Weekend Update - 2004-09-26
Weekend Poker
I took a short break from my regularly scheduled grind to try some S&Gs. I generally don’t play these as I never play NL and I just don’t feel like I can do well in them. I played probably 10 on Pacific and 3 on Party. I placed in the money in 60% of them and actually won at $10+1 at Party for my first win (won one at Pacific too). Basically my money balance was about even at the end of the “day” while giving me a lot more experience compared to what I had before. I’m happy with that, although it did point out that I have a lot to learn about NL (and tourney) play.
It’s just crazy what some of these people do. I’m sure it’s nothing new to those of you who play these, but it’s unreal the mistakes people make. The best was when we lost three people on the first hand of a Pacific $5+0.50. Incredible. It was a fun diversion but I don’t plan on making it my main play anytime soon.
I really should have been multi-tabling Party though. I’ve got 1000 raked hands to go through to clear that bonus. I did play some at Party on Friday night along with some Interpoker. Nothing too exciting to report, results were mixed. I thought I misplayed some things, and upon further review I see I was marginal in a couple of places. Nothing too bad, so the good news was that I played correctly, or at least I wasn’t making calls/bets when I shouldn’t have. Now as far as “correctly”, that is somewhat subjective of course. Was I Jones correct or Miller correct? I’m still a bit too weak, but there’s worse things to be than weak.
I’ve really been reviewing my play a lot more lately and I’m pretty happy with it. My overall “correctness” (for some definition of that) is much better than it was a couple of months ago. Perhaps moving up to make 2/4 my “main” online game has made me want to evaluate this more as a bad swing there will chew away at your bankroll quickly compared to 1/2. Variance can get you no matter what, but at least I’m not making as many dumb decisions to help that along any more than it needs.
Ultimate Poker Challenge
After missing the first week, I have watched the following three weeks of the Ultimate Poker Challenge. The production value isn’t as high as the WPT or WSOP, but it is interesting seeing some of the big names playing. Eric Seidel has been on twice (winning one) already, Andy Bloch won the third event and Todd Brunson was on this past week. (getting second after having his rockets cracked by AT by a straight on the river). Nick B from 2+2 has been on twice and won one event. Other big names are supposedly on deck too.
The Good: They show pot sizes and the bets as well as the cards. Lot of big names.
The Bad: They have guest commentators to go along with the main guy. They have ranged from Jennifer Harmon to some poker dealer. The poker dealer was pretty bad IMHO. Jennifer Harmon was not a whole lot better, but they don’t really give much analysis, more of an opinion.
They tend to skip over people entirely if they don’t do anything and they seem to splice together some of the shots during the hand. It’s not that bad, but it’s somewhat noticable.
They also put a whole final table in one hour (which edited down as I have done end up being a short 39 minutes or so), so it’s a lot of all ins, but hey, seeing Eric Seidel play is all good.
Other TV
Don’t forget, ESPN Classic is showing the 1997 and 1998 WSOP and the 1996 US Poker open Monday through Wednesday at 11PM CDT.