Grubby at PokerWorks

The Heartland Poker Tour is going on the next couple weekends at Majestic Star in Gary, Indiana, and I’d be tempted to make the trek down there if bad luck wasn’t shadowing me like body odor on buses.

The usual bad luck coupled with playing against an increasing amount of good players is crippling me. Online, I’ve noticed even in 1/2 NL it’s hard to see a flop without a raise. In SnGs, players are lasting to later levels when blinds are big enough that skill is taken out.

Where the bad luck comes is in hitting that flop, check-raising, then being reraised all-in with a draw. I consistently call these overbets and am rarely behind when the cards flip (unless at Stars where they make you wait), but often that draw comes. I can fold top pair, top kicker to a bet like that. I can even fold bottom and middle two pair. But AA, KK, a set? I can’t let go.

I try to think how I’d play the hand if the cards were face up, and with a flopped set vs. someone’s flush draw, I still wouldn’t be able to let go despite my rotten luck.

On Saturday, a coworker put together an 11-person, $112 sit-n-go with 1st and 2nd receiving seats to the Heartland Poker Tour and 3rd place getting his money back. If either of those seat-winners cashed, the other players would share 10 percent.

I was the only one who brought beer and the only one who drank. I guess it wasn’t that kind of poker game. Or maybe people don’t like to drink at noon on a Saturday.

The game mimicked the tournament we were playing for: T10,000 chips, T100/100 starting blinds, 30-minute rounds.

Playing live after so much time online is refreshing and after a few rounds it’s much easier to pick up betting patterns. It must be how it feels when people get out of prison.

A whole lot of limping, which is less and less online. I need to table hop online more often when I see people aren’t limping or that when they do they’re setting a trap. Pride and wanting to play against good players gets in the way and before long I’ve lost a couple buy-ins and struggle to get back… while still at the same table.

Two players were in most pots and called down with any pairs. One player raised often but would fold to a reraise.

I stayed away from those two players and preferred to tangle with the guy who raised, picking off a few pots from him.

I didn’t pick up any tricky moves either. If someone called a raise, they often folded on the flop rather than raise or check-raise the turn.

Down to three people, it was the chip leader and me and the other guy having about equal stacks. Chip leader just sat back while the two of us were duking it out.

Final hand was A7s in the T1500/3000 small blind. I had about T12,000 and the button raised to T8000, leaving behind about T6000.

I was either folding or pushing. I couldn’t last much longer and if I won this hand, the other guy would be taken in by blinds. If I folded, I would be the one suffering the blinds.

I took a stand. He called and showed KQo.

Flop: rags. Turn: rag. River: Queen.

Bitch.

A few hands earlier when we still had 5 people, I was up against the same player. He was all-in with 33. I had 10-Js. Flop was 8-9-x with the 89 of my suit.

Any heart, any 7, any Q, any 10, any J.

Even a runner two pair would’ve been good.

With that many outs, I was favored to win 71 percent vs. 27 percent.

But no help at all.

It’s no wonder I’ve never received a W2-G on slots.

I did feel good about getting my money back, even though it took 5 1/2 hours to do so.

Headed home, played a quick hit-and-run 2/4 limit session that put me +100 in less than 10 minutes. I clicked the hand histories hoping I’d cracked some big hands, but in every case I had the better hand and they called down with bad kickers.

Headed to Landmark Center to check out The Host, a terrific and funny monster flick, then walked down six ramps in the same complex to find eatZi’s, a silly name but fantastic gourmet market for a hungry grub like me.Â

Chef-prepared salads and sandwiches, hot meals, pasta, dessert, everything you could imagine. A nice assortment of wine and boxed products, with an emphasis on healthy food.

I chose a Thai Beef Salad for $7.99 and watched as the chef lovingly prepared it with a smile. It overflowed the bowl, and he was able to mash it down with the lid, giving me at least 1.5x the amount of a normal salad.

On checkout I found out that every hour before closing, all items with a red dot are buy one, get one free.

I snagged two packs of six chocolate chip cookies for $2.29, less than Pepperidge Farm.

They bagged it up in a large clear plastic bag somewhat resembling a Hefty bag, and everyone on the train ride back could either see what I was eating or assume I had just rummaged through someone’s trash.

On the walk back from the nice North Clark area, I passed a couple “For Rent” signs. To be in walking distance of indie films and Eatzi’s would be like being in walking distance of a poker room. $1200 for a one-bedroom, though, and I kept walking.Â

Chatted with grubette, who’s in Florida enjoying Disneyworld’s Animal Kingdom resort but didn’t try the $20 trick to get a view of the wildlife.  I’m hoping she stops by Seminole Hard Rock to pay respects to where Anna Nicole Smith was found.

It was about midnight and I could’ve gone to bed early to wake up rested enough to hike up to Skokie, but I succumbed to that poker itch and fired up Poker Stars.

Across a gamut of games, lost not only the $100 that I was up for the day, but my entire remaining balance. I tried steeling myself, played conservatively, stuck to ABC and didn’t make moves, but the suckouts were unbelievable.

A final 50+5 non-turbo SnG knocked me out with AA vs. AQ (two queens showed up) and the inevitable “LOL” and “wow” comments that would’ve had me tilting had I still been in the tourney.

Going to bed would’ve been a good idea, but I retreated to Full Tilt and lost $300 more before finally throwing in the towel. Though at 6 a.m. with Daylight Savings Time, that may have been passing out rather than purposeful quitting.

If a good poker player is unaffected mentally by bad runs and bad beats, I’m far from even approaching good.

What began as a good mood quickly soured into name-calling and wall-pounding. I wanted to see one of the weird-looking furry centipede-like insects that crawl around in my apartment, just so I could take out my bad beats on it.

But the Thai Beef Salad and cookies were excellent.

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This entry was posted on Monday, March 12th, 2007 at 2:56 am and is filed under Uncategorized.