking to drop the hammer and scoop river but it was not meant to be. This was my only "on the come" big push in tourney.
jducky: calls 1400
loosejuice: calls 1400
*** RIVER *** [Jc Ks 8h 7h] [Qd]
jducky: checks
loosejuice: bets 2100
Deal 'em22: folds
jducky: folds
loosejuice collected 5600 from pot

Here is the busto hand...I survive this and I am up with chip leaders with 1/3 of field gone already. First place pays 95K so there would have been a kick to the roll if I got in the money somehow...

PokerStars Game #12266287671: Tournament #70000016, $300+$20 Omaha Hi/Lo Pot Limit - Level IV(50/100) - 2007/09/25 - 17:06:21 (ET)Table '70000016 135' 9-max Seat #4 is the buttonSeat 1: synedm (3555 in chips) Seat 2: Deal 'em22 (6956 in chips) Seat 3: mattg1983 (6352 in chips) Seat 4: Arnoldo (8342 in chips) Seat 5: strolg (3497 in chips) Seat 6: jducky (7839 in chips) Seat 7: Tutnik (13656 in chips) Seat 8: loosejuice (6998 in chips) Seat 9: tatco (7716 in chips) strolg: posts small blind 50jducky: posts big blind 100*** HOLE CARDS

***Dealt to Deal 'em22 [7c 2s Ac Kh]
Tutnik: folds
loosejuice: folds
tatco: folds
synedm: calls 100
Deal 'em22: calls 100
mattg1983: folds
Arnoldo: folds
strolg: calls 50
jducky: raises 400 to 500
synedm: calls 400
Deal 'em22: calls 400 - I fold this if synedm doesn't call.
strolg: folds
*** FLOP *** [Ks 6d 7h]
jducky: checks
synedm: checks
Deal 'em22: bets 1600jducky: calls 1600 - he calls despite it being obvious what he has and that I can cripple him on next bet.
synedm: folds
*** TURN *** [Ks 6d 7h] [Jh]
jducky: checks
Deal 'em22: bets 4800 - just hoping he didn't pick up a flush draw in which case there is no getting rid of him
jducky: calls 4800 - ugh...he has the flush draw
*** RIVER *** [Ks 6d 7h Jh] [6s]
jducky: bets 939 and is all-in
Deal 'em22: calls 56 and is all-in - i know i am beat but no sense folding really
*** SHOW DOWN ***jducky: shows [Th Ah As 8d] (HI: two pair, Aces and Sixes)
Deal 'em22: shows [7c 2s Ac Kh] (HI: two pair, Kings and Sevens)
jducky collected 14512 from pot
No low hand qualified

Omaha PL High.

Sometimes you get tired off just calling preflop and say what the fuck. Let me pop it back, he probably doesn't have aces. Then he repops and you know what you are up against but now you want to hit one on him. Call. And then the pokergods drop a gift out of the sky, all shiny and new as your opponent tries to stack off but alas it is not to be. Welcome to two outer hell. This type of stuff has happened often enough that I didn't get too fazed by it but it still stings. I am sure these things even out in the long run but it is going to have to be the very long run because today alone it happened twice. Rather improbable in that I was only playing one table for a few hours but when you run bad, you run bad. And if the universe is listening...uncle already, ok? Leave me alone for awhile.

PokerStars Pot-Limit Omaha High, $10 BB (6 handed) Hand History Converter Tool from http://www.flopturnriver.comFlopTurnRiver.com (Format: Plain Text)CO ($1911.30)



Hero ($840)

SB ($842.25)

BB ($1341)

UTG ($929.75)

MP ($377)

Preflop: Hero is Button with Td, Kc, Qs, 8s.

UTG raises to $30, 2 folds, Hero raises to $105, 2 folds, UTG raises to $330, Hero calls



$225.Flop: ($675) 7h, 8h, 8d (2 players)

UTG bets $599.75 (All-In), Hero calls $510 (All-In).

Turn: ($1695) Js (2 players, 2 all-in)

River: ($1695) Ah (2 players, 2 all-in)

Final Pot: $1695

Woke up and checked my emails. Neteller has cried uncle and will no longer transfer money to poker sites for its U.S. customers. Ideas? How do players that move big amounts of money in and out do things? If this is the divine universe's way of letting me know that perhaps leaving my riskless annuity-like comfy job, you know - the one only twenty minutes from my house with the solid benefits, the one I can do in my sleep with the friendly co-workers, that one...well, how bout just one more sign? If this is the case, please have the mailman deliver two more magazines today to my front door for my knucklehead neighbor who could not manage to fill out the forwarding address form correctly. At which point, I will reconsider this move as I, well...read his magazines :-)

Hello everyone...very funny. I have had one poster since the gala inauguration of this blog and that is one more than I thought I would have at this point. But I am grateful for one and will look to add more once I commit to writing more than once a year.

I have been toying with giving the online game a shot in earnest but I obsess about Dr. Frist's backdoor boonswoggle legislation. Do I have to get an offshore bank account and mailing address to ensure I can move money electronically? My guess is Neteller will roll over any day now as two of their former execs were arrested recently. If the answer to that is yes, how do I do it as cheaply and securely as possible? Walking away from work for awhile not much of a problem as I have many years experience and an MBA should online play prove unforgiving. Just hop back on the merry-go-round and hope that pay at least approximates what I make now. The plan would be to focus my energies on PL Omaha, either 3-6 or 5-10 initially as the swings at these levels are well below what I can afford. I would also like to work on my NL holdem game at similar stakes. I could put more of my cash initially to play bigger but I see no reason to do that. Why not just earn my way up the ladder and be patient? If I can't beat 5-10, 10-20 isn't going to work either. My work bonus doesn't hit for another month and a half so plenty of time to think more about this.

Meanwhile, my weekly game is on life support. We used to have 6 to 8 stout players, now down to four diehards and one every other week type. Short handed play really exposes weak play so some guys lose fairly regularly and it can get a little pricey. A 200 buck loss is no biggie, but you put a few of the 400-500 ones together and maybe one real bad one and you have a player reconsider just why he plays in game anymore. We play dealers choice, lots of PL Omaha and Holdem, usually 200 cap. We also play lots of games with fixed max bets like 30 bucks, 5 or 2, Omaha hi-low, Seventy Straight, Eighty Trips, etc. Any guys in Bergen County, NJ looking for a weekly game?

Played an hour or so online, 3-6 holdem no limit...played a 300 stack and won first two hands, small pots but always nice to start well.

Here's one for the weekly game fellas: I raise preflop on the button and get one caller. Flop comes jack high, 4 5...I check and raise other guys 20 wager with same amount, he calls. Turn brings a king...I lead out for 100 straight and he calls again after thinking awhile, think he is on a weak jack. River brings the 6 and I pop it for 200. Assuming he has the jack, what do you do? I have only a buck or two left so a raise means nothing here and if he calls and loses I would have taken about 60% of his stack.
He ended up folding without showing...I had absolutely nothing so I either had to just run up the surrender flag or fire one more shot. Since he didn't raise me at any point in hand I never felt he made two pair which would be an automatic call. Maybe he had J 10 or Q J, who knows. I took the muck option off and flashed the table my offsuit 8 10! Try and get them to give me action because now I am going into full rock mode, no more bluffs (was the only one I did in session.)

I got KK in the big blind and someone had raised the pot 20 preflop. I decided to re-raise though I am sure I could have smooth called and then check raised any flop without an ace or three connected cards. Decided to throw out the line and see if QQ or JJ was out there for the hammering. No such luck, guy folded :(

Had 22 early on but faced a raise in front of me with two to act behind me...was afraid of a re-raise and decided to fold. Sure enough guy behind me raises 45 which would have ended it right there for me. Here is the bad part...flop comes 9 5 2! ka-ching...I would have pulled 300 easy there, would have made boat 2's and 9's...re-raiser had KK. KK putting his whole stack in on flop if I play it right but alas I was already out.

That's all I remember as the game was adjourned for the ringing dinner bell...mustard chicken with rice and beans dominates six handed hold'em. Nice to be back at an online table since I haven't played since early winter.

It is the last workday before Christmas and it is dead dead dead at work. So I am churning through the old blogroll to pass the time and it occurs to me that I set this site up once when I had to register to post a comment somewhere, but never actually wrote anything here. Now, I write notes to a buddy of mine after a weekly dealers choice game which can run a wee bit to the longwinded side so it should not be much of a stretch to get a post or two up here from time to time. So where to begin?

I am currently on a self imposed vacation from online poker, if by vacation you mean that I got my doors blown off in $2,000 pot limit omaha. Ace ace queen queen double suited was my last hand, found the other guy with aces double suited and we got into a little raising contest preflop. Rainbow flop, runner runner spades and the baseball cap comes off and takes flight into the kitchen, followed by a few choice curse words said in no particular order, pick up hat and launch into living room, curse, rinse and repeat.

How long does it take the mind to rid itself of the psychic pain of a bad run at the tables? A day, a week, a month? I think it takes a solid week before a particularly humbling beat can fully leave the system but I play sporadically. And what of the always special re-depositing money to my Firepay account after a big loss? My wife loves to see those little Firepay withdrawls on the bank statement, loves it no end.

Actually, when I got it into my head that Omaha might be a great way to make a living, she and I agreed that I could use my bonus money from work this year as my bankroll for the game. Never mind that I have several times built the bankroll up to a certain level in Hold'em, stepped up to the 30-60, got whacked like Big Pussy, and returned to the 5-10 or 10-20 to try try again. Never mind that the only time I even play Omaha is in a much, much smaller stakes weekly game. These are details my friends, nothing to concern yourselves with. And so I forged ahead, $2,000 pot limit Omaha high.

They say Omaha is a game of draws. Believe it. Learn it. Write it on your bathroom mirror and memorize it. Because I have seen enough top sets, straights, and flushes go bye bye in my short time there that it makes me yearn for the days of Hold'em where a monster has teeth, opponents draw dead, and the chip count falls under the heading Arrivals.

So, I haven't played online since early December so if this is a poker blog, and I am going to write about a hand now and then, I guess I will start with a pot limit hold'em hand from the weekly cash game.

I am on the button and look down to find every players favorite Christmas gift...pocket rockets. Look up quickly as if from a dream and check the action. Playing six handed, the three players in front of me decide not to post the four dollar blind and fold straight away...nice! Loose aggressive player on my left in the small blind, smart tight player in the big blind. Let's smooth call and look to trap. Small blind completes and tight big blind raises five. Call and call.

Flop comes out Q 10 4 rainbow and two checks in front of me. I don't like the flop because preflop raiser' s probably has pocket pair 10 or higher from my experience with him. I lead out for ten bucks to see where I am and get two calls. Turn brings a danger card as a jack comes so I am drawing dead vs big slick. Small blind checks and big blind leads out for twenty... what do you do?

I am sure I am way behind now with my aces, probably to a set trying to protect vs the broadway straight draw. I curse and show my rockets as I lay down. Small blind folds. Winner had the set of queens so I have to take some small pleasure in a good fold but one of these days pair vs overpair needs to hold up. Maybe in 2006...Happy New Year.