Our tournament will move to FTP

I put something about this in a post on the forum, but I feel our blog is the Ante Up! source of record, so I'm putting this here as well.

Scott and I talked today and we agreed that PokerRoom has mishandled our tournament so poorly and egregiously that we are forced to move the tournament to Full Tilt Poker. Why Full Tilt? Well, the most obvious reason is because the site is Mac-friendly, which is the reason we started with PokerRoom. Now that Full Tilt has a Mac client it is the next logical choice.

I apologize to all of the people who left their current sites to join PokerRoom and have been playing there to get familiar with its software for our tournaments, but this had to be done. PokerRoom cancelled our second tournament without warning, has yet to refund our money and its support system is a joke, to be kind. In the interest of our listeners and fans we decided it was time to make the move.

And to those who already acted on the boycott I commend you. I am keeping my word though and leaving my money in there until Friday (4/28). If we do not get our refunds by then I will yank my money from there and swear off of it, spreading the word of PokerRoom disdain as I go. I encourage everyone to email PokerRoom and let them know exactly what is transpiring here and your disappointment in their site.

Again, I apologize for the moving of this tournament, but it had to be done.

And don't forget to listen to this week's show with the president of the Poker Players Alliance.

Peace.

Poker Podcast Challenge registration

Though I didn't receive an email from them yet (BIG SURPRISE), I decided to go to Poker Room today to see if I could find this podcast tournament, and sure enough, under the restricted tab there it was. And I had a little blue arrow, which means I could play in it. So I clicked on the tournament and was the FIRST one to sign up! So, go there and sign up NOW! You don't need a password and you don't need an email, just go if you already registered (if you're not registered it's too late). And let's kick some podcast butt!

Internet poker threatened

You might not have noticed this if you've been busy trying to clear your FullTilt bonus or fleecing the fish at PokerRoom.com, but some members of the good ole U.S. Congress have introduced legislation to officially ban Internet gambling in the United States. (The issue has always been in a hazy gray area legally, but this would pull the plug on it). Michael Bolcerek, president of the Poker Players Alliance, (that's him here with Howard Lederer, Jesus Ferguson and Greg Raymer lobbying in Washington) will be our guest on the April 26 podcast to talk about the legislation and his group, which is fighting it. If you don't want to find yourself limited to $2 poker at Derby Lane, be sure you tune in. You can read more about the Alliance and the legislation by clicking here. And as always, be sure to fire away some questions here if there are things you want us to ask him.

Great poker weekend, and updates

Hey all,

Just thought I'd drop a note as this awesome weekend comes to a close. I am so stoked about Jennifer Harman being on the show (SEND QUESTIONS DAMMIT!), but my weekend only got better after finding that out. To start, I made a bunch of money on PokerRoom, totally recouping all of the losses I had from Full Tilt a few weeks back. So now I'm marching forward again. I don't know if all of you are like this, but whenever I have a negative session(s), I'm never really happy until I win all of that money back so I can add to my bankroll and head up the ladder.

The best hand I had all weekend came in PLO. I won't get into the actual hand because it would take forever to type, but I did include a photo. That's right, a ROYAL FLUSH BABY! And, to make it better, the guy turned over QQ for quad queens! I was so excited because I never think to take a screenshot when I make a good hand, but this time I remembered, I just didn't wait to snap it when he showed his hand. I wasn't sure if he was going to, and I didn't want to miss the opportunity to get it. But it's no wonder I got action. I flopped the nuts and he made a set. The turn gave me the Royal Flush draw and him quads. He bet half the pot and I only called, thinking I was probably beat but couldn't give up this chance. The J♥ fell and you can imagine my heart pounding away! At that point you can see how much was in the pot, although my screen shot is pretty blurry. Let's just say I had 70 units left, so I bet 35, thinking he had to have a boat and would raise. He put me all-in and I typed in "ROYAL BABY!" and then called. He flashed the quads and I almost crapped my pants. Easily the largest pot of my life, and this came on the heels of me having a stellar NL session. This was my second most successful poker weekend of my career. Again, I don't want to put money totals up on here anymore as I am starting to get weary of listing wins and losses because of big brother, if you know what I mean. Let's just say a lot of you have read this blog for a while and you've read about some of my bigger wins, and this weekend puts them all to shame.

Some other things: I called PokerRoom again to ask where the hell our refunds were, and after being on hold for 20 minutes plus a 30-minute conversation with a guy whose first language was anything but English, this is what he had to say: There was a technical problem that caused your tournament to cancel. We felt that we could fix it in time so your tournament could still go off in time, but we were wrong. (At this point I told him how stupid that would have been because everyone involved in the tournament was under the impression it was staying canceled, and for them to reinstate it and not tell us would've been a HUGE mistake. I also laid into him about their horrible service, etc.) He then told me that PR has been sending me emails updating the situation and I told him I haven't received any. I also told him I've been getting promotional emails all along from them, so if they are sending me emails something's wrong. We re-re-re-reconfirmed my email address and the guy said he would send me another email confirming our conversation, which I NEVER GOT AGAIN! So finally I said, "Look, we all want our refunds! What the hell is taking so long?" He said we could have tournament tickets IMMEDIATELY if we wanted them. I told him to go scratch. First of all there was no way I was going to make that decision for the other guys who already bought in, and second, why should we be forced to spend that money on another tournament now? We should be able to have that money to do as we please. I also read him the riot act saying PR has had our money all of this time and they are collecting interest on it while we just sit here and wait. I threw everything but the kitchen sink at him. So, the last thing he said was that we all would get our refunds but he couldn't say when as he wasn't sure how long it would take the finance department to deposit that money back. What a load of bull! If we don't get our refunds this week I'm flying to the home office and cracking skulls!

Did any of you ever see HIGH ROLLER, the movie about Stu Ungar, who was played horribly by Michael "Call me Christopher" Imperioli? This movie was so bad I don't even want to talk about it, but I got it this weekend USED at Sound Exchange for like $6. I couldn't resist, but OMG it was bad! And they left out a bunch of stuff. If I hadn't read ONE OF A KIND I might not have been so disappointed, but when an "autobiography" is written so well and detailed, and then you see some piece of effluvium thrown together just to make a buck and capitalize on the poker craze, it made me sick. Hardly any poker, very little gin, no mention of his sister or stepson committing suicide, no mention of the glasses being worn to cover the collapsed nasal passage, etc. It's like they wanted to show how tragic this was, but then they watered it down. Very disappointing, and Scott had told me it was crap, but it's kind of like a car accident, you know you shouldn't look but you have to.

One last thing, I'm headed to Derby Lane on Monday night to pay the entry fee to the big tournament on Sunday (4/23). It's capped at 400 and if they get a full complement they promise $4K on top. I also think they are paying top 27. I am not going to turn down a chance at that kind of money down here in FL for just $45. Who else is in?

OK, I lied, this is the last thing. Don't forget about Saturday's Podcast Freeroll. Sign up by Thursday.

Peace.

Going for the home run

Lately it seems I have been trying to hit a home run everytime I get into a pot with what I think is the best hand at that moment, and I know this is bad. Maybe it's because of those bad beats I have taken and I want to get that money back ASAP. I don't know, but I do know that's not good poker, and it makes me feel like a one-trick pony. I have to stop it, but I guess it's just because I am afraid of getting outdrawn lately. I realized some of the losses I disected here were of the outflopped variety, but most of the time it's the losses where I'm trying to force an obvious draw out only to have the guy call no matter what I bet and then hit it on the end.

I know this all-or-nothing approach can only be detrimental to a bankroll and I will stop it, but sometimes it pays off so well that it's hard to resist. Like when I flopped a set of queens last night and the guy reraised me to half my stack. I could have just called, just in case he would have folded to my reraise, but I pushed anyway, and he called with middle set. It was a huge pot and I was glad I won it, but it could have gone the other way and I could have lost a bundle again.

This is something I have to deal with. I need to remind myself constantly that it's all one big session, and I shouldn't try to win it all back on one hand.

Anyone else ever go through this? At least I realize it. Admitting you have a problem is half the battle, right?

JENNIFER HARMAN IS HERE MAY 3RD!

Scott and I were throwing around topic ideas for future shows and he said, "What do you think about doing a show on Women in Poker?" And I said, that's a great idea, who should we get? We thought, who is the best female player in the game? So of course the first person we thought of was JENNIFER HARMAN. She's not only the best female player in the world, but one of the best players in the world bar none! She's a two-time WSOP bracelet winner, she's made a final table at the WPT and she plays in THE GAME with Doyle, Chip, Eli and Barry. This is going to be an awesome show!

She will be on May 3rd. So, if you have any questions please list them here or email us. Spread the word.

Back in the saddle again

Well, yesterday I got tired of reading Sklansky's Small Stakes Hold 'Em and wanted to play, but it was too late to drive all the way down to Derby Lane. So what's a poker player to do? Yes, I played on the Internet last night. And it looked like nothing was going to change for me. As you know, I promised not to play on FullTilt for a while, and I am holding true to that. In fact, I even removed the icon from my dock on my iMac so I CAN'T play there.

Anyway, I went on PokerRoom and decided to play small ball first, sitting down at a $.25 table, buying in for the max $25. I let the blinds go around about two times before I got a playable hand. I was on the button with 6♠6♥. Everyone folded to me, so I raised it to $1, which is 4x the BB. They both called me, so there's $3 in the pot. The flop was 6♣A♥7♥. So, I've hit my set, but there's two to a straight and two to a flush. They both check, so at this point I think to myself, if I give them 2-to-1 on their money and they are drawing to a flush they would be getting the right pot odds, so I bet $5. The SB folds and the BB almost lets the time expire before calling. He has about $1 more than me (which is about $15 at this point. The turn is a 2♣. This is a great card for me because it completes no straight or flush. But the guy bets out $5 here, which is great for me again because if it gave him a set of 2s he's dead. I look at the board and think I have him so I push all-in to make a semibluff at the flush pay. He calls instantly and the river is a J♥. What did he have? And would you be able to guess if I didn't give the result away in the intro to this post?

He had Q♥3♥. And the beats go on. He was getting about 3-to-1 on his money, but he was at least a 5-to-1 dog because he had to put me on at least a set, two pair or top pair. I can't remember the last time I flopped a set online and won. That's the God's honest truth. I can't remember.

So just like that I was down $25. I decided there that although boneheaded calls like that do happen in the higher limits, I felt they were definitely more rare, and I had to move up if I was going to play any quality poker on this night. So, I moved up to a shorthanded $1 NL table and bought in for $50, which I hate doing and you'll soon see why.

I won a coupla small pots and was up to $56 before falling back to about $45. There were a few hands where I raised with something like AQo, get called, the flop would come with a K and the guy would bet a ton and force me to fold. You know the drill. So with $45 left I pick up A♣A♥. UTG limps and the next guy folds to me. I'm on the button and raise to $3. The SB folds and the BB, who just had a bad beat dealt to him calls. The UTG now raises me all-in. I actually have a bittersweet moment here, because I am so tired of bad beats, etc, that I think to myself, well, I'm gonna be down $75 in about an hour if I lose this one, plus the other guy is still left to act. But of course I call. The BB calls too, but he only had $27 left after that bad beat.

On PokerRoom, in cash games, when you go all-in the cards just fly across the screen in a blur, so I can't remember all of the cards, but an K♣ skipped across the screen and there was a J too, but not sure of the other cards. Well, the UTG flashes two ladies, which I had to search the board for before I clicked SHOW. When there was no queen on the board I clicked SHOW and the final guy mucked. I raked in $120 and was up about $50 for the night. I clicked on the HAND COUNTER and saw that the guy on tilt called with 7♠8♣. So he had nothing and was complete off his rocker.

I stuck around for a few more hands, but did catch anything worth playing, and when it was time to pay the BB I left. So, I was happy with the way it turned out, but I wonder if I had won that first hand when I made a set of sixes at the $25 table, would I have left and played for more money elsewhere? Probably not, and I would have only been up $25 at that point. So although the defeat sucked, and cost me $25, I think in the end it actually made me a net of $25 because I wouldn't have left otherwise and I wouldn't have made that monster hand. Now, you could argue that I would have made more money at the other table, but would I have made another $25? Probably not, because I usually get tired or like to quit when I have a decent win.

Poker Podcast Challenge

OK, I signed up our podcast for this tournament. It's a $2K freeroll on PokerRoom and you can sign up for it here I'm not sure how much money will be in the prize pool if they only get like 50 guys to play, but if it's the whole $2K that would be awesome. Also, there's a $50 bounty on my head and Scott's as well as other podcast hosts. So go there and sign up and play April 22 at 7 p.m. ET. If they ask for a password it's ANTEUP06, though I'm not sure it asks for one. If you don't have a PokerRoom account you need to get one, and you can sign up through the Refer-A-Friend by emailing me or just through PokerRoom.

If we have the best showing I think we get a trophy and some money is donated to a charity or something. So let's kick butt!

Ante Up! tourney update Part II

So, after two emails to PokerRoom I decided to call the toll-free number this morning. The guy says he is merely an operator and that he can only check status of complaints, etc. He then tells me they received my two emails and that they were forwarded to the proper departments. He speculated that we didn't have enough people to sign up. When I told him that the tournament had been cancelled a week early, he had no response other than to say they would email me as soon as they had an answer. He said he would put on the file that we would like to reinstate the tournament but if we couldn't that we all wanted our refunds. I said, well, duh! Then he said he would send me an email in a matter of minutes confirming our conversation. I never got it. So today I tried the LIVE CHAT thing and here's the exact conversation:

Welcome to Customer Support, my name's Lindsay. How may I assist you?
Hi Lindsay, I recently started a tournament and it was cancelled. I've sent two emails to find out why they cancelled my tourney and why no one has gotten refunds. I also called this morning and was told I would get an email from him in a few minutes, that was 5 hours ago.
I'm sorry to hear that you're experiencing problems and apologize for the inconvenience.
The name of the tournament was WILLHOPPER'S TOURNAMENT; It was supposed to be Saturday at 6 p.m ET
Upon reviewing your account Mr. Cosenza I found that your query has indeed been forwarded to the relevant department. Once they have a resolution, you will most definitely be notified via email.
What am i supposed to tell my friends? I mean, the tourney was supposed to be in 4 days; and can you reconfirm my email address, because the gentleman this morning did but I never received his confirmation email.
I do apologize for this and I thank you for your understanding with this matter. Is there anything else I can help you with at this stage?
Yes, read the above msg thanks.

At this point she gives me the correct address and signs off. So, I hope to have an answer by tomorrow, which is when we will announce on our show whether the tournament will stay cancelled or we will do another one. Sorry guys.

My day at Derby Lane

Since I've taken a break from playing online for money, I decided to head to Derby Lane today to play in the early tournament. I was actually one of the first few to sign up and was hoping to see at least one of you there, but no one came up to me and I didn't recognize anyone as fellow Ante Uppers.

Anyway, I had an hour to kill so I sat down at double flop and played only Ax suited, pairs and suited connectors, preferrably sutied Broadway cards. I won only about 3-4 hands, and two of them were scoopers, so when I looked down at my stack and saw I was up $60 at 12:50 p.m. I said "I'm gone! Freerolling baby!" The best hand I made in DF was with A♥ 8♥. The top board came Q♥7♥3♠. The other board came 3♥4♣8♠. I was on the button, which made it very nice because the old guy to my left bet out and everyone called. When it got to me I raised it and everyone had to call, so there was a bundle in there. I got my gin card when a J♥ fell on the top to give me the stone-cold nuts. The other board saw another baby card, a 2♦. So I had top pair on the board as well, but I wasn't counting on winning it because of the straight possibilities. So the river paired my flush board, which ticked me off and slowed me down. Why? On the hand before, some guy had stayed in to the end with SAILBOATS when every card on the board was over his fours. He stayed in despite bets and raises. When he made trips on the river to beat my Aces up I was none too happy. So if THAT donk stayed in I figured someone could've made a boat on my board.

Anyway, the other board came ANOTHER baby card, a 6♠. But no flush, just a bunch to straight, and all anybody needed was a 5, and knowing these characters someone would. The bet got to $4 but I didn't reraise to $6 for fear of the boat. Turns out, EVERYONE was playing my board and no one had my flush beat! I also won the bottom board with top pair! So that was a nice pot and when I looked at the time on my cell phone it was time to leave for the tournament. No matter what happend in the tournament I was a winner for the day, which felt good.

My tournament can be summed up in about 4-5 hands. I played tight early, picked up pocket rockets and raised, got a reraise and I pushed. He called and turned over King Kong. I knocked him out and a few hands later I won another decent pot when I had J♥10♥ on the button and called a decent raise. I was open-ended after the flop and made the nuts on the turn. I won a couple of other hands, but the one hand that sucked came with the blinds $200-$400.

I looked down at J♥J♠ in the cutoff seat. The guy under the gun raised to $1,000. Everyone folded to me and that's when I looked behind me. The button and the blinds had decent stacks, and judging by the resigned looks on their faces I figured they were likely folding. So I just called, thinking I would get this guy heads-up. The button and small blind folded. But the big blind, who was our chip leader by a bunch and had JUST sat down, reraised to $2,500. The initial raiser pushed for $5K more, which would have set me all-in for sure. So now I'm looking at a raise, my call, a reraise from the chip leader (who I have no idea how he plays) and the re-reraise from the UTG raiser. What should I do? The pots giving me a little less than 3-to-1 on my money. But, alas, I fold.

It killed me to fold because other than the aces I got an hour ago it was the only pocket pair I had seen. But I'm disciplined, and I laid it down. I was thinking at best I'm in a race, and if I am, I'm racing at least 2, maybe 3 or 4 cards. But I REALLY thought I was dominated and a 4-to-1 dog. The UTG turned over AQo (?!?!) and the chip leader turned over AKo. No one paired up and I would've taken down about a $12K pot. Instead I was down to like $3,500. If I make that call I cash. Instead I go out about an hour later (two off the bubble no less). When the blinds reached $500-$1,000 I had $2K left. My all-in suited 9-8 looked great to me and actually made a straight. But, I was called by AK and the flop was Q-J-10.

Not a bad day, though. I got to play poker for four hours, made some money in double flop and essentially played in the tournament for free.

Would I play those jacks in the same spot in the same situation again? Well, I probably will re-raise next time. If the chip leader re-reraised me after that I would have definitely be pot-committed and would have called the UTG all-in. It killed me when the other players didn't pair up.

It's nice to play in a B&M place again, though, I missed it. I'll definitely be playing in the big Spring Tournament on April 23 with a max of 400 players. Top prize is $4K if it caps out.

Hope you all played well this weekend. I know Scott has a similar story from his trip to TBD and we'll probably talk about it on the show.

Confessions of a beaten man

I'm writing this because I have to take a break. FullTiltPoker has kicked my butt to the point where I have to stop playing on the Internet for a while. I've lost a decent amount the past two days and it's not that I haven't done that before and come back from it because I have. But I go through these phases every once in a while where I just can't take the bad beats, the suckouts and the bricks anymore. Last night was the final straw, and I'm not going to sit here and type up all of my bad beats or my bad decisions, but I feel like the cards aren't agreeing with me lately when it comes to online play, so I'm just not going to do it for a while. Remember the set over set over set? It happened again AND again, believe it or not. And in Razz, starting with 4 to a wheel three times at $3-$6 and then hitting brick-brick-brick each and every time when the bring-in insists on playing rags like K-10 is just too much for my bankroll to absorb.

So only some of this is Razz related, and I don't want you to think I'm done playing poker, because that's not true. I will still play in our Ante Up! tournament on the 15th, but I won't be spending too much time online. I might dabble at PokerRoom because (1) the bad beats and action flops are there, but not NEARLY as bad as FTP and (2) some people have asked for a refer-a-friend for this tournament and I want to make sure they get their bonus. But other than that, I'm done.

I will still play plenty of B&M and homegame poker, but that's it.

So, in turn, I think the blog entries might suffer because most of the stuff I bring up here is related to my online play. I apologize in advance for this, but I can't have something to say about poker every day if I'm not playing every day.

My bankroll is still plenty fat, but I need to stop the online bleeding. So don't look for me cuz I won't be there.

Sorry guys.

Flopped a royal flush

That was one encouraging hand from a rather so-so weekend. I was playing 4 tables of Omaha Hi-Lo at once, and on my $2/$4 limit table, I flopped the heart royal flush. And here's the best part - I got action all the way to the end. (Opponent had flopped top set, a dangerous position when a flush is on board. He boated up on the river). Now, if that only had been in one of my pot limit rooms ....

Razz success

After I suffered that horrible beat on FTP last week I made two promises to myself: (1) I'm gonna steer clear of NLHE on FTP for a good long time and (2) I will only play higher limits in Razz.

Some of you may play microlimits and some of you may play higher limits like $5-$10, but I decided I wouldn't play Razz for any less than $3-$6 unless there's no action, then I might drop down to $2-$4. When we play in our spread homegame we usually have a limit of $2-4 so it's not necessarily a huge leap and certainly not high-limit poker by any stretch of the imagination. But for me, online has always been about microlimits in limit games or NL play when playing Hold Em. Well, the other night I listened to our Kenna James episode again and when someone has asked him how he turned pro, he basically just said that when he knew he could play the game he dived right in and started playing the higher limits.

Well, to be honest, I never really moved up in limits since my online poker "career" started. I always just played $.25-$.50 Omaha, sometimes PL Omaha. Or if I played stud or draw I played the same microlimits. If I played NLHE I was all over the place from $.5-$.10 to $2-$4, it just depended on my mood.

But I have been having better than average success playing razz, so much so that I've only had one losing session out of about 20 or so. I was playing $1-$2 or less during this stretch and one day I decided to watch the $5-$10 table. These guys weren't doing ANYTHING spectacular, they were just playing Razz the way it was meant to be played. After I saw this I felt like if I moved up in class I would still succeed. So I went to $2-$4 and had a big session. I did this a coupla times and then said, I'm gonna try $3-6. This weekend I played nothing but $3-$6 Razz and won almost $200 in about two hours' time. I had a lot to do with the family so I didn't play too much, but it was still very lucrative. I will continue at this level until I either get spanked or until I realize I'm ready for $4-$8 or $5-$10.

Why am I telling you this? Because I think there are a lot of players out there who wonder if they are good enough to move up in rank. I always wondered what I would play like making $6 bets instead of $.50 on the turn. I found out that I am still winning, and you'll never know until you try. If you lose, go back down and keep killing the level you were beating until you made the jump. When you are comfortable again, give it a shot.

I'll keep you posted on my Razz journey, and don't forget the Razz tourney on FTP tomorrow night (4/4, 9 p.m.)

Team tournament: Good strategy, bad luck

Hey folks, Fasso and I flamed out spectacularly in our debut team tournament. Thanks for all the strategy advice. We put it all together, and I think we developed a pretty strong gameplan. And I was even more convinced that our plan was strong when I took my seat. But, alas, cards were cold and we just hit some bad luck and were on the road pretty quickly.

We settled on a tight preflop, aggressive postflop strategy. The thought being that we had a lot of time to wait for premium hands in this blind/chip structure, and when we hit, we knew we'd get action. Bottom line: We didn't want to play 2-card poker; we wanted to play 5-card poker. We figured 20K would get us in the money, so our chips stacks toward the end would dictate whether we joined the all-in fest or became a spectator to the mayhem. Sadly, we didn't last long enough to find out.

Fasso was the first of us out, somewhere in 100s (150 players started). He got crippled with 99 on a safe final board (losing to JJ). That was our textbook strategy; just too bad someone woke up with a higher pocket pair. He went out a few hands later with the lowest pocket-pair in a preflop all-in against two higher pocket pairs. Again, with the dumb luck.

I survived until just after the first break (in the 90s). The downfall to our strategy was not getting cards. You can't beat calling stations without them, and I was looking at a table of calling stations taking down nice pots from the few Gus Hansens at the table who were foolish enough to dance with them. I played only three hands in my 70 minutes in the tournament, winning on of them.
1. AQ UTG. Made a 3x preflop raise, and only the big blind called. Flop came 9-10-9, and violated our strategy to make a play at the pot. It worked. (I figured my tight table image would pay dividends; it did).
2. AJ in the BB. Everyone folded to the button, who had been raising every pot. He made it 700 to go with blinds at 50-100. Again, I violated our strategy but I was tired of him stealing. Flop came K high, I checked, he moved all-in and I folded.
3. JJ UTG. With just 1200 left and blinds at 100-200, I moved all-in. Only caller came to my immediate left, and he had QQ. Sighhhhhh. Yes, I violated our strategy for a third and final time, but I take comfort in knowing that even with a 3x raise, I would have moved all-in on the rag flop and lost anyhow.

I did throw away 2-3 hands that I normally would have played, if not for our strategy. They all would have won, though not many chips. And even if I had won all those pots, I surely would have still been eliminated on the JJ vs. QQ.

Bottom line, good strategy, bad luck. That's poker.