Bar Poker Book

I have been working on a book about bar poker. I have about 5-6 chapters so far. I am going to post a chapter at a time. I am looking for feedback. E-mail me with comments. Thanks! Dave Chapter 1 Bar Poker, it has become a nation wide promotion phenomenon. In states where tougher DUI laws and smoking bans have made the bar business a challenge, bar poker has been a bright spot for owners and managers. Many states have challenged the right of bar owners to run free texas hold-em tournaments as a promotion calling it an illegal form of gambling. Bars have been raided and licenses have been threatened, but in most states free bar poker is popular and still growing even in today’s tough economic times. There are many forms of bar poker today. One of the most popular is the league format. Leagues are run for a set number of weeks and players play for local prizes each night and are awarded points for attendance and how they finish in a league night. These points are tracked by the company and top players are then eligible to advance to Regional, State, or National Tournaments. Prizes can be as large as a World Series of Poker main event seat or World Poker Tour event seat to cash or prizes. Many bars chose to run their own weekly games and offer their own prizes without bringing in an outside service. Most states require that there is no entry fee to play and no purchase is required and some states regulate what you can give out as prizes (check your local state laws for to find out what is permitted). I have heard this statement many times at a bar poker game. It is only for fun or it didn’t cost me anything to play. This may be true, but you can become a better poker player by playing bar poker. No where else can you get experience in reading people and see a wider variety of poker styles then at bar poker.

Sunday Poker Championships

Sunday was the finals of the top ten players of my bar league game on Sundays at the Clearwater Legion. We were playing for a casino buy-in worth $120. I started in 7th place with 7200 in chips. The leader had 12000. Chips were based opn points received during a 16 week quailifing period. It was a table of of 8 solid players and 2 unpredictable players. When I play in a bar game for a bigger prize I bring out my cash tournament game and leave the bar game at home. My plan was to play agressive during the lower blind levels and then tighten up as the blinds increased. Early I was able to take a few small pots to get to 9000 chips. I then was big blind with K-6 off. Several players limped in so I checked my BB. Flop was K-9-7 rainbow. I bet 200 and received one caller, one of the unpredictable players. Turn was a 4. I bet out 200 again and was called. River was an 8. I bet 600 and was called and he turned over 8-9 offsuit and won with two pair. I was worried about kicker, so I played it a little too slow. I should have raised more after the flop and on the turn. Lesson learned. I was hanging around in the 7000 range for a long time when under the gun I had deuces. Now I am not a big fan of dueces as I have lost several times when I flopped a set, so i play them somewhat cautiously. I raised 4 times the big blind. The BB calls. She is a very tight player, so she has a hand of some kind. Flop comes A-7-2 two clubs. BB bets 600, I raise to 2000, BB goes all in, I call hoping that she doesn't have a bigger set. She turns up big slick and I double up and become the chip leader. I then go on a card rush and end up taking out several players and get to heads up with a small chip lead against another good player. Final hand was me raising big with A-3 suited and getting reraised all in. I more then pot committed and figure I am behind but call. He has A-5 off. At least there is a good cahnce of a split pot. Flop comes all big cards, so it looks like a split. I then turn a 3 and end up taking the touranment down. It was a fun time with mostly good play and now I can go play a bigger tournament at the casino in the next few weeks. Twitter Poker Tour (#TPT) if you are not on twitter you need to get signed up and start playing this tournament. It is low cost to enter and the organizers have gotten some great sponsors to put prizes. I wish I could play more often, but have hard time with the Thursday night times. For info go to www.twitterpokertour.com More later!

Ken Veirling

Ken Veirling a bowler and great person that I have known for over 30 years was in a terrible car accident on his way to the USBC open in Las Vegas. This is his caring bridge website with infomation about him and if anyone would like to donate anything. Here is the info for the account set up to help out Ken. Owatonna HomeTown Credit Union 2400 Bridge StreetOwatonna, MN 55060 Phone Number:507-451-3798 Account Number:92879 http://www.caringbridge.org/visit/comicdude My family wishes the best to Ken and his family.

This week!

Well it has been quite a week. Tuesday: I had to fill out paper work for my new job that starts on May 4th. If you take everyone in the room and took two of them and added their ages together, I was still older! LOL. At least I have a job. It also was my Bar poker game in Clearwater. My aces ran into a set early in the tournament and I was down to a few chips. Fortunatly the one that won my chips was a person that soon gave them back and then some. Was hoping to amke the points and did. I was pretty much card dead all night. That's how it goes some nights. Wednesday: My first day to my lake place for the season. I have a lake lot with a 40" travel trailer on it on Lake Miltona which is 15 miles north of Alexandria MN. I wasn't sure if the ice would be out when we got there, but it was in the bay we are on and the main lake ice went out during the day. The first few times at the lake are a lot of work. You have to de-winterize the trailer, restart the water, put out the dock and lifts, and put in the boat. I have two boats. One small fishing boat with a 25 Hp motor and a fish-ski boat. I always start the year with my fishing boat for the early season crappie fishing. My lot is on a bluff with 60 stairs to the bottom. Because my neighbor didn't have thier chair lift turned on I had to carry my motor down the stairs. I get it down there and then it doesn't start. So, I have to carry it back up the stairs! Ouch! Thursday: What a day! 87 degrees! That is 30 above normal for this time of year. Got a great sunburn and got the rest of my lake work done. All ready to go fishing next week! My wife and I were wore out so we decided to watch a movie early and go to bed. As I am watching the Wrestler (good movies) I notice lightning in the distance. Damn, now I have to go out and put everything away because we didn't think it was going to rain. Friday: Wake up and where is the warm weather. Wind is blowing straight out of the north and it's 40 degrees. Got to love MN 40 degree swing in less then 24 hrs. Head home for Friday poker game. Interesting thing my Friday donkfest poker game. It is one of the craziest bar games I have ever run. I used to do two games a night and rand quick blinds in the first one so it woudl get done in 3 hrs. Well last week I dropped the second game and made the blinds longer. Now you would think this would make the tournament last longer, but not my Friday game. Longer blinds and finished 10 minutes faster then the week before LOL. Started with 5000 in chips and by first break with blinds at 75-150 we have lost half the field. Not so good for the bar. I may have to change the structure to try and keep people playing longer! I don't know if it will help though. More later

College Bowling Championships

My wife and I headed to ITC College Bowling champioships in Rockford IL. last weekend to see my son Kyle and to watch his team try for a national title. We got there about half way though the qualifing and they were leading. How it works. Teams bowl 32 games of baker bowling, which is when each of five players bowl two fames of each game. Bowler 1 bowls 1st and 6th frames and so on. They finished as the high qualifier. The next day they are put into a double elimination bracket and bowl best 4 of 7 games to advance. They started by bowling the 16 seeded Arizona State team. It was a tough match and went down to game seven for Witchita to win. Next they bowled Nebraska and won in four straight games. Now they only needed one more win to get them to the semi-finals the next day, but lost to Webber International 4-2, This moved them to the loser bracket where they had to play ASU again to move to semi-finals. They beat ASU 4-2 in a close match. They now moved to championship Saturday where they were to meet Webber Int. again, but this time had to beat them twice to get to finals. They won 4-2 and then 4-1 to advance to finals against Saginaw Valley State. It would be a battle of no. 1 vs no 2 for the championship. The finals are on TV in June on CBS College sports, so they had to set up a TV studio for the finals. I sat just past the foul with all the other WSU parents. It was an exciting final with Saginaw winning the first game when the anchor left a split in the tenthy frame. The finals are the best 2 of 3 because of TV. Witchta then came back and won game 2 and 3 to win their 9th championship. It was very exciting. A little later we watched the womens team dominate the finals to amke it a sweep for the Shockers. Here is a link to see results http://www.bowl.com/articleView.aspx?i=15485&f=1. Now maybe I can go back to playing some poker!

Easter Poker Weekend

Hope evryone had a nice Easter. I spent it with my family in Osakis. It was a good time. I also was able to open my summer lake place. Soon it will be less poker and more fishing. I can hardly wait. It's a toss up between poker, fishing and bowling as my first passion. Friday poker Friday night I ran my weekly bar game at McCanns. We had a good turn out for it being good Friday. As it usually is on fridays, it was a game full of bad poker and suck outs. I run two games most Fridays and play the second one. I ahve been thinking of dropping the late one because of low turn out and crazy drunken poker. We only had 10 so I gave everyone a double stack and ran it sit and go style with quick blinds. I was not into playing so I decided to play every flop regardless of raise unless someone was all in. After a hour I had exactly what I had started with and was up and down the whole time. I went all in with A-J suited and was called by 7-7 and lost out. It was ok, I had enough by then. The person that won that hand ended up winning the tournament and it was something else. He won every hand that he played except one and of course most of the time he was behind. When I handed him the first prize I told him that he better head to the casino before his hot streak ends. Saturday poker Saturday was my first ever home game that I have hosted. I don't know cab you call it a home game when you hold it somewhere else? I hosted it in the backroom of a local Legion club. When I set it up and I didn't realize that it was Easter weekend. The turn out was low but those that came had a good time. We played 2 games with a $25 buy-in with $5 being a bounty and a $10 late game. In the first game I was the chip leader when we got to the bubble. I was the big blind. The small blind made a 4 times the blind raise. He had been making regular raises on big blind so I had decided this time I would call. I had J-4 offsuit. He rasied and I called. Flop was J-5-5. Perfect! He goes all in and I call. He turns over 5-2 of spades and I loss half my stack. A little later I have a pair and go all-in and am called by an aces and he flops an ace. I am the bubble boy! It is the first time in a real money touranment that I have been the bubble. It is depressing. I got knocked out early in the second. I will do the tournament again sometime. It was fun. Monday poker Monday was my every 8 weeks to take the winners of my Sunday bar game to Milacs casino and buy them into there $60 tournament. Yes, I also play! It started like it was going to be a bad night. I lost 2/3 of my stack early when I couldn't hit a flop with good starting cards. I started with 3000 in chips and was down to 1200. I get a pocket pair and push all in and get two callers and they hold up and i am back above starting. I then go on a heater and end the first break at 9000 in chips. This tournament goes fast after the first break and turns into an all in fest. I get aces and raise it 4 times the big blind. Someone goes all-in for about half my stack. He has been going all in a lot and complains that he is getting bored. I call and he turns over K-Q offsuit. Flop is 9-8-4 two hearts. It goes runner runner heart and I get four card flushed. Wow that sucks. I then go card dead with someone going all-in evrey hand. Blinds are starting to get high and I am coming up on my BB which almost puts me all in. We are down to two tables and I get moved to the other table and the best is that I move from the BB to the button. I then get three good hands in a row and go all in and the blinds fold to me. I double up and make it to the final table. I draw the position behind the dealer perfect! I lokk around the table and realize that I am the short stack by a lot. They are paying the top 7 so I need at least a double up to cash. I am waiting for a decent hand to push all in. I have A-10 suited so I am thinking this is the hand. Guy under the gun limps in. I put him on low pair, weak ace or king something. I push all in. evryone folds to limper and he goes into how he hates this hand and calls and turns up A-Q off. How do you not raise under the gun in a game with mostly all ins. I would ahve folded to a raise with a-10. I lose and finish 10th. I played a good tournament, but am depressed that this is two casino final tables in a row without cashing. Maybe next time.

#TPT

Last night was the end of season 2 of the Twitter Poker Tour (#TPT). I was not able to play as many of these events as I would have liked, but did finish well in the last two. I also played a couple of other online tournaments at the same time last night. Once again my faith in online poker has been tested. The first tournament was a razz tournament. For those of you that don't know razz is 7-card stud low only with 1-2-3-4-5 being the best low. I played this more for fun then to make money. 52 players started and I ended up around 20th. I also played the 50k on Poker Stars. I had aces twice, kings 3 times and A-K many times. Aces won once and kings only won once. I was four card flushed 3 times. I once was put all in after raising with A-K clubs by KK and of course I flopped the nut flush and won. I play a lot of live poker and this stuff just doesn't happen that often. Anyway I made it to 1400 place a little short of the money when my kings lost to A-8. Then it was time for the #TPT. I enjoy this tournament very much. It has less players and prize money, but the quality of play is so much higher. I played very tight for the first hour and stayed around even in chips. Then in the second hour I played looser on a tight table and accumlated some chips. I made the final table and had a pretty good run of cards to move up to chip leader with 4 players left. Then it happened! LOL! I had kings and with two players limped I raised it up quite a bit hoping just to take it there. Player moved all-in and I called. He had A-2 off and flop came A-2-Q and I lost. No big deal. I still had plenty of chips. The very next hand, I am dealt QQ. Wow I am thinking. This is great. People are going to think I am on tilt, I go all-in hoping for a call and a chance to double up. I get the call from the player that just beat me and he has KK and we both have a diamond. He turns a straight and rivers a four card flush. I was never ahead at any point in the hand. I finish 4th. Did I play these hands wrong? Maybe. I am ok with the first all-in call. He doesn't have me covered. I should have played the queens slower, because maybe I could have bet him out with the ace on the flop, but maybe not! I could have gotten away after the turn, for sure. I wanted the double up and ended up out instead. I think I would have played it the same next time anyway! 4th place was good for $19, so I ended up about even for the day. Now I want to talk about tilt. Tilt is when you lose a hand that you either thought you should have won or a hand that you miss played to lose. It causes you to play differently then you normally would. An example is someone losing a big pot and then going all-in on the next hand. I see a lot of tilt in bar poker games. I can honestly say that I have rarely ever gone on tilt. I think part of it is that I don't play many big buy-in tournaments and the other part is you take so many bad beats playing bar poker that you become ablivious to it. I usually try and use tilt or the perception of tilt to my advantage.

Heartland Night

Last night was my bar game with the top 10 playing for a $350 Hearland Poker Tour seat. I started 4th in chips. Everyone was very tight to start. In an early hand I had A-J suited and raised and was called by as I found out later A-K. Flop brought an ace, but I was thinking I was behind. Turn paired the board mayking my feel a little better about a chop. We both checked after the river and I lost about 1/3 of my chip stack. Even though I was a little short, I continued to play very solid poker and won many smaller pots to keep my stack growing a little. By two hours in we had lost 3 of ten players, but no one had yet to take control of the table. I was now big blind and person that was behind me in small blind likes to make plays with his big and small blind. I had q-10 and decided if he raised my BB I would come over the top. He just called instead, so I decided to check and see the flop. Flop came 4-10-A. I am now sure that I am ahead as he didn't raise preflop. He checks and I make a pot size bet and he calls. Turn is another ten. He bets, I rerasie all in he insta calls. He has A-5. My hands hold up and I double up. I now have a chip stack that I can play with. We are now down to five. I have been stealing blinds against the tighter players for about the last hour. I look down and have a-4 suited with the small & big blind tight players. It is folded to me, blinds are now 1000-2000. I raise to 6000. Everyone folds to big blind that has a little under 10,000. He thinks for a lond time and reluctantly pushes in. It isn't that much more for me to call so I do figuring I am way behind. He turns over 10-J unsuited. So he plays tight the whole tournament and then risks it all with that hand. It is hard to figure some people out!.I flop a flush draw and he is drawing to six outs on the river and catches a ten to take the pot. I am know short stacked, but not out yet. I end up going out in 4th place, but I am happy with my play for the evening. I didn't feel like had made any mistakes. In the end even though there was a big prize, it was still a group of bar poker players. Phil Helmouth says that if poker were only a game of skill that he would win everytime. It seems like an egotistical statement, but I understand where it comes from. Even if you play every hand perfectly, you still don't always win. I feel that I played very well last night and should have wom, but only managed a 4th place finish. I suppose there are 9 others that played last night that feel the same way! Online from yesterday. My son played and won a $10 sit and go and then won on a NL table to bring the AP bankroll to $319. Thanks Kyle! I played a $10 S & G and lost out on a very tight table. I played some 1-2 limit and managed to win my S & G money back, so bankroll unchanged. Hoping to go to casino tonight, but it isn't looking good. Having a bathroom remodeled and may have to work on that. On a side note. If you haven't joined twitter yet, you need to. www.twitter.com. It is fun to get live updates from big tournaments on how the pros that you follow are doing. You get there thoughts and feelings about how they are playing. Something you can't get from TV.

Tonights Poker

Tonight is the finals of my Tuesday bar game. The top 10 are playing for a Heratland Poker Tour seat. Starting chips are based on points won over the last 16 weeks. I will start out in 4th place in chips with 8225. The leader has a little over 11,000. I play many styles of poker. I have a game for bar poker and I have a game for buy-in tournaments. Some parts of my game cross over but each of the tournaments require the different styles. Because tonight is for a real prize, I will be bringing out the A game for this tournament. I am hoping this change will not be picked up by the other players and I can use it to my advantage. I haven't played in a Heartland for a long time and would like to try again. Will Blog about tournament soon! Heartland Poker Tour link www.heartlandpokertour.com

Weekend

Had nice weekend spent away from home. Kind of traveled the state. Had a great turn out for my youth bowling tournament. 38 kids. Congrats to the winners Tyler Swanson of Mankato and Dan Reinke from New Ulm full results at www.cmjtt.com. Tried a new restaurant to me on Saturday night. Boston's Pizza and Sports Bar. Good pizza and a great atmosphere to watch Michigan State kick butt on UConn! If MSU wins tonight that will be defeating 3 number one seeds in a row. I wonder if anyone has every done that before? Maybe this will now give the Big Ten a little credibility. Who knows! Stopped by my Sunday bar game on the way home to check on how it was going. They had just broke to final table. Looked like the usual suspects, but if Mike won I will be buying his buy-in. so go Mike! Next the bartender tells me that they are going to be closed next sunday for easter so no poker, problem is he didn't tell the people playing. Hopefully no is too mad at me when they show up next week. Would like to go and play at Hinckley on Wed. night. Will have to see how it goes. Looking forward to the last #TPT tournament of the season on Thursday. www.twiiterpokertour.com. If you haven't gotten on Twitter yet, you are behind the times Join today and follow me.

Free Poker Night

Last night was my bar poker game at McCann's. Great turn out 35 in game one and 23 in game two. It was a crazy night with a lot of new people and many that over indulged. That's good for the bar anyway. It makes for an interesting night. On fridays I only play in the second game. We had alternates, so I was last one on table. My very first hand I was under the gun and called in the dark before getting cards. I look down and I have big slick suited in spades. Damn, I should have raised. Button raises to 1000. I call. heads up.. Flop is Qs-Jh-6s. I check, button bets 2000.. I decide to call figuring that I am ahead with all the draws and overs. Turn is a blank. I check, button bets 2000 which puts me all in. I decide that I am going to call. I have lots of outs and maybe a head, but unlikely. I announce to the table that I should fold but with all the outs I am going to call. Button turns over J-10 off. He has second pair and a straight draw. River is a 10 and I double up. I know I don't like to put my tournament life on the line with a draw, but i am trying to play a little more aggressive. I am conservative in nature and it carries over to my poker game some times. I rake in the chips and announce that I am the new donkey at the table. I got a laugh anyway. I managed to get 3 place good for the prize bubble! Now you know where the title of my blog comes from. Even though it doesn't exactly fit, the saying always a bridesmaid never a bride comes to mind. I suppose I should say groom! LOL Heading out of town for the weekend to run my junior bowling tournament the CMJTT. Back on Monday!

Thursday Night Poker

It was #TPT (twitter poker tour www.twitterpokertour.com) night last night on Full Tilt. Ever since winning the first ever TPT, I haven't faired well. Last night was my redemption. Well kind of! I got to heads up with a slight chip lead and then lost a big hand to become short stacked. Doubled up twice getting quad aces on the second hand. Where were they when I had chips. LOL Very happy withg my 2nd place finish good for $41. My account was getting low on Full Tilt so good timing. On Poker Stars played the 50K tournament $3 rebuy tournament. cashed in 575 for $22 for a profit of $10. I like these tournament even though play can be crazy. It depends on table draw. I had a crazy table to start so I just played tight and went all-in with big hands and hope they hold up. If I can get to end of rebuy above 3000 in chips I feel that I have a chance. On Absolute I played the $4 sniper again. I didn't cash but took out 3 players so it was only a $1 loss. I can live with that. Cash play was not so good for me. I was riverd on a huge pot on 2-4 limit and lost $40. Oh well today is a new day. Maybe my son Kyle will play today and win some back for me. Right Kyle! Running bar poker tonight, two games at McCann's. It's the start of a new season for them. I run 16 weeks and then the top 10 play a one table tournament for a Heartland Poker Tour seat. www.heartlandpokertour.com The people that play with me seem to like this. Hopefully someday someone wins big so I can promote that. My kids gave me an Ipod for christmas to use when playing live poker. I finally downloaded some music into it yesterday. Now all I need is to go and play a tournament somewhere. It sounds like a good excuse anyway. Running my Monthly Jr Bowling tournament this sunday in Faribault. Hoping to have a great turn out. It's my donation to the youth of MN. www.cmjtt.com I enjoy doing it and it keeps me involved in a small way with the bowling industry my first love. Sorry Honey! LOL

Poker and a Movie

Last night was an online night for me. I played the 50K $3 rebuy on Stars, the $4 sniper on Absolute and the Cowboy poker league on Tilt. Bubbled in the poker league. Sucked out on in the rebuy (as usual) and cashed for $5 and won 8 rebuys in the sniper. I also watch the movie I love you man on my favorite online site. more later. Over all just a fair day. I was reading some posts about whether online poker is rigged or not. I am not a big stats guy so there is no evidence from me, but I believe that online poker is tlilted towards the house. I play a lot of live poker some free and some buy-ins, but you don't get the massive swings that you get online. I am not saying swings don't happen live it just seems to me that online takes it to the extreme. Even though this is what I believe I will still play online poker. I look at it as entertainment, no different then playing some of the socail network games that are out there. As long as I don't lose too much money and so far I am up a little to date. Back to the movie. I love you man. I thought it was a little boring. Not much of a plot or a script. I would only recommend watching this one on video or better yet free online. Don't forget it's #tpt tonight at 8:00pm central time. go to www.twitterpokertour.com for more info. I am due for a good showing in this one. What do you say Full Tilt!

Casino Trip

Went to the casino at Hinkley on Monday night. I played in a $20 + 5 rebuy tournament. As with most rebuys it was very crazy. Lots of all-ins and lots of rebuys. You have to play rebuys differently then a freeze out. I was pretty much card dead the whole rebuy period and didn't win a hand. That sucks in rebuy! After being knocked out of the tournament, I played the only cash game that was going a 3-6 limit game. My card deadness didn't change. I lost about $50 and decided I needed a break so I went to eat. Later, I came back and there was seat at the same table. My cards finally became better and I was able to walk away $100 up after a couple of hours. So I won all my losses back. I consider that a successful trip.