So it looks like, after four events, it’s again between Mr. White and Mr. Blue in the allround classification. Maybe we should admit by now that they are the best tournament (important) players in our middle. However, we’re talking about the overall ranking here, the big money still has to be earned in our ‘main event’.
Mr. White planned winning the winner takes all event last time and so he did, we must give him credit for that. He defeated the surprising Ms. Blonde heads-up, won 120€ and acquired six important points for the overall ranking, where he is one point behind leader Mr. Blue (17) now, who finished fourth. But also Brown and Orange (14) and even myself (12) still can win there, only Ms. Blonde is eliminated (11).
The first two to be eliminated yesterday were our last two bracelet winners, being myself (6th) and Mr. Orange (5th). When the other four remained, White won the deciding pot of the evening towards his victory. Here we go (without suits, as they aren’t important in this hand):
Ms. Blonde (button) 2950, 86
Mr. White (sb, 30) 3800, TT
Mr. Brown (bb, 60) 1700, K3
Mr. Blue 3550, 99
Blue is under the gun and makes it 200 to go. Blonde gets out of the way and then it’s up to White with pocket tens. He makes it 750 and with Blue calling the two deep stacks go heads-up to the flop. Flop comes K 6 9 so Blue outdraws White by spiking his set. Blue leads out with a bet of 850 and White calls. The turn gives White a higher set: T. Blue shoves his resting 1950 chips into the pot and gets of course insta called. The river comes another 6 and White wins a 7130 pot with the best full house.
Mr. White was very happy he got to eliminate personally Mr. Blue as he knew it was important that Blue didn’t finish top three, regarding the overall ranking. Mr. Brown was knocked out in the next blinds level and the deep stacked Mr. White remained with Ms. Blonde. White finished her with A3, which was played curiously. He limped to trap, while Blonde had K2. flop came 7 A K and Blonde shoved, White called. Up to the main event now!
It was time for some Pot Limit Omaha in Event 3 and it was our newbie Mr. Orange who happened to be the best in this game, winning the Event after already finishing second in the first event. Mr. Blue leads the overall ranking with 14 points, Mr. Orange became second with 12 points (Pink 11, Brown & White 10, Blonde 6).
Mr. Orange had to beat Mr. Blue heads-up after I was knocked out myself in third place in the event I really wanted to win. Now I have to really go for it in the last two events to catch up with Blue in the overall ranking again. The most important hand was played when we were all still in the tournament. Here we go:
Mr. White (button) 2400, XXXX
Mr. Orange (sb, 15) 2550, AhAs5hQd
Mr. Blue (bb, 30) 1600, XXXX
Mr. Brown 1200, 8s9hTdJd
Ms. Pink 2700, KsKc6s6h
Ms. Blonde 1500, XXXX
Mr. Brown limps from under the gun, Pink bets pot, Orange raises pot from the small blind, both Brown and Pink call. Reasonably good plays from these PLO-donkeys. Then the flop is creating a lot of action: AcQhKh. This is a HUGE flop for Orange: flopping top set and the nut flush draw, while Brown flops the actual nuts (broadway) and Pink middle set. Orange leads out with a pot bet (I didn’t expect this good play from a n00b), Brown raises the maximum, Pink calls and Orange comes over the top again. Now Brown moves all-in and here’s the first donkey play: Pink calls again while she must know her middle set is never good here. Orange moves of course also and Pink is commited.
Then come the runners: 4c4s . So Orange takes down a HUGE main pot with Aces full (eliminating Mr. Brown) and Pink wins a small side pot with Kings full but is also crippled with only ten big blinds left. So Pink is eliminated next, followed by the other lady. I was knocked out myself because of a lot of bad luck and then it was Orange versus Blue again, just like in Event 1. This time it was Orange who won, by winning the crucial hand where he flopped a set of tens and Blue the nut flush draw. The draw wasn’t made and Orange took the bracelet. I’m going after that Winner Takes All bracelet.
Our second Event in the PSOP took place yesterday, a NLHE tourney with rebuys and add-on and it was win Ms. Pink who won the Event and $126, beating Mr. Brown who won a $54 prize but was down six bucks nevertheless .
That was because he had to rebuy when this was still possible and decided to buy an add-on, so he was in for 60€ total. However, by finishing second, he acquired 5 points for the allround ranking, where Brown, Blue and Pink all have 9 points now (Orange/White 6, Blonde 3). This was becaused Mr. Orange, runner-up in the first event was eliminated early this time and didn’t opt for a rebuy. Some moments later exactly the same happened to our other newbie, Ms. Blonde. So it was the old gang from that moment on .
Ms. Pink and Mr. White (each one having eliminated a player) were the chipleaders, Brown and Blue were short. Brown went broke right before the break and decided to rebuy and add-on one hand later. Pink also opted for an add-on. Right áfter the break, Mr. Blue was eliminated by Ms. Pink when his pocket Tens didn’t hold up against Pinks AQ. I didn’t have to see the rest of the tournament and decided to throw my laptop on the table and play some online poker for the rest of the evening. Not a bad decision: I made $70 playing some double-or-nothing tournaments. The deciding hand in our tournament was again played threehanded:
Mr. White (button) 3800, Kh9s
Ms. Pink (sb, 50) 9500, 8s3d
Mr. Brown (bb, 100) 4700, JdTh
Mr. White raises it up preflop (350) with a reasonably good hand shorthanded and gets called by Mr. Brown. The flop comes KsQs3h and gives Mr. White his toppair but Mr. Brown the OESD. Brown checks and White makes a continuation bet of 550, called by Brown. The turn is the one you probably already guessed: the 9 (of diamonds). Brown checks again and White bets 1250 and Brown moves all-in. White puts him on a spade draw and calls of course. The river is a blank, the Ace of diamonds.
It were two big stacks against each other from that moment on in a very long heads-up session. At one point Brown had a chiplead of 13k vs 5k, but when Pink was short stack and finally HAD to play aggressive, she took some big and important pots. Final showdown was Pink shoving from the SB with KJ, called by Brown with KT: KJ held up. PLO next time!
I’m very happy to inform you about my victory in our first Event of the PSOP . I beated Mr. Orange heads-up in the quest for 90€ and six points for the overall classification.
Mr. White and Ms. Blonde were already knocked out during the second blind level. Blonde went broke on slowplaying Aces against Mr. Brown, who catched his flush on the river. And Mr. White couldn’t throw away his Queens preflop against my Kings. About 45 minutes later, Ms. Pink left the table and Mr. Blue, Mr. Orange and Mr. Brown were left to play the most important pot of the evening:
Mr. Blue (button) 4600, 6c7c
Mr. Brown (sb,30) 3800, AcJc
Mr. Orange (bb,60) 3600, As7s
So some pretty huge hands three handed. I raised it up from the button to 180 and I was raised by Mr. Brown to 600. Orange called, so did I. Flop came: 5cAd4c. Brown bets 600 again with toppair and the nut flushdraw, Orange min raises to 1200 with hís Ace and I shove with my huge draw. Brown of course calls and Orange folds. Turn is 8h and gives me the straight, river is a blank: Ks. After that hand I have 10200 chips against Orange with 1800 chips left.
When the blinds were 100/200 the final hand was played. Orange pushed his 2200 chips in the middle with KdQd and I called with 88, which held up. Looking forward to Event 2!
Yes, that’s right: we are going to have our own Pokerheist Series of Poker very soon! We were having a homegame at Mr. Blue’s place yesterday and right there we launched the idea of organising 5 sixhanded tournaments, events, with the four of us and two other people who were in the game and agreed to the plan. Let’s call them Mr. Orange and Ms. Blonde from now on .
The PSOP will consist of the following events:
- Event 1: NLHE Freeze-out, 20€ buy-in; 1st place 90€ 2nd place 30€
- Event 2: NLHE Rebuy + 1 Add-on, 20€ buy-in; 1st place 70% 2nd place 30%
-Event 3: PLO Freeze-out, 20€ buy-in; 1st place 90€ 2nd place 30€
-Event 4: NLHE Freeze-out Winner Takes all, 20€ buy-in; 1st place 120€
-Event 5: NLHE Freeze-out ‘Main Event’, 50€ buy-in, 1st place 210€ 2nd place 90€
Each event will have a 2000 starting stack, except for the Main Event, which will be ‘deep stack’: 4000 chips. And besides those events, everybody pays 5€ ‘rake’ per event, so that’s 30€ per event, 150€ total. This prize goes entirely to the player who has the best all-round results over all five events. The cumulated amount of money doesn’t count here, but the cumulation of places. When two players have the same score, the number of events won counts. When the score is still the same after this, the classification of the Main Event counts. We’ll shuffle up and deal as soon as possible and keep you posted about the results of our first event!
After that miserable piece of poker knowledge that Mr. Blue dropped here last time, I will show you something today that you can really use to improve your own game. It’s all about certain moves you can make on the river.
I stumbled upon this subject because I was involved in a specific situation this week during a tournament on FTP:
I like my hand a little more because I’m on the button here. I could have raised, but try to see a flop cheaply here. Now the Ace flops with a pair of threes and the small blind leads out: always risky. However, I’m not folding of course and try to see what he’ll do on the turn. He bets the same amount on the turn which could be a sign of having a three: there’s a small chance that I’m going to outdraw that hand on this board. When he bets small on the river again I have enough information and I make a raise for two reasons.
First of all I was playing fairly loose-aggressive on this table and he could call me here with a medium pocket pair because of my image. And second, he might have a smaller Ace and pay my value raise. I think he had like 55 or something and he folds. Btw, if you would like to read more of my plays and the terrible beats I have to face now and then in specific, you can visit my own very interesting poker blog!
LOL did Mr. Blue show a royal flush from me last time in Pot Limit Omaha, this time I just flopped a straight flush in TEXAS HOLD’EM! I just cashed out my bankroll when a couple of dollars rakeback was deposited in my account, so I decided to play a little sit ‘n go for a buck or something when I was bored .
I was playing like almost every hand and the funny thing was: I almost won 60% of them ^^. So we were down to three players when I got…
…KQ suited in the big blind. A shorty moves with an Ace and is CRUSHED LIKE HELL on the flop hehe. As the odds of flopping a straight flush depend on the kind of hand you hold in the hole, it’s hard to say what my exact chances were here. The best chance you have is when you hold mid range suited connectors from 45 to TJ, you are about 1 to 5000 in that case to flop a straight flush. Guess I was lucky^^.
Every poker player will have its own different tactics to play the big pocket pairs from let’s say Queens to Aces. Hand like Jacks and Tens are known as ‘problem-hands’, as people are often dragged into big pots with those hands. But how to play the small pocket pairs preflop?
The great part of all poker players agrees on how to play them in early and middle position: just limp when possible and try to flop your set. Of course, in late position you can be a little more creative and try to win the pot preflop or acquire pot control. I have a little expample from a tournament I played this week, where I had 33 in early position:
Now this is a relatively weak raise on the button: three times the big blind with already two callers in front you. Maybe I should have bet the flop with the paired board but in the end I’m still able to pick up the pot with a good bet.
Mr. Brown has also sent me an interesting hand from an heads-up game he played on Full Tilt:
Apparently he’s playing Pot Limit Omaha for the moment and apparently he made a royal flush . Now I don’t know much about this game but the pot looks nice ^^.
Hello folks, I’m finally getting back into poker again. I didn’t play for a couple of months after the challenge, but I decided to deposit a small amount of money in my Pokerstars account and play some sng’s without much stress. And there you go: I won a tourney with 45 players .
I even saved some hands to show you. The first hand shows that it’s possible to win a nice pot with the magnificent Eight-Deuce:
The turn is a beauty for me and I offer the two drawers the wrong price to chase a flushdraw or gutshot with a 9 or a Jack. When the river comes the Ace of hearts I know I’m good and make a value bet in case somebody had a pair with his draw. Some moments later I make an excellent read as far as that’s possible in online poker:
Having AK on the button is of course perfect, your hand is always disguised. I also check the flop and bet the turn when I hit toppair. Now what you don’t see in the replay, is that my opponent took a long time before making the call. That’s why I check the river and notice my opponent made his flush on the turn. It are those hands and moments which determine if you’ll reach the money in a tournament, not the big pots that you win. Well of course, they are also important .
Well, my concept of a dream table is pretty simple: you take the whining mister Phil Hellmuth and four heros who will suck out on him till he goes totally crazy .
So the four guys who play with me against the guy with all his bracelets will be:
* Sammy Farha! High Stakes Poker proved that letting those two guys just play heads-up is already outstanding television.
* Gus Hansen. Well, if Philly gets Sammy off a hand, there will still be Gus Hansen behind him “thinking he should call with his overcard”
* Roland De Wolfe. This guy is prolly the European equivalent of Sammy Farha. Everybody who saw the EPT event in Dublin he won, knows where I’m talking about. If he can drive William Thorson crazy, he will definitely drive Phil Hellmuth crazy.
* Humberto Brenes. Just after Phil faced a big bad beat against Farha, Humberto will play the next hand against him and sends his shark to Phil’s stack. Can you imagine? Can’t wait to see it!
The ‘Stay Away You Nitty Nit Award’ goes to
Howard Lederer. Try to play a hand some time Howard, it really is a nice game, poker.
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