We don't have a game with you

If you've played any amount of golf, you've probably laid some money on the line. I'm part of a group of 18 guys who play together every weekend. It's pretty cool, we have 3 standing tee times every weekend morning, and we just make up teams amongst whomever shows up, and we play a small stakes team match. $2 for front, $2 for back, $2 for overall, 50 cents for closest to the pin on the par 3's, and a $1 in the middle for the 2 best low net scores.

Every Saturday. Every Sunday. The group (not me) has been doing this for a little over 20 years, members coming and going. The stakes are tiny, but the competition is fierce. It's a little comical to see a bunch of guys with 6-figure incomes (and I bet at least a couple guys are closer to 7 figures than 5 figures) gloat over quarters at the end of the round.

Today, 8 of us went to a new local course to check it out. The email said we'll play 3 (meaning we had to count 3 guys' scores each hole out of our foursome). Fine.

The course was good, but pretty difficult, and the new greens were rock-hard. As a team, we hit both par 3's on the front, but neither one was really close. As we were going up the seventh fairway, our opponents were coming down the sixth, and we asked them how many greenies they got. Their response: "One. But we don't have a game with you. We didn't agree before we teed off."

That came from the captain of the other team (our captains are just the guys with the lowest handicaps). He's a nice guy, but if he played poker, he would definitely be an angle shooter. There's certainly room to be an angle shooter in golf, especially in match play, and he's done it time and again. It's actually a running joke among the rest of the crew. Off the course, he's got to be one of the nicest guys I've ever met, and would give anyone the shirt off his back. But something in him changes when he gets in competition mode.

I'm writing about this because I've been annoyed about it all day, just on principle. Among our foursome, after the obligatory "nice shot" when one of us hit it well, the next most popular word the rest of the day was "chickenshit."

But I'm also writing about this because I've been thinking about some of the ways competition changes me. Although I wouldn't pull a stunt like this, I've got other things I really need to work on when things don't work out. And they apply not only to sports, but to poker as well. Even though I know better, my big problem in any sort of competition is getting way too pissed off, both at myself and even worse at my teammates and opponents sometimes.

Anything I do on an even semi-regular basis, I put in a lot of effort to do well. And when that effort isn't immediately gratified, I lose patience and get frustrated at least. I envy and admire those of you who take hardships in stride. It must make things so much more enjoyable. So, I think that's something to shoot for as well as all the other goals. In addition to making my favorite activities more enjoyable for me, it will make me a more pleasant guy to be around, a nice little win/win life lesson.

There haven't been a lot of hands because I haven't been playing much, but over a few thousand this month, I'm running a little better than expected on my all-ins, which is a welcome change from the recent past. I'm up for the month, and 4 buy-ins away from moving up a level on Full Tilt to equal the level I'm at on Stars, as I'm keeping my rolls for each site separate for now.

I'm still having trouble in re-raised pots, especially when I'm not the aggressor. Knowing I lack the confidence to play them, I'm being more inclined to fold. More on that later.

Group review almost ready to start

Grinder, Losbert, and I are waiting for a fourth so we can get started with the study group idea from my last post. pkr_brat was first to comment, but I haven't heard back. mongoose is up for the idea.

pkr_brat and mongoose: post a comment with your email address (or email me at pokerrow at gmail with your addresses).

Anyone who missed it the first time and is interested, see my last post and leave a comment or send an email. I think groups of 4 would be ideal, but depending on the interest, we can probably adapt. I'm excited about the idea, and I think it will complement live sweat sessions nicely. We'll see.

Speaking of live sweat sessions, I hooked up with michaeyk in between his world travels, and had a nice extended sweat session with him....thanks again Mike! He identified a couple bad plays on my part, especially one where I double-barreled in a bad spot (which is most of the time at the micros), something that can get expensive. Looking forward to continuing when you get back.

Perhaps it was the lucky charm of a sweat session, but I had a rare cooler transformed into suckout that went my way:

Full Tilt Poker - No Limit Hold'em Cash Game - $0.10/$0.25 Blinds - 6 Players - (http://www.legopoker.com http://www.legopoker.com/hh)

SB: $24.75
BB: $25.80
UTG: $17.05
MP: $31.15
CO: $25.00
Hero (BTN): $24.90

Preflop: Hero is dealt 7c 7h (6 Players)
UTG raises to $0.85, MP folds, CO calls $0.85, Hero calls $0.85, SB folds, BB calls $0.60

Flop: ($3.50) Ah 2h 7d (4 Players)
BB checks, UTG checks, CO checks, Hero bets $2.65, BB folds, UTG raises all-in to $16.20, CO folds, Hero calls $13.55

Turn: ($35.90) Ah 2h 7d 8c (2 Players - 1 All-In)

River: ($35.90) Ah 2h 7d 8c 7s (2 Players - 1 All-In)

Pot Size: $35.90 ($1.75 Rake)

UTG had As Ad (a full house, Aces full of Sevens) and LOST (-$17.05)
Hero had 7c 7h (four of a kind, Sevens) and WON (+$17.10)

My idea for group review

I'd like to get a regular group of 3-4 folks for a group session review. Due to my schedule, I'm pretty limited and unpredictable in my ability to log on to a poker site (mostly due to work throughout the day), but I can make some time for chat, Skype, blogs, etc. So my proposal is the following:

1. Rotate the reviewee. In other words, only one person will be the subject at a time.
2. The reviewee will have a session for review. My idea here is to play your normal session (if you usually play 8 tables, do it for this exercise, if you usually only 2-table, that's OK, too).
3. Commit to a session you'll use before you play. In other words, don't select the session afterwards when you see how well you did, etc. We'll do enough of these that the good and bad should come out over time.
4. Email the first 200 hands of the session (I can help people get the hands out of PokerTracker if needed). We probably won't have time to go through all 200 hands.
5. Schedule an hour where we can all be available....AIM, Skype, Telephone, whatever.
6. We will go through hands in the order played...most of them will go quickly as they will be routine preflop folds. But in doing reviews before, you never know when something you think is routine, someone else will have a comment about. If anyone can figure out how to do this using remote desktop viewing, that would be cool, but otherwise, we should all be able to follow along.

If this sounds interesting to anyone reading, leave a comment with what times work (these are times to meet). I personally don't care what stakes people play -- when I played minbet, I got pretty good insight working with people from stakes above and pretty far below -- but perhaps others care.

As for me, I would be available generally from 9AM to 5PM U.S. Pacific time on weekdays, since I can schedule an hour at work more easily than I can schedule an hour at home :). I play 25NL on Full Tilt and 50 NL on PokerStars.

Some hands

Haven't posted any hands in a while, so here are 3. They're large pot hands, catching up on some August backlog.

Hand 1: Villain is 39/26/2.2.
Full Tilt Poker - No Limit Hold'em Cash Game - $0.10/$0.25 Blinds - 6 Players - (http://www.legopoker.com http://www.legopoker.com/hh)

Hero (SB): $25.00
BB: $25.00
UTG: $4.55
MP: $34.10
CO: $43.90
BTN: $46.55

Preflop: Hero is dealt Kc Kh (6 Players)
2 folds, CO raises to $0.85, BTN folds, Hero raises to $2.80, BB folds, CO calls $1.95

Flop: ($5.85) 4s Jd 9c (2 Players)
Hero bets $4.05, CO raises to $8.10, Hero calls $4.05

Turn: ($22.05) 4s Jd 9c Ad (2 Players)
Hero bets $10.55, CO raises all-in to $33.00, Hero calls all-in for $3.55
Uncalled bet of $18.90 returned to CO

Don't like the turn play much. If I'm calling the flop, it's to CRAI on the turn, and betting the ace isn't the way, and that bet size is terrible since I have so little behind. Plus, once that ace comes out, I need to play for a smaller pot, not a larger one. I think it's fine to continue with the hand, since he's not likely raising with just an ace on the flop -- of course he could have AJ. But most of the time when stacks go in here, I'm in bad shape, I think, so my plan to CRAI should probably be to check/call, and lead the river if he checks behind the turn.

River: ($50.25) 4s Jd 9c Ad 9d (2 Players - 2 All-In)

Pot Size: $50.25 ($2.50 Rake)

Results:
CO had 9s 8s (three of a kind, Nines) and WON (+$22.75)
Hero had Kc Kh (two pair, Kings and Nines) and LOST (-$25.00)
LOL....he played the hand worse than I did, but he got there :(.

Hand 2: Villain is 42/14/1.8.
Full Tilt Poker - No Limit Hold'em Cash Game - $0.10/$0.25 Blinds - 5 Players - (http://www.legopoker.com http://www.legopoker.com/hh)

Hero (SB): $25.00
BB: $21.95
UTG: $14.20
CO: $15.60
BTN: $24.50

Preflop: Hero is dealt 8c Jc (5 Players)
3 folds, Hero raises to $0.90, BB calls $0.65

A note on the raise size...I use a program called Full Tilt Shortcuts to automate bets, and it shorts the preflop raise size by the amount of the SB when you are actually in the SB, and sometimes I forget to increment it by that SB. Don't think it really matters, since it's still a little more than a pot-sized raise.

Flop: ($1.80) 9c 7c Jd (2 Players)
Hero bets $1.80, BB calls $1.80

Turn: ($5.40) 9c 7c Jd 3s (2 Players)
Hero bets $4.05, BB raises to $15.75, Hero raises all-in to $22.30, BB calls all-in for $3.50
Uncalled bet of $3.05 returned to Hero

If he (effectively) pushed on the flop, I would have called instantly, and I still think that this call is OK, but I'm not nearly as sure. It still seems like it is a semibluff a lot of times here, and if I'm behind, I would have a ton of outs. Plus, it's a blind battle, so I would need to call lighter than normal. OK?

River: ($43.90) 9c 7c Jd 3s Ah (2 Players - 2 All-In)

Pot Size: $43.90 ($2.15 Rake)

Results:
BB had 7d 9s (two pair, Nines and Sevens) and WON (+$19.80)
Hero had 8c Jc (a pair of Jacks) and LOST (-$21.95)


Hand 3: Villain is 43/0, so I'm pretty comfortable isolating him with a weak suited ace.
Full Tilt Poker - No Limit Hold'em Cash Game - $0.10/$0.25 Blinds - 6 Players - (http://www.legopoker.com http://www.legopoker.com/hh)

SB: $9.75
BB: $10.65
UTG: $21.25
MP: $16.35
CO: $25.50
Hero (BTN): $35.55

Preflop: Hero is dealt Ac 6c (6 Players)
UTG folds, MP calls $0.25, CO folds, Hero raises to $1.25, 2 folds, MP calls $1.00

Flop: ($2.85) 3h 5c 4h (2 Players)
MP checks, Hero bets $3.45, MP calls $3.45

Normally, my c-bets are from 75% to 100% of the pot, but sometimes, I will overbet the pot with both made and drawing hands.

Turn: ($9.75) 3h 5c 4h 2s (2 Players)
MP checks, Hero bets $4.45, MP raises all-in to $11.65, Hero calls $7.20

Seems standard.

River: ($33.05) 3h 5c 4h 2s Jh (2 Players - 1 All-In)

Pot Size: $33.05 ($1.65 Rake)

Results:
MP had 8h 7h (a flush, Jack high) and WON (+$15.05)
Hero had Ac 6c (a straight, Six high) and LOST (-$16.35)

I'm going through my backlog of big hands in order, whether I won or lost, played it poorly or well, just to make sure I'm not biasing anything with my selection. If the money gets in preflop and I've got KK or AA, I don't think that I'll post it because win or lose, it's not going to be controversial, and if my worst problem is ever that I get it all in with KK, then I'll have a great career :).

If a lot of money goes in postflop, I want to post it, even if I think I got a bad beat or got coolered, I may be looking at it incorrectly. Dodgyken correctly says that he hates it when someone just says they're running badly. I think that one reason people say that so much (there are certainly others) is because they don't recognize that bad play on their parts in the big pots. They just chalk it up to bad luck, when they shouldn't.

September Goals

Labor Day weekend was fun. I played golf twice (rare for me on the weekends) and shot well both days, so I judge it a success. Other than that, lots of swimming and partying with friends and neighbors. I played a little bit Friday evening and last night, and things seem to be going as before, but the few days off at least left me refreshed. And gave me some time to think about goals.

1. 10,000 hands. I won't force this one, as it really depends on what time is left over after work and family, and how tired I am. 10k makes a good target for me, though. 4 tables at a time max.
   
2. Participate in poker communities. In order to make it objective, I'll say 100 meaningful posts across forums and blogs. That's not a lot for many of you, but for us full-time-jobbers, it seems reasonable. I'll have to remember to keep track of it, so I can measure it.
3. Review my own play. I try to review every session -- mostly looking at hands I got significantly involved with. To make this goal more easy to achieve (but still valuable), I'll set a 75% of hands played threshold. In other words, if I play 10,000 hands, I need to review 7,500 of them.
4. Actively study 10 CR videos. Many times I will watch, and maybe not even pay full attention. Again, many of you who play full time will view way more than 10, but for me, I need to make sure that I'm also devoting time to other study.
5. Tighten up UTG relative to Button VPIP. In general, I've gotten feedback on this blog and elsewhere that perhaps I need to play more straightforward, and there is some merit to that thought. I feel like I think well enough to play OK against decent players, but I probably get too fancy against and overestimate a lot of the micro opponents I face. I can't control their cards, but part of playing more straightforwardly is to get tight UTG. So, I want my UTG VPIP to be half my button VPIP this month. No more raising suited connectors and one-gappers to balance my preflop raising from UTG this month ;).
6. Practice hand-reading. I'm trying to pay attention to hands I'm not involved with at the tables, but that is hard to measure at the end of the month, so I will do something extra. As part of my session reviews, I will filter for hands that go to showdown, and will put players on ranges, and will make a guess of their hands before PT shows me the cards. For now, I will go through the exercise for 2,500 hands. The important part is to put them on a range, but that is difficult, so I'll just keep track of how many times I make the correct guess by showdown. Hopefully just going through the exercise will help me get better, but that will be pretty subjective.

OK, that's probably enough goals for the month.