A couple tournaments and Vegas

First the Vegas part. I am playing The WSOP event number 34 on June 18th. I had been planning this for weeks and was really excited about it then reading Memphis's blog here. I read that he is also entering the same event. How cool is that. Hopefully we will get a chance to meet up down there prior to the event... Even better if we both can get through day 1. That's the first goal anyways.

I played 2 live tournaments the last couple days and it was like night and day for me. Both tournaments had just under 50 entrants so a decent field. On Tuesday night it just seemed no matter what I did the cards just didn't fall for me. Twice I called short stacks all ins with a dominating hand and got sucked out on but that's poker. Then finally when I got short stacked and pushed with pocket 8's I got called with J,10 and of course the Jack hit and that was my night. Jacks were my nemesis all week.

Last night I started off strong with AJ suited early and caught a Jack on the flop and turn and won a decent pot to in the first blind level. From there I was up and down a lot.. That's the only Jacks I loved last night as you will find out. The table I was at was fairly aggressive which I usually prefer. No limping at this table. I also hit pocket Queens and pocket Kings with both holding up. The Queens I got when an early position excellent player pushed all in. I had him covered and insta called him with my Ladies. They held up !! That helped build my chips.

I sailed along never being a huge stack but always with enough chips to play with. I hit the final table with probably out of 8 the 5th stack. I played fairly conservative and bet big when I got AK there and took down a good pot.

When we got down to 4 people and I was now the short stack I got dealt 2,6 in the BB. Exciting hand eh. Everyone folded to the SB who just called. I checked. Excellent get to see a free flop. Flop comes 2,2,8. You gotta love that flop. SB older lady checked and I checked behind hoping she might catch something on the turn. I wanted a bigger pot. I was playing to win not just happy to take it down there. The turn brings a Jack. She bet (hit her J) which almost covered my stack so I pushed all in with my remaining few chips. Flipped up the cards and she had J9 I think. She looked surprised when she saw my trip deuces. You gotta love deuces they can be so deceiving. Anyways here comes the river. Yep you guessed it a Jack on the river which gave her a full boat of JJJ22 and me a a full house of 222JJ. Tough to lose like that but still a pretty decent night. I could have bet on the flop and taken it down but to me that was safe flop. What do you think???

Speaking of Jacks I was playing an online cash ring game (very low stakes) on Sunday and was dealt KQ. There was preflop raise of about 5x the BB. I was the BB. I just flat called. Flop comes Q 7 3. I bet to see where I was at and the preflop raiser goes all in for I think it was like 2 bucks. Told you it was low stakes. Ha Ha. I thought about it. Couldn't put him on AA or KK. I thought maybe AQ so I hesitated. Decided to call. He had pocket Jacks so I had him dominated. Turn was a 2 I think and the river was of course a Jack.. Told you I hate Jacks this week.

Susan Jacks, The invention Of Lying and WSOP

Do you remember Susan Jacks?? She was the lead singer of that late sixties early seventies band called The Poppy Family. They had a few hits but their big one was Which Way You Goin Billy. Other big ones were That's Where I Went Wrong and Where Evil Grows. Susan was born in Canada and grew up in a suburb of Vancouver. I still remember when they came and played at my high school. They were great. Anyways I just read Susan has kidney disease and desperately needs a kidney transplant. In Canada 85% of people think transplants are good and necessary but only 14 % of people have signed donor cards. People really need to do this it could be your brother or sister that needs one. I certainly wish Susan well and hopefully she gets her kidney transplant before it's too late.



I went and saw that new movie last night called The Invention of Lying. It stars Jennifer Garner and Ricky Gervais. The movie is about a place where nobody can lie. Everyone tells the truth. Can you imagine that? Ricky and Jennifer go on a date and she tells him that really he has no chance with her as she is out of his league and that he is fat and has a stubby nose. Everyone tells everybody what they think. I wonder what our world would be like if that was true. If people told it like it is. Anyways without spoiling too much Ricky becomes the first person who is able to lie and what happens afterwords is a reflection of our life. It pokes fun at relationships, religion, genetic matching and just life in general. I found the movie concept incredibly original (nice for a change) but not quite as funny as I thought it might be. Having said that I certainly think this one is worth watching and have no hesitation in recommending it.

I see the WSOP Europe has just wrapped up and it came down to Daniel Negraneau and Barry Shulman heads up and Barry prevailed after a 5 hour marathon. I watched some of the action and hand history on the Internet and it was quite a battle. Twice Barry was all in and managed to escape. Barry of course is the father of November Nine WSOP finalist Jeff Shulman. Can Dad and Son win both in the same year?? It should be interesting.

HST and WSOP 40,000

Here in B.C. our wonderful provincial government has decided to Harmonize the provincial sales tax with the federal sales tax and call it the HST. The provincial sales tax (PST) is currently 7% and the federal sales tax (GST or goods and services tax)is 5%. This new tax will be 12% and basically we will just have the one tax. Sounds simple right?? Sounds like a no brainer?? But wait. This tax will now apply to many things that weren't formerly taxed by both taxes. Things like restaurant meals, new home sales, Real estate fees, going to the hairdresser. The list goes on and on. So instead of this being something that makes sense to the average working person this is just another tax grab. So why are they bringing it in?? They say it will save businesses money by only having to administer 1 tax. Then why are small businesses screaming?? They are screaming because they know that some of them will be losing customers (ie restaurants) as the cost of meals will go up. So basically this tax will be good for big business and our government coffers. A recent poll shows that 90% of B. C residents are against this HST and I think on this issue the government better listen. We are basically fed up with being taxed to death. This provincial government better wake up and smell the coffee. This is a no go for us here in B. C.. We do have recall legislation here in B.C. and with 90% against this might be all we need to throw this bunch out.

I finally got around to watching the televised 2 hour first event of this years WSOP 40,000 buy in event and came away suitably impressed. I was really impressed with the play of Vitaly Lunkin who when it came to heads up play clearly in my opinion was the best player. This is taking nothing away from Issac Haxton but in the hands showed Issac did push with some questionable cards and Vitaly was very unlucky not to win before he did. This is taking nothing away from Haxton but I wonder if nerves got the better of him at the end. Even watching Justin Bonomo's face in the crowd you could read in his eyes that he was thinking (you pushed with that?) I know we will definitely see more of Issac in the future as he is an incredible player.
I loved the way Lunkin played his pocket Aces both times heads up(even though he lost once). I am not a fan of slow playing aces except Headsup. In my opinion in a full ring game or tournament slow playing Aces is just looking to get in trouble but you do want to get 1 caller. That's just perfect for Headsup. I think the look on Haxton's face both times when he saw the Aces was priceless.

Bar watch and The Bracelet

Where I live in B.C. they have started a Bar Watch program. What is Bar Watch? Its basically a program to keep undesirables and trouble makers out of our bars and nightclubs. What happens is when you enter a nightclub (and its only nightclubs that have problems) you are asked for identification and your ID is scanned into a computer system. Everyone is asked regardless of age or gender. Then if you cause problems by fighting or just generally being a troublemaker the next time you try and go in your ID will be flagged and you will be denied entry. This is a great way to make our nightclubs safer for everybody. Do you see anything wrong with it?? I don't. Most people don't. Hey if you don't want to have your ID scanned then don't go in the bar. Pretty simple. Well then you get our so called privacy commissionaire involved. He has now determined that this is illegal. Why is it illegal? Well it seems it infringes on peoples rights not to have their ID scanned. Huh?? What about the rights of everyone else to expect to be safe when they go in. What about the rights of nearby stores when these same troublemakers come out and break windows and damage their property? Nobody is forcing these people to have their ID scanned. In my my opinion bars have a right to make sure their establishments are safe.
Maybe they should make all bars nightclubs private clubs and charge a yearly membership fee. Then to become a member you have to have your ID scanned. Charge a nominal fee and that should get around this very silly ruling.

I was reading another blog yesterday and it seems one of the November Nine who have made the final table of The Main Event of the World Series of Poker has stated that if he wins he will throw the bracelet in the garbage. Huh?? Yes he will not accept the bracelet that goes with the 8 or 9 million dollar first prize. It seems that he is trying to make a statement of some kind. He has some sort of grudge against Harrah's Inc which owns the Rio and the rights now to the WSOP.

Well I know most poker players dream is to someday win a bracelet at the WSOP. Oh sure the winning money is a major bonus too but the bracelet is what true poker players dream about. In my opinion this is a very misguided attempt at making a statement. If you don't agree with how the WSOP is run now don't enter the events. Don't cover the events in the magazine you own. Simple?? Very Simple. Jeff Schulman editor and publisher of Card Player magazine you really need to think this through. That is something a child would do not a respected poker player. Work with them. If you win you will have more say in things.

Not that I am counting but 49 days until I am in Vegas. Okay yes I am counting...

Medical and Cuba

Last night I met up with a couple of friends who live in the U.S midwest. I hadn't seen them in about 7 years but they were in town visiting relatives and we managed to get together for a couple hours at a pub. They had both moved to the U.S. around 25 years ago as he opened a business up down there. It was great to see them but in the course of 2 hours a couple things came up that really shocked me.

First was that they have resident alien status in the U.S and have maintained their Canadian citizenship. A couple years ago they came to Canada and flew to Cuba (that's a Cuban beach above) for a holiday. As you know Americans are not legally allowed to travel to Cuba but us Canadians are. Anyways when they arrived back after their holiday they had to go through U.S customs and when they told them where they had been they were pulled out of line and told they could and probably would be fined for going to Cuba. They explained that they were Canadians but living in the U.S as resident aliens. That didn't seem to matter and some more threats were made. Anyways they were pretty worried but its been a couple years now and nothing did happen but it sure scared them. Seems pretty weird that you can't even visit a country. Hopefully under this new administration that might change.

The second thing that came up was the medical system. They have coverage through his business but evidently you can only go to certain hospitals that your provider lets you. They recently had to change providers as they didn't like the medical facility of the last provider. Another thing was that she had to get a needed medical procedure and she still had to pay like 1600 dollars out of her own pocket for it. I was floored. Here in Canada while our medical system is far from perfect you can go to any hospital of your choosing and almost everything is free except cosmetic surgery. While we have all seen Michael Moore's movie Sicko having friends who related personal stories really hit home. I know we here in Canada complain about wait times but really we have it good. I am certainly not cutting down the American system but I honestly believe quality medical should be available to all people and it should be free. Yes charge a monthly premium but make it geared to income. Will it cost lots of money?? Of course but don't tell me that health care isn't more important than anything. They said a lot of their friends are hoping that again under this new administration things will change.

I see all the online Poker sites are all really pushing their events that could possibly win you free entry into the Main Event of this years WSOP. One of the sites is running tv ads up here in Canada that if you win the main event and qualify through their site they will pay you an additional 10 million dollars. That is a huge chunk of change on top of the 9 million plus you will win for the event.

Top Pros and Deep Fields

I was reading Daniel Negreanu's blog this morning and he mentioned how he had gone down to the Bellagio and played a 400-800 mixed game there. He ended up winning like $30,000. I can't imagine playing for that kind of money. I don't think most people can. You notice a lot of the top pros playing incredibly high stakes cash games now.

What you don't see is a lot of the top pros getting through the deep fields in high level tournaments. You look at the final table of this years WSOP main event and basically most were unknowns with the exception of maybe Chino Rheem and Ivan Demidov and even they weren't well known. The incredibly deep fields makes it a very difficult process to get through. Plus the quality of the fields has increased dramatically. People can play every day online and for hours. When you play that often and that many hands your skill level will increase. In past years you saw winners like Johnny Chan win in consecutive years. I don't for see that ever happening again in the Main event at WSOP.

Poker is one sport/game that the average person can actually play at a world Championship if they buy in or win a satelite. I think that's what has made poker appeal so much to the masses. I know for myself it would be a dream to play in the Main Event and hopefully I will get the chance someday.

I was still feeling pretty crappy yesterday so I played a couple freerolls at Fulltilt and managed in the first to finish 242nd or something out of 2700. Not great but okay. Should have done much better but overplayed my AJ against AK and when I hit my J on the flop thought I was safe but the K on the turn killed me. In the Canada freeroll at night I was basically card dead and didn't even make the top 1000.

Jennifer Harmon a class act

Jennifer is my favourite female poker player. She has 2 WSOP bracelets and is truly a class act. She plays well, looks incredible and unlike a few top pros is a credit to the game. Everytime I have watched her on tv I have come away more and more impressed with her poker skills.I can see why she is regarded as one of the premier poker players of either gender in the world. A little know fact which I read was that Jennifer had a kidney transplant a few years ago. She is married to fellow poker pro Marco Traniello.

Very sad news about Natascha Richardson the actress. Seems she suffered a head injury while skiing on a beginner run in Quebec. The reports haven't been good, one can only hope that she pulls through.

I see the WSOP in Las Vegas is also having a 40,000 dollar buy in event. This is addition to their annual MAIN EVENT which is a 10,000 dollar buy in. It should be interesting to see the quality and depth of that field. Not sure if any of the sites are running satelites for it but I can only see the sponsored pros and the very wealthy paying that amount. Should be an interesting event.