This says it all:

The rest can be summed up in three hands:

Cracked the hammer with pocket nines early on with a nine-high flop. The runner-runner seven deuce only gave my opponent two pair to my set.

Limped with KJ spades under the gun. Flop was all rags with two spades and I put out a bet hoping to take it right there, but Iggy smooth-calls me. The turn is a K and I bet out again. This time Iggy puts in a big raise. I re-raise him all-in for a little bit more and he calls. I miss my flush and my top pair is no good against his set of threes.

Doubling Iggy up left me with less than a starting stack, but still a lot of breathing room. Still, I got impatient with folding and when the SB raised my BB twice in a row, I pushed with A7. Of course, he calls with AJ. Oops. Flop holds both a J and a 7 and I’m out in 94th out of 109.

Not content with simply being a losing tournament player, I decided to lose two buy-ins at the cash tables, too, giving back my prior three days of winnings at Full Tilt.

Poker as a procrastination tool can be so -EV.

Just as I finished the last post, my turbo freeroll started up.

It’s nice to be chip leader after your first hand.

Update 3:24 PM: Came in second out of 857. $12.50! These turbos are a total crapshoot, but that’s kinda what makes them fun (especially when they’re free).

I’ve probably mentioned that I can’t stand tournaments–multi-table tournaments, sit-n-goes, whatever. There’s something about putting in your chips while you have the best of it, suffering a brutal beat on the river, and getting knocked out after investing your buy-in and 1-4 hours of your life with nothing to show for it that just doesn’t appeal to me. In a cash game, you tag the idiot, re-buy, and wait for him to make another mistake. In a tourney you don’t have this option.

Still, there’s something to be said about being able to multiply your buy-in by a factor of 10, 20, or more. I think if I played a lot more tournaments, that luck factor would be reduced substantially. As they say, you will find the same group of men and women at the final tables time after time. More practice might also help me suck less.

But practice costs money; or does it?
Continue reading Tournament practice →

You have one day left to register for the next stage of the World Poker Blogger Tour:

Wednesday, March 30, 9pm ET
PokerStars
$20+2 buyin, NLHE tournament
Password: thehammer
Listed under the Private Tournaments tab.
Open to bloggers and readers.

So far there are only 17 registered players. Probably our weakest one-day-before showing yet! Get up off your duff and register already.

As usual, I will pass on the tourney due to academic considerations.