Where you left your keys ...Rick's Cafe Americain

My first online experience was in simulated No Limit Texas Hold ‘em satellites. Everyone starts with $2000 in monopoly money and plays until one person is left standing.  I quickly learned that free satellites are the saddest of the freeplay jokes.  The first hand is inevitably a player going all in with 8-9o and getting 4 callers.  I can respect the nerve (if not the wisdom) of betting all-in with rags, but calling all-in with Doyle Brunson is just stupid.  And it happens all the time.  A new satellite starts every five minutes, so there is no consequence to losing. By the second hand of every satellite the table is six-seated and one guy has $10,000.  Feh.

Ring games are much closer to live game play than the satellites are to tournaments.  PokerPages gives you $1000 to play with, allows you to keep your winnings in the bank and only allows you to refill your bank every 24 hours.  If you lose all your money here, you can’t just start playing again. Still, are there many card rooms where people sit down to play a 10-25 game with $200,000?  I grant that these players earned their stacks starting with the same $1000 that I did, but it is also clear that they shrug and play drawing hands without account of pot odds because they aren’t risking real money.  I’m up to ~$20K and I feel like I am learning about how people play but the ersatz money is really corrupting of discipline (for both me and the opposition).

Tournaments are the best part of online poker; even the free ones have a realistic feel.  There is a lot of Satellite Syndrome early, but most of those players are cleaned out quickly.  If you don’t earn the table’s respect, a lot of all-in’s catch up to you right quick.  The better players want to win strictly for pride, so there is a lot of smart, disciplined play.  My initial forays into tournament play were met with quick dismissals, but I started playing much more disciplined and it paid off.  13th out of ~175 in limit 7-card stud and 11th out of ~250 in NL hold ‘em. 

As much as I wanted to win before, now I really have to play smart: my aforementioned friend in Islamabad, Mustardman, has registered with Poker Pages also.  In the two tournaments we have played in together, he finished 10th to my 26th out of ~180 at limit h/l omaha and 15th to my 14th out of ~180 in pot limit 7-card stud.  Mustard has good instincts for someone even more novice than I am, but he mostly lasts deep into tournaments by playing extra-tight and coasting. By the time he makes it to the final few tables he is so short-stacked the blinds eat him alive and he has no real chance to win.

My games have gone better than I would have expected.  I was chip leader for a long time in the Omaha tournament but I followed a bad beat (that didn’t even cost me all that much) by going on tilt.  In the space one cycle of the button I managed to blow all of my chips in a painful death spiral.  I have nobody to blame but myself.  On the other hand, I busted out of the last stud tournament on a hand that would only have happened without money on the line.  (Once again, the lack of financial consequence rears its head.) A big stack called my all-in raise (with jacks up) of +180,000 with nothing but a low pair, an ace and three cards to come.  He caught that ace on the river to win.  Frustrating, but the final placement was still a good feeling. 

Now I have to make a damn final table.  Then I can start playing strangers for money.