Online Poker

And it's over. I guess we were about 560th in the end.

It all went very choppy. The table broke and before I could open up the new one I'd raised to 2400 under the gun with AQ. One player calls and the flop brings 245.

We apparently bet 3200 out of position here, leaving us with 5800 but the other player has a bit less. He moves all in for 7400.

[01:44] Fake Me: committed

Well, yeah. Easy for me to criticise when I'm somehow completely detached from the hand I know. This is one of those bets where you look like a genius when he holds AK and can lay it down, but otherwise gets you into a world of trouble. It's a check-fold, or a move all in - there's no half measures with these stacks. I'd often push here if there's something to represent but on this super low board, any pocket pair is going to play, so you won't get any worse hands to call so you're only doing yourself a favour against AK or another AQ.

[01:44] Fake Me: arse
[01:44] Fake Me: F**K

We didn't get any help and we're down to 1600 with the big blind coming right now. Any two will do now with 900 already in the pot in blinds and antes, and 33 looks sweet. It's very sweet in fact when a 3 comes on the flop and we just about stay alive.

Next hand JJ vs KQ and we double up.

Next hand TT vs KK and it's time for bed.

[01:48] Fake Me: bollocks
[01:48] Fake Me: sorry

Hey, it's a hell of a lot better than having me blind away because I can't make the start. At least we had a shot...


Anyway, I'd already noticed that a lot of the Full Tilt pros were playing this, and looking at the top stacks now I can still see John Juana, Erick Lindgren and Kristy Gazes vying for a seat. We finished above Phil Gordon, by the way, for what it's worth. It does seem a bit tight though that these players - who undoubtedly are getting their Main Event entry paid by Full Tilt - are playing this satellite. One would expect the Team Full Tilt field to have a decent success rate in these satellites (it will be interesting to see how many of them make it), and certainly you would expect better than 1-in-24 to make the top 127.

So if Full Tilt are paying their entry to the satellite, isn't this just a stealth rake? And if they're not, why are these guys playing it at all?

The strangest thing about having someone play for you is that I'm really not sweating it that badly at all. We're getting in bad shape, picking up just the blinds with AA and somehow I'm not relating what's happening on screen at all to my shot at a $10k seat and ultimately $10m and all that fame and (more) fortune malarky.

Even when this happens, I just find it ... well... slightly amusing.

[01:30] Fake Me: well 5 hands to push or not
[01:30] Fake Me: all in next hand
[01:31] Fake Me: ok not this time
[01:32] Fake Me X: KJ o
[01:32] Real Me: nooooooooo
He duly moves all in, from early middle position

Fortunately the big stack big blind folded, and we're still alive.

And try as I might to stay out of it, I can't. But whether I'd follow my own advice here I don't know...

[01:37] Fake Me: ok this level is going to kill us
[01:37] Fake Me: looks very dodgy now mate
[01:37] Real Me: push any 2 if folded
[01:37] Fake Me: here we go
He does as I suggest
[01:38] Real Me: gl
[01:38] Real Me: what ya got?
[01:38] Fake Me: KQ
We are called by AJ, but the flop brings a Q and we survive
[01:38] Real Me: f**k yeah
[01:38] Fake Me: rockin

An average stack is within sniffing distance once more...

So Full Tilt's fear that they'd be out of pocked on the guaranted tournament was - as expected - a load of nonsense. There were 3,050 entrants making 127 seats to be awarded! They're making a cool $106,750 in entry fees from this tournament alone.

I also just checked at PokerStars who were having a 150 guaranteed seat satellite today - with 7,377 players they are awarding 234 seats! Blimey, that'll go on until the wee hours and then some.... The self proclaimed largest satellite in the world ever, and it's very hard to argue. I didn't even realise their software could cope with such a big field - usually it's capped at 3600 or some such number.

I got back a bit earlier than I thought I would and I've already seen myself rollercoaster.

[00:13] Real Me: how are we doing?
[00:14] Fake Me: 5500
[00:14] Fake Me: make that 9200
[00:14] Fake Me: AA just held up
[00:19] Fake Me: in 50th place
[00:24] Fake Me: 11595 chips

At that point we were in 37th place and I'd finally got settled, microwaved myself a chicken burger (surprisingly good, and ready in just 55 seconds) and pulled up the table on screen to watch.

Then it all went a little pear shaped. The first hand I saw with AQs turned into the nut flush draw vs two overpairs (88 and JJ on a 7-high board) and we got no love from the poker gods. I decided to stop watching for a while - clearly it's bad luck to observe yourself from afar, with likely side effects ranging from mild itching to a variety of natural disasters.

But by the time I was brave enough to peak again we were back down to just over 5000, and the average had overtaken us. It's now the second break, and after a steal with 66 (so I'm told) we have 5,785 with 250/500 blinds and a 50 ante. 1090 players remain and the average stack is 8394.

So I'd already qualified for tonights Full Tilt 100 WSOP Seat guaranteed satellite, but after I realised I wouldn't actually be able to play it from the start I've had to make a deal with someone else to play it for me. I can't really say who this is, as he's apparently had to arrange to "work from home" tomorrow in case it goes on late (I figured it'd run to about 5am if all goes to plan).

The prize package is a $10,000 WSOP Main Event Seat with $2,000 for expenses paid in cash. I had tried everything to get Full Tilt to deregister me from the tournament - I'd asked if I could transfer the seat, take it's value in satellite tokens to play other tournies on their site, even if they'd give me the $535 seat value to buy into a WSOP event for which of course I'd agree to wear their gear (which is pretty hideous) whilst I played. They gave me the runaround for almost 2 weeks, sounding like something was going to happen but eventually the Promotions Manager said no.

Their excuse: this is a guaranteed seat tournament so you must play it. They were afraid that there would not be enough entrants to cover the 100 Main Event seat prizes. Like that would ever happen. I was more pissed off that they kept me hoping for so long without a straight answer, than the fact that they wouldn't actually bend the rules for me. I mean, how long does it take to say "rules is rules"?

Anyway, so to get my glamourous assistant to play the tourney for me, I had to give up the $2k additional prize money - not an awful deal for either of us really, as I'm already in Vegas if I get the seat and the chance to $2k cash for 6-8 hours playing at no risk isn't bad. I'm just hoping its enough incentive for him to not actually play this like a freeroll!

The fun starts at 11pm, and I'll be back probably sometime between midnight and 1am.

I'll try not to turn this into a bad beat whinge.  I got beat, but it wasn't particularly bad.  I just want to write the hand down to help me think about how I played it.

Party Poker No-Limit Hold'em, $ BB (10 handed) Hand History Converter Tool from FlopTurnRiver.com (Format: HTML)

Hero ($20)
BB ($24.75)
UTG ($26.05)
UTG+1 ($37.55)
UTG+2 ($13.65)
MP1 ($36.54)
MP2 ($6.20)
MP3 ($24.15)
CO ($31.85)
Button ($27.24)

Preflop: Hero is SB with Tc, 7h. Hero posts a blind of $0.10.

3 folds, MP1 calls $0.25, 1 fold, MP3 calls $0.25, CO calls $0.25, 1 fold, Hero completes, BB checks.

So this call is a bit loose with a poor hand and no position. However this game was playing pretty weak-tight and I'd been able to take down a lot of four- or five-way pots with a single flop bet when the board came low or paired. I was in a seeing-the-flop kind of mood, and this was probably about the worst hand I'd be completing the small blind with.

Flop: ($1.25) 9s, 8c, 6d (5 players)

Hero checks

Mmmm looks good. Let's make sure. My staight is the nuts. and the board is a rainbow. All good. I don't need to show any strength here, with a low board I might not get any action anyway so let's either allow someone else to take a stab or if nobody wants to bet then someone might catch a decent second-best hand on the turn.

BB checks, MP1 checks, MP3 bets $0.75, CO calls $0.75, Hero calls $0.75

OK, two people with chips to give me and two still to act. I like to call here. Make me look weak, nobody will really pay attention and encourage the other two to join in with the calling and the donating

BB calls $0.75, MP1 raises to $1.5, MP3 calls $0.75, CO calls $0.75, Hero calls $0.75, BB calls $0.75.


Now it gets interesting. A minimum raise as a check-raise from MP1 - what the hell does that mean? Does he have a huge hand? Or is he trying to build a pot with a big draw? The hand I've not considered so far - and at the time didn't consider until it was to late - was the mighty TJ. This hand has a decent draw, and pumping the pot vs 4 opponents is profitable as long as nobody comes over the top. Would he do this, though, and risk a reraise from MP3 which might price out his draw completely?

There's a wide range of hands for the min-raiser, most likely a set that thinks it's the best or possibly a limped overpair that wants to know if it's good. Right now there's no hand that I'm behind. It is this bet that I just don't know whether to call or raise. On the one hand, I want to keep everyone around when I have the nuts, but I want to make sure I know that I either still have the best hand after the next card, or that it moves me back to second place so I can get out.

Like I said, I hadn't really considered JT as a threat. I'd decided that I'd slow down to a pair on board, although this is silly. If I figure someone for a set, let's raise it up now because they're never folding it. But what do I do when a Q or 7 falls... I needed to know, and didn't.

So guess what...


Turn: ($8.75) Qc (5 players)

Hero checks, BB checks, MP1 checks, MP3 checks, CO bets $4, Hero raises $14.25 (all in) BB folds, MP1 folds, MP3 folds, CO calls $14.25.


So is my hand good? Maybe... Can I lay it down? Almost certainly not. So I think I have to push now. Against the made straight with JT I'm toast. Against a set I'm still in pretty good shape. If I just call, again I'm possibly giving an inferior hand a chance to catch up before making a difficult decision, and a quarter of the deck will pair the board to give me that decision. The pot's big enough that I'm probably going to have to call even if it pairs, unless I can convince myself there's really nothing I'm beating.

Then again, that $4 bet doesn't really show any great strength. CO has limped along the whole way so far, now everyone checks to him and he bets in position on the first high card to hit the board. Maybe he just has a Q and suddenly likes the look of it, or maybe Qx two pair.

I panic-push, and this isn't a great situation to be in or a great move to be making. The one hand that has me crushed is a distinct possibility, and I'm throwing money away to that hand, whilst if the bettor only has top pair he might well get away from it. I can't really see many better alternatives right now though.


River: ($27) 9d (2 players)


Final Pot: $27

Main Pot: $27, between Hero and CO.

Results:

Hero has Tc 7h (straight, ten high).
CO has 6h 6s (full house, sixes full of nines).
Outcome: CO wins $27.

So I got lucky, and was against a set. Then I got unlucky and he boated to beat me.

What did I do wrong? I think I got too greedy early on. The first flop call was probably best, as long as I was prepared to react to a possible better straight getting there as well as a full house. But after the min raise, and another call I guess it's time to start asking for information, even if I do have the current nuts. I needed to bet big enough to make a straight draw make a mistake and force any made hand to decide whether they are good.

Given a second chance, I sandbag the flop and reraise to $8. I get it all in against CO and still lose. In fact this way I'm giving him twice as much pot equity by putting my money in earlier, but I just don't think I'm good enough to play the hand any slower and confidently make the right decision.

So much for my quest.  First day went OK, but not great, with me winning a seat to a $50+$4 satellite on PokerRoom, which it turns out is good for any $50+$4 event apart from the one I wanted to play in.  Looks like entry to the Stage 2 Poker Classic is via the Stage 1 tournament only.  Bit stupid really, and a pisser for me because now I have to find a decent $50+$4 to play on there.

In any case, through some combniation of not having a clock in the living room and getting caught up in the previous night's Big Brother on Sky+ over tea, I'd managed to miss the 7pm Stage 2 tournament three nights running.  Played just one more UltimateBet satellite since my enthusiastic qualification mission began, and subsequently turned into a damp squib.  Just too much to do before Vegas (T-14 now!) so it was totally the wrong time to try something like this.

So that UB tournament was a $10+$1 rebuy/addon into a $215 Aruba qualifier and has the dubious honour of having the most blatently rigged final hand in the history of online poker.  The screenshot pretty much says it all.  Click the thumbnail to see the full horror...

Three handed and short-stacked, I move all-in for about 7 times the big blind with a pocket pair.  It's usually ahead here.  The small blind calls with his pocket pair.  He figures to usually be ahead.  Big blind goes mental with the third pair and we're in a three-way all-in situation 77 vs 88 vs 99.  Needless to say the winning hand was belonged to the chip leader so it didn't matter that he was way behind pre-flop.  It was all over 3 seconds later.

I made some notes along the way in this satellite also - see, I started off on the right foot with the quest!  But right now I think leave it at that.

To be continued... sometime, hopefully fairly soon.  Maybe.

I have decided to make it my mission this week to qualify for a big event through an online satellite.  Why, I'm not really sure with Vegas just round the corner (T-18!).  But I've not had much time to play poker lately and I decided that if I was make time to play this week then I'd do it with a mission.

I'm still not going to be able to throw myself at this, with hundreds of other real world things to get done before we go away, but any poker I play will be focused on The Mission.  I'm going to try to (gasp) single-table these games too, something I haven't done for quite a while.  Occasionally two quallies I want to play will overlap so I might make an exception, other than that I'll have to see just how good my patience is!

I have identified four possible satellites that I want to get into as cheaply as possible:

OnGame Poker Classic:
Stage 1: $6+1
Stage 2: $50+$4
Stage 3: $300+20
Final: $5000+$200 on Sept 2nd played online down to 45 players
Final 45 play live in Barcelona Sept 28th-Oct 1st

Aruba Ultimate Poker Classic:
Sub-qualifiers to satellites costing $200 or $1000
Event is Sept 23rd - Oct 1st
$10,000 package includes $5,200 entry plus travel and accomodation

Camp Hellmuth:
Satellites are $109, package worth $3000
Event takes place in Vegas Aug 11-13
Camp value $2000 + $1500 expenses paid

Ultimate Bet WSOP $3k Satellite:
$30+$3 rebuys or $50+$5 freezeout.
Prize is $2000 in WSOP entries + $1000 cash.
I'd use this for a main event satellite and another preliminary event.

I've so far played four qualifiers, and so far managed to keep to one table at a time without getting itchy fingers!

PokerRoom $6+$1 Poker Classic Stage 1.  I began at lunchtime with the 12:10 qualifier and it was short and sweet, but thanks to a masterpiece of misplanning this early in my quest I'd already put some bacon in the George Foreman grill before I realised it was about to start and would have been distracted by food shortly afterwards anyway.  8 minutes in and I was busted with QQ, moving in on the flop with my overpair vs two flush draws which both hit on the turn.  I was pleased to see I was ahead but didn't really like the move as my all-in came after I got raised and called by the other two players.  The bacon factor, along with seeing that there was only one seat and one cash place in this satellite with 24 players almost certainly influenced my decision.

$11 feeder to Camp Hellmuth satellite.  I survived 59 minutes before busting out in 6th place - hey at least I didn't have to sit through the break with hardly any chips left...  There were only 9 entrants in this giving us a small overlay on the seat value, but meaning that it was first place or nothing.  With a minimum raise to 120 under-the-gun and one caller I reraise to 340 with 44.  If the min-raiser actually has a hand and comes to life I can get away from this with 865 chips remaining.  The raiser folds, but the weak caller wants to see a flop and I feel I have to move in on the flop when he checks to me as long as the board doesn't look too scary.  He instacalls with JT on a J62 rainbow board (couldn't ask for much better without a 4!) and I'm done.

$20+$2 satellite to $109 Tournament.  As UB now offer tournament dollars, even though this was not a Hellmuth satellite I would be able to use the seat value to play in the event I wanted.  This seemed like good value, with one seat for every five and a half players (I have had decent success in a similar structure on PokerStars) however it was a turbo tournament with 5 minute levels.  In total there were 38 players for 6 seats and $106 cash, but I went dry when it mattered and got called by a rag ace when I needed to steal some blinds.  I went to the rail in 16th place.

PokerRoom $7+$1 Satellite to $50+$4.  This seemed to be a bit better value than the Stage 1 qualifier, with the same value ticket prize.  Finally, things go right and I land a ticket for just over 2 hours work.  I have more detailled notes about this one, and depending on whether it sounds vaguely interesting when I read it back I might post some hands later.  However when I went to register for the Stage 2 tournament, it wouldn't let me use this ticket!  My next mission is to find out why...

Summary:
Played: 4
Cost: $48
Won: $54

Not exactly impressive yet.  About even