A quick announcement - a new quarterly magazine is picking up this blog as a syndicated column, along with some additional content from yours truly. We're still negotiating, but watch this space for updates.

I don't have a theme to write about at the moment due to not playing too many hands lately, but some of the ones I've played have been interesting, anyway. In no particular order:

-Spot the mistake(s): 25/50 in the 650 WSOP sat on Stars (I have about 3K chips.) I open limp AA UTG+1 hoping to limp/RR (this isn't the mistake), 1 more limper, SB completes, BB checks. The flop comes K54 2 clubs (I don't have the Ac), it's checked to me and I bet 150. The last limper raises to 500, the others fold, and I call. The turn is an offsuit 8 and I check/call 3/4 pot, then check/call 1/2 pot all in on a jack river. Clear mistake #1: not 3 betting the flop. If he has 54, fine, but I should be willing to get it in against the vast majority of his range on that board. Clear mistake #2: calling the river. It hit one of the few hands that he can very well have (KJ) that I still beat, and he should really not be 3 barreling a bluff by this point. I'm just not good often enough.

-A similar "fancy play syndrome" type hand that, IMO, is actually not FPS'd at all: In the Bodog 50K 109 on Sunday, a very loose, very bad player who calls down with any piece limps in MP at 75/150 (I have about 4K; he has me well covered). In a previous hand, he limp/overcalled my isolation raise from EP (the button had also called), led 1/3 pot into me on a Qxx board, then got 50 BB in vs. the button with Q9o. In this hand, it's folded to me on the button with AKs. The blinds are both decent and one of whom is probably capable of making a move. I overlimp looking to shove on a blind raise. Almost nobody ever overlimp/reraises on purpose (fish do it with hands like 44 sometimes.) I think this play is underrated, especially when you have a medium strength postflop hand like AK-AQ, JJ-88 (and very rarely, only with the right table conditions, AA-QQ) that you want to stack off with on some flops but not others. Just don't ever do it with 44/this is probably best off never used in a cash game where you can't just bomb it all in. A good chunk of the value here comes from them putting you on exactly a small pair and never anything as good as AK, and calling light.

-Playing with bounties, jackpots, and other weird promos: Some day, I'm going to write a few blog entries on this in detail, because, to my knowledge, nothing in print on any of these is any good.

I: In any promo where you can win your buyin back or a significant amount of money relative to the pot, loose preflop calls are basically essential. This especially goes for bounty tournaments where someone has shoved in front of you and you are closing the action; in a 50% bounty structure, even when half your chips are at risk to the all in, your pot odds are lousy, and you think you're ~33% to win (in other words, you have something like 92o), there is a very good argument for calling. Like I said, someday, I'll do the math (which is pretty extensive), but this is a popular format at the lower limits and people don't really play them well.

II: WSEX "Aces never lose" hand that I posted on 2+2: at 10/20 limit (where you get $75 back if your aces lose at showdown), I raise red AA UTG and only the BB calls. The flop comes something like J 9 5 , BB checks, and I check behind. The turn comes something like the 3 , bet/call; river J, bet/call. BB shows J7o, no clubs, and takes it, but I make $15 on the hand (35 postflop), and unless he was going to checkraise this on the flop and maybe 4 bet, I played it optimally. After doublechecking on 2+2, I'm pretty sure it's optimal vs. his entire range, too. "Insurance" promos like this one also make for odd strategy decisions.

There should be one more update before the WSOP - starting around the 6th, I'll be shifting to daily updates with lots and lots of live hands/chip counts :)

Taking a long break always makes me want to play more poker right after getting back. I've been playing a decent amount since Thursday and should have a bunch of fun hands up soon. In the meantime, while I'm picking up material, I thought I'd throw up a quick post on where and how to play to build a bankroll. I'm not Jesus Ferguson and don't make a habit out of making $1 into 20K on a regular basis, but I do occasionally play lower stakes and like to look for spots to boost ROI "off the beaten track". It's not 2004 anymore and making high 4 figures a month from little to no risk casino whoring is a thing of the past, but if I had to make a few thousand dollars into 20,000 as fast as possible, here's what I would do:

1)Immediately move my roll onto as many sites as possible, *but* move it entirely off Stars. I love Stars and have made a lot of money there, but it's just not a good cash game site and the tournaments aren't conducive to a low budget. Even buyins as low as the 11r or the 20/180's get their share of good players, there are no overlays, and satelliting into a tournament only gives you T$ (or W$!!!), so if you're on a tight roll with little margin for error, what's the point?

2)Split the roll up as follows: 50% "cash game site", 50% "tournaments" - split up between Bodog and FTP. The cash game roll can technically be anywhere you have rakeback, but should be on the site with the softest games you can find. I recommend Cake for US players; Euros should look into places like Everest. Other places like UB, Absolute or even WSEX (if you're a limit player) are fine, too, but under no circumstances should your cash game site be Stars or FTP. The combination of bad or nonexistent rakeback + tough games isn't worth it.

3)Why Bodog and FTP for tournaments? Bodog has overlays on every guaranteed tourney they run and soft fields; FT has the best satellites, good SNG's (that aren't as nearly fully solved/12 tabled as Stars) and a good, but still fast-ish structure. Roll permitting, you should also look into some of the smaller sites, still focusing on game selection and overlays.

4)Play weird games. If a site has good NL, it will have great limit and fantastic Omaha. If a site's midlevel SNG's take too long and/or have an odd structure, the top level ones are a goldmine - because pros shun them - and you can probably take shots on a short roll. If you've ever read a book on stud, you already know more than most people playing small stakes HORSE. Those FTP sats where everyone starts with 3 BB? It's probably possible to break 100% ROI in them, because *no one* other than the rare SNG pro has memorized 3 BB ICM theory, much less bubble play when everyone has 5 big bets. Explore, explore, explore.

See you at the tables.

Today, I'm going to take a break from posting in lesson format and just talk about satellites.

I love sats. They are my best game and almost everyone else's worst game. Many otherwise good, even great, tournament players completely blow up when faced with late game sat situations, are terrible at knowing when and how to pushbot, and add thousands of dollars to shortstacks' EV late in a sat. Cash game players are worse - I can think of at least one 25/50 NL winning regular who's close to dead money whenever he picks up a big stack in a satellite, solely through misplaced aggression. Last year, I picked up 2 WSOP seats in only four $650 events; this year, I won my first package on my fourth 'big event' try (3 Stars 650's and the FTP 1K event I qualified in) and, although I'll be traveling and probably playing for only half of May, hope to pick up 2-4 more packages before the ME starts. Thanks to the constant mistakes everyone else makes, playing a big sat awarding many seats is a little like playing during the good old days of 2004 Party.

Yesterday, I played a number of interesting hands that show how bad the play is. I'd rather not analyze them all today, but I'll throw one out there for now. Here's the hand that got me into the $1060 sat for a $109 investment:

Seat 2: the1captain (13,145)
Seat 3: DooshCom (19,800)
Seat 9: Adar (13,555)
the1captain antes 200
DooshCom antes 200
Adar antes 200
the1captain posts the small blind of 800
DooshCom posts the big blind of 1,600
The button is in seat #9
*** HOLE CARDS ***
Dealt to Adar [7s Ah]
Adar raises to 13,355, and is all in
the1captain calls 12,145, and is all in
DooshCom: okay I got crap..
DooshCom has 15 seconds left to act
DooshCom: but..I'm gonna call anyway
DooshCom calls 11,755
Adar shows [7s Ah]
the1captain shows [Ad Qh]
DooshCom shows [Ks 4s]
*** FLOP *** [Tc 6s 2d]
Adar: win pls
*** TURN *** [Tc 6s 2d] [2c]
*** RIVER *** [Tc 6s 2d 2c] [4d]
Adar shows a pair of Twos
DooshCom shows two pair, Fours and Twos
DooshCom wins the side pot (820) with two pair, Fours and Twos
DooshCom: lol
the1captain shows a pair of Twos
DooshCom wins the main pot (39,435) with two pair, Fours and Twos
DooshCom: I did
Adar: ty

Funny call, right? Now let's do some math. This sat paid several people but gave out only 2 $1060 seats; third place got something like 480. Overall, then, we were playing for 2 more $580 spots.

If DC had sat out, losing this hand would leave me with 410 chips; he'd have 18K and captain would have 24K. I would then have to win around 3 consecutive all ins with a random hand, probably against two people at least once, just to come back to the 5K mark - at which point I'd still be a dog. In other words, my equity in the tournament if he'd sat out might be 10-20 bucks or so (you can use ICM - Google for this - to find the exact number, but I'd be shocked if it was more) and the other two would essentially have 570 each. Of course, if I won, the tournament would be over. In short, if he left and got himself a sandwich, he would wind up ahead maybe $575 in Sklansky bucks.

But DC called, figuring it didn't much matter what would happen. As it happens, he had two live cards, his best case scenario, giving him 37% equity/AQ 43%/me 20%. Let's examine what happens in this 'best case':

-When I win, the tournament is over;
-When he wins, the tournament is also over;
-When captain wins, the tournament is over only if I also lose. I'm a 56% favorite in the 820 chip sidepot.

It's not totally exact because equity isn't really winning percentage, but as it happens, a little over 20% of the time, I wind up with 820 chips, he winds up with 6K and captain has a giant stack. At that point, because it's my BB and his SB next, I am exactly 2 all ins away from being a big favorite to take the second seat. My equity in that scenario is somewhere in the neighborhood of $100, all of it coming out of his equity. Since that happens 20% of the time, this cost him 20 bucks - and that was the absolute best case. If I actually have a real hand or captain dominates him, the worst case costs him upwards of 50.

Sounds small, right? Well, the buyin is $109. This random 'I'll just toss in my chips to end this faster' call is like giving away a quarter of your stack before you ever start the tourney.

And that's why satellites will always be +EV.