Sleep With the Fishes, Dine on the Whales

Hope everyone is enjoying themselves, their families and the holiday season. I hope next year is everything you want it to be. In the coming days, I'll be posting a column on Exit Strategy (why you always need one) and a little personal story Meet The Parents. Funny moment as the future in laws all got together for the first time. In the meantime a quick hand that I played on Sunday. I had crap in the big blind. Somebody makes one of those pot building raises to like 7 and everybody calls to me. I have to pay 5 for a $65 pot, yes, I'll play just about any two cards. Flop is KK2. I have a 2 and it's checked around. Turn is an 8. I figure I'll take a stab because people might buy I have a K. I bet. Folded to a kid in the small blind whose decision making is wild at best. He calls. Okay. I'm going to shut her down. He's liable to call with an 8 or slowplay his king (thought doing it twice is strange). If he can call that turn bet, he'll call my...

Played in the Houma Dead Money satellite tournament. Was second out--stellar performance I know. My final hand involved me trying to steal with AQ suited and short-stacked in the face of a min-raise and call. I had 2500, blinds were 100-200, so 1100 in the pot. The initial caller called, a steady player named Craig, and he had Kings. Well played, I had no idea he was that strong. I hit my Queen on the flop so probably would been the hand I died with regardless. I also bled off some chips with AQ earlier v. AK when an ace hit the flop. I raised, after leading out preflop and the eventual winner of the tournament shoved all in. I had a good read of strength from him ('You mean besides the fact he put all his chips in?' Captain Obvious). I thought his insta-call of my preflop raise, which brought two other callers along, and his predatory lean in doing so meant I was trailing. The Ace came and I fired out hoping he had a pocket pair or something besides AK. His shove confirmed t...

Yet when I get called out in the comments section I have to respond. As Dooleyera wrote, "When did you get your Aces in... pre-flop or post flop? regardless to get knocked out that many times with em is tough.been a week since your last update. your loyal readers are dissapointed.lookin to play some pokah in Jan....down in nawlins. time to own. gotten beat up online. comin to learn from the pros. that means you gulf coast bloggers." Umm. Mostly get in preflop. That time postflop. That boomtown tournament has had me look down at Aces in the big blind with somebody all in for more too many times. I can't not call and invariably they hit their set of... 2s. Actually, I've been running pretty well. I usually post less when I'm doing well, because like bad beat stories I'm sure brags are pretty annoying also. Guess there isn't much to talk about otherwise so maybe I have to a little bit. Also, as one friend told me he checks in on my blog to see me com...

Let me put some of my own thoughts back into this blog. Course the story here is the success of David at the 7 clans. We met up with him on Thursday and offered him a spot on TEAM GCP after playing with him n the event. We'll set him up with a blog so I won't have to repost his thoughts here. He's a solid player who should do well, excuse me, is doing well with the deep stack of the main event. With over half the field eliminated David has the potential to get a big score. Considering he confided he was card dead on the first day I'm hoping he gets a mini-rush and can go even deeper. Lots of poker this week. Got another live cash and that was fun. However, it felt like Deja Vu all over again as the bubble to the final 20 (the money) consisted of three tables with my table being the only one knocking out players. Literally, with 29 left we were responsible for knocking out 8 to get to the money (yes, they were moving players over). I Outlasted 172 players and ne...

Lemme catch up here. Tuesday was the Tag Team event, and I didn't get a voucher for it with the mega satellite prize package. Wednesday I showed up, and I busted out real early. I couldn't get started, I missed continuation bets, I got real tentative and people drew out on me. Thursday, you and Gene showed up, and I played kinda deep--it started with 150-200 entrants, I got to like 35. I busted out trying to steal blinds with a 6-9 suited. Not so swift, but I felt really pressured to make a move with blinds catching up. I also lost $200 in the 2-5 no limit cash game after the tourney on Thursday, but I caught that back up Friday morning when I flopped 2 pair with AK suited and got a call from a lady who was outta postion, but thought her pair of Aces would get her there since the guys at the other end of the table were dragging pots with second pairs. She'd check, I'd bet, she'd call, on the flop, the turn, and on the river. Maybe she figured I was playing ...

I got time off from work, so I'll be able to play in all the tournaments I won entry into, except for today. Today is a tag team tournament, and I don't have a voucher for that because it wasn't part of the prize package. I'll try to keep better notes about what happens. Lemme know if there's any info you'd like to have for the website that I haven't thought of. For example, I know that they are running satellite tournaments in the poker room all week for the main event, I heard they're like one table tournaments, shoot out's. I think if you win a shoot out, you get free entry into some other satellite, not sure, but I'll find out. I'll talk up the site, as usual.

"Yesterday, Monday December 3, I picked up receipts for the rest of the weeks tournaments at the poker room. I played in the Monday tournament which started out with 167 entrants. Once again, I got short stacked early playing around with suited aces, putting in bets on the turn and the river with 3 and 4 flush draws and middle pair, draws not getting there and the Ace not hitting to make my 2 pair. I busted out at the 4th table which I think is still pretty deep in the tournament. My last hand, I was short stacked and looking to double up before the blinds busted me out. I got AJ suited, went all in and was called by Freddy, from Alexandria with a huge stack. Freddy flipped up pocket queens, but I felt good about it, I had to do it with a short stack and the blinds about to knock me out in a few more hands. I flopped 2 pair, no queen, and I figured I had it in the bag. Turn was a blank, the river was a queen. I felt like I got shot in the chest:) I was crushed, felt it al...

"The 7 Clans Mega satellite started Sunday at noon with 267 entrants. The round were 30 minutes each. I started out playing pretty loose like everybody else and my stack dwindled down quick because of it. At the first break at the conclusion of the 100-200 round, I was already short stacked--about $1200 in chips and I'd started with $4000. I started thinking about the tourney in terms of just make it to the next break, and that's all I did. After the second break the blinds went up to $600-$1200. I kept catching shitty cards, nothing to go all in with, the big blind got to me, and I got dealt a 3-5 offsuit. Everybody at the table was telling me to throw in the last $500 chip, and I said no, I can't go all in with this, I want to see the next hand. The dealer said I could go all in on the small blind, so I mucked the 35 and looked at another hand. I got a suited king in the small blind, 3 or 4 callers, and I made the flush with it. 2 hand later I went all in ag...

GCP's main man at Coushatta in his own words: "I've been playing Hold'Em since 1996. I started in college. I'm an engineer, so Iike math and I like weighing pros and cons to different technical solutions, which is how I approach decision making in poker. The first time I ever saw it played, I was in high school in 1987. They were playing it at a titty bar that I was in illegally. I wanted to play, i was immediately intrigued, but I figured it'd be way outta control to sit down and start playing cards in the only well lighted place in the whole club when I was just 16 years old:) In 1998 or 1999, I started playing 7 card hi/low split with some old men in Crowley on a daily basis. I also started playing the the white chip hold em games in the casinos in lake charles and baton rouge. I got my fill of poker about 2 years ago, and i swore off it. I was sick of watching J9 offsuit suck out on the river, and losing money to them, in the white chip games so i j...

A friend of GCP's, David Spicer, won the Coushatta mega satellite, giving him a seat into every one of their events this week. He might not be able to make a couple of tournaments because of work, but don't worry, I've certainly volunteered to play them for him, and chop the winnings in some way. If possible we are going to try and track his progress as part of our coverage of the event. Maybe we'll be able to get him some GCP gear too. Obviously, to win the mega Davids got skills, but I got to play with him in Lafayette and I saw first hand as he sliced and diced the weak players at the table. So good, luck to David and check out www.gulfcoastpoker.net for details on the tournament and David's results. www.gulfcoastpoker.net

Wanted to revisit my online experiment. As some of you know, I've started a Pokerstars account with that tiny amount I won via a freeroll. http://sleepwiththefishesdineonthewhales.blogspot.com/2007/10/monday-column-online-play-sounds-dirty.html Now for the First Update: playing micro limits very infrequently, I've raised that "bankroll" to over a whopping $12. At the same time, I've also played a few 12000 people freerolls hoping to satellite into a bigger event and met with zero success. Well, less than zero because I've gotten to the bubble a few times. Anyway as of this morning that's $0.00 invested to $1.75 to $12.90. The zero to a million is the dream, but I've also laid out goals of seeing a lot of hands and refining other aspects of my game to help with my live play. How's that working out? At first, I was surprised by how true the play is regardless of the penny stakes, and to keep myself honest, in my head I was just moving the deci...