i went along to the world series of poker today at harvey's casino in south lake tahoe. it was the final table - the only two guys i recognised were phil ivey and joe awada. there was a guy called jonathan shecter who looked pretty familiar.
i watched for a couple of hours and saw a great hand of poker. one of the things about going to see poker live is that you don't get to see the hole cards...
early on jeffrey lisandro was chip leader with about 400k and phil ivey had about 250k.
blinds were, if i recall, $2000/$4000. i can't recall how they got to the flop but it comes 444. ivey bets $12,000 and lisandro raises him to $40,000. ivey calls.
the turn comes: a 5. lisandro bets $100,000. ivey sat and thought for a good 6 or 7 minutes - all the time barely making eye contact with lisandro. he responds by going all in. now lisandro thinks about this for a good 3 or 4 minutes before laying it down. the atmosphere was electric. i can't wait to see that hand played out on tv to find out what they both had.
back on earth, i've been playing online for real money and doing ok. i uploaded $30 two days ago and have about $75 in my account. i'll play a combination of tournaments and buy-in games. i find, online even for real cash on the line, people still take some crazy chances and i have to change my game accordingly.
i won $50 playing with friends in the house tonight - i experimented with playing a lot more aggressively and it seemed to pay off. i'm coming to the following conclusions about my game:
1. i get killed by bad kickers all the time. i've instituted an informal rule (subject to change depending on who i'm playing, position, stack size, etc.) that i avoind cards lower than 7 like the plague. whereas i used to play, say, A5 (even suited) regularly, i've started folding that kind of hand. having a good pair (or two) and losing to a better kicker sucks and this change seems to have helped a lot.
2. as a result of the above change, i'm playing fewer hands than normal. i think it's pretty normal when playing at kitchen-table level to play almost every hand in the hope of catching. i've started being very picky about what i'll open with and hand-selection is also improvgin my success i find.
3. slow playing a hand is heaven and hell. when it works, it's great but when it doesn't - more often - it sucks. i used to slow play more hands but now, more often, i'll take a pot down earlier and settle for a smaller pot.
4. i read and respect petersko's remarks but i i only play no-limit. i find that the all-in move is an essential tool of my poker game and i could not play without it.
i'm all in!
alasdair
i watched for a couple of hours and saw a great hand of poker. one of the things about going to see poker live is that you don't get to see the hole cards...
early on jeffrey lisandro was chip leader with about 400k and phil ivey had about 250k.
blinds were, if i recall, $2000/$4000. i can't recall how they got to the flop but it comes 444. ivey bets $12,000 and lisandro raises him to $40,000. ivey calls.
the turn comes: a 5. lisandro bets $100,000. ivey sat and thought for a good 6 or 7 minutes - all the time barely making eye contact with lisandro. he responds by going all in. now lisandro thinks about this for a good 3 or 4 minutes before laying it down. the atmosphere was electric. i can't wait to see that hand played out on tv to find out what they both had.
back on earth, i've been playing online for real money and doing ok. i uploaded $30 two days ago and have about $75 in my account. i'll play a combination of tournaments and buy-in games. i find, online even for real cash on the line, people still take some crazy chances and i have to change my game accordingly.
i won $50 playing with friends in the house tonight - i experimented with playing a lot more aggressively and it seemed to pay off. i'm coming to the following conclusions about my game:
1. i get killed by bad kickers all the time. i've instituted an informal rule (subject to change depending on who i'm playing, position, stack size, etc.) that i avoind cards lower than 7 like the plague. whereas i used to play, say, A5 (even suited) regularly, i've started folding that kind of hand. having a good pair (or two) and losing to a better kicker sucks and this change seems to have helped a lot.
2. as a result of the above change, i'm playing fewer hands than normal. i think it's pretty normal when playing at kitchen-table level to play almost every hand in the hope of catching. i've started being very picky about what i'll open with and hand-selection is also improvgin my success i find.
3. slow playing a hand is heaven and hell. when it works, it's great but when it doesn't - more often - it sucks. i used to slow play more hands but now, more often, i'll take a pot down earlier and settle for a smaller pot.
4. i read and respect petersko's remarks but i i only play no-limit. i find that the all-in move is an essential tool of my poker game and i could not play without it.
i'm all in!
alasdair
at least second got me my buy-in back.