Sleep With the Fishes, Dine on the Whales

Annette somethingorother. She just won the WSOPE as an 18 year old. Her story is as old as time itself, or maybe not. Maybe it's only as old as two years. Used to be women at an early age would discover a hidden talent and then get stepped over by men with less talent and then get informed barefoot and pregnant was all they could aspire to. Of course before that, in say 2005, the only talent or industry a woman could go into was the oldest profession, so I guess this online poker pro business is a relatively new thing. Anyway, enough with the chauvinistic history (and ladies, I'm joking) and on to Anette. Playing strictly freerolls about two years ago, the Norwegian Nightmare (her build is kind of Christian Okoye except instead of muscle she's all meat), did the closest thing to exersize a poker player can do and that's left mouse button click over and over again in 12 hour sessions fueled by Tobelerones and goat's milk. She parlayed her free rolls into real ...

Cash game expert Joe Bush got a piece of the bad beat jackpot at Harrahs on Thursday night. Pot was pretty big considering one guy flopped quad 10s. I hope he was just smooth-calling the pocket aces that got the needed third ace on the river. Also, Joe "Bullets" Comeaux got his aces cracked on the same night for $100. Nice wins fellas. Played at Boomtown today. Once again I ran into the painkillers during the tournament and beat a hasty exit. Good thing is I picked up a tell on the guy that had them. He did two distinctly different things when he had nothing and he had something. Unfortunately, it took me calling with a pocket pair of my own to figure it out. Guy is a good player who I've seen at a number of local final tables so this might really help me out in the future so even without a cash I might have earned some money today. I'm so tired of running into aces or losing with them in these tournaments. Pretty brutal stretch of late. Going to be a busy...

Couple of big hands from this weekend... Dug a hole with this one because I am a donkfish sometimes. Raise preflop with AK. Had my standard Martian image at the table. A borderline LAG calls out of position from the blind. Flop is 443. I check or continuation bet (can't remember exactly but 90% sure I bet). If I bet he just called. Turn is a 10. I check. He bets fairly large in relation to the pot. I find myself being such a nit, that on flops like this I get a lot of action because people put me on AK or high cards and bet into me with air. I've made a number of profitable calls with nothing in just this situation. Course his air could have just improved on the turn as a 10 is a very playable hand with a huge range of for the second card for a lo0se player. All cards above it and probably down to the 7. Granted a pair, of say 8s ,on his part is good at this point but I'm not giving him credit for that hand based on the action. I decide I'm going to let m...

I have commented previously about odd happenings on Absolute Poker. Now there is verified proof cheating exists there. Ugh. Read all the ugly details... http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/21381022/

Always a nailbiter in a series of close games. Every year you see something you've never seen before. This time was a battle of two highly respected coaches trying to outdo each other in the stupid department. Miles won the game but was he the winner in the "more dumb coach department of stupidness?" Category 1: Back-up QB Both brought in their second string quarterbacks for mediocre to horrible results. Tuberville for Auburn sought to stymie his momentum by bringing in his running qb at LSU's 20. The defense keyed in on the run and stopped it. The idea would have been a solid one at say, first and goal from the five, where a slash type athlete could do some damage. Bringing him in on the 20 to run was a waste. If they wanted to be clever, and offensive co-ordinator Al Borges is certainly that, as he is a creative strategian normally, why not tweak the obvious and line up with both in the backfield, but have Cox stand where the halfback normally does and then...

We are happy to help spread the word about the Acadiana Poker Series. It's a great cause. The tournaments promise plenty of play with starting stacks of $16,000 and rebuys of $8,000. Buy-in is just $100 and rebuys are but $50. You save the registration fee if you sign up online ($10). I'm curious as to what the blind schedule is. I imagine they won't be starting at $25 $25 but who knows. I'm looking forward to seeing a number of friends in Lafayette I haven't seen in a while. Should be fun.

I got engaged on saturday to this lovely girl. Who somehow accepted this wrecked grill as good enough. On sunday took 35th in World Championship for Poker Bloggers on Pokerstars. Really wanted to make top 10 to get the site's name out there. But I'll take the 80 gig iPod I won in the free roll.

I have registered to play in the PokerStars World Blogger Championship of Online Poker ! This Online Poker Tournament is a No Limit Texas Holdem event exclusive to Bloggers. Registration code: 1091710

Saw the impossible last night. An intelligent guys with a serviceable knowledge of poker, odds etc, but no idea of table sense lay waste to our table. He walked away with four racks of red (2k), 3 stacks of 25s, (1.5k) and almost the rest of the next rack with 5s. This was on a 1-2 table. I somehow was the only player who ended "up" against him. I pussied out on a board of AQQ7 (two clubs) with AK and didn't put my entire stack in. He would have called with his flush draw that didn't hit. I gave him too much credit for AQ or QQ. Still a big pot, but my winnings could have been $200 more. That being said, I saw him twice make $300 calls with one card to come on weak flush draws and hit. Saw literally three big stacks come to the table and as one guy put it "I got tired of watching you push this table around" so he bluffs off $600 with 8-4 o/suit and no pair while the villian has top pair. Literally, the dude couldn't lose. And people kept trying...

He's in first place in the 536 pool and a fan of the Turning Stone.

San Diego San Diego MNF: NY Giants San Diego San Diego San Diego San Diego Baltimore Oakland Miami MNF: Atlanta St. Louis OUT 2 MNFers Oakland OUT 2 MNFers Dallas Miami NY Jets OUT 2 MNFers Atlanta OUT 2 MNFers

I'm taking Oakland to lose. I hate relying on a 2-3 team (San Diego) for a win but oh well. In other news I'm taking Baltimore to NOT cover as my Lock of the Week. Way too many points for a defensive team.

Went back to the Stone as I mentioned in last week's column. I'll also say this, and sorry to let out the secret for the three or four decent players there but... TURNING STONE IS THE SOFTEST POKER ROOM in the U.S. They mostly spread 1-2 games with max buy-ins of $100, $200, and $500. The $500 table looked pretty good but by the time I got in they all had 5-10 type money. I guess I could have bought in for $500 and kept rebuying but my wallet wasn't that thick (especially after last monday). My friend and I decided to sit down at the $200 table. After I ran a bluff, unsuccessfully, on a guy I was one buy-in deep. I realized this table was mostly going to be showdown poker and tightened up. It was almost insufferable to listen to the strategy conversations going on at the table. These guys made me feel a competent player. I wonder if a top pro ever overheard me and my friends talking and would also want to take a nail gun to their stomach to just end drivel. When gutshot cha...

MNF: Dallas New England New England New England Indianapolis New England New England Indianapolis Cleveland Buffalo Cleveland MNF: Buffalo OUT 2 MNF Cleveland OUT 2 MNF MNF: Buffalo Buffalo MNF: Buffalo MNF: Buffalo Tampa Bay MNF: Buffalo

I'm taking Cleveland to lose to New England. This game has trap written all over it, and is the reason why I'd avoid the 17 point spread. But a half-hearted New England will still be too much for the Browns even if the Browns do the impossible and keep it close. Monday night hangovers be damned New England wins this game. My LOW is the over 47.5. I gave ya'll the gimme last week with the C0lts-Broncos and I think this one is just as good. New England might get there on their own and the Browns should score at least 10. Bet away.

Goondingy likes to say, "I'm surrounded by lunchboxes," usually at Boomtown. One of our bloggers shows how it literally feels. Last night at about 2 am, folding a flush and pushing with 7s I was one of them. I think I was My Little Pony.

Six years ago at a friend of mine's wedding in upstate New York, about 8 of us after the festivities made a late night journey to "local" casino Turning Stone. Cocksure that we were each going to win a grand, because that summer when many of us went to Vegas for the first time the theme was "Own the City," and own the city we did. Being first timers, and naiive and dumb gamblers we went on an incredible rush of good luck. Literally turning every craps table we encountered into winner. I think we even turned a profit by rolling dice on the late night buffet tables. So when all but two of us, all turned a profit it was reasonable to think the casinos did just print money and made their money on their shows. One night we so decimated a craps table at the Venetian they literally forced us to leave and closed the table. We had a solid two hours of winning rolls after winning rolls. We all bet the same way and hit the same numbers. It was like a living breathing Vegas...

On Saturday Gene and I played at Boomtown. Weird tournament structure. I get to the final table with 12k and 8 of the other players were all at about the same ranging from 10k to 22k. Then the other guy has almost ~ 100k. Yet, the blind structure was 3-6k. He offered a chop where he got first place and we divided the rest of the money. I didn't know what to do and still don't really. The button hadn't been placed yet so I had no insight on that but obviously we had 9 short stacks and a bully (who still had a small M for a standard tournament). As 8 voted yes, I took the chop fearing I'd say no and be put in the big blind because of my luck. It was going to be a haphazard all in fest but I invested so much time I wanted a higher return. Compare that to Harrahs on Wednesday and I bubbled at 12th and 5 minutes later they all chopped for a grand each. The big stack at my table kept talking about how he was late to pick up his kid, so I knew he'd be generous (di...