Sleep With the Fishes, Dine on the Whales

It was Russ. Russ Hamilton. He bares all responsibility. He acted independently and defrauded the company he was merely an advisor too. He cheated your friends out of millions of dollars. He was a rogue employee. Yes. Just like Absolute Poker could not possibly have a cheating scandal. Nor could Ultimate Bet, remember, their security was airtight. The Absolute guy, he too, was working by himself. This smells like rotten fish. Surely, a ton of evidence was presented to the investigators showing all things leading to Hamilton. Surely, everyone interviewed pointed fingers Hamilton's way. And in all likelihood the guy was complicit, but acting alone? Come on. He's the latest sheep thrown to the wolves. He's the latest fall guy, and just maybe, him being a Main Event champion makes him a big enough name and a compelling enough figure to appease the masses. Right now, you'd think the best thing to happen would be Russ Hamilton coming out and naming names and all those other c...

In the Harrahs weekly, MP bets. Guy two seats later raises significantly. I look down at KK. The blinds and antes were, I believe, 50-200-400. First guy made it 1000. Next guy made it 2300. I had about 7k in front of me. I shove. First guy calls. Second guy calls (both have me outchipped. First guy substantially and the second guy moderately). Flop bricks out. First guy reaches for his chips. Second guy says, I call if you push. He induces the check, and then shoves, and first guy feels obligated and looks almost ashamed to call probably because of the goading. First guy AK. Second guy JJ. Turn blank. River A. JJ is incensed. "He should have known we had monsters." Maybe preflop he can get away from that when I'm indicating Kings or Aces, but probably 3 or 4 people in that tournament can fold AK preflop. Also, with AK in your hand less likely you are against bullets or cowboys... but with this type of action almost always. However, I had just shoved t...

Wow. The 2+2 pages are alight with accusations about Monkey. My gut tells me he's in a pretty bad spot. He could be the ultimate con man and I'm his next victim or dupe, but I think he's the one that got scammed. Right now, I'm near a 100% he's not involved. While I won't be wiring anybody any money any time soon, I believe the guy. He's told me he's willing to work with Jonathan Little about this and go to the authorities. Or work separately with the police to get this righted. I've advised him not to play this out in the forums at 2+2. The people that are involved in this doubt him, and he needs to regain their trust and show due diligence in getting the guys. If he's forthcoming in doing this, he should clear his name. And if Jonathan Little is swayed, the rest of 2+2 will follow. Really, they are the only folks that should be involved. 2+2 needs to be aware of what's going on, so nobody else gets duped but Monkey doesn't need to get b...

Gearing up for the weekly again. Had an alright night Monday night but once again didn't even come close to a sweat for the football squares. Though at least this time I had football mathmatical chances to win (TD and FG vs. FG, FG). Normally I need some sort of saftey and missed extra point madness to get to my number. Will cover, a couple of quick hands. Trying to overload on my suckouts as I've hit a few recently. Not to mention this past weekend I ran like Jesse Owens at my friends wedding for tiny stakes (cab fare money). Three handed flopping straights and nutting full houses on the river. Why can't I get that in a real tournament? Yes, I'm bitching because I'm running good. I'm a bitcher. On Monday night, I flop two pair, A9, bet and the tourist calls it. He's chasing and the magic flush card turns and he does the microtell stare at his chips. Suh-weet. He checks his temporary nuts, I'm certainly not going to bet his hand for him-chec...

Got some feedback on my new logo from two of ya'll. 1. Looks cool. 2. Looks like your first day experimenting with Photoshop. Maybe you'll get better. Kind of right down the middle there. Here's a picture of something a little bit sacrilegious. Expect radio silence from me the next couple of days. www.gulfcoastpoker.net

Yesterday, I finished in 7 th at the Harrahs weekly. Another cash which is good. I cost myself money which is bad. My blog post two days ago was prophetic as I needed to hit a miracle set on somebody in a pair vs. overpair matchup and it hit. At that point, I felt confident the final table was in my future. I said I wouldn't be greedy this time. Shockingly, greed won that internal battle and I cost myself money. A chop was offered by the overwhelming chip leader. I saw three short stacks and demurred. I was the only one to pass. The money started moving about the table like it was water and I went absolutely card dead. Anytime I thought about just trying to steal with nothing, and didn't, somebody showed down a monster. Sweet. The chipleader at one point had to make a 6k call from the BB against a woman who was pretty nitty to knock her out and didn't. The BB had him invested 4k. Yeah, 6k to win 21k. 3 to 1+. At that point, I thought Uh-oh this isn't...

Good thing help got there. Pretty soon a lion's got to eat. Ticking timelion. http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20080916/ap_on_re_us/ike_tales_of_survival www.gulfcoastpoker.net

I've gotten some sick, sick updates from Monkey in Tunica. His next blog will be interesting. Some cliffnotes: he sat down in a room with a 96k jackpot, then was told to get up because the guy decided he didn't want to leave. Before he can gets re-seated somebody hits the jackpot. Next he had kings flop came out 999. Turn was a king. His opponent held A9. Ow. I'm headed to Austin on Thursday for a friend's wedding. It's an interesting affair to say the least. I'm not sure he's formally asked his wife yet for her hand in marriage. That's the way he... rolls. I decided today to get the Absolute account off my computer and trash the software. Had some money left on it. What should I do? Play on a crooked site? Cash out? What would you do? I'll be playing the Harrahs mid-week tomorrow morning. I won't be greedy this week. We'll see if I hit a set when I have to. Alright, more to come tomorrow. www.gulfcoastpoker.net

Looking for a new logo. Welcoming all submissions. Here's one. www.gulfcoastpoker.net

Alright the latest edition of the timelion is coming soon. I promise. In the meantime, my tagline on gulfcoastpoker.net says I'll talk about issues facing the coast, so here's one of those. 1. Next time you are evacuated and some asshat tells you they have no sympathy for you because you are too stupid to move out of a city that is below sea level explain to the ignoramus some simple facts. The port of New Orleans and the oil from the gulf that comes through here are too vital to the NATION's economy to simple desert the city. In fact, though the sane thing to do might be to build a new New Orleans round about Baton Rouge or a little further North up the river the costs for that are so exorbitant and prohibitive it's actually better/cheaper to slowly build up the levees here and hope the huge storm doesn't come before the city is secure. Course should New Orleans ever get eviscerated then yes, a move upriver is the smart thing to do. So in effect, all us "...

Still evacuated. With my two dogs and all the hassle of getting everything together to head north, I'm waiting on Ike before I head back. Of course that storm has taken forever to get into the gulf and nobody knows what it's doing. Yesterday half the computer models had it going to Texas the other half had it going to Florida. I just checked and almost all of them having it go to Texas or well west of New Orleans. Looks like I might be headed back tomorrow. The latest models: http://www.nola.com/hurricane-ike/wide.ssf?http://my.sfwmd.gov/sfwmd/common/images/weather/plots/storm_09.gif . I found that on NOLA dot.com. There also have a pretty good interactive graphic of Gustave's storm surge on there, and some news such as the first post-Gustave muder (what a milestone). So, bored I drive down to the ATL to visit two college buddies on Saturday and watch Richmond upend UVA (or so we planned). I felt we outplayed UVA for much of the game just couldn't score. UVA did enough ...

Sounds like GeneD made it out the storm okay. No power and minor roof damage. He is bunking up with a friend. I'm still evacuated. Headed to Atlanta tomorrow for some football. Bringing the dogs so hopefully they'll be on their best behavior. Couple of vendors for the wedding have been hard to get a hold of. Tried to get wedding insurance but nobody will sell to me if there are storms near the gulf. Nothing much on the poker front. Will play some online as I'm jonesing a bit. Hope everybody else did well. Looking forward to receiving updates from the other bloggers once/if power is resotred. Hope anybody reading had minimal damage too. www.gulfcoastpoker.net

Email Thread of smacktalk before the season begins which came through my inbox today... It meanders, there is some solid smack, some weak smack, some themes and in general like the crunch of leaves in the Northeast under foot a sign football is upon us. So I posted it here. mmm beer. mmm football. "Sent: Tuesday, December 26, 2006 12:05:55 PM Subject: Re: STONE COLD, LEAD PIPER Hopefully everyone in New Orleans now realizes that Eli is not a good QB. I've held off for a long time as the bandwagon has fallen off but I can't defend his awful play anymore." Merry Christmas, I stumbled upon that email in the vault though it was a good way to kick off the new season in honor of the reigning SuperBowl champions and their fans. The weather isn't pretty in December. I guess there is a reason they are called fairweather fans. My pick: The Over of 41. Tonight. Involving the gnats and foreskins. Sent: Thursday, September 4, 2008 11:13:55 AM Subject: Re: STONE CO...

So, I'm evacuated. I'm looking up a book for my book of the month feature on Amazon and I input poker. I had no idea just how bad this game has jumped the shark. Some of my favorites follow. Hmmm. What's in this? Stale cigarette smoke, the thin reedy reek of alcohol, a heady mixture of B.O. and unbrushed teeth, with just a smidge of cheap casino cleaning scent? Sounds delisch. Don't fall over yourself buying this. You too can smell like a guy who hasn't left his seat in 30 hours--any time of the day. One spray of this and your nose will be flooded with the gentle, romantic odor of unwashed feet. Of course this probably taste better than Johnny Chan's All-in poker drink. You have to see this watch to believe it. With two important messages for the discerning poker player. "Go All-in" across the top and "Stay off Tilt" on the bottom. Product endorsement by Phil Helmet, "You know, if not for this $439.00 watch (yes, you could buy 8 Swatc...