MONDAY COLUMN--online play (sounds dirty doesn't it): why i want to be a fat norwegian chick
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 and never deposited once... that's right never deposited once (or so the legend goes) and is now one of the most feared and respected online players out there. She literally built a bankroll from nothing and is now a mulit-millionaire, did I mention she's 18 and she started with nothing.
There is also the legend of Jesus Ferguson. Maybe I should say myth or maybe I should say baldfaced PR lie, but it goes something like this. As a personal challenge, Chris freerolled his way into some cash on FullTilt, and then playing strictly microstakes built his bankroll up to $10k just to see if he could do it. Like he doesn't have better things to do. Oh, it gets better he did it the first time, alledgedly, anonymously. As the urban legend goes he repeated this feat under his real name and managed to do it a second time too just for shicks and giggles.
Ruling out superuser account access, that Mark Seif says any site could have, that's an impressive feat and not one that I disbelieve Chris couldn't or didn't pull off. My sarcasm just stems from the question why would he do it. Doesn't he have major tournaments to win? Besides PR for FullTilt what value would such an endevor be to Chris. Okay, maybe a personal challenge.
Well, my time is also worth a lot more than playing freerolls to become another Anette or to idly challenge myself like Chris... but I think I can justify the utility of such an experience far more easily than the guy whose face is on your nearest stained glass window. I want to see a lot of hands. The low buy-in live tournaments that I can currently afford have fields that are 70% donkfishes that populate those MTTs online. So, playing a lot of hands against those fools might be of some value to me. Even if the opportunity cost of not playing at Harrahs is high.
So even, if I do try and emulate a girl that has favorably been compared to a young Mimi from the Drew Carey Show, how do I go about it. Hmmm... I deposited some money in Absolute some time ago and built it up a bit. Maybe I should play some there. Except now it's basically common knowledge that the properitors of said site are alledged to be sleazeballs, really, sleazy, greedy, cheating, coke-sniffing, stupid idiots killing their golden goose. So my odyssey is not going to start there.
Prior to that I won some money online on a different site and didn't get all of it when it closed its doors with me up some cash. Firepay never got those funds. So what's a guy to do? Right now I'm about as eager to throw cash money to the unregulated online poker world as I am to throw cash money down in a well and wish for it to multiply. For all those pennys I chucked in fountains, mall fountains, the Trevi fountains, water fountains, the money trees I wished for as a kid should be growing in my backyard any day now. Maybe when they do grow I'll send some of that money to an online site. Still what's a guy to do? Play play-money? I don't think so.
As previously mentioned a week or so ago, I played on the freeroll on Pokerstars for bloggers. I won an iPod... but that did little to building a real money account from fake money. ebay the iPod and play with the proceeds. I think not, but still did Anette play for iPods all those years ago? No. Fortunately, one side effect of that entry was I started an account on Pokerstars. With no activity since, it was with a little surprise that I found an email in my inbox, giving me a ticket into two freerolls this weekend where you can win real money.
Okay. I'll bite, and like Greg Raymer at a lobster buffet, bite I did. I dove in with gusto. Last night in my first freeroll I got up a few thousand and had to go to a Halloween party with the lady pictured (much to her displeasure I might mention) somewhere on this blog. I asked GeneD and Austin Martin to take over my play. Yes, I know NEVER, EVER, EVER give somebody your account information. Right. Hopefully, they won't chip-dump my balance of zero dollars to anyone. Maybe they'll roll me by changing my mailing address to intercept the iPod that will be obselete by the time it gets here. Anyway, neither could play.
I must say as I drove to the party with no true fill-in I was disappointed because I thought my stack was big enough to get me pretty deep.
BUT... Apparently it was. In my mailbox today, I received word that I finished in 42nd place. Pokerstars had also deposited my cash prize into my account. Ooooweee. My bankroll has begun! Look out.
Tonight, I could have gone to Harrahs and taken care of the drunken revelers from Voodoo fest looking to kill some time before the buzzes wear off, but instead I found myself playing another freeroll. Again, I build up my stack and think maybe I should just put it on cruise control all the way to some more cold hard cash, ummm, actually since I won so little maybe I should call it what it truly is--cold hard coins.
Suddenly I look at pocket Queens. I raise big. I get a call. Flop comes KK5. We are the two big stacks at the table but he's got me covered. I tread carefully. Check. He bets small (I think he's got a king). I'll call and hope to hit... that lovely lady on the turn. Sweet there she is. Now, I'm going to felt him. No way he has K5. I rule out KK too because no reraise preflop. I check. He bets slightly bigger but still trying to reel the fish in and get some money on his set from me. It cinches it to me that he's got a king. I min-reraise. He fires back again. I re-raise anew (like maybe I'm trying to bluff him off the hand) and we were still under half our stacks. Finally he pushes me all in. Call. Sure enough he's got K-J. Delicious. First place actually gets you enough money to play some micro-limits. I'm going to be the big stack in the tournament... sweetness.
But... I didn't win the hand. The point of this story and this post, may now seem like a convoluted attempt to mask a bad beat tale, but it's not. The online-haters will talk about how much sicker the beats are online but that was a four outer and routinely the last month or so I have been beaten by one and two outers on the river live. So, I am not deterred!
My quest to be Anette will not cease because of one crappy turn of fate, or more accurately one anomoly of programming, in fact, as I type this I am folding hands in another freeroll. This one is a limit poker free roll. I feel like I'm playing 3-6 again. It's on like donkey kong. Once a week, I'll be playing online hands for nothing but experience and the dream that one day I'll be Anette.
Yes, one day, the legend of Wildbill and his now staggering bankroll of... wait for it... $1.75 will join the immortalizing tales of Anette somethingorother and Jesus' paid intern (you know it wasn't him come on) and I too will be an internet legend.
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 and never deposited once... that's right never deposited once (or so the legend goes) and is now one of the most feared and respected online players out there. She literally built a bankroll from nothing and is now a mulit-millionaire, did I mention she's 18 and she started with nothing.
There is also the legend of Jesus Ferguson. Maybe I should say myth or maybe I should say baldfaced PR lie, but it goes something like this. As a personal challenge, Chris freerolled his way into some cash on FullTilt, and then playing strictly microstakes built his bankroll up to $10k just to see if he could do it. Like he doesn't have better things to do. Oh, it gets better he did it the first time, alledgedly, anonymously. As the urban legend goes he repeated this feat under his real name and managed to do it a second time too just for shicks and giggles.
Ruling out superuser account access, that Mark Seif says any site could have, that's an impressive feat and not one that I disbelieve Chris couldn't or didn't pull off. My sarcasm just stems from the question why would he do it. Doesn't he have major tournaments to win? Besides PR for FullTilt what value would such an endevor be to Chris. Okay, maybe a personal challenge.
Well, my time is also worth a lot more than playing freerolls to become another Anette or to idly challenge myself like Chris... but I think I can justify the utility of such an experience far more easily than the guy whose face is on your nearest stained glass window. I want to see a lot of hands. The low buy-in live tournaments that I can currently afford have fields that are 70% donkfishes that populate those MTTs online. So, playing a lot of hands against those fools might be of some value to me. Even if the opportunity cost of not playing at Harrahs is high.
So even, if I do try and emulate a girl that has favorably been compared to a young Mimi from the Drew Carey Show, how do I go about it. Hmmm... I deposited some money in Absolute some time ago and built it up a bit. Maybe I should play some there. Except now it's basically common knowledge that the properitors of said site are alledged to be sleazeballs, really, sleazy, greedy, cheating, coke-sniffing, stupid idiots killing their golden goose. So my odyssey is not going to start there.
Prior to that I won some money online on a different site and didn't get all of it when it closed its doors with me up some cash. Firepay never got those funds. So what's a guy to do? Right now I'm about as eager to throw cash money to the unregulated online poker world as I am to throw cash money down in a well and wish for it to multiply. For all those pennys I chucked in fountains, mall fountains, the Trevi fountains, water fountains, the money trees I wished for as a kid should be growing in my backyard any day now. Maybe when they do grow I'll send some of that money to an online site. Still what's a guy to do? Play play-money? I don't think so.
As previously mentioned a week or so ago, I played on the freeroll on Pokerstars for bloggers. I won an iPod... but that did little to building a real money account from fake money. ebay the iPod and play with the proceeds. I think not, but still did Anette play for iPods all those years ago? No. Fortunately, one side effect of that entry was I started an account on Pokerstars. With no activity since, it was with a little surprise that I found an email in my inbox, giving me a ticket into two freerolls this weekend where you can win real money.
Okay. I'll bite, and like Greg Raymer at a lobster buffet, bite I did. I dove in with gusto. Last night in my first freeroll I got up a few thousand and had to go to a Halloween party with the lady pictured (much to her displeasure I might mention) somewhere on this blog. I asked GeneD and Austin Martin to take over my play. Yes, I know NEVER, EVER, EVER give somebody your account information. Right. Hopefully, they won't chip-dump my balance of zero dollars to anyone. Maybe they'll roll me by changing my mailing address to intercept the iPod that will be obselete by the time it gets here. Anyway, neither could play.
I must say as I drove to the party with no true fill-in I was disappointed because I thought my stack was big enough to get me pretty deep.
BUT... Apparently it was. In my mailbox today, I received word that I finished in 42nd place. Pokerstars had also deposited my cash prize into my account. Ooooweee. My bankroll has begun! Look out.
Tonight, I could have gone to Harrahs and taken care of the drunken revelers from Voodoo fest looking to kill some time before the buzzes wear off, but instead I found myself playing another freeroll. Again, I build up my stack and think maybe I should just put it on cruise control all the way to some more cold hard cash, ummm, actually since I won so little maybe I should call it what it truly is--cold hard coins.
Suddenly I look at pocket Queens. I raise big. I get a call. Flop comes KK5. We are the two big stacks at the table but he's got me covered. I tread carefully. Check. He bets small (I think he's got a king). I'll call and hope to hit... that lovely lady on the turn. Sweet there she is. Now, I'm going to felt him. No way he has K5. I rule out KK too because no reraise preflop. I check. He bets slightly bigger but still trying to reel the fish in and get some money on his set from me. It cinches it to me that he's got a king. I min-reraise. He fires back again. I re-raise anew (like maybe I'm trying to bluff him off the hand) and we were still under half our stacks. Finally he pushes me all in. Call. Sure enough he's got K-J. Delicious. First place actually gets you enough money to play some micro-limits. I'm going to be the big stack in the tournament... sweetness.
But... I didn't win the hand. The point of this story and this post, may now seem like a convoluted attempt to mask a bad beat tale, but it's not. The online-haters will talk about how much sicker the beats are online but that was a four outer and routinely the last month or so I have been beaten by one and two outers on the river live. So, I am not deterred!
My quest to be Anette will not cease because of one crappy turn of fate, or more accurately one anomoly of programming, in fact, as I type this I am folding hands in another freeroll. This one is a limit poker free roll. I feel like I'm playing 3-6 again. It's on like donkey kong. Once a week, I'll be playing online hands for nothing but experience and the dream that one day I'll be Anette.
Yes, one day, the legend of Wildbill and his now staggering bankroll of... wait for it... $1.75 will join the immortalizing tales of Anette somethingorother and Jesus' paid intern (you know it wasn't him come on) and I too will be an internet legend.
Comments