Biloxi blues

After leaving Livingston, I headed south down I-20/59 toward the Gulf Coast. Most of my Tuscaloosa crew weren’t going to New Orleans until Thursday, but since I was already a quarter of the way there I figured I’d spend the night in Biloxi if any lodging were available.

As my Grand Prix moved further south, I began to encounter trees twisted into unnatural shapes and old buildings missing roofs. When I reached the coast, the destruction was almost unimaginable, but sometimes truth is stranger than fiction. I hit the coast front highway in Gulfport and turned east toward Biloxi. Rubble was piled everywhere, as concrete slabs and blown out signs were all that remained of many buildings. I passed an IHOP, the Bombay Bicycle Club, Jefferson Davis’ home Beauvoir – all places I’ve visited, and most gone beyond repair.

In some cases, the shells of the old casinos remained, but most of the former floating barges were completely destroyed. Three have re-opened – Imperial Palace, Isle of Capri and Palace, the former two having opened poker rooms to meet the demand.

I headed to IP to check out the poker room and got into a 1-2 NL game. Almost as soon as I sat down, my pal BJ from T-Town called and said he and some friends were already in New Orleans. Change of plans. As I had just sat down, I figured I might as well stay and play for an hour or so, especially since there was this old crazy man named Harold sitting at the table who would play ace rag for all his chips. As he had most of the chips at the table this kept him from going bust.

Finally, I picked up AK and raised to $15, Harold made it $55 and I pushed the rest of my $200 or so stack in the pot. Just my luck, Harold turns over KK. Thank you ace on the turn. Harold lost another pot and then gave the rest of his $130 to the dealer.

“He can probably afford it,” one player said of Harold’s gambling ways.

“I hope so,” I replied.

My day in court

Most of the stereotypes that portray the South in the media are pure bullshit. The overalls and bare feet, the KKK running rampant, the no teeth backwoods squeal like a pig butt lover. But the one stereotype where the movies often get it right is the country courthouse.

So I thought as I sat in a chair outside the courtroom of the Sumter County Courthouse in Livingston, Al.., Wednesday afternoon, peering outside a large window at a stately magnolia growing outside the 19th Century building. Inside the courtroom, District Attorney Greg Griggers was prosecuting an assault charge against a man named Jerome who had invited me to see the deplorable and unsafe conditions of the Sumter County High School football field four years ago for a possible newspaper article. An incident at the school led to a fight, which my host tried to break up. But in the end, Jerome himself was charged with assault.

Finally his day in court had come, and I was the only one who could help get him off as I was the sole impartial witness to the fight. The bailiff summoned me and I walked into the room, with its high ceilings and ornately detailed judge’s bench. The facilities screamed Old South. The court reporter swore me in and I took my seat in the witness booth.

While reporting for The T-News, I always admired Griggers’ ability at questioning witnesses, but now the tables were turned and I was the one facing the grilling. Every bit of doubt I had in these events from four years ago he was able to turn on me and portray me as one who was unsure of what really happened. Trying to remember the details of an event that took place so long ago is almost impossible. The essential action was this: Jerome and I walked into the school office and found Jerome's sister and the school secretary jawing at each other. The sister asked to see the school principal and the secretary ignored her. As the secretary turned to walk out of the room, the sister grabbed her and I began to witness the first and only catfight of my life. Jerome tried to break it up and finally some teachers came into the room. One teacher grabbed Jerome and he pushed back, thus the assault charge. The teacher is white and Jerome is black, but I'm not sure it's fair to say the charge was racially motivated (and most of the jury was black, thus eliminating a bias factor against Jerome in his trial).

I finished my dribble and was excused from the courtroom after a few cross examinations. I got in my car and headed south. I received a call from Jerome later that night as I prepared to take a shower in my New Orleans hotel room. He was found guilty.

Quote of the day + WSOP entry

"It’s become almost impossible for entry-level players to get a foothold, much less work their way up the ladder. Juice on the lower buy-in events can be as much as 25%. Add in travel expenses to the never-ending increases in juice and the tournament professional is soon to become an endangered species. The biggest names with huge bankrolls or sponsorship deals will survive, but run-of-the-mill touring pro will not make it unless he gets very lucky in a few big events. " -- 2 + 2 user Blair, lamenting the increasing fees that casinos are charging for tournament entries.

So this is what it feels like...to win a tournament I mean. Now I remember the reason I love this game. It allows me to fulfill my competitive nature in a game of wits when I can't adequately compete in other endeavors. (Though I was the captain of the 1999 University of Alabama Intramural Wiffleball Championship team...)

The tournament in question was a 82-player $10+$1 affair on Poker Share Sunday afternoon. I wouldn't usually get involved in such small fry stuff, but this was part of the Bluff Poker Tour and the winner would get a $1,500 WSOP entry of their choice in addition to about $250 in prize money. Talk about an overlay.

And we started with 2,500 in chips with a slow blind structure, a fantastic pace if you want some play. When we got down to three handed I had 70,000 in chips and the blinds were only 500-1,000! When's the last time you played a tournament where that happened?

I was patient, waited for the aggressive chip leader to make some wrong moves and nailed him. So now I have at least one bracelet event buy in waiting for me this summer, and if there was every any doubt about whether or not I would definitely go to Vegas this ended it.

Quote of the day

"About six months ago I talked to this 17-year-old kid online. He had a brand new Porsche and a condominium he paid for with cash. Dude, when I was 17 I was delivering Chinese food for about $8 an hour." -- Josh Arieh, on the Card Player radio show "The Circuit" discussing the financial success of young online poker players.

Bloggers convention link

Anyone who is thinking about going to this probably already knows all of this already, but here's the link to the World Poker Bloggers Tour thing in Vegas this summer. It's the second week in July, with the tournament on July 8 at Caesar's Palace.

http://www.thisisnotapokerblog.com/archives2/cat_wpbt.html

Quote of the day

"That is kind of like asking how do I prepare to go to Vietnam. Dodge lots of bullets and get lucky at key times," -- 2 + 2 forum member CerebralDamage in response to a question on how to prepare for a major live tournament.

I'm finding some pretty funny stuff out there so I think I'll make "Quote of the Day" a regular feature of this blog, it just won't be every day necessarily, only when the mood strikes.

Good times, bad times, you know I've had my share

The good news: just had an almost +$3,000 week.

The bad news: it only leaves me slightly ahead for the month of April.
I think the most important thing for me is I have my confidence back, and a poker player without confidence is like a Jedi without the Force…or a fat kid without cake.

This is why I love online poker:

Buy-in for $120 at VIP Poker (the former Planet Poker) in a $3/$5 NL game just trying to double up. We are playing three handed.

Hand #6: I get KsJh and make it $15 from the button. Both blinds call.
Flop is Js 2c 3c
Check-check-I bet $40.
SB folds and BB check-raises me all in for my last $60. OK, I think, can’t fold here. Turn and river are blanks. He shows Qh3s

Hand #7: Very next hand, I pick up KK in BB. Button limps and SB folds. I make it $20. Button pops it to $80.
Does he aces? Maybe so, maybe not, but I’ve got to have stones with the second nut pre-flop hand so I push the rest of my stack in the pot (perhaps another $200). He instacalls and board comes Q high. I show first and he folds.

Hand #10: I am in the BB with AK. Button folds and the SB decides he hasn’t quite donked off enough chips so he goes all in over my $5 BB for $100 and change.
I figure at worst I’m a coin flip and more likely I’m 66 percent or better so I call. I get nervous as the board completely misses me. Well, it missed his Q3 as well. If that’s his favorite hand may I suggest finding a new one.

And ten hands later I’m at about $630 and decide I’ve done enough damage for one day. “Take care,” I type to the remaining donk as I depart the table.

I’m far from out of the woods, but I can at least see the daylight. And the killer donkeys seem to have stopped chasing me through Neverwin Forest. Now I look toward Vegas and the WSOP with a brighter outlook (and hopefully a decent bankroll if I can keep this up.)

It’s my goal to head to Vegas around July 6-7 for the bloggers’ weekend, which would be my first trip for that fracas, and stay through BARGE, which runs Aug. 15-20. Yep, that’s a LONG time, about six weeks in all.

It appears I’ll be able to swing it because Ted’s wife is a bigtime slot player at the Reno Fitzgerald’s and they offer her a deal where she can get a room at the Vegas Fitzgerald’s for about $400 for the entire month of July.

After Ted and I split the room, we’re talking about $200 for the month! $7 a day! Unreal.
I also believe I can get a room at the Plaza for BARGE for a couple of weeks in August at $20 per night.

It appears six weeks in Vegas may be very affordable, though I may get sick of 99-cent shrimp cocktails at Golden Gate before it’s over.

Quote of the day

"Gee, I hope it works" -- RGPer Howard Beale's response to a post that Paris Hilton may begin writting a monthly poker column for Bluff magazine, a move that the original poster said could really put poker on the map.

WSOP packages and prelim chips

Here's an listing of some of the various online sites' WSOP qualifying offerings, which I will update many times in the next couple of months:

Party Poker

• Runs a number of daily freerolls into a Saturday tournament. These freerolls are like the old zombie fests. Try to protect your monster hands against 3,500 undead poker players trying to tear you limb for limb. I believe 100 out of this field (which fills up quickly when registration opens) move on to the Saturday tournament. Survive another mine field and win some main event seats or even a $50K HORSE seat. Definitely a long shot, but you can't complain about free!
• Runs a daily $200+$15 sat in which two or three win a ME seat. Another tough road.
• The good ol' Steps and their impossible ladder is back. This year, it's five steps to the top, rather than six, which is a double-edged sword -- fewer rungs to climb but fewer chances to move up. For example, last year on Step 1 I believe the top 2 went to Step 2, now it's only the winner. If you're a good SNG player with a hefty bankroll, play the $500 Step 4s to try for the win. I know one local resident who already won his seat this way.

Poker Stars

• The Sunday $650 qualifier continues, with about 600 people competing on a recent Sunday, which yielded about 33 seats. The trick is getting there, and PS continues to run a ton of qualifiers. If you like SNGs you'll like PS new focus on these $16 double shootouts in which the winner gets a $650 seat. PS runs a ton of these around the clock, which means fewer of the $73+$7 or $25+$2 with rebuys multi-table tournaments that other players (like me) prefer.
• PS has released their list of WSOP bracelet events they will allow players to use their W$ to buy into with. All of the tournaments are NLHE and the list can be found here: http://www.pokerstars.com/wsop/fpp/

Ultimate Bet

• As usual, UB is running their $100 and $200 buy ins for main event seats, with sats into these. As with Party, only a handful of people will get seats in these tournaments.
• An interesting thing UB is doing this year is a new series of tournaments every day for specific bracelet events. Buy ins are $30 + rebuys or $50 freezeout. Here's the schedule: http://www.ultimatebet.com/promotions/6-weeks-wsop.html?l=may30

Bodog

• Good overlays here, as Bodog is running multiple tournaments each weekend with buy ins of $67.50, $125 and $250 guaranteeing a ME seat in each one. There haven't been enough people to make the prize pool large enough to cover the $12K package; in fact, some of the fields have had overlays of $6K or so.
• Small overlays are also available in bracelet event packages run on weeknights. The prize is a $1,500 entry and $1,000 cash for a $50 buy in. There are usually only 45 players or so entered into each of these, creating an overlay of about $250 most nights.

Poker Share

• Saving the best for last, as overlays here are astounding! Each Sunday, the site runs a $250 or $500 buy in tournament in which a $13K package is added. For example, I played recently with 30 other patrons, creating a prize pool of $8K. First got a package and second took the prize pool. Does a $13K overlay sound good to you? Not only is the ME tourney a great deal, but so are the satellites to get into them. Each one guarantees two seats into that Sunday's ME tourney. I won a seat recently with 19 players in a $25 buy in. That's a prize pool of $475. But the site guaranteed two $500 + $30 seats!
• PS also runs a $50 + $5 buy in tournament every Wednesday that adds a $1,500 WSOP bracelet event entry to the prize pool. So if there's $1,000 in the pool, the winner gets the seat and second takes the $1,000 (as in the Sunday event). Astounding sats for this one too. Played one this afternoon that guaranteed two seats. Buy in = $5.50. Players = 6. Show me a better deal. Anywhere.

Quote of the day

"That's what I'm trying to do, get a jet, you know, get a couple of jets maybe and be able to fly to my poker tournaments." -- Phil Hellmuth on the Card Player radio show "The Circuit" speaking of his goal of making $100 million to $200 million dollars.

He also lamented the fact that Daniel Negreanu's weekly newspaper column has a wider subscriber base than his own, which is now in about 40 newspapers. Meanwhile, some dude named Johnny Kampis has a column in five newspapers. 8 to 1 ratio of Hellmuth over Kampis? Haha, I'll take it.

That's my Oliver

Oliver Tse once again proves that the only thing bigger than his mouth is his ego. I'm all for good information (which Oliver has plenty of with his insider connections), but not if I have to get it from someone of such arrogance. Check out the link. Apparently, no W$ for tournament buy ins because none of the prelims will be televised this year.

http://forumserver.twoplustwo.com/showflat.php?Cat=0&Number=5576486&page=0&fpart=all&vc=1

Boost of confidence

Isn't it scary how one big win or big loss can affect your outlook on poker? Or maybe it's just me. I've felt like a mangy dog, kicked to the curb, the last couple of months and haven't felt at all confident about my game or my chances of winning in any given session. And then, WHAM, last night I haul in $1,200 in our local $5-$10 limit game. (Obviously, that's a monster win in a game of that size, even if we use a rock that occasionally makes for straight 10-10-10 bets on some hands.)

Two days ago I felt I couldn't win. Now I'm ready to take on the world. Strange, isn't it? At least I feel like I got my mojo back. Groooovy, baby.

I got some other good news Monday as the guy who runs that local game offered to stake me in a $500 NLHE tournament in New Orleans next month. He asked if I was going to the WSOP Circuit Event there and I replied that I was thinking about skipping it since I hadn't been running well and was trying to save up for the big Vegas splash this summer. He offered me the stake, which I very happily accepted. Plus, some of us Tuscaloosa poker players will room together, further saving precious bankroll dollars. I get a freeroll at that event for half any winnings minus the buy in. I've never been one to try to sell pieces of myself, so this will be a first, but one I look forward to.

World Series of Poker schedule and tidbits

Yea, this is nothing new, but I'm posting it here and will link it from the sidebar as part of my resource package.

Apparently, ESPN hasn't decided their broadcast plans yet, so PokerStars hasn't said yet which tournaments players can use their W$ for.

Another tidbit: apparently Harrah's is going to bring some portable toilets for use inside the WSOP area. (They were selling ads to be placed on the toilets on the lifestyle show marketing page on their Web site.) Anyone who was at last year's WSOP remembers what a logjam bathroom breaks were. They are also apparently planning a player's lounge of some sort...describing it as a place to relax, drink, eat and....bet? Perhaps they are going to set up some VP machines...


2006 World Series of Poker Rio All-Suite Hotel & Casino June 25 – August 10

Casino Employee No-Limit Event (2 day event)
$500.00
27-Jun-06
Tuesday
12 noon

No-Limit Hold'em (3 day event)
$1,500.00
28-Jun-06
Wednesday
12 noon

Pot-Limit Hold'em (3 day event)
$1,500.00
29-Jun-06
Thursday
12 noon

Limit Hold'em (3 day event)
$1,500.00
30-Jun-06
Friday
12 noon

No-limit Hold'em Short Handed, 6/table (3 day event)
$2,500.00
1-Jul-06
Saturday
12 noon

No-Limit Hold'em (3 day event)
$2,000.00
2-Jul-06
Sunday
12 noon

Limit Hold'em (3 day event)
$3,000.00
3-Jul-06
Monday
12 noon

Omaha Hi-low Split (3 day event)
$2,000.00
4-Jul-06
Tuesday
12 noon

No-Limit Hold'em (3 day event)
$5,000.00
5-Jul-06
Wednesday
12 noon

Seven Card Stud (3 day event)
$1,500.00
6-Jul-06
Thursday
12 noon

Limit Hold'em (3 day event)
$1,500.00
6-Jul-06
Thursday
2:00 PM

Omaha Hi-low Split (2 day event)
$5,000.00
7-Jul-06
Friday
12 noon

No-Limit Hold'em (3 day event)
$2,500.00
8-Jul-06
Saturday
12 noon

No-Limit Hold'em w/re-buys (3 day event)
$1,000.00
9-Jul-06
Sunday
11:00 AM

Ladies Event No-Limit Hold'em (2 day event)
$1,000.00
9-Jul-06
Sunday
12 noon

Pot-Limit Omaha (3 day event)
$10,000.00
10-Jul-06
Monday
12 noon

No-Limit Hold'em (3 day event)
$1,000.00
11-Jul-06
Tuesday
12 noon

Pot-Limit Hold'em (2 day event)
$2,000.00
12-Jul-06
Wednesday
11:00 AM

Seniors No-Limit Hold'em (2 day event)
$1,000.00
12-Jul-06
Wednesday
12 noon

No-Limit 2-7 Draw Lowball w/rebuys (2 day event)
$5,000.00
13-Jul-06
Thursday
12 noon

No-Limit Hold'em- Short handed 6/table (3 day event)
$2,500.00
14-Jul-06
Friday
12 noon

No-Limit Hold'em (3 day event)
$2,000.00
15-Jul-06
Saturday
12 noon

Limit Hold'em (3 day event)
$3,000.00
15-Jul-06
Saturday
2:00 PM

Omaha Hi-low Split (3 day event)
$3,000.00
16-Jul-06
Sunday
12 noon

No-Limit Hold'em Shootout (3 day event)
$2,000.00
17-Jul-06
Monday
12 noon

Pot-Limit Omaha (2 day event)
$1,500.00
18-Jul-06
Tuesday
12 noon

No-Limit Hold'em (2 day event)
$1,500.00
19-Jul-06
Wednesday
12 noon

Seven Card Stud (2 day event)
$5,000.00
19-Jul-06
Wednesday
2:00 PM

Pot-Limit Hold'em (2 day event)
$2,500.00
20-Jul-06
Thursday
12 noon

No-Limit Hold'em- Short handed 6/table (3 day event)
$5,000.00
21-Jul-06
Friday
12 noon

No-Limit Hold'em (3 day event)
$2,000.00
22-Jul-06
Saturday
12 noon

Pot-Limit Hold'em (3 day event)
$5,000.00
22-Jul-06
Saturday
2:00 PM

Seven Card Razz (2 day event)
$1,500.00
23-Jul-06
Sunday
12 noon

No-Limit Hold'em w/re-buys (3 day event)
$1,000.00
24-Jul-06
Monday
12 noon

Seven Card Hi Low Split (2 day event)
$1,000.00
24-Jul-06
Monday
2:00 PM

Limit Hold'em Shootout (3 day event)
$1,500.00
25-Jul-06
Tuesday
12 noon

No-Limit Hold'em (3 day event)
$1,500.00
25-Jul-06
Tuesday
4:00 PM

H.O.R.S.E. (3 day event)
$50,000.00
26-Jul-06
Wednesday
see below

Satellite Day

27-Jul-06
Thursday

Media/Celebrity Event and Satellite Day

28-Jul-06
Friday

No-Limit Texas Hold'em World Championship Event
$10,000.00
28-Jul-06
Friday
12 Noon

Day 1A 2000 play down to 800

29-Jul-06
Saturday
12 Noon

Day 1B 2000 play down to 800

30-Jul-06
Sunday
12 Noon

Day 1C 2000 play down to 800

31-Jul-06
Monday
12 Noon

Day 1D 2000 play down to 800

1-Aug-06
Tuesday
12 noon

A + B 1600 to 700

2-Aug-06
Wednesday
12 noon

C + D 1600 to 700

3-Aug-06
Thursday
Day off for main event


No-Limit Hold'em (2 day event)
$1,000.00
4-Aug-06
Friday
12 noon

ABCD Play 1400 down to 600

5-Aug-06
Saturday
12 noon

Play 600 down to 300

5-Aug-06
Saturday
10:00 AM
No-Limit Hold'em (2 day event)
$1,500.00

6-Aug-06
Sunday
12 noon

Play 300 down to 150

6-Aug-06
Sunday
10:00 AM
No-Limit Hold'em (2 day event)
$1,500.00

7-Aug-06
Monday
12 noon

Play 150 down to 60

7-Aug-06
Monday
10:00 AM
No-Limit Hold'em (2 day event)
$1,500.00

8-Aug-06
Tuesday
12 noon

Play 60 down to 27

8-Aug-06
Tuesday
10:00 AM
No-Limit Hold'em (2 day event)
$1,500.00

9-Aug-06
Wednesday
12 noon

Play 27 down to 9

9-Aug-06
Wednesday
10:00 AM
No-Limit Hold'em (1 day event)
$1,500.00

10-Aug-06
Thursday
12 noon

Final Table

Satellite Schedule
$225 Buy-In Super Satellites will take place daily at 3 p.m and 9 p.m.. $1060 Buy-In Mega Satellites will take place nightly at 7 p.m. (Super Satellite Days on July 26 and July 27: $225 buy-in Super Satellite will take place at 10 a.m. and 4 p.m. $1060 buy-in Mega Satellite will take place at 1 p.m. and 8 p.m.)

Second Chance Tournament Schedule
$540 Buy-In No-Limit Hold'em tournaments will take place daily at 5 p.m. $225 Buy-In No-Limit Hold'em tournaments will take place nightly at 11 p.m.

The following percentages will be withheld from each buy-in for each event:
Buy-in
Take-Out
$500
10%
$1,000.00
9%
$1,500.00
9%
$2,000.00
9%
$2,500.00
8%
$3,000.00
8%
$5,000.00
6%
$10,000.00
6%
Harrah's reserves the right to cancel, change or modify the tournament or any tournament event, in part or in whole, without notice.

New poll, search bar and other improvements

You may recall that poll on the top professional poker player that I have had since I first started this blog in October naught four. Well, I finally got a new one. Check out the new poll in the right-hand sidebar. How many people will enter this year's WSOP main event? I'm curious to find out. That number could be a good indicator of how much growth the game of poker will see in the next year. I suspect the growth will slow and perhaps plateau in 2007.

I'm trying to figure out this HTML crap with moderate success. You may have noticed the page is now wider than before. I've also added a Google search tool at the top of the page in which you can surf the Web from Poker Nation or search the blog for poker content.

MissT WSOP qualifier

MissT is an avid RGPer and hostess of a number of bracelet event WSOP qualifiers on Poker Stars. The link to her site is below. She asked for some pimpage to fill the one up she is planning for Sunday so here's the details:

For all you players that have been following the MissT74 WSOP Qualifiers, there will only be ONE more before I leave, and thus this will be the last one for about 3 weeks time. I will start them back up once I'm back home and caught up on work and home life. If you're interested, email me ASAP, as I anticipate this one filling up due to there not being one for the past 2 weeks, and it being the last one for the next 3 weeks.

INFO:
Date: Sunday, 4/23/06
Time: 10:00 pm EST
Game: NLHE
Players: min 20, max 30
Cost: $50.00
Transfer: $40.00 to MissT74 from (Kingman) on PokerStars and then email me. Your password will be issued at that time.
Prize: $1,000 WSOP seat if there are 20 players, $1,500 WSOP seat if there are 30 players.

Any questions, again, simply email me. Pass the word around, everyone is welcomed. Feel free to pimp this on your blog if you'd be so kind to, that way I can assure that it gets filled up and that I'm not stressing out 15 mins before the event is suppose to start. LOL. tanya@pecksmedicalbilling.com is the email address.

Upcoming in Poker Nation

In an attempt to make this blog more of a resource than it has been, I plan in the next few months to make some posts that could be of great use to my brethren. To wit, you will see:

• A listing of some of the available WSOP packages on each site and a comparison of some of the satellite offerings
• Planning for the WSOP: Using my first-hand experience, I'll share some useful tidbits with some of you WSOP virgins who may be reading this
• A comparison of some of the tournaments and tournament sites across the country that I have traveled to for those of you considering which places you may want to travel in 2006-2007
• A look at which online sites have some tournament overlays
• A rake comparison of some online sites
• And whatever other useful stuff I can come up with between now and then

I also plan to link to these specific posts from my blog sidebar, so the information will be easy to find in the future. Check back early and often as I'll shoot these posts out from time to time in the coming months. As always, thanks for your patronage.

Quote of the day

"A few? 10 percent of the field cashes. How can you say that most everyone has "no chance" to cash when one player from every table will cash, and there is enough dead money to fill every crate in the last scene from Raiders of the Lost Ark?" -- 2 + 2 user epdaws in response to a comment that only a few people have a chance to cash in the WSOP main event

Yes, I'm turning into a shill

For a year a and a half I didn't worry about affiliate links and any of that jazzy BS to put on this blog, but I figure now that I might as well try to make a little money with this little blog, so you will now see some ads on this here little page as I also try to jazz it up in other ways to compensate for the clutter.

If the Noble pop-up is really annoying, set your browser to eliminate pop-ups. If you haven't already done this, I don't know why because pop ups drive me batty and I figured they drive most people the same. Let me say one thing about Noble, though. It's the site in which I've won most of my money in the past year, grinding it out at the 10-20 limit games. Many of the guys who I often beat are now playing the 30-60 and 50-100 limit tables the site recently opened up, so it might be worth your while to check the site out. But if you do check it out, please do so through my pop up or link. Grazi. http://adv.noblepoker.com/cgi-bin/SetupPoker.exe?id=N&member=18100000&profile=8520

Let me also pimp Poker Savvy real quickly. When Jay Greenspan first started it a few years ago, I enjoyed reading the variety of content on there. In fact, I told Jay we ought to start a Poker Savvy Magazine together. He wasn't much into it and I didn't really have the know how. This was before the onslaught of All-In, Bluff, Poker Pro and the rest....so who knows what might have been? I only recently checked the site out again and they have good promotions working. If you sign up with some online poker sites through them you can get some good bonuses and earn Poker Savvy points that can be used for various merchandse. Check them out at this link: http://www.pokersavvy.com/r/3607

It's hard out here for a poker player

How many times can you say it? This game is humbling. This game is humbling. This game is humbling.

And if you're trying to make a living at it, it's hard to justify it as a career when you win $500 in the first quarter of the year. That's where I stand after three months. Good thing I'm embarking on a new career soon.

Have I played poorly? Not really. Have I gone on tilt? Only mildly. What's wrong with my play? I can't think of anything. I'm playing the same way I was when I was winning.

So why am I losing? This is the part that contradicts those who scream at the top of their lungs that poker is not gambling. I call bullshit. I used to be one of those staunch defenders. Hell, I used to refer to poker as a "sport." (No, it isn't.)

This truth seems evident: in a skillful contest, the person who wins is the one who is able to use his skill to defeat his opponent. Does this happen in poker? Certainly. Does the most skillful play or player always win? Certainly not. I may make a great read and snuff out a bluff, but if I call and get outdrawn then my skillful play does not benefit me.

You play this game long enough, you learn that poker is a mix of luck and skill. Skill really does win out in the long run, but how long is that run? Because when you hit a bad streak for three months you really start to wonder. And you can't tell me I'm not "gambling" that my luck is going to turn around soon. The truth is I just don't know.

I'm sitting in The Tuscaloosa News as I write this. I'm back temporarily, putting together an annual fact book for the newspaper in an independent contract that will last through the month. It's weird being back in the office. I get bored and antsy as I've enjoyed nine freedoms of cubicle freedom, but being back with the co-workers also has a comfortable familiar feeling too. The important thing about the job is it helps keep me afloat as I ride through the rocky waters of a poker losing streak. I hope my boat doesn't run aground in the meantime.

Do I usually sound this stupid?

The Birmingham News recently published an article about college kids and poker in which writer Thomas Spencer spoke with experts, students and the likes of yours truly about the popularity and dangers of youthful card playing. He also spoke at length with Shannon Storr, the former UA student who did very well in the Aussie Millions (see previous blog posts.) Here's the part where I come into play:

Johnny Kampis, a UA graduate who is taking a year off for poker before starting on a master's degree in marketing, said there's a lot more poker around the university than during his days as an undergraduate.

"There has been an influx of younger players," said Kampis, 29. "There are some of them that play almost every night. They all play No-Limit Texas Hold'em. They play what they see on TV. They are using their parents' money, so they don't mind if they lose it all."

If the professional gambling lifestyle is alluring for college kids, Kampis warns, that dream fades fast. Kampis hasn't had the big break that propelled Shorr, but he's getting by playing tournaments across the country. He's looking forward to returning to school in the fall.

"Playing poker for a living is not what it's cracked up to be," he said. "It's a good hobby and fun game. Don't make it your life. It becomes a grind and is less enjoyable than it used to be."

Now, don't think I'm accusing Spencer of misquoting me, an accusation which as a reporter I absolutely hated (though these things do happen from time to time, what with imperfect hearing and all.) I recall speaking to him in a slow and slurred fashion when he called me while I was in Reno. Perhaps I was half drunk at the time. I do remember hemming and hawing as if I could not complete a coherent thought, which is probably apparent from the quotes he could and did use. I think Spencer did convey my rambling thoughts well as my main point was that I do believe too many people are or thinking about chasing a pipe dream.

Maybe my book, if it is ever published, will save a few people from acting too quickly and harshly as I think it will provide a strong warning to prospective pros. Then again, when they read about my jetsetting across the country while still keeping my head above water, the reading could have the opposite effect.