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

The game went on despite my laundry issues and it seems like a quite different game than the one I played last week.  When Coach is on his game, he can be good to watch, and he was obviously on his game.  He took down $193, and he did it on a short schedule.  He showed up late, and always leaves by 11, so the table must have been drastically tilted in his direction for the short time he was there.  In giving me an abbreviated game report he gave an unsolicited shout-out to fellow blogger Pauly, calling him “deceptively good.” Coach is also engaging in some effective trash talking.  He called Ferarri out, essentially telling Ferarri (mostly in jest, but all good jokes hurt a little) that he wins only when Coach isn’t around.  And even though Ferarri finished up $140, he won that money before Coach arrived and after Coach left.  Hmmm.

Rick took a big hit when a game of 5stud-"replace"-hi/lo was called when he was in the loo.  He returned to the table and received an inadequate summary explanation of the game and it cost him.  Here is the good summary explanation: The game is dealt like 5 card stud (1 down, four up).  After the round of betting after 5th street, the players are given three options: stand, exchange an up card for $1 or exchange the hole card for $2, followed by another round of betting (and perhaps a declare; I didn’t ask). 

After the five cards were dealt, Rick had (2)-3-4-5-3, Helmut had (x)-Q-Q-x-x and the dealer was sitting on an obvious high.  Here is how bad the summary explanation was: Rick tossed in $2 asked for another card.  When Om reached to take away his hole card, Rick had the rule reexplained because he thought he was just buying a 6th card.  But it was explained poorly because he didn’t realize he could exchange a 3 for a buck.  So he didn’t.  Helmut, of course, exchanged a Q, and ended up with Rick’s low.  A minor scandal followed when the dealer, realizing that he had sort of screwed Rick with a half-assed explanation, opted not to bet his obvious high hand.  Helmut, on the other hand, bet his low.  Of course, though it is probably true that Helmut shouldn’t have bet ... Rick really shouldn’t have raised.  He obviously thought Helmut was bluffing, but when you miss your hand you can’t complain when the bluff fails.  (Congrats to Ms. Rick for winning a Bugsy’s Club freeroll.  Someone has to put bread on the table.)

Pauly’s got the final tally over at Tao, so I won’t repeat it here.

Money Vanishing Into The Ether
As for my own game, it has seriously cratered.  My discipline is weak, so I play bad starting hands.  Even though I have a very good sense of the strength of my hand, it isn’t helping.  It is making me weak, when I feel that I am being bluffed at and I am seeing bluffers in the shadows when they are waving their nuts right in my face.  Needless to say, it is costing me.  I’ve put $175 into online sites ($100 at pokerstars and $75 at bugsy’s club) and have lost about 70 of it.  Most crushing is that I am losing at the .10/.20 tables.  I have to get my head straight, I have to get back to reading, and I have to start respecting the players that are beating me in the showdowns. 

Last night (when I started writing this entry) I sat down at a .50/1 table playing cycles of hold ‘em and Omaha/8.  Nothing interesting happened during the first round of hold ‘em, except that I played tight.  Which meant that I didn’t play at all.  Omaha was a different story.  I kept getting the cards. A♠ 2♠ A♣ 9♣.  Now that’s a starting hand!  I flopped the nut low, but the flush didn’t develop.  Still, I took down a nice pot.  Two hands later I got bullets, one of the bullets had a suited friend and a three to boot.  Took the low again, and split another nice pot.  In the space of 20 minutes I went up $14.  I was feeling great.  Over the next hour and a half I lost that $14 twice.  The final indignity came when I decided to sign off.  I didn’t move quickly enough and my hand was dealt.  The Hammer.  How could I not play The Hammer?  Easy, stupid.  Just lay down the cards.  But I didn’t.  Instead, I bluffed all the way to the river.  I checked (yes, I was in the early position), expecting him to bet so I could throw away my cards.  But no, he checked back to me forcing me to flash The Hammer in shame. Quite the curl up and die moment.  So I signed off without saying goodbye.

As I write this, I am sitting in 2d place in a 5+.50 Limit Hold ‘Em SNG.  Or I would be if pokerstars didn’t keep crashing.  Excuse me while I go sign back on.

I signed back on. By the time I returned I was in 4th place in chips and there were only 7 players left.  Only one hand of note.  Sitting in the BB I was dealt 42o.  Everyone folded to the button (chismar, the chip leader at the time) who called.  I checked, and the flop was KK8.  I bet, chismar called.  The turn was a T and the board was a rainbow.  I checked, chismar checked.  The river was an 8 and I bet again.  chismar laid down his cards and the mystery of the BB took a modest pot.

Eventually we got down to four, and there was no real chip leader.  The blinds were at 250/500 and all four of us had between 2700 and 4100.  And we swapped rank for a while without anyone making a move.  The four players left were:

Ugarte (fearless reporter)
Gencyn (tight player; eventual winner)
waddy3 (solid, but plays too many hands)
chismar (calling station, sees every flop, luckiest sonuvabitch alive)

I took the chip lead for a little while on one of two typical chismar hands.  Dealt 9To in the BB, I checked; chismar called from the SB.  The flop was 2-3-T, so I bet and chismar called.  The turn was a 9, I bet, chismar called again.  The river was a beautiful T, I bet, chismar thought and then called my full house.  It should have crippled him, but that bastard survived.

A few hands later I was dealt AJo in the BB (yes, I did most of my playing late in the tourney out of the blinds).  The flop was a rainbow 2-3-9.  chismar, sitting on a very short stack, bet and I called, figuring my A was enough, but 2 overcards made the bet worthwhile anyway.  The turn was a random card (T? 7?), chismar went all in with his last 200 and I called.  He turned over 64o!!!.  See if you can guess the river.  A fucking 6, and that bastard beats me.  This after rivering waddy3 at least three times. 

The rest of the tourney was uneventful, but I lost another decent pot to that guy when he actually played a hand well (caught top pair on the flop and let me chase my overcards to no avail), and I ended up busting out in 4th.  It gave me some pleasure to see that chismar finished in 3d.  His luck had to run out eventually.

On to the universe of bloggers ...
Chris Halverson’s eponymous blog is a very good read, and I welcome him to Rick’s blogroll.  I thank him again for the cheesecake (even though I didn’t have the patience to sit through the introductions and have never watched the game).  Also happy to see that he is hanging out at Rick’s Cafe and not just loitering in the poker material.  There is a whole multi-topic blog here at Rick’s and I commend it all to you.

Suited Trash is Liz’s new roundup of the blog world.  Or it would be if she ever came back to the NYC from AC.  No complaints, though, because she gave us the bullet point treatment, so the Grovel is a recommended blog.  Well, OK. One teeny-tiny, really minor, extra petty complaint. Liz links to the Grovel, but calls the link “Rick Blaine.” Please either link to the Cafe (and call the link “Rick’s Cafe Americain") or link directly to the poker content (and title the link “Ugarte’s Poker Grovel").  (See?  Really minor and petty.)

In all seriousness, thanks for the link, Liz.  When the posts start rolling I will be a regular visitor for the roundup. She also says on her blog that she is looking for home games in NYC.  Liz, as an NYC denizen, you are obviously welcome to join me and Pauly at Ferarri’s game.

HDouble at The Cards Speak added the Grovel to his blogroll without even telling me and I just spotted my name there.  He’s got a hell of a blog.  Very good stuff without getting all braggy, so I am pleased to add him to the blogroll. (Hint, hint.)

Last, but certainly not least, an oversight has been corrected and Felicia Lee has been added to the blogroll.  Alas, Felicia Lee’s blog is really a Yahoo! group, which requires a (free) Yahoo account and a signup.  While the group is interactive, count me among the many who think she should move to a conventional blog.  The link above is a website with links to each of her reports, but they are in a strange order, which makes it a bit of a nuisance to find the latest entry.  Am I really giving design tips?  I have to go to sleep.

That’s it for now as, once again, I have to go cry.