WSOP Time

Heading out for the WSOP tomorrow, not playing an event til Sunday but I may throw some updates in on here. I will be playing lots of PLO cash as well, that has been going very well since online poker went out in the US.

I've had a few big chances the last 10 days or so and couldn't come up with a big score. Took 7th in the Mulligan which was 66k to win where I was 2/10 at one point, got 13th in the 730 pm 109r which was 35k to win and then got 12th in the $1k last night which was $82k to win... bleh

I've had a good start to the college basketball season up around 2.6 units, I hope to win 20 units throughout the season. I'll be on Virginia Tech, Central Florida, Old Dominion, and Loyola Chicago. All home teams who are small favs or small dogs. These 4 teams return 19 of 20 starters from last season. (Edit after games-These 4 went 3-1 tonight with Va Tech blowing a 4 pt lead with the ball with a minute 40 left. Loyola covered by a point and Central Florida got the outright W as a 3pt dog, Old Dominion beat Richmond who had just beat Purdue)

Big game for IU tonight as they go on the road against a halfway decent team. Should be interesting, they are only 5.5 point dogs so a very winnable game.

Big Score!

I just chopped the Stars weekly $250 Guaranteed($320 buyin) 3 ways for $43,681. This is my 2nd biggest online score. My biggest being chopping this same tourney nearly 2 years ago for $47k. Things finally starting to look up lately.

No Promises

I may start updating this again every once in a while, may document my college basketball picks here as well. The season is starting soon and I'm pretty excited. Poker is finally going well lately after months and months or torment. I got back in the tourney grind and finally had some decent scores. I'm also playing a lot of pot limit omaha and trying to get better at that game. I've studied a lot and trying new things and hopefully I put it all together sometime soon, it has been going well lately.

wsop update

The WSOP has not been kind to me this year. After cashing in 40% of the events I played in the last 2 years I am now 0-10 this year in WSOP events. So when you are not making day 2s and cashing tourneys the buyins add up. I have cashed one tourney out here and that was the Venetian $1k. I got 11th out of 336 for $4k, it was $100k to win. It was real soft and I basically crushed day 2 but I could not win a hand at showdown and lost a flip to bust. Still got 5-7 events left so hopefully I can get something going.

We went out last night to Green Valley Ranch to see Steel Panther which is a 80s hair cover band. We got VIP seating in a horseshoe booth down on the floor that was a pretty nice setup. They kicked people out who were in our booth which was sort of awkward but whatever. Steel Panther was pretty good. Won $450 at blackjack, but I was up $1275 and announced last hand and put $275 out and of course I get 88. So I split, get a 2, double down and end up losing $825 on the hand to put me back at that $450 profit. Oh well. Green Valley is a pretty nice place and treats us pretty well picking us up and taking us back in limos or escalades. Though I talked to a host today who said they had my average bet last night as $50 and I wasn't very happy about that as it should have been closer to $110 or so. I seem to run bad at blackjack rating as I got screwed at the Gold Coast last year as well.

Sigh....

WSOP has been dumb so far. I've played 3 events and went deep in the $1500 but short of the money. I was sitting on $60k(double average) with 90 minutes to go in the night and everything went wrong to take me to busto. I ran TT into QQ in blind battle, lost a flip, then ran TT into JJ vs a 11 bb stack, then shoved K6 on button and AA and QQ were in the blinds. I lasted about 5 hours today in the 6 max building my stack up to 15k at one point but nothing good there either. No horses have done anything yet either, its been brick city...

The Future

I ran into a neat video of my favorite Hoosier last year, Verdell Jones. Verdell was criticized heavily during the start of the season all the way through the midpoint on Peegs, well some kept on him all year. I was super impressed when in his first college game, he runs the point and puts up one of the more impressive stat lines that you will see. He put up 18 points on 4-11 FG shooting and 10-13 FT shooting. Yes the fg shooting % isn't great but he gets to the line so much it compensates for his missed fgs as his TS% is very good. He also had 5 assists 5 rebounds 3 steals and 3 blocks! Easy game. Here is a youtube video of him with highlights from when he was like 10 all the way up through senior year of high school. I expect big things next year.

Omaha is fun and a score

Lindsay is taking a nap as she wouldn't go play basketball with me, so I figured I'd finally update this. A couple sundays ago I had my biggest score since November when I placed 2nd in the Full Tilt Mulligan for $33k, first was $53k and the final hand was pretty nasty so that sort of sucked but whatever.

I have pretty much been trying to get out of the tourney grind and move onto cash games for a long time it seems but I always come crawling back. I have never been able to get into NL cash games, I just find it pretty boring. PLO otoh has been an enjoyable experience thus far as I am up $10,000 in the last couple weeks in about 12k hands played. $5k of that came on one Saturday where I won $1500 in the car at 2/4 and 5/10 then won $3500 more at 5/10 that night in about 10 minutes. I ran really hot. The rest of the profits come mostly from 1/2 and a bit from 2/4 which I have played more the last couple days.

WSOP is coming up and I'll be out there the entire month of June and into July as the main event starts July 3rd. I will be playing lots of events and hopefully running better on day 2s unlike the last couple of years. I will be updating at my twitter with tourney updates each days so anyone who wants can follow along.

I'm Still Alive

Havent posted in six months, never been in a writing mood I guess... Still not currently, but will give a small update. The last six months of 08 went really well as I got 4th in the Stars Warmup for 40k and I won the $250k on Stars in November for $47k. Won a couple other tourneys as well for 8k and 12k. So with all that this was my best year yet. Had a 2nd/3rd already in 09 on the 1st and the 2nd for $8k combined, dumb I couldn't close one out, but decent start I suppose.

Jackpot!

I finally won two tourneys in the same night again and this time it was good for a jackpot. I won the 2 Big daily doubles on Full Tilt that start at 10:00 and 10:01 pm est. These are usually 15k guarantees and get around 250 players or so but the $30k jackpot was hit just in June after not cleared out for a while and they were only 10k guaranteeds this night with just 190 players each. They are $75 buyins btw, $60 going to the tourney pool, $9 to the jackpot, and $6 for the fees. Each win was worth $3k, and the final jackpot figures were...

mattster24 $9,351.32 Double Win
mattster24 $831.23 Double Final Table
mattster24 $249.37 Best Double Finish
mattster24 $93.51 Double Cash

so around $10.5k, pretty solid.

I went down and played some blackjack afterwards and got down to $180 and put it all out there, and got some sort of hand I needed to double on, I pulled $140 out of my wallet and doubled for less, that gave me $500 to work with, I left it all out there and doubled that. I now had $1000 which was the table max so I figured may as well table max it one time, her up card was a 6 and I squeezed(it was a doubledeck pitch game) out my cards and the first was a 3 and the second was an 8, the pit boss watched as I squeezed and he was laughing as he knew I was going to have to find some way to double this down. So Karec ran up to the room to get another $1000 so I could double down. He got back I put the $1000 out there for the double down and she gave me my double card(face down) and she turned over a ten for 16 then an 8 or something and bustoed. shew...

$10k Limit Day 2

The day started out pretty well as I picked up AK and got a 3 bet in and was called on a 234 flop and turn and checked down the river to beat AJ. My high point was 95k about 15 minutes into the day putting me probably top 5 in chips and that was as high as I would get. I was pretty card dead the entire day and when I would pick up hands they were no good. I picked up AK in the sb and Steve Sung(aggressive young Asian) raises, I 3 bet, he calls. Flop AAT, he has TT, so there goes quite a few chips. I couldn't pick up anything after that for about an hour when I picked up AQ on the button and run into AA in the sb. That took me to around 35k in chips when avg was 90 or so with 45 players left. Hoyt Corkins had just came to our table with a ton of chips and he raises utg +1, I 3 bet with TT, he 4 bets, I just call. I only had enough chips left for flop/turn/river bets basically so he bets the Qxx flop and I call, turn x he bets I call, river K, he bets, I call and he has AK of course. There was no point to me raising at any point because he was never folding, at least I don't think, I'm pretty sure he doesn't fold the turn if I raise. That left me with 3k chips which I got in with AQ vs AK. bleh

I believe that it is for me at the WSOP, played 9 events cashed 3 and barely made any money. Had my chances once again this year just like last year but once again no day 2 luck. oh well. Time to go home and play some golf and get that single digit handicap.

$10k Limit

I finally got a bunch of sleep last night since I busted early in the $1500, woke up around 2 pm Vegas time and turned on the US Open just in time to see Tiger already lost the lead. I had to leave right after he donked his second shot on the par 5 14th I think into some nasty stuff. I get over to the Rio and I'm watching it before the tourney starts but then the tourney starts and I have no tv view from where I'm sitting. There is a big tv real close but it has the tourney clock on it, but there is a hanging tv with the same thing on it so I go over to a floorman and see if he could change it to the Open, he says he wishes he could but can't since it has the clock on it and that tv is tied into the same system as the hanging tv. I go back to my seat and Bill Edler sits down across from me and he goes over to the floorman and asks the same thing and still no dice. So I'm getting up between every hand and trying to get a view of a tv that is so far away that I can't really tell what is going on. Phil Ivey then sits on my left which is not too great but sort of cool since I've never played with him and I'm sure it will be somewhat interesting. I ask him if he could get the open on for us since I know he'll be wanting to watch the Lakers/Celtics game anyway later since he has a million dollar bet on the series. He textes someone and a couple minutes later I see a Rio suit walking through the tourney area, a guy I saw doing something for Phil the other day, this guy goes to the tv and puts it on the Open, Phil looks over to me and says "you happy?" ha

Phil and Bill were doing a few prop bets on golf, like if this guy would get up and down, if the putt would make it to the hole or not, I wanted to get in on it, but couldn't find anytihng I really liked and didn't really want to take the worst of it on any bets. Doyle joined our table a bit later, Ivey won $185k off of Doyle before Ivey finally busted on flop props. 185 thousand on frickin props in a couple hours, pretty sick.

Onto the tourney I hung around 20k for a while until I picked up Aces and got into a 4 way 3 bet pot and managed to not get it to hold, that and a couple other random hands got me down to around 13k when I picked up AK twice in about 5 hands and won big pots off of Phil Ivey, the second one basically busting him. I got up to about 30k when I picked up Aces again and once again had some action preflop as it went 3 ways for 3 bets. I then managed to lose with Aces again, not the way to win limit tourneys or any tourney for that matter. I went on a terror after that though winning about every pot I was involved in including flopping a boat with 22 vs Bill Edler on a KK2 flop and flopping a double gutter plus flush draw with JTs vs Brandon Adams and getting there on the turn for a big pot. So besides those 2 aces hands I ran pretty well. I finished the day with 74k in chips which is good for top 10 with 98 left. 218 started, $500k to win. GL to me tomorrow.

WSOP $2000 Day 2

Built up early winning QQ vs AK but then lost AK all in preflop to KQ which would have put me over double average. I never got much going after that and just kept grinding away until I finally picked up AKs with 13 bigs in early position, I shoved and someone wakes up with Aces behind me, gg me. I went out 48th for $7500, my third WSOP cash, but once again nothing big. I played the $1500 today and was out early losing almost half my stack when I got Aces cracked then lost AQ to AJ all in preflop, bleh. Tomorrow I have the $10k Limit World Championship at 5 pm.

$2000 Day 1

Have $53k going into day 2, avg is 40k, 134 left, 99th pays $4700. I built up quickly today and had 13k by the first break, got most of it with a set of Tens vs top pair. I was card dead most of the day and didn't really do much til a few hours later when I sucked out with sixes all in preflop vs Joe Sebok's sevens to get me to 25k. A few hands later I picked up aces in the cutoff, I raised bb called. Flop A52, he checkraises me, I call. Turn 6 he bets, I shove he calls and has 57 of hearts which he turned a flush draw which was pretty sick but I dodged the heart river and doubled. Run good time tomorrow.

WSOP $2500 Day 2

Lost around half my stack on random stuff, money bubble bursts, 2 hands later pick up TT in the big blind... Aaronbeen raises in the cut to 5k, I shove 40k from the big blind, he calls. Flop Ace and I am out in 99th for $5700. So standard.

WSOP $2500 Day 1

Made it through day 1 with $70k in chips, average stack is $50k. 140 left, 99 pay... 1st is 666k.

Another Bubble

Got Headsup in the $5k shootout only to bust 2nd after playing 11.5 hours. Our table was the final table to finish, one table was done at 330 pm, by 7 there were only a few tables remaining of the original 36th. If I would have won I would have been guaranteed $17,000 and advanced to the final 36 tomorrow. Back to back bubbles.... not much fun at all, I've already logged 35 hours or so of live poker in 3 tourneys. It's much funner to bust out in 2 hours and have your whole day to do something. Sort of frustrated, but I'm playing pretty well I think so that's all that really matters. I'm too lazy and tired to post about any hands really, I actually did run well today besides the whole playing 11.5 hours and bubbling thing. Got the $2500 NL tomorrow, I'll be texting updates Here

Text Updates

I can now text updates to so you can follow along there, probably text at least every 2 hours or so while I play. Playing $5k shootout(sit n go) today.

WSOP $2k

1592 players, 153 paid, I busted 160th. That seems like enough to say about that.

WSOP $5k Mixed Holdem Day 2

Came into the day in pretty good shape somewhere around 25/91 with $47k. I got to my seat and immediately wasn't thrilled with Noah Boeken and David Williams on my left, Lindgren on Williams left and there was actually an open seat on my left for a while until Gavin Griffin filled it. I'm not even sure if I played a hand in the first hour, I know I didn't play a single hand in the first 30 minutes during the limit portion. I really didn't have any big hands, I maintained my stack by 3 betting in the no limit portion and can't remember dragging any decent pots in the limit portion.

The first notable hand that I remember well was when I picked up AQs in the small blind and Robert Williamson raised in the cutoff to 4500, I made it 12k to go and he tanked and finally put his 16k total in with A8s. He flops the nut flush so that was real cute, instead of being over 60k, I'm down to 30k. I think I chipped that back up a bit then lost with TT in the limit portion. I 3 bet a lp raiser, continued an all rags flop, King turned and I checked and he checked, river A, i check and call to his obv A4. That put me in bad shape, but then I finally got a suckout winning A5 to David Williams Jacks to get me back to around 40k. From then on it was a grind, I did pick up Aces and Queens in a single orbit only to get no action. I then picked up QQ in the bb a bit later and flatted Newhizzle's utg raise. Flop KTx, I checkcall, turn A, I checkfold.

When we got to the total bubble we were in the limit portion and I had 28k at the start of the bubble which was 2k/4k blinds 4k/8k limit, which put me basically in last. I think there was one stack shorter than mine and he doubled up twice while we were on the total bubble. I did get all in vs Lindgren AKo vs AKo and he flops a frickin flush draw but doesn't get there. Then all of a sudden the bubble burst and I was in the money. I busted 2 hands later shoving 18k with A6s with 1k/2k blinds, Lindgren picked up AK in the big blind. My cash was good for $10,922, which isn't horrible to start the series. Tomorrow is the $2k.