What a difference a day makes

Boy, what a difference a day can make in the way the cards turn in your favor and not in your favor. It's something that we all experience and have to get used to; but yikes... coulda woulda shoulda.

Also, thanks for the comments on the new layout of the blog. I will certainly take all the comments into consideration as I continue to change things around. Please fill free to continue to comment on how things look.

But before I start about my last two days of poker, I wanted to link to a post from Poker Funds Investments where he talks about what the potential problems with low limit monkeys like myself and the uber successful pros. I won't steal any thunder in this blog; but I think it is worth the time to check out. Check it out here. Anyway, I really enjoyed it and it really hit home with me and I hope to take to heart in the upcoming months.

Sunday.... It was just one of those days where the cards were on my side. Even KK was on my side as I won some huge pots there.

In the interest of time, I will just put a graph and the rest will be pretty self explanatory..






So in about 50 minutes I made almost 5 buyins. Call it a hit and run. Call it getting my Iron Man points and quitting. Call it whatever you want, but I did quit. I did play almost 500 hands so that ain't just hit and running; but playing 6 tables now really helps in playing better poker.

During this 500 hands, I flopped a set exactly 0%. That's not to say that I didn't get lucky because I did get really lucky on one hand; but it was spurred on by terrible play by the villain. Check it out:

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HAND #1
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Full Tilt, $0.25/$0.50 NL Hold'em Cash Game, 6 Players
Hand History Converter by Stoxpoker - http://www.stoxpoker.com/

Hero (CO): $50.50 (101 bb)
BTN: $58.85 (117.7 bb)
SB: $50.25 (100.5 bb)
BB: $52.25 (104.5 bb)
UTG: $84.10 (168.2 bb)
MP: $60.90 (121.8 bb)

Pre-Flop: Hero is CO with T:heart: J:heart:
UTG raises to $1.50, MP folds, Hero calls $1.50, 3 folds

Flop: ($3.75) T:diamond: J:spade: 9:club: (2 players)
UTG bets $2.50, Hero calls $2.50

Turn: ($8.75) 7:diamond: (2 players)
UTG bets $2, Hero raises to $8, UTG raises to $14, Hero calls $6

River: ($36.75) T:spade: (2 players)
UTG checks, Hero bets $32.50 and is all-in, UTG calls $32.50

Results: $101.75 pot ($3 rake)
Hero showed T:heart: J:heart: (a full house, Tens full of Jacks) and won $98.75 ($48.25 net)
UTG mucked and lost (-$50.50 net)

Yep, the weak min raise gave me odds to call and hit my full house.

So, I will take those days when I can get them.

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So I went into tonight hoping that I could continue the momentum; but unfortunately, I got stuck a little under 2 buyins early. One thing crazy on the night was that I flopped a set 33% of the time tonight which is just incredible. I was due to hit those can of numbers just from a law of averages thing. Unfortunately, one time I hit a set, I lost to a turned flush and I still paid it off. I almost folded; but again that hero call thing got in the way. So, I didn't really get paid off on those sets; but what can you do. I'll take the sets any day.

I got all in 6 times tonight and here was my All In EV Equity as supplied from Holdem Manager

#1 12.7% - Oops... AJ vs AK on Ace High board against Short stack.
#2 53.7% - JJ vs AJ who was on a flush draw
#3 74.8% - AJ vs K4 on JQT board
#4 55.8% - 98s ... more on this one later
#5 72.6% - TT vs QJs on 7T5 board and he was on flush draw
#6 80.8% - KK vs 99 preflop

I only won 1/2 of them; but that is besides the point. The point is that I'm getting my money in with the best of it and that can never be a bad thing.

#4 was an interesting hand. Give me your thoughts on how I played it.

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HAND #2
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Full Tilt, $0.25/$0.50 NL Hold'em Cash Game, 6 Players
Hand History Converter by Stoxpoker - http://www.stoxpoker.com/

BTN: $72.30 (144.6 bb)
Hero (SB): $73.10 (146.2 bb)
BB: $103.45 (206.9 bb)
UTG: $11.25 (22.5 bb)
MP: $16.65 (33.3 bb)
CO: $45.35 (90.7 bb)

Pre-Flop: Hero is SB with 8:spade: 9:spade:
UTG calls $0.50, MP raises to $2.25, CO calls $2.25, BTN folds, Hero calls $2, BB folds, UTG calls $1.75

I obviously love playing suited connectors in multi way hands; but really should I have been calling here? First, I am OOP and I am really not getting implied odds against these short stacks.
Flop: ($9.50) 8:club: 9:diamond: 5:heart: (4 players)
Hero checks, UTG bets $9 and is all-in, MP raises to $14.40 and is all-in, CO folds, Hero calls $14.40

Easy call of course as I was up against QQ and T8. I was a 56% favorite. I actually thought I was a little bigger favorite when I saw the cards turned over.

Turn: ($47.30) 9:club: (3 players, 2 are all-in)
River: ($47.30) 2:heart: (3 players, 2 are all-in)

Results: $47.30 pot ($2.35 rake)
MP showed Q:heart: Q:diamond: (two pairs, Queens and Nines) and lost (-$16.65 net)
Hero showed 8:spade: 9:spade: (a full house, Nines full of Eights) and won $44.95 ($28.30 net)
UTG showed T:diamond: 8:diamond: (two pairs, Nines and Eights) and lost (-$11.25 net)

Luckily, my hand held up; but should I have been involved in the first place and if I was, should I have squeezing instead of calling with my suited connectors from the SB?

So how did the night end up, was I able to get back my buyins? Let's take a look.

Wahoo!! I made it back despite losing with KK... AGAIN!!!! But at the end of the day, that is what I am working for and really focusing on. I'll take the up days. Again, I only played 400 hands before I quit as I wanted to go to bed early tonight (more about this a little later) as soon as I got my Iron Man points. Or should I say my Gold Man points.

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So I called it a day because tomorrow is my annual marathon golf day. Me and my brother always take off a day around June 21st (longest day of year) to play all day golf. There is a pretty nice course a little bit from my house that charges $29 for all day which now also includes lunch. Now that we are getting older, we don't play as much as we used to; but we plan on playing at least 2 rounds of golf.

One year on a near perfect day we played 76 holes of golf. We started at 6AM and playing to a little after 8PM. Let me tell you, that is a day of golf. Surprisingly, my best round came on the 4th round. Now, it isn't really feasible to do that anymore with kids and wives and stuff; but still 2 rounds of golf will beat working any day.

Have a nice day!!!