Gob libs.

Hey all. Yesterday was a (shitty, awesome, boring) night. First of all, I made (no, a few, one) final table(s). Then, I got (really lucky, really unlucky, outplayed), which always seems to happen to me.

But that's (annoying, awesome, stupid) and I don't want to talk about it.

Turning stone is happening soon! Email me at gobboboy@yahoo.com if you guys want to meet up there. I'll be there the whole week, punting cash. My cell's 217-722-8131. Don't prank call me, now. Well, I won't stop you. I get lonely.

I'm a giver.

Someone asked to see some hand histories of mine... here are a few that I have available for download.

http://gobboboy.homestead.com/files/gobbohhs.zip

Enjoy.

RRRRRRRRRRRRRRREBUY!

I've had a lot of people ask me recently how I play the rebuy periods. People assume I play pretty manaiacally, and that's true. But there definitely is a direct connection between how big my stack is after the rebuy period to how well I do in the tournament. A good rebuy period depends completely on the table. There are usually two kinds of tables: tables where people are willing to gamble and tables where they aren't. When they're not really willing to gamble and are playing tight, I just shove every hand. I don't suggest this unless:
1) You're good at playing a big stack.
and
2) Your bankroll is big enough to support 10 rebuys in one tournament.

That said, having a loose table is MUCH better. A loose table where essentially there are two people allin every hand is key to a huge stack. I generally have 30k in these tables if I get any cards whatsoever, since all you have to do is judge risk reward and have maybe one big hand hold up.

That's about it... rebuy periods are really simple, and you just have to find something that works for you. Honestly, the rebuy period is the worst of your worries. It's more important to work on your mid-game play and late game play in these rebuys because the stacks are so deep.

Good luck at the tables, everyone.

I'm going to vomit in terror.

4th in the 35k on stars tonight for a cool $2.7k. Not too bad. There were a few hands that I felt as if I got kind of screwed on, I'll probably post a few of them here or on 2+2 later. A friend of mine got 3rd in it, which was cool, but he was to my direct left and honestly we couldn't help but (WARNING: THIS WORD HAS CAUSED A LOT OF CONTROVERSY. I DIDN'T CHEAT AND MANY OF YOU CAN KISS MY ASS) softplay (IN THE SENSE THAT WE DID NOT BEAT THE SHIT OUT OF EACH OTHER PREFLOP. WE DIDN'T COLLUDE, AND WE ONLY PLAYED WEAKLY PREFLOP BECAUSE WE LIKE TO PLAY POSTFLOP) each other.

I've gotten kind of screwed at final tables lately. Either cold decked or card dead, nothing's particularly gone right. I hope when I final table the main event at Turning Stone, things change.

G'night all.

Blog more, eh?

The last few days have been pretty rough for me. I've been trying to play cash games and SNG's, but I'm either very terrible or been catching the bad side of variance (both of which are probably true).

Honestly, I think "MTT variance" is one of the biggest misconceptions in poker. Any game where you're able to put in all your chips is extremely high variance from hand to hand, but if that's true, why are we told that NL cash games have less variance than limit cash games? I think it's just better to say that you see how often you can get your money in way ahead, and if you ever lose one of those (for all your chips), you bust.

In cash games, you rebuy when you lose your stack. Let's say you can get your money in ahead 75/25. So you can go win, win, win, lose/rebuy, lose/rebuy, win, win and be way ahead.

In a tournament, once you lose, all your work is gone. So people say the variance is extremely high because you can play "perfect" poker and not win over a very long period of time.

So what's new? This is rudimentary information and this is why we have to use good bankroll management. I think that, psychologically, MTT's are the easiest for you to play. When you have 200 buyins and lose one, it's almost nothing to shrug it off. When you have 50 buyins for SNG's and play multiples of them, a few things:

1) The losses are significant.
2) The wins are not as significant.
3) Because it's your bankroll divided by 50 instead of your bankroll divided by 100 or even 200, each entry is psychologically a lot more impacting. I'm operating on a $17k bankroll right now, but $109 SNG's are a lot of money to me whereas spending over $100 easily on a $10r is nothing to me.

I think what I'm trying to say is... do what you're comfortable with. You need to find what you like doing and what you're good at doing. So I'll keep donating in cash games from time to time, so find me at the tables when you can.

gobbo dance time!

Just chopped a $30r heads up on stars for $3442.50. I would've crushed him heads up but the blinds were high in comparison to the stacks and he was playing like a maniac, so I didn't want to risk the variance.

I've been playing poker for such a short amount of time... I really do not want to be complaining all the time about my 'bad luck.' I have a lifetime of poker to play and I appreciate everyone's advice and friendship that they've given me over the last few months.

Why all the mushy stuff? This win put me over $20k in my br, which is the goal I put down which I didn't expect to meet for probably another year. It really doesn't feel that different, but $20k is a lot of money.

Nothing left to do except do it all again. Good luck everyone, see you at the tables.

TELL EM WHAT HE'S WON!

21st again in the 45k. Join us again tomorrow night when I jab this pencil through my cerebrum.

All work and no final table makes gobbo a dull boy.

There is a LOT going through my head right now. Tonight I got 11th in the fabulous tourney called the 45k on stars. So in the past two weeks I've had an 11th, a 12th, 8th and a 3rd. That's a pretty solid showing for one tournament, but regardless it's kind of disappointing.

Though they say that it takes a lot more skill to make it deep consistently than take it down when you get deep, bubbling final tables sucks. A lot. I'll just try to make it tomorrow. I'm likely going to to play the 100k on AP too since I have friends going to do it.

On another note, I decided recently that I'm going to take next semester off of college to become a poker bum, at least for a few months. Let's see if it's by choice or if I'm kicked out of school, shall we?

Mixed feelings.

I took 3rd last night in the 45k on stars for just over $5k. The hand history is put online here:
http://gobboboy.homestead.com/files/45k3rd.txt

It was a pretty smooth final table until I took a terrible beat 3rd handed and then got frustrated and made a bad call when I tried to trap someone.

I think I broke through some major walls recently in my game, and I reaped some rewards last night. I lost nearly every race I played in and still made it to 3rd place, something which I am incredibly proud of. I hope this means I will have a lot more success in the future.

D'oh.

Well, tonight was kind of a disappointing night. I've been playing terribly this week and finally tonight when my good friend exitonly4 decided he didn't want to play in the 45k (and I donked off my stack), I took over and started actually playing well. I got all the way to the final two tables where the ridiculously aggressive chipleader shoved in 2 million preflop with 94s and he flopped two pair on my AT.

I'm not one who is good at controlling my emotions, so needless to say I was PISSED. Tournament poker is a lot like regular poker, but when you go out deep in tournaments it feels as if a knife just stabbed deep into you. This is the 3rd time I've gone out very deep in tournaments and it felt like I barely accomplished anything.

But that's poker. And I hope I go deep again tomorrow night. When I make it to the final table, I'm bringing it home.