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    <title>Possibly too level-headed</title>
    <link>http://www.tworags.com</link>
    <description>Tworags.com - poker guide for serious poker players who play Texas Holdem and Other Poker Games</description>
    <language>en-us</language>
    <lastBuildDate>Tue, 13 May 08 04:56:35 -0400</lastBuildDate>
    
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      <title>FTOPS 2-5</title>
      <link><![CDATA[http://tworags.com/index.php?ACTION=blogs&todo=view&ID=2510]]></link>
      <author>admin@tworags.com (Adanthar)</author>
      <description><![CDATA[Unfortunately, I only had time to play one event in the last two days, FTOPS4 (the 200 PLHE event), which went nowhere after a promising start. Who knew that the triple shootout would sell out 40 minutes ahead of time? I'd have tried the Stud 8 tourney tonight, as well, but some allergy or other that's making my nose itch like crazy also made me cut the day's session short after 5 PM or so (and just as importantly, I'm not nearly as good at S8 as at razz). 

Tomorrow's tourneys are a 535 PLO (no way) and a 100r (maybe, if I feel better and find enough other stuff to fill up a screen with.) Sunday is a 530 HU (probably not; I think I'm +EV in a field like that, but not by a huge amount, and its too early for my other tourneys) and a 300 freezeout (definitely); Monday has a 200 PLO8 tourney (maybe, since I don't horribly suck in those) and a 1K (meh, pass.)

While I'm at it, those of you that want to take a close look at variance should check out [url=http://forumserver.twoplustwo. [[ This is a content summary only. Visit my website for full links, other content, and more! ]]]]></description>
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      <pubDate>Fri, 09 May 08 21:12:02 -0400</pubDate>
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      <title>FTOPS1 - a good start</title>
      <link><![CDATA[http://tworags.com/index.php?ACTION=blogs&todo=view&ID=2504]]></link>
      <author>admin@tworags.com (Adanthar)</author>
      <description><![CDATA[It's not a great one because I always hate finishing in this area for a little while after I bust, but 40/4100-odd runners for ~2K isn't bad. (Add up another few hundred in CR fees because this has at least 1 vid in it and probably 2...if FT emails me the HH's. Who knew this laptop didn't save those by default?)

I'm incompetent at PLO and will pass on it, but the shootout tonight looks cool.]]></description>
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      <pubDate>Thu, 08 May 08 11:14:29 -0400</pubDate>
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      <title>Intrade</title>
      <link><![CDATA[http://tworags.com/index.php?ACTION=blogs&todo=view&ID=2496]]></link>
      <author>admin@tworags.com (Adanthar)</author>
      <description><![CDATA[Now that the primaries are essentially over, I think I can safely post my Intrade experience. I just made a long post on 2+2 that I'll copy here.

[...]I estimate my final primary election wager results at around +10K (on an initial 10K roll on Intrade and another 2K or so in Paul bets). On the one hand, this does represent a nice 250% or so yearly ROI. On the other, I actually thought I could do better.

[...]

Postmortem:

In addition to being very profitable, the first phase of this experiment has definitely taught me some valuable lessons. In fact, the reason I'm writing this post out is to gather my thoughts; although the market between now and November only contains a handful of good opportunities, I want to get some of the more useful information down on paper in order to remind myself of these concepts down the line.

These lessons didn't come cheap. Although, as I said, my yearly ROI is ridiculous, had I done everything right, I think I would have broken twice that.  [[ This is a content summary only. Visit my website for full links, other content, and more! ]]]]></description>
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      <pubDate>Wed, 07 May 08 12:55:39 -0400</pubDate>
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      <title>FTOPS/WSOP</title>
      <link><![CDATA[http://tworags.com/index.php?ACTION=blogs&todo=view&ID=2494]]></link>
      <author>admin@tworags.com (Adanthar)</author>
      <description><![CDATA[Last night, I finalized my WSOP living arrangements - all I need to do now is finally buy flight tickets and I'm set. As some people can tell you, the last time I took a flight to attend a tournament, I managed to sleep through a gate change, so as insurance, I promise to blog about anything similar happening this time in the most embarrassing way possible. 

In online news, after a week...well, not really 'off' (playing 1-2 tourneys a night for fun > not playing anything, but not actually work, either), it's once again time to spend a few K and a bunch of time on FTOPS events. The bad news is that 1)for whatever reason, I run so awfully at FTOPS that my best finish was in an LO8 event of all things, and 2)since I have little cash online, I'm gonna have to actually do well if I don't want to shift money around. The good news is that...well, it's FTOPS. [[ This is a content summary only. Visit my website for full links, other content, and more! ]]]]></description>
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      <pubDate>Wed, 07 May 08 09:30:35 -0400</pubDate>
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      <title>Right, yeah, that hope thing</title>
      <link><![CDATA[http://tworags.com/index.php?ACTION=blogs&todo=view&ID=2441]]></link>
      <author>admin@tworags.com (Adanthar)</author>
      <description><![CDATA[Since my last entry, I've played 2 full tournament days (by "full", I mean "very little", because I suck at volume) and a half day on Sunday. The Sunday was a complete bust, but last Wednesday included an FT bubble on UB and tonight had a 9'th place finish in the Cake 30r. That's the good news; the bad is that I think I played the UB tourney mediocre and probably did something wrong in the Cake tourney, too - I had a 270K (1st) to 110K (2nd) CL with 15 left, lost it on a pretty mediocre PF call, got most of it back with 12 left and then proceeded to bluff a good chunk of it off/not win another pot for half an hour. It doesn't help when people decide to defend their blind with 92s and get there, but that wasn't the entire story; once I got that lead, I just should have done more with it than I did. 

It's been a long time since I've been final tabling this consistently, but now that I'm doing it, I need to top 3 and/or win these things, and that's just not happening so far. [[ This is a content summary only. Visit my website for full links, other content, and more! ]]]]></description>
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      <pubDate>Tue, 29 Apr 08 01:55:09 -0400</pubDate>
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      <title>It's definitely getting better but I can't decide how much</title>
      <link><![CDATA[http://tworags.com/index.php?ACTION=blogs&todo=view&ID=2416]]></link>
      <author>admin@tworags.com (Adanthar)</author>
      <description><![CDATA[Played only two tourneys today. #1 was a weird, tiny Cake gold card freeroll rebuy where, on the first hand post-rebuy period, I got AA in vs. KT for a top 3 stack (with 18 left/3 2K WSOP packages) on a Kxx board and lost.

#2 was the UB bountyment. I came to the FT with the #2 stack, misplayed a really weird hand, possibly misplayed another (but doubt it), came back, and eventually got someone to call off 40% of effective stacks PF holding A[s] T[s] vs. my JJ 4 handed. The rest went in on the flop, which was 8 high with, of course, 3 spades. 

Since I didn't play Monday, that makes 2 FT's in 6 tourneys, plus a very good day on Intrade today when Obama predictably lost Pennsylvania/dragged the political prediction season out another two months. But I still have to complain - I'm just not getting the good breaks late in tourneys that make up so godawfully much of your ROI.

Oh well. Now to go figure out how badly I messed that first hand up.]]></description>
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      <pubDate>Wed, 23 Apr 08 01:32:22 -0400</pubDate>
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      <title>Finally got something worth posting</title>
      <link><![CDATA[http://tworags.com/index.php?ACTION=blogs&todo=view&ID=2402]]></link>
      <author>admin@tworags.com (Adanthar)</author>
      <description><![CDATA[After a really frustrating month and a half, I finally have a major FT to show for it, the UB 200K. That tournament's been very good to me over the years, and today was no exception. Unfortunately, I ran just like I've run since March once I actually made the final table and took 6'th for 9K after two back to back unavoidable coolers, but I did play really good poker to get there (answer to how long it takes for enough bad beats to make me a little sloppy: right around a month and a half. In fact, I was starting to worry at how long it was taking to get a tournament worth making a video about this month...) 

Now to keep doing that and build on the nice after tax season bounce.  

Also, bonus hand for those of you who think I'm nitty (nobody post this on 2+2 for a day or two please):

MaximusBets is at seat 0 with 3010.
lowhanginset is at seat 1 with 7250.
PocketOwnage is at seat 2 with 1810.
-BENTLEY- is at seat 3 with 2660.
jas0042 is at seat 4 with 2600. [[ This is a content summary only. Visit my website for full links, other content, and more! ]]]]></description>
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      <pubDate>Mon, 21 Apr 08 00:00:12 -0400</pubDate>
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      <title>EPassporte suspending US poker site service</title>
      <link><![CDATA[http://tworags.com/index.php?ACTION=blogs&todo=view&ID=2356]]></link>
      <author>admin@tworags.com (Adanthar)</author>
      <description><![CDATA[No details other than what I'm reading on 2+2, but I thought I'd pass it on. It looks like they're still processing withdrawals if you have money actually in the e-wallet, but are pulling out of the poker deposit/withdrawal business.

Looking at PS, FTP and Cake, it seems they all have alternate ewallets and bank account transfers set up (for anyone that cares, after about a six month gap, Cake has finally had check service for the last couple of weeks), so the effects, if any, should be minimal. Nevertheless, it sure would be nice to get a friendlier, non-Republican controlled DOJ right about now.]]></description>
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      <pubDate>Fri, 11 Apr 08 22:38:17 -0400</pubDate>
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      <title>Yay...tax season</title>
      <link><![CDATA[http://tworags.com/index.php?ACTION=blogs&todo=view&ID=2346]]></link>
      <author>admin@tworags.com (Adanthar)</author>
      <description><![CDATA[Stuff that everyone reading this should do if they haven't already:

-Get an extension. Anybody know a gambling CPA in the NYC area? :(

In case that doesn't work, though...

-Do your taxes. That is, don't not do your taxes. A surprising amount of people I know are in this category :p

-Finalize your records. I keep good ones to start with, but even if you don't, the least you should do is take all those random withdrawal slips and make an Excel file that you can point at a couple of years from now when you've long since forgotten everything.

-Fill out a Treasury form and get it in before 6/30 if you've got 10K in overseas accounts. Poker sites are a gray area.

-If you're a pro, include a check for Q1 estimated taxes when you do your return.

-Make a resolution to actually get receipts for everything you do this year and not just rely on credit card statements...oops. [[ This is a content summary only. Visit my website for full links, other content, and more! ]]]]></description>
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      <pubDate>Wed, 09 Apr 08 21:50:04 -0400</pubDate>
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      <title>A short list of phrases that immediately make me laugh </title>
      <link><![CDATA[http://tworags.com/index.php?ACTION=blogs&todo=view&ID=2311]]></link>
      <author>admin@tworags.com (Adanthar)</author>
      <description><![CDATA[In no particular order, but maybe I'll make a top 10 list out of this someday!

1)"AK is a drawing hand". I've never met anyone that took this phrase seriously who has won any money at poker and I'm pretty sure I never will.

2)"I raise to find out where I am". Could you possibly find out where you are without (usually) lighting a PSB on fire? Probably. Are you guaranteed to use that information properly once you get it? Nope. Can you strategically use this phrase in a liveament to greatly alter your image as seen by the guy to your left? Definitely!

3)"I put him on AK." 
3a)"I put him on two overs."
3b)"I put him on AA."

Fortunately, I found a great way to always put myself on AA, too. All I had to do was go to the PokerStars directory on my hard drive and replace every card graphic with an ace. Now I get aces every hand! [[ This is a content summary only. Visit my website for full links, other content, and more! ]]]]></description>
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      <pubDate>Fri, 04 Apr 08 22:38:51 -0400</pubDate>
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      <title>Yay, April</title>
      <link><![CDATA[http://tworags.com/index.php?ACTION=blogs&todo=view&ID=2275]]></link>
      <author>admin@tworags.com (Adanthar)</author>
      <description><![CDATA[The good thing about April from my POV is that it's not March. I think last month was my worst month ever tournament-wise, largely due to being down something like 15K to 20K in EV (which is itself related to a whole lot of "final 2 tabling".) The less said about it, the better, which brings us to my April goal: either stop running bad or put in some hands of HU cash and join the rest of my friends at putting up psychotically high winrates. HU is the last untapped frontier about which nothing is written down, and the PT graphs show it...but I've always liked tournaments, to the point where I've probably given up some EV by playing them. I'm sure I'll resolve that conflict eventually; thus far, whenever I'm almost fed up enough to go play cash for a couple of months, I wind up winning something big and stop caring, but I guess I'm due for a really extended downswing eventually. 

60 Minutes = probably happening (at least, my segment is definitely getting shot). [[ This is a content summary only. Visit my website for full links, other content, and more! ]]]]></description>
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      <pubDate>Tue, 01 Apr 08 19:25:31 -0400</pubDate>
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      <title>Like sand through the hourglass, these are the 60 Minutes of our lives</title>
      <link><![CDATA[http://tworags.com/index.php?ACTION=blogs&todo=view&ID=2212]]></link>
      <author>admin@tworags.com (Adanthar)</author>
      <description><![CDATA[[d][d][d][d] Poker content here [d][d][d][d]

The lack of entries in the blog this week is largely because, for the first time all year, I'm playing a ton, including a very belated attempt at learning to 8 table MTT's. It's been a mixed bag - I think I'm still running bad when it comes to important pots - but although I don't have much to show for it, I've gone deep a few times and have a bunch of lost late flips for chipleads to point to, in addition to improved hand reading over more tables. I also have hands worth posting on 2+2 for the first time in a very long time; usually, I put in little enough volume that I very rarely have a hand with more than 1 tough choice in it, but lately, there've been some fun ones. 

[d][d][d][d] Actual important stuff here [d][d][d][d]

But hey, none of you guys care. [[ This is a content summary only. Visit my website for full links, other content, and more! ]]]]></description>
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      <pubDate>Mon, 24 Mar 08 23:33:03 -0400</pubDate>
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      <title>Running bad, playing better</title>
      <link><![CDATA[http://tworags.com/index.php?ACTION=blogs&todo=view&ID=2169]]></link>
      <author>admin@tworags.com (Adanthar)</author>
      <description><![CDATA[I've finally returned to playing a full (for me - bond and shaundeeb leave me in the dust four times over) schedule; it feels good, even if I don't have much to show for it so far. Last night, I only played 3 tourneys (so much for a full schedule, right?), but took 19'th in the UB 200K after a big blind vs. blind hand went bad late; last week, it was a 10'th place in an FTP 65K in another ugly blind vs. blind spot I couldn't get away from. If either of those goes anywhere, I have a really nice month, but that plus a whole lotta overpairs getting cracked = poker. A successful tourney graph basically looks like an insane artist's rendition of an inverted Egyptian pyramid, so this isn't anything out of the ordinary...besides, judging from the news this week, anything I win is quite likely to be worthless after the apocalypse forces us all to scrounge for gas while fighting off Australian biker gangs near the world's last remaining fuel refinery. [[ This is a content summary only. Visit my website for full links, other content, and more! ]]]]></description>
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      <pubDate>Mon, 17 Mar 08 19:13:19 -0400</pubDate>
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      <title>60 Minutes</title>
      <link><![CDATA[http://tworags.com/index.php?ACTION=blogs&todo=view&ID=2112]]></link>
      <author>admin@tworags.com (Adanthar)</author>
      <description><![CDATA[I wasn't going to post about [url=http://www.natarem.com/2008/03/10/60-minutes-considering-absolute-poker-story/]this[/url] until after the taping and/or when we had an air time, but since the story apparently already broke, Nat's blog pretty much covers it: we're likely (assuming they don't kill the story now!) going to be on 60 Minutes in a few weeks. 

Some of you might think this is bad for online poker. I disagree. In the short term, yes, this could be a little ugly (although if the scandal itself and having people chat about it on every single table didn't drive down those AP numbers, this story, released to an audience that largely has no interest in playing poker in the first place, certainly isn't going to.) In the long run, however, stories like this, packaged properly and with an undertone of "regulation would be great for the industry", have the potential to keep the game vibrant. [[ This is a content summary only. Visit my website for full links, other content, and more! ]]]]></description>
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      <pubDate>Tue, 11 Mar 08 01:16:29 -0400</pubDate>
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      <title>3 betting early on or the lack thereof</title>
      <link><![CDATA[http://tworags.com/index.php?ACTION=blogs&todo=view&ID=2086]]></link>
      <author>admin@tworags.com (Adanthar)</author>
      <description><![CDATA[In the last few days, I've returned to playing more or less full time (and running terrible - I think I'm ~25% with overpairs since Sunday - but that's generally how Murphy's Law works). Aside from the runbad, life has been pretty good; whenever I'm not distracted by video games, movies, books or some other shiny thing that comes along, I've been occupied by some business idea or other, and a lot of these seem like they're going to pay off within the next year to two years. Of course, given my attention span, there are far too many shiny things in the world to keep that going for long, but hey, I try.

So, right, hey look a bike...umm...yeah, this blog. I feel like I've been writing a lot of shorter entries instead of a few big ones. There's a reason for that; when I started this project, I had half-coherent plans to use some of the strategy entries in a future book or article series. [[ This is a content summary only. Visit my website for full links, other content, and more! ]]]]></description>
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      <pubDate>Thu, 06 Mar 08 18:13:42 -0500</pubDate>
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      <title>This is what a bad tournament day looks like</title>
      <link><![CDATA[http://tworags.com/index.php?ACTION=blogs&todo=view&ID=2052]]></link>
      <author>admin@tworags.com (Adanthar)</author>
      <description><![CDATA[Sunday:

109r: I didn't have time to rebuy on the first hand, so when I picked up aces, I naturally shoved (I love shoving monsters on the first hand of a rebuy), got called and lost. Later, 2 big suckouts (I admit it!) gave me a top 10 stack with 100 to go...then JJ ran into A9 for half of it. That guy later went on to slowroll someone else with kings and become chip leader. I had JJ run into KK on the exact money bubble with a 1.5x stack in the BB (who folds obv) so I got to be the bubble boy.

240 bounty: QQ ran into AA, sucked out once to get a decent stack again, lost something else, busto. I won a bounty, though!

Bodog 100K: Built up a (very) big stack, took TT vs. 88/AT for the CL with 100 left, and lost half of it. Shoved an 8x stack with 55, got called by A5 for a bunch of it, lost that. Eventually busto 70th (63 paid).

Stars Mil: Built up 35K stack on the best table ever, then lost most of it in 3 consec hands. [[ This is a content summary only. Visit my website for full links, other content, and more! ]]]]></description>
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      <pubDate>Sun, 02 Mar 08 21:15:51 -0500</pubDate>
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      <title>Day 2 (short, not that sweet)</title>
      <link><![CDATA[http://tworags.com/index.php?ACTION=blogs&todo=view&ID=2011]]></link>
      <author>admin@tworags.com (Adanthar)</author>
      <description><![CDATA[To be honest, there really wasn't even much to say about today. Very early on, I made my once a month customary bluff with total air. Usually, that stuff works. Today, it didn't work, left me with 2K at 200/400 and a shot image. Thanks to the latter, that 2K quickly became 18K, but that turned out to be the high point and I eventually busted an hour or two later. When you don't steal a single blind at a good, aggressive table and improve on the flop once the entire day, that tends to happen. Then I went back to the room, played a $700 EPT Step 5 and promptly ran AK into AA again, followed by a KK < AA in one of the other few tournies I played. I've run really hot this week.

To put that in perspective, though, that's got *nothing* on Shaun today. Shaun busted out of the LAPC with aces when 100 BB worth of chips went in on a Kc9c4x board; he was up against the other aces and got rivered. [[ This is a content summary only. Visit my website for full links, other content, and more! ]]]]></description>
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      <pubDate>Mon, 25 Feb 08 09:14:40 -0500</pubDate>
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      <title>Mid-tourney blogging</title>
      <link><![CDATA[http://tworags.com/index.php?ACTION=blogs&todo=view&ID=2001]]></link>
      <author>admin@tworags.com (Adanthar)</author>
      <description><![CDATA[Getting this entry in fast because day 2 starts in 25 mins :)

Played a big sat on Friday, lasted long enough that it was too late for SNG's but didn't get an actual seat, bought in anyway on Saturday.

Saturday was mixed. My table was fantastic, playing something like 40/8 for four levels with no name pros except the first to bust Cam Hua/later arrival fslexicduck (Vanessa Selbst), but I was card dead for most of the day - at a table like that one, isolating limpers was pointless and overlimping just let me miss every single flop. I did chip up over the final level, though, and wound up with ~29K.

Today's first table seems, uhh...

WROBLEWSKI ANNA 116550 21 1 
TRANIELLO MARCO 25225 21 2  
EDLER WILLIAM 28800 21 3 
JAMES KENNA 16750 21 4 
RAVITCH SERGE 28850 21 5
WALNUM ANDREAS 26600 21 6 
BAUERLEIN EUGENE 41750 21 7 
RAMIREZ SENOVIO 25975 21 8 
ESFANDIARI ANTONIO 119475 21 9 

I hope it breaks early! Wish me luck.]]></description>
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      <pubDate>Sun, 24 Feb 08 15:10:51 -0500</pubDate>
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      <title>Two for two in the LAPC*</title>
      <link><![CDATA[http://tworags.com/index.php?ACTION=blogs&todo=view&ID=1976]]></link>
      <author>admin@tworags.com (Adanthar)</author>
      <description><![CDATA[*in busting out before the first break, heh.

The Commerce is a very good cardroom; my impression is that the games are as soft as anything outside of Vegas during the WSOP season. This extends to their tournaments, which feature some incredibly soft play (example today: someone checkraised a 600 chip bet to 1200 with Qx on a Q65r board, bet 500 of his leftover 1050 on a 3 turn, then check/folded a 9 on the river - showing the queen.) Overall, these people are simply atrocious and if I lived here in LA, I'd probably never leave the place. However, the structure features low starting stacks (60-70 BB) with long levels. This is a great structure if you get chips early, because the late game features a lot of play, but it's not good if you're card dead or unlucky in the first few hours; you absolutely need to double or triple up early and cannot pass up any reasonable opportunity to do it. [[ This is a content summary only. Visit my website for full links, other content, and more! ]]]]></description>
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      <pubDate>Thu, 21 Feb 08 20:02:43 -0500</pubDate>
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      <title>Sitting and going in LA</title>
      <link><![CDATA[http://tworags.com/index.php?ACTION=blogs&todo=view&ID=1968]]></link>
      <author>admin@tworags.com (Adanthar)</author>
      <description><![CDATA[Confession: when it comes to travel, I'm pretty incompetent. Oh, I (read: my wife) pack light, don't sweat the small stuff, and haven't ever done anything to get me arrested, but when combining being short on sleep with going somewhere by myself, bad things tend to happen. Nevertheless, one missed connection due largely to my own stupidity later, I did, in fact, get to LA almost on time - just in time for the televised SNG.

Without spoiling it, the event went really well. Unfortunately, I only had one interesting hand the whole time; with the cards I was dealt all being on one extreme or the other, every other decision I had to make was really easy. That hiccup notwithstanding, the event itself was a lot of fun, and, with half a dozen very good online players up against Layne Flack, Todd Brunson and Jose Canseco (who lasted longer than either of those two, BTW), it made for a lot of good poker. I'll blog a lot more about it after the video is released. [[ This is a content summary only. Visit my website for full links, other content, and more! ]]]]></description>
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      <pubDate>Wed, 20 Feb 08 17:45:02 -0500</pubDate>
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      <title>The last week or so</title>
      <link><![CDATA[http://tworags.com/index.php?ACTION=blogs&todo=view&ID=1938]]></link>
      <author>admin@tworags.com (Adanthar)</author>
      <description><![CDATA[Sort of a good news/bad news type thing. Good news: I got a NY Times interview (see last entry) that apparently got reprinted in a few places that friends of mine actually saw, and I started playing poker again. Bad news: none of the poker playing led anywhere, obv. After some initial rust wore off, I found myself making a couple of good reads for stacks at 5/10 FR NL (did I mention I'm a nit?), but I did dust off a little more than I got from the reads during the rusty phase. In addition, I seem to be on quite a decent streak of getting everything in the TPGK to set range cracked or coolered by stuff, both in FR and in tournaments. It hasn't really concerned me much, but I hope it works out better at LAPC (leaving tomorrow in the very early morning - if the flights hold up one time, getting there in time to play a cool televised SNG. More on that later.) 

I'm doing quite well in a few things, though. [[ This is a content summary only. Visit my website for full links, other content, and more! ]]]]></description>
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      <pubDate>Sun, 17 Feb 08 23:15:00 -0500</pubDate>
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      <title>Bad news: 0 for Sunday</title>
      <link><![CDATA[http://tworags.com/index.php?ACTION=blogs&todo=view&ID=1892]]></link>
      <author>admin@tworags.com (Adanthar)</author>
      <description><![CDATA[In fact, I don't think I broke the 2 hour mark anywhere.

Good news: I made the NY Times! 

[url=http://www.nytimes.com/2008/02/13/business/13leonhardt.html?_r=1&hp&oref=slogin]NY Times article[/url]

It's not about poker, but hey, I'll take it.  ]]></description>
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      <pubDate>Tue, 12 Feb 08 21:21:40 -0500</pubDate>
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      <title>Yeah I definitely need to play more</title>
      <link><![CDATA[http://tworags.com/index.php?ACTION=blogs&todo=view&ID=1846]]></link>
      <author>admin@tworags.com (Adanthar)</author>
      <description><![CDATA[Good news: I made my first '08 final table last night. (That sounded really bad until I realized I'd played 30 donkaments all year, lol. Which leads me to:) 

Bad news: I took 7'th because I actually made an impatient reshove. Yeah, it was 7 BB to a minraise and probably didn't even cost me much in equity, but it's still very dumb and not something I should ever do. And, after some thought, I'm pretty sure the reason I did it was because I didn't play enough recently.

So, a short term fix = me playing most of the FTOPS events and enough other donkaments to fill my screen before I leave for LA. That ought to be enough to get me un-rusty.

Oh well, at least I made moneys/got the Bodog runbad streak out of the way. 

(Bodog runbad streak: a 2000% ROI over the course of a year and a half/70 tournaments, followed by an 0 for 48 streak that brought it down to 500%)]]></description>
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      <pubDate>Thu, 07 Feb 08 14:29:08 -0500</pubDate>
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      <title>Hey, I made money on Sunday</title>
      <link><![CDATA[http://tworags.com/index.php?ACTION=blogs&todo=view&ID=1833]]></link>
      <author>admin@tworags.com (Adanthar)</author>
      <description><![CDATA[Only $200 or so, but hey, money's nice. I only played about four tourneys, bubbled the UB 200K, but went very deep in the Stars 1M again before busting out 200-something. It's also got enough plays in it to be a CR vid or two, so I'm set for this month.

If you're in the appropriate states, don't forget to vote today :)]]></description>
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      <pubDate>Tue, 05 Feb 08 16:03:12 -0500</pubDate>
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      <title>Day 2 recap</title>
      <link><![CDATA[http://tworags.com/index.php?ACTION=blogs&todo=view&ID=1821]]></link>
      <author>admin@tworags.com (Adanthar)</author>
      <description><![CDATA[For whatever reason, Day 2 is easier to remember than Day 1...

My first table had several decent players, including WacoKidd with an identical stack to my right, but the main factor was the guy immediately to my left, a middle aged, very obese guy who had about 100K. On the very first hand, the action went, IIRC: old, nitty looking short stacked guy raises in EP for 1/4 of his stack, two callers including Waco in LP, the obese guy in the BB 3 bets pretty big, nitty old guy snap shoves. The first caller folds nines, Waco folds jacks, the old guy has tens and loses to the fat guy's...Q8 sooted. He then goes on to play every hand that can make a straight or flush while the rest of us are all salivating. Sample hand from the rest of the hour and a half I spent there: Waco raises on the button to 3200 at 600/1200, I flat call jacks because I want the guy in, the guy obviously overcalls. Flop Q[h]9[h]2[s]. [[ This is a content summary only. Visit my website for full links, other content, and more! ]]]]></description>
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      <pubDate>Sun, 03 Feb 08 12:57:38 -0500</pubDate>
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      <title>Day 1 recap</title>
      <link><![CDATA[http://tworags.com/index.php?ACTION=blogs&todo=view&ID=1813]]></link>
      <author>admin@tworags.com (Adanthar)</author>
      <description><![CDATA[Enough being lazy...time to post hands!

At this point, the details of Day 1 are sort of blurry. Most of the action early on was focused on John Hennigan to my left. What would usually happen is that he'd small ball, raise + cbet his way into pots from other people, I'd somehow wind up in the pot with him, flop a set and win half of what he got from them, ie, the minimum. I flopped at least 6 sets in the first 4 levels and didn't win more than 1 barrel from him on any of them (probably as infuriating for him as me, because none of the hands went to showdown and he must've been thinking I was crushing him somehow. Nope, just catching cards.) BTW, John plays incredibly fast (warning bells should go off whenever someone competent takes < 15 secs to make big decisions, IMO) and incredibly well in general; the fact that I couldn't get paid off is a big sign of that. 

As I said, early on, I'd just do something, John to my left would do something, I'd flop a set and win money. [[ This is a content summary only. Visit my website for full links, other content, and more! ]]]]></description>
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      <pubDate>Sat, 02 Feb 08 19:07:52 -0500</pubDate>
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      <title>Borgatasto</title>
      <link><![CDATA[http://tworags.com/index.php?ACTION=blogs&todo=view&ID=1803]]></link>
      <author>admin@tworags.com (Adanthar)</author>
      <description><![CDATA[This is a couple of days late largely thanks to lack of laptop, but I busto'ed on Day 2 in an impressive fashion, first getting to 157K (2x average) largely off a pot I won at showdown with T high and then calling two thirds of it off on 2 hands (one okay, one lousy) before busting several hours later.

This entry's a placeholder for a full recap later on.]]></description>
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      <pubDate>Wed, 30 Jan 08 11:59:15 -0500</pubDate>
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      <title>Day 1 results</title>
      <link><![CDATA[http://tworags.com/index.php?ACTION=blogs&todo=view&ID=1793]]></link>
      <author>admin@tworags.com (Adanthar)</author>
      <description><![CDATA[I've got 69K heading into Day 2 (~45K average, 360 of 500-odd left, 54 paid.) It was a tough table/seat draw, with John Hennigan (last year's winner and, I think, one of the best poker players I've ever sat with) directly to my left, but I got the best of him all day - it helps to flop lots of sets. In addition, Rhett Butler was to my right, Rizen spent all day in Seat 8 (I was Seat 4), and a shortstacked Tmay420 showed up for the last couple of levels in Seat 9, but there were a few soft spots and I chipped up off all of them. I never ended a level with fewer chips than I started with, which is always a good sign, and will have > 100 BB going into Day 2, another good sign. As I've usually been saying on here, I'm getting more and more comfortable with the way live play flows and all of my moves are working/I'm picking off small bluffs with third pair repeatedly. [[ This is a content summary only. Visit my website for full links, other content, and more! ]]]]></description>
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      <pubDate>Sun, 27 Jan 08 23:51:54 -0500</pubDate>
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      <title>Busto (and busto)</title>
      <link><![CDATA[http://tworags.com/index.php?ACTION=blogs&todo=view&ID=1785]]></link>
      <author>admin@tworags.com (Adanthar)</author>
      <description><![CDATA[Got here last night and just played the $5200 event ("just" as in "busted an hour ago".) It was another non-starter where I never got over my starting stack, although I played moderately well before running KK into AA with an effective 22 BB. Doh. 

More (okay, not more) importantly, after struggling for a day or so, my laptop hard drive looks to have totally died. In fact, I'm typing this from the hotel lobby's free Internet PC's. This means no updating the blog until I'm back home on Monday or Tuesday (or maybe Thursday if I run hot in the ME, heh) - I already ordered a replacement off Ebay, but not having a working PC is really going to suck till then.  

The good news is I always make sure to copy all the data over to my desktop/vice versa, so I think the only thing I've permanently lost is a few photos I was too lazy to transfer the last time. The bad news is the amount of time it's gonna take to install Windows/Office/Pokertracker/all the other stuff on the new drive... [[ This is a content summary only. Visit my website for full links, other content, and more! ]]]]></description>
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      <pubDate>Fri, 25 Jan 08 19:16:17 -0500</pubDate>
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      <title>AC/weekend</title>
      <link><![CDATA[http://tworags.com/index.php?ACTION=blogs&todo=view&ID=1755]]></link>
      <author>admin@tworags.com (Adanthar)</author>
      <description><![CDATA[Quick update:

-Played one big AC tourney, a 1K sat (too busy the next day to play the other one.) Won 0 hands in 3 hours. Highlight (also the only light): calling a 10x UTG shove with 9x and TT to see the other guy turn over Q5s. I river a boat, except I was drawing to quads on the flop. lols. 

Sunday went okay, not great. Made two deep runs in both Stars and FTP. I wound up bubbling @ FTP on a reshove gone bad when someone behind me had kings, but making it to the top 300 on Stars. It's not a good result or anything, but I had built up deep stacks on both tourneys, and that's how you final table them eventually.

Making the second half of my CR vid before I go back out to AC for the 10K ME (and a couple of more prelims) on Wednesday or Thursday.]]></description>
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      <pubDate>Fri, 18 Jan 08 19:37:57 -0500</pubDate>
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      <title>Yay, new site design</title>
      <link><![CDATA[http://tworags.com/index.php?ACTION=blogs&todo=view&ID=1747]]></link>
      <author>admin@tworags.com (Adanthar)</author>
      <description><![CDATA[Very nice IMO :)

My poker vacation's stretched to an unprecedented 2 weeks (granted some of that was involuntary and Wednesday was the first day I could really talk and walk around), but it's time for it to end. I'm heading down to the Borgata tomorrow morning and will be playing the $1500 the day after that (theoretically I could play the 1K tomorrow as well but something tells me I'm not gonna get there on time. doh.) Assuming I don't FT that, I'm heading back after I busto, then playing a full Sunday (if you have a Cardrunners subscription and see my latest video...there's a reason I play these things, OMFG was that FT awful) and resuming a full schedule after that. 

For whatever reason, I've been strangely hesitant about starting to play again, but it's time to let go and enjoy it. 

]]></description>
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      <pubDate>Fri, 18 Jan 08 00:22:34 -0500</pubDate>
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      <title>Feeling like death</title>
      <link><![CDATA[http://tworags.com/index.php?ACTION=blogs&todo=view&ID=1704]]></link>
      <author>admin@tworags.com (Adanthar)</author>
      <description><![CDATA[Pretty much out of it since Friday. This is gonna be the first Sunday I've voluntarily missed in at least a year. Dumb flu :(

Totally wrecks my schedule, though I should be alive and moving again within the next couple of days.

]]></description>
      <guid isPermaLink="true"><![CDATA[http://tworags.com/index.php?ACTION=blogs&todo=view&ID=1704]]></guid>
      <pubDate>Sun, 13 Jan 08 16:37:14 -0500</pubDate>
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      <title>Weekend results</title>
      <link><![CDATA[http://tworags.com/index.php?ACTION=blogs&todo=view&ID=1658]]></link>
      <author>admin@tworags.com (Adanthar)</author>
      <description><![CDATA[Nothing of note this Sunday. I did go deep in the only thing I played on Saturday, a big event, but, you know, mess up a hand, lose half your stack, win 3 buyins instead of 30, ooooopsie. I *have* ramped up my play a little bit and am slowly learning to 6 table (this probably has something to do with why I bubbled everything on Wednesday, the other day I played a lot this week :p) 

The two screwups of note that both cost me tournaments this weekend both involved misjudging raise size tells. I lost a huge pot just ITM in a $530 when someone raised only 3x after a limper, I didn't think for enough time and jammed 99 next to act; of course, he had aces. Similarly, in the Million, a 30/15 raised 4x in LMP, I had tens in the small blind, thought even a 4x size still meant a lighter hand than most people would have there and jammed a pretty nice stack. Nope, he had jacks. [[ This is a content summary only. Visit my website for full links, other content, and more! ]]]]></description>
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      <pubDate>Sun, 06 Jan 08 20:36:55 -0500</pubDate>
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      <title>CR posted my video on Youtube as a sample</title>
      <link><![CDATA[http://tworags.com/index.php?ACTION=blogs&todo=view&ID=1642]]></link>
      <author>admin@tworags.com (Adanthar)</author>
      <description><![CDATA[[url=http://www.youtube.com/results?search_query=adanthar&search=Search]Link to Adanthar MTT CardRunner vids on YouTube[/url] 

Check it out - it's not the best vid I've done, but it's a pretty good one and has a nice summary of blind defense/pot odds in MTT's in Part 3 somewhere.

Update: Looks like it's got some pretty bad audio sync issues. These don't exist in the actual CR vid, I swear :p
]]></description>
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      <pubDate>Fri, 04 Jan 08 21:28:54 -0500</pubDate>
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      <title>First 2008 post: BR management and game management revisited</title>
      <link><![CDATA[http://tworags.com/index.php?ACTION=blogs&todo=view&ID=1632]]></link>
      <author>admin@tworags.com (Adanthar)</author>
      <description><![CDATA[I've noticed something about the scene. Since UIGEA, it's a lot easier to find a nosebleed game - every site out there now has at least 50/100 NL and most top out at 3/6 - but the games that used to be called high stakes, those bread and butter 5/10 and 10/20 games, run at the same rate they did two years ago and at 10x the difficulty rating. They're still very beatable, but you have to know what a TAGfish is to beat them, and have to know what a dolphin (the LAGfish eating the TAGfish) is to crush them. The same thing applies to tournaments; we don't notice it because the donks we play in the first two hours are almost as bad as ever, but, increasingly, a vast percentage of the people ITM in the bigger stakes events are at least TAGfish. [[ This is a content summary only. Visit my website for full links, other content, and more! ]]]]></description>
      <guid isPermaLink="true"><![CDATA[http://tworags.com/index.php?ACTION=blogs&todo=view&ID=1632]]></guid>
      <pubDate>Wed, 02 Jan 08 19:14:04 -0500</pubDate>
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      <title>Wait, *what*?</title>
      <link><![CDATA[http://tworags.com/index.php?ACTION=blogs&todo=view&ID=1616]]></link>
      <author>admin@tworags.com (Adanthar)</author>
      <description><![CDATA[Sunday was a relatively pointless 0 for 4, some tough breaks blah blah blah, whatever. That isn't really the point of this post.

Since it's Dec 31 (and I'm about to log off the Internet to go have fun), people have been posting their yearly results. Yeah, okay, The Bryce won 2.5 million in nosebleed limit because he's God, a few people have 500K-800K years because they're freaking insane, whatever.

leatherass (a Supernova Elite who grinded 80 billion hands at midstakes) was breaking even on the year and needed a spectacular 100K month to get anywhere?

Daut44, one of the better 25/50 Stars regs (IMO) and a good tourney player, is up a total of 100K online?

Gobboboy is down money total on the year which *does* count his 250K (after staking) Aussie cash 2'nd place???

WTF??? How do I have higher numbers than any of these people? It's not like I play a lot and it's not like I'm *that* good! [[ This is a content summary only. Visit my website for full links, other content, and more! ]]]]></description>
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      <pubDate>Mon, 31 Dec 07 22:59:07 -0500</pubDate>
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      <title>Back after these messages</title>
      <link><![CDATA[http://tworags.com/index.php?ACTION=blogs&todo=view&ID=1606]]></link>
      <author>admin@tworags.com (Adanthar)</author>
      <description><![CDATA[Other than that one Sunday and a couple of tourneys today/tomorrow, I'm taking a break until the New Year. Nothing particularly important - I just wanted to be refreshed for January and the Borgata WPT. 

Tallying up the year, it looks very good; even though I didn't win a six figure Sunday event like last year, I still had some huge scores and great results for how little I play. My new year's resolution, other than the cash thing, is to put in more hands in general and take those results to the next level. Aside from that, though, I'm pretty happy with my life and the way things have worked out.

Again, happy holidays, and, except for tomorrow, see you in '08.]]></description>
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      <pubDate>Sat, 29 Dec 07 17:56:15 -0500</pubDate>
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      <title>Suuuuuunday</title>
      <link><![CDATA[http://tworags.com/index.php?ACTION=blogs&todo=view&ID=1582]]></link>
      <author>admin@tworags.com (Adanthar)</author>
      <description><![CDATA[Short version: Went nowhere, only played one least bit interesting hand all day.

JackPotter2 is at seat 0 with 2770.
[b]korrupt911 is at seat 1 with 475.[/b]
T LaZeR is at seat 2 with 3005.
BadAzzCop is at seat 3 with 2095.
[b]Adanthar1 is at seat 4 with 2965.
phildar10 is at seat 5 with 3790.[/b]
Tmay_420 is at seat 6 with 1845.
RandalFlowers is at seat 7 with 2685.
Hixx is at seat 8 with 2645.
habash is at seat 9 with 2725.
The button is at seat 5.

Tmay_420 posts the small blind of 10.
RandalFlowers posts the big blind of 20.

JackPotter2:  -- --
korrupt911:  -- --
T LaZeR:  -- --
BadAzzCop:  -- --
Adanthar1:  Qc Qh
phildar10:  -- --
Tmay_420:  -- --
RandalFlowers:  -- --
Hixx:  -- --
habash:  -- --

Pre-flop:

Hixx folds.   habash folds.   JackPotter2 folds.
[b]korrupt911 raises to 60.   T LaZeR folds.   BadAzzCop
folds.   Adanthar1 re-raises to 210.   phildar10 calls.[/b]
Tmay_420 folds.   RandalFlowers folds.   korrupt911
calls. [[ This is a content summary only. Visit my website for full links, other content, and more! ]]]]></description>
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      <pubDate>Sun, 23 Dec 07 22:54:07 -0500</pubDate>
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      <title>Back home and unjetlagged</title>
      <link><![CDATA[http://tworags.com/index.php?ACTION=blogs&todo=view&ID=1540]]></link>
      <author>admin@tworags.com (Adanthar)</author>
      <description><![CDATA[Feeling way better about poker in general (although, of course, the guy from my last post wound up finishing fourth obv.) I even put in a Sunday where I built up some pretty big stacks [and then blew them off, one in spectacular fashion that will get my replacement CR vid tomorrow laughed at :p. I blame leftover tilt and/or the one big mistake of the month I'm allowing myself to make.] 

Regardless, after a mandatory couple of days off to recover, I'll be back playing a big MTT schedule and probably mixing it in with some MSNL 6 max after New Year's. I need to get myself in a frame of mind to finally get over cash variance and just grind out some hands, because regardless of how good I am getting at MTT's and how much I'm going deep in big events, I can only get as aggressive as I need to get by learning to crush midstakes. [[ This is a content summary only. Visit my website for full links, other content, and more! ]]]]></description>
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      <pubDate>Wed, 19 Dec 07 18:05:20 -0500</pubDate>
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      <title>Bellagio Day 3: lol, donkament</title>
      <link><![CDATA[http://tworags.com/index.php?ACTION=blogs&todo=view&ID=1520]]></link>
      <author>admin@tworags.com (Adanthar)</author>
      <description><![CDATA[Buuuuuuuusto ~54'th for 29K (which, minus staking and makeup, means I made 1K on the series. Ship it?)

There were a bunch of hands, but the key four in a nutshell:

-Up to 200K by chipping up and never seeing a showdown, I raise QQ at 2/4K. Loose/bad Asian guy calls 1/3 of his stack in the BB, then stop and goes me all in on a J86 flop with the mighty 98o. It's good, so I lose 70K. 

-Back to 200K by chipping up and never seeing a showdown, I eventually win a big flip with tens vs. AK, get up to 330K, then raise A[s]J[s] from MP to 22K at 4/8 with a very tight image. Folded to the BB, who's been playing worse and worse all day as he's gotten drunker and drunker; he calls. Flop K[s] J[c] 3[s], he checks, I bet something like 35K to try to induce a shove, he snap shoves, I snap call and his K[h]2[h] wins (sigh, way to CR your bluff catcher). This drops me down to 140K while he gets about 300K. [[ This is a content summary only. Visit my website for full links, other content, and more! ]]]]></description>
      <guid isPermaLink="true"><![CDATA[http://tworags.com/index.php?ACTION=blogs&todo=view&ID=1520]]></guid>
      <pubDate>Sun, 16 Dec 07 04:35:01 -0500</pubDate>
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      <title>Bellagio 15K, day 2</title>
      <link><![CDATA[http://tworags.com/index.php?ACTION=blogs&todo=view&ID=1516]]></link>
      <author>admin@tworags.com (Adanthar)</author>
      <description><![CDATA[Short version because I'm a little tired: I have 119,700, right around the average with 152 people left (paying 100). The blinds will be [edit: 1500/3000 with a 400 ante next level and 2000/4000/500 after 90 minutes, so a lot of people will be busting early on in the day, but I have enough chips to hopefully make it through for a while.]

I started off today at a tough table with Phil Ivey, the tournament CL (who's still the CL today). Apparently, the way he gets a lot of his chips is by getting someone to overcall his bet on a QT9K board, then check/call all in on the river without a jack. That said, he played very well and I felt lucky that the table broke after 30 minutes, until I got to my new table, which, at various times, featured Hoyt Corkins (with a big stack on my right),  another FTP pro whose name I can't remember, JC Alvarado, Ted Lawson, Antonio Esfandiari and a bunch of other people who didn't suck. [[ This is a content summary only. Visit my website for full links, other content, and more! ]]]]></description>
      <guid isPermaLink="true"><![CDATA[http://tworags.com/index.php?ACTION=blogs&todo=view&ID=1516]]></guid>
      <pubDate>Sat, 15 Dec 07 03:35:12 -0500</pubDate>
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      <title>Placeholder</title>
      <link><![CDATA[http://tworags.com/index.php?ACTION=blogs&todo=view&ID=1498]]></link>
      <author>admin@tworags.com (Adanthar)</author>
      <description><![CDATA[On second thought, I can't really sleep yet (soon, though!), so briefly, good hands from today:

-Re: Vivek: He calls PF. I think this is okay against a decent or worse player, but a mistake against g2cu (in fairness, he didn't know how good good2cu was - this is just a hypo we talked about later.) Even at 4:1, the reverse implied odds here are a real problem, because with middle cards, g2cu will probably play pretty optimally on the flop against your range - that is, if he's got air or totally whiffed the flop, as a good player, he will evaluate flop texture and check behind/fold more when middle cards hit, which is exactly what you have right now. Conversely, when he gets it in against you, you'll probably be in much worse shape than you want to be in even when you hit a pair.

I personally felt that g2cu was opening well more than what Vivek'd need to just automatically make a shove profitable, but V disagreed. Barring that, I'd just fold. [[ This is a content summary only. Visit my website for full links, other content, and more! ]]]]></description>
      <guid isPermaLink="true"><![CDATA[http://tworags.com/index.php?ACTION=blogs&todo=view&ID=1498]]></guid>
      <pubDate>Fri, 14 Dec 07 03:00:52 -0500</pubDate>
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      <title>All play and no sleep makes mumble mumble snore</title>
      <link><![CDATA[http://tworags.com/index.php?ACTION=blogs&todo=view&ID=1496]]></link>
      <author>admin@tworags.com (Adanthar)</author>
      <description><![CDATA[Okay, where do I start with today?

Umm...let's start with yesterday, instead. I lasted 90 minutes in yesterday's sat (thus, 0 for 3 on seeing the 200/400 level) but Vivek and I bought in to the 15K directly anyway, incidentally leaving us cash busto. That means we go home and go to sleep early, right?

...yeah, obviously, I don't fall asleep till 4:30 AM. But that's okay, because my alarm is set for 10:30 and that's six whole hours, right?

...yeah, the groundskeeper team decided to mow the lawn or something at around 8 AM with an extremely loud something or other, right outside our windows.

Of course, we both get to the Bellagio completely fried but still forced to play five 90 minute levels of deepstacked donkament poker with no dinner break...

...so of course I have 84K (45K average @ 300/600) and Vivek has 60K, after, at least in my case, misplaying almost every critical hand. The highlights:

1)I have 88 in a 5 way limped pot (30K stacks, 50/100 blinds). Flop 842r.  [[ This is a content summary only. Visit my website for full links, other content, and more! ]]]]></description>
      <guid isPermaLink="true"><![CDATA[http://tworags.com/index.php?ACTION=blogs&todo=view&ID=1496]]></guid>
      <pubDate>Fri, 14 Dec 07 02:26:06 -0500</pubDate>
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      <title>I read souls</title>
      <link><![CDATA[http://tworags.com/index.php?ACTION=blogs&todo=view&ID=1485]]></link>
      <author>admin@tworags.com (Adanthar)</author>
      <description><![CDATA[ I'll have more about Vivek's hand in my next entry since he still hasn't posted it online yet. In the meantime, here's a brag post about the satellite tonight:

When we're standing in line to buy into the sat, an early middle aged guy ("MAG") behind us standing in line with his girlfriend/wife asks if we have some spare casino chips he can buy (because the registration cage only takes chips and not bills for some reason). We sell him a couple of hundred; he pays us from a giant wad of bills he's taken out of his pocket. This guy is plainly a regular, maybe a semipro or pro, and at least decent at poker, but he's over 30 and his SO is here, which means he's not nearly as LAGgy early on as some random 18 year old in the same spot. Anyway, thanks to a dumb Bellagio rule of seating all the people in line in order, all three of us get seated at the same table. [[ This is a content summary only. Visit my website for full links, other content, and more! ]]]]></description>
      <guid isPermaLink="true"><![CDATA[http://tworags.com/index.php?ACTION=blogs&todo=view&ID=1485]]></guid>
      <pubDate>Wed, 12 Dec 07 07:40:29 -0500</pubDate>
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      <title>Weekend results</title>
      <link><![CDATA[http://tworags.com/index.php?ACTION=blogs&todo=view&ID=1480]]></link>
      <author>admin@tworags.com (Adanthar)</author>
      <description><![CDATA[Today counts as a weekend because I say it does and because it equally went nowhere, heh. I didn't play either of the Bellagio 5K's (under the weather on Saturday, too sleepy on Monday) but did play a full Sunday schedule plus the satellite at 10 PM tonight. All of them were pretty much totally pointless, with no real deep runs to speak of except an FTP 750K bubble where someone jammed 66 for 16x BB, I overjammed tens for 17x and got called by QQ behind me/managed to somehow whiff both of my outs. I also managed to not win a single hand in the satellite today - it had a pretty lousy structure (3K chips, 40 minute levels starting from 25/50), so I played four hands in 90 minutes, lost all of them and was busto so fast that I'm actually going to get enough sleep for the 1 PM sat tomorrow. [[ This is a content summary only. Visit my website for full links, other content, and more! ]]]]></description>
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      <pubDate>Tue, 11 Dec 07 04:14:28 -0500</pubDate>
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      <title>Live poker is also silly</title>
      <link><![CDATA[http://tworags.com/index.php?ACTION=blogs&todo=view&ID=1461]]></link>
      <author>admin@tworags.com (Adanthar)</author>
      <description><![CDATA[The 3K yesterday was amazing - I actually managed to go 0 VPIP for the first 90 minutes. Given I showed up a little late, it means I went into the first break able to say I was better off watching TV. I might be a nit, but c'mon, that's absurd. It didn't go anywhere after that, either - we started with 6K, and six hours later, I'd never gone under 4000 or over 6500 the entire time when I won a flip to put me at a whopping 11K at 300/600. Then I busted five hands later. In a perfect world, I think I'd have been better off dropping the buyin on one of those ice cream sundaes made out of real gold at Serendipity, but in a perfect world, they also wouldn't have shut that place down for health code violations, so it evens out. Either way, I think I yawned more times while folding yesterday than I sucked out two Sundays ago, and without even a funny Cardrunners vid to show for it. [[ This is a content summary only. Visit my website for full links, other content, and more! ]]]]></description>
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      <pubDate>Fri, 07 Dec 07 23:20:02 -0500</pubDate>
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      <title>Flying is a bad beat</title>
      <link><![CDATA[http://tworags.com/index.php?ACTION=blogs&todo=view&ID=1451]]></link>
      <author>admin@tworags.com (Adanthar)</author>
      <description><![CDATA[It turns out that scheduling a 1 hour, cross-airline layover is not a good idea when you're flying from NY through Minneapolis in bad weather. Not only did I miss my flight, I got stuck in Minneapolis for a night. Fun fact about American Airlines policy: if it's an airport problem and not a plane problem, they'll only give you half-off coupons for a hotel instead of comping it. It's as if they were competing to lose my business, especially when I *just* signed up for their frequent flier program, like, two weeks ago. 

Anyway, I finally got to Vegas yesterday, watched Vivek (psyduck) bubble the 15K Venetian event (uuggggghh), then lasted 90 minutes in today's Bellagio $2500 tourney when QQ < KK. Standard, but whatever, lots more poker coming up soon.

On the plus side, I'm officially not going to Australia in January. [[ This is a content summary only. Visit my website for full links, other content, and more! ]]]]></description>
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      <pubDate>Wed, 05 Dec 07 19:56:11 -0500</pubDate>
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      <title>Another Sunday FT</title>
      <link><![CDATA[http://tworags.com/index.php?ACTION=blogs&todo=view&ID=1435]]></link>
      <author>admin@tworags.com (Adanthar)</author>
      <description><![CDATA[Short version: I went 1 for 6 today, but the 1 was a 7'th place in the UB 200K for 7,000. This one's bittersweet; I sucked out on the first hand of ITM (just like the FTPment) so it's another freeroll, but after surviving ~45 minutes of 11 handed play with a nice stack, finishing seventh is really annoying. The culprit was the only guy at the FT that I'd say was bad, who led into me on a JT5 board with A3 (making effective stacks a PSB at that point) and then hit a 3 outer (okay, 7 outer, turn gutshot ftw) when I decided to let him bluff. Doh...now *that* one hurts, because it's only a good play if he leads a river blank, but he didn't even have the decency to be good enough to lead the river ace. In other words, I might have played it bad vs. a bad player with lots of money on the line, which sucks. (oh yeah, and then I ran Ax with 8 BB into his jacks. lol donkaments etc. [[ This is a content summary only. Visit my website for full links, other content, and more! ]]]]></description>
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      <pubDate>Mon, 03 Dec 07 00:08:15 -0500</pubDate>
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      <title>Showing other people how I play so that they may beat me at pokah</title>
      <link><![CDATA[http://tworags.com/index.php?ACTION=blogs&todo=view&ID=1404]]></link>
      <author>admin@tworags.com (Adanthar)</author>
      <description><![CDATA[In between taking a couple of days off (I always do this when I play so late it messes up my sleep schedule) I've been analyzing my play in the donkament and making several videos out of it. So far, I've got about a half hour of raw video, covering just under half the MTT, but it's by far the less juicy half so it looks like my next month Cardrunners schedule is covered early. (Gotta finish this before I head to Vegas on Monday - otherwise, I'm gonna be doing this in my friend's apartment rather than playing. Yuck!) The way I do these videos is actually fairly time-consuming, because I record every important hand and often need several takes to get the commentary right; so far it looks like it takes me about three hours to record one hour of video, not counting prepping the HH for the converter and fixing any crashes. It's definitely not something I'd do for free, but on the other hand, the after the fact play by play lets me rethink every major decision, which is a big help. [[ This is a content summary only. Visit my website for full links, other content, and more! ]]]]></description>
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      <pubDate>Thu, 29 Nov 07 01:37:12 -0500</pubDate>
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      <title>Tournaments are *so* silly</title>
      <link><![CDATA[http://tworags.com/index.php?ACTION=blogs&todo=view&ID=1381]]></link>
      <author>admin@tworags.com (Adanthar)</author>
      <description><![CDATA[[img]http://img218.imageshack.us/img218/9153/56kwindx1.jpg[/img]

Step 1: suck out hardcore ~5 times
Step 2: play pretty well
Step 3: set up, then lose a big flip for 2/3 the chips in play 3 handed
Step 4: massively profit anyway and feel pretty good about it

trip report here/CR vid coming eventually.]]></description>
      <guid isPermaLink="true"><![CDATA[http://tworags.com/index.php?ACTION=blogs&todo=view&ID=1381]]></guid>
      <pubDate>Mon, 26 Nov 07 03:25:05 -0500</pubDate>
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