Once again, the Alouettes

For the second year in a row, the Saskatchewan Roughriders allowed an emminently winnable Grey Cup game to slip through their fingers against the Montreal Alouettes. The circumstances were less painful the second time around - thank goodness - but the fact remains, the Riders could be Grey Cup champs right now had they made just one or two more plays. That is a lousy realization.
Anyway, I figured I'd revisit my pregame predictions to see how poorly I did.
ANTHONY CALVILLO WILL STRUGGLE
I was definitely wrong about this, but not by as much as you might think. It's hard to say that a QB who throws for 342 yards struggled. But Calvillo definitely struggled at times, particularly in the second quarter, and the fact his team only put up 21 points underscores the fact that this was far from a vintage Alouettes offensive performance.
A big part of my Calvillo prediction was based on the notion it would be cold at Commonwealth Stadium. It was just below the freezing mark at kickoff, though - not nearly the frigid weather I'd been hoping for. In the end, Calvillo managed the game like a pro and made just enough plays in the passing game to fend off the Riders.
IF ALS WIN, COBOURNE WILL WIN MVP
I whiffed on this one, big-time. Cobourne, the Alouettes running back, got off to a great start in the first quarter, but his team abandoned the run at that point and never went back to him in any serious way. That decision, in my mind, greatly contributed to Montreal's struggles to move the ball during that point of the game.
Montreal just continued to ride the arm of Calvillo, for better or for worse, and he eventually cracked the Riders' blitz-happy scheme with quick-hit passes to Jamel Richardson and S.J. Green. The two jumbo-sized receivers look nearly identical, as they wear similar numbers (18 and 19) and tinted visors. They utterly terrorized the Sask secondary, and Richardson was full value for the MVP award.
WILL DURANT COME THROUGH? NOT A CLUE.
Yeah, I pretty much nailed this one, in that I foresaw that the Riders QB would be wildly inconsistent once again. After a rough first quarter, Durant moved the ball well in the second quarter, but several promising drives stalled short of the end zone.
Durant was ice-cold in the third quarter, but finally got something going in the fourth, marching the Riders down a short field for a major to cut the deficit to 21-18.
On the ensuing Als possession, Montreal drove into field goal range, but placekicker Damon Duval missed his second field goal of the game. (How bad has Duval been in the last two Grey Cups? I don't see how the Als could bring him back next year.) Durant got the ball back with less than two minutes left, but he threw an interception that essentially ended the game.
I feel Durant was hamstrung to a certain extent by the Riders' offensive game plan - I would have liked to see them take more shots down the field, and utilize Durant's running ability to a greater extent. A lack of offensive creativity hurt Saskatchewan's chances.
FINAL SCORE
I was predicting (hoping?) the Riders would win 24-21. When Saskatchewan got the ball back with two minutes left, my prediction was still very much in play. If the Riders had driven into field goal range and forced OT, there was a possibility I could have nailed it right on the nose.
It didn't work out that way, but I'll take a little solace in the fact I was correct that the Grey Cup would be a defensive struggle, rather the offensive show everyone was predicting.
Congrats to Calvillo and the Alouettes. Well done, well deserved.

Fearful Grey Cup predictions

As a Saskatchewan Roughriders fan, I am both wildly excited and deeply nervous about the Grey Cup game on Sunday. Last season, you'll recall, the Riders lost the CFL title game 28-27 to the Montreal Alouettes when they sent out an extra man for Montreal's field goal attempt on the final play. Als kicker Damon Duval, who had struggled all game long, missed his first attempt, but the Riders' too-many-men penalty gave him another try, which he made. That couldn't possibly happen again, could it? COULD IT?
At any rate, here are a few hunches I have about how Riders-Alouettes II will play out.
CALVILLO WILL STRUGGLE
I was in attendance at Regina's Taylor Field for the 2003 Grey Cup, and watched Montreal QB Anthony Calvillo drop an absolute stink-bomb in a 34-22 loss to the Edmonton Eskimos. The conditions were ridiculously cold that day, and it seemed that the frigid temperatures didn't agree with Calvillo.
Even in last year's Grey Cup in Calgary, Calvillo played very poorly until the fourth quarter. The colder it is in Edmonton on Sunday, the better it is for the Riders. The forecast is calling for -6 C with 10 km/h winds on Sunday afternoon, but hopefully that's enough to cool off Calvillo.
IF THE ALS WIN, COBOURNE WILL BE MVP
Montreal's real ace in the hole, to me, is running back Avon Cobourne. He's a tough little runner, and the Riders have had a hard time stopping the run. The question is, if Calvillo struggles, how quickly will Alouettes coach Marc Trestman identify that and put the ball in Cobourne's hands?
WILL DURANT COME THROUGH? NOT A CLUE.
I've titled this post "Fearful predictions," and I'm honestly too scared to venture a guess as to how Saskatchewan QB Darian Durant will play on Sunday. I have no idea what to expect from Durant on a week-to-week basis, or even quarter-to-quarter at times this season. He's been consistently inconsistent, despite leading the CFL in passing yardage.
I'll say this for Durant, though - he may not always get it done in the prettiest fashion, but he's a winner. He's also the kind of QB who won't lock in on one receiver - last week in Calgary, with favourite targets Andy Fantuz and Weston Dressler blanketed by the Stampeders, he looked for Chris Getzlaf more often.
It should be noted that Montreal's defence surrendered the most passing yardage in the CFL, but also led the league in interceptions. Durant threw 22 picks, and he's got to to a better job of taking care of the ball on Sunday.
FINAL SCORE
Since I'm thoroughly biased . . . Roughriders 24, Alouettes 21. The weather will help keep the offences in check, and Durant will make just enough plays down the stretch to get the job done. And Saskatchewan will have the proper number of players on the field at all times.

Final thoughts on the final table

The 2010 edition of the World Series of Poker main event final table will go down in history as perhaps the most dramatic and entertaining WSOP final tables of all time. I’ve had a couple weeks to digest how it all went down; here are my thoughts.
OH CANADA!
Congrats to Montreal native Jonathan Duhamel (pictured above) for becoming the first Canadian to win the main event. He didn’t play the best poker at the final table (more on that in a minute) but he got lucky in some big spots, and then finished things off with overwhelming aggression.
Certain members of the poker media have wondered aloud whether Duhamel’s win will cause a poker explosion in Canada, similar to what happened when Chris Moneymaker won in 2003. I tend to think that’s not going to materialize. The thing is, Canadians already love poker. The game has been well-exposed in Canada on TV, and most of those who might be inclined to play, already do.
If there’s a poker explosion, it’ll be in Quebec. The French-speaking media apparently loves Duhamel – RDS, the francophone arm of TSN, sent a camera crew down to Vegas to document the 23-year-old’s every move leading up to the final table. How to you say check-raise en francais?
I WAS RIGHT ABOUT CHEONG (SORT OF)
Back in July, I predicted Joseph Cheong would win the main event. I really admired his perseverance and sharp play in rebuilding his stack after Filippo Candio gave him a sick beat leading up to the final table.
By and large, Cheong’s performance at the final table justified my faith in him. He looked awesome on TV during the early stages, and from reading various hand-by-hand blogs after watching the telecast, he absolutely dominated the table to an extent that wasn’t really reflected in the TV coverage. I was particularly impressed with the way he induced Matthew Jarvis to bluff off half his stack on one of the early hands.
What folks are going to remember Cheong for, unfortunately, is one of the all-time great blow-ups. He built his stack from 23.5 million at the start to over 100 million when it was down to three-handed between himself, Duhamel and John Racener. Racener was short-stacked, and it seemed like just a matter of time before Cheong and Duhamel locked horns heads-up.
But then Cheong decided to six-bet all in against Duhamel with A7o, and was called by the Quebecker’s QQ. The queens held, crippling Cheong, and he was eliminated a couple hands later.
I listened to audio of the post-tourney media scrums with the players, and Cheong basically said he made a read and went with it. He said he’d probably do it the same way if he found himself in the same spot again. Obviously it was an epic mistake, but I respect that the guy has so much confidence in his reads. If you’re not confident in poker, you’re screwed.
Part of Cheong’s thinking was, he felt he could get Duhamel off a hand like QQ. And honestly, if I’d been in Duhamel’s shoes, I would have been hard-pressed to call off my chips in that spot. In his post-match interview, though, Duhamel said it was an “easy call” – which implies that because of Cheong’s constant aggression, he didn’t give him credit for a big hand. Failing to consider his table image was Cheong’s biggest error, in my mind.
It says a lot about Cheong’s skill that even after he blew off such a huge stack, the folks at ESPN.com were still blown away by the clinic he put on prior to that.
MIZRACHI BLEW IT
The most recognizable pro at the final table was Michael “The Grinder” Mizrachi. After starting the day seventh in chips, he grinded his way up to the chip lead at the dinner break. He had the biggest stack when play got to five-handed, but he managed to bust in fifth place.
Grinder’s tournament came down to three crucial hands – two of which he played badly, and one of which he got unlucky on. On the first key hand, he open-raised with A8 suited, and then the short-stacked Racener shoved all in. Racener had been playing tight all day, but Grinder decided to take an ill-advised shot at him. Racener had Mizrachi dominated with AK, and his hand held to take a big chunk out of Grinder’s stack.
Later on, Racener gave Duhamel a sick beat when his AQ sucked out against AK, all in preflop. The very next hand, Duhamel raised in the small blind with A9o. Mizrachi shipped it from the big blind with 33, and after humming and hawing for a long while, Duhamel called off his stack. I think this was a brutal call by Duhamel – the best he could have hoped for there was a coin flip, and he could have easily been dominated. Mizrachi had an incredulous look on his face when Duhamel showed A9. At any rate, Duhamel was extremely fortunate to flop a nine and double up.
The eventual champ executed a lovely trap to knock out Mizrachi. Duhamel limped in the small blind with AA, and the Grinder checked with Q8o. The flop came queen high . . . Duhamel checked . . . Grinder bet . . . Duhamel check-raised . . . Grinder snap-shoved . . . and Duhamel called. Two cards later, Mizrachi was busto.
When Mizrachi took the lead at the dinner break, everyone expected him to run over the table from that point. That he managed to blow off all his chips in short order was quite stunning.
TIGHT PLAYERS HAD THE RIGHT IDEA
Racener and Candio were by far the tightest players at the table, and I have to give them both a certain amount of props for that. It ain’t sexy to play snug, but there’s something to be said for moving up the pay scale. Candio netted just over $3 million for fourth place, and runner-up Racener won $5.5 million for essentially sitting there and waiting for everyone else to beat each other up.
John Dolan, who began the day second in chips with 46 million but busted in sixth, might be a richer man today had he played as conservatively as Racener and Candio.

From donkey to genius

To summarize my crazy November poker run, I basically forgot how to play the game for a minute there . . . and then I remembered.
To be more specific, I made a $1,000 profit during a stellar October, and then managed to blow off $900 of it in the worst single downswing of my tournament career (such as it is).
The way I look at it, the first $200 of the downswing was just the natural variance of poker. I got moderately unlucky in a couple sit-n-gos, no big deal. The next $500 was entirely on me - I played like a donkey. I completely lost my confidence, and every move I made was wrong. If I made a continuation bet, I was definitely getting check-raised. If I had the chip lead on the money bubble, I'd find a way to be the next guy eliminated.
At that point, I decided to buckle down and play some decent freaking poker. I've found that the best way to regain my poker mojo is to play 27-player sit-n-gos as opposed to single-table SNGs. For some reason, the multi-table format tends to encourage me to play simple ABC poker, as opposed to making fancy (often low-percentage) moves. And when I'm playing poorly, a little ABC poker is just what the doctor ordered. From there, I can add bluffs back into my game gradually - only picking the most obvious spots at the start, and opening things up a bit as I regain my confidence.
This tactic probably would have worked, but I ran horrendously bad and managed to bleed off another $200. I lost in all sorts of sick ways: KK vs. QQ, KQ vs. QT, AK vs. AQ, etc. I couldn't catch a break, but I felt like I was playing well again.
The circumstances of my inevitable upswing were kind of interesting. I came down with the flu today and had to stay home from work. As I lay on the couch, chugging ginger ale and sipping chicken soup, I decided to take a shot at one of the big multi-table tournaments. I hit up one with a $20 buy-in, and ended up finishing seventh out of about 1200 people for $671. Pretty sweet on some levels - I got a big chunk of my bankroll back in a big hurry. Of couse, first place was $3,800, so once again I came up just short of a real big score.
Ultimately, I was pleased with my play. I was very patient, navigating my way past the money bubble with a stack that was just a couple bucks below average. Then I was fortunate enough to catch KK against a big stack's QQ, and scored a nice double-up.
I doubled up a second time in fascinating circumstances. The player to my left and I both had very deep stacks of around 50,000, and I think the blinds were around 500-1000. I limped in the small blind with KJ (after everyone else had folded), and he made a bigger-than-usual raise out of the big blind. I just felt like he was robbing me and didn't want any action in that spot. So I shoved, and he snap-called with A9o.
My hand was obviously caught in the cookie jar, but he made a ridiculous call in my opinion. Sure, he had a better hand than me, but that's a very marginal spot to call off all your chips. He's only 60 per cent to win there. Anyway, I flopped a king, and it held to give me one of the biggest stacks in the tournament with about 50 players remaining.
I rode that stack down to the final two tables, at which point I opened up my game and got some timely resteals.
I arrived at the final table with just over 300,000 in chips, which was good for fifth place, just below average. The top five spots paid at least $1,000, which is what I was sort of aiming for, and I decided to be patient. I was rather unlucky not to finish higher - the short stacks kept sucking out and doubling up. It was kind of gross. I only caught one big hand - AA in the big blind - and wouldn't you know it, everybody else folded to me. So sick.
This final table was slow going, and my 300k stack ended up shrinking in relation to the blinds, which rose to 12,500-25,000. I ended up busting in seventh when the chip leader made a small raise from the button, and I felt my AhTh was good enough for a resteal. He called with AQ, and my suckout didn't materialize.
At the end of the day, I'm really happy with both my play and the result. One of these times, I'll get the win.
Bankroll = $5,700

Random thoughts, Episode 2

I enjoyed writing my last "Random Thoughts" post so much, I'm going back to the well.
--> My homeboy Conan O'Brien is back on TV. After being exiled from NBC, he's back with a new latenight show on TBS. As a longtime CoCo fan, his Monday night debut had me pretty stoked. The ginger-haired comedy genius seemed hyper, nervous and excited all at the same time during his monologue, which was both understandable and interesting to watch. But the skits were excellent - both the video recapping his last six months, where he was repeatedly shot Godfather-style by a band of machine gun-toting mafiosos, and the Ricky Gervais guest spot. Conan had two particularly memorable lines. More or less the first words out of his mouth were, "Welcome to my second annual first show." Later on, he dropped the following gem: "It's not easy doing a late-night show on a channel without a lot of money that viewers have trouble finding. So that's why I left NBC." Bazinga.
Here's an interesting look at the impact of O'Brien's debut, via the L.A. Times: http://latimesblogs.latimes.com/showtracker/2010/11/conan-obrien-grabs-42-million-viewers-in-tbs-premiere.html
--> After Week 1 of the NFL season, I set the over-under on when Dallas Cowboys head coach Wade Phillips would be fired at 3.5 games. If you took the over, you made money - Phillips lasted seven more games before Jerry Jones axed him following Sunday's 45-7 debacle against Green Bay. In the end, my line was a little aggressive, but I definitely had the right idea.
--> Just how much do I despise B.C. sports teams? Consider the following: I was actively rooting against my favourite CFL team, the Saskatchewan Roughriders, when they were playing the Edmonton Eskimos this past Saturday. My logic, such as it was, was that a Riders win would knock the Eskimos out of the playoff race, thereby paving the way for the B.C. Lions to claim the third and final postseason slot in the West. My wife and I actually had a mild argument about this - she felt I should have been supporting the Riders, because they needed to snap their four-game losing streak prior to the playoffs. I just couldn't set aside my anti-B.C. bias. And wouldn't you know it, my Riders screwed me, beating Edmonton to let the Lions in the back door. You better believe I hate Saskatchewan's chances in the West semifinal vs. B.C. this Sunday.

--> The whole saga surrounding Randy Moss's release by the Minnesota Vikings last week was amazing and surreal, and nobody was more entertained by it than I was. Reason being, I had traded Moss in my fantasy football keeper league two weeks prior, netting a pair of high picks in next year's draft. Moss had been one of my keepers for four seasons. We'd had some good times, even celebrating a fantasy league title together (in a manner of speaking), but I picked the perfect time to cut bait with the head-case wideout. Not that I don't think that Moss will be an impact guy in Tennessee - in fact, I think he will - but he's officially entered the stage of his career where he's not a keeper in our pool. He's entered the Terrell Owens zone - diminishing talents, and too tempermental to be reliable on a week-to-week basis.
--> I went out of my way to avoid finding out any results from the World Series of Poker main event final table, in order to enjoy Tuesday night's broadcast in a greater way. I unfollowed PokerNews on Twitter. I turned off the radio every time they mentioned the WSOP. Then on Sunday I went to ESPN.com's front page, and right there near the top was a headline naming the two players who had gotten to heads-up. Thanks a million, ESPN. I have since found out who ended up winning, but I won't reveal that in this space yet, in case some of you were saving it for the broadcast.
--> If you read my last post, you might recall I won $1,000 grinding sit-n-gos on PokerStars in October. Well, I blew off half of that in the first week of November. I can't even complain I ran bad. I just played awful - as awful as I've played in the last couple years. I definitely got unlucky at times, but the bigger problem was, I rarely put myself in a position to win. So many decisions I made were wrong. Motivation-wise, I was often playing just for something to do, not because I was stoked to compete. At times like these, I really believe God is telling me to take a break from poker. So that's what I'm doing, at least until Friday. On the bright side, I finished second at my monthly home-game tournament. But online, I'm playin' like a donkey. A break is just the ticket.
Bankroll = $5,500

Random thoughts

--> When you read Bill Simmons’s excellent and entertaining columns on ESPN.com, you assume they’re written by a man’s man. Someone who watches football in a tricked-out man cave. Someone who speaks in a deep baritone. Then you hear his podcast, and he’s got this high-pitched, nasal voice. It’s both jarring and hilarious. It’s like taking a sip from a cup that you assume is filled with orange juice, and it’s milk.

--> NBC aired a “Women of Saturday Night Live” special this week, and it reminded me that Rachel Dratch is easily the most underrated performer in SNL history. Take that hyperbolic statement for what it's worth - I’m too young to remember a lot of the old-school SNLers. But during my era, Dratch was, to steal a poker phrase, the nuts. Only thing keeping her from proper recognition: She’s kinda funny-looking. But that’s part of what makes her hilarious! Do yourself a favour: Go to YouTube and type in “Debbie Downer” in the search bar. You're welcome.
--> I was looking at a print ad the other day that made reference to “faves.” As in, “My faves include skinny jeans and cargo pants.” It occurred to me that the only place I’ve run across the word “faves” is in ads. I’ve literally never heard anyone use that word in conversation. Granted, I’m not exactly hip to all the slang kids are using these days, but I figure I would have come across it once or twice if this was a word people used. To quote a venerable cinema classic (Zoolander), I feel like I’m taking crazy pills!
--> So the other day I was listening to the soundtrack for the movie “Magnolia,” which mainly consists of tracks by the understated-yet-excellent Aimee Mann. It occurred to me that it would rule to hear the White Stripes cover Mann’s “Save Me.” Super-weird mix of artists, but a good song is a good song. I want to hear it with a metal/blues twist. Get it done, Jack White.

--> A couple months ago, on this very blog, I went on the record with a prediction that Joseph Cheong (pictured right) would win the World Series of Poker main event. With the final table set to play out next week, I stand by that. I also stand by my offer to wager even money on Cheong (third in chips) and Michael Mizrachi (seventh in chips) against the rest of the final table field. ESPN.com’s Gary Wise recently wrote a really insightful feature on Cheong. Here’s the URL: http://sports.espn.go.com/espn/poker/columns/story?columnist=wise_gary&id=5757063
--> Speaking of poker, October was quite literally a grand month for me. I turned a $1,000 profit on PokerStars, marking the third four-digit month in the past year or so. I was just playing aggressive, trusting my reads, and crushing folks. My ROI, roughly calculated, was around 45 per cent – just plain sweet. Bankroll = $6,000.

LeBron James, Villain

The very first day of our New York trip, my buddy Matt and I dragged our wives to the NBA Store on Fifth Avenue.
For an NBA fan, this place is pretty much Mecca. Jerseys and shorts and hats for every team in the league. All kinds of memorabilia. There was no way I was walking out of that store without buying something.
And you know what I bought? A LeBron James Cleveland Cavaliers jersey I found on the discount rack for $30. It was the super-snazzy wine-and-gold road jersey, with the old Cavs logo on the chest. Just a great-looking piece, and an unbelievably good price for an authentic uniform.
What made this garment even more awesome to me is, it felt like I was making a political statement of sorts. Maybe political isn’t quite the right adjective, but I was taking a stand on an issue by buying that jersey. I don’t like that LeBron dissed his home-state fans. That was some mean stuff. And every time I wear that jersey, I’ll remember that it was the one he was always meant to wear.
Yup, I’m definitely chugging the Haterade when it comes to the artist formerly known as King James. I caught the first half of the Heat’s season-opener in Boston, and thoroughly enjoyed watching James, Wade and Bosh stumble around trying to figure out what their roles were as the boos rained down. I’ve also been doing a fair bit of reading on the Heat, and here are some of the more interesting factoids I’ve come across:
-- LeBron had eight turnovers against the Celtics, and nine the following evening against Philadelphia. In 548 career games coming into this season, he’d only had eight-plus turnovers 10 times. Interesting.
-- TNT, which broadcast the Celtics-Heat game, said 7.4 million people tuned in, making it the highest-rated regular season game on cable in NBA history. Interestingly, after Boston and Miami, the highest local ratings came out of Cleveland. Amazing how collective loathing will tend to galvanize people.
-- Cavs owner Dan Gilbert kind of went ballistic post-Decision, firing off an insanely angry letter. He went on ESPN radio after the Celtics game, and dropped this little nugget: "That was sort of a surreal experience . . . I guess they are only going to be 81-1 now.” Bazinga.
-- Bill Simmons caught both of the Heat’s first two games, and his fascinating take on the whole thing was on ESPN.com. Definitely worth a read. Perhaps the most interesting passage:
“The best thing about Pre-Decision LeBron? How he connected with his teammates and fans. He wanted to win, he wanted to have a good time, he wanted to put on a show, he wanted to be liked, and most of all, he wanted to amaze. Watching Post-Decision LeBron talk cryptically about taking mental notes, retweet vicious messages, broach the race card and prance around preseason games with an Eff You edge was like seeing Will Ferrell play a war criminal or something. It just didn't feel right.”
LeBron, if you happen to stumble onto this obscure blog in your cyberspace wanderings, this is why everybody is upset.

Live poker is fun

Poker-wise, I’m rolling pretty well right now.
Since returning from New York City three weeks ago (travel blog coming up, I promise), I’m up $650 on PokerStars. I’ve gone back to my roots, playing fewer multi-table tournaments in favour of good old-fashioned sit-n-gos – of both the nine-player and 27-player variety. And frankly, I’m crushing ‘em.
Thus, I was full of confidence on Saturday night when I went to a live charity tournament. I’m not generally a big fan of charity events – unless I really buy into the cause – because they typically take half the prize pool. I hate to go all Grinch here, but it’s honestly not a great poker investment. But I went to this tourney, which was in support of a women’s hockey team, because a friend of a friend was involved. And I was kind of craving some live poker.
Organization-wise, this tournament was kind of a gong show. The tourney director obviously wasn’t a hardcore poker player. She’d raise the blinds at random times – they were supposed to be half-hour levels, but then she’d bump them up after five minutes because “the tournament is running too long, and there’s still too many players in.” LOL.
More concerning to me is that the buy-in was $50, there were 55 players, and the total payout was only $850 – $500 for first, $200 for second, $100 for third and $50 for fourth. That means the hockey team kept two-thirds of the prize pool, rather than the traditional 50 per cent. Nothing worth griping about. Just sayin’.
At any rate, I discovered that there’s a tradeoff for the team taking most of the prize pool – the vast majority of the people there weren’t poker players. Or at least, not experienced poker players.
At my six-handed starting table, there wasn’t a single tight-aggressive player among them. Everyone was uber-passive, whether loose or tight. There was a ton of preflop limping, and no one bet – and I mean ever – unless they had at least top pair. No creativity at all, plenty of calling stations obviously, but it was kind of fun to play a tournament where there’s not a single tough decision to make. No one’s putting pressure on you. They might as well have been playing with their cards face-up. It was a very relaxing, fun atmosphere.
That said, for the first four hours, I never had an above-average stack. I won a few pots, lost a few, saw a ton of flops, but just couldn’t make any hands. I was pretty content to play mistake-free, small-ball poker against my table full of calling stations.
I managed to grind my way to the final three tables, making a couple of hands at opportune times to stay out of the danger zone. Then, with the blinds 200-400, I shoved in middle position for 3,300 with JJ. The big blind, who had a slightly smaller stack than me, made an utterly inexplicable call with Q8 offsuit. Then the flop came down 988. Of course. But the turn was a 10, and the river was a 7 to make me a glorious straight.
A couple hands later, my buddy Neil moved to our table. Neil’s nickname is “The Gouger” for his penchant for constantly raising the price of poker with aggressive raises, and he had easily the largest stack in the tournament. I was in the big blind at 300-600 when he raised from the small blind to 1800. I looked down at Ac7c, and just knew I had the best hand. I shoved for 5,500 total, which actually gave him pretty compelling odds to call at 2-to-1. But I managed to talk him out of it, and he told me he laid down QdJd. I told him I had AQ. LOL once again.
Immediately after that hand, we moved to the eight-handed final table. The blinds were 500-1000, and I started with 7,500, which was actually about average. I quickly had 1,500 carved out of my stack by the blinds, but at that point I went all short-stack ninja. I must have moved all in at least a half-dozen times without a showdown, managing to actually increase my stack as we burst the money bubble to four players.
At that point, the short stack moved in on the button, and I called from the small blind with A7. He showed A5, but hit his 5 on the turn, crippling me to 2,000. For you mathematicians in the crowd, that’s two big blinds.
Then, something wild happened. The very next hand, I picked up JJ in the small blind, and doubled up against the big blind’s 76 offsuit. Then I picked up KsJs on the button, and doubled against the big blind’s J4. After a successful blind-stealing shove, I doubled through Neil, flopping a set with 99 against his KJ. And just like that, I was the chip leader. Madness.
After the player to my left busted in fourth place, we negotiated a chop. The three of us were guaranteed $250, with an extra $50 left to the winner. I ended up getting to heads-up with Neil, but with the blinds at 2000-4000, we only had about six big blinds apiece. He ended up winning when his QdTd out-raced my 55.
This tournament wasn’t the WSOP by any means, but it was a blast. Good camaraderie, good food, and it helps when you leave with an extra $250 in your jeans. I also felt like I played pretty well. There’s no way to put this without sounding arrogant, but it felt kind of funny to be in a spot where I was so much better than my opponents. More than anything, the result is just another confidence-builder.
My main online bankroll is currently at $5,650. Poker is fun again.

I'm still alive

If you're one of my five loyal readers, I'm sure you've been devastated at my utter neglect of this blog over the last few weeks. My humblest apologies for that. I've simply been too busy since returning from vacation, and it's been hard to get back into the swing of blogging.
Here's the Cliff's Notes on what's been going on lately.
-- I mentioned in my last post that my wife and I were headed to New York City for a week. That trip happened, and it was amazing. I intend to blog about it in detail in the very near future.
-- My fantasy football team has been struggling, so I made a blockbuster deal with the future in mind. I swapped Randy Moss and Antonio Gates to a front-runner for a trio of premium draft picks in 2011. That's the beauty of a keeper league - you can pull the plug on the current season and become a major contender the next year.
-- I'm playing some pretty freaking solid poker right now. I'm up a modest amount (about $250), and I could be ahead even more if a couple cards had fallen differently. I went deep in a couple of massive MTTs, but didn't make it into the seriously large money. But the more important thing is, I'm playing with a ton of confidence, blending aggression with patience, and I'm feeling on the verge of a monster run.
Bankroll = $5,250

A winning month, the ugly way

Poker is such a sick game.
For the better part of the last two months, my results have been mediocre overall, and downright atrocious for extended stretches. I barely broke even in August, and as recently as Monday, I was $300 in the hole for September.
Then Wednesday night happened. The only reason I was playing was, I needed to play $150 worth of sit-n-gos to qualify for my monthly VIP level on PokerStars. Otherwise, I probably wouldn't have opened the laptop. I was straight-up sick of the game.
Over the previous couple of weeks, I'd run so bad that I'd lost confidence that I was remotely capable of winning any tournament I entered. I made a few mistakes, sure. But I also lost when I did everything right. I lost holding AA vs. QQ, all in preflop. I lost with KK vs. 87o, with the money going in on a J84 flop. I can't count how many times I lost with AK vs. AQ. If I got my money in the pot in that spot, it was a certainty that there would be a queen on the flop.
The above paragraph might sound like a donkey's lament. But I'm not trying to say I played perfect poker. Far from it. Honestly, I did run pretty freaking bad. It's hard to continue to make the correct play when you're not getting rewarded. It's a vicious psychological cycle that can cause your game to deteriorate. It might seem easy to chalk it up to the natural variance of poker, but it's also hard to keep perspective in the middle of a run like that.
But I digress. We were talking about Wednesday night.
My hot streak actually started on Tuesday, when I won a $30 27-player SNG. On Wednesday, I ended up entering five SNGs, winning three and cashing in a fourth. I won two 27-player events - a $10 and a $30 - and also won a single-table $30.
Woot woot, back on track! My beautiful Wednesday allowed me to finish the month of September $300 to the good.
To review, my September looked like this: $300 upswing . . . $600 downswing . . . $200 upswing . . . $200 downswing . . . $600 upswing. Like a freaking yoyo. I'd prefer that my bankroll grew in a more stable fashion, but at least it's growing. It's better than the alternative, for sure.
Obviously, there are a few more days left in September. But I'm booking a $300 win this month, because I'm headed to NYC - that's right, the Big Apple - on vacation until Oct. 1. So no blogging for a couple days, but I'll tell you all about it when I get back. Spoiler alert: I have Yankees-Red Sox tickets. Booya!
Bankroll = $5,000

Insanity in Sask.

Yikes.
It's hard to know what to make of the Saskatchewan Roughriders these days. At the start of the season, they looked like the best team in the CFL in winning their first three games. The offence looked unstoppable, and Darian Durant looked like the best QB in the league.
Looks can be deceiving, for sure, and the Riders crapped the bed on several occasions in dropping four of their next seven games. Inexplicable losses - to the hapless Edmonton Eskimos on Aug. 28, and a brutal 31-2 capitulation against the Winnipeg Blue Bombers on Sept. 12 - became the norm.
Then came Friday's home game against the Calgary Stampeders, the CFL's best team. The outcome is best described with a paraphrase from that cinema classic, Dumb and Dumber: Just when you think they can't get any stupider, they go and do something like this . . . AND TOTALLY REDEEM THEMSELVES!
Well, total redemption might be putting it a little strong. Durant was in a brutal slump coming in, having thrown three TDs and 10 picks in his previous six games. He put up some crazy numbers on Friday, throwing for 495 yards. But he threw a pick-six on Saskatchewan's first possession, and made a couple head-scratching decisions down the stretch.
Ultimately, Durant got the Riders into position to beat the Stamps in regulation, galloping away on an electrifying scramble to get into field goal range with the score tied 37-37 and just a couple ticks on the clock.
But this is where the game got strange. In what is sure to become a huge talking point in Saskatchewan for the next couple days, Riders coach Ken Miller sent punter Eddie Johnson out to try to boot the ball through the end zone for a single point. His excellent field goal kicker, Luca Congi, is pretty much automatic from 35 yards, which is the kick he would have been looking at. Needless to say, Johnson's punt was short and Calgary ran the ball out of the end zone, forcing OT.
Now, I generally think Miller provides the Riders with above-average coaching. He is one of the CFL's best. But on this call, he must have been smoking some powerful peyote.
Not to worry, though - the Riders won in OT. Sheer madness. Only in the CFL, right?

RANDOM NFL OBSERVATIONS:
Sunday's best highlight was Randy Moss scorching Darrelle Revis for a long TD, on a ridiculous one-handed catch, no less. Who's the slounch now? . . . LaDainian Tomlinson is the best running back on the New York Jets roster . . . Reports of the Indianapolis Colts' demise have been greatly exaggerated . . . The Seattle Seahawks came back to earth, big time, in Game 2 of the Pete Carroll era. I think that's more along the lines of what we can expect from the Seahawks this season . . . Cleveland Browns fans were utterly unsurprised by Derek Anderson's horrendous bed-crapping against Atlanta . . . Hard to tell who's more overrated: the Dallas Cowboys or Tony Romo. It's kind of crazy, but it seems like a lack of discipline is almost part of the culture in Cowboy-land . . . The over-under on Wade Phillips's tenure as Cowboys coach is 3.5 games . . . Aside from Minnesota Vikings fans, the only folks worried about Brett Favre's slow start to the season are fantasy football leaguers who drafted him three rounds too high. The rest of us just think it's funny . . . Speaking of fantasy football, all those "experts" who were horny for Joe Flacco in the preseason better be updating their resumes.

Some of my fantasies involve football

If you'd been sitting beside me on my couch during the NFL Monday nighter between the San Diego Chargers and Kansas City Chiefs, you'd have a perfect understanding of why fantasy football rules.
First, a bit of background. I'm involved in a 14-team fantasy keeper league. It's pretty hardcore - the buy-in is $100 per year, and you get to keep three players from your roster the year before. You play head-to-head with one other team each week, and whoever gets the most points gets the W. Top eight teams make the playoffs, and the post-season champ takes home the bulk of the prize pool. I won the whole enchilada in 2008. It gets kind of intense, but in all the right ways.
Which brings us back to the Monday nighter. Heading into the San Diego-Kansas City game, I held a 10-point lead over my opponent - last year's champ, incidentally. We both had two players involved: I had Chargers TE Antonio Gates and Chiefs RB Thomas Jones, and he had Chargers QB Philip Rivers (pictured above) and the San Diego defence.
It wasn't a promising match-up for me, despite my lead. Our point system is kind of screwed up - quarterbacks are by far the biggest points-generators. So with Rivers going up against the KC defence, I had reason to worry.
But as the game wore on, my optimism grew. The underdog Chiefs built a 21-7 halftime lead, severely denting the fantasy value of my opponent's San Diego D. Rivers did throw one touchdown pass, but it was to Gates - my tight end. Sweeeeeet.
Rivers got things going in the second half, though. I groaned aloud when he threw a 59-yard TD pass to a wide open Legedu Nanee. And I was chewing my fingernails as he drove the Chargers inside KC's 10 yard line with less than a minute remaining.
I should mention that at this point, I held a 55-51 lead. TD throws are worth four points, so if Rivers completed a pass into the end zone, we'd be tied, with a strong possibility of Rivers racking up even more points in OT.
But the Chiefs defence stood firm, and when Rivers's fourth-down pass fell harmlessly to the turf, I was a little more excited than I should have been.
You just gotta love fantasy football. The NFL, more than any other sport, is well-suited to sports-pool gambling - the fact that most games occur on the same day of the week makes it ideal for head-to-head pools, and you only have to set your roster once a week. And NFL football in HD is like watching a good movie. Even my wife enjoys it.

John Updike = The Ted Williams of writing

A couple weeks ago in Colorado, I was giddy with delight when I stumbled upon a hardcover copy of John Updike's "Hub Fans Bid Kid Adieu" in a bookshop.
"Hub Fans" is a magazine story chronicling Ted Williams's final game at Fenway Park, originally published in 1960 for The New Yorker. The fact it's been released in hardcover hints at its legendary status - it's been called the greatest magazine article in the history of sportswriting. Which is kind of crazy, because Updike wasn't a sportswriter per se. In fact, "Hub Fans" was his one and only foray into the sports genre.
I won't pretend I knew anything about Updike's career before I sat down to read this article, aside from being aware of the legendary nature of this particular piece. (Yes, I am the quintessential dumb jock.) Cliff's Notes on Updike: He's one of just three authors to win two Pulitzers for fiction. If that sort of thing impresses you. Which it should.
To suggest this post is a "review" of Updike's article would be the height of arrogance on my part. Consider it simply an appreciation.
Updike's prose flows. Nearing the climax of the story, the author casually mentions that batting, to Williams, is "his cherished task." Three simple words, and they reveal so much about the Red Sox legend. Watching through Updike's eyes as Williams (SPOILER ALERT!) hits a dramatic home run in the final at-bat of his career might be more fun than having been there in person.
In addition to the insights about Williams's career, Updike taught me something important about writing. In a passage lauding the Splendid Splinter's commitment to excellence every single time he stepped to the plate, Updike wrote the following:
"Baseball is a game of the long season, of relentless and gradual averaging-out. Irrelevance - since the reference point of most individual contests is remote and statistical - always threatens that interest, which can be maintained not by the occasional heroics that sportswriters feed upon but by players who always care; who care, that is to say, about themselves and their art. Insofar as the clutch hitter is not a sportswriter's myth, he is a vulgarity, like a writer who writes only for money."
Those are not the most thrilling sentences in the piece, but they contain the most interesting idea. To Updike, a batter who raises his concentration level in perceived "important" situations is a vulgarity. Striving for excellence in scenarios both thrilling and mundane is not just a matter of character, but the truest form of art.
This notion applies to me. If I intend to truly excel as a writer, I need to write not only for a paycheque, but because it's who I am and how I express myself. That's why it's a good idea for me to write this blog - to develop my voice as I write for recreation. It's a thought I've obviously had in the back of my mind, but Updike - who passed away in January 2009 - expressed it for me. He was a wise man.

Spending my bankroll, in more ways than one

When a winning poker player finds creative non-poker-related ways to nuke his/her bankroll, it's said that player has "a leak." There are plenty of stories floating around concerning famous poker stars who blow through their profits in record time. T.J. Cloutier, for instance, apparently pawned one of his World Series of Poker bracelets last year after (allegedly) bleeding off untold thousands of dollars the craps tables. Crazy to think that someone so proficient at managing a stack of tournament chips could be so poor at managing a bankroll.
I don't have a compulsive, degenerate leak like that. My leak is more like a slow drip. Every once in a while - about once a year - I talk myself into some new poker gear. And since there's no way I could justify spending our household finances on such a frivolity, I dip into the poker bankroll.

The latest expenditure was a sweet new poker table, courtesy of a local B.C. supplier - pokerchipsets.ca out of Maple Ridge. They have some awesome stuff, and I picked up a luscious blue-felted table just in time for the September edition of the monthly poker league I run.
Unfortunately, my stay on the new table was all too brief. After treading water for over an hour, I made a total donkey play, getting my 30xBB stack into the middle on a K64 flop. With six players at the table, I'd raised under the gun with KQ. I had two callers, including a monster-stacked player to my left who had been overbetting the pot all night long when he made huge hands. I felt I probably had the best hand on the flop, and elected to slowplay. Mr. Overbettor made it 3000 to go, which was a little bit more than half my stack. The other player folded, and after a couple seconds' thought, I shipped it. He called and turned over AK - a hand that surprised me, because I would have assumed an aggressive player such as he would have reraised with that hand preflop.
But that's no excuse. I'd watched him overbet with big hands on two prior occasions - it was clearly his M.O. for the evening - but I refused to believe him because he's very capable of making big moves and an overbet reeks so much of a bluff. Additionally, if I'd bet the flop, I could have gotten away if he'd raised. Even after slowplaying, with 30 big blinds in my stack, I could/should have been able to get away after seeing his previous showdown hands.
Terrible play by me. Lesson learned . . . I hope.
Online, I managed to lose back all of my early September profits with some rather inattentive and impatient play. On the bright side, I'm still breaking even this month, but after leaking off some cash buying the table, the bankroll is a fair bit thinner.
Bankroll = $4,700

So hot right now

I'm off to a nice start to the month of September, poker-wise.
Lately I've found a comfort zone in the 27-player sit-n-go tournaments. Playing these events are a bit of a compromise for me - I've really enjoyed playing multi-table tourneys lately, but I rarely have six to eight hours to burn. Thus, the 27-player SNGs are sort of a happy medium.
Anyway, I played a trio of these events on the weekend - buy-ins of $11, $22 and $33. I won the two smaller ones, and finished second in the largest for a total profit of around $500. Subtract a couple of empty MTT buy-ins, and I'm up $300 for the month. Sweet.
Bankroll = $5,300

Behind the scenes with LeBron

So a couple weeks back I bought an issue of GQ. That's something straight guys do, right? RIGHT?
Regardless, I had a good reason: The September issue contained a feature on LeBron James written by J.R. Moehringer. I came across a promo for the story on ESPN.com. Apparently Moehringer had rare access to LeBron around the time he made "The Decision": Two exclusive interviews before, and one interview after.
I was even more intrigued when I realized Moehringer was the dude who wrote an amazing profile of Pete Carroll back in 2007, excellently entitled "23 reasons why a profile of Pete Carroll does not appear in this space." I came across that piece in a sportswriting anthology book, and it simply blew my mind. You can read that story at the following URL: www.lamag.com/article.aspx?id=6918. It's well worth the 45 minutes it'll take to read. Trust me - print it out, read it on the can if you have to. Moehringer is wicked talented.
At any rate, the LeBron story doesn't measure up to the Carroll piece, but it was still well worth the $4.99 I paid for the magazine. Here are some of the highlights:
-- Best line: "He sounds like a big kid," Moehringer says of LeBron, recounting their final chat. "Maybe that's why it all unfolded this way. Kids get into all kinds of trouble. Especially during the summer." Bazinga.
-- Worst line: "I arrive in Cleveland at the start of July. James's decision hovers in the humid air. Poland must have felt this way in the summer of 1939. Except it's not an invasion Cleveland fears, but a departure." Point taken. But while LeBron was culturally important to Cleveland, his departure seems somehow less impactful than Poland being invaded by the Nazis. A bit of an exaggeration, J.R.
-- Moehringer was on set for "The Decision" and got all kinds of deadly behind-the-scenes stuff. My favourite part was that James arrived at the shoot with Kanye West. Surreal. Also, the kids who sat in the bleachers behind James, serving as props for TV, had chugged a bunch of free Vitaminwater before the show (the company was one of the sponsors) and were pretty much bursting with pee by the time the show was over. This is the random stuff that makes a story come to life.
-- Moehringer talks to Maverick Carter, one of James's advisors, after the decision, as everybody was ripping James to shreds. "He (Carter) sounds baffled and woozy, like a science buff who was mixing chemicals in the garage and accidentally blew up the neighbourhood. 'How did it get so big?' he asks plaintively." Classic stuff. I'm no genius, but it seemed patently obvious to me that the only way the TV special would go over well was if James was returning to the Cavaliers. Memo to LeBron: Next time, don't listen to a guy named Maverick. Unless he's teaching you how to cheat at cards or dispose of a body.
-- There's a recurring scene where Moehringer negotiates with LeBron's publicist to find a private interview room. "This won't work," the publicist says at one point, evaluating a potential interview location. "LeBron's never been in this room before." Are you kidding me? Classic.
-- In the end, Moehringer more or less concludes that by heading to Miami with his buddies Bosh and Wade, James is trying to recreate the tight-knit vibe of his high school team. Seems logical.
-- A quick word on GQ. In between the pages and pages and pages of ads, there were a lot of interesting features worth reading. I'd buy it again. But I'm not going to become a metrosexual.

A month of mediocre poker

It's been quite a while since I've had time to update this blog, so I'll hit you with a brief August poker overview.
Basically, I spent the month mired in mediocrity. (How's that for alliteration?) I played a ton, perhaps as much as I have in any given month. It was certainly the most I've played at my current stakes. But I ended up turning just a $200 profit - marginal considering how much I played.
Looking back, I think my mentality got a little twisted around the time I wrote my first post of the day on Aug. 13 (entitled "Finally, a nice score"). I was coming off my most successful month ever, profiting $1,300, but I realized that if I earned that amount each month, it would take me 28 years to pay off my mortgage. Which, of course, is the whole point of this exercise.
So I decided I was going to spend more time playing multi-table tournaments in an effort to make a big score. That's not terrible logic, but I got into a frame of mind where if I failed to cash in a couple tournaments, I'd enter an even bigger buy-in tourney to win back my losses all in one shot. Like, if I finished out of the money in three or four $30 SNGs, I'd play a $100 SNG to try to get even again. It was sort of like trying to win a tournament in the first level.
It was not an effective mindset, and I was fortunate to get a couple nice MTT results to turn a profit in August. I ended the month by finishing seventh out of 503 players in a $30 MTT. I was the chip leader with 18 players remaining, but ran into some problems with around 11 players left and settled for a $480 payday. First place was $2,800, but my inexperience in that spot (final table of MTT) showed. Next time I'll take it down.
Bottom line is, I now realize I need to get back to the grinding mentality, rather than trying to get rich quick. I'll still play MTTs - in fact, I think my game sets up really well for that format - but I'm just going to be a little more calm about it. Right now, I feel like I'm in a good place mentally and poised for big things.
Looking forward to a monster month of September.
Bankroll = $5,000

Soaking up some Colorado culture

Just returned home after a glorious poker-free, TV-free week of vacation in Colorado. I'm always fascinated by the United States, so I figured I'd share a few observations.

-- The first face I saw when I stepped off the plane in Denver was John Elway's. The legendary Broncos quarterback was on a billboard, hawking some product or another. But as my Colorado stay progressed, it became clear to me that the entire state has fallen in love with another QB - Tim Tebow (pictured right). The former Florida Gators superstar - a first-round pick by the Broncos a couple months back - was everywhere. At a closet-sized sports store in the airport, Tebow's No. 15 was the only Broncos jersey available. I ran into a man wearing a Tebow jersey while hiking up a 12,000-foot peak at the Continental Divide. And let's not even start on the blanket Tebow coverage in the media, both locally and nationally.
The thing is, it's likely going to be a while until we see what Tebow can do in the NFL. With incumbent QB Kyle Orton inking a one-year contract extension last week that will keep him in Broncos silks through 2011, Tebow's first legitimate shot at the starting job won't likely come until 2012. But that's good news for Tebow - he's regarded as a work in progress, and will need time to develop. Whether Broncos fans are willing to be so patient is another matter.

-- The major reason for my trip to Colorado was to attend my cousin's wedding. She was married at the Stanley Hotel, a historic building in Estes Park, about an hour and a half north of Denver. The coolest thing about the place, to me, is that it is linked closely to The Shining, the Steven King book that became a classic film directed by Stanley Kubrick. According to Wikipedia, King once stayed at the Stanley, which inspired him to write The Shining. Scenes for the mini-series version of the book were filmed at the hotel, though it was not used for Kubrick's cinematic version. Channel 42 on all guest room televisions at the Stanley shows the Kubrick movie on a continuous loop. How cool is that? All the place was missing was a hedge maze.
-- On our way to hiking at the Continental Divide, we drove through Black Hawk and Central City - former Colorado gold rush towns which are the only municipalities in the state where gambling is currently legal. Thus, casinos dominate the square footage in these towns. It feels like they're practically stacked on top of each other.
The thing that got me chuckling was a banner on one of the casinos that advertised "THE LOOSEST SLOTS IN TOWN!" The ad went on to state that the casino paid out 99.485 per cent (or thereabouts, my memory isn't perfect) of the money that people fed into its slot machines. It completely slayed me that a casino would lay out its larcenous business plan in such brazen detail - "We intend to bleed the cash out of your wallet, slowly but surely!" And the genius of it was that they made it look like they were doing people a favour - "We could be taking even more of your money!" Seems to me, the only smart people involved with slot machines are the people running them.

-- I had a couple of interesting political conversations with Americans. First of all, everyone I talked to seems to believe Barack Obama is intent on driving the U.S. economy into the ground. The main worry is that Obama's business taxation plans will crush an already fragile economy. Take that for what it's worth - I was mainly speaking with Republicans. But at the very least, it does offer an interesting counterpoint to the optimistic portrayal of Obama in the Canadian media. Which is, in a nutshell, "At least he's not George W. Bush. And he seems cool."
Beyond that, I had a fascinating exchange with a man who casually ripped the Canadian medical system during an anti-Obama vent session. The president's medicare plan, he argued, is inherently flawed because it's modeled after the Canadian system. "Everyone who wants to get a surgery done goes down to the States and pays for it," he said smugly. The fact I'm Canadian was not lost on him.
Point taken. We have issues with surgery wait times in Canada. But no more than 15 minutes later, the same guy told a story about a car accident he was involved in. Basically, another vehicle pulled in front of him, and the driver slammed on the brakes to intentionally cause an accident. Turned out, the brake-slammer had a pre-existing medical condition that required a hip replacement. Not having $90,000 to pay for the surgery, he caused the car accident and sued the other driver - and settled out of court with the insurance provider for $140,000.
Aside from the fact that this lawsuit scheme is utterly insidious, it occurred to me that if the hip-replacement dude had Canadian-style medical coverage, he would not have needed to cause a car accident to raise funds. He may have had to sit on a waitlist for a few months, but he would have gotten his surgery. So you tell me - which system is better?
-- On the plane back home, I was somewhat surprised when the 20-something gentleman seated next to me ordered a jack and coke. Before noon. Kind of odd. Then I looked over and noticed he was reading "I Hope They Serve Beer in Hell" by Tucker Max - a New York Times bestseller that is more or less a how-to guide for womanizing drunks. Suddenly, it all made sense to me. I was grateful to be seated between this guy and my wife.
-- One of the underrated joys of returning from vacation is seeing what wonders have accumulated on the PVR over the course of a week. I've already watched the latest episode of Mad Men (one of the best episodes ever, utterly incendiary), and I'm looking forward to devouring a couple of new WSOP episodes. It's good to be home.

What's a hipster doofus?

Some of you might be wondering what the deal is with the title of this blog. I shall tell you.
"Hipster doofus" is a reference from Seinfeld, the greatest sitcom of all time. As I recall, somebody used the term to refer to Kramer, who took offence to the label in a hilarious way. For some reason that quote just lodged itself in my brain and I started using it in conversation. I can proudly say that I've introduced "hipster doofus" into the vernacular of my circle of friends and co-workers.

(Trivia: A bit of internet research seems to indicate that the hipster doofus line was from the episode "The Handicap Spot" from Season 4. Apparently series co-creator Larry David lifted the line from an unfavourable review of the show, which described Kramer with the same term. Take that info with a grain of salt - it is the internet).
Originally, my friend Matt and I used "hipster doofus" to refer to people who take their coolness very seriously. They listen to bands you've never heard of and watch art-house movies nobody's ever seen before. They cultivate their coolness. They work hard at it. They're pretentious about it.
Urbandictionary.com had a pretty solid definition for hipster doofus: "Someone who has taken being hip and unique to an extreme and therefore worn the 'cool' out of the hip."
That pretty much sums it up. So now you know.
The ironic thing is, I actually have a few hipster-doofus tendencies myself. I own a record player and a decent collection of rock classics (Springsteen, Joni Mitchell, Fleetwood Mac, John Lennon) on vinyl. I enjoy some indie bands. And I like to feel superior about my taste in movies.
But I hope I don't go too far down the hipster doofus rabbit trail. I don't aspire to be pretentious, for starters. And it seems to me that in this era, people tend to define themselves by what they like as opposed to who they are. I want to be more concerned with my character.
But if I happen to catch a few deadly movies along the way, so be it.

A devastating beat

I just came within a whisker of a monster score.
If my tear ducts worked, I would be crying as I typed this. I just finished 13th out of 1,213 players in a $20 multi-table tournament, and I exited in the most devastating fashion.
We'll start from the beginnning. This morning I bought into three MTTs: a $10 turbo, a deep-stack $10, and a standard-speed $20. I wasn't able to get anything going in the turbo, and I busted out of the deep-stack event a couple hours in when I flopped bottom set against my opponent's top set. Nothing you can do about that.
But I made a monster run in the $20, which had a guaranteed prize pool of $20,000. I just played real solid, disciplined poker and steadily built my stack.
With about 250 players left, I was in fifth place with around 30k, but at that point I lost a pot that would have given me the chip lead. A middle-position player made a small raise, and was called in three spots before it got to me in the big blind with JJ. I made a nice reraise, and the original raiser thought for quite a while before shipping all in. Everyone else folded, and I had great odds to call. He had AK, and I was safe through the flop and turn before a king appeared on the river. Dang.
I grinded my stack back up, only to fall back to 20k when my AQ lost to a short stack's A9, all in preflop. But 20k was the average when the money bubble burst with 180 players left, so I was content to ride it out and avoid confrontations.
At that point, I simply went card dead and pretty much didn't play a hand for an hour. I did make one nice hero call to maintain a playable stack. A player in the cutoff raised, and I flat-called on the button with 88. The big blind called as well, and we saw a flop of 643, two clubs. It was checked around to me, and I bet about two-thirds the pot. The BB folded, but the original raiser reraised all in. I just felt like he was full of crap. He'd been stealing preflop, and I figured he put me on two big cards that had missed the flop. I called off my stack, and he had Q4 offsuit. Booya. I managed to dodge his five outs to double to about 60k.
With about 50 players left and the blinds at 2000-4000, I was basically treading water at 60k (15xBB) when I finally picked up a couple hands. The new player to my right had been raising every second pot, and when he min-raised in the cutoff, I shipped with AdQd on the button. He called with 56 offsuit (?!?!?!), and I was fortunate enough to flop a queen. Two hands later, I had KK and found a customer who called a nice big bet on the flop before folding the turn. All of a sudden, I had 170k.
My stack probably peaked around 190k, and I cruised through to the final two tables. There was this Russian dude a couple seats to my right who was extremely aggressive preflop. I pretty much stayed out of his way, except for one pot where I made a nice resteal out of the small blind.
Anyway, that brings us to our crucial hand. We were six-handed at my table when the pesky Russian raised under the gun. I was ecstatic because I had AA on the button. I reraised, he called, and we saw a flop of KQ3. The pot was around 100k at this point. He checked, and I bet about half the pot, leaving myself 50k behind. He reraised all in, I called, and he showed QJ offsuit. What a donkey. The turn was safe, but he rivered a third queen to bust me in 13th place, good for $182. Unlucky freaking 13.
Did I mention first place was $4,300, which would have been the biggest score of my fledgling poker career? And that the pot I lost contained 331k, which would have put me in fifth place when they got down to the final table? What a spot that would have been. Even sixth place paid a grand. Talk about a brutal beat.
The good news is, the Saskatchewan Roughriders crushed the B.C. Lions in CFL action last night. So I've got that going for me, which is nice.
What's also clear is, these MTTs have great potential for profit for me. To recap, I've had recent finishes of 37th out of 1,551 players; 3rd out of 228; and 13th out of 1,213. I am going to win one of these. It's only a matter of time. I just need my aces to hold up ONE TIME!
For the time being, though, I need to take a breather from poker. I need a mental break to get my confidence back in the sit-n-gos, and to be honest, I'm just a little bit tired of cards right now.
Bankroll = $5,150

Finally, a nice score

I should warn you, this post is long-winded and chock full of poker nerd content.
If you're a faithful reader of this blog (meaning my wife and a couple of my buddies), you may be wondering where I've been all week. Losing money playing on PokerStars, that's where I've been. And too frustrated to type anything about it.
Let's rewind to about seven days ago. I was contemplating my wildy successful month of July (+$1,300), patting myself on the back and such, when I had a reality check. I realized that in order to make my poker pipe dream a reality, I need to be making more cheddar. Specifically, I figured that if I were to earn $1,300 a month, it would take me about 28 years to earn enough money to pay off my mortgage. At which point it would be nearly paid of anyway.
The upshot is, I need to either a) move up to higher sit-n-go stakes; or b) make some big scores in multi-table tournaments.
To be honest, I'd never really checked what PokerStars had to offer in terms of multi-table tournaments (MTTs). I pretty much just stuck to what they offered under the sit-n-go tab. And for the most part, that was fine. It's a time issue for me - I don't often have five-to-eight hours to play a huge MTT.
But last week, I had a bit of time on Thursday evening/Friday morning, and I was pleasantly surprised to find that PokerStars has an awesome array of MTTs. They're at a wide variety of buy-ins, starting every 15 minutes or so, and they guarantee large fields by offering guaranteed prize pools.
The thing with massive-field MTTs is, the variance is just huge. Whereas my raw odds are one in three to cash in a single-table SNG, they're more like one in 1,000 (or worse) in a massive field.
Thus, it was no surprise that I blew off a couple hundred bucks' worth of my bankroll chasing a big score. I threw away a couple of early MTT buy-ins, as I learned I needed to discard some of the over-aggressive strategies that I employ in sit-n-gos.
The problem, as far as bankroll management, was that I was still mired in a SNG slump in the meantime. Add it all up, and I was on a $500 downswing.
My multi-table foray wasn't without deep runs. I made a min-cash in a huge turbo tournament, and I was really deep in a $10 standard-speed tournament when disaster struck. For background, you need to understand that this tourney had 1,551 starters and a $2,700 first-place prize. We were inside of 40 players, and I had a slightly below average but playable stack of about 20 big blinds. Just a couple of minutes before the four-hour break, I was dealt AA in the big blind. The player on the button shipped 10xBB, I snap-called, and he showed JT offsuit. Flop 783, turn 9, and river was inconsequential as he made the nut straight. Frickin' awful. I busted a couple hands later to end up 37th. My payout? 27 freaking bucks - also known as one per cent of first-place money.
The long odds notwithstanding, I felt I had a truly deep run in me - like a final table. So on Thursday evening I gave it one more go, and struck paydirt in a $30 MTT with a $4,000 guaranteed prize pool. 228 players started, and I ended up finishing third for exactly $772.92.
I played real solid early on and steadily built my stack. In the middle stages, I ended up getting a key double-up holding KK vs. KQ, with all the money going in on a queen-high flop. Hard to find a better spot than that.
I cruised through the money bubble (at 36 players), but I had to get real lucky a couple times once we got down to two tables. At one point, a late-position player limped into the pot, and I had A6 in the small blind. Sensing weakness, I shipped it for about 12xBB, and was snap-called by AK. Now, I realize I got my money in horrendously in this spot, but I have no idea why anyone would slowplay AK. At any rate, I rivered a six to knock out my opponent, whom I had covered by a few bucks.
Later on, with 10 players left, I shipped all in with AdQd after a mid-position raise I thought was suspect. Unfortunately for me, the big blind woke up with AK. Unfortunately for him, I paired my queen on the flop and turned trips.
That got us down to the final table, and I was second in chips with about 62k. Average was 38k, and I was determined to just play snug and avoid the mistakes that derailed me at my last MTT final table (see the Aug. 2 post). For the most part, I succeeded at that. My stack had some minor fluctuations, but I was able to make it to three-handed with about 65k. I grinded it back up to 80k, with blinds at 1250-2500, when I met my demise. Holding AQo in the big blind, I shipped over the top of a button raise. The button called with 88, and the flop came 877 - disaster, game over.
My payout was about $700 shy of first-place money, but I was really happy with how I navigated the final table. I gave myself a good chance to win, and I've managed to get back in the black for the month of August.
I am of the belief that I could use a poker break - my SNG slump is a big concern - but I'll spend $60 or so on MTT buy-ins on Friday morning before I relax.
Bankroll = $5,000

Poker is a brutal game

I don't even know how to summarize the last three days' worth of online poker grinding without sounding like a donkey. Maybe that's exactly what I am.
So here's the raw, unvarnished truth. I began the month of August on a modest $100 upswing, which I promptly liquidated with a $500 downswing.
(Spoiler alert: This story has a happy ending. No, not that kind. Get your mind out of the gutter.)
What does a $500 downswing look like? Try not cashing in NINE single-table sit-n-gos in a row. Five of those were $50 buy-ins, and the last one was a $100 buy-in, which I'd never played before on PokerStars. Sometimes trying to recoup all your losses in one fell swoop isn't the best idea.

In evaluating my play, I can honestly say I was playing pretty well for at least six or seven of the nine SNGs. I ran horrendously bad all the way through - I probably lost about 80 per cent of my coin flips, which is just a function of the cruel variance of poker. If that's an exaggeration, I can say for certain that I didn't win a single flip in a crucial spot, ie. the money bubble.
I was pretty happy with my play at the start of my brutal run, but as the losses piled up, I started to tilt a little bit. I probably gave away two or three tournaments in the middle. Towards the end I was focused again, but the deck just seemed to hate me. One tournament, I busted holding AK vs. KJ, all in preflop. In the $100 SNG, I put myself in a great position to win. I got my stack up to 3800 with four players left, but busted with a string of rough beats on the money bubble.
(Here's the part where things start to turn around.)
On Tuesday evening, mentally bruised and battered, I decided to enter one of those 180-player, $10 turbo SNGs. I don't play those very often - they're fun to play, for sure, but the uber-aggressive blind structure can tend to throw off my rhythm for regular tournaments. I figured changing things up couldn't hurt at this point - plus, it offered an opportunity to win all my money back with minimal investment.
I ended up finishing second for $398, which put my bankroll right back to where it was at the start of the month. Talk about craziness. These turbo tournaments basically amount to a run-good contest, and I managed to finally find some luck. Maybe the PokerStars software felt guilty after hoovering all that cash out of my bankroll.
Whatever the case, I'm pleased to be back on level ground. I'd like to get back to gradually grinding my bankroll upward, rather than riding this rollercoaster.
Lest everyone get the impression I'm an incorrigible donkey, I've posted my earnings graph (courtesy of sharkscope.com) to remind everyone (and myself) that I can play this game.
Bankroll = $4,800

Best. Month. Ever.

Good news first. Poker-wise, the month of July was my most profitable since I began playing sit-n-gos in the $20-$50 neighbourhood. I made $1,300 - running pretty well, playing pretty well - to exceed the grand I made back in November.
I'm glad to be back on track, particularly coming off my first losing month (June). Maybe there's something to this blogging thing. I think it helps me to keep my head straight.
The bit of "bad" news is, July could have been even better. On Friday, I played a 180-player SNG with a $20 buy-in. These ones come together so rarely - at least, the non-turbo variety. The 180-player turbos come together all the time, and they're pretty fun, but the longer blind levels set up better for my game.
At any rate, I ended up final-tabling this tournament, finishing seventh for $128. I was a little pissed off, though, because I was third in chips with nine players left, with 35 big blinds in my stack. I lost the very first hand at the final table - holding KQ on Kxx flop, I bet out, and called a reraise. The turn was an ace, we checked it down, and my opponent had A4 offsuit. Are you kidding me. Then I gave away half my stack on a botched blind-steal that grew into a three-barrel bluff. Eventually I ended up shipping light in late position, called in two places, and busted.
A big disappointment, because first place was $1,080. Live and learn, I guess. If I had simply folded the pivotal hand instead of going for the blind-steal, I would have made an even deeper run.
Of course, if you'd told me when the tournament started that I'd finish seventh out of 180, I would have been exceedingly happy.
Bankroll = $4,800

Media blitz

Movies, books, TV . . . I love 'em all. But I hate wasting my time on sub-par media.
Lately, though, I've been fortunate enough to hit the jackpot, so I figured I'd share my good fortune with you.
MOVIES: INCEPTION
If you enjoy having your mind blown, go see Inception. Simple as that.
It's been more than a week since I watched Inception, and I'm still not quite sure what to make of it. What I am sure of is, I loved it. It's two and a half hours long, but it feels like half that. It's one of thos movies where you walk out of the theatre in a daze.
The basic premise of the film is that the technology exists to infiltrate people's dreams. Leonardo DiCaprio's character is the leader of a team that does just that. That's as much as I'll reveal in terms of plot. I will say, the ending was awesome.
DiCaprio aside, the real star of this movie is writer/director Christopher Nolan. He's most famous for reviving the Batman franchise, and anyone who hasn't seen The Dark Knight at this point simply doesn't enjoy movies. Inception, for me, was most reminiscent of Memento, the flick that put Nolan on the map a decade ago. Like Memento, Inception is a complex psychological thriller. But where Memento was minimalist, Inception is sprawling, with epic action scenes set in multiple universes. If that makes any sense.
(A quick aside: I honestly haven't seen a Nolan movie I haven't enjoyed. Insomnia, with Al Pacino and Robin Williams, and The Prestige with Christopher Bale, are also worth two hours of your time).
In Inception, Nolan riffs on the sources of inspiration, the power of dreams, and the very nature of our perceived reality. Excellent movie.

BOOKS: DOWNTOWN OWL
For a guy with a blog called "The Hipster Doofus," it's inexplicable that I hadn't read a Chuck Klosterman book until last week. So when I stumbled upon Klosterman's 2008 novel "Downtown Owl" during a recent trip to the library (retro, I know), I figured I had to pick it up.
Prior to reading Downtown Owl, I was aware Klosterman was a big sports fan (he occasionally co-authors columns with ESPN.com's Bill Simmons), and had a penchant for sprinkling his writing with pop culture references. On both those counts, Downtown Owl lived up to my preconceived notions. Klosterman's writing voice is so unique, it's hard to explain. But viewing the world through his eyes is simply fascinating.
Downtown Owl, a dark comedy set in 1983, is a three-pronged story chronicling the lives of residents of a middle-of-nowhere town in North Dakota. Klosterman's tale is tightly written, and somehow witty and profound at the same time. I don't read a lot of books, but I devoured this one in less than a week; it will not be my last encounter with Klosterman.

TV: MAD MEN
My favourite TV show these days is Mad Men, the brilliant AMC series about the troubled cast of characters at an ad agency in the 1960s.
Thus, I was pretty stoked about the season premiere last Sunday evening, and I was not disappointed. The show has a different feel for the fourth season - the central characters have established a brand-new ad agency, and with that comes a fresh new set that lends the show a brighter look. The characters are likewise dymanic. Don Draper's rage is closer to the surface. Peggy is more confident - likely a product of having Don beg her to join the new agency in the Season 3 finale. And it's fascinating to watch Betty Draper and the kids adjust to their new family situation.
If you missed the Mad Men bandwagon, I own the first three seasons on DVD. Feel free to borrow them.

Playin' like a donkey, and bouncing back

Blogging about my poker exploits is fun when I'm winning. It's a little less enjoyable when I'm playing like a donkey. Humbling, even. But if I'm going to do this, I'd better be honest, so here's a look at a session I'm not so proud of.
In poker, when somebody loses their mind and starts spewing chips, it's said they're "on tilt." For me, in the bigger picture, sometimes I go on "life tilt." Which is to say, my passion for poker causes me to make terrible choices.
Last Sunday evening, I put in a long shift at the office and didn't arrive home until 11 p.m. But for some reason, I thought it would be wise to crack open the computer and play some sit-n-gos. The first tournament I played was a single-table $30 buy-in, and I built up my stack early. Then I took a gross beat - I bet every street holding QQ on a rag board, only to have my opponent overtake me with a runner-runner flush.
I subsequently lost my mind, and busted out of that tournament and three others - a $50, a $30 and a $20. Including the PokerStars rake, I was down about $140 for the session. Determined to snap my losing streak before I went to bed, I entered a $10 heads-up tourney. And another. And another. By the time I finally won one of those, it was 3 a.m. and I was $160 in the hole.
That's what I mean by life tilt.
The fact of the matter is, I never should have started playing so late at night. Obviously a bad decision for my physical and mental health, and brutal on my poker bankroll. Never mind the fact that I'd planned to continue my poker fast for another couple days. Situations like this are why I need to take breaks from poker.
In terms of poker $, I'm trending upwards again. Five days after my spew-fest, I got back at it and won back all I'd lost, plus another $120. The big scores were a pair of $50 single-table SNGs, which I won for a profit of around $350.
Bankroll = $4,720. Hoping to make better decisions going forward.

A cool poker milestone

I broke my self-imposed poker fast for 24 hours on Thursday/Friday, in order to maintain my VIP level at Pokerstars. The basic deal is, you need to earn a certain number of frequent player points each month to earn bonuses.
Along the way, I enriched myself by about $300, and hit a pretty cool milestone. According to sharkscope.com, I've exceeded the $5,000 plateau in terms of total tournament profits on Pokerstars. Pretty sweet - and I actually still have most of the cash.
On Thursday evening, I was playing about as well as I ever have. I played 14 sit-n-go tournaments, mainly single-tables at a $20 or $30 buy-in. I managed to cash in nine of those, including three wins. I was playing aggressively, and it was like the virtual tables were tilted towards me - I was a magnet for chips.
The sick thing is, I made about $300 while getting close to 100 per cent return on investment . . . and yet I felt the session could have been better. Some of the thirds should have been seconds, and some of the seconds should have been firsts. It was a combination of decision-making and sick beats, but all in all, I can't be too upset making that kind of cash.
I got back at it on Friday morning to finish clearing my bonus, and basically treaded water for eight tournaments. The last one I played was a 180-player, $20 buy-in multi-table tournament, and I left with bit of a sour taste in my mouth. In the latter stages of that event, I had KK and got it all in against two opponents with a chance to more than quadruple up (two early-position raisers folded preflop, creating a ton of dead money in the pot). I was up against AQ and 66, and I flopped a king. But there was also a 10 on the flop, and the turn was a FREAKING JACK to make a broadway straight for the AQ.
Had I won that pot, I would have had a well-above-average stack as we hit the home stretch, and the way I'd been playing, I liked my chances. As it stood, I busted in 59th place. First place was $1,000, and let's just say, some couch cushions got tossed around the living room.
Just like a poker player, to win a whole bunch of cash and then whine about a bad beat. Sorry about that.
Anyway, it's back to the poker fast for at least another week. The break really helped to clear my head, and I think that coming back fresh was a big part of my success over the last 24 hours.
Bankroll = $4,600

Eskimos gift-wrap a win for Riders

The Saskatchewan Roughriders may indeed be the best team in the CFL at the moment, as I suggested last week. But that doesn't mean they've arrived.
Take Saturday's home game against the Edmonton Eskimos, which the Riders "won" 24-20 to move to a perfect 3-0 on the season. I use the quotation marks because the Riders didn't so much win the game, as the Eskimos lost it.
The 0-3 Eskies limped off the field with bullet-riddled feet - Kelly Campbell dropped an easy TD catch in the end zone just before halftime, and Calvin McCarty and Fred Stamps had momentum-crushing fumbles in the fourth quarter.
The Roughriders, for their part, played fairly badly compared to the lofty standard they set in last week's blowout win over the B.C. Lions. The offence sputtered for much of the game, until some creative fourth-quarter play-calling bailed them out. The defence, so dominant the previous week against B.C., was rendered ordinary by an Eskimos o-line that was less generous than that of the Lions. But the Riders defenders deserve credit for being opportunistic in generating the turnovers, and it's the mark of a quality team to pull through with a victory when it's not firing on all cylinders. We'll see how this develops.
On a side note, I got a huge kick out of the Roughriders' new red-and-black retro uniforms - particularly the hideous argyle-type slacks that the coaching staff were made to wear. Those pants would have embarrassed even a professional golfer. Good times.