cash game hands:




mtt hands:



hopefully ill win money next month...

So today we finally moved into our new condo, which is a pretty big relief considering a bunch of stuff came up mainly with cost issues and internet issues that may have prevented us from getting the condo in the first place. It took a while to find a place we liked that also had good location and access to a really good internet line, so im pretty happy that the whole process is over.

Anyways, the place is on the top floor of a condo building on Sukhumvit Soi 31 in Bangkok, and its next to where the Prime Minister lives. The area that we live in is pretty cool, there are a bunch of food places, massage places and relatively close to a lot of nightlife and such. The condo itself is 700 sq meters, 2 stories, and has 4 bedrooms + maids quarters (we are getting a live in maid that works 6 days a week and can cook, clean and run errands), living room, separate grind room, bar, and a pretty cool garden on the balcony.

here are some pics:



garden area



other side of garden with gazebo, we are going to try to put in a croquet set or a mini golf set along with a grill and some lawn furniture



living room



Dining room and open area, with a view of the balcony from the 2nd floor. We plan on getting a nice nerf gun set to shoot people with off the balcony.



kitchen



view from the master bedroom into the garden



Bar area



view from balcony

We still are working on the furnishings and stuff like that, I'm getting a pretty nice computer chair tomorrow, but I am also looking to get some cool stuff like an arcade basketball machine, ping pong table, etc. Ill try to post some more pics when we get everything setup.

Also, poker sucks but Jersey Shore is amazing.

Shout out to Owen "OTL" Loft, who apparently reads my blog, sup brah

Hey guys, I guess I haven't made a real update in a while so here it goes...

WSOP was a bit bittersweet to say the least, It started out pretty fantastic but ended rather poorly. The first weekend I got to Vegas I won $40k mainly from a $36k mtt score. A week or two after that I had logged a bunch of hours playing live cash from 5/10 - 25/50 and was up about $30k, and had $25k or so in wsop staking profits due having decent pieces of a couple of guys getting 6 figure scores. After that my failures at actual WSOP events, side events (i.e. Ceasars, Venetian DSE) began to compound and led to a 0 for lots of MTTs over the summer, along with horses losing more and more money. I actually made two Day 2s but didn't have a single cash, which is actually kind of hard to accomplish because somewhere between 12-18% of the field makes it to Day 2 and around 11-12% get paid. Also I got coolered out of the Main Event early day 2 and lost a decent chunk of money investing in others main event action which actually set me at a small net loss overall in staking this summer. Pretty disappointing but obviously its standard variance as almost everyone is favored to lose money at the WSOP.

It might sound like a silly thing to say, but I was really craving for some glory and publicity over just pure profit this summer. Maybe its to stroke my already inflated ego, but there is just something about winning a bracelet, or making a deep run in the main event and being on ESPN that many of my friends outside the poker world can relate to or look at as a pretty sick accomplishment. Although either accomplishment has no real relevance to actual poker ability, there is a reason why the average person thinks Phil Helmuth is the best player in the world and hasn't heard of Jungleman12 or Issac Haxton. In a perfect world, they should really give out bracelets to the biggest winner at 5/10 rather than a $1k crap shoot, but c'est la vie, there is no real glory in winning $100k a month besides posting an HEM graph and getting 2+2 fan boys all wet.

Other than that, I did have a lot of fun in Vegas meeting people and participating in various activities. I'm happy i started the trend that got a bunch of Leggo guys to try out trampoline dodgeball (which is awesome). I think its pretty critical to engage in a lot of off strip activities to keep your sanity while spending 7 weeks in Vegas, as the city can get quite soul crushing after a while. Other than enjoying the city and playing live, I did very little in terms of poker (playing online, watching videos, reviewing hands) so I have been trying to get back into it and hopefully shed some of the rust.

One thing I can't stand about the poker community, that I experienced full force this summer, is the shameless self promotion everyone seems to engage in. I feel that poker should be played without all the marketing, sponsorships, etc., but instead for the enjoyment of the game. It's annoying to think that I'm generating about $5-10k in rake a month that goes straight to the pockets of Howard Lederer and company, who then pay it out to some mediocre player that happens to be female/minority/marketable. Obviously, it sounds like I am just hating and I would definitely take advantage of any opportunity that arises (which i would be snap sucking on Howard's teet), but I definitely think the game shouldn't be played in that way. In addition, I feel like sponsored players have some unjustified sense of entitlement and/or superiority that makes them exempt from putting in hard work in order to constantly improve to be a successful player in the long run. Other stuff such as Vanessa Rousso's "big slick boot camp" or the Maven VT which are essentially tourist traps and borderline scams for uninformed recreational players thinking that paying 4k to have Vanessa teach you what "M" is and how to calculate it will instantly make them profitable in the games. I could probably go on forever about this topic, Its one of the things i definitely will not miss about playing live poker and Las Vegas over the summer. I guess its all part of the game though. (realized i made a bunch of Wire references in this paragraph)

I am still undecided how my opinions have changed about live players vs. online players after talking extensively with a good number of older players who almost exclusively play live. It's really interesting to listen to their perspective on the game. I've gained a decent amount of respect for them; live players usually aren't simply clicking buttons and are usually intelligent people regardless of there level of understanding about the game. It's definitely kind of awkward trying to explain to someone why certain "live pro" plays are burning money (i.e. why 3bet/folding AQ is bad, raise/folding KJ on KQ8 is bad, etc.) when they have a specific rigid thought process that they adhere to. Here are some observations about some of the faults I think may exclusively live players have. Take the follow with a grain of salt; I by no means am an expert in live play nor do I have a large enough sample do gauge my live success so by all means i could be -EV in certain live settings versus players I am describing below:

1. In tournaments they value their tournament life way too much with out and solid justification besides "I can find a better spot" when faced with higher variance situations. I posed a question to a group of mainly live players: going into 500/1000/100 ante w/ 40k stack on day 2 of the main event, if you were to open the btn with QQ to 2.5k and the sb were to jam and shows you AKo, would you call or fold? Surprisingly, the vast majority said they would fold, and I was even berated for considering i would call despite the fact that its pretty clear you are giving up 10k or so in cev by folding. I think this logic can be coupled with a gross over estimation of their abilities and/or edge over the field, even in events as soft as the main event.

2. A blatant lack of understanding of the mathematics behind poker, equity, fold equity, ICM, etc.
A lot of them are overly stubborn with their views, especially ones that have had major success in the past when games were much much softer or without understanding the concept of variance/sample size. I had one guy time and time again point to the fact that he has over a 300% roi in about 60 lifetime live mtts and considered it a big enough sample where his actual roi converged to something close to that. Pretty laughable if you ask me.

3. An over emphasis on "feel" and over confidence in their "feel" game compared to others, couple with a lack of deductive reasoning or logical plan for their actions. Maybe I am totally off on this point and am just lacking in this department due having much less live experience, but I do think that many live players make decisions based on pure intuition rather than logic.

I can't really think of anything else to say about my summer in Vegas, besides the fact that I had a great time and it was nice to meet many of you for the first time. I had some sick good meals and a bunch of fun nights out. I do think i improved a lot as a player, especially in my live game. I feel a lot more competent live playing a bunch of high stakes cash and world series events all summer...

looking to stake some people in todays sunday mirrion giving 83/17 deals (i.e. you keep 17% i keep 83%).

def need to be reputable, preferably i know you to some degree. PM me.

I have 67k going into day 2, average is probably 40-45 so i am in pretty good shape. My starting table wasn't great but i managed to adjust and play really well, picking really good spots to bluff and win without showdown.

Play resumes on Friday.

update:

1. Getting pretty owed at WSOP, so far I've made the final level of day 1 about 5 times, and have a couple of day 2s but no cashes. Its actually really hard not to cash if you make day 2 of a standard NLHE event considering they play down to about 13-15% of the field and a little over 10% get paid. I've been playing well and haven't made too many mistakes so I just want to continue to do my best and not be results oriented about my play.

2. Cash games running all over town are pretty soft. I wish i had the motivation or stamina to play really long cash game sessions live but I haven't been able to play more than a 3-4 hours straight in live full ring games. Its just so boring to play 25 hands an hour at full ring, no matter how you look at it.

3. I'm not sure why I am awake at 7:30am, but, needless to say, my sleep schedule really sucks.

4. For some non poker related activities, yesterday, I went with a group to go play trampoline dodge ball at skyzone (http://lasvegas.skyzonesports.com/default.aspx). Its exactly what it sounds like, a room that has floors and walls composed of trampolines is used as a dodge ball arena. It was a ton of fun although my shoulder is killing me from destroying everyone with my cannon of an arm.

5. Last week I went to the Las Vegas 51's baseball game. They are an affiliate of the Toronto Blue Jays and a terrible AAA team. However, they have dollar beer nights and it is surprisingly fun to go get drunk and prop bet on everything that happens. I had a pretty sick sweat in the bottom of the 9th: I had the under on 19 total hits (there were 15 total going into the 9th) and bet on Vegas to beat Sacramento (Vegas was down 4-2 going into the 9th). Someone hit a solo home run, then there was a hit and a walk with 2 outs, and Edwin Encarnacion was up to bat. At this point I was basically free rolling a scoop because its almost impossible to get 2 hits and for Vegas not to win the game. Anyways, he drilled a deep fly ball to center that was caught by the center fielder on the warning track, which was a huge slowroll.

Not much else interesting has happened, ill try to make a post with something more substantial in the near future when I'm less lazy. See you all at the Leggo party tonight.

so we took Sunday off and went to the gun range to shoot the Uzi and some glock 9mm handguns. here are some videos:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XE-XXPO28jo

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=q29T7gmtqI4

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=D6zQhJ6aLnM

It was a lot of fun, I definitely plan on going again this summer and trying some of the more "exotic" guns.

Oh hey there loyal readers of my awesome blog, I figured I would fill you guys in on the Vegas happenings.

The Bad:

- Bubbled the WSOP 1k 3 from the money, getting in 77 vs. 99 on 9878 w/ 2 flush draws on the turn for a pot that would have been 4x average and over $30k in chip equity.

- 0/5 in WSOP events, our house is probably 0/21 or something.

- Running pretty awful in online cash games although i'm only down like $3k-4k, I have been getting coolered a bunch and not putting in much volume due to tilt quitting.

- Down a little bit in betting on the Celtics. Also, it was pretty embarrassing wearing a Ray Allen jersey to a BWW filled with Lakers fans and watch him go 0/13 from the field. Ran terrible in my American Idol bet (i laid 750 to win $4k w/ 12 left that Crystal would win. She was clearly much better but came in 2nd to some clown).

- Big chunks of a couple of players who are giant failures so far, namely my roommate here Nathan and Nicolak. I'm kidding (but not really they need to start making me money).

- Sweat JP at the final table of the $1500 limit holdem, which is the most boring type of poker to watch. Seriously, full ring limit? I left after a couple hours of torture and he ended up getting 6th i think.

The Good:

- shipped the stars 50r for $36k the first weekend I was here

- had 5% of Peter Gilmore who came in 4th in the 5k nl for $240k or something. Congrats bud!

- I'm running hotter than the sun at live cash games, probably up $32k total at 5/10 - 25/50. Got a well known live pro to 6bet shove $12k total @ 25/50 with ATs vs. my AA. And I held twice.

- Simon beating Durrr heads up for the bracelet. What a LEGEND.

- Crushed some clown leggo members in bowling props. Thanks for the money guys.

The Funny:

- Today i went grocery shopping with Nathan. We started loading a lot of groceries into my car. Mid way through I realize that it wasn't my car and someone with a similar car had left their doors unlocked.

- Went to Naked Fish with a bunch of people, the bill ended up being $250. I get HU with Ricky, and he proposes that we crossbook 100%. I snap accept and win, so now he had to pay the bill and owes me an additional $250. Best meal of my life.

- I made a stupid bet w/ $20 bucks @ even money that there wasn't a 24 hour Wal-Mart in Vegas. What the hell was i thinking.

- Ricky Forenbach registers for the women's event, and gets a standing ovation after being the 2nd guy knocked out. Epic.

- Won a $10 dollar bet that Greece didn't win the last world cup. LOL.

- Won a $25 dollar bet where i gave Nicolak 2:1 that the "small asian guy who played well" at our friend Joe's 5k shootout table was not Genius28. Probably one of the worse bets ever, he had Genius28, I had every other small asian on earth.

Anyways, today i lasted about 30 hands in the 1k and had by far the softest table I have ever played. Tomorrow i'm going to skip Sunday mtts because Nathan and I are going to try to go to the gun range, go skydiving, drive around dune buggies in the desert and/or find some mountains to climb. $2500 6max on Monday, I'm pretty excited for that event, enough of this 10 handed bullshit.

So i had a house all planned out for Vegas but the contract for the lease was terminated at the last moment. I was told it was due to "construction" issues but im like 99% sure they got a better offer for the house and took it. Luckily for me, my boy John (Nicolak) hooked me up with one of his friends, which has worked out very nicely. So I'm staying at Joe Tehan's house with him, Adam Friedman (cried on TV once) and Nathan (innoccous232, one of the bigger fish that kmoneyk bum hunts on ftp). I'm 23 and Nathan is 21, so we are quite a bit younger than Joe/Adam and the rest of the guys they hang out with which makes for a pretty interesting dynamic. Nathan gets the brunt of the hazing since he is a huge life fish.

So wsop updates:

event 3: 1k turbo lotto crapshoot

starting table with Nicolak 2 to my left. I try a silly bluff on him: I open btn with Q9s, he flats from the BB. Flop comes KT4r i have a bdfd, he checks i check behind. Turn is a T, and i turn the bdfd. He leads, I call. River is a brick, he bets 600, I make it 1600, he shoves cause he has 44. Other than that not much interesting happens i end up losing 44<AK then JTs<AKs where i made a marginal raise/call from the btn w/ JTs with like 16bbs.

event 8: 1500

Had a pretty tough starting table that consisted of Aspoker8, Pwnasarus, Joe Cada and Grant Hinkle. First hand of the day, Pwnasarus opens in mp i 3bet to 450 in the co w/ AKo, btn flats and aspoker8 makes it 1450 in the BB with 4500 starting chips. I tank for a while then fold. I ran pretty card dead for a while but picked up a ton of pots in good spots to barrel/3bet and win without showdown. Table breaks eventually, and I have like 2-3x average going into dinner break. I end up bubbling the event on the last level of the day AKs<AA then i lose a7<65 bvb. Pretty tilting to play 11 hours straight only to get coolered and bubble.

event 13: 1k

Had one interesting hand at my starting table that i'm a little bit conflicted about so i guess i can post it here to see what others think:

blinds are 25/50

laggy euro with awesome facial hair opens to 175 utg, mid 30s woman with a ftp patch (she might be a red pro) floats utg+1. i flat 54hh on the btn.

Flop: Qh 7s 6d

utg leads for 350, girl calls, i call.

Turn: 2h

euro bets 500, girl shoves for 1250, i have 3.1k behind and utg covers.

fold/shove/call?

Anyways, i chip up nicely but end up at a pretty tough table with USCphildo and Adam "Roothless" Levy to my left. Don't remember many of the hands i played but i ended the day with 40kish chips which is 27th out of 288 going into day 2.

Other than that, i grinded mtts last sunday and had 5 cashes including winning the 50r for 36k. We had a bunch of people over grinding at our house including Nicolak who sat next to me and witnessed me getting brutalized/coolered in everything before running hot and winning the 50r. There is a house rule that if someone has a 5 figure score or more, they owe the rest of the house a sushi dinner. Kind of a bullshit rule since i played almost 30 mtts while all the live pros here can barely handle 5 on the day. 5 Figures is kind of low if im playing like 4k in buy ins, but 36k was nice so i didn't mind. I ended up losing about 7 buyins to Nicolak playing battleship hu before we went out. He ran pretty hot and i spewed a ton, lol.

I haven't played much online cash this month, although i'm up $9k ish in live cash sessions, playing 5/10 live is really boring. Sometime this week i think i'm going to go take a shot and sit at 25/50 at Bellagio with $20k or something. Perhaps I won't be bored to death in that game.

I might have dual wsop final tables to rail today: JP OSU is 1/13 in the limit holdem event and siac0 is 9/27 in the 1500. GL to both.

live 10 handed poker is stupid.