$3,000 pot won with ___ high!!!!

This is a true story that I witnessed at the Borgata almost a year ago. People always were interested to hear it at the poker table so I figured it would be a good story to post up here.

A man franticly paces back and forth in the basement poker room of the Borgata in Atlantic City, NJ. He is down over $10,000 for the day and has the room a stir with his crazy antics. Wearing a faded jean jacket and tethered jeans he looks like a Motley Crew fan leftover from the 80's. He has been drinking a little and he just lost another buy-in in 5/10 NL. He stops his pace and meets with a floor man who knows him and they discuss re-buying. He says he has a duffle bag full of money in his room and wants to rebuy but doesn't want to lose his seat. Somehow the floor gives him a marker and they front him the newly lifted cap of $1,500 to buy back in the 5/10 NL game.

The table he is playing with is full of young sharks. I recognized all the faces as regulars who were licking their chops to get a piece of this deadbeat. The weathered man played super LAG and quick. Raising $100's preflop and pushing all-in on the flop, so to play with him you had to be rolled or you could be wiped out in a single hand. Guy raises to $40, the man yells all-in, everyone folds. Time after time, till....

Young Asian Kid sits in MP and raises up to $45, gets to the deadbeat who thinks for a minute and once again yells all-in!!! for $1,500. The Kid goes into a tank for a few minutes and tries to interrogate the man before finally calling the all-in completely nervous for all to see.

Flop is KKQ.....

Turn...Q...

River...3

The drama unfolds and the Asian kid gets erratic. He belts at the guy "What do you have?", "I don't know" replies the man. The kid looks so nervous that you know his hand is most likely dead. The man says "What do you got kid?".... embarrassed the kid replies "All I have is a ten high". The man checks his cards one more time and says "That's good kid".

How to berrate another player!

Here is the best example I have ever seen by Tony G. Hilarious.



Happy Friday!!!

How to Bluff the Nuts!

Welcome to today's class, please take your seat. Today you will learn the secret art of "How to Bluff the Nuts!" (also known as the "Art of Burning Benjamins"). What I am about to tell you is a secret strategy that has been passed down through the generations and up until now has only existed in the shadows. Light a candle, dim the lights, and I will tell ye a story that will make your bankroll shiver with fright...

To Bluff the Nuts you have to have a small devil sitting on your shoulder preferably no taller than four inches. He will whisper paranoia into your ear saying "Hey kid! He's making a move on you, go all-in". You should respond "Right away Lucifer!" and proceed to Example A:

Folds around to BTN who raises to $4, SB folds, I am in BB with 66 (one short of the devils area code) and raise it to $15, BB thinks and min-raises it to $30, "Hey kid, its that move I was talking about" - OH NO HE DIDN'T!, I raise ALL-IN to $108, BTN calls and flips over AA. NH

The next night, which was a full moon might I add (werewolves?) a flop comes down KT3 rainbow, I bet pre-flop so I continue on the flop with my QJ $8, guy bumps to $28, I call, Turn K (KT3K), I check he fires $30, I push for $80ish, he insta-calls with 33 (set).. I am drawing dead. Thanks Lucifer! I enjoy burning money, whats next?

OK how about we don't bluff and just call of our stack shall we? We shall! I have T6, Folds to blinds and we check it down (Pot $2), on the river SB pushes all-in having me covered ($118), the pot is $2 and here's the board Q 9 5 J 8 . I time down to the last second and think there is no way a KT plays it like this and my finger like a retarded chimpanzee hits the call button. Villain shows KT and I win the award for King Donkey for the night.

Despite these HORRIBLE plays by myself I am only down around -3 buyins at 100NL ($300). Luckily I have over 40 buy-ins at this level or I would go into Def-con 4. Instead I am going to take a break tonight and just not play poker. Another thing I am happy that I made these mistakes at 100NL and not 200NL which I plan on playing sometime next week.

Class is dismissed...

Weekend in Review + Dave Atell!

Well it turned out my Friday night plans were cancelled so I managed to play in the 5k freeroll as I posted earlier. Out of 108 entrants I placed 14th for a $60 profit. Small, but its free money so I will take it.

I enjoyed the rest of the weekend playing little poker. I went to a BBQ Sunday and ended up playing some Guitar Hero once the weather turned bad. It's amazing the cult following that surrounds that game. I watched some guys play the game on expert and it was pretty amazing.

In other news, I scored two free tickets to the Dave Attell comedy show in DC this Friday night. This show will be recorded by HBO and like I said, is free! There are still some tickets left, click here if your interested. Here is a clip from one of his standups:



In review, my bankroll stands at around 4.5k. There are three days left in May so I will see if I can get it up to 5k but I am in no rush. Here is a great post by Brian Townsend about being on top and not losing it all like Mahatma.

The poker diva floods Flickr

If search the word "poker" on Flickr you will undoubtedly see dozens of photos of high stakes poker pro Liz Lieu. So much so that she has flooded Flickr with over 600+ photos of herself. Is she conceited or does she have a PR person that is trying to promote her through a sort of gorilla marketing campaign?

With a little research, it turns out she is not just a pretty face but the real deal. With over half a million in tournament winnings, my hat goes off to the pretty woman from Vietnam. Instead of finding cool poker related photos on Flickr I found you Liz Lieu (over... and over... again).

In other (geek) news, I purchased a Targus Wireless Keypad and I love it. I play on a laptop so all the number keys are in a horizontal line across the keyboard. This can be a pain in the ass typing in bets night after night. Now with my wireless mouse and keypad I can just sit back in my chair, completely hands free of the keyboard.

In other (poker) news, I played 5 tables of .50/1 last night. I find it hard to concentrate with the smaller bets but I think I played fine. I lost 1 buy-in ($100) where I had AK on a A73 flop and another guy had 77, what can you do. I honestly look forward to not playing poker tonight and possibly tomorrow. I need a break.

I recommend you read this post over at Tao of Poker by Pauly.
It is excellent. A+++

WTF?

Truth is a hard pill to swallow... and the truth (gulp) is I haven't had a winning session in over five days. My bankroll is down to 4.6k which isn't busto, but I have had to make adjustments. I downshifted from 1/2 NL to .50/1 NL and 2/4 NL is not even in the picture.

It is nothing new to say poker is a grind, when it rain it pours, cei la vie, etc. I honestly think I need to take a break from poker for at least a few days. If I posted a graph of my play for the month of May it would look similar to the outline of Mt. Everest.

I ran into a 95/66/2.5 villain last night. In layman's terms, that is a player who plays ever hand and he raises ever hand. Needless to say Moby Dick ate Captain Ahab and I was stuck -$700 at the table. This player was unreal hitting every flop hard with two pair, sets, etc. He ended up leaving the table up $1,200. I have never seen a bad player hit a luck streak like this guy online.



Here are five major hands ($200+ pots) between the villain and I.

Oh that's how you raise with T4!

I've got the flush... oh your horseshoe gave you a bigger one!

Bluffing off with AQ... of course he has the J.

wait a minute... did I win?

Calling the psycho down with two ladies