Hand from Hustler

This is a pretty sick spot I think.

5/10 at Hustler Casino

A guy limps UTG, I limp in the HJ with JTo. The BTN limps, the SB calls, the BB checks, and we see a 9c7h5d flop.

The BB is an azn lady who has been playing very tight up to this point. She leads out for 45. UTG folds, and I decide to call, hoping to spike an 8 because we're pretty deep stacked. A Queen or King on the turn would give me an additional straight draw, and it's possible a pair of Jacks or Tens could be good. The SB calls behind me.

The turn is the 8c, giving me the nut straight and putting two clubs on the board. SB checks, and she bets 130. I raise to 400, and the SB folds. She calls.

The river is an 8. She tanks for a bit and then decides to bet 700.

What would you do here and why?



I'll see you across the felt.
Bryce

Looking back

I felt like writing a little more.

Today I went to Commerce Casino and played 40/80 mix with Mimi Tran and several online poker players who do coaching with major training sites. I beat the game for a smallish win of 1400 and felt good about it. It was fun playing all the different games. We played Omaha 8, Stud 8, 2-7 Tripledraw, Baduci, Badaci, and Hold'em. They are all limit games.

Just now I read one of my old blog posts from Feb 2008.

Wow

I've come a long way. Back then I thought I was good at poker.
I think I'm good at poker now. But I know I'm substantially better now than I was then. I think the people who I played poker with then can attest to that. It's amazing how differently I view the game now. I feel like I've grown so much, and yet there is still so much I need to learn.

Last year I turned a loss attempting to gamble for a living. It was the first full year, I did that. The year before I would've turned a loss if not for that one big win at the WSOP. Maybe I'm not cut out for professionally gambling? Maybe I'll find out this year. In 2009, I might've been barely good enough to win a living earn from poker. In 2010, I definitely was, but I made too many other mistakes, like managing my money, or allowing myself to get cheated.
I want this year to be different.
I want to prove I can win big at poker and I want to prove I've learned from my mistakes, and make better life decisions.

I feel like there should also be more balance in my life. I'm gonna try to do some other stuff, but I don't know exactly what yet. A friend of mine asked if I'd like to start a study group in investing into options. It sounds interesting, and I'd like to check it out. I was a finance major after all, and I've heard a lot about the similarities in investing and poker.

Hopefully, you'll hear some big news coming. Of the good kind.

I'll see you across the felt.

Bryce

January Updates + December results & 2010 results

I'll start with January.

These numbers are pretty bad, but I have a lot of excuses. First, my biggest win of the month, I had to scratch off, because I never got paid. I won $17k that night, and when I get the money, I can backtrack and change it, but until I do, it counts like I never got it. Secondly, the PCA main and hotel at Atlantis are counted in these numbers, but I won those in a $700 satellite in December. I counted it as profit then, so I'm counting it as a loss now. Lastly, I did some drunken gambling in the pit at Atlantis, which was a pretty dumb idea. Altogether, it adds up into this disaster.

January

Cash Games

Live ($8,178.25)
Online ($5,727.26)

Tournaments

Live $507.40
Online ($1,265.50)

Poker ($14,663.61)
Staking ($812.50)
Other Gambling ($5,711.50)
Month's Expenses ($6,248.15)
Net on month ($27,435.76)

Unfortunately, my results for last year are equally dismal. After talking to my CPA, I had to backtrack and remove wins I haven't been paid for until I receive money for them. Since I'm currently owed a LOT of money, I basically had to deduce so much income, that I turned a loss on the year. I actually won $80k at the poker table, but wasn't paid that much. Add in losses staking, and other gambling, I'm down on the year. I'm also now pretty certain I was cheated out of nearly $80k at a home game I was playing at. If I had never played there, I would've had a good year. I think I learned my lesson about that game, and maybe home games in general. I'm pretty jaded about home games now.
My thoughts on staking on the past year, were that I took a few very high variance gambles on players who I think are very good. It didn't work out. I think a few other people were simply bad horses. I should be more selective about my staking.

On the gambling, some of that is props where I got destroyed by the cheats at that game. The rest is counting blackjack, which went really poorly for me this year. Combined my loss at attempted counting drunk at Atlantis in January, I think I'm gonna give it up. While it's fun, I simply don't think I can do it well enough, and don't really want to put the effort into doing more. It was fun getting barred from South Point though, it gives me a good story and makes me sound like a sick counter.

December

Cash Games

Live ($4,061.00)
Online $1,571.45

Tournaments

Online $5,656.75

Poker $3,167.20
Staking $140.00
Other Gambling $2,862.50
Month's Expenses $0.00
Net on month $6,169.70

Net on Year ($4,378.75)

Net on Year for Staking ($20,887.24)

Other Gambling ($32,025)

Net on Year for Poker $51,630

Poker Related Expenses $4,799

I'll see you across the felt.
Bryce