Sunday, June 27, 2010
Yet Another WSOP Update
Biggest news this week of course was Phil Ivey's bracelet, which moves him into a tie on 4 with his ex-wife (as tweeted by the legendary DougLeePoker). Ivey becomes the 2nd of my 20 "TV pros" to break through into profit (cf 4/20 Euros and 5/20 Internet kids). This clawback pulls TV Pros to $600k in the red, Euros are still $800k up and Internet kids now $400k down after a bit of a dry spell. To be fair, that $400k is entirely attributable to Justin Bonomo, Jason Mercier and Mike Watson who have played a ton of events with little success.
Had I picked Richard Ashby or Sam Trickett in my Euro list they'd be even further up - congrats to Richard for his 2nd place in the $10K HORSE. Devilfish is chip leader in the $5K PLO8 after busting Hellmuth in some douche-on-douche action which ended with both players swapping f-bombs. Stay classy guys.
Meanwhile I've hardly been playing at all, enjoying the football and spinning a bit of $5-10 Stud High on the side. I've made more money on the football so far :). Once that calms down I'll be back at the grind.
Had I picked Richard Ashby or Sam Trickett in my Euro list they'd be even further up - congrats to Richard for his 2nd place in the $10K HORSE. Devilfish is chip leader in the $5K PLO8 after busting Hellmuth in some douche-on-douche action which ended with both players swapping f-bombs. Stay classy guys.
Meanwhile I've hardly been playing at all, enjoying the football and spinning a bit of $5-10 Stud High on the side. I've made more money on the football so far :). Once that calms down I'll be back at the grind.
Sunday, June 20, 2010
Another WSOP Update
Past the half-way mark now and the pace is beginning to tell. Various reports I'm hearing suggest that it's more fractious out there by the day, and I doubt it's going to ease off soon. Anyhoo, it's been a fairly quiet week for our WSOP trackees. Euro pros are a comfortable $1m up thanks to Flushy's second big score, this one an eye-watering $300k for second in the $10k Omaha 8. Maximum respect ! Moorman and Elky have also chipped in with decent scores to keep them ticking over nicely. 2+2ers are about $200k down, not too much going on there. TV pros, however, continue to dig themselves deeper and deeper, with the sole exception of Men Nguyen. Men is heads up in the $5K 6-max as I write, guaranteed $410k and gunning for $250k more ftw. A win would pull the TV pros back to $500k down.
Without Men it would be a complete trainwreck for this group ; not one of the other 19 is in profit and some of the stats make gruesome reading. We will, however, wait for the rest of the series before laughing too loud. One more interesting factor to relate is that only 2 of my 60 chosen players have failed to show - and they're both Danish, Eastgate and Jorgensen. Dr Pauly suggested on a recent 2+2 podcast that a lot of Scandis aren't showing because of tax issues which I could believe. Good podcast by the way, excellent interview with Barry Greenstein, check it out. And well done to Mike Ellis, yet another one for the good guys !
As for me, I enjoyed putting some volume in for a few weeks but soon enough it reached the point where I thought "fuck it, football's on". You know what I'm like by now :). The only thing I'm going to commit to medium term is playing Sundays. Must play Sundays. Quite looking forward to tonight after a break. Besides that, woteva. As I alluded to on Twitter, I'm becoming more comfortable with not feeling that I have to prove anything to anyone. We'll see how it goes.
And finally, great post on 2+2 from chicken10der in a thread about WSOP disappointments :
"lisandro won 3 bracelets last year and doesn't have any this year. what a dropoff, i guess he just forgot how to play. how did he get so bad in one year?
Update : Nguyen 2nd, TV pros currently $750k down.
Without Men it would be a complete trainwreck for this group ; not one of the other 19 is in profit and some of the stats make gruesome reading. We will, however, wait for the rest of the series before laughing too loud. One more interesting factor to relate is that only 2 of my 60 chosen players have failed to show - and they're both Danish, Eastgate and Jorgensen. Dr Pauly suggested on a recent 2+2 podcast that a lot of Scandis aren't showing because of tax issues which I could believe. Good podcast by the way, excellent interview with Barry Greenstein, check it out. And well done to Mike Ellis, yet another one for the good guys !
As for me, I enjoyed putting some volume in for a few weeks but soon enough it reached the point where I thought "fuck it, football's on". You know what I'm like by now :). The only thing I'm going to commit to medium term is playing Sundays. Must play Sundays. Quite looking forward to tonight after a break. Besides that, woteva. As I alluded to on Twitter, I'm becoming more comfortable with not feeling that I have to prove anything to anyone. We'll see how it goes.
And finally, great post on 2+2 from chicken10der in a thread about WSOP disappointments :
"lisandro won 3 bracelets last year and doesn't have any this year. what a dropoff, i guess he just forgot how to play. how did he get so bad in one year?
Update : Nguyen 2nd, TV pros currently $750k down.
Sunday, June 13, 2010
WSOP Update
On it rolls. Main controversy this week was when a dozen or so guys entered the Ladies Event, but I'm staying out of that one :). Massive congrats to Richard Ashby (Chufty online), I've said before I'm not especially funking for British players but it so happens that Praz, James, Richard and Neil are all top guys and I'm really pleased for them. No slight intended to Sam Trickett who I've simply never met :).
Anyway, neither Richard nor Sam were in my Euro list, but Dario Minieri picked up $50K in the Stud 8. Then while checking that I realised I had missed him off the entrants in the $50K Players Championship, so there went that :). Despite that, Euro pros are still $750k to the good. 2+2ers are almost even thanks to Jeff "yellowsub" Williams winning $320K. TV pros, however, haven't done anything significant since Men Nyugen's stud win and are now $900K in the red. Top bracelet hoes are Phil Ivey with 18 events and (though he's not on a list) Tom Dwan with 17. Those prop bets really focus the mind !
If there is a trend starting to manifest, it's that people who are playing every event they can really aren't doing very well. None of the 11 players who have played 12+ events are in profit, and quite a few have won next to nothing. There is some mixture of cause and effect here - if you get a result you're more likely to take a few days off, plus obviously the worse you do the more events you're able to enter, but even so it will be interesting to see how that pans out. Overall the 60 players are about even, that is slightly down but I have counted buyins for the $10K Omaha 8 which has only just started.
Anyway, neither Richard nor Sam were in my Euro list, but Dario Minieri picked up $50K in the Stud 8. Then while checking that I realised I had missed him off the entrants in the $50K Players Championship, so there went that :). Despite that, Euro pros are still $750k to the good. 2+2ers are almost even thanks to Jeff "yellowsub" Williams winning $320K. TV pros, however, haven't done anything significant since Men Nyugen's stud win and are now $900K in the red. Top bracelet hoes are Phil Ivey with 18 events and (though he's not on a list) Tom Dwan with 17. Those prop bets really focus the mind !
If there is a trend starting to manifest, it's that people who are playing every event they can really aren't doing very well. None of the 11 players who have played 12+ events are in profit, and quite a few have won next to nothing. There is some mixture of cause and effect here - if you get a result you're more likely to take a few days off, plus obviously the worse you do the more events you're able to enter, but even so it will be interesting to see how that pans out. Overall the 60 players are about even, that is slightly down but I have counted buyins for the $10K Omaha 8 which has only just started.
Sunday, June 06, 2010
Rhythm Of The Grind
I'm getting into the swing of this grind and finding it generally easier than I thought it would be. Pretty much playing Friday through Monday, and then Wednesday if I'm free and feel like an extra session. So I try to fit my socialising into Tuesday-Thursday, then at the weekend I'm hitting quite the groove. It looks something like this :
11.30 - Get up, breakfast, surf the web, see what's going on in the WSOP, review play from previous night if necessary, etc
1.30ish - Hit the driving range/course/park (for short game practice). A bit of fresh air and exercise goes a long way. Pick up some food on the way back.
3.30 - Eat. What would you call it ? A sort of afternoon equivalent of brunch ? Anyway, eat, and maybe watch a training video or some old High Stakes Poker or something.
Whenever - catch a 60-90 minute power nap. I think that's my favourite bit.
6.30ish - Get up again, maybe a light snack. Surf the web again. Catch up on any emails or anything that need doing.
8.00 (7 on Sat/Sun) - Grindomatic ! Fri/Sat/Mon, play about $4-5K worth of buyins, aiming to finish around 3.30am latest. Sunday, more $ and longer hours, depending on how deep I go of course. Was actually up till 8-30am last Sunday !
Generally I feel fine when I'm playing, and out in the fresh air walking or playing golf, maybe a little bit zoned the rest of the time. Poker has been going great, and could easily have been a lot better, have had a ridiculous number of deep runs in things without closing as much as I'd like, but a great deal of that is out of my hands with the various flips and coolers you have to fade in tournaments, especially late on.
WSOP Tracking Update : The Euro pros have flown out of the blocks with Praz ($500K) and Neil ($270K) picking up huge lumps and Flushy chip leader in the PL (1st is $190K) at time of writing. Massive congrats to all of them of course, three of the UK's very best tournament players. 2+2ers are only slightly down in buyins (normalising the effect of the $50K event somewhat) but $250k down in money terms, and TV donks, sorry pros, are $850k in the hole, muhahahaha. Guarantee you when one of them binks $300k it'll be "Year of the Pros !". GTFO. Biggest bracelet chasing hoes so far are Ivey, Raymer and Bonomo with 9 events each, closely followed by Lindgren and Negreanu with 8. Those 5 players have no cashes yet, that's right, 0/43. Yes, Hellmuth is only on 7 but he is slightly hampered by lacking that "get chips or get gone" mindset. And overall, the whole 60 players are about $400k down, that's including binks for $500k and $270k ! More description of random noise masquerading as analysis next weekend.
Update Sunday AM : I'm not going to do this every day, but as some events were ongoing when I wrote that ^^^, Flushy shipped it for $196k, congrats to a top player and top man ! Men the Master won the Stud for $390k (no editorial comment). Ivey and Lindgren cashed for $3K each. 2+2ers Terrence Chan and Jason Potter are in the last 20 of the Limit, gl to them. Pros now only $500k down and over all 60 players now $150k up.
11.30 - Get up, breakfast, surf the web, see what's going on in the WSOP, review play from previous night if necessary, etc
1.30ish - Hit the driving range/course/park (for short game practice). A bit of fresh air and exercise goes a long way. Pick up some food on the way back.
3.30 - Eat. What would you call it ? A sort of afternoon equivalent of brunch ? Anyway, eat, and maybe watch a training video or some old High Stakes Poker or something.
Whenever - catch a 60-90 minute power nap. I think that's my favourite bit.
6.30ish - Get up again, maybe a light snack. Surf the web again. Catch up on any emails or anything that need doing.
8.00 (7 on Sat/Sun) - Grindomatic ! Fri/Sat/Mon, play about $4-5K worth of buyins, aiming to finish around 3.30am latest. Sunday, more $ and longer hours, depending on how deep I go of course. Was actually up till 8-30am last Sunday !
Generally I feel fine when I'm playing, and out in the fresh air walking or playing golf, maybe a little bit zoned the rest of the time. Poker has been going great, and could easily have been a lot better, have had a ridiculous number of deep runs in things without closing as much as I'd like, but a great deal of that is out of my hands with the various flips and coolers you have to fade in tournaments, especially late on.
WSOP Tracking Update : The Euro pros have flown out of the blocks with Praz ($500K) and Neil ($270K) picking up huge lumps and Flushy chip leader in the PL (1st is $190K) at time of writing. Massive congrats to all of them of course, three of the UK's very best tournament players. 2+2ers are only slightly down in buyins (normalising the effect of the $50K event somewhat) but $250k down in money terms, and TV donks, sorry pros, are $850k in the hole, muhahahaha. Guarantee you when one of them binks $300k it'll be "Year of the Pros !". GTFO. Biggest bracelet chasing hoes so far are Ivey, Raymer and Bonomo with 9 events each, closely followed by Lindgren and Negreanu with 8. Those 5 players have no cashes yet, that's right, 0/43. Yes, Hellmuth is only on 7 but he is slightly hampered by lacking that "get chips or get gone" mindset. And overall, the whole 60 players are about $400k down, that's including binks for $500k and $270k ! More description of random noise masquerading as analysis next weekend.
Update Sunday AM : I'm not going to do this every day, but as some events were ongoing when I wrote that ^^^, Flushy shipped it for $196k, congrats to a top player and top man ! Men the Master won the Stud for $390k (no editorial comment). Ivey and Lindgren cashed for $3K each. 2+2ers Terrence Chan and Jason Potter are in the last 20 of the Limit, gl to them. Pros now only $500k down and over all 60 players now $150k up.
