Kind of a different angle here, but one that I think is worth mentioning in regards to 'reckless play' or 'bad play', and bloggers not playing to their full potential in blogger events:
First off, I think there is a bit of confusion as to what bad play really is. As an example - if you open the pot in late position with a 3xBB bet while holding 75o and I smooth-call with my Big Slick sooted, the flop comes A55, are you a donkey because you have a crap hand? No. You made a positional play, I called you rather than raised you out of the pot, you happened to catch and trapped me.
Now on the other hand, if you call my 4xBB raise with 75o then a.) yes, you may be a donkey and b.) please show up at my house with lots of money every week for a home game BUT c.) you will never see me chastise you for that play because I want you and your chips there everytime I sit down. Every. Single. Time.
Quite honestly, I am just tired of people mistaking bad cards for bad play. Even in Super/System, is Doyle teaching you how to win with AA? No, any idiot can figure that out, but do you know how to win with suited connectors and the like, when to lay them down, when to call or raise with them? Those are the decisions that make poker a great game, and fortunately for a lot of us, people usually make the wrong decisions. If you happen to luck out every once in a while by making poor decisions, all that much better for me, because you will have renewed faith in that choice. By all means, keep doing it.
Bad beats happen, suck it up or get out of the game. And anyone who says that they have never delivered a bad beat is either lying or isn't playing to their full potential. It happens.
You are not obligated to play good cards against me. In fact, I prefer you don't. In turn, I am not obligated to play good cards against you. You should hope I don't.
Now, as far as any of us not playing to our full potential in blogger events: in theory that is crap, but there is truth to it as well. Fact is - we are all there to not only win, but to wipe your ass all over the sidewalk in the process. Make no mistake, there is only one purpose. However sometimes life happens. I have had to leave many a tournament early because I have to go pick up my daugther, in which case I completely donk off my chips. Lucky you. But otherwise yeah, I'm not going to make it easy for you to take my chips. Usually, but shit happens sometimes.
That said, do I play blogger tournaments as hard / take them as seriously as I do my 'real' tournaments? Absolutely not. But here is the reason/difference and this is important so pay attention dammit!
I am not sitting here making notes on all of you like I would in a real tournament. I am not watching for betting patterns, doing the math, and taking note of how you play middle pairs, connectors, etc. I am not looking for your pauses prior to a bet, or watching for how fast you call me. I take 'real' tournaments extremely seriously, and quite honestly I couldn't do that in a blogger event (let alone 5 of them every week), especially while chat is going constantly, etc. Besides, it is exhausting - who the hell would want to?
In blogger tourneys I am playing purely by instinct, and am not using the 'tools' that we acquire to win other events. Does that mean I am not bringing my A-game to the table? You bet your ass it does - the only people that would assume I do are the ones that don't know about what really goes into proper tournament play - the study, the calculations, note taking, concentration, patience, and persistence. It would be ridiculous to assume that I am going to use every possible trick and technique I am aware of in every blogger tournament. You think I'd rather take notes and calculate pot odds than chat with all of you in the girlie chats? Not bloody likely.
BUT - I would never use that as an excuse as to why I lost. You beat me in a blogger event, you beat the best game that I brought to the table that day. I lose, it is my own fault. I don't care what cards you played or how you played them. I have no excuses, you beat what I brought to the table. That is no one's fault but my own.
So people please, can we not just all have fun kicking each other's asses?
No, I dont mean the type that goes into your inbox and holds viruses. I mean the actual canned meat (and I use the term 'meat' loosely) that I have ranted about before. Seriously, who really buys this stuff? It's like Alpo pate for humans. The pleather of protein. Ugh....
Anyways, if you happen to be a Spam lover then I know you can't do without this recipe that I found linked up on my gmail page. Spam Breakfast Burritos. Does it get any better than that?
See, this is why I don't usually get out of bed before noon. I may come back later and actually talk about poker, ya never know.
Yep, I lost the bet. Though Iak was unable to post his comment on my previous post for some reason, he took me up on my challenge of a last longer in the MATH tournament last night. His terms? The loser buys the winner's entry next week, plus the loser must post about the loss on their blog. I have posted it on CardSquad, so if you would like to see me eat a little crow, head on over therevia this link.
See, that is the problem with posting. You do it once or twice in the same week, and people come to expect that you will write all the time. Sheesh. But, since someone forcefully told me to asked so nicely that I post again, I figured I would induldge the request and yap nonsensically on here for a while before sleep.
First, the wedding. It truly was a wonderful event. Big congrats again to my brother for not only finding such a wonderful person to marry, but also for convincing her that marrying into our family is a good idea. Don't know how you managed that, Rod, but congrats again!
I also managed to play some poker this weekend, though my results were less than remarkable. I played the 30k last night with mah boyz Hoy and Iak, and Hoy and I proceeded to go out back-to-back after each of us suffered nasty little bad beats, finishing in 1240th (him) and 1241 (me) out of 1274. Not exactly a stellar performance, I know. That's ok - since they both beat me in the 30k, it is my mission to destroy both of them in the MATH tourney tomorrow night but shhh...don't tell them that, it'll just be our little secret. Ah crap - they both read this, my cover is blown. Fine, I'll just issue a little challenge to them both then. Last longer bet, boys? Name your terms.
I then decided to play the 12k tournament and walked straight into the worst run of cards I have seen in a long time. (And I have seen a lot, trust me.) I don't like to complain about being card dead, but even positionally I wasn't able to come up with anything. After the first 1 hour and 22 minutes, these were my stats:
Street Won Won/Saw Won/Total Pre-flop 0 / 0% 0% Flop 0 / 0% 0% Turn 0 / 0% 0% River 0 / 0% 0% Showdown 1 / 100% 1%
Nice, eh? I mean, I am a tight player, but come on!
I finished in 61st place out of 235, and it was pretty miraculous that I even made it that far. Anyways, it was definitely amateur night when it came to my play - I couldn't make anything happen so I should have just bailed on poker altogether for the evening. I was just unable to slip into the groove of the table and it clearly showed in my results. Fortunately days like this don't happen too often to me, so I am just going to shrug it off and get back on the horse tomorrow.
Hope everyone who went to the Bash had a blast, I wish I could have been there!
Alright, completely off-topic for a poker blog, I know, but I told a few people I would put up shots of the wedding cake as it got made. Besides, I'm actually posting twice in one week - to hell with the actual content, that is amazing enough!
Here is a look at the roses I made out of pulled sugar. (DO NOT try this at home!! Trust me!) The images didn't really photograph well, but I think you should be able to see most of the detail.
Well I am finally back in the swing of things, and am so busy lately I don't know which way to turn next. It is a good kind of busy though, I don't have time to sit around and think about unpleasant things. I've made a return to poker as well, and not only have I been on one of best runs of my life, I am once again playing in the proper frame of mind.
I played five $50 SNG's back to back and cashed in each, including two first place prizes, two seconds, and a third. I then lost one, but proceeded to cash in three more. Last week I placed second in one of the many weekly blogger tournaments and then proceeded to take 7th in the Stars $100 tournament which was good for $875. (I sooo should have colleced the $7k for first place, though.) In between all that I have also returned to playing ring games, mostly NL, and have had an insane run there too. Now I'm planning to get back into the Sunday million tournament again, since I am once again able to really concentrate on the game.
So aside from poker I have been busy doing all kinds of things, including making the cake for my brother's wedding. He is getting married next Saturday, and has asked me to do that as well as to emcee the event. I get to roast him in the process, so this should be a lot of fun. As far as the cake, I was thrilled because cake decoration is among my better skills, but for some reason simply decorating and making icing roses wasn't quite enough. I wanted this cake to be something really fabulous, so late, late at night I have been learning the art of sugar pulling / blowing. If you have ever seen finished pieces, you know it really is quite something - but holy fuck is it hard to do! (Here is where everyone collectively says um, durrrr.) Leave it to me to decide that I want to learn a new skill like that two weeks before the wedding. Afterwards, if I am still able to hold a camera with all the burns on my hands, I'll take a picture of the finished product.
(btw - for some odd reason, my comments are now at the tops of my posts. Don't know why that is happening. Anyone know how I can get them to be at the end of the posts again?)
