2nd in 9k Gtd.

I just took 2nd in the $25 9k gtd. on UB for $1,700. I ran like hell heads up which is extremely frustrating, but lucky for me Derek gave me insurance so I essentially won $1,925. It is still a nice payday, but the guy that I was playing HU against was absolutely terrible, and I had him down to 7 bb's and got it in a few times but just couldn't close the deal. Such is poker.

This cash will cap off an amazing month for me overall. Cash games-wise, I was at a peak of $2,200 for the month but am currently up $1600 through 15k hands after a bit of a downswing. I wasn't really playing my best poker due to the fact that I had been playing a bit too much, and I recognized that. I was talking to Pete yesterday and told him that cash hadn't been that great and that I was probably gonna take today off. Fortunately, I can't resist the 6:20 tourney, and I did the run good.

I will probably withdraw about 3k for living expenses for a little while and leave around 3k in my account, which I will set to build up again next month. As great as this month has been and stuff, trying to play solely to hit a quota of hands put in for the month just doesn't really do it for me. I am still enjoying trying to get better and stuff, but I might need to take a few more days off during the month.

In other news, I will be starting working later this week at Semiahmoo Country Club in Blaine. I am actually pretty excited about this. While I'm still in school, it will probably just be a 2-day a week job with playing privileges, free range balls, etc. My swing is absolutely terrible right now, and I am all f***ed up in the head, so it will be a work in progress.

Shout out to Buffman for his wife giving birth to Seattle's Buffest Child. I wish the child great health and I really hope that his life really isn't over.

God Bless,

JG

Bad Sesh

I woke up today and decided to jump into some games. There were only 3 full ring games, so I made the mistake of sitting with a guy who was sitting alone at 3 tables. I really got owned pretty bad.

http://www.liquidpoker.net/h/670353
This one sucked pretty bad. This was like 5 hands into the session.

http://www.liquidpoker.net/h/670352
This one was about 10 mins later and absolutely set me off. I should have left after the first fiasco.

http://www.liquidpoker.net/h/670358
I think this one was pretty bad also. I'm really not beating much on this river besides super random bluffs. I do this frequently where I pay people off because my hand is so underrepresented that I convince myself that they could be value betting worse, etc.

There were a few other spots where I was just owned. It's kinda disheartening to think that these are the kind of players that I will be playing against if I decide to move up in stakes - knowledgeable, thinking players. My HU game really is not very good. I have okay fundamentals, but the meta-game, psychological aspects are quite unfamiliar to me. I have said that I want to improve that aspect of my game but just haven't really done so. I am crushing the full ring games right now and just am not interested in messing with that.

Overall, I lost about $320 to Pokerqualle but got about $85 back playing FR. Just gotta have better HU discipline I guess when starting tables.

I have one more class then I'm heading home for the weekend.

God Bless,

JG

Heating Up

I am off to a great start this month. Through 6200 hands, I am up $1,360, running at 21 bb/100 which is pretty sweet. The thing is, I am basically running at EV but just feel like I am maximizing value in every hand. It is really a great feeling. Two days ago, I played an extremely fun pot against a guy:

http://www.cardschat.com/hand/

Hopefully this converter works. I still believe that the strongest line that these players take is check/call flop then check/min-raise turn. It is the easiest thing in the world to play against because you know that opponents typically are never bluffing. In this particular spot, I got c/r'd on the turn and called Grant over. I decided to flat turn and jam river. It didn't hit me until that night that I had a 2-outer for the loser's share of the bad beat, which was around $140k at the time. $50k or whatever would have been pretty nice.

I just got back from hanging out with the gf and am in bed now. I was about to put in some hands and just before I was about to post at my first table, I decided that I was too tired and that it would not be optimal for me to play. This is one of the things that I am really going to try hard to work on - having better discipline and only playing when I really feel like playing. But with things going so well right now, I want to play as much as possible. I earned like $350 in rakeback last month, and am hoping to earn around $500 this month if I put in around 25k hands which is what I'm on pace for.

Time to go to bed. The Masters starts tomorrow, and I am tilting because stupid ESPN coverage is from 1-4:30, and I have class from 12-4!

My four players in our Masters pool are:

1. Geoff Ogilvy (STEAL at #5)
2. Zach Johnson
3. Nick Watney
4. Stewart Cink

I really like my team. Watney is playing incredible, and a lot of experts think Ogilvy's game fits Augusta well. I guess someone's gonna have to break the streak of no Australians winning. Why not him?

God Bless,

JG

Griiiiiindin

Hopefully those that read my last blog actually scrolled down to see that it was a joke. I had a pretty good weekend. On Thursday, Buffman and Derek came up, and we went to the Pitch were I consumed quite a few pitchers of beer. I apparently was the only one drinking at the end before we headed down to the bars. I remember very few interactions with people. We went to the Nightlight for 80's night, and the bouncer asked for my wrist, and I apparently showed him my elbow, so he let me in but told me to go drink water. It was a great night.

The rest of the weekend was kind of lazy. Saturday we watched the basketball games, and I scooped $10 off Grant with him giving me Michigan St. and the points against UConn. We went to a new Sonic drive-in that they put in up in Ferndale. It was quite disappointing. One of my lifelong dreams was to go to a Sonic drive in to partake in what appeared to be heaven on earth according to the commercials. Not so.

Yesterday and today, I have played a good amount of online with a big session earlier today. Here are some of the hands:

http://www.pokerhand.org/?4079250
Standard isolate p/f against this 38/3/1.0 fish. Flop bet is standard, and I fold out a lot of 10's and 22-55, 77-99 with my turn bet. But he obviously turned TPTK and was never folding. Glad that I pulled the trigger on the river, as it's very hard for him to call without a K or Q.

http://www.pokerhand.org/?4079257
This one is interesting. This player is pretty spewy but we played a hand earlier where she min-raised 88 and c,called on a 8 6 4 then potted 6 turn. She takes the same line here, and I decide to call turn/fold river. I think she has JJ a lot here, flush a decent amount and AdJx sometimes. I've realized that I've done this too often as of late where I will call a LPP's flop bet or turn bet in spots where they are hardly ever bluffing just hoping that they shut down on the turn/river, and they always just pot it.

http://www.pokerhand.org/?4079271
Always fun to get in spots like these.

http://www.pokerhand.org/?4079277
I was really proud of this one. This guy is a good, thinking player, so I knew that I could rep AK if I committed myself to it. As soon as he quickly called my flop bet, I put my head in my pillow and was like, "he's never folding aces". But I tried to put myself in his shoes and I know that a $72 turn bet when he had like $140 behind would have to look like I'm never folding to a shove. I was obviously bet/folding the turn and would have c/folded river if he had called. Ironically, the rabbit cam brought an 8 on the river hehe.

There were a couple other cool ones, but these should keep all my readers busy. Yesterday I played 1243 hands and finished down $93, but today I put in 1291 hands, finishing up $391. I am slightly ahead of pace for 20k hands this month, with 4500 hands, up $482 and 10.68 bb/100 which is good.

I did some good lifting last week and went running today around Lake Padden. I may be getting a job at Semiahmoo Golf Course for this quarter, which would be sweet - if for nothing else, for free golf.

God Bless,

JG

Busto on Ultimate Bet

This is going to be a really embarassing blog post. I am ashamed and devastated at what went down late last night. I don't even really want to get into too much detail, but I will say that this blog probably won't be much about poker anymore. Again, my drunken state got the best of me. I came back from the bars late and decided to sit with this guy at a 1/2NL table. To start the day, I had around 3k in my account. I buy in 400, and he has around 600 to start. About the 3rd hand, I raise AK on the button to 6, he makes it 18, and I make it 44, and he calls oop. Flop comes A55, and he c/calls, and we get it in on the 2 turn, and he shows 55.

So $400 down the drain, and I can't believe it. Instead of just sucking it up and going to bed, I decide to go sit with a guy at a 2/4NL HU table. We battled it out for a while with no real memorable pots until I flatted his button raise with 44 from the bb. We were both full, and the flop comes Ax 4d 3d. I check, he leads 15, I make it 40, he makes it 105. I ship it in, and he calls with Ad5d. Turn x, river Kd giving him the scoop.

So I am down to 1800 and decide to take 500 to blackjack. I get down to 100 and decide to rebuy my entire account. I was betting about $50 on average and got my account back to about $2900 and decided to place just a couple more bets. I then went on a huge decline and was down to $300. I decided to bet $150. I got 8-3 against a 6 and doubled down for my entire account. I got an 8. The dealer obv went 5, K, and here I am.

I honestly don't know what to say. Perhaps this will be a good thing for me in that it will allow me to focus on other things in my life. I really don't have any motivation to try and deposit or borrow from friends and try to rebuild right now. I am really sick to my stomach. I couldn't sleep at all last night and skipped class today because I wanted to throw up all day. I don't need anyone to tell me how stupid I was or whatever but would just like for people to tell me that they're there for me and stuff. Alcohol is the worst thing in the world, and I think that this should confirm this fact to anyone that reads this.



































HAHAHAHAHAHA! APRIL FOOOOOOOLS!!!!






Lol, I hope that people don't think that I would ever ever do something like that :-)

Okay but seriously, today is April 1st and marks the beginning of what will def be a great month. I have set a goal to play 20k hands this month and think that that will not be very difficult. I put in a 1200 hand session today in nearly 3 hours after class. I finished up $170 and got in some pretty interesting spots.

http://www.pokerhand.org/?4056737
This guy was playing 52/21, so I decided to raise to 4.5x from the BB. I had been playing somewhat aggressively, and we were short-handed so I knew he was capable of spazzing out. I decide to bet/call the flop because we were both deep. I guess I would have folded river if he bet any meaningful amount. Fortunately he didn't.

http://www.pokerhand.org/?4056757
I don't really even know why I'm posting this one. It's extremely standard, and I think calling this river is a complete leak. I almost talked myself into him min-raising a straight or a set or 2-pair, but then I caught myself and thought that a guy playing 40/7/1 is just not capable of doing anything like that.

http://www.pokerhand.org/?4056769
I'm still not entirely sure about this hand. He was 41/14 and seemed kind of like a suspicious player based on some previous hands. I wanted to lead a little less on this flop to induce a monkey spew. I'm 100% certain I have/had the best hand on the flop. Turn is slightly interesting, but I didn't think I was gonna get two streets of value vs. a worse 2-pair, so I check it back for pot control. River he used about 1/4 of his time bank and potted it. For me to have him beat he had to be bluff-raising the flop because he is never doing this with a worse two-pair I don't think unless he is turning his hand into a bluff which would be weird. I just find that they have it a lot on this river because my hand I think looks like an overpair. Oh well, comments on this would be appreciated.

I just got back from eating Mexican and was meaning to go work out, but I have fantasy draft in an hour and a half, so I'm just gonna do some research and postpone lifting. Not a good start to the month.

Thanks for reading.

God Bless,

JG