Bodog Poker Blogger Tourney #2

Filed in archive Internet Poker by David Aydt on September 11, 2007

Info from this site: Keep your poker face.com

Bodog... er NewBodog.com (thanks to the wonderful people that are taking advantage of legal loopholes because of the UIGEA) is staging the second part of its Online Poker Blogger Tournament.

Bodog, well known for its soft bonuses and even softer ring games, is putting up $125 in tournament credits in addition to the money put up by your fellow bloggers to compete for. Again, thanks to the wonderfully vague UIGEA, its become difficult for players to transfer funds from the bigger sites such as PokerStars or Full Tilt to compete.

But, who doesn't like free money? So, if you have the means check out the email invite below to participate (for poker bloggers only please):

Bodog is pleased to invite online poker bloggers to play in it's first ever Poker Blogger Tournament with added prize money courtesy of Bodog.

Bodog is adding a total of $125 in bonus money to the tournament. If you are one of the last 5 players to be eliminated prior to being paid out by the standard payout structure, you will get your buy-in returned by way of a $10 bonus. If you finish 2nd in the tournament you will receive a $25 bonus. And if you finish first, Bodog will give you a $50 bonus.

This tournament is Bodog's way of acknowledging poker blogger's contribution to the great game of poker.

The tournament will run weekly on Tuesday evenings and will require a password for entry that all bloggers can promote within their community.

Details of tournament:
• Dates Remaining: Sept 11, 18, 25 and Oct 2, 2007
• Tournament Name: "Online Poker Blogger Tournament" at Bodog
• Entry Password: bodogblogger
• Buy-in + fee: $10 + $1
• Starting Chips: 3000 (Double Stack)
• Payout: Standard Bodog payout structure
• Bonuses:
o T$50 bonus paid to 1st place finisher.
o T$25 bonus paid to 2nd place finisher.
o T$10 bonus paid to the 5 players that are eliminated prior to payouts.
 These bonuses will be awarded within 24hrs of the tournament completion.
 T$ = Tournament Credits. These can be used as a buy in to almost all scheduled tournaments at Bodog and have a ratio to cash of 1:1.
 T$ can also be combined with cash to buy in to tournaments.
• Day of week: Tuesdays
• Start time: 8:35pm ET

Bodog has committed to run this tournament every Tuesday through October 2nd. If participation warrants it, we'll be able to keep it running and possibly increase the prizes and/or turn this into a poker league with an ongoing leader board!

If you haven't played at the Bodog Poker Room before, please download and install the free software client at:

New Bodog

"The important thing is to keep playing, to play against weak opponents and to play
for big stakes."- Warren Buffet

This is my motto for online poker. In fact, I might just make it my signature
statement. Warren is speaking of playing bridge in this situation, but boy, does it
ever apply to poker!

"The important thing is to keep playing," if I don't have a bankroll because I blew
it on playing some game that was out of my league, I'm out of the game and can't
continue to make money. Taking shots is one thing, but over estimating your
abilities and over extending your bankroll is just arrogant. Spending your bankroll
is akin to being a quitter, IMHO. Bankroll management is key in our game, if you
don't have any tools you can't do any work. Our Bankroll is the tool of our trade.
No money, no play, it's that simple.

"To play against weak opponents," Many people have ego problems that keep leading
them to play tougher and tougher games. I guess that their motivation is different
than mine. My motivation is to make money at a hobby that I enjoy, not to beat the
best players in the world. I think that eventually one will lead to the other, but
I'm not going to risk a substantial portion of my bankroll against players who have
developed their game far beyond mine. "You can sheer a sheep many times, but only
skin it once" has a key thought in it that you may not readily see. I'm looking
to sheer sheep, not fight wolves! That's why I don't play my current stakes on
some of the more populated sites. I'm a 4 lb bass in a 2-acre pond where I'm
currently playing, but if I were to move over to Poker Stars... well, a 4 lb bass is
snack food in one of those games. Yes, a Brian Townsend who is driven by ego to
conquer the game will run up the gamut of the poker world faster than me and will
probably always be a better poker player than me, I'm okay with that. I just want
my little piece of the pie on a steady and consistent basis.

"And to play for big stakes." This is kind of a see rules 1 & 2 statement, if you
manage your bankroll and stay in the game and you consistently play against weaker
players with the occasional, calculated shot taken to move up in the poker world,
eventually you will play higher and higher stakes that will give you a bigger and
bigger return. 8 months ago I was playing $10NL with a $24 Bankroll. This was the
smallest stakes game that was available to me and I was consistently playing weaker
opponents. In the last 8 months I have moved up to $100NL and I still feel that I
am one of the best players on the site and stakes that I am playing. Do I want to
move up to $400 and $600NL, yes, when I'm ready and when my bankroll is large enough
to sustain the variance of that stake. Without bankroll management, I am likely to
become just another shooting star.

That's my $0.02 on how this snippet of Buffetology relates to poker.

It’s been well over a month and a half since I have been to my favorite card room, the Horseshoe-Bossier City . After the hit that my ego took when I went down to Biloxi, MS, I decided to slow down a bit and take some time off from the live felt. I thought that I might be a little rusty with my reading of tells, but I ended up picking up on some things, but wasn’t as sharp on it as I had been the last time that I visited the Shoe.

There were two changes at the Shoe that I noticed. The first was a flat screen added at the back of the room, this flat screen was much bigger than the rest of the flat screens, and a little lower down on the wall. I guess this was so that the seated players near the back of the room would be able to watch TV w/o having to strain their necks while looking way up near the ceiling. It was a nice addition to the room.

The second change was that the room had went from a $1/2 NL structure, to a $1/3 NL structure. The house does this for one primary reason; it allows them to drop the first dollar of rake much quicker than a $1/2 game will. As a poker player, this raise in stakes actually creates a slightly larger game, but it also brings the pre-flop raises back into a normal range relative to the big blind. This may be a temporary phenomenon, but the pre-flop raise size was 4 to 7x the BB on almost every hand versus the 5 to 10x for a $1/2 game. Basically, people are buying in for the same amount or more, and they haven’t adjusted their betting sizes up to match the new structure. The biggest example of this comes in a 7 way limped pot that now holds $21 vs the $14 of a $1/2 structure. The standard flop bet is still $10, which is now half the pot, versus a bet of ¾ of the pot. This creates a situation where drawing hands are more valuable. I actually like the adjustment as it allows a good player to play for slightly higher stakes, while everyone else is still betting like it is a $1/2 game.

The session started off nicely, the 2nd hand dealt to me was pocket 8s, and despite the warnings going off in my head, I just over limped them in the high jack. The flop was K- J- 7r and it checked around to me and I just checked right along w/ everyone else at the table. The turn was an off suit 3 and when it checked around to me again I bet $10 into the $15 pot. The button and SB folded and the BB min-raised me to $20. Everyone in between folded back to me and I just smooth called hoping to see a cheap showdown with him having a 7 or a bluff or I might be able to spike an 8 on the river. Sure enough, the 8 fell on the river and the villain checked to me again, I fired a $25 milking bet into the pot and he made a crying call w/ his lonely pair of Kings from the BB. “Nice slow play buddy!” Mark me as up $50 for my opening hand!

I raised behind some limpers w/ pocket 9s or 10s a few times, only to see four-handed flops of A-K-7. Well, the 7 may be off, but there was definitely an Ace and a King on every flop when I held 9s or 10s and when your 4 handed w/ a MPP on that kind of flop, you never fire a continuation bet, unless you’re some kind of maniac!

I over limped my favorite hand, 63 from the CO, and saw a multi way flop of A45 . Well, 63 is my absolute favorite hand, but a suited 6-3 will do. A lady in the 1 seat fired $15 into the pot and when the action folded to me I made it $45 to go. The button and blinds folded and the 1 seat called the additional $30. The turn was the 10 , and after the 1 seat checked to me, I fired a full stack of reds into the pot earning the fold from my opponent. The 2 seat began giving the lady some pointers about how I was playing, but from what I could hear, he had no clue of the depth of my game. I got up from the table to put this hand into my voice recorder because I didn’t want the table to know that I was capable of such a strong semi-bluff.

After folding for an hour or so due to K-3o’s and 8-4s’s and the like, I decided to make a move and loosen up my table image a bit. With the 64 in MP2, I open-raised to $10 and got called by the standard 4 callers. The flop was on my side as it fell A87, giving me a flush draw w/ a gut shot str8 draw. The lady in the 1 seat once again led into the pot, this time for $10. I raised it to $50 from the 5 seat and once again the 1 seat is my only caller. The turn is a total brick, and when she checked to me again, I blasted another $100 stack of red chips into the pot. She folded a little quicker this time and I triumphantly flipped my semi-bluff over and ask for the dealer to reveal the river card for me. It would have filled up my gut-shot which would have been the go card for a monster pot for me. Too bad I bet her out of the hand on the turn, but the result was what I was looking for, I showed down a non-premium hand that I played aggressively and won. Then it was back to folding.

Unfortunately, the table roster turned over 75% within the next hour or so, and I was still very card dead and folding every hand dealt to me. I did win some small hands out of the blinds, but they were relatively inconsequential. The value of my shown bluff was quickly diluted as the players rotated out, and I was back to square one as a rock! Seats 1 & 2 left, and a lady that we’ll call Ms Debbie transferred over to the 2 seat from another table. She was sitting $550 deep, and had a no-nonsense look to her.

With my squeaky tight image, I raised to $15 from the CO w/ K J getting the standard 3 callers to put the pot at $60. The flop came K-4-2r and Ms Debbie led out into me for $30. I felt like this was some kind of information bet and I wanted to test the waters to find out where she was at. I counted out $90 and saw that she was already reaching for some calling chips, I probably should have taken this as a sign of weakness, but I hadn’t played much with her as of yet and I wanted to control the pot a bit and so I just called her $30. The turn was an uncomfortable 10 and we both checked the turn. The river was a 9 and she led out again for $50. I thought maybe that she had paired her kicker and caught up, so I once again just called her down. She saw my hand and admitted that she was out-kicked, and I was just perplexed at how she could be out-kicked by my K-J on that board. When I questioned her, her response was classic, which set the tone for the rest of the hands that I played against her. She said, “I hit two pair a lot!” And she meant it! She claimed that she was on a card rush since 5am that morning and it was 6pm. Boy, was I itching to get involved with her now!

Another hour or so went by with me folding or raising, and my won pots were small ones. Many pots I would just let go after my pre-flop raise; the standard 3 players would call me, and the flop would come all over cards to my MPP. A-Q had become my standard “premium” hand, and I can’t tell you how much I really hate this hand! Anyway, I’m dealt another AQ in late position and bump it to $15 and once again get the standard 3 callers, including the now deep-stacked Ms. Debbie. She had grown her stack to ~$800 when this hand came up. I was ~$550 deep at the start of this hand. The flop was Q 54 and she led into me for $30. Due to the last hand that I played w/ her, I figured that she was out-kicked once again and so I made it $90 to go. Everyone folded around to her and she called, so far so goot! As she calls she questions me, “Do you have pocket Kings over there?” The turn was a very scary card, it brought the J which fit into her 2 pair range and kind of spooked me a bit. I checked behind on the turn to control the size of the pot and to induce her to bet the river with a weaker queen. The river was another bad card, an off suit 10, and once again she led the river into me, this time for $100. I called due to the fact that I had induced a bluff, but unfortunately the river had paired her kicker. “NH, Lady!”

This frustrated me a bit, and I lost another pot w/ QQ against a turned set. Fortunately for me, live players don’t bet in increments of the pot, nor do they raise accordingly. Min-raises are standard and the river bets following a turn min-raise are usually the size of the initial turn bet. “Reload, table 6!!”

With about $290 sitting in front of me and Ms Debbie sitting uber-deep at about $1,600 in the BB, I’m dealt KQ in MP2. UTG and MP1 limp in, I decide to play this one different and not raise to $15 with it, especially since a $15 raise only swells the pot and doesn’t insure a heads up pot. Most of the rest of the table limps in and we see a flop of QJ3 . Ms Debbie leads out for $10, MP1 calls $10 and I raise it to $50. The rest of the table folds out to Ms. Debbie, she calls and the MP1 player folds. Pot = ~$130. The turn is an off suit 7 and she checks to me, I feel that I am once again ahead of her range, especially since her range includes many flush draws and Qs with worse kickers. I reach over and push out a stack of reds for a $100 bet and, in return, she digs around in her monster stack to find 2 black $100 chips for a min-raise! With the history that I had w/ her I didn’t hesitate to push out my remaining $140. She instantly called the additional $40 and totally floored me with her hand, I never once put her on this, especially since she had just checked her option in the BB. I mean, I’ve got her pegged as a player who overplays top pair, chases on occasion and generally is flying by the seat of her pants. She then enlightens me with her brilliant knowledge of poker tells, “Sweetie, when someone bets their black chips, that means that they plan on getting them back!” Wow, and you play that bad? Thanks for the insight! Her hand? Pocket Aces that she checked into a multi-way limped pot!

I’ll admit that I grossly over-played my hand, but this is the worst example of playing pocket aces that I have ever seen! Then to feel so confident about her one pair is just plain sickening. I played my hand like I had >2 pair, and she puts all her money in against this betting line w/ confidence. Geez! I wish that I would
have brought more money to the casino! The river was a brick and I’m sent packing with another poker horror story.

Thinking back on this final hand, I’m less sick about my decision than I was when it first happened. I had her pegged as a certain type of over-player, and I got my wish by getting all of my money in against her, but for once she woke up w/ and once again grossly misplayed a very strong hand. Here’s to unfortunate circumstances!

Well, the Battle for the Luckbox has officially begun and the Landlord nation has suffered some defeat!

Bodog No-Limit Hold'em, $1.00 BB (9 handed) Hand History converter Courtesy of PokerZion.com

saw flop|saw showdown

UTG BJJIII ($225.75)
UTG+1 ($76.15)
MP1 ($174.65)
MP2 ($56.50)
MP3 ($52.00)
CO ($158.35)
Landlord79 ($92.00)
SB ($101.50)
BB ($156.50)

Preflop: Landlord79 is Button with 7 , 7 .
UTG BJJIII raises to $5, 3 folds, MP3 calls $5, CO calls $5, Landlord79 calls $5, 2 folds.

Flop: ($21.50) 7 , 9 , 9 (4 players)
BJJIII bets $25, MP3 folds, CO folds, Landlord79 bets $87 (All-In), BJJIII calls $62.

Turn: ($195.50) K (2 players, 1 all-in)

River: ($195.50) A (2 players, 1 all-in)

Final Pot: $195.50

Results:
BJJIII has K K (full house, kings full of nines).
Landlord79 has 7 7 (full house, sevens full of nines).
Outcome: BJJIII wins $195.50.

How can I always get my money in so goot and lose? Freakin Luckbox!!

And again!

Bodog No-Limit Hold'em, $1.00 BB (9 handed) Hand History converter Courtesy of PokerZion.com

saw flop| saw showdown

SB BJJIII ($325.25)
BB ($76.15)
UTG ($169.15)
UTG+1 ($56.50)
MP1 ($47.00)
MP2 ($147.85)
Landlord79 ($100.00)
CO ($101.00)
Button ($166.75)

Preflop: Landlord79 is MP3 with A, 6:.
4 folds, Landlord79 raises to $4, 2 folds, SB BJJIII calls $3.50, 1 fold.

Flop: ($9) 2 , 7 , 8 (2 players).
BJJIII checks, Landlord79 bets $6, BJJIII calls $6.

Turn: ($21) J (2 players)
BJJIII checks, Landlord79 bets $15, BJJIII bets $315.25 (All-In), Landlord79 folds.

Final Pot: $351.25

Results below:
No showdown. BJJIII shows 8 8 and wins $351.25.

Why OH why didn't I take the blue pill and check the turn?????


I did win the biggest online pot of my life this week though!

Bodog No-Limit Hold'em, $1.00 BB (9 handed) Hand History converter Courtesy of PokerZion.com

saw flop|saw showdown

Button ($76.50)
SB ($144.50)
BB ($47.50)
Landlord79 ($193.25)
UTG+1 ($81.00)
MP1 ($73.90)
MP2 ($66.35)
MP3 ($96.00)
CO ($146.00)

Preflop: Landlord79 is UTG with J , J .
Landlord79 raises to $3, 1 fold, MP1 calls $3, 1 fold, MP3 calls $3, 3 folds, BB calls $2.

Flop: ($12.50) J , 5 , 8 (4 players)
BB checks, Landlord79 checks, MP1 checks, MP3 bets $7.25, BB folds, Landlord79 calls $7.25, MP1 calls $7.25.

Turn: ($34.25) 4 (3 players)
Landlord79 bets $20, MP1 bets $63.65 (All-In), MP3 bets $85.75 (All-In), Landlord79 calls $65.75.

River: ($269.40) 9 (3 players, 2 all-in)

Final Pot: $269.40

Results below:
Landlord79 has J J (three of a kind, jacks).
MP1 has 8 8 (three of a kind, eights).
MP3 has 5 5 (three of a kind, fives).
Outcome: Landlord79 wins $269.40.


Alright, enough w/ the bad beats and the brags, September results were:

Went to Biloxi and lost ($1,069.00) over 17 hours of play.
Online wins were $310.00 over 31.5 hours.
Net loss was ($759.00)

After my biggest monthly win ever, I'm now facing my biggest monthly loss. I went through a 10 buyin downswing between live and online play, then also went on a 4 buyin downswing online after peeking out at a $500 profit for the month. I brought my net online win back up to $310 at the end of this month with my biggest pot won ever, actually, my total online win would have been higher to close the month out if I wouldn't have sat down w/ BJJIII last night and gotten sucked out on! Anyway, I'm happy w/ my recovery, it could have been much worse.


***October Goals***
Get back into the saddle w/ live casino play and win some monies at my favorite honey hole "the Horseshoe- Bossier City"
Play 5k hands this month and win >$500 online. I'd like to be playing $1/2 NL sometime in November or sooner.

***1 Year Goal***
#1. I want to have $20k in my BR by July 1, 2008
#2. If the legal landscape clears, I'd love to turn pro not long after achieving goal #1



***August Graph*** (It shows $200 more than I made, thank Dogwatch for that)

Rules of Engagement

For all of my loyal fans out there who check my blog every day hoping to get a line or two from me, =) sorry that I haven't written in a while but it's the end of the quarter and it's crunch time at work, we've also had lots of stuff going on at church, so I have been uber busy and have taken any spare time that I have to actually play poker instead of write about it. (Wow, that's a long sentence.)

I want to talk about managing when you play poker to optimize your win rate and minimize your losing sessions. I really feel that the players who can better manage themselves will end up making more money at poker and that they'll be the ones who are still around 10 or 20 years from now.

Everyone has his or her own quirks as far as what works best for them concerning optimal playing times. For me, I know that I play bad when I'm tired or rushed. On my trip to Biloxi, MS earlier this month, I was coming off a bout with strep throat. I was still on anti-biotics from the weekend before and wasn't fully recovered. I
figured that a few days of recovery would have allowed me to think clearly enough to play poker profitably. Boy was I wrong. Looking back, I now attribute 50% of my losses to mental fatigue and just plain not feeling up to doing the work of playing good poker. Sure my cards ran bad, that's the down side of variance, but I believe that my losses would have been a lot less if I would have been on top of my game that weekend. This fatigue carried through the next week as I proceeded to go through the biggest downswing of my life, which bottomed out at 10 buyins.

Another area that leaves me feeling tired and doesn't allow me to play at my best is playing poker after sex. I've paid the stupid tax on this lesson at least 2x already, and Saturday night, I tried my luck at it again. I guess that I thought that I had gotten good enough at poker to over come this weakness. I had cut my 10
buy in down swing in half for this month and was on the road to getting it all back when I found myself in a "Right Moment" with my wife. Once the action was over, I decided to do my next favorite activity and play some poker. Boy, what a bad idea that was, I proceeded to drop 2.5 buyins in the course of about 3 hours. I stayed up much too late and played way too long and I paid the penalty for it! I can honestly say that I have never paid for sex, but it has for sure cost me plenty of money!

I've also found that I don't play well when I'm on a time crunch. Situations of "Oh, I've got an hour before I have to be at so & so" are just not the right time to play. I've found that I make hurried calls and take the razor thin edges that are better left unplayed.

I also don't prefer to play at LAG tables where everyone is floating and calling down light. I like to be at semi-educated tables where the players have read enough Skylansky material to fold much too often. I'm not a chronic bluffer, but I do prefer heads up pots against people that I can predict what they are going to do. When I am getting floated and called down w/ 2nd pair or worse, I just need to get up and find another table.

So, what I'm going to do is reiterate to all of my loyal blog readers what my guidelines are for being at my peak when I play cards. This is mostly for my benefit, but I'm going to share it w/ you guys just so that you can help keep me accountable.

1. Don't play when I'm tired, this includes after sex, when I'm short on sleep, and after a very stressful day at work.
2. Don't play when time is an issue. This includes when my wife is pestering me and when I have to be somewhere in a short period of time.
3. Don't play at wild tables. The discipline to get up from these tables should add at least 1BB/100 Hands to my bottom line.

For the month so far, I am up ~$200 online and haven't been back to the casino for some live action since my Biloxi debacle. I was up ~$500 online prior to Saturday night and also lost $170 on Monday afternoon during a time crunched session. Combined, I'm at ~($870) for the month, and would have been half way into that Biloxi loss if I would not have broken my first two rules.

Update as of 10pm, I picked up about $50 tonight in a 2 hour session. It's not much but it's another win!

LL79