Party Poker Blog

"To check-raise with a hand with which you want to thin out the field, you want the probable bettor to your right so that people will have to call a double bet to stay in. With a very strong hand and most come hands, you want the probable bettor to your left so the other players in the hand might call that bettor's single bet and then be invited to call the raise."
David Sklansky, Theory of Poker

Damn blogger.com. Couldn't post. Hopefully this uber-long post will make up for the delay.

So, it's been awhile since I've said said this, so allow me to reiterate:

I LOVE PARTY POKER! Especially on Friday nights. I was already up about $60 when I somehow lucked out and found an uber-loose, maniac, chat filled 3.6 table.

Vitriolic chatty table > silent serious table

I used to utilize chat as a weapon much more than I do now. Now I tend to only chat if I want to regale a friend sweating the table, or to deflect attacks from a fish who's giving away money. I had both reasons last evening. A young punk was browbeating the table fish, who was handing out brutal river beats. That, in and of itself, is uncalled for, but the hilarious thing was, he was quoting Phil Helmuth's book the entire time. Let's just say hilarity ensued.

But anyway, with the action on this table, you would have thought this was 50.1, with several players on tilt for good measure. Insane. I lost a massive pot with AA to J4o early on but managed to dig my way out of the hole by winning a $160 pot when nobody called my river bet.

DoctorJ_CA: wow - that might set a record for largest uncalled pot on party poker

There's actually a ton of hilarious lines from last evening, but I'll just post this one:

sandos: nice kicker XXXX face

If only I could play on a table like that every night, I could die a happy man.

K, enough about Friday night maniacs. Ready for a rambling, chock-full of poker goodness post?

I had two good questions in my comments that I'll address here.

#1 If I only have one PC, would it be better to join Party Poker or Empire?

Party Poker and Empire are identical with the exception of one thing: multi-table tournaments. Despite the overlay in the big weekly Empire tourneys, Party's selection of multi's is far superior. There's just a ton of them, running around the clock. So for that reason, I'd go with Party Poker if I had to pick one.

#2 What do you think about poker stars vs party poker?

I've certainly blogged about this many times, but I'll state the facts one more time for my new readers.
I've played on PokerStars since beta. There's no comparison. PokerStars has the best software and customer support, hands down, but they are lacking one very important feature: 20,000 fish.

There are *far* more fish in the aquarium at Party. The play is far looser on Party. Thankfully, Party Poker doesn't show the inane stat of "players seeing flop" like at Stars. Stars has many skilled European players, something I rarely see on Party. There's simply no comparison. If game selection is important to you, play on Party Poker.

To recap:

Party Poker > Poker Stars

Speaking of Party/Empire, here's some news:

Empire Poker has launched their Vegas Dreams tournament where 10 World Series of Poker seats are available to be won. The qualifiers cost $10 to enter so all you Chris Moneymaker wanna-be's go read the details here.

PartyPoker.com Million IV qualifiers starting on March 1st
The fourth Party Poker million qualifiers will start on the 1st of March and the estimated prize pool is $6 million. Entry is either by a $1 lucky dollar tournament, a $25 qualifier or a $200 semi-final. For every 50 participants in the semi-finals, one entry will be available for the finals. The Party Poker million IV final will take place onboard a cruise ship.

News about one of my favorite poker authors:
Mike Caro leaves Planet Poker
When Planet Poker (the Internet's first play for cash poker room) started up 6 years ago, Mike Caro (the legendary Mad Genius of poker) joined forces with them to promote the cardroom and online poker in general. After a very fruitful partnership, Mike has decided to leave Planet and pursue other interests. Roy Cooke, the renowned poker expert, professional poker player, and Senior Columnist at Card Player magazine, will be taking over Mike's duties at Planet Poker.

I sure miss Mike in RGP. Speaking of which, there is yet another movement to create a Moderated Rec.Gambling.Poker newsgroup. I found this interesting take about a potential moderated group:

--
Proposed RGPM
In regards to the guidelines you posit, would the following be permitted? Quotes are inexact but sufficiently close for debate purposes:

"You're approaching worthlessness." Carson to Negreanu

"I'd cheerfully spit in your face." Phillips to Carson

"Whoosh. That's the sound of the point, whizzing over your head."
Weideman to Treesong

"Annie Duke is really lame, for the following sixty reasons, including her smelly feet."
Negreanu to the world.

"You like to smear feces all over yourself?"
Rowdy to Treesong

"What I really hate is those people who just MAKE SHIT UP."
Phillips to Treesong
--

That's actually kind of a lame 'highlight' reel of flames from RGP but it will have to suffice.

So I really wanted to pontificate about a few poker concepts, especially Fancy Play Syndrome, but I've got some linking I want to get out of the que. I'll ramble about that stuff tomorrow.

Here's a new poker blog from LiveJournal. Thoughtful posts from a newish player, I hope he keeps it up.
D's Journal
I don't know if he reads me or not, but he's wise enough to echo my sentiments exactly:

--
I should start by singing the praises of PokerTracker. If you aren't using it and you are playing online, you are literally throwing money away.
--

Thanks to Chris & Pauly, I discovered Wil Wheaton posting about poker in his hugely popular blog. A must read:
Lying in Odessa Part I

Per Felicia comes Sgt. Rock's trip reports. A worthy read.

The Poker Vegan had a pro gay-marriage, accusatory homophobe finger-pointing post, continuing his bizarre sense of morality. Let's see if I follow this, Meat is Murder but packing meat is OK?

Oh the humanity.

I actually had a Redd Foxx like rant about the Vegan, but deleted it. Maybe next time.

Yikes - Poker Perspectives is back from the dead and he's up and posting again.
Poker Perspectives

WSOP tournament director, Matt Savage, has announced the blind structure for the 2004 World Series of Poker. That seems worthy of sharing. I humbly apologize for the all caps, but I'm too lazy to re-key it in.


WORLD CHAMPIONSHIP EVENT
NO LIMIT TEXAS HOLD'EM
$10,000 BUY-IN
MONDAY, MAY 22, 2004, 1PM
SCHEDULE OF PLAY

DAYS ONE AND TWO
LEVEL ANTE BLINDS
1ST - $25-$50
2ND - $50 - $100
3RD - $100 - $200
4TH $25 $100 - $200
5TH $50 $150 - $300
END OF DAYS ONE AND TWO
\6TH $50 $200 - $400
7TH $50 $250 - $500
8TH $75 $300 - $600
REMOVE $25 CHIPS
9TH $100 $400 - $800
10TH $100 $500-$1,000
END OF THIRD DAY
11TH $200 $600 - $1,200
12TH $200 $800 - $1,600
13TH $300 $1,000 - $2,000
14TH $400 $1,200 - $2,400
REMOVE $100 CHIPS
15TH $500 $1,500 - $3,000
END OF FOURTH DAY

DAYS FIVE, SIX AND SEVEN
16TH $500 $2,000 - $4,000
17TH $500 $2,500 - $5,000
REMOVE $500 CHIPS
18TH $1,000 $3,000 - $6,000
19TH $1,000 $4,000 - $8,000
20TH $1,000 $5,000 - $10,000
21ST $2,000 $6,000 - $12,000
22ND $2,000 $8,000 - $16,000
23ND $3,000 $10,000 - $20,000
24TH $4,000 $12,000 - $24,000
REMOVE $1,000 CHIPS
25TH $5,000 $15,000 - $30,000
26TH $5,000 $20,000 - $40,000
27TH $5,000 $25,000 - $50,000
REMOVE $5,000 CHIPS
28TH $10,000 $30,000 - $60,000
29TH $10,000 $40,000 - $80,000
30TH $10,000 $50,000 - $100,000
31ST $20,000 $60,000 - $120,000
32ND $20,000 $80,000 - $160,000
33RD $30,000 $100,000 - $200,000

EACH LEVEL WILL LAST TWO HOURS. THERE WILL BE A 15 MINUTE BREAK AFTER EVERY
LEVEL. 75 MINUTE DINNER BREAKS WILL FOLLOW THE THIRD COMPLETED LEVEL EACH DAY.
FIELD WILL BE SPLIT OVER FIRST TWO DAYS AND COMBINE ON THE THIRD DAY. THE
FOURTH DAY WILL PLAY FIVE LEVELS. THE FIFTH DAY WILL BE PLAYED DOWN TO 36
PLAYERS. THE SIXTH DAY WILL BE PLAYED DOWN TO THE FINAL NINE PLAYERS. PLAY
RESUMES AT NOON EACH DAY.
--

Doh, I forgot to link to this excellent post by Clarkmeister about luck on 2+2, so here ya go:
Running bad or playing badly?

Yet another interesting 2+2 post and reply about John Feeny and his excellent book, Inside the Poker Mind.

--
In your book, you say a good player should see about 15% of the flops and that an excellent player can squeeze profit out of an additional 10-15%. Does the 15% include hands in the blind without having to any additional bets, does it include hands in the blinds that you have to call a raise? or is the 15% limited to hands played that are not in the blinds.

reply:

The 15% figure refers to hands when you are not in the blinds. You might want to check out the essay "Playing 15 Percent" in Poker Essays II (by Mason), which is where it seems the number originated.
--

Allrighty then, that oughta keep the poker beast in you satiated for a bit.

Oh wait, I almost forgot WPT pro, Richard ("I had to drink my coffee from a styrofoam cup - what is the world coming to?") Brodie, updated with a new post, woohoo!
Lion Tales

Word Perfect^TM sucked, by the way, Richard. ;) Kidding, of course. I'm a pretty big Brodie fan.

I've been hearing some rumblings in the background that some esteemed poker bloggers are trying to find us a home base for a weekly private tourney. Who knows, though, maybe everyone will be content with TruePoker. We're only eleven days away from tourney #2.

Sadly, I don't have cool prizes to throw into the prize pool ala Grubby, but I WILL throw in a Party Poker jacket for the winner. That seems worthy.

So again, thanks for reading. If you enjoy this here blog and ARE NOT playing on Party Poker, you need to get your head checked and sign up on Party Poker with bonus code IGGY! Do it NOW! Seriously, use whatever bonus code you want (IGGY!), but MOVE YOUR GAME TO PARTY. You'll thank me later, believe me.

Link of the Day:
He Will Gore the Nations
Vutant.Com: "Gore fans, don't let the fact that this film is about Jesus put you off. There is almost no religious content at all. Jesus is too busy getting stabbed, scouraged and beaten to do much preaching."