I ended up third in that tournament after I blew my lead as chip leader. Not bad though, a $15 investment netted me over $271! This might be my 2nd best ITM finish.

In the middle of a rebuy tournament and getting close to the bubble, this hand helped make it possible that I actually might cash in. The min raise was the result of the situation and my overbet (All-in) on the previous hand, so I wanted to make it appear that I was extremely strong and was underbetting. I was quite happy with my read on the situation:

Hand 788139687,
Started at 7/31/2006 11:12 PM
Table 'Medellin': 20-20 No Limit HE (TournamentChips)
Seat 0: pe66te (8,715 in chips)
Seat 1: syphos (6,400 in chips)
Seat 2: donkieley (10,715 in chips)
Seat 4: richardrorty (46,200 in chips) (on the button)
Seat 5: meistral (8,599 in chips)
Seat 6: Ruippa (5,530 in chips)
Seat 7: KurianMan (14,411 in chips)
Seat 8: tjb10 (14,900 in chips)
Seat 9: 1L.A. RAY (9,030 in chips)
*** Blind Bet Round *** :
Dealt to syphos: Qs
Dealt to syphos: Js
meistral : Post Blind (400)
Ruippa : Post Blind (800)
*** Pre-Flop *** :
KurianMan : Fold
tjb10 : Fold
1L.A. RAY : Fold
pe66te : Fold
syphos : Bet (1,600)
donkieley : Fold
richardrorty : Fold
meistral : Call (1,200)
Ruippa : Call (800)
*** Flop *** :
10s 10h 8c
meistral : Bet (1,000)
Ruippa : Fold
syphos : Raise (4,800)
syphos : All In (4,800)
meistral : Fold
*** SUMMARY ***
Pot: 10,600
syphos bet 6,400, collected 10,600, net 4,200
meistral lost 2,600
Ruippa lost 1,600

I knew it was a bad night...and I now hate my internet connection. It has been stable for 3 months and now it started dropping all night. Lost two games because of it. My second game ended like this for the night:

8/9 for placing in the money for my SNGs (6/9 for 1st), broke my streak on game 8, but I will continue the count since game 9 was probably my luckiest and most aggressive SNG yet.

The numbers that made it interesting:

Number of hands played: 101
Number of hands won: 33
Percentage of showdowns won: 100%


At some point I knocked out 6th place with K4 (he had J9 and got tired of me being aggressive and stealing his blind). After that, the next 7 rounds people would fold to my bets or my blinds. I knocked 4th place out with 3/4 offsuit beating his AKo. The final hand of the game, I raise 3.2 times the big blind, the big blind went all in (for 2k more, I had about 12k to his 3k), I called and he shows K4. My A5 wins it.


About 4/5ths of the way done with Harrington on Hold 'em 3 and 1/2 way done with Caro's Book of Poker Tells. So far, it feels as if I do better if I study poker while playing poker. The questions keep my mind sharp and make sure I am playing the game as I should instead of getting lazy or falling into patterns.

I was on a one-week losing streak for the previous week and lost nearly $200 in SNGs and various MTT. However, in the last two days I have placed in the money in 6 of the games I have played and have won 4 of those.

Also played heads up against Julie twice last night before she left for Michigan. The first game has had one of the worse bad beats I have ever delivered:


Syphonhail (10:14:13 AM): She always forces me to play heads up with her
Syphonhail (10:14:24 AM): I am always reluctant, but she just wants to beat me
Syphonhail (10:14:42 AM): For the first game we decided to play with deep chip stacks (10k) and start with 5/10 blinds, going up every five minutes
Syphonhail (10:14:56 AM): Which might be better or worse than being forced to play poker :p
Syphonhail (10:15:09 AM): When the blinds reached 200/400 with 75 antes, I get dealt pocket kings, I raise 2x BB and she calls
Syphonhail (10:15:18 AM): The flop is 3 K 3
Syphonhail (10:15:28 AM): I think sweet, but I have the deck crippled (a la brunson) so I check and she checks.
Syphonhail (10:15:48 AM): The turn is a K. I, again, check, she checks.
Syphonhail (10:15:55 AM): The last card is a blank, and I check one more time hoping to induce a bluff
Syphonhail (10:16:06 AM): She bets 400 (min bet), I min raise to 800
Syphonhail (10:16:18 AM): She thinks for a bit and throws in the $5000 chip.
Syphonhail (10:16:29 AM): I raise all in and she calls.
Syphonhail (10:16:31 AM): calls, and for some reason she shows first...turning over the pocket 3s.
Syphonhail (10:17:00 AM): ...I reluctantly show her that her quads are no good and fear that I am about to get wrath for "getting lucky" once again.


I'm in love with my new chips still.

Last night was our last pre-ICPSR game (as one or tow regulars are leaving for a month), and I finally got to use my new set of Nevada Jack clays. Some pictures of the beauties:

Everything but the 5k chip.

And my stack at some point in the game. More pictures are at my photoblog on syphonhail.blogspot.com.

While I won a few beginning hand, my stack went to under 1k before the rebuy period; however, after rebuying, I was able to build my stack into a decent 2nd place lead and won the game after a couple of dominated hands.

The final hand of the game, I look down at ks2d, the flop is:

Kd10d5s. Connor bets 1000 (Blinds were 500/1000 with a 200 ante). I move all in and he quickly calls. He flips over Kc7s. I say shit. The river is a Jd. I think "please another high card" as the final card is flipped over to reveal a 9d. I think yay, I get to split the pot while Connor announces "wow, the 2d takes the flop" and I am delighted that a 4 flush had hit the board. The suckout takes it!

Decided to play for some higher cash on pokerroom by entering into a qualifier for a $100 ticket.

Lesson #1
See what tournaments the room offers before trying through a qualifier. Pokerroom only has one regular game at 100+8, and it's a rebuy...which will not help me with only one ticket. So, since they no longer run their 100+8 WSOP qualifier, the only real recourse I have is sit and gos.

Lesson #2
When playing at high stakes, play at night and not in the early morning/afternoon. The people there tend be tighter and more skilled then your after-work or weekend crowd.


Overall, I was doing well and was in third place into the blinds hit 50/100. I spent too much money trying to buy a pot from the CL and then subsequently lossed my stack to a min-raiser. I looked down at 99 versus the guy right behind me raising it to 200. I reraised all in to 1k, he called and showed his aces. Maybe next time.

Quick update: I made $280ish playing at bet365 ($200 bonus plus $80 in winnings), but I am close to busting my $100 in pokershare...so I am within a breath of achieving my goal...time to start thinking about a new one.

Decided to go back to party with my own money for the first time in forever (prior to this, I have been using their random $50 bonus to play some quick and loose no limit). The huge playerbase leads to some relatively soft tables and, consequently, some decent runs. I checked my account (due to a welcomed suggestion) and found a 15% deposit bonus. I didn't have much in my account due to some of my money being tied up into sunpoker and various casino bonuses, so I deposit the remainder of my Neteller account for a healthy $330 (about $50 bonus).

The hands went by quickly (I forgot how quickly). I played 3 tournaments, placed in the money in all three (one satellite tournament landed me one off of the token, but for $24 which was 2.4x the buy-in...a net gain). Beyond that, I only two-tabled $50 NL. As of two minutes ago, I cashed out $487 dollars - a nice gain.

On my 1k bankroll progress, I am sitting around $790-800. I am dreading completing the sunpoker bonus as it a slow one to pick up and I haven't really touched it since I waded through a quarter of it. That leaves about 370 MPP or over 1k in raked hands at $50 tables.

Further lessons from Casino Play

Lesson #2: 888/21.com sites do not like me. I have gone on prolonged bad streaks enough that I imagined taking screenshots of my BJ tracker and posting, but declined in my madness. Since I am done with both of those sites (with a substantial loss at both), I may be hard pressed to return.

Lesson #3: Don't play while tired. Though this is a no-brainer in poker, in mechanical games like slots or BJ, you can make a mistake and make the wrong move. Thoughts like "crap, I had 16 with a 10 showing, I meant surrender not hit!" start to go through your head as the cards become a blur.

XXXXX

Well, I am on the Goldenpalace promotion. I have to wager 8k in bets and am currently at 2.81k. However, I am happy to announce that I am staying even at 400 (100 depost + bonus), we will see ohw that fluctuates over the next 5k in bets (as I have already swung from 460 to 300).

Now that I have posted a few random tournaments and a narrative to accompany my gambling career (whatever that may be), it is time to set a goal. As a graduate student, the largest I have built my bankroll up to is $800. That was from a $200 deposit back in February and through poker only. Now, with some recent hits at various sites, my bank fell to $550. With my Casino adventures yesterday, I have bumped that up to $680.

Thus, the July goal will be to break the $1k barrier. For many out there, that might be peanuts, but I figure it is a noble goal and I have the oppurtunity to do that through various casino bonuses and such. Increasing my current roll by less than 1/3rd should be possible if I continue to make +EV venutres. If I am able to deposit to Golden Palace for their casino bonus, that might be enough to put me over the edge, but I will look into.

So, current promotions:
Waiting to cashout tonight at Planetluck and Starluck casinos: $530
In play at Sunpoker, attempting to clear their July $100 (25% done) Bonus: $150.

Casino Bonuses...

I have always been wary of any casino bonus or casino play that is not poker. All the games are designed to have a house edge; otherwise, the casino would not be in business. However, after consulting with a friend, he informed me that he has made a few dollars (several K) in getting online bonuses. After reading part of a 50page thread on pokersourceonline.com, I figured to give it a try.

First came 888. Deposit 200, 200%, clear after playing 10k worth of hands (due to my use of neteller). I was up $100 last night and decided to go to bed. I should have waited a few more days before playing. I woke up this morning and gave it a go with some betting variability. At one point I was up $800 (including the bonus) and with an hour I lost it all trying to recoup minor losses. Since I didn't wait for my deposit to get returned to neteller, I had to play that...and I was on tilt.

That was a bit too much to lose.

So...I learned a lesson and tried two more casino bonuses. This time my play was consistent and level headed. With both bonuses (on the starluck and planetluck sites), I am up $336. With the $200 loss, I am still up 136.

So, money lost, a lesson (or two learned) and I think I shall cash in on more of these bonuses.

A play conducted in 3 updates.

Update #1
Blogger: Dear sir, we think your blog (specifically, syphpoker) is a blog full of spam. Either respond to us or we will delete your blog. Until then, we cannot allow you to post.
Syphos: Gwa?
Blogger (a few days later): Feel free to post.
Syphos: yay!

My blog was shut down for a few days, so that is the cause of failure to post. Others must have tried to get some referral cash using blogspot in the past (or used bots to generate lame sites like this).

Update #2
I have finished my final PSO promotion and will soon own some of the clay Nevada Jacks, I cannot wait until that is cleared and I get to update my skulls. Consequently, I have cashed out all my current sites and am looking for places to start playing again (maybe bonus whore to rebuild my bankroll).

I have hit a slump. At one point I had $30 sitting in my pokerrewards account, and over a week, I built that up to $200 playing sit and goes and a few MTT. In the last 2 days, I blew all 200 playing just $10 SNGs. Some I can attribute to bad luck, maybe a few to bad plays, but I need to sit down and re-evaluate why I am getting crushed at what were such soft games.

Update #3
Played a home game on Thursday with 10 people ($5 buy-in with rebuys and add-ons). The pot swelled to a decent $85, and we decided to pay out to 4 places (not my decision, but I agreed since it made the math easier). As per the previous trend, I ended up first and the girlfriend second ($40 and $25 - $15 and $5 for 3rd and 2nd). We will see if I am on a lucky streak or if I know my colleagues too well. A new game should happen on the 4th with a BBQ.