Time to grow up!

I am starting a new job next week. I will be cooking at the St Cloud Hospital. I am a little over 50 years old and I suppose it was time to grow up and get a big boy job! It's the first job in my working career that offers a full benefit package and 40 hr work weeks. What am I going to do with all the extra time? It does require every other weekend but that is less weekends then in the past. It was a challenge to get this job. Over the years I have applied over 6 times for various positions including other cook positions and this was the first time for an interview. The hardest part of the process was trying to get my immunization records. 40 years ago they didn't keep such great records of such things and it took a blood test to see if I had antibodies in my system for Mumps, Measles & Rubella, which luckily I did or it would have been a 4 week delay to get shots. I am still going to be helping out at the Pizza Ranch for a couple of days a week. I am very grateful to Jackie and Darren for giving me the opportunity to work there for the past 3 1/2 years. I met a lot of great young people that I would have never had the chance to get to know. I'll bet that it was close to 4 or 5 hundred different people under the age of 25 over the time frame. It was fun to watch many of them grow over their time at the Ranch. The only thing that will be a challenge for me is this is the first job that my hours wouldn't be very flexible. No more last minute let's go to the lake or casino trips. They will have to be more planned out, but it seems a small price to pay. I may even get a chance to play some poker occasionally as a lot of my shifts will be early in the day. I guess we will have to wait and see.

The Lederer Files

I have been slowly watching all the parts of the Howard Lederer files on Facebook through Youtube. Thanks to Tony and Matt for posting. There are 7 parts so far and I have watched most of 6 of them. They are about 30 minutes each so it takes a lot of time to watch it all. A few things are apparent real quickly. One Howard is very boring to listen to. He talks in mostly a monotone voice and is trying hard not to look as the bad guy. He clearly has waited until he knew that he was mostly off the hook before coming forward. He talks a lot about what happened and how it happened as he sees it. It is an interesting perspective and I would recommend that any online poker player should watch and learn because what happened to Full Tilt could easily happen to any online site. If I follow correctly, He says that a big part of there lack of funds came from the fact that after the new law regulating the banks that Full Tilt kept giving players there full deposit and allowed them to play even though they were not getting the money from the processing company. So very little money was actually coming in and they were still paying out if players cashed out. I believe him that this was part of the reason, but there has to be more to it. What he doesn't talk about was what he and the other board members were getting from Full Tilt during this time frame. He does say that one point they tried to raise enough money from the board to try and keep the site going, but by then the government was so far into it's investigation that not enough money could be raised to keep Full Tilt alive. So now, Poker Stars owns Full Tilt but isn't required to pay any of the money back. The government has most of the money but why should they give it back. All they have to do is sit back and manage the lawsuits from players that lost the most and settle with them for a small amount. Meanwhile guys like me that had a small amount on the site are out of luck. I had maybe $25, so there is not much of a point in trying to reclaim it. For Poker Stars it's a big win. They buy out there main competitor when the US market opens up again and will have access to all Full Tilt player data base with really paying much of anything. It is a gamble for them if the US market doesn't open back up, but I would think that they know what they are doing and planning for the future. Here is a link to part 1 in case you are interested.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3g1wFJx461U&feature=relmfu

CMPPA Omaha Split

Yesterday was the St Cloud Series of Poker Omaha Hi-low tournament. It is one of my favorite CMPPA events of the year. It played out to be a very interesting tournament. My first table was mostly a solid bunch with a couple of loose cannons, but in Omaha unless the loose canons are catching they don't last long and that is exactly how it played out. The stronger players quickly weeded out the weaker players and we ended up with a table full of good players all with big stacks. The other table meanwhile was very loose and aggressive with that table knocking out most of the players. It even managed to put a few good players on tilt! The biggest wild card at the games was Josh. It was Josh's 1st CMPPA event of the year. Josh is a weak holdem player at best and not very knowledgeable about Omaha, so I expected a quick exit by him. Was I surprised. He managed a final table and finished ahead of my on the money bubble in 5th place. Congrats Josh. The funny thing about his play was that he didn't fold once all day perflop. Think about that. Not one preflop fold. And on most hands he called the turn and the river. I have never seen a stack go up and down as fast as his did. It made for a very challenging final table. At final table I was about average in chip stack, but when you have a player that won't fold it forced me to change how I was playing. Any raises that you would make would be called by Josh and then several players behind would call either because of pot odds or because they just wanted a chance at Josh's chips. In a way the skill was taken away because everyone just started limping most hands and you ended up with 3-4 players to see flop. This changes everything in a split games. It becomes who catches the flops and unfortunately it wasn't me. It didn't take me long to limp off most of my stack. It isn't how I would ever expect to play on a final table. It's just how it played out. In retrospect I just should have tighten way up and played my blinds and waited for Josh to be eliminated, but it's hard to pass up on the chance at free chips. That's the great thing about poker no matter what your style everyone has their day when everything goes right and you do well.

One thing that was very apparent yesterday was how out of poker practice I am. Not that I played poorly, but at how bad I was at reading hands that were turned over. At least I kept the table amused with my miss calls. In fact, it was one of those days when I got it wrong most every time. Omaha split can be a challenge to read the highs and lows, but when you are the tournament director you are suppose to it right most of the time. Glad I could provide comic relief.

Now on to my pet peeve of the day. I got invited to a home game after the CMPPA event last night. It was a $10 buy-in with one rebuy. It sounded like fun as My wife had to work last night and it was my birthday and didn't feel like going home just yet. The game was to start at 8pm. The ordeal to get there is another story (sorry Don), but did manage to arrive right at 8pm. There were lots of cars there and it seemed like everything was a go. This game was to held in the garage and he had a nice setup. I walk in and sit down to wait for the game to start and home owner announces that others had run to get chairs, so it wasn't going to start for a while. Ok, so I will wait. By 8:30 people are still coming and leaving to go eat or get beverages. I have had enough so I leave. I appreciate the invite to the home game, but please when you tell me to be there at 8pm don't start at 9pm. In this day of busy lives there is a lot I could have done in that hour and then arrived at 9pm. Also you are running a rebuy tournament, there were plenty of players there at 8pm to start and the others could have joined as they arrived. This is a big reason that I rarely play in home games or run them for that matter. I am a person if you tell me to be there at a certain time that's when I will be there.

Congratulation to Dustin on another CMPPA win in impressive style winning with quad queens on the last hand. Someday maybe I will win one!

St Cloud Series Event #1

This took a while but finally a little time to blog. Last months SCSOP event was a very fun and classic bar poker game. I played well all day and then made one mistake and It cost me my tournament. Chalk it up to another hard poker lesson. I had decided to play very tight aggressive in this event and that is basically how I played but my cards ran so good for the first 2 hrs that it looked as if I was playing hyper aggressive. It is funny how one player can change the whole way a table plays. Most of you know Carlos and I am not going to use code names for this story. Carlos was an hour late for this event and as the tables worked out he ended up at the table next to me. Now I didn't play many hands with him and he didn't get many of my chips, but he did change the outcome of my tournament. Carlos won several big pots when he first got to the table and amassed a big chip stack. I had been close to the chip leader the whole time. When Carlos has chips he opens his already lose game up even more and he extra loose at this point basically playing every hand and in his situation I probably would have played the same. Blinds are 100-200 and I have over 14,000 in chips. I am small blind and pot is raised and then reraised by another very loose aggressive player that usually has nothing when he raises. Person in front of Carlos calls and of course Carlos calls. I look down to 3-4 off suit. It's only 400 more and I sure that there is going to be at least 2 callers behind me and guy that reaised would never reraise. I figure see flop and then fold. Flop is 3-4-6 two diamonds. I am not putting anyone on 2-5 or 5-7 so I check to make a reraise. There is a pretty big bet and Carlos calls, so I move all in to try and get rid of at least one if not everyone. A couple fold and then it gets back to bettor and he insta calls, so I figure he has an over pair. Carlos thinks for like 5 minutes and then folds. Guy turns over 6-9 of diamonds. So he has top pair and a flush draw. Really! Reraise preflop with 6-9 suited and then call off almost all your chips with a draw. I am not sure of the odds here but depending on the diamond situation of other players he may have been close to 50-50. Turn of course is a diamond and my day is over. It was a poor play by me playing the 3-4 to start with but when you add someone like Carlos to a table it forces other to play more aggressive and it increases the pot odds to stay in hands. Had there been a raise and a reraise and no one else when it got to me I fold and am still alive. Now, Carlos did end up 2nd in tournament and I am not knocking how he played. I just need to learn to adjust my game even more for players with that same style of play. I will say that when he got heads up that instead of getting more aggressive he got really tight and it cost him the tournament. He did lose one big hand that he was drawn out on but he should have had a big chip lead at that point and was barely ahead to survive. Any congrats to Rod on his 1st CMPPA title. You played well and won all the big pots at the right time. Next is Omaha Split my favorite game so hopefully I will have something good to blog about next!

Blog Response

So, my blog yesterday created quite a discussion on Facebook yesterday. I'm glad at least someone is reading them. It's about my comments on the half point for non customers on Monday, Wednesday & Thursday nights at the Ultimate. As it was quickly brought to my attention, " We don't do that on Friday nights" by the Friday tournament director. My question is why not? As a former bar owner, I would not have wanted non customers to knock customers out and have them leave my business. If I saw this happening I would have had a private conversation with the non customer and asked to please start purchasing or don't come back. It was also brought to my attention that I had many such players when I ran games. There is a big difference between running games and owning the bar where the games are played. At McCann's, I had many conversations with Wendell about non customers and he was more looking at the numbers of players and figured more players was better then less even if they didn't spend money. Do I agree with this statement. Yes and No. First of all the bar poker industry has changed a lot since I owned a bar. I am guessing that if I still owned GB or South that there would only be one poker game at each place per week just purely on a numbers game. I was once told by a Marketing Guy that for every $10 you spend on a promo that the minimum return should be $100 in sales. So if a promo costs $100 which is close to the average bar poker game these days you would need $1000 in sale to justify the promo and that is only the minimum. There is the car in parking lot factor. If your parking lot is fuller it is more likely that someone driving by will stop and see what is going on. How many times have you gone to a bar that has an empty parking lot? Anyway if you have 50 players at your game which most local bar games do not get anymore they would have to spend an average of $20 each for you to hit your minimum to justify the promotion. The other comment was about about the Ultimate having the longest running games and I couldn't agree more. The Monday game at the Ultimate is the longest running bar poker game in MN as it was the original game that got the whole law changed in the first place and their biggest game the Friday one was also a GB game that got transferred when the new owners of the bowling centers couldn't justify running games anymore and believe me if the new owners would have been making lots of money on Bar Poker they would have kept the games going. I hope the bars keep running bar poker games as I love to go and play when I can, but most have moved them to nights of the week where there are only hoping to break even or make a small profit. Very few will give up prime time such as Friday and Saturday nights to actually try and profit from the promotion. I have been trying to help Dustin find a new home for his Saturday game and it has been very difficult. It has as much to do with the reputation of bar poker in the St Cloud area as it has to do with anything. I don't mean that in a negative way towards players, I just mean that the way bar owners think of it. Even the Casinos are having a tough time making a go of it, as management of Casinos continue to close and cut back hours of poker rooms. Bar Poker has evolved a lot in the past 8 years and it will have to continue to evolve if it intends to survive.

I'm back!

It seems forever since my last blog and that may be because it has been over a month. In that time frame I have played poker one time with a very respectable finish at the Ultimate. Of course the big news since my last blog is the closing of McCann's and the lose of three games a week in St Cloud. I always saw the closing of McCann's as enviable but was hoping for the them to keep going. They have been a great support for the CMPPA and the chance to play their will be missed. A big thank you and good luck to Wendell & Matt in their future endeavors. This really leaves a hole in the St Cloud bar poker market with not a lot of hope for someone to step and replace those lost games. There is still the Ultimate but he is not very committed to poker and will with any excuse cancel or change the payout of his games. The most ridiculous new rule there is the if you don't purchase anything you only get half of the points or prize money. I do understand why he wants to do this but I believe that he is going about it all wrong. He is encouraging players to not buy anything. I say if they don't purchase anything just give the tournament director the authority to kick that person out of the bar. Plain and simple. No purchase no play! Why as a bar owner would you want a non customer to be knocking out paying customers from your game. They just cost you money. Kick them out! A bar owner has the right to refuse service to anyone. Use that right! Anyway back to McCann's loss.

What does this mean to the CMPPA.

 Mostly we have lost our main sponsor and location to play. We can't trust that the Ultimate will follow through with allowing us to play there as he has already cancelled twice in the past. The Clearwater Legion will allow us to play there but it's hard to run events such as the St Cloud Series of Poker, which begins this month, and not play any of them in St Cloud. I am looking into possible other places but it's hard to get a commitment from others for Saturdays and we will need a place for two days for the main event. If anyone has ideas, please let me know through comments on blog or through my facebook page.

St Cloud Series of Poker

Begins on August 18th at noon at the Clearwater Legion with no limit holdem. The board of the CMPPA has decided that one month memberships maybe purchased for only $10 or you can purchase a rest of the year membership for only $35. The other events include Omaha Split, HORSE & a two day Main Event. For more info go to www.cmppa.com

Epic & Heartland Poker sale

A couple of weeks ago Federated Sports & Gaming was auctioned off from it's bankrupcy. It's assets included the Epic Poker League and Heartland Poker Tour. If you are a follow my blogs you know that I said from the beginning that this was not a good thing for the HPT to be bought out. Pinnicle Entertainment is now the new owners beating out several other potential buyers. If you read the court documents that have been released it states that the original owners of the HPT may be charged with fraud because of part of the payments from FS&G. Here is a link to article written by PokerNews http://www.pokernews.com/news/2012/06/epic-poker-league-heartland-poker-tour-acquired-by-pinnacle-12866.htm. Even though the HPT continues to run tournaments all over the country, there is no way that all this will not have a negative effect on it's future. What started out as two guys from Fargo's dream has turned into a financial and legal mess that will probably cost them everything. From my own experience once you have to get lawyers involved it will get very costly. I have always liked the original HPT guys and wish them the best, but am afraid it will not come out good for them as they are facing off with companies with deep pockets and nothing to lose. It's too bad, had they just stayed as smaller Midwest events instead of wanting to become the second coming of the World Poker Tour they would not be in current situation. Look how quickly the Mid-Sates Poker Tour has grown replacing them by providing the same tournaments with better structures and more of a chance for the local Casinos to profit. I just hope the owners the MSPT don't get greedy and forget the MN poker players that got them to where they are today as the HPT did.

Excited to play again!

Finally after almost months of no poker playing, I get off work early enough to go and play a bar game at McCann's. I am kind of excited. I get there and order a beer and a burger basket. I am planning on playing tight aggressive as I want the night to last for a while. Blinds are at 50-100 and just got to that level. I was a little late and also had to wait for a spot to open up. I get my place and my food arrives. I fold the first few hands and then call a preflop raise and fold on the river as my draws don't pan out. I am in later position and look down to see aces. Two limpers in ahead of me so I raise to 400. Small blind calls. I get reraised to 1200 by big blind. Two limpers insta call. I move all in for 3000 over the 1200. Big blind instantly move all in over the top. First limper insta calls. The other limper is unhappy but figures he is priced in so call for most of his chips. I figure the reraiser has Kings or Ace-King. Flop comes K-6-4. First limper moves all in. Now I am hoping he has A-K also. Other limper decides there is too much in pot to fold and calls the all in and leaves himself with 300 chips. Q on turn and 3 on river. The rerasier turns over K-J off. First limper has a set of 6's and last limper calls with a pair ofd 3's and hits river and still loses. So, I am out. Figures, I really want to play and I get donked out. Now , you may ask why I say that when I ended up with the 3rd best hand. Look at how this hand played out. I made a normal size raise with my aces. I then get reraised by K-J off with myself and 3 others in the pot. I have no choice but to move all in to try and get rid of players which of course doesn't work in bar poker. What could the K-J possibly be thinking with a reraise. He think he has the best hand! He think a small raise of 800 is going to get rid of other players. No he's just a dipshit that thinks K-J off is a monster hand. Had he just called the 400 raise instead of reraising with nothing. I am probably able to lay down my aces down as he would be first to bet and he would have because he has K-J off for gods sake. The 6's would have moved all in. The 3's would have folded. I would have thought about it a while and realized I was behind and folded. I would have lived on to play another hand and who knows from there what can happen. Instead I gobble down my burger and head home scratching my head as to why I ever play bar poker.

The past few weeks

It's been another busy few weeks. Working a lot and trying to get lake place ready for summer. Ran my year end Jr. Bowling tournament for the CMJTT and SMJTT a couple of weeks ago to make for the end of another successful tournament tour. Was a little surprised to only have 25 out of a total of 53 that could have bowled, but it went well and 16 of the 25 took home scholarship money. The rest just missed out. In the lower average division we paid 8 out of 11. Not a bad percentage. Work has been busy and it seems that I have been working a lot of 12 hour shift. I don't mind them but it is getting harder on my old body. It is not looking like I am going to get to play any poker anytime soon. In a couple of weeks is the annual CMPPA heads up tournament, but I will only be there long enough to get it started as I have to work all day. Trying to decide if I should go fishing today, but can't seem to make up my mind. It seems to the norm lately. Not sure if it's an old age thing or if I am just getting bored. I did have a nice time last weekend when my wife and I were joined by my son and his girlfriend for the Night Ranger - 38 Special concert at Jackpot Junction. The concert was excellent with Night Ranger being the best part. I also managed to win a few bucks at the casino so it made for a fun trip. Enough so that we are going to a Foreigner concert in July at Grand Casino Milacs. That's a little catch up on wants been going on lately. I am hoping soon that I will be at the lake so much that I don't have any time for blogs, but you know how that goes.

Blog update

Sorry, it's been a while again with blog writing. The spring is always a tough time of the year to make time for the computer as I am opening up the lake place and trying to get as much work done there as possible so I can spend most of the summer just having fun and fishing. Haven't played much poker and honestly haven't missed it much. There is a CMPPA event this coming weekend that I will be running to start but then have to go to work later in the day. I am starting to wonder if some of the things that I run in my life are really worth it. The CMPPA seemed like a good idea when I formed it, but that was when I was running 2-3 bar games a week. Now, with membership down, I am just not sure if it is still worth my time. Making an organization like the CMPPA work requires a lot of effort and I am not sure that if I don't put that effort in that anyone else will. I am grateful for the help that all the CMPPA board members give me but what is missing is me being at local bar games promoting the CMPPA and I just can't do that anymore. I am not ready to give up yet, but my feeling is that next year maybe the last year of the CMPPA. I also run several youth bowling tournaments that has grown to a north and southern MN divisions thanks to my daughter Kara. But, my end of the tournaments the Central MN Jr Traveling Tournament is dwindling mostly due to the fact that I am not in any of the bowling centers anymore to be able to promote it. It also doesn't help that most of the local centers here hardly even have a Jr bowling program anymore. Next season is the 10th anniversary of the CMJTT and I plan on running events here in Central MN, but that might be the end of it. I guess that I just might be getting tried of all the donations of my time that doesn't seem to matter to anyone else but me.

CMPPA Team Event

This past weekend was the CMPPA annual Team Tournament. Easily the most fun event of the year. As I am not playing as much bar poker any more it was difficult to come with a team this year. My first player was easy. I asked a guy that is a solid player and he said yes, so one down. I was having trouble with the other when I saw a guy I thought might be another solid player. I asked him and he also said yes. How'd it turn out you might ask. Well, we first out in limit Holdem. Now, I don't blame my partner that got taken out as he had a full house and ran into quads. In omaha we had fairly quick exit also, but I am part to blame for this as I consider myself a good Omaha player but was mostly card dead during my times at the game. Now in No Limit we actually had a chance to win. I more then doubled us up early to give us a giant stack and command of the table. Unfortunately our weak link showed up in the later rounds and we ended getting knocked out in fifth place. It was still a fun day and I have at least half of a team for next year. There were several interesting things that happened during the day. The limit tournament was won by one of the weakest teams playing. It just goes to show that because it was a limit game, this team was never able early as in the other games to be forced to put all their chips in because of the limits with not that good of hands. It just confirms that poker is as much a game of luck as it is of skill. The other interesting thing is that Omaha was won by a team that had one player that had no idea how to play Omaha and won many pots not even knowing what she had. Lastly, we ended up with a tie for the overall champions. What I did was track each team as they were knocked out of each tournament by place and then added them together and the low total is the winner. Each team totaled 13 points. I decided to do a heads up playoff with each team changing players every 5 minutes. It was a fun heads up and lasted almost an hour. In the end the better team ended up winning, of course that is my opinion. Congrats to Shank, Redfish & Tiny (team Any Two Cards) on their win. It was good to see Redfish as he doesn't play that much bar poker anymore. He was a former partner in many of my past poker ventours. At least now he will have to come and play next year as defending champions.

Vacation

I haven't had much to talk about lately after having taken a really nice two week vacation to California and then cruising to Mexico, but here goes anyway. I did get a chance one night on cruise to play some 1-2 no limit cash game. On cruise ships they use the Poker Pro tables that are electronic with no dealer. It kind of like playing online but with the players right in front of you, so you can get tells. I watched for quite a while before playing and it clearly was a no foldem game, but I knew that going in. I put in $100 which was probably a too little for the pot sizes but that was what I was willing to lose. Every hand was raised preflop from $7 to $12 and  most players called. I had decided to play very tight and try and win a few big pots and get out. My first hand that I played was QQ. I raised to $12 and got two callers. Flop was all unders. I fired out $25 and got two callers. Turn is a K. Lady bets out. I fold. Hand plays out until end. She has K-J and other guy has 8's and calls all the way with second pair. Down $37. A few hands later, I am big blind for $2. It is raised to $7. I have KQ, so I make the call. Flop is K-Q-10. I push all in for my last $64 and get two callers. Turn is a small card and river is a J. I'm done. Same lady bets out on river other guy calls. Lady shows A-5 and other guy has K-5. So, lady calls $64 with Ace high and a gut shot draw and hits and other guy call with top pair and a 5 kicker. What did they think I had? That was the end of my cruise card playing. If I had brought a $1000 with me to play poker, I think I could have won a lot of money. But, I was on vacation and didn't really want to spend it playing cards.

                                              6 Corona's and Chips & Salsa for $10!

My hyper aggressive play continues to work well for me. It creates lots of table tilt and seems to work well for bar poker games. It's the chip big or go home mentality.

CMPPA Team event today. That should give something new to blog about.

Disturbing Bar Poker Trend

I have noticed a trend the last few times that I played bar poker that is kind of disturbing to me. It is the chop at the end of the tournament. Now, in real cash tournaments I understand the reason for chopping and have done it on several occasions. The blinds become so high that it just comes down to who gets the cards or gets lucky at the end. In most cash tournaments, it makes sense when you get down to 3-4 players. In bar poker at most games you are playing for small prizes and points that you accumulate to try and move on to bigger tournaments to try and win bigger prizes. In many of these games there is a big difference between 1st and 2nd in point values. Most of these chops occur when you get to heads up. Now, I'm not against you chopping the prizes. I am just against including who gets first in this discussion. If two players make it to heads up and one player is playing for points and the other maybe only plays once in a while and doesn't care about the points. The discussion can go. I will give you the prize money if you give me the points for 1st. I don't see this is good for the integraty of the game. Those ill gotten points could make the difference between someone making the next level or how many chips they get at the next tournament. It just doesn't seem fair to me. When I ran games, I never let it happen. Can you imagine how it would look an TV if when they got to heads up at the WSOP and the announcer says. The two players left have decided to share in the final prizes with one player getting 35% and taking the win and the other gets 65% and is the runner up. It wouldn't make for very good television. The part that is forgotten is that most bar players rarely get to play heads up and most can't adjust their game to the different style that is required. So, if you rarely get to heads up why wouldn't you want to play it out just for the experience of doing it alone. It is very difficult to simulate heads up when the blinds are high so just do it. I know it's late, your both tired and the tournament director probably wants to go home, but for your and the games best interest just play it out!

BlackJack!

Friday night I got off work early enough to go and play the game at McCann's. Now Friday can be a little crazy and this was no different. I decided to not play the out and out aggression but instead use a controlled and calculated aggression. I got my table and two good players to my left and the rest of the table was at best description loose cannons. I won a few pots early with some good starting hands and was early chip leader on the table. I then got into a hand with one of the good players on the table. Pot was raised preflop by a weaker player so I called with a suited king. I ended up flopping what I thought was a flush draw, straight draw and what I figured were two over cards. Good player bet out and I reraised. He came over the top all in. I figured I was close to 50-50 and maybe even a slight favorite and it was not all my chips so I called. Ended up rivering the flush and winning a big pot taking out oen of the good players. A little later the other good player makes a strange move and pushes all in blind under the gun for 2500 with blinds at 75-150. I look at him and laugh. Maybe I should call blind. So I do. Everyone else folds and he flips over 2-2. I am thinking at least I got overs. I then turn over JJ LOL! They hold up and I win. What's the odds of two blind all in to both have a pocket pair. There are still alternates in the tournament and he comes a very intoxicated and very load older guy. He is really annoying and it is clear that he is going to play every hand until out. I decide to walk away from the table and just be at table to see cards and fold until this guy is out. He lost about half his chips in the 1st two hands. On the 3rd hand I look down at 8-8. His is first to act and pushes all his chips in and turns up his cards A-10 and yells out BLACKJACK! I never laughed so hard in my life. I called and everyone else folds. Cards run out and my eights hold up. Guy still doesn't understand why his blackjack didn't get paid off. He finally leaves table and we are all still laughing. I then continue my domination of the table. I make final table and have the whole final table covered. Unfortunately, at the final I finally went card dead, but did manage a 3rd place finish and some a free meal for the next days tournament. I was very happy with how my style of play worked out and will have to do some more research into it and it's viability to my game.
The next day was the 1st CMPPA members only event and I started off with good cards that were always second best and ended up short stacked early after not being able to bet a player off of his ace. We both had an ace but he had me out kicked. I probably should have just called and taken the loss but thought I might be able to bet him off. Anyway it ended up to be an early exit for me, but I was happy with the way I played non the less. During the six o'clock game the Blackjack guy ends up sitting on my right. He is dealer so I deal for him. He ends up calling an all in on the flop with 5-2 off which is all undercards to the board to double a really bad player up 1st hand, but at least he only lasted one hand this time.

Ski Weekend

It was a nice weekend for a getaway. Got up early on Saturday and headed to Rochester. It was definitely winter on Sat. with temps in the low numbers with lots of wind. Had lunch at John Hardy's BBQ. If you are ever in Rochester you need to try it out. It should be on Diners, Drive-in and Dives. It don't look like much, but the food is excellent. Go for the pulled pork or ribs. After lunch, of course, we had to go to the Goodwill and they had red tags at 50% off. If you don't go to goodwill you wouldn't understand, but they almost never discount their red tag stuff as it things that they have purchased from Target. So, it's new products. It's a good thing we brought the van because it got filled. LOL! Next we headed downtown to where they had an Ice Bar setup. Now it's sounds like fun but with the temp at 0 and winds 20-30 mph it was cold, so we headed to a local bar and watch from warm comfort with a pint of Burly Brown Ale. We did walk back through the Ice Bar and it was really cool, but I just couldn't get into over paying for a drink in an Ice glass and freeze my tail off at the same time. Headed back to Kara's for a fun evening playing games and enjoying a few cocktails. Sunday it was much warmer, so we headed to Welsh Village for afternoon of skiing. I haven't been to Welsh Village since I was in high school, so let's say 30 years. Anyway it was much nicer and bigger then it was back then. The day turned out beautiful with sun and temps in the 30's. Surprisingly, with the lack of snow and weather that we have had the place was in great shape and we have a really good time. Will go back for sure. My funny story of the day is I was riding one of the lifts and we were taking to the guy we were riding with and got to the top to get off and as I was jumping off the chair caught me in the butt and started lifting me up, so it was either jump off or ride down again, so I jump and end up flat on my back. Someone should have had a video because I am sure it would have been funny. As Welsh is only a few miles from Treasure Island we had to make a stop. We are driving to the Casino and we go through a small town that's has a mom and pop bar so we had to stop. Behind the bar is the owner an older woman that had owned the bar for over 30 years. She was fun to talk to but it was one of those bars that when you walk in everyone stops what they are doing and stares at you as you come in. It even had a dog walking around and served Elk burgers. I didn't lose any money at the Casino and didn't hurt anything skiing, so it was a good day. Long drive home on Monday as it snowed south of the cities and people just aren't used to driving in snow this year. Was happy to see no snow north of Maple Grove as it was a stressful drive up till then.

The CMPPA ran a Ladies only poker event while I was gone on Saturday. We had 14 women show up which was a little disappointing, but it sounds as if they had a good time, so will have to try again next year. This weekend is the first member event of the year, so hopefully, I will have another poker blog soon.

Happy Valentine's Day!

Super Bowl

So, another Super Bowl has come and gone. My wife and I started a new tradition a few years ago and we stay home and watch the game and make appetizers. Well, to be truthful we actually watch for the commercials. The game was one of the better ones and you all know what went on with it. My only comment is when the Giants scored the last touchdown and everyone was saying why didn't he just fall down on one yard line. I say get the touchdown. I would rather be four or five points ahead with less then a minute and rely on defense then wait until last second and be behind and rely on a field goal to win. There is just too much that can go wrong. Bad snap or a block and you lose. I think they did the right thing by scoring. Now on to the commercials. I thought they were some of the best from the past few years. It's obvious the car companies must be doing well again as almost everyone had a commercial and Hyundia must have had 4 or 5. There were many favorites. The best two in a row was the Pepsi Elton John and then the Hyundia Cheetah. The one that made me laugh the most was the baby in the sling Doritos commercial. But over all the commercials were just as good as the game and the apps. We had a great cheese dip and Debbie made a bacon wrapped little sizzlers that were awesome. In fact, we had so much food that we didn't even heat it all up.

TGIF

Have had a chance to play some poker again the last two Fridays. McCann's Friday game is maybe the weakest bar game that I have ever played. It truely is no foldem holdem. I again continued with my aggressive play building a big stack the first week. It is amazing how many times that you can out flop someone just by playing lots of hands. Then last night I ran into the curse of aggressive play. I started the night with 4 pocket pairs and several big face card hands in the first 10 hands and didn't win a single hand in the process losing most of my chips. One of my last hands I had pocket 7's. The hand played out strange with a preflop raise by me and a reraise and then still 5 callers. Flop was A-4-3 rainbow. Reraiser was last to act so everyone checked to him and he did too. Turn was a 6. I check and another player bets out a relatively small bet to pot size. Everyone else folds to me. I decide to call and see what happens. River is another 6. Player bets out 2850 which is enough to put me all in. I think about how this played out. He was small blind. He could have called with a weak Ace, but I am thinking he more then likely has a 3 or 4. He is a player that would carry a bluff the whole way. I am like 95% sure that I have the best hand and should have called but decided that I wasn't ready to leave yet so I folded in case he had an ace or 6. He told me he had King high and I believe him. My read was right I just wasn't able to pull the trigger on it as it was all my chips. A little later I was knocked out, so now I know that I should have called and even if I was knocked out it wouldn't have changed my tournament outcome. Another bar poker lesson learned. I then went over to the Ultimate for their late game. I sat down on my table it made the McCann's game look pretty good. Not one real player on the table. Can you say Donkey! A few hands into to tournament, I am big blind with JJ. The pot was raised and there were many callers, so I reraise to try and get some people out. Yea, right! Everyone called, Flop is K-K-6. It gets checked around. Turn is a 2. Original raiser bets about half his chips. Everyone else folds to me. I am sure that he doesn't have a King because he would have bet flop. He has a pair of some kind, but how big. I decide to push him all in and take my chances. He calls and turns over aces. I lose most of my chips. Push in a few hands later and lose again. I still like the aggressive play, but now need to tailor it a little to find my happy medium. It was still a fun night. Beer was really good as it always is at McCann's and didn't last long enough to over pay for one at the Ultimate. Made it home in plenty of time to work on my Sliders marathon!

Bad Beat on Cancer Event

Last weekend was the 3rd annual Jim Wang Bad Beat on Cancer Charity event sponsored by the CMPPA and McCann's. It was another successful event with almost $1200 raised for the American Cancer Society. Thanks to all that helped make it possible. All the board members of the CMPPA, Wendell at McCann's, Ron Miller and anyone else that donated to the silent auction. We had 65 entries for tournament and almost all donated an extra $5 to the cause. This we added a raffle that was run by Jeff Determan and it raised a nice chunk of change. Thanks Jeff! The big winner was Tannia Peterson that won a one year membership into the CMPPA. Congrats and welcome. CMPPA member Scott Foster was the poker tournament winner getting his 2012 membership paid for and $50 cash. Second was Herman Musil good for $50 cash and $20 Mills Fleet Farm card. Third was Shelly Habiger for $25 cash. Fourth was Dan Ascher and fifth was Matt Wolfe. Congrats to all. I did manage a 6th place bubble boy finish good for a really ugly bowling trophy and a $10 Summerland certificate. I had a really good poker day as I continued my aggressive play and built a nice size stack. It helped a lot because late in the tournament I was mostly card dead and folding. The final table overall was well played except for the women that got 3rd place. She spent the day sucking out and people and then went super tight on the final table. One of the hands involved the second place finisher who was all in on the button for 17,000. Shelly was big blind for 6000 with a really big stack and folded. She shows pocket 3's. We all are shocked. How can you fold a pocket pair heads up on final table for such a little amount. She announces that she is not going to just give her chips away. Now she may not have won the hand, but she had over 2-1 odds to make call and if she takes the guy out I make the prizes so I am not happy. I ask her if she thinks she can fold her way to the win. Others continue to give her a hard time and she does basically fold her way to 3rd and never had a chance to win the tournament. I played all day with the winner Scott and he played a great tournament and deserved to win. We have two up coming events for the CMPPA for February. On Sat. the 11th we will host our 1st ever Women's only open event and then on the 18th is the 1st members only holdem event. Hope to see you all there!

I do also need to apologize about my last post. I didn't realize that the FPN had changed their State Tournaments and now play down to an actual champion. So she actually was the state champion and I stand corrected.

State Champion

This weekend was the 3rd annual Jim Wang Bad Beat on Cancer event. We had 65 people for the tournament and raised close to $1200 for the American Cancer Society. It was a fun event and I even managed to make final table and bubble the prizes, but that another blog. Before I go on with my blog, I am going to make a disclaimer. I am a big fan of the Free Poker Network and what they have created for the MN bar poker players. In no way is this intended to be about their organization. That said here is an incident from the tournament.
I had a really good run in the Charity event this past weekend. I continued with my aggressive play and build a large stack and was able to run most of the table over. It created a lot of tilt by the players on the table. A little later in the tournament when we broke to 2 tables a women from Wilmar was moved to my table across from me. She had clearly been drinking a lot and I immediately started raising her and playing hands she was involved in. She was not very happy about all the raising but that's what I do when I have a big stack. She was wearing a FPN sweatshirt and kept making comments about being a state champion. It was mostly bragging, but a lot had to do with the alcohol. As I stated above I have a lot of respect for the FPN and what they have built, but what does it really mean to be State Champion. The FPN has a system that starts at the local level with a certain amount of weeks of qualifying, then the top person advances to state tournament and the top so many advance to a regional tournament. Ultimately all these tournaments are qualifiers to try and advance to the National event in hope to win cash and or poker tournament buy ins. It's a system that most bar poker leagues use. One of the different things about the FPN is they allow players to win extra chips and to start with double stacks. Now I have played in many poker tournaments at casinos all over the country and I have never played a tournament that some players started with double stacks. It kind of happens in rebuy tournaments but then all players have the option of buying in for the same stack. I find it unfair that you are able to start in any of those tournaments with more chips then others. You are all playing for the same prize, why not start out equal and let the best or luckiest player win. I understand why they are doing it, but don't see it as a fair tournament. Now back to the statement. Now I am very happy for her for making it to the national tournament and having a chance to win a big prize, but you are not a state champion. You are only a national qualifier. These tournaments are not played down to a winner. They are just played until the amount of players left advance. Calling these qualifiers state champions is like calling all the regional winners of a State High School tournament state champions, but they do play it out and declare a real state champion. A poker tournament that you are playing just to qualify requires a totally different strategy then when you try and win it. It's my biggest peeve with the free poker system. We are teaching players to qualify, but not how to win poker tournaments. So, good luck to all you national qualifiers and when you actually win the national event, then I will consider you a FPN champion.

Boulders Tap House

My wife and I went to the new restaurant in town last night. Boulders Tap House opened up on Monday in the old Timberlodge building. Their premise is a burger and wing joint with 41 different tap beers. They have lots of TV's and are going for a Buffalo Wild Wings kind of feel. What surprised me the most was how little of a change that was made from the old Timberlodge. They kept most of the interior layout and just added new carpet and seating. It looks good and I am sure will do very well. We tried a couple of different beers and both were excellent. The burger was very good and was about normal price for the area. We also tried a couple of orders of boneless wings and I thought they were a little small. We tried two different sauces that were higher up on their hot scale. Both were good but not really very hot which was ok by me. The only bad thing was there was a hair in my wings and when I showed the server she apologized and that was it. I didn't see any managers running around and the table next to use had some kind of problem too and received something free. The place is owned by the same company that owns Grizzlys and I think that Grizzlys has better burgers. I am sure that I will go back to this restaurant but it's not as good as I had hoped. If they have a great happy hour once they are through there opening stage that would help with me decision to return more often. You will ahve to give it a try and let me know what you think.

SOPA

Yesterday was the big Internet push about the proposed government bills SOPA & PIPA to restrict Americans access to certain Internet sites. A lot of this comes from the music industry wanting to stop the illegal downloading of their products costing them millions of dollars. I do get that. The problem is the bill goes much deeper then just the music industry and is certainly a 1st amendment issue. Part of the issue is who is at fault with such sites. Let's start with online gambling. If it is illegal in MN to play online poker and I make the decision to play on a site. Is it the sites fault for allowing me to play or is it my fault for doing something that I think maybe illegal. The same applies to online music sites that allow people to upload and download songs or movies. Are they to blame for setting up the site or are you for using the site. I think it is hard to differentiate. These bills certainly would affect many other sites that are not doing anything wrong. Imange not being able to use Wikipedia just because they have information on them about a site deemed illegal by our government. All seach engines such as Goggle would also be affected because they lead us to these sites. Now I don't claim to understand how the whole bills would work but this Brit has very good explaination of why we should be worried. Here is a youyube link.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JhwuXNv8fJM&feature=youtu.be&hd=1

With all that our government has on its plate, don't they have better things to worry about then censoring the internet, such as trying to figure out a way to get sales taxes out all the internet sales. That makes a lot more sense to me. It's just not fair that an internet company can sell products and not pay any sales taxes and the CMPPA which is basically a non profit business has to pay sales tax on every membership collected. I try with this blog to stay out of politics but felt that this was a big enough issue to bring it up. Take all the information available and make your own decision.

Ultimate Wednesday

I finally had time to go and play poker again last night. My only option on Wed. is the Ultimate Sports Bar. Not my favorite place to play, mostly because the drinks are so high. I continued my very aggressive play. I folded 3 times preflop in the 1st hour. What I really like about this play is it puts people on tilt when you turn over your hand and rake a pot. For the first time in a long time I was running very hot. Ended the 1st break 1000 ahead and except for losing one big hand played very solid. They were several very predictable players on my table, so it make playing much easier. The hand that really made my stack was about half way through the 2nd hour. I had A-7 in the big blind. It was raised maybe 4 times the big blind by a player that either had two big cards or a bigger pair, so I was going to play carefully. Ended up with another caller. Flop was 7-6-3 two suited cards. I check and orginal bettor puts out a less then pot size bet. I am thinking he has an over pair to me, but he would also make a continuation bet with A-K, so I call. Player behind me raises all in. Bettor folds. I think about it for a while. I can't really figure what he could have. A small set maybe. I don't think he has 4-5. I decide to call which puts me all in. I think he has A-7 like me or maybe something like A-6 or K-7. He turns up 3-6 offsuit for two pair. LOL! He limped in per flop with 3-6 off and then called the raise. I'm in trouble. Turn is a another 3 giving him a full house. River is a 7 giving me a bigger full house. I hit my two outer. That stuff doesn't usually happen to me, but I will take it when it does. I then went on a streak of calling all ins with the worst hand and keep winning. Where is the big buy tournament when this happens. Make the final table. Now down to 4 players and they are paying 3 spots. I am small blind with Q-4 suited when big blind raises. I call thinking that the big blind would also call because he usually does and he was short stacked. Flop is Q-4-8. I bet out. I get reraised a lot. I am 99% sure that I have the best hand. He must have AA or KK. There is an outside chance he has a set but I think AA or KK. This player and I have about the same size stack and we are way ahead of the other two players. I am supposed to move all in at this point and he would have to call. I look at the other stacks. One player is very short. I will call him cheater Mike. I am deciding what I should do and then realize if I move all in and win or even if I lose it's going to put cheater Mike into the money. I decide to fold because I don't want him to fold his way into the cash. I say fold and turn up my two pair. Other player turns up KK and says how can you fold. I then tell him the only reason was so that cheater Mike would not make the money and he laughs and says I understand totally. A few hands later cheater Mike goes out in 4th place and I make the money. I end up going out in 3rd. If I had won the hand with 2 pair I probably would have won tournament, but you know what. I am ok with that.

Weird Weather

Yesterday it snowed 10" in parts of Texas and here in St Cloud it was a record 49 degrees. I was outside working on my garage in a sweatshirt. Today is going to be another record temp day and then the cold might set in. It's hard to believe that it's January 10th. I'm not complaining but what happened to this being another very snowy year in MN. When I took my dock out on Lake Miltona in the fall the water level was on the low side. If we don't get some snow and or rain soon I might not even be able to land any of my boats. I just feel sorry for businesses that rely on snow. Think about ski places, resorts for fishing or snowmobiling, and people that plow snow for a living. In this tough economic times this maybe what puts them out of business. I have enjoyed the weather but I think the downside  far out ways the plus side of no snow in MN.

Greater MN Traveling Tournament

Back in 1994 I started an annual traveling tournament, that was for friends and family to get together and bowl and have a great time. Over the years it turned into the Greater MN Traveling Tournament. The concept was designed by me and ran most years by myself, my sister and her husband. There have been many a fun times had at these events. The tournament consisted of a singles, double and team event with sign up that day and payout the same day. There have been poker tournaments and much drinking involved with many of these events. 4 years ago when when I got out of the bowling business, I stopped being involved with the events. My brother has continued running the events. No one has ever asked me if it was ok to keep running these events without me or asked about using the name. In fact, I have never been invited to participate. Maybe I am just being a little defensive about the whole thing, but I also started a yearly golf event back in 1991 that has continued on without me also. I just feel that it isn't quite right for these events to continue without at least a name change or to stop say it's the 19th annual when in actuality it's maybe the 4th year in it's current state. I suppose that I could start running my own events again and stop whining about it, but don't really have the interest. It just bothers me that these events continue without even an ounce of thought about where these events came from and if I hadn't started them they wouldn't even be in existence today.

Sad State of Bowling in St Cloud

Sorry to all you poker guys, but this is another bowling post. Another bowling center has closed down in the St Cloud area. It's not much of a surprise to see Vilo Lanes in Waite Park close as it has been on the brink for many years. This leaves 3 center in the area market not including the game room at the college. Great River Bowl, Southway Bowl and El Paso Lanes in St Joe. El Paso even though it has bowling lanes is really a bar that happens to have lanes in it. They are uncared for and haven't been modernized since the 60's. It has a small mix of league bowlers and is rarely open for open bowlers. Southway is the combination of Granite Bowls and from what I hear most league bowlers are waiting for a chance to move to Great River. Great River continues to lead the way with the nicest center in the area, but seems to be spending it's time increasing bar and restaurant business instead of concentrating on it's bowling business. Where does that leave the bowlers of St Cloud. Excuse the language but it seems appropriate here. Shit out of luck! St Cloud which used to be a bowling heaven will soon be a place where no one goes bowling anymore. It's a sad state for our city. Bowling is still one of the most participated in sports and seems to be growing in other areas of the country, so why not here. Lets start with the area USBC board that is full of older single minded individuals that don't really understand the business of bowling. The few good board members are becoming disenfranchised and leaving the board. Leaving the future unclear. The center owners themselves are probably the biggest problem. There is no clear vision to teach the youth about bowling. Youth are the future of the bowling industry and no one here seems to care. I am not saying that there are not youth leagues here in St Cloud it's just that they are creating future league bowlers. At best they are creating once a year bowlers. Now, a person could certainly blame the economy for a lot of the industries problems, but instead of putting blame why not try and find solution.

Happy New Year ALL!