So I'm playing 8/16 LHE in the Bellagio last night because I didn't have enough cash on hand to play a reasonable game. At that point in the night I still thought there was a decent chance I was going to meet up with a friend (who was at a bachelor party) at a club or for some gambling and drinking later. So I figured I'd set in the loose crazy game and try to win some money while enjoying a few beverages.
Started off the night fairly well, I made some good plays got some good value for several hands, but then I went totally card dead. All of my draws missed, all of their draws got there, I rarely flopped a pair etc etc etc. Before I know it I haven't won a hand in about 2 hours and I'm down to about $200 from my original $500. A few more bad flops and I'm down to $160. At this point I just feel that this game isn't working for me, and I'm going to get up and go to Caesars or something. My plan was to just play until my BB and then take a break.
Then the hand occurred that taught me a valuable LHE lesson, and maybe a little bigger lesson as well. And while it possible cost me a +$300 pot, if I correctly apply the lesson i guess it could make me money in the long run.
A little background: one of the main reasons I was staying at the table was because I easily had the best seat in the whole table. I had to two tightest players to my direct left, and I had a player to my right that while well ententioned obviously had no clue how to play poker. In fact he had to be briefed on the mechanics of play at least half a dozen times in the 2 hours he had been sitting. He had won several pots off of me by getting there every time, as well as not ever folding when I had draws that missed (to my credit I didn't waste too many bets bluffing him once he showed a willingness to call down with K-high in every HU pot no matter what the action). To his credit his biggest mistakes were betting and raising when his hand did not warrant it in the slightest as well as rarely folding if he had any SD value. While these are exploitable mistakes in LHE, and playing that way will surely cause you to go bust in the long they are mistakes that can only be exploited if people are hitting hands against you and this night he was hitting enough hands to stay afloat. There were also some other LP calling stations further to my right, so combined with this player I easily had the best seat at the table. If I could have played that seat for the rest of my life I think I'm easily a 5BB/100 winner in that game.
So back to the hand. I look down in MP and see 44. Two players have limped in front including our big fish. I limp as well and super tight player two to my left (who isn't very good but thinks he's good because he plays soooo tight and can't hand read for shit) raises. BB calls, limpers call and I call and we see a 5 way flop for 2sb. Dream flop of A84 rainbow comes down. The fish bets into me, I think about raising, but then I know that the guy behind me will raise with any Ax, and then I can trap the field for a c/r on the turn when he bets again. So I just call, tight guy raises as I thought, fish calls and I call.
Now the 6 comes on the turn. Fish leads again, I know tight player will raise all of his good Ax again, so I call playing on 3-betting the field when it comes back around. Tight guy raises (sweet), fish calls, and I 3-bet. Tight guy looks puzzled for about 3 seconds, then announces a 4-bet. Fish calls two cold (lolzers) and I realize that I'm likely now up against a set of aces. I call and we see the river.
the river is the 7 making the board A8467. Before any action the tight guy groans. I now know he has some kind of set and thinks that made someone a straight. Fish now bets into me, I decide "wtf, huge pot, I has a set, I call". Then tight guy lifts his hand off the table and shows me and other tight player to my left his AA before groaning and finally calling. Fish knuckles the table and AA scoops the pot. Now can you spot the big mistake I made that could have changed who got shipped the pot?
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If you guessed that I should have raised the river then you deserve a cookie. If I had stopped for a second and realized that fish could very easily be betting the river with any two pair and that my hand likely has decent equity against his range, and that by raising the river I could rep a straight and possibly get the tight guy to fold. Now any good player will look at my action on the turn and quickly realize that I am much more likely to have a lower set than a hand with a 5 in it since the only hand that I could have c/3bet the turn would have been 75 exactly. But this player didn't hand read will, he only board read well. When I raised the river he wouldnt have considered that my range of hands on the turn had very few 5x hands in them he just would have figured "4 to a straight on the board someone has to have it" and possibly mucked his set of aces. Considering that there was over 20BB in the pot, I was going to pay one more to see the SD, that additional BB would only have to buy me the pot about 4-5% of the time to be profitable. I think the chance that I have the fish beat, and get the tight player to fold is definitely better than 5% if I would have raised the river.
Instead of taking time to think out the situation, and make the best and most profitable decision I made the standard easy make a call and see a SD decision. Afterwards I got up and left the table as I had planned, but before I could even make it into the bathroom I realized my mistake. I was immediately very pissed at myself for not seeing such a profitable river play. Sure it is a somewhat advanced play, but I played LHE for a living exclusively for about 5 months against much tougher competition in higher stakes games and I feel like that is a play I should have seen.
So lesson learned. In LHE whether or not you should call or raise the river is not based on whether or not you think you have the best hand, it has to do with whether or not you think that you can possibly fold out better hands while still getting called by worse. In this case the small parlay that I fold out a higher set and beat the fish was definitely a profitable play. The math of the situation is undeniable, and the best play on the river was certainly a raise.
The second and maybe more important lesson is that if you are faced with an action you didnt anticipate on the river (ie fish bets after the 4th straight card comes) don't play on instinct take time to think through the situation. While we as poker players should be prepared for all possible situations (ie don't bet or raise if you don't know what to do if they reraise) obviously new facets of complex hand can certainly present new opportunities for us to make profitable plays. Ignoring those opportunities, or failing to understand them costs us money at the table and probably cost me a fairly significant portion of a very large pot last night (since my play wouldn't always work but it had enough value to work some of the time).
next post is going to be more of a summary of my trip. My thoughts on vegas (both good and bad) and the various casinos.
thanks for reading
jim
Monday, June 30, 2008
Friday, June 27, 2008
busted out of the event...
So I pretty much played like crap today. Early on played a few decent hands, made a nice laydown or two, and then just kind of went card dead.
The I had a little more than our starting 4k stack when I limped on the button with A9s after three other people limped. Jeff Madsen had limped UTG with about 2.4k stack. The flop comes down A84 with two hearts and everyone checks to me. I bet 300 into the 500 pot, and Madsen thinks for about 30 seconds before c/r'ing to 800. Now I had stabbed at pots as the last one to act and had to fold to raises at least 2 times in the last 45 minutes, and I knew he had seen me be fairly active. Combine that with the fact that he made a non-committing raise, and he could easily have a flush draw and I decided to ship it in. My hand looks really weak there, and I figured there was a decent chance he was bluffing since its fairly unlikely he limps a better Ax from UTG with that stack.
turns out I was way off with my guess as he had limped AKo from UTG (huh?) and after he snap called and I didn't catch up my stack is down to crap. Plus we are now 1 hand away from the break and the blinds become 200. So I'll have 8BB when I get back from the break.
First hand we get back from the break a really good player that I talked with a little bit limps UTG, and I have AA. Normally I would have just raised to 3-4BB, but I knew that he would see that as a committing raise and I had just finished talking with him about how often I was going to be shipping it in during the break. So I thought if I thought for a little bit and then shipped it in that he might call me off light. Instead he basically insta-mucked and I got no value for my aces. In retro-spect I really think I should have just limped as well and tryed to get someone else to squeeze raise from behind and get it in with the AA. I also could have possible won a c-bet on the flop from the aggressive limper.
A couple hands later with about 1.8k in chips I ship it in from UTG with 55. Aggressive european guy 2 to my left thinks for about 2 minutes before going all-in for about 2.4k, then madsen directly to his left thinks for about 1 minute before going all-in for a little over 4k, then the guy two to Madsen's left thinks for about 30 seconds before going all-in for about 3.8k. So I know I'm going ot have to spike now that we have 4 players all-in LOL. I flip up the speed limit, next guy has 88, Madsen has JJ, and then the last player has AA. So I've only got about 10% equity in the pot, but if I hit a 5 at least I'll be up to 7.2k in chips. The AA held up though, and two of us were eliminated. Madsen must have busted a few hands later because I saw him out in the hallway not much longer. So I guess that hand basically eliminated 3 of the 8 players at the table. And I can proudly say I got it in with the worst hand. wheeeeee.
overall I think I played like crap. I think a lot of it had to do with the fact that I got basically no sleep for the last 3 days because of the baseball game, packing, couldnt sleep on the flight, and then went out last night and partied a little too hard. In retrospect I probably should have gone back to the room at a reasonable hour instead of going clubbing with the European guys from raktherake. We had a good time, but I was feeling it this morning.
Also I definitely didn't adjust enough to the 10 handed nittiness of live poker. I told myself to slow down before the tournament, and I tried, But with the short stack I could have been more patient and played the AA slower and probably should have just mucked the 55. I could have gotten down to 4-5 BB before needing to ship that light UTG. TBH I really didn't think anyone would call with JJ+ or AK. So I feel like I played like crap and basically bustoed my chance to win some good money. I guess busting out early is better than slowly busting out, but when you play bad you pretty much feel like an idiot. and I feel like an idiot.
So I'm going to grab some late dinner and find a cash game. Not sure if I want to go back to the Rio, check out the poker room here at the Palms or head to the strip.
later
The I had a little more than our starting 4k stack when I limped on the button with A9s after three other people limped. Jeff Madsen had limped UTG with about 2.4k stack. The flop comes down A84 with two hearts and everyone checks to me. I bet 300 into the 500 pot, and Madsen thinks for about 30 seconds before c/r'ing to 800. Now I had stabbed at pots as the last one to act and had to fold to raises at least 2 times in the last 45 minutes, and I knew he had seen me be fairly active. Combine that with the fact that he made a non-committing raise, and he could easily have a flush draw and I decided to ship it in. My hand looks really weak there, and I figured there was a decent chance he was bluffing since its fairly unlikely he limps a better Ax from UTG with that stack.
turns out I was way off with my guess as he had limped AKo from UTG (huh?) and after he snap called and I didn't catch up my stack is down to crap. Plus we are now 1 hand away from the break and the blinds become 200. So I'll have 8BB when I get back from the break.
First hand we get back from the break a really good player that I talked with a little bit limps UTG, and I have AA. Normally I would have just raised to 3-4BB, but I knew that he would see that as a committing raise and I had just finished talking with him about how often I was going to be shipping it in during the break. So I thought if I thought for a little bit and then shipped it in that he might call me off light. Instead he basically insta-mucked and I got no value for my aces. In retro-spect I really think I should have just limped as well and tryed to get someone else to squeeze raise from behind and get it in with the AA. I also could have possible won a c-bet on the flop from the aggressive limper.
A couple hands later with about 1.8k in chips I ship it in from UTG with 55. Aggressive european guy 2 to my left thinks for about 2 minutes before going all-in for about 2.4k, then madsen directly to his left thinks for about 1 minute before going all-in for a little over 4k, then the guy two to Madsen's left thinks for about 30 seconds before going all-in for about 3.8k. So I know I'm going ot have to spike now that we have 4 players all-in LOL. I flip up the speed limit, next guy has 88, Madsen has JJ, and then the last player has AA. So I've only got about 10% equity in the pot, but if I hit a 5 at least I'll be up to 7.2k in chips. The AA held up though, and two of us were eliminated. Madsen must have busted a few hands later because I saw him out in the hallway not much longer. So I guess that hand basically eliminated 3 of the 8 players at the table. And I can proudly say I got it in with the worst hand. wheeeeee.
overall I think I played like crap. I think a lot of it had to do with the fact that I got basically no sleep for the last 3 days because of the baseball game, packing, couldnt sleep on the flight, and then went out last night and partied a little too hard. In retrospect I probably should have gone back to the room at a reasonable hour instead of going clubbing with the European guys from raktherake. We had a good time, but I was feeling it this morning.
Also I definitely didn't adjust enough to the 10 handed nittiness of live poker. I told myself to slow down before the tournament, and I tried, But with the short stack I could have been more patient and played the AA slower and probably should have just mucked the 55. I could have gotten down to 4-5 BB before needing to ship that light UTG. TBH I really didn't think anyone would call with JJ+ or AK. So I feel like I played like crap and basically bustoed my chance to win some good money. I guess busting out early is better than slowly busting out, but when you play bad you pretty much feel like an idiot. and I feel like an idiot.
So I'm going to grab some late dinner and find a cash game. Not sure if I want to go back to the Rio, check out the poker room here at the Palms or head to the strip.
later
Thursday, June 26, 2008
The first of many vegas blog posts
So I'm sitting in JFK waiting for my flight to Vegas to board and this chick just passed out and fell down while standing up right in front of me. Apparently she took a crap ton of benadryl (way too much sounds like) and just whacked out. I think shes going to be ok, they've got her sitting up and getting her some water. Weird stuff always seems to happen when I'm in NYC, maybe that's why I'm not a big fan of it.
Another thing, I really really hate boarding planes early. I pretty much always sit until the last minute. The idea of rushing to the front and standing in line to get a seat on a cramped airplane just seems goofy to me. I'd rather sit here and type away on the free wifi.
Baseball is going great. I'm 4-0 with a 2.5 ERA and two saves. I threw a complete game 3-2 win last night, so right now my arm feels like its being repeadtedly punched by someone pretty strong. Yay for arm soreness. But the team is doing great, we are hitting well, and the guys in the field are playing terrific. We're solidly in second place right now after winning 6 straight, and I think we have about half the wins we need ot make the playoffs.
anway I'm off to vegas, so I'll be updating with poker playing and vegas shennanigans.
later
jim
Another thing, I really really hate boarding planes early. I pretty much always sit until the last minute. The idea of rushing to the front and standing in line to get a seat on a cramped airplane just seems goofy to me. I'd rather sit here and type away on the free wifi.
Baseball is going great. I'm 4-0 with a 2.5 ERA and two saves. I threw a complete game 3-2 win last night, so right now my arm feels like its being repeadtedly punched by someone pretty strong. Yay for arm soreness. But the team is doing great, we are hitting well, and the guys in the field are playing terrific. We're solidly in second place right now after winning 6 straight, and I think we have about half the wins we need ot make the playoffs.
anway I'm off to vegas, so I'll be updating with poker playing and vegas shennanigans.
later
jim
Sunday, June 8, 2008
WSOP 2008 here I come.
(obligatory and cliched blog intro coming)
VEGAS BABY! VEGAS!
So by being one of the top 54 most raked players on FTP last month I was entered into a freeroll by my affiliate. The prize was 2 $5k packages to the 2008 WSOP. So 27 of the 54 qualified players turned out, and I ended up taking first place and getting a package. I'll find out the full details in a day or so, but needless to say I'm totally stoked right now. I've never been to LV, and getting to go and play in a WSOP event is pretty exciting.
I may try to post up some interesting hands later, but I'm a little too pumped right now to go sort through them all. Also thanks littlebu for the sweat, always nice to have someone pulling for you.
later
jim
VEGAS BABY! VEGAS!
So by being one of the top 54 most raked players on FTP last month I was entered into a freeroll by my affiliate. The prize was 2 $5k packages to the 2008 WSOP. So 27 of the 54 qualified players turned out, and I ended up taking first place and getting a package. I'll find out the full details in a day or so, but needless to say I'm totally stoked right now. I've never been to LV, and getting to go and play in a WSOP event is pretty exciting.
I may try to post up some interesting hands later, but I'm a little too pumped right now to go sort through them all. Also thanks littlebu for the sweat, always nice to have someone pulling for you.
later
jim
Friday, June 6, 2008
the tornadoes consider picking me up....but don't call back :-(
So on wednesday around noon I got a call from the bench coach of the Worcester Tornadoes (team I attended spring training with) who proceeded to ask me how I felt and if I had been throwing. I of course replied yes that I had thrown twice in the last week and was ready to go. He said they were considering picking me up and that he would call me back in a little bit.
So he then called me back about an hour later to tell me that they had to discuss a few things and that they would make a decision later that night and get back to me the next day around 1 PM (after their early 11AM game I'm assuming).
So I of course got very excited. I checked out their website and found that they had recently released a RHP who had been used in relief (which would be my primary role on the team) and I noticed that a few of their relievers had been struggling a little bit. I called my dad and of course he was excited as well. Katy was on call last night so I paged her and gave her a headsup that when she got back on noon on thursday there was a decent chance I might be packing up and heading to worcester to go on a road trip (the tornadoes are getting ready to go on a 6 game canadian road trip).
So I had plans for things I wanted to get done, but to be honest I was a little nervous and excited so I didn't play as much poker or do my laundry. Instead I pretty much just hung around the apartment waiting to hear the verdict.
Of course time started to move slow on thursday morning. Then katy got home around noon and still I'd heard nothing. Around 2pm I was assuming I would hear from the team anytime soon. Around 3pm nothing, and I started to figure that was as good as a no. I was sure as soon as the Tornadoes finished their home game they would be hopping a bust to head to Ottawa. So if they were going to pick anyone up yesterday it would obviously be before they left town.
By 6pm I called my Park League manager and let him know that I would be available to start on Friday since even if they decided to pick me up I wouldn't be playing with the team for at least another week since they were off to Canada.
To be honest I think it was kind of crap that they didn't even call me back on thursday to give me a thumbs up, maybe in a week or so, or a thumbs down. Its not like my life is hanging on the balance (I'm having a great summer so far playing baseball and poker all day) but I still would like to know whats going on.
Anyway I played a couple of sessions of NL and a little LHE yesterday and this morning. In NL I was down about 3 buy-ins, but to be honest I was really happy with my play. Most of my losses were coolers or coin-flips, and I think I only maybe spewed once or twice. Plus I ran some quality bluffs and really had great images on most of my tables.
In LHE I ran awful in HU and lost a ton of bets against a decent player at 8/16 (I know wtf am I doing playing a decent player HU), but in my defense he hit so many flops I didn't know whether he was playing bad or a good player. I'm pretty sure he was actually a decent player, but he definitely ran hot as the sun. The good news was that I made most of it back at 6max 8/16 and 10/20, so it was only a loss of about $200. So overall I've dropped about $1500 in the last couple of days, but for the month I'm still doing great.
I'm running pretty well, I think I'm playing excellently, and I'm enjoying the games. I think June could be a great month and I'm looking forward to getting a good start on the summer.
Also one last thing. I'm pretty sure I'm going to remove the remainder of my roll from AP. The NL games on there suck, and I'm just not playing enough LHE and their benefits (while really good) aren't worth the trouble each month. Plus after the UB cheating crap I just hate the idea that a company that tried to cheat their customers after already being caught once will be getting my rake. I really don't like the idea of only having cash on one site because if FTP has cashout problems I'm in tough shape. But I could probably find someone to do me a transfer from FTP to stars at the end of the summer and try out their games. I figure by that point my FTP bankroll will probably be big enough that I could afford to cut it in half without putting me in bad shape on there.
weather is pretty crappy here so I would say the chances we play tonight are about 50/50. I don't think its going to rain a ton this afternoon, but its been raining off and on for about 48 hours now, and I don't know that the sun is going to come out this afternoon to dry the field out. I wouldn't mind a rain out too much since it would give my finger a chance to fully heal. I'll surely rip it open if I pitch tonight, but I dealt with it the other night so whatever.
Also great job by the Celtics and Pierce especially last night. The 4th quarter was a testament to team defense, and I really want to see the good guy (KG) win it all instead of the guy who up until this season (and I mean right until the beginning of the season) was one of the worst teammates ever (Kobe).
later
jim
So he then called me back about an hour later to tell me that they had to discuss a few things and that they would make a decision later that night and get back to me the next day around 1 PM (after their early 11AM game I'm assuming).
So I of course got very excited. I checked out their website and found that they had recently released a RHP who had been used in relief (which would be my primary role on the team) and I noticed that a few of their relievers had been struggling a little bit. I called my dad and of course he was excited as well. Katy was on call last night so I paged her and gave her a headsup that when she got back on noon on thursday there was a decent chance I might be packing up and heading to worcester to go on a road trip (the tornadoes are getting ready to go on a 6 game canadian road trip).
So I had plans for things I wanted to get done, but to be honest I was a little nervous and excited so I didn't play as much poker or do my laundry. Instead I pretty much just hung around the apartment waiting to hear the verdict.
Of course time started to move slow on thursday morning. Then katy got home around noon and still I'd heard nothing. Around 2pm I was assuming I would hear from the team anytime soon. Around 3pm nothing, and I started to figure that was as good as a no. I was sure as soon as the Tornadoes finished their home game they would be hopping a bust to head to Ottawa. So if they were going to pick anyone up yesterday it would obviously be before they left town.
By 6pm I called my Park League manager and let him know that I would be available to start on Friday since even if they decided to pick me up I wouldn't be playing with the team for at least another week since they were off to Canada.
To be honest I think it was kind of crap that they didn't even call me back on thursday to give me a thumbs up, maybe in a week or so, or a thumbs down. Its not like my life is hanging on the balance (I'm having a great summer so far playing baseball and poker all day) but I still would like to know whats going on.
Anyway I played a couple of sessions of NL and a little LHE yesterday and this morning. In NL I was down about 3 buy-ins, but to be honest I was really happy with my play. Most of my losses were coolers or coin-flips, and I think I only maybe spewed once or twice. Plus I ran some quality bluffs and really had great images on most of my tables.
In LHE I ran awful in HU and lost a ton of bets against a decent player at 8/16 (I know wtf am I doing playing a decent player HU), but in my defense he hit so many flops I didn't know whether he was playing bad or a good player. I'm pretty sure he was actually a decent player, but he definitely ran hot as the sun. The good news was that I made most of it back at 6max 8/16 and 10/20, so it was only a loss of about $200. So overall I've dropped about $1500 in the last couple of days, but for the month I'm still doing great.
I'm running pretty well, I think I'm playing excellently, and I'm enjoying the games. I think June could be a great month and I'm looking forward to getting a good start on the summer.
Also one last thing. I'm pretty sure I'm going to remove the remainder of my roll from AP. The NL games on there suck, and I'm just not playing enough LHE and their benefits (while really good) aren't worth the trouble each month. Plus after the UB cheating crap I just hate the idea that a company that tried to cheat their customers after already being caught once will be getting my rake. I really don't like the idea of only having cash on one site because if FTP has cashout problems I'm in tough shape. But I could probably find someone to do me a transfer from FTP to stars at the end of the summer and try out their games. I figure by that point my FTP bankroll will probably be big enough that I could afford to cut it in half without putting me in bad shape on there.
weather is pretty crappy here so I would say the chances we play tonight are about 50/50. I don't think its going to rain a ton this afternoon, but its been raining off and on for about 48 hours now, and I don't know that the sun is going to come out this afternoon to dry the field out. I wouldn't mind a rain out too much since it would give my finger a chance to fully heal. I'll surely rip it open if I pitch tonight, but I dealt with it the other night so whatever.
Also great job by the Celtics and Pierce especially last night. The 4th quarter was a testament to team defense, and I really want to see the good guy (KG) win it all instead of the guy who up until this season (and I mean right until the beginning of the season) was one of the worst teammates ever (Kobe).
later
jim
Wednesday, June 4, 2008
Love it or leave it but you gotta admit, on the scale of one to awesome... I'm the shit.
So ended up having a nice May of poker despite the fact that I felt I never ran well the whole month. I just grinded out 62k hands and banked a just under 5 figure month (prolly over with bonii and rakeback). I also think I found some more leaks in my NL game that I had developed from multitabling, as well as I started to find some more profitable bluffing spots in NL. Overall I think I'm playing much better the last week or so, and I'm running nice and hot which is always a plus.
I've started off this month very well, and booked nice wins the past three days. I'm also finding it nice to play early in the morning since I'm typically well rested and I think the games are soft though in a different way than normal. Usually when you are looking for soft games you think playing at night or in the evening is the way to go since that is when most of the fish are playing. And that is true. But that is also the time when all of the best regular players are playing as well. So you really have to work hard on table selection at those times, because some tables you have little to no edge on. As well as the fact that a table with 3 good regs, one meh player, and a fish isn't really that profitable. The other good regs are going to make your life hell, and you'll be fighting to iso the fish the whole time.
When playing in the mornings you find less big fish, but you find quite a few more very mediocre regs (or simply not very good TAGfish). These players have some very exploitable leaks (not playing enough hands pf, playing poorly postflop, not bluffing often enough, folding to too many c-bets etc) and you can find lots of profitable spots to bluff or run them over. If you are catching a few hands it makes it quite a bit easier. I actually tend to play a little more aggressive (both post and preflop) in the mornings than I do at night. The evening and night games are almost impossible to run over, and you have to limit your bluffing somewhat.
On the baseball front things are going well. I got my first start of the Park League season on friday night. I felt pretty good, and ended up pitching 8 innings (we normally play 7 inning games so we were in extras) and started the 9th before they pulled me when I gave up a leadoff hit. My control was so-so as I was having a lot of trouble adjusting to the mound for the first 3-4 innings (the fields we play on are in pretty lousy condition). I ended up with 11 Ks, but I had 8 BB as well. In my defense at least 2 of the BB were situations where I got behind and decided to not give the guy anything to hit because I had first base open and a guy on second. But that is still way to many walks. I gave up 3 runs, and the book had them all as earned, but I'm pretty sure at least 1 of them was unearned. I pitched well, my stuff was nasty (splitty was dirty) and faught through some fatigue and a really bad blister from my split finger grip. I think I threw about 160 pitches though, which is way way way to many. We had to stop the game in the 9th with a 6-3 lead because the lights went out on the field. So when we resume we will be in the bottom of the 9th with 2 on and 1 out and a 3 run lead. If we pick up a couple of outs then I'll get the win. My line for the game was 8IP, 3R, 11Ks, 8BBs, and I'm in line for the win if we pick up two more outs.
I also picked up a win last night when I came in for two innings of relief. I came in with 2 runners on and no outs in the 5th innings and we had a 6-4 lead. I got the first batter to ground to the shortstop, but he was going to his right (third baseman came off of the bag to try and field the ball) and he didn't have a play at first. The next guy laid down a nice bunt that took a bad hop and got under my hand so that I had no play (probably an error on me). Then I got a ground ball for a double play, and struck out the last batter of the inning. So overall not a bad inning considering that the team hit two balls in the infield that we couldn't make plays on and I had two runners inherited. They scored two runs to tie the game up, but things could have gone much worse. We scored a run to take a 7-6 lead and I mowed through the next inning. Leadoff batter grounded out to me. Then I went strikeout, hit-by-pitch (nasty splitter in a 0-1 count that he leaned into imo), strikeout to end the inning. I told the coach that I probably shouldn't go another inning since I'm planning on starting on friday. My arm was definitely a little fatigued, and the blister on my finger was openly bleeding the whole night (I had put super glue on it before the game but it wore off in warmups).
So my line for the game was 2 IP, 0 R, 3Ks, 0BB, 1H and I picked up the win. If we win that suspended game then I'll have 2 Ws on the year. Right now I'm leading the park league in IP, and Ks. If I get that other W then I'd be leading the league in Ws as well. Looks like the Tornadoes might have made a mistake in not picking me up. My stuff is nasty and last night I spotted my fastball better than I have in I don't know when.
Its pouring the rain here so we are likely going to be rained out for tonight. I wasn't going to be available to pitch anway, but it looks like I won't even be heading to the park. I booked a nice $2k score this morning on the tables, enjoyed some leftover tacos (I make outstanding tacos imo) and watched last nights episode of deadliest catch (huge fan of that show). Now I'm feeling a little sleepy so I think I'm going to go take a nap. Rumor has it that I might be drinking beers with a buddy and teammate this afternoon who has the day off work. Wouldn't mind having a night away from the tables.
later
jim
I've started off this month very well, and booked nice wins the past three days. I'm also finding it nice to play early in the morning since I'm typically well rested and I think the games are soft though in a different way than normal. Usually when you are looking for soft games you think playing at night or in the evening is the way to go since that is when most of the fish are playing. And that is true. But that is also the time when all of the best regular players are playing as well. So you really have to work hard on table selection at those times, because some tables you have little to no edge on. As well as the fact that a table with 3 good regs, one meh player, and a fish isn't really that profitable. The other good regs are going to make your life hell, and you'll be fighting to iso the fish the whole time.
When playing in the mornings you find less big fish, but you find quite a few more very mediocre regs (or simply not very good TAGfish). These players have some very exploitable leaks (not playing enough hands pf, playing poorly postflop, not bluffing often enough, folding to too many c-bets etc) and you can find lots of profitable spots to bluff or run them over. If you are catching a few hands it makes it quite a bit easier. I actually tend to play a little more aggressive (both post and preflop) in the mornings than I do at night. The evening and night games are almost impossible to run over, and you have to limit your bluffing somewhat.
On the baseball front things are going well. I got my first start of the Park League season on friday night. I felt pretty good, and ended up pitching 8 innings (we normally play 7 inning games so we were in extras) and started the 9th before they pulled me when I gave up a leadoff hit. My control was so-so as I was having a lot of trouble adjusting to the mound for the first 3-4 innings (the fields we play on are in pretty lousy condition). I ended up with 11 Ks, but I had 8 BB as well. In my defense at least 2 of the BB were situations where I got behind and decided to not give the guy anything to hit because I had first base open and a guy on second. But that is still way to many walks. I gave up 3 runs, and the book had them all as earned, but I'm pretty sure at least 1 of them was unearned. I pitched well, my stuff was nasty (splitty was dirty) and faught through some fatigue and a really bad blister from my split finger grip. I think I threw about 160 pitches though, which is way way way to many. We had to stop the game in the 9th with a 6-3 lead because the lights went out on the field. So when we resume we will be in the bottom of the 9th with 2 on and 1 out and a 3 run lead. If we pick up a couple of outs then I'll get the win. My line for the game was 8IP, 3R, 11Ks, 8BBs, and I'm in line for the win if we pick up two more outs.
I also picked up a win last night when I came in for two innings of relief. I came in with 2 runners on and no outs in the 5th innings and we had a 6-4 lead. I got the first batter to ground to the shortstop, but he was going to his right (third baseman came off of the bag to try and field the ball) and he didn't have a play at first. The next guy laid down a nice bunt that took a bad hop and got under my hand so that I had no play (probably an error on me). Then I got a ground ball for a double play, and struck out the last batter of the inning. So overall not a bad inning considering that the team hit two balls in the infield that we couldn't make plays on and I had two runners inherited. They scored two runs to tie the game up, but things could have gone much worse. We scored a run to take a 7-6 lead and I mowed through the next inning. Leadoff batter grounded out to me. Then I went strikeout, hit-by-pitch (nasty splitter in a 0-1 count that he leaned into imo), strikeout to end the inning. I told the coach that I probably shouldn't go another inning since I'm planning on starting on friday. My arm was definitely a little fatigued, and the blister on my finger was openly bleeding the whole night (I had put super glue on it before the game but it wore off in warmups).
So my line for the game was 2 IP, 0 R, 3Ks, 0BB, 1H and I picked up the win. If we win that suspended game then I'll have 2 Ws on the year. Right now I'm leading the park league in IP, and Ks. If I get that other W then I'd be leading the league in Ws as well. Looks like the Tornadoes might have made a mistake in not picking me up. My stuff is nasty and last night I spotted my fastball better than I have in I don't know when.
Its pouring the rain here so we are likely going to be rained out for tonight. I wasn't going to be available to pitch anway, but it looks like I won't even be heading to the park. I booked a nice $2k score this morning on the tables, enjoyed some leftover tacos (I make outstanding tacos imo) and watched last nights episode of deadliest catch (huge fan of that show). Now I'm feeling a little sleepy so I think I'm going to go take a nap. Rumor has it that I might be drinking beers with a buddy and teammate this afternoon who has the day off work. Wouldn't mind having a night away from the tables.
later
jim
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