A one-armed Chinese man, a drug dealer wearing a gaudy gold Virgin of Guadelupe pendant on a gaudy gold rope, and Shane Nickerson.

Yeah, it's just another night in the $100 NL game at Commerce.

Shane, I've decided, has the worst luck in the universe. I watched him lose a buy-in to a donkey who called him all the way down with an underpair, only to catch her one-outer on the river to bust his flopped top two pair. I also saw him lose a buy-in to the guy we're pretty sure was a drug dealer n Shane flopped a set of nines against the his pocket queens, and the villain caught running clubs to make a flush. Aiyah!

When I got home, I wrote to Shane:

The Flush Suckout Guy has this great set of speakers in his van that he can sell you, straight from the factory. I think he has some designer cologne, too, but he may have to run around the corner to pick it up.

Shane wrote back:

That guy writes himself, man.

Indeed, he did. His fingernails were stained black, the same color as his black Los Angeles Dodgers cap. His huge adam's apple pushed out against two or three days worth of stubble. His blue eyes were bloodshot and pinned, and when he walked up to the table, he bounced his head around, pealed a one hundred dollar bill off a thick gangster roll from his pocket, and said, "Yeah-heah-heah-ha-ha-hah-heaaah!" He was one of the worst players I've ever seen, and that wad of bills came out of his pocket for several rebuys while I was there.

While it's very convenient to play online, one of the major benefits of playing live poker is seeing characters like Suckout Guy and One Armed Man. Shane and I also saw a guy in a floor-length oilskin duster who had a Texas Rangers star to accompany the feather on his fedora, as well as a gaggle of outrageously hot girls in too-tight cowboy shirts. (As if there's such a thing!) The guy in the 8 seat at our table said he took the SAT with me at Granada Hills High about sixteen years ago, and at one point stacked up over $500 in front of him by making boat-over-boat.

The game down there is extremely loose, and if you're not careful, you will get killed by some jerk who calls your fifteen dollar pre-flop raise (the blinds are 2 and 3) with a raggedy ace and ends up making two pair on the turn to bust your AK. So I played outrageously tight, raising with Group I and II hands only, and only limping with all other pocket pairs or medium suited connectors if I could get in late with at least two limpers ahead of me. I didn't play many hands, but I got paid off twice with pocket queens and a successful continuation bet with AQ when a king hit the flop. I played for about three hours, and I left $53 to the good after tokes and blinds. Not great, but better than losing, and when is the last time you got to say that you played with a one-armed man?

Yeah-heah-heah-ha-ha-hah-heaaah!

Phil Ivey is the 2005 Monte Carlo Millions Poker Tournament Champion! I love it when a true champion of the game wins these events.

It was also a very lucky day for John Juanda, after getting knocked out of the main event he fought his way back into a $125,000 payday by winning the consolation event and a seat at the final table.

Results and prize money won for the final 7 players are as follows:

• 7th - Kenna James $53,000 
• 6th - John Juanda $125,000
• 5th - Richard Herbert $175,000
• 4th - Bengt Sonnert $250,000
• 3rd - Marc Goodwin $300,000
• 2nd - Paul Jackson $600,000
• 1st -  Phil Ivey $1,000,000

Congratulations to all the winners - I can't wait to see this one on television.

Source and photo credit: MonteCarloMillions.com

As I mentioned in previous posts, the Monte Carlo Millions held a consolation tournament for those knocked out of the main event. There were seven players left today, and the winner of this tournament would earn a seat at the final table with the remaining six players in the main event.   

It was not to be for Johan Storakers though. His K7 didn't improve against John Juanda’s JJ, and he was out in 7^th place.

Interesting side note, partway through the action Victor Ramdin apparently received a ten minute penalty for showing his hand as he folded, while there were still other players left to act – potentially giving away important information. It’s about time tournament directors started doing this. While the other players soaked up Ramdin’s blinds, John Juanda eliminated Ken Lennaard with a full house. Lennaard finished in 6^th place.

Seven players will move on to the final table today, capturing the lion’s share of the $3,000,000 prize pool. Six of these players have already been determined. With their respective chip counts, they are:

         

Phil Ivey  $2,317,000

Richard Herbert  $908,000

Paul Jackson  $809,000

Marc Goodwin  $681,000

Bengt Sonnet  $582,000

Kenna James  $310,000

      

The seventh player to make the table will be winner of the consolation tournament. They began with seven players today, chip counts are as follows:

          

I can only imagine that the action was fast and intense as the remaining twelve players began the day shorthanded, at two tables of six. The first two casualties were Haralabos Voulgaris and Sargon Ruhu, followed shortly after by Chris Ferguson. Yes, Jesus is out in 10^th place. 

          

Erik Sagstrom busted out in 9^th place when his AA was cracked by Phil Ivey’s KQ. The flop was 6-4-K, and the turn brought another K. No help on the river for Erik, and he departed with $35,000. 

       

The eighth place finisher was Jean Jacques Ghebali, who pocketed $50,000 for his efforts. 

       

Down to seven players, the chip count was as follows:

           

The Amateur Poker Tour and the Amateur Poker League are getting ready to kick off a twelve-month tour of North America beginning on December 10^th in Wichita, Kansas. Participants can play for a suggested donation of $40, the proceeds of which will be donated to the Coalition to Salute America’s Heroes – an organization created to assist disabled veterans and their families to rebuild their lives. Prizes and awards will be given out at each event. 

       

The tour is also planning a stop in Baghdad, Iraq on Independence Day, July 4^th of 2006, allowing American Servicemen to play. 

        

Other planned locations include St. Louis, Dallas, Miami, and Foxwoods Casino in Mashantucket, Connecticut. You can find out more information about the tournament though the ‘read’ link below.

So it turns out that the earlier starting time, to accomodate European players, really kills everyone in North America. Just 28 players showed up today, making this a smallest . . . er, most intimate, I mean, WWdN Invitational, yet.

We'll be back to 1900 EST next time, for now and forever, starting in two weeks. There is no game next week, due to the Thanksgiving holiday in the USA.

I wasn't going to live blog, but I'm starting late, at the request of Heather.

1:08 PM (all times Pacific) - BG, Dave Westbay, Carsten, and Heather are all at my table. I'm in seat 5 at table two.

1:17 PM - I made two pair with KQ, but three spades on the board, so I overbet, hoping to get a worse hand to call. BG called . . . with KK! Queen made me a boat, but BG's boat was bigger. I'm own to 4285 now.

1:14 PM - I have had an incredible run of cards, including aces twice, a flopped boat with 33, and the flops just keep on hitting me. I'm currently the chipleader with 5050. I can't help but feel like I'm just holding them until CJ gets here.

1:21 PM - Blinds are at 15/30, average ia 1750. Big stack is 5785, small stack is 375. I've got 4165. 24 players left. All further updates will be in extended.

Tonight, WWdN West Coast Warmup #2 is happening at PokerStars, and I'll be honest with all of you: I like my chances.

Yesterday, I got heads-up in a $22 SNG, and had my kings cracked by 84d (!) when the flop came 6s-5s-9h, and he turned the 7h for a gutshot. On the very next hand, I had AKo. He raised, I called, planning to stop-n-go. When the flop came Ah Jh 9d, I sang a little song to myself, because I was certain to double up. He checked, I made a small bet, he raised and I pushed, confident I was ahead, and hoping he'd put me on a tilt-push and call. He called, showed Ac 8d, and I was about a 4:1 favorite. The turn was the 5d, improving me to about 9:1, and the river was the 8h, reducing me to 0:1. Ai-yah!

So what I'm saying is, I used up all my bad luck yesterday, and I'm dangerous tonight.

The first WWdN Thursday tourney at PokerStars was a lot of fun. I got very lucky and won almost all of the major coinflips I needed to win to make the final table, and I even sucked out major on Daddy to River a flush against his nut straight when I was really hurtin' early on.

I was the chipleader for a bit before the bubble, until I lost half my stack when I just couldn't call a huge raise with AQ and a K on the turn with the villain betting into me the whole way. That put me into shortstack mode, and I barely made it to the final table. On my last hand, I found A7o. UTG min-raised, which is usually a very reliable online tell (very strong hand) but I'd seen this player minraise and limp with really weak hands, and marginal kings. It was an easy push when it was folded to me. The blinds folded, and he showed AJc. OUCH!

I caught a miracle 7 on the flop with no diamonds . . . and he picked up a J on the turn. We both paired our aces on the river, and I went out in 8th.

Not bad at all, as far as I am concerned, especially since this was a very tough field of 87 players, including some of the best poker bloggers out there.

PokerStars Tournament #14855882, No Limit Hold'em

Buy-In: $10.00/$1.00
87 players
Total Prize Pool: $870.00 
Tournament started - 2005/11/10 - 22:30:00 (ET)

Dear Wil Wheaton, 

You finished the tournament in 8th place.
A $39.15 award has been credited to your Real Money account.

Congratulations!
Thank you for participating.

It's not a ton of money, but that's not the point of these tourneys. I had a fantastic time, and I even won the unofficial and undeclared CardSquad last longer, which gives me a pretty good record in that event.

Remember, tomorrow is the Friday game.

Last week's WWdN Friday game was the best one yet, and if you ask anyone who played, I'm sure they'll agree. The quality of play from start to fnish was superb, the final table was exciting, and like last week, two hugely popular bloggers went heads-up for the title.

I may be a bit biased in my judgement, because not only did I finish 14th out of 127, but my friend Alan, from geekandproud.net, won the whole thing in a crazy heads-up battle with Iggy.

PokerStars players know him as penner42, but I know Alan as Metsfan, because I met him under that nickname years ago on the WWdN Soapbox, a messageboard I ran for several years at my website. Alan eventually became a moderator for me, and helped me switch to Debian Linux. If I'm not mistaken, I helped introduce Alan to online poker, too.

He's got a great level-by-level recap of his tournament experience over at his blog, where he says, "As you'll see, I didn't win this with skill, it was just a question of getting completely run over by the deck and getting lucky on one hand."

I've watched Alan play, and I don't know if I agree with that assessment, but read his recap and let us know what you think.

We all know that bad beats are part of the game, and we all know that whenever we play a NLHE tournament, we are one donkey move or bad beat away from elimination. Even though we know that it's not really better to be lucky than good, we're going to have long stretches of time where the Poker Gods make us feel like it's really true. We also know that the best way to ease the pain of this reality is to always stock up on hookers and blow.

But some of us (well, okay, me. I can't speak for anyone else) aren't at a place in our life where hookers or blow are really an option. And since nobody wants to listen to your stupid bad beat story, Phil, we often turn to humor to cope.

Jason Kirk, aka Spaceman, gives us an example of the latter with a hilarious guide to playing this magnificent game titled "Jason's Secrets of No-Limit Hold'Em: How to Lose"

It's five simple steps to mastering this delicate art, including:

4. Make a badly-timed steal for all your chips.

It may be necessary to collude on this step to insure your opponent has a real hand. Don’t listen to those people who call collusion unethical or cheating or illegal - a loser does what he has to if he plans on losing with maximum efficiency. Many people lose their will to lose at this point. We call those people quitters.

Step #4 is gut-check time. You have to ask yourself: Do I really have what it takes to lose? Am I truly committed to the long-term path of losing? If the answer is no, by all means join the quitters. Losing isn’t for everyone. I would tell you there is no shame in quitting, but there is. Most people learn to deal with it in time, however, and chances are that if you quit the albatross will only hang around your neck for a short time.

If you ask yourself these questions and you find yourself answering “yes,” it’s time to steal. Try to find a hand like Q-3 or J-5 - something with little chance to win a pot - and make a normal-looking raise with it. Be certain that one of the blinds is holding a real hand (this is where collusion may become necessary). When he re-raises you, simply push all your chips to the middle and watch him call you immediately. You’ll feel a rush of joy when you realize you’re less than 15% to win the hand, a rush that only intensifies as your chances of winning drop closer to (and eventually reach) 0. That’s the Joy of Losing(TM).

Regular readers of Jason's blog, Catching the Antichrist, know that he's been getting kicked in the junk a lot recently, even though Jason clearly knows what he's doing at the poker tables. In fact, I think he schooled me a little bit in a cash game after a WWdN Friday tourney recently, but I'd never admit that in public. I hope that Jason's luck turns around sooner than later . . . but not if it means we'll lose entries like this.

Click the link below to read Jason's full post, if you think you've got what it takes to take your game to the next level.

I hit set-over-set in this week's WWdN Friday Game, and it gave me a huge lead very early on. As a result, I was able to steal when I needed to,  and I could afford to take a couple of chances at the right time. I think it had a lot to do with my 14th place finish.

I talked about it over at WWdN:iX for the benefit of my blog readers who are not necessarily students of the game, or even CardSquad readers, and I'll be surprised it it gets a lot of comments (other than, "I thought you weren't going to write about poker here any more!" :-)

I discussed why I played it the way I did, and concluded: This hand illustrates the element of luck in poker: jsmitty399, who had the tens, was entirely correct to call my raise, and must have felt great when he made his set. If I were him, I would have gone broke on that hand, too, because from his perspective, pocket queens is "monsters under the bed." If he hadn't made his set, he probably would have gotten away from the hand on my continuation bet . . .  I could just as easily have had AQ and been way behind. Hell, if I had aces or kings I would have been way behind. So jsmitty399 got very unlucky at the same time I got very lucky. That doesn't make us very good or very bad poker players . . . it just makes us poker players.

I'm interested to hear what CardSquad readers think about my reasoning over at WWdN:iX, not necessarily about this particular hand's results, but about the thoughts I had while it unfolded and the strategic implications for future games. It's lengthy, so I've put it in extended, starting after the flop when I hit top set.

It's Friday already? Where did the rest of this week go? I'll check behind the couch, as soon as I'm done live blogging this week's WWdN Friday Game, the Donegal Invitational. Last week's game was a metric assload of fun, and featured a heads-up battle between GRob and Daddy, two well-known (you'll notice I didn't say "respected" Har.) poker bloggers.

I don't think I've ever given proper credit to FlipChipPro from the always wonderful LasVegasVegas.com for the great picture of Darwin, which he took at this year's 2005 WSOP.

I'm even more excited than usual for this week's game, because I'm totally loaded on termite poison fumes. I had a beam in my house treated this morning, and even though it's all non-toxic-envoronmemtally-friendly-it-tastes-great-when-you-spread-it-on-a-cracker safe and good, the smell of wet, termite-ridden wood is an overwhelming cloud in my house.

Enjoy that image, while I move on . . .

3:57 PM (all times Pacific) - We have 116 players this week, and I am starting in seat 2 at table 3.

3:58 PM - PokerGeek still hasn't paid up on our last longer from the other night. I will mercilessly shame and flog his deadbeat ass throughout the entire liveblog today, until he does. Geek paid up! Details are in extended.

4:01 PM - Cards are in the air! I get 8-2o in the SB, and fold to an EP raise. There are three empty seats at my table.

4:03 PM - Mrs. Al Can't Hang is at my table!

4:06 PM - I just won a nice pot when I bluffed with the best hand. I had A6o, and paired my 6 on the flop. Tricky Sue went the distance with me with her AK.

4:07 PM - Late registration has closed, and we have 127 people this week. First place will take home $381. The final two tables will pay.

4:09 PM - I have to do an interview for PokerStars, so I'm not going to live blog for at least the next twenty minutes. When I return, updates will be in extended.

"The biggest homegame in the world"
    - PokerGeek

And now, your weekly reminder that the WWdN Friday game at PokerStars is all ready to go.

What: WWdN: Donegal Invitational
Where: PokerStars.
When: Friday, November 4th. 7:00 PM EST
Password: monkey
Tournament number: 14391236
Buy-in: $10+1

It's hard to find a starting time that can accomodate everyone who wants to play, but the 7:00 PM tourney a couple of weeks ago drew the largest field, so I'm trying that time again this week. I know that it's not the best start time for West coasters, but if I set the start time much later than that, it blows it for almost all of the people East of us. In an effort to accomodate as many people as possible, I'm going to add a game for us on Thursdays, which I'll call the WWdN West Coast Warm-up, unless someone can come up with a better name. It will run as long as there are people interested.