Online poker Scandal

Since shortly after thanksgiving, there has been a revelation of an online scam by a member of the community who was previously highly revered. The community is pocketfives.com"

Personally, I was stunned when the allegations first surfaced and then saddened when a confession was issued.

Pocketfives.com is a great site and the OT community is second to none on the internet. I hope that people don't hold this sad event against the many good people there.

FTOPS

May will see me enter my first FTOPS event. I entered a seven card stud high low tournament earlier. I didn't realize it was a satellite event for the FTOPS. There weren't many entrants in the tournament but I was able to win one of two satellite entries. I am pretty happy to say the least.

Back to Back Final Tables at UB

Today's tourney only had 79 entrants, but I was able to beat 76 of them. The deck hit me in the mouth early at the final table but unfortunately I kept gettting outkicked once we were down to three and then found top pair up against an over pair on the hand that knocked me out.
It has been a pretty good run lately. In four out of the last six tournaments I played, I have cashed and have two final tables that were both top three finishes. I should have one the one I made it to heads-up play, but I am pleased with how things are going in the tournaments now. This was definitely a good way to start off the weekend.

Good luck at the tables everyone.

Peace and Love all around

Triple play for iLLNuGWichee and Final Table for Mathclub

Congrats to Zac, who plays online as iLLNuGWichee had an awesome day yesterday. He made the final table of the FullTiltPoker $75,000 Guarantee, winning $2338.95 for finishing 7th out of 503 entrants. Zac also final tabled the FullTiltPoker $33,000 Guarantee (1r+1a), winning $742.50 for finishing 9th out of 123 runners.

Over at PokerStars Zac's good work continued. He final tabled the $109 NL Hold'em [turbo - $15,000 guaranteed], cashing for $1759.50 for a finish of 5th of 306 players. Great playing sir!

Shaun aka Mathclub playing as ktpie on FullTilt, final tabled the FullTiltPoker $19,500 Guarantee (Rebuy) on 04-16-2009. He won $1642.13 for taking 5th place out of 266 runners. Congratulations Shaun! Well played sir!

Congrats to ChazMental

Congrats to Pocketfives.com legend and all around great guy ChazMental. Playing on the Cake Poker network, Chaz made the final table of the $10rebuy tournament earlier last night/this morning. Chaz earned $360.00 for finishing 7th out of 338 runners in the tourney.

This was Chaz's second final table this week.

Great job Sir!


Shaunne and Chaz

Final Table at UB

I played in the UltimateBet $4 sniper tournament last night. I got enough good cards and got lucky enough to make it to the final table and then heads up. I started off heads up with a chip lead. Lost it. Then got it back. Then I was inpatient and tried to steal a blind w J5 when I had no business pushing, lost the hand and then lost the tournament.

It was so cool to get to the final table but I am really disappointed in not being able to finish off the tournament. I got some nice rail action from Pocketfives.com's Dr.GHouse, who was also nice enough to make a rail thread when I made the final table. I hope to seal the deal next time.

Good luck at the tables everyone.

Huge Pot from the latest High Stakes Poker

High Stakes Poker on GSN (formerly the Game Show Network), channel 309 on DirectTV, is one of my favorite shows. This is a hand from last night's episode.

Congrats to Jennifear!

Jennifear aka PunkinBear won the $120 Tourney on UB yesterday to the very James Bondish tune of $7,007. She beat out 244 other players to win the tourney.

Congrats Jen, very well played!

Jennifear is also a fantastic teacher who can really help your game. Visit her site Jennifear's Poker Palace here.

You can also read a conversation with Jennifear from May, 2008 here.

TheAssassinato slays competition again

Congrats to Alex "theassassinato" Fitzgerald for another big win on FullTiltPoker. He won the FullTiltPoker $40,000 Guarantee (Rebuy) on Thursday, April 2, 2009. For winning the tourney and beating out 317 other runners, Alex won a very nice $31150.00. Very well played sir!

You can read about the life of a poker pro and see other cool pics he has taken by reading Alex's blog here

Nuggy wins again!

Congrats to iLLNuGWichee. He won the FullTiltPoker $25,000 Guarantee (Rebuy) on Aprils Fools Day, 04-01-2009. For dispatching 387 other players, Zac won $10845.00.
Great job sir!

Congrats to Mathclub

Playing as ktpie on FullTiltPoker, Shaun aka "mathclub" finished 2nd out of 358 in the FullTiltPoker $22,500 Guarantee last night, this morning or next Wednesday (I have a hard time keeping New Zealand time straight)but it was apparently March 31, 2009 in the Eastern United States. He won a nice $3952.32 for making it heads up.

Very good job sir and well played.

Congrats to Wretchy

Congrats to Dan "Wretchy" Martin. He won seat in the 2009 World Series of Poker on FullTiltPoker last night. Wretchy was one of only three people to qualify. Congratulations and here's to hoping for a good run and a final table.

Natalie Portman to star in poker movie

I saw a link in Shane Schleger's blog about an article written by a friend of his where the friend discusses working with Natalie Portman for her role in an upcoming poker movie, My Blueberry Nights. The author is Peter Alson who wrote the well received poker book Take me to the river.

First, it was great to hear that someone with some poker credibility was working with the director and an actor on a poker movie. Second, it's great to hear that Natalie Portman will be starring in a poker movie.

The article is pretty interesting, though short. You can check it out here.

Doyle's Room

At this time of morning before Senator Frist sneaked an amendment into the Safe Port Act (the Unlawful Internet Gaming Enforcement Act) in an attempt to stop online gaming, I often found myself up because of trouble sleeping. I often found myself playing tournaments at Doyle's Room.
Each day on an almost hourly basis, Doyle' Room would have several small and micro buy-in tournaments. These tourneys were great because under the tourney structure used on the site at the time (5 minute blind levels) and coupled with the fact that the tourneys would attract somewhere between 25-70 players, the tourneys could be played to completion in about an hour and a half.
I was surprised when Doyle's Room left the American market after passage of the UIGEA. I was very happy when Doyle's Room re-entered the market and began accepting American players again. Unfortunately, the time away has really taken away a lot of what made playing at Doyle's Room appealing.
The number of players has been down. The tourneys which offered many chances to play at the lower limits, whether in hold em, Omaha (both hi and 8b) and other forms are mostly gone. A site that had many choices for the tourney player earlier now has almost no selection now. These tourneys were offered without guarantees so I am surprised with the site's decision to cut back on the schedule drastically.
I have a lot of respect for Doyle Brunson and always root for him when he is playing. I know he doesn't run the site but it is sad to see the site he is associated with make decisions that do nothing to make the site better.

Great night for members of Pocketfives.com

Another great evening for members of the Off Topic section of Pocketfives.com on the virtual felt.

Agriffrod made the final table in the PokerStars 25K guaranteed $109 NLHE. He took home $916.50 for finishing 9th out of 611.

Wein, playing under his screen name of ChasingIdiot at FullTiltPoker, finished 4th of 248 in the $33K $50 + 1 rebuy +1 addon. Wein took a horrible beat when his AQ lost to A7 all in pre-flop or it is the reporter's opinion he would have won the tourney.

Mathclub final tabled the UltimateBet Bounty 10K Guaranteed. He won $850.00 for finishing 4th out of 199.

Ship it to Mathclub!

Mathclub, playing under his FullTilt alias of ktpie, took down the Fifty+Fifty tourney on FullTilt last night. He beat 973 other players to win a very nice prize of $9,555.00. Very good job by the King of New Zealand poker.



On UlitmateBet, Mathclub made the final table in the UltimateBet Bounty 10K Guaranteed, finishing 4th out of 199 for a nice score of $850.00.
Great Job sir!

Huge Night for Wretchy and iLLNuGwhicee

Monday night saw Wretchy make the final table of the $109r on PokerStars and iLLnuGWichee win the $30k guarantee on FullTilt and also final table the $23k guarantee Knock Out tourney there.

Wretchy finished 4th out of 261. He won a very cool $9296.00. No one should be surprised. He's so deep in that thing they ought to rename it the Wretchy Rebuy. Very nice work sir!


Nuggy won $7,200.00 for beating out 286 others in the $100+9 NLHE MTT. He followed that up by making the final table in the midnight $70 + 5 KO tourney. For finishing 8th out of 366 there, Nuggy was rewarded with $575.00. No word on how many knockouts he recorded. Another incredible night for Nuggy. Congrats!

TranquilChaos and Mathclub roll through tourney fields!

Friend of the blog Tranquilchaos cut through the field in the UltimateBet Sniper 10K Guaranteed on yesterday. He won the tournament and earned $2350.00 for beating the field of 628.
As many of you know, TC is Devin Porter who has made multiple final tables on the WPT and a final table at the WSOP. Don't let this picture fool you, he is definitely a threat to take down a bracelet at the WSOP this year.
Congrats on a fine effort Devin!

You can read his blog here: TranquilChaos

Our New Zealand friend, Mathclub, had another great evening on the virtual felt. On PokerStars under his screenname jakehekejnr, he won Tournament 86799589 in the early hours of 05-02-2008. For outlasting 156 other players, Mathclub won $1083.31. He also made the final table in the $33 and $5rebuy on FullTilt. Another great evening for a really good guy! Awesome job sir! I wouldn't be surprised to see Mathclub take some expensive jewelry home from Las Vegas this summer. However, he may have a disadvantage since he'll only be able to play one tournament at a time.

UltimateBet's new tournament schedule

UltimateBet was my first site. I have been playing tournaments there for almost four years. I played there before the software change drove away a ton of business and have stayed there while the customer support and management have, at times, seemed to have been trying to get rid of the rest.

UltimateBet recently decided to let Poker Pro Annie Duke revise the tournament schedule for the site. One of the most attractive features of the site, and often cited as the attractive feature of the site, is the tournament structure. I will give credit to UB for not messing with the structure. What I can't understand is how the tournaments which had been attracting a steady increase in players on a nightly basis can just be moved. If you want to add new ones fine, but keep the ones that were drawing well. It appears that the lower buy-in bounty tournaments have been elminated, moved to a different time, or will be offered on a less than nightly basis. It makes no sense. When I first started at UB almost 4 years ago, there wer always between 400-700 players in a nightly $5 tournament without a guarantee that ran around 9:00 pm EST. During a previous tournament schedule change, this tourney was moved to an earlier time. After the software "update", these tournaments were lucky to get 200 entrants.
Before the most recent update, there as a $5.50 tournament which started around the same time as a $6.50 bounty tournament. There were always 300-400 more players in the bounty tournament.
I will have more on this later as I try to find tournaments at my level on a place I have long considered to be my home site and I have always continued to play there in spite of the pleading of many friends who play online. Now I'm beginning to think that they may have been right all along. Peace.

Wretchy WSOP ME event bound!

Congrats to Wretchy for turning his $630 satellite entry fee into an $11,000 main event package on PokerStars yesterday. When he final tables that bad boy the ROI will be through the roof. GL sir.