Basics are Good
Tuesday, September 13, 2005
At 11:20 or so last night, I finally leveled with fiance Kim. "Honey, I'm going to be selfish and play some poker." "But I'm tired, cuddle with me." "I've had a hard day, and all I want to do is play some poker and relax." "Okay." And that was it. See, fiance Kim is a wet-dream. She is an early sleeper, and I usually lie with her. Once she falls asleep, I either watch some drivel on TV that she wouldn't be interested in, or head back to the living room to play some poker. Last night, I cut to the chase. "I'm playing poker." And she was cool. She always is. That is why I am marrying her. Not the poker, ass! Her easy going personality.
So, I log on, but I don't have any direction. It's already late, but GCox is online, and he is usually good for a game. Unfortunately, he, too, has been running bad at the tables, so he was grinding away at the .25/.50 limit tables at Titan/Noble (they use the same rooms and blah blah blah). It ocurred to me that I, too, needed to curb my action a bit. A bad run at the tables has brought my nearly $500 bankroll to just over $300. But .25/.50 would feel tedious. That is when it occurred to me. Let's get back to the basics.
"$5 SNG on Noble?" I asked, knowing full well the answer. "Sure." GCox is always one to comply when it comes to poker. We fired up a ten-person Maui SNG (where if you win 5 in a row, you get $15,000 or something, or if you place 1st or 2nd in 5 in a row, you get $200). I started the game playing very tight. One player in particular took our about four other competitors, two at a time, both times on suckouts. Meanwhile, another player, whose name was Sweepster or something, was playing a very interesting game. It wasn't a good game. No. Rather, it was a very predictable game. He was making often low stabs at pots. Continuation bets. The whole nines. I realized that I was watching my own unsophisticated game. It's not how I play all of the time, but sometimes when I get in a rut, I think I play Sweepster's brand of mindless, relentless poker. I literally called his action BEFORE he acted for an entire hand. Limp. Small raise. Raise of 200 (2x big blind). 400 raise. That is right. I KNEW he was going to bet 200 exactly and 400 exactly. In the end, I paid him off on that hand, mostly because I knew he was drawing and hit, and I wanted validation of my theory once he hit on the river. But even so, I turned my read into a cash cow, as I continuously re-raised Sweepster.
Suddenly, we we down to four player, and GCox and I were still in it. Sadly, GCox made a move with A2, and ran into AT. Out on the bubble, he closed up shop before I could say goodnight. G, take a breather man. I know your game and you are good. A bad run of cards and maybe some tilting (not that I saw, but I don't watch you all of the time) is probably to blame for your recent dip. Keep your head on straight and you'll be fine.
As it turns out, I took 2nd. I played well on a shortstack for a good portion of the game. This is my hallmark. Good shortstack play. The rule of 10 is a god send. If you don't know it, I'll pass along the gem: If you have less than 10x the BB in a tournament, either fold or go all-in. Even if you are the SB, do NOT call. Just fold or go all-in. You'll pick up a bunch of blinds usually, and suddenly you are healthy or you've outlasted the 3rd place played who had 5x your chips.
The win is $10 profit which is a nice round number. It also puts me on course for 4 more Maui 1st or 2nd place wins for the $200 bonus. I am crossing my fingers.
I'm still busy. I'm reading Moneymaker's book (good so far), and I've finished The Professor, The Banker, and the Suicide King, another solid read. So, poker is everywhere, even when I'm sitting in the stupid NJ continuing legal education classes.
Love that Poker.
posted by Jordan @ 8:19 AM,
1 Comments:
-
At 10:17 AM,
TripJax said...
-
Sweepster sounds like my game sometimes. I clearly need to switch it up on occasion...
"Heh, you said wet-dream."
