I will formally introduce myself soon in the “Introductions” forum, but right now I'm about to play in day two of a WSOP Cinci $580 live circuit event and I need help/critiqued asap.

I guess it's important to tell you why I decided to come here, though.

 

WSOP Cincinnati $365.00 donkament:

Hand 1:

Blinds are 100/200/25 ante.

I have around a 11k stack.

I am in MP and make it 550 with A6s

Folds around to the BB who literally just late registered.

Only read I have is that he is Pakistani.

(Read I gathered today when I saw him in Cinci's poker room is that he wears a purple scarf while playing PLO and if he had the purple scarf on in a hand against me I'd have called him out of spite.)

Anyway, pretend we don't know this guy wears a purple scarf into the poker room.

After some debating, this guy elects to call.

Flop is A Jd 3d

Flop A Jd 3d he leads 600. I call.

(Should I have raised or just called to keep bluffs in?)

Turn is Kc he checks. I bet 2k.

He fires all in. Didnt want to stack off here. I fold.

(How big of a ***** am I? Thoughts on this hand?)

Hand 2:

Table seems full of unsophisticated/bet when they have it villains.

Not much position raising or tricky play going on.

I have 8k stack..blinds 150/300/25.

Raise 650 w AhKs. BB calls.

Flop A 10s 2s.

He checks, I bet 800. Turn is a Jh.

I bet 2k. He calls.

River 9c he ships all in for his last 4k.

I have 4k left.

I fold.

(In small stakes cash the check/c, check/c, lead river big is usually a monster.

Usually same in these small donkaments?)

So, as you can see from the two hands from above, my tournament game definitely needs work.

On top of all that, what would you do if a purple scarf wearing Pakistani bastard bluffed you out of a pot?

Most would probably never speak of it again.

But, I believe we must learn to confront our failures and grow from out mistakes.

Therefore, I am now here to observe my prey and understand how all you Beats By Dre/hoodie wearing motherfuckers think. It is my intention to never let a man that wears a scarf or any toolbox wearing a Lock poker patch bluff me out of a pot again. I would say the only other thing that might be more humiliating is having your girlfriend cheat on you with a Big Boy dishwasher or some shit. (It happened to me and after years of therapy didn't work…I finally saw her on the TV show “Cops” getting the shit beat out of her in a domestic violence dispute and I started to feel good again.)

Anyway, the purple scarf sent me over the ****ing edge and if you'd all like I'll try to hunt down the guy so you can pay him an affiliate fee for me joining. If you don't want that swine to get paid, the first time I saw your site was when Chris Moon plugged it on his Twitter. I also heard good things in 2+2 poker forums. I have been known to make a thread or two over there in the Marketplace: Live Staking forum.

Now, onto the most important thing…improving.

I decided to chart most of my important hands from yesterday's live tournament and would love to see some TPE Live Tourney Pros do this so I can sponge in all of your thought processes and decide which ones work best for me and my game. I'm paying you bastards twenty nine ninety five fat ass dirty american dollars a month that should be going to an old over the hill stripper that needs to bronze the heels+thong because those are the only ones that will give me a blowjob on the cheap anymore.

As long as you continue to help me improve my game, you'll continue to get my hard earned dollars.

Maybe with all you bastards help I'll be able to piece off one of these donkaments, buy the 8-ball strong enough to explode Charlie Sheen's heart, and be able to take home some top level talent/a true a-liner/every beer drinking poker playing slob's dream.

What's with the influx of all these hipster, panzi-ass, veggie burrito eating douchebags anyway?

They probably all drive hybrids or cars with a ****ing 4 cylinder in it.

No doubt their girlfriends will leave them for a man that drives a Harley Davidson or a Dodge Ram with a hemi in it as soon as they're broke and busto. They won't care that he doesn't recycle and doesn't want to go to the Apple Orchard.

Swear to god in ten more years live poker tournaments are going to be like a Burning Man festival.

Daisy picking ****ing hippy fruitcakes who live in their parents basement are going to be handing out some anti-war literature while pakistanis wearing purple scarfs are going to be getting high on marijjjjuanna in the bathroom laughing about how they bluffed some old dude wearing a wolfshirt, American flag pants, and a “Back To Back World War Champions” hat with an eagle on it out of a pot. My young girlfriend will probably even be getting ****ed in the janitors closet by three smelly Dj fuckface dudes who can't spin vinyl and haven't took a shower in three days.. but they gave her good molly, fist pump well, and they spin deep house or dubstep so “they're so ****ing cool.”

Wow, what a god-damn nightmare.

Puts more fear in my heart than the times I dream about my long lost cat getting weed smoke blown in his face by some unemployed stoners with bridge cards and there's nothing I can do but watch because it's a dream and I wake up in a profuse sweat.

I'm basically here to save poker and I hope that an American Bad Ass Beer drinking swine like myself piecing off a few donkaments can inspire more men to tell their wives to “**** off” and get these guys down to the casino or down to the live tournaments to play what I consider to be America's greatest past time….

Poker.

When I do, I hope you'll all be waiting with open arms and remember to make sure that each and every one of them feels welcomed and is having fun. I think sometimes we forget how incredible and exciting poker is when you only get to play it a couple times a month.

Sure, it's annoying when you see a guy buy in for $100 at $1/$2 NLHE or $200 at $2/$5 NLHE…but if you think about what the guy had to do to scrape together that money or the shit he's going to have to hear from his wife because he wanted to go gamble…you'll realize he's there for the same reason you were when you first started…

People still love this game.

I still love this game.

Where is the only place in the world a CEO, a line cook, a professional athlete, a model, a retired auto worker, a marine, a drug dealer, a police officer, a racist, and a black man could sit to together, drink, talk, and have some fun?

That's right. A poker table.

Never forget how lucky you are to be sitting at one.

 

Anyway, onto the hands I charted from the tournament I played in yesterday…

 

Please critique one thing, two things, three things, or everything.

 

WSOP CINCI $580 Buy In

Level 1: 25/50

Get to work early with opening 89s+, all broadways, pps and premiums as long as an unsophisticated/fit or fold villain has limped in or it's been folded to me.

My goal was definitely to be more active today and look for spots to bluff/be more creative with my lines/be more aggressive.

In fact, I'll admit….

All the videos I watched on Tournament Poker Edge had me fukking amped.

I was ready to get after it today.

First interesting spot is when I raise AK from utg2 to 300 and am called by a smart/sophisticated villain OTB.

Stack sizes are 12k and flop comes 3 3 7.

I feel as though if I cbet he will know this flop has missed my range and will flat/try to take it away on the turn or will check/raise right here and put me to a test.

So, I decide to check to him and he bets 325, I r/r to 725 and he folds pretty quickly.

I just felt that taking this line was better than a double or triple barrel and saves us chips in the long run.

Shortly after we move into…

Level 2: 50/75

It's folded around to a thinking/tourney player in the HJ and he raises to 225. I elect to flat out of the BB/play him heads up with Q9s.

Flop comes Q/x/x and this tourney player proceeds to double barrel 325, 625, but then gives up on the river and we scoop the pot.

We make our first mistake of the day when an active player to our right opens to 225 and we call OTB with 6h2h/the intentions to outplay him.

Pot is heads up and flop comes…

Ah As 7s

He checks, I want to rep an ace here, so I check and the turn comes a 2c.

He bets 250. I call 250.

River is an off 8. He checks. I bet 525. He calls with 3/3 and we lose the pot.

Definitely think I should have put a raise in on the turn. That's more powerful and the villain in the hand has to think about how big our river bet is going to be….meh…I fukked up. Oh well, onto the next hand!!!

Oh yeah, btw… I actually double barreled twice in this level and it worked!!

Level 3: 50/100

We have K/Q utg and we raise to 325, we get 2 competent villains who make the call and one fish. 1 competent villain is OTB, other is in the bb, fish is in the sb.

So, the pot goes 4 ways, 1300 in the middle.

Flop is Kh Jc 9c

It checks to me and I check to villain otb again with intentions to get a c/r on him. I figure the pot is pretty big/he is going to take a stab at it.

My plan fails, villain checks and a 3h falls OTT.

Fish in SB donks out 600. Competent villain in bb calls 600. I call 600.

OTB folds.

River is another brick and it checks through to me, I decide to check behind because as it is I've butchered the hand so bad/don't want to chance losing a big amount of chips here.

We end up winning the hand,though.

Level 4: 75/150

I had been giving up my OTB and CO a lot to the aggro on the right of me in the last level. So, I decided that I was going to start making sure I 3-bet in the right spots. After a 3bet with J9d and a 3bet with A9s, the aggro starts to lay off his aggressiveness towards our BB and SB. He also is folding more and giving us a chance to open light when folded around to us….

Level 5: 100/200

One limper when it gets to us, we are OTB and the BB has 4k left.

We raise to 425 with Q10s.

Both players call.

Flop comes 238, and both villains check. I bet 500.

Unsophisticated villain in bb calls quickly. Other guy folds.

Turn is a Q. I decide I want to check here in hopes that he'll shove all rivers.

River is a 6 and the villain ships like I want him to, but he's got 4/5.

Probably shouldn't have called here. Idk, maybe being results oriented?

Villain had showed no signs of ability to bluff, but I thought he would be shoving any piece of that flop that he caught, villain was definitely type to “PUT ME ON AK.”

Anyway, oh well, onto the next hand.

We're sitting with 16k in chips.

Level 6: 100/200/25 ante

Level 7: 150/300/25 ante

Level 8: 200/400/50 ante

We go card dead in the above 3 levels and I almost feel as though I need to force something to happen/make something happen.

However, there's just no good spots being presented and I am folding hand after hand.

I manage to get in a few position raises/c-bets and 1 successful 3-bet, but other than that there isn't much action.

We manage to head into the next level with 15k in chips.

Level 9: 250/500/50 ante

Obviously, since we've been card dead for around 2 hours, we have developed a tight image.

We decide to raise 1100 utg with QJs.

Best player at the table/the young competent tourney kid otb makes it 3k.

Judging by his previous 3bets this sizing is huge.

I feel he wants a fold.

I decide to stop being a ***** and man up for my first light 4 bet ship here.

He tanks for a min and calls with pocket 9s.

We spike a Q on flop and are now sitting with 30k.

This was huge for my confidence. I was able to correctly put him on a medium strength hand/pair and I really think he should have found a fold given my tight image, UTG raising range, and the fact that was my first 4-bet all day. I think he made a mistake calling there as this was the first time I ever tried a play like this. Under normal circumstances I am 4-bet shipping AK and QQ+ there.

Like I said, though…today I was fukking amped. Ship it.

Level 10: 300/600/75

Action is all pretty standard in this level. We attempt three 3bets…2 of which work… the other we fold to a 4-bet ship.

I'm 3betting any villains I feel have a light opening range as long as I have an ace blocker. So, I'm most likely 3-betting the best hand…but in the past I would have been folding in these spots/playing too nitty.

So, this is a step forward for me.

Level 11: 400/800/100

We're around 50k when we get into this hand…

I raise AQ utg to 2k.

Asian aggro calls in BB.

Flop 9c 5c 3s

He checks..I bet 2200…he calls.

Turn Ac he bets out 6k.

I call.

River 5d…He ships for 25k.

I tank and think if he had a club draw he check/raises me otf.

If he has A9, set of 3s, or 5x lucky him. He gets paid off.

He had 9/6 offsuit.

As you seen from the hand history in my past two tournaments, I would normally fold in a spot like this.

But, I read it for what it was…a desperate attempt to steal the pot after he let an ace fall on the turn…he must have been burning up inside when that A hit and for some reason thought he could bluff me out of the pot.

Level 12: 500/1000/100

This level is not good to us….

We lose two 10k coin flips all in.

One with 77, the other with 1010.

We were in the BB on one of them when an MP guy goes all in.

We were in the SB with the other one of them when a guy OTB goes all in.

So, this gets us down to around 55k.

Level 13: 600/1200/100

This is where we make the biggest mistake of tournament.

Super nitty guy who was holding onto his 15k SS for AS LONG as he could. Just letting it wither and wither away finally decides to ship from MP when we are in the BB with A/8 suited.

I call him and he has QQ. MEH.

Horrible to give away 25% of our chip stack there with A/8s…idk what got into me.

So, we're down to 40k and we get A/Q otb and a 22k stack has shipped all in from mp.

We call here and villain has K/Q, we hold.

We're back up to 65k and starting to feel better.

Level 14: 700/1400/200

We are in HJ with Kc10c and raise to 3k.

WSOP ring winner calls OTB.

He has 30k chips left.

BB calls and SB calls. Both of them have 80k+.

Flop is 5h5d2d

BB and Sb checks. I check with intention to raise OTB because he is a ring winner/competent and this is the same line I would take with ANY premium pair.

12k in pot, he bets 4.8k.

SB and BB fold.

I min raise to 9.6k.

He tanks for a minute then ships all in and we have to fold our king high.

Great read by him. Idk how bad of a play it is by me. I swear on everything I love I take the same line with 88+, AQ, AK.

He showed A/J offsuit.

After that hand we're back to around 50k.

Then over the course of the next couple hours it's all position raising, 3-betting, or 4betting all in with AK.

Ended up bagging around 64k and as of yet I haven't got AA, KK, QQ, or JJ in this tournament.

So, hopefully I get some monsters today when I go back to play at 3pm.

26 players left, 18 get paid.

Our 64k stack is around tourney average.

What's my plan now?

Thanks for reading.