Bender To Remember: Wildin' Out In St. Louis
Tuesday, July 31, 2007
After two straight weekends of travelling, I am slap ass whooped. I absolutely plan on doing zilch this coming weekend just as recovery. This drivel should not even qualify as a post, but I just figured I would drop a line to let everyone know I'm still alive...ish.I must say I enjoyed the hell out of St. Louis and it all culminated with a 17 hour bender to remember on Sunday. I managed to...see a very exciting MLB game...get pulled by cops for being one of EIGHT passengers in a Toyota Yaris...play some fun poker and craps...and see some capital knockers at a local strip club. There was lots of stuff in between, but that was the main stuff.
The Yaris incident was rather hilarious. We got pulled for, as the cop put it, "looking like a freaking clown car act." Some how, some way, we managed to convince the cops to let us off with a warning and cab it the rest of the way to the bar. I still laugh every time I think about us trying to squeeze our way in and out of that car. I will never forget my buddy Paul trying to reason with the cop all the while unable to even make eye contact with him due to his face being plastered to the windshield in the front seat. Classic.
That's it for today. I gotz nothing in the gas tank so I'll be lucky to finish work much less this post.
Until next time, may the felt be with you.
posted by TripJax @ 1:28 PM,
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Bachelor Parties, Barry Bonds & Serious Bidness
Thursday, July 26, 2007
Ahoy all. Alas the Okie-Vegas trip reports will have to be put on hold until next week. I'm heading out in the a.m. for a extra long weekend bachelor party and I just can't put forth the effort of writing a long post today. All I can say is...partying, strip clubs, casinos oh my!
I'll be back to posting Tuesday or Wednesday of next week though...pinky swear.
For today I just want to throw out a couple of random things and see what sticks.
I watched the ESPN special last night about Barry Bonds and the scandal surrounding his reported steroid use/abuse. During the show it came up numerous times that he was not the friendliest of people when it came to media and the circus that surrounded him day in and day out. It got me thinking, which is usually a scary thing.
Now the above paragraph pretty much explains, at least partially, why he had to have a thick skin. He constantly had people in his face. Imagine that for a moment. You have a good day at the plate and you have 50 people waiting to interview you. You have a horrible day and 50 people are waiting to interview you. You take the day off from playing and 50 people are waiting to interview you. And this is not just because of the controversy. Ever since he has been considered the next great chance to break the homerun record, he has been hounded.
All the above duly noted...I wonder. I wonder if...now this is assuming he did take performance enhancing drugs mind you...but I wonder if there is any correlation to the point in time where he started taking drugs and the point in time his sour attitude really started to kick in.
Point being...drugs can do some crazy ass shit to your behaviour. So whose to say his attitude wasn't at least partially the result of the drugs that were taken. It would be interesting to see if there would be a way to go back to journalist archives and search for a pattern of increased sour attitude around the alleged time of the drug use. It wouldn't prove anything, but it would probably dig the hole Barry has to climb out of just little deeper.
On a side note, I'm sure we've probably all heard the rumors that steroids can make your pee pee smaller. That's a shame for Barry Bonds. He must have dropped from a 12 incher to a 10 incher. Poor guy.
I was offered a job recently that both excites and petrifies me at the same time. It is close to an offer I can't refuse, but I've given myself and the family time to mull it over and decide. I've been at the same job going on 9 years now so it would be a big deal to me if I were to make a change. I really like where I work so that makes it an even tougher decision. Glad I have a weekend of drinking with buddies to think things through. Who am I kidding...we'll be at strip clubs hanging out with capital knockers half the time. Honey, if you're reading this, I'll be sure to cover my eyes when boobies are near. I'll peek through the cracks of my fingers, but that's all.
Moving on quickly...
Time to study up on my craps and blackjack. Trips to casinos two weeks in a row?! My mind is playing tricks on me!
Until next time, may the felt be with you
posted by TripJax @ 5:41 PM,
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Okie-Vegas Day 1a
Wednesday, July 25, 2007
Last tuesday night, 07.17.07, Jerry Yang was well on his way to taking down the WSoP Main Event and the $8 meeeeeellion dollars that accompanied the kick ask main event bracelet. As I watched the live coverage via the intertubes, at around 10pm I realized it was high time for me to be in lala land. You see, I had to be UP at 2:00 a.m. in order to hit the road for Okie-Vegas.
Unfortunately, 2:00 a.m. came way quicker than I expected, but fortunately it meant I was on my way to Okie! As I told Surflexus I would do, I texted him with, "On the way!" as soon as I hit the road which was around 2:30am. Five plus hours later I was strolling into Atlanta, but had yet to hear from Surflexus, which surprised me. I followed up my text with another text letting him know I was in the Honda showroom (where he works) and I was wearing camo shorts and a green shirt (so he would be able to point me out).
A few minutes later I get a text from him asking if I had left the company I work for and letting me know he approved of my wardrobe choice. It was an odd text reply to say the least. As I pondered how to reply to the text, I suddenly realized I have another person in my cell phone contacts with the same "real" first name as Surflexus. Like a dumb ass, I had been texting the wrong person all along.
So here I am texting a former co-worker and friend of mine at 2:30 a.m., then again at 8:00 a.m. letting him know what I was wearing. I felt like a complete tard considering he had no idea what I was talking about. I . I later texted my buddy back explaning my idiot move and we both got a quick laugh. In hindsight, his response of approval of my wardrobe is rather hilarious considering he had no idea why I was texting him.
It was quite awesome meeting up with Surflexus for the first time when he made it to the dealership. As I suspected, he is as hilarious, jovial and as outgoing as he was on the phone prior to meeting him.
From Atlanta Surflexus and I hit the road to Tunica. Six(ish) hours later we strolled into the land of fields and nothingness. Nothing but casinos! We met up with Duggles for some grub prior to hitting the poker tables. Now this was my 2nd time hanging out with Duggles and, though it might ruin his reputation, he really is a great, great guy. For someone with a blog title of "Go Be Rude" and a reputation for having a strong opinion on many topics, he sure is good people. Sorry Duggles for making you look good there.
We resolved to play the $130 buy-in tournament and were firing out chips in no time. Duggles was the 1st of us to fall and soon after he snapped this picture...
You'll notice a severe chip shortage in front of me in that picture. While I did have chips, hiding behind my hand, I was creeping towards the felt. In the end I fell when my 55 was whooped by two overs. Thanks Duggles for snapping my first picture while playing in a live casino tournament.
Both Duggles and I finished somewhere in the middle of the 52 player field. However, Surflexus basically paid for his entire trip right off the bat by chopping 1st place four ways at the final table. He was the lowest chipstack and they all agreed to do an even chop, so he obviously got the best deal of anyone. It was a bounty tournament so the only thing the chipleader asked for was each of the remaining players bounties, which were worth $25 each. It was a great showing for Surflexus and Duggles managed to snap this great pic of him in play during the tournament...
Congrats on a phenomenol showing Surf! Check here for more on Duggles trip to Tunica and here for Surf's take on the whole day.
After the tournament Surf and I decided to take on the daunting task of driving the remaining 7+ hours to Oklahoma City. It was tough and we had to slap ourselves silly to keep focused, but in the end we made it to GCox's house. At this point I had been awake for 30+ hours and I hit a wall. I went straight to bed while GCox and Surf made there way to pick up Kat.
I dubbed this post Okie-Vegas Day 1a as I had been up since 2:00am Wednesday morning and it basically felt like I had been awake an extra day. Stay tuned for my next installment of Okie-Vegas trip reports with more pokery action on Day 1b and the beginnings of alcohol induced tardedness on Day 2.
Until next time, may the felt be with you.
posted by TripJax @ 10:19 AM,
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Okie-Vegas Ends
Monday, July 23, 2007
Just a heads-up that I'll have some Okie-Vegas trip reports up soon. For now, I just spent almost a full day in a car driving or riding shotgun non-stop from Oklahoma to North Carolina so I need some sleep and chill time. The trip was every bit worth the drive for sure. For now, just know poker bloggers rule. We're uberghey, but we rule.
Until next time, may the felt be with you.
posted by TripJax @ 6:00 PM,
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Lets Light This Candle
Tuesday, July 17, 2007
In less than 12 hours I "hit the road jax" en route to Atlanta. Once in Atlanta I'll be meeting up with Surflexus and we'll head towards Tunica. To say I'm excited would be an understatement. I love meeting fellow broggers whenever possible and this trip I'll be able to scratch that itch, meeting new broggers (new to me) as well as some I've met before. Not to mention I've had limited time in casinos so any chance to step foot in one is an exciting moment for me.Once in Tunica we'll grab some grub and play some monkey poker with Duggles and Jusdealem. I'm not sure how long we'll be hanging out in Tunica, but I'm sure it will be quite a while. At some point, either tomorrow night or heading into Thursday morning, Surf and I will make our way to Oklahoma to begin Okie-Vegas. You can read here and here about all that.
Just to get myself ready, last night I went to a cook out and had my fair share of beers. At 1am we were still hard at it even though everyone had to go to work. Well, I didn't have to go to work, but I had a job interview at 9am. I'm not looking for a job, but this particular job came looking for me so I figure I should at least listen to their story.
As I sat there during the interview that involved nearly 9 employees of a top tier financial services firm, I couldn't help but think to myself, "these people have no idea I just shotgunned 3 Coors Light cans just a few short hours ago. Not to mention the many beers before those. So yeah, we'll see about that job when I get back from Okie.
Well, I'm guessing this might be my last post until next week, however, if I'm able to post a few updates during the week, I'll try.
Until next time, may the felt be with you.
posted by TripJax @ 1:39 PM,
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"U S and A!"
Monday, July 16, 2007
Good morning all on this fine Monday morning. Now usually my temperament wouldn't be so optimistic with the start of the work week, but that's just it, I have no work this week. I begin my Okie-Vegas trip on Wednesday, so I decided to take the full week off and spend Monday and Tuesday with the family. In fact, I won't touch work again until next Tuesday, July 24th. Within the hour we're headed to a local pool for some sun and fun. To my fellow blogthren who sit and read this post from work, my thoughts be with you.
On the poker front, I played minimal poker over the weekend with a little bit of success. I didn't play any large tournaments, opting for some laid back heads-up action and/or 6-max turbo sng's. Sometimes my attention is not best served with a large field MTT, so during those times the shorty games are best for me. The only MTT I played was the small buy-in, big fun tournament know as the Brit Bloggerment #17. Though it was dubbed a battle of the sexes, it was really more of a battle of the countries. And to be honest, with only 3 players out of 27 from "U S and A!" it had the makings of a potential USA massacre.
Not so fast however...did I mention that two of the Americans were yours truly as well as Wolverine Fan, who was the one that invited/reminded me of the tournament. Of the 27 entrants, Wolverine managed a 3rd place finish, while I pulled off a 2nd place showing. I really thought I was going to win this one throughout as I was at or near the chiplead almost from start to finish. In fact, I doubled up on the 1st hand of the tournament and never looked back. Unfortunately, I did most of my damage early and, when it mattered, I got my money in well behind heads up and paid the price.
I had a great time and I'm glad I was able to give the U S and A a positive showing. Also it's always good to play with some long time blog friends that I don't get the chance to see on the felt much anymore.
Well that's it for today. I'll probably give my last post for a while tomorrow morning, giving my plans for Okie-Vegas.
Now for a moment of funny before I go. While this actually played on morning radio, thus is approved for everyone, I'm not so sure the audio here would go over too well in certain work places, so either turn the volume down or grab your headphones folks. The video itself, however, is safe for work.
I'm trying to embed the video below, but if I can't get it to work, here it is.
Until next time, may the felt be with you.
posted by TripJax @ 9:44 AM,
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50/50 5uck Up
Friday, July 13, 2007
I deal with risk management every day. When you maintain over 1 billion in assets under management, just at the local level, risk becomes damn near paramount. So you would think on occasion I would mirror that mantra on the felt. Last night was not the case.
Things started pristine. I jumped onrine in time to try and satellite into the 50/50 on Full Tilt. For those who don't know by now, that's the $50,000 guarantee with a $50 buy-in. The satellite I played paid entries to the top 15, while giving some cash back to 16th place. As we neared the bubble I was 2nd in chips and easily coasted into the 50/50.
The start of the tourney foreshadowed what was to come for me. Thinking the tourney started at 10pm, I was in the kitchen making a sandwich when I heard an alert/beep noting I had a hand waiting. The tourney started at 9:30pm. I was unprepared and my mind was not in the right place. Doh! Queue my demise...
Midway into the 1st hour of play I managed to double up when my AA miraculously held up vs. a guy with KK and a flush draw. I'm still amazed that happened. However, not too long after, but before the 1st break, I fonkeyed my way right out of the tourney. I didn't assess the risk I was taking in a hand vs. the reward it would bring. I just bled my chips onto the table and to a guy who was more than happy to take them, all the while mocking my craptastic play.
To be honest, I don't think I played the hand too bad based on my read and what I felt the guy had, but my read was entirely wrong and once the hand played out, I looked like a dumb ass. I put myself in a situation where, on the river, if I fold it is probably a bad play and if I call it is probably a bad play. That's not a good situation to put yourself in. That's the risk you take when you have a gut feeling and react to it strongly.
The hand was basically my button vs. the small blind where I limped with 44 and he raised 3x pushing the BB out. I put him on Ace Big (AK,AQ,AJ) and felt I could pwn his chips if I hit a set. I called his raise and the flop came down 2 3 5 rainbow. Not a bad flop for me at all, especially if I put my opponent on Ace Big. I still have my pair, with one over, as well as the open ended straight draw. Interestingly, if I put my opponent on Ace Big, one of my outs is gone in his Ace, but if an Ace hits, he might be hard pressed to get away from his top pair, even with 4 cards to a straight on the board. I think he would have a hard time putting me on a 4 there.
The turn brought an off suit 8 I think and this time I checked. He bet and I think this is where I made my mistake. His bet was a decent sized bet, but it screamed I want this pot now. I took that as weakness and put a substantial amount of chips in the pot to put the pressure on him and hopefully take the pot right there. Still, even if he called and I was behind, I had outs. The river brought a blank for me and he bet out putting me all-in. At this point I had 800 chips left and there was probably 7000+ in the pot. If I fold I'm down to 800 with the average at 4,000 and the chip leader well over 10,000. If I call and lose, I'm obviously out. I chose to go with my read and call rather than leave myself an up hill battle with less than 1k in chips. He flipped over an over pair to the board, T T, and that was the end of me. A 50/50 5uck Up on my part.
So I think I just wrote a whole post about a random ass hand early in a tournament that really doesn't amount to much in the grand scheme of things. However, I spent so much time last night letting this hand get stuck in my head, I think I needed to let it out. I took a big risk early in a tournament with a small pair that I just didn't need to take. Especially in the 50/50 where I've read numerous times that you can gradually get yourself into the groove in the first 2 hours and still make a nice run.
Lesson learned...risk assessed...and now hopefully manageable.
Until next time, may the felt be with you.
posted by TripJax @ 1:30 PM,
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Hallelujah It's Raining Khan
Thursday, July 12, 2007
It seems, at the moment, RaiNKhAN is kicking ass and taking names at the WSOP Main Event. To be honest, I hadn't heard that name since I posted this about a year ago.
If you missed that particular post and the the two videos that I linked back then, well be sure to check them out again right here...
Intro to Crazy ass multi-tabling mofo RaiNKhAN
Crazy ass multi-tabling mofo RaiNKhAN
That is all.
Until next time, may the felt be with you.
posted by TripJax @ 1:09 PM,
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Settin' Me Straight
Wednesday, July 11, 2007
In my previous post I made the following comment regarding the net profit/loss spreadsheet Al was going to post on his blog...
I know for a fact mine will actually be lower (total fees/buyins), especially with the Big Game events, as I never bought directly into those and double tokened into them usually for either a $6 or $8 cost. And most of the time I satellited into the Hoy as well.
In that sentence I was trying to justify - for most everyone, not just myself - how the numbers could be left to question considering the tokens.
However, I followed up that line with...
But lets be honest, anyone who says they satellited into every $75 and $26 event is lying if they say they did it on the 1st try everytime. I'm sure most of us paid less than the actual amount that Al will show, but I don't expect it to be the rock bottom number either.
When Al did eventually post the numbers he added the following...
You may use the insta-Waffles method of justifying your loses but I'm not buying it. A satellite buyin is really no different than my preferred method of hitting up the cash game tables to make my nut for the tournament buyin. If that's the case then I'm ahead because I freerolled into everyone.
And later Hoy chimed in with...
In the end, Al had a better one-paragraph explanation in his Tuesday post this week than I could come up with , but basically to me this is what I like to think of as "recockulous". Folks, as Al puts it better than me, a $26 buyin is a $26 buyin is a $26 buyin. It truly does not matter whether you only paid $8 to buy in to the MATH one week because you had a token. It's still a $26 value coming out of your account and into the tournament prize pool for that event. Period. As Al explains on his blog, this would be no different from someone claiming they freerolled into every single BBT event because they always made sure to win an amount of cash at least equal to that day's BBT tournament buyin every single day before he or she sat down to play the BBT event. It makes no sense whether you won the $26 at the cash tables, won the money in a token sng, or paid $26 cash from your full tilt account. It was a $26 buyin. Period. Accept that, because the logic is sound and the concept is spot-on. And this doesn't even get in to the fact of how would we ever be able to check or verify how many token sngs were lost before you finally won that one token in, say, your 5th or 6th sng? Does your buyin for that night's BBT tournament then become $44 instead of the $26 cash buyin, because you had to play five $8.80 buyin token sngs in order to win your one token? Come on with that. The whole thing is preposterous. Everyone's layout for these tournaments is exactly the same as everyone else's regardless of where the money comes from or what form it takes (token, cash table profits, straight up cash buyin, etc.). So that suggestion I would say is successfully debunked.
In true Hoy style, he puts it out there in the long-winded version, but ya know what, both Hoy and Al are right on this one. In my post yesterday, I teetered both agreeing and disagreeing to a degree, but they put it perfectly. Who gives a fuck how you earn your buy-in? The moment you buy-in that is money out of your control and out of your bankroll - whether cash or token.
So thanks fellas for putting it out there and giving your thoughts. In a weird way, all the above will help me in the future to stop trying to justify break-even or loss situations just because it was a token. That's just tarded. A buy-in is a buy-in is a buy-in.
Until next time, may the felt be with you.
posted by TripJax @ 4:59 PM,
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The BBT - My Final Two Cents
Tuesday, July 10, 2007
A lot has been written about the BBT points system over the last few weeks.
I think it bears repeating that Al, Hoy & Mookie created a great thing when they put their heads together and brought us the Battle of the Blogger Tournaments.
I think most of us agree that the BBT was an overall success. A few folks had some negative thoughts on a couple of aspects of the BBT. The main gripes were with the number of tournaments involved and the points system. I'm going to hit on those two items, then finish off this post with my thoughts on BBTwo***.
First off, I think the length - 40 total tournaments - was no biggie for me. If anything, it gave me more reason to fire up the laptop and play some poker. To be honest, I plan on playing as many tournaments as I can each week anyway, so this was never an issue for me. I knew I would play at least half the events, which would assure me a spot in the freeroll even if I was not in the top 50 in points.
I think the length and number of tournaments was a bit much for those who hadn't already been playing ALL the blogger tournaments on a semi regular basis in the first place. Many bloggers came out of no where and started playing all the BBT events and, before long, the sheer number of tournaments started to weigh on them. Again, that's just my personal opinion, but I'm guessing I'm not far off from the issue that was at hand for the number of tourneys.
The second issue, as it turns out, was the points system utilized for the series of tournaments. I again didn't find any big issue with the points system, but I can see where some folks would. Here's the thing...anyone who played for points throughout all 39 events is probably looking at this and realizing they really screwed that idea up.
The thing about the points is that if you cashed in the tournament you were getting the points that really mattered. If you didn't cash in the tournament you were just getting points to keep you afloat. Bottomline for me was cash always superceded points. After about the second event I realized that it was pretty much tarded to play for points. Points were most likely not going to increase my bankroll so keeping my eyes on the prize at each tournament became the ultimate goal.
So what am I getting at? Just like in general poker strategy, each person had a choice regarding the points. I guarantee you the outcome of some of those tournaments was effected by the points system, but that shouldn't be deemed a bad thing. If you played your game and your strategy, hopefully you succeeded in that strategy. If you were going for points, I hope you got those points and maybe won some money along the way. If you were going for the money, hopefully you made some money and some points fell in your pocket along the way too.
Bottom line is I hope no one out there blames the points system for not finishing well in the BBT. There were 39 events available. We each sealed our own fate with the number of events we played and our results. Good luck or bad, if you played enough events, you hopefully got a glimpse at your poker game. 39 events is nothing in the grand scheme of things, but it is long enough to build a pretty strong series like the BBT.
As for my personal experience with the BBT...
I did make the Top 50 in points finishing in what I believe to be a respectable 16th place. I played in 27 of the 39 events completed. I played in every event that I possibly could, but occasionally I was travelling or had no internet connection and was thus unable to play.
Interestingly, no one who placed ahead of me played in less events (Don and Astin also played in 27 events). That leads me to believe I might could have moved up a little in the standings had I played more events, but honestly that rationale applies to anyone who didn't play every event.
I think in the end Blinders recent post summed up what my BBT experience was about.
BBT Final Points/Event Standings - 16th (885 total points or 32.8 per event)
BBT Final Cash/Event Standings - 1st ($1,845 total or $68.33 per event)
BBT Final Final Table % Standings - 22nd (18.5%)
BBT Final In The Money % Standings - 8th (18.5%)
BBT Final In The Points % Standings - ??? I didn't even make the top 30, where Blinders stopped his grid, which means I was below 50% in the final in the points standings for the total number of events.
I'd say the above pretty much shows that points did not have to be a priority in order to finish okay in the BBT. I'll take 1st overall in cash and 8th overall ITM% and below 30th in points anyday. Sure I would have liked to have been in the top 5 and gotten more cash and/or prizes, but I'm not losing any sleep right now because I didn't, nor should anyone else. That's not what this series was about.
All the above leads me to one final note about the standings. Bayne was/is a fucking machine. He nailed the cash and the points with 4 fucking wins, 12 final tables and 28 in the points. That was just plain sick. All I can say is well done sir.
So where does the BBT go from here? Personally, I do hope we see a BBTwo, with a few changes from the first. So here are my thoughts...
Like Mookie mentioned, I think a FTOPS style series would be great. Maybe have 15 or 16 total events of various games with NL Holdem being the primary game (NL Holdem, Limit, Both Omahas, Both Studs, Razz, HORSE, Heads-up, Shootout, etc...).
Here is where the "ifs" come into play. As in if Full Tilt is willing to help out again with reimbursing a portion of the rake and if other companies are willing to pony up some free shit again. We shouldn't just make these assumptions as anytime someone gives free shit away, we should be happy...especially when it is the poker site reimbursing thousands of dollars along the way.
Assuming there is again some support...other cool ideas/additions to the FTOPS idea could be...
- Having a $24+$2 Tournament of Champions at the end for all the winners of the various events. Two ways this could be paid for. First, if Full Tilt would agree to have $26 of rake deducted from each tourney to go towards each winners buy-in to the Tournament of Champions. Or second, have it deducted from the prize pool prior to running the numbers for the tourney.
- Instead of having a the current points system, let the money do the talking. Create a points scale that is based on making it into the money. If you make it in the money you get points, which increase based on where you finish in the money. Anyone who makes it into the money in any of the events, thus earns a point, gets into the freeroll.
Not only does this close the gap on points and actual in the money earnings, it allows folks to have a chance to make the freeroll each and every time they play. With only 15 events, and with a good chance that some folks will cash more than once, getting ITM will be more important and making the money will really mean something (not that it shouldn't already).
- I think having a host for every tourney would be a good thing too. And of course giving away something for knocking out that host would be nice. For instance, a spot in the freeroll or a free banner or some random thing. Whatever is thought up.
And finally, just like last time, whatever can be rounded up for the freeroll, be it freebies or cash or whatever.
So what do we really have here? Basically it's just ganking all the ideas that Full Tilt already has for FTOPS and trying to some way some how give them a poker blogger vibe. So put your heads together fellas and see what you can come up with. I certainly hope at some point we again have a BBT series no matter how it is planned.
Let me close by noting I'm looking forward to seeing the final graph Al has for us on the BBT regarding the net net earnings after buy-ins. Of course we can all throw out the token justification for why our numbers should be lower. I know for a fact mine will actually be lower, especially with the Big Game events, as I never bought directly into those and double tokened into them usually for either a $6 or $8 cost. And most of the time I satellited into the Hoy as well. But lets be honest, anyone who says they satellited into every $75 and $26 event is lying if they say they did it on the 1st try everytime. I'm sure most of us paid less than the actual amount that Al will show, but I don't expect it to be the rock bottom number either.
Until next time, may the felt be with you.
***There is currently no BBTwo...nor is it even named that..nor do I have anything to do with it. That's just a quick easy name I came up with for if there is a 2nd tournament series.
posted by TripJax @ 4:03 AM,
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Bee-Otch
Monday, July 09, 2007
ChickJax and I broke under the pressure (self-imposed) and took KidJax to see Transformers this weekend. I had heard good and bad prior to going, but I decided to keep an open mind and decide for myself.I must say I very much enjoyed the movie. Now granted, there are parts I disliked (i.e. would like to have been omitted) and at times the storyline was on the tarded side, but as for the action I was sucked in. I do think it was about 20 minutes too long and had they shaved some of the ridiculous stuff from the movie, it would have been just right.
So I decided to take it as that...a great action movie that made me laugh more than my fair share and left me wanting more. It's also a movie I will buy for KidJax so we can enjoy early and often together.
After the movie we had some friends drop by the house who had gone to a later showing the same day. The following conversation ensued:
ChickJax: That actress (Megan Fox) is gorgeous.
TripJax: Yeah she is.
ChickJax: She has beautiful teeth.
Tron (Friend): She had teeth?
TripJax: Nice.
Now...please please please make sure you do NOT get duped into renting this film. As a buddy of mine said, "Grandparents around the world will buy this dvd for their grandkid(s) thinking they are buying the real thing." Fucked up.
Later Bee-Otches (see the movie and that will make sense).
Allow me to finish up this post by helping out a buddy and his hairy gymnast.
Until next time, may the felt be with you.
posted by TripJax @ 12:53 PM,
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America, Fuck Yeah!
Friday, July 06, 2007
How do on this fine Friday morning? I, for one, am extremely happy last night is behind us. After a few days of great play and/or luck (you decide if you were at the tables with me or watching), the brown stinky decided to hit the fan last night. Wait, I need to boost my blog parental rating, thus the SHIT hit the fan. There, that's better.I'll refrain from discussing anymore of my poker shenanigans 'cause that BS is boring. Yes this is a poker blog, but I have way too many other ways of boring you - primarily with my craptastic writing - so I'll proceed accordingly.
Sometimes blogs get ganked for whatever reason. I realize often it is because they lay dormant and someone snatches them up to use for their own. I'm not sure how that happens, but it happens. Here is an example of a poker blog I used to read by Ten Mile, but it was ganked by someone who is a World of Warcraft guru. I actually met the former poker blogger and played poker with him at last years Okie-Vegas, so I'd be interested to hear what became of him. As for the new WOW blog, it seems some poker bloggers are still linking to him, so you might want to remove your links to his page from your site. No sense in giving a pirate more booty.
Another blog that seems to have been raided is Bobby Bracelet's 2nd attempt at gay blogging over at MYTGOD (My Totally Gay Online Diary). Something tells me Bracelet did not write this post.
When I got my 80g iPod video, the first thing I wanted to do was add some movies. I was a little disappointed in the selection on iTunes, but I know they will continue to grow the library over time. One of the movies that caught my eye was Team America: World Police. I had yet to see it and figured it would be a good movie to have for my next business travel/flight. I bought it and am glad I did as I think it is hilarious. I'm pretty sure it has the funniest sex scene ever, which is a tad awkward to watch while on a plane with a stranger sitting next to you. I'll leave it at that.
After seeing the movie, I've decided that I'll probably watch a couple of scenes from it every Independence Day. Specifically there are some "America Boasting" songs that really bring home the spirit of America in a funny sense. I managed to find a montage of the songs from the movie and thought I would post them here. For this particular post, I'm mainly speaking about the 2nd and 3rd songs (Freedom Isn't Free and America, Fuck Yeah!), though they are all good stuff.
Team America: Montage Of Songs
If you're like me and can't view the You Tube website from work, try this little work around that I found allows me to view some You Tube videos. Just use Google's regular search function for the video and hopefully it will show up on the search list with a caption of the video on the search page. There will be a "watch video" link that allows you to watch the video directly from Google's search page instead of on You Tube. For instance, here is the search page for the Team America Montage Of Songs video.
I've decided to hold off on my BBTwo thoughts until Monday so I can put a little more thought into it.
Until next time, may the felt be with you.
posted by TripJax @ 9:41 AM,
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BBTwo
Thursday, July 05, 2007
I managed to miss The Mookie last night as we were out watching the city fireworks show which turned out to be great. The show is within walking distance of our house, which is really cool, but can also be a hassle due to all the traffic in our neighborhood. I hate I missed the pokery action 'cause I heard it was changed to a 3000 chip starting stack.
Now I know only a few weeks ago I mentioned how I liked the subtle differences in The Math and The Mookie, including the different starting chip stacks, but I must now admit, I think the 3000 is much better in the long run. The only downside will probably be the length of time to complete the tournament, but considering The Math is that long and it doesn't bother me personally, I see no reason why it wouldn't do well for The Mookie too. That's just my 2 cents.
As Okie-Vegas draws near, I'm starting to get the tingling sensation in my stomach. It's mainly from anticipation, but there's also some jitters from being away from the family that long for anything other than a business trip. I had originally planned on only doing a weekend jaunt via plane, but when we decided to make the drive there with a stop-off in Tunica, I knew we would need to tack on a few extra days just for the driving. ChickJax is an absolute trooper and it means a lot to me that she doesn't mind me taking the occasional trip to play the game I love with the incredible friends I've met since starting this gay blog.
Thanks babe.
There's been a lot of posts lately centering around the points system that was used in the BBT this year. I for one really enjoyed the entire series and don't think the points system was a big deal. Anyone who solely played for the points got what they deserved and most likely paid for it in the long run.
I must admit, in the first couple of events I fell into the "points pit" hoping to ease my way into the points and then make my moves. However, I very quickly realized that it made zero sense to do this. I knew I was going to make the freeroll 'cause I would definitely play at least half of the events, so the only thing left was to try to place in the top 5 for some extra prizes.
I truly believe you have to enter every tournament with eyes on the prize and nothing else. Squeeking into the points or money shouldn't be your main priority in these low buy-in online tournaments. If you aren't gunning for 1st, you are missing the gravy.
As for any future BBT events, as I hope there will be a BBTwo, I have some ideas swirling around in my head for a follow-up series and I'll be sure to post them here so others can critque. I know I have nothing to do with the actual prep, but it can't hurt to try and build and work to improve on a great thing. I think Mookie's idea of an FTOPS (ish) kind of series structure would be rather cool and not take as long as a 40 tournament series. I want to put a little more thought into it, but I'll post about it soon. Maybe even tomorrow.
Until next time, may the felt be with you.
posted by TripJax @ 3:18 PM,
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...And You Will Know Me By The Trail Of Dead
Monday, July 02, 2007
I had to use that title 'cause I was listening to that band with 18 players remaining in The Blogger Big Game and I rode them all the way to the win. Quite a fitting title when you win a tournament, I must say. I'd like to write more tonight, but my bed beckons. For anyone interested, I'll add more to this post about the tournament tomorrow - make that today - when I get a chance.
Thanks to everyone who railed, especially my brother, who also made the final table, but missed out on cashing.
*Update*
I gotta tell ya, there's nothing quite like the rush after winning a tournament. I was very calm as the pop-up, erm, popped up to let me know I had won the tournament. Of course, as usually happens when I win a decent size tournament, I say that I'm tired and need to go to bed, but I end up just lying there with a little bit too much secretion from ye ole adrenal medulla to the bloodstream (otherwise known as adrenaline).
As I mentioned in a recent previous post, I cashed out the bulk of my roll in prep for Okie-Vegas. I had rounded to the nearest $100, which left me with $13.00 in my account along with one $26 token. I hemmed and hawwed about what to do with the token as I really wanted to play a large guarantee tourney, but I also wanted to play the Blogger Big Game. Eventually I decided to play a token SNG to try and win the $75 seat.
While that SNG was playing out, I also played the cheap ass NL cash game tables with my $13 trying to get it up to $15. My thought was if I didn't win the token at the sng, I'd have one more chance at a token frenzy for a $75 token. Nothing like cashing out your roll to make you feel like a broke ass online poker player. To keep this post from never ending, I'll get to the point. I won my token sng on the 1st try and donked off the $13 all the way down to one penny remaining.
That's right, after buying into the Blogger Big Game last night, I had one penny remaining in my account. I recall this situation happening to Chad not too long ago and he went on a rush building his roll back up. I was hoping for the same, but knew it would be tough.
As for the tournament last night, I don't recall a whole lot of details. I hung around at or below the average for most of the first 2 hours. In fact, I recall when the average was around 7000+, I think I had about 2500 in chips. I knew it would be a tough road with the chip leader at 14,000 by that point, but I wasn't worried too much. I just needed one little rush to get me going. That rush came at the expense of Julius Goat. Sorry my friend.
As the blinds and antes started to build, I could see the steals beginning to increase at my table. I knew this was prime time to pick up some chips from folks unable to call with hands like AT or a small pocket pair, where it feels good to win a steal, but you just can't call an all-in from someone with chips. At that point I didn't have enough to re-steal with a raise that wasn't an all-in, but my pushing all-in was definitely enough to put players to tough decisions. I started to try and steal less, but resteal more. In particular, I had a couple of hands against Goat where I pushed him off his raises.
In one particular steal I pushed all-in with 7 9 hearts when he had raised it up. Not even an orbit later I pick up AA and try to mask my huge hand with another steal opportunity. I overbet by pushing all-in again and he called again with JJ. I believe he calls me with even a lesser hand based on the frustration factor of constantly being played back at.
From there I don't remember much. I recall a big hand against Hoy where I flopped a straight draw and turned a straight and flush draw. I pushed hoping to take the hand down there, but even if I got a call, I had quite a few outs. I think I had TJ with a board of Xs Q K Xs. I would have much rather made the play having KQ and the TJ be on the board, giving me overs as well, but as it were, I felt my push gave enough bang to get him out for a nice pot or win a huge pot if I spike the river. He called (don't remember with what, but I want to say a pair of 8's) and I spiked my spade on the river to take down the pot. I believe I showed more emotion on that hand than I did when I won the tournament.
From there it was a tough battle, especially when we got 3 handed. At one point or another we were all 3 chipleaders as well as the short stack. It was back and forth quite a bit. I got extremely lucky - in a weird way - to be the awkward stack during most of the 3 way action. What I mean by that is I was usually not the chippleader, or even 2nd place, but I had a chip count that both players knew I would probably push with any 3X raise. For this reason, I believe RakeFeeder gave me a lot of walks in the BB that otherwise I wouldn't have normally gotten. His passive play in those hands really kept me afloat without having to constantly push.
While I did play rather timid early on 3 handed, eventually I really ramped up the aggression. I was putting them both to decisions with very suspect hands hoping that I could keep that trend going when I woke up with a monster. I don't recall much of the action at that point, but when I ramped up the aggression, things didn't last much longer. When Hoy and I got heads-up I just had a good feeling about winning it all even though I was the shorter stack. Any time he raised it up, I pushed knowing if he didn't have a monster he would have a tough decision to make. That seemed to work as I think he became willing to race fairly quickly.
If we had more chips to work vs. the blinds and antes at that point, I think it could have been a long drawn out heads up match. However, with the situation at hand, I was not going to play it out that way. Luckily, on the last hand I had AT vs his KX and my hand held up for the win.
So kids, that's how you go from one penny in your FT account to quite a bit more.
Good times peoples. And thanks for all the comments.
I'm happy to grab some momentum going into the freeroll. I had missed my fair share of the BBT tourneys lately due to travel obligations, so I had seen my place slip from the teens to the twenties. With this win I was able to get back into the teens (no pun intended).
I'm bummed that my bro probably won't be playing in the freeroll. He only played 13 events, final tabling 5 of them, and cashing in I think 3 or 4, but it wasn't enough since he could only play in that many events due to his work schedule. Oh well, maybe next year, if there is a next year.
Until next time, may the felt be with you.
posted by TripJax @ 1:50 AM,
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