Blog Title: seymour cards

Me, Myself and StackTown

Its been a while, in fact more than a while, its been bloody ages since I really posted here on a regular basis.

To those that still drop by, i’m sorry.

Two things I want to share.

First, I’m still playing poker, playing NL50 at the mo and not running to well. I get paint in the hole, board is all low, i play low suited connectors, the board is all paint. And so the cycle has been repeating for the last 3000 hands. Which although isn’t a huge sample is a long time in my poker world as I’m not playing as often as I would like to. Plus I can only lame ass 3 table so its a slow grind!

Second thing is, I’m still hugely enjoying the poker community, so I have decided to start a new site called ‘StackTown’

StackTown is a combi blog news site where I want to look at the lighter side of poker. Imagine interesting titbits’ of poker info, poker news and my poker life blended together into something that I hope you find enjoyable.

So, if you are still out there, still reading then please pop across to StackTown

http://www.stacktown.com

Thanks everyone

update, whoop!

been finding my poker feet again lately on titan. so far so good although things could have gone a little better, my aces full of fours was obv going down to quad 4's, sigh!

will share some more once i sort out a few things like poker tracker 3, anyone used it? any good?

also found the following blog which has been making me laugh over the last couple of weeks, one/angry/kid

worth a gander if you're feeling a little angry!

less than a week until vegas!

getting myself set for vegas now, i leave early next week for my whirlwind 3 day business + pleasure trip.

i'll be staying at mandalay bay which i'm quite happy about as it looks pretty cool from what i've seen. no idea if they have a poker room, i'll suss that out on the ground otherwise i'll head to the bellagio.

also organising a table at tao as well. a friend has a fair few contacts in vegas so is sorting that stuff out.

other then that its going to be a mad dash between meetings and the felt.,,or the slots if i'm really time pressed.

it will be a good first taster regardless and since my total expenditure for the trip will equal what i lose, if i lose, you can't really beat that!

lets hope i hit a lucky streak while i'm there

challenge seymour

still travelling and haven't had the time to really bust out a serious session but have been dabbling. finding it really hard to motivate myself however when i only have 30 mins here or 45 mins there. just not enough time to get into the game, get some reads and make moves.

i think i may have a solution though. today mansion sent me a software cd containing a mighty $15 worth of free moolah! now its not a lot but i quite fancy playing with this little roll and seeing where i get too. i'll start at the micros and work my way up and hopefully take over the world without spending a penny.

hopefully i'll kick that off shortly and fill you all in on the progress.

now back to travel...boring....except i have to go to vegas at the end of the month for a meeting....vegas baby!! can't wait, its gonna be a blast. i won't have a ton of free time but i'm gonna make the most of it. i'll probably try and only sleep on the plane ride out and then back again! not sure where i'm gonna be staying, organised by the corporation, but i probably won't be the bellagio...if its not then i'd like it to be here!

on a final note, it seems wombol has reinvented himself, or is in the process of doing so. he's started a new blog called social supremacy check it out if you have a minute. its not quite poker but its interesting none the less.

anyhoo folks, good luck at the tables

bank roll boost?

was wondering the other night how i was gonna boost my roll rapidly, and then, as if by the power of god the answer arrived, by email via burkina-faso...

"Dear Comrade,

How are you today? Hope all is well. Please be informed that I have decided to contact you for a fund transfer transaction worth the sum of US$10,500,000.00 into your reliable bank account as the sole NEXT-OF-KIN to the foreign deceased customer of our bank (an International Billionaire French Businessman) who was killed with his entire family by PLANE-CRASH in Central England atmost 3 years ago. Since his death occured, no body have show up as his next of kin for the claim because the account is untraceable.

Upon the investigation I carried out from his records, I found out that his foreign business consultant whowould have trace the account died earlier before the deceased. Therefore, this is a confidential and sealed deal.

For thesuccess of this transaction, you should apply and act as the onlyexisting NEXT-OF-KIN to the deceased which our bank will replace the deceased account information through proper documentation in position ofyour own account.

This transaction is risk-free, it will never harm your good reputation in your society because no one can trace the account, and on the instant of the transfer of the fund into your account, the chapter of this transaction will be closed entirely.

Note that in a business of this nature, the bank dont want to know yourdifference between the deceased country, religion or believe because our bank inheritance law is against that. So, it is a preference for us achieve this success without any problem.

Please note down that once the fund get transferred into your account, you will take 39% of the total sum while the rest will be for me as I will arrange myself down to your country to take my share.

I need your urgent response and include your private telephone/mobile numbers for easy communication.Please reply if you can be trusted in this deal.

Thanks,

Mr.ADAMA KADIOGO"

euro 2008 sports betting

anyone else get that tingle of disappointment as the czech republic vs swizzleland game kicked off on saturday? i certainly did, if only england were there, but then after 20 mins of the game i actually felt a little relieved i wouldn't be subjected to the stress and disappointment of england crashing out to a ronaldo penalty or some other dismal result.

with renewed enthusiasm i've decided to step back into the long forgotten waters of sports betting. i've steered clear of sports betting since the world cup because quite frankly i'm shite at it!! but nows the time to give it a little go me thinks.

i've deposited £25 into blue sq and i'm gonna see where that gets me. i'm not going to set the world on fire but it makes the games a little more interesting. my plan is to place a £5 bet on the results of each days games to improve my odds a little.

yesterday i put £5 on germany and croatia to win and tripled my dosh so good start. not sure about todays games yet but already looking forward to it.

normality?

finally i feel like my feet have touched the ground! may has been a total whirlwind and i've had to neglect a fair amount of stuff in my life, including this blog. but hopefully i'll be able to stay in one place for longer then 5 days in june so i can get a bit of normality back.

on the poker front i have played 0 online hands in may, how mad is that, nothing, zip, nada! i did manage to play some pokes on the plane to seattle though, its about 9 hours or so direct with ba and i was sitting next to a colleague who hosts a regular poker evening with some of his mates. he was larging it about his skills so we played for about 2 hours or so with some travel chips that he had. we were only playing 10/20p blinds but i still managed to take about £30 from him which i was very chuffed about. can't say any of it was luck either, just none of his lines made any sense so i was happy to call him down with as little as 2nd pair and i was often right to do so.

when in seattle i went on a mega shopping spree as well, spunked a fortune. got myself a brand new 32gb ipod touch which i'm rather pleased with. i love the fact its wifi enabled so i can log onto the net wherever there is a hotspot. also got some kick ass trainers for the gym which i'm addicted too. i hate it when i miss a workout now as i feel sluggish and shitty. also went mad on clothes, jeans, t's, polos and the like. i don't like buying shirts or suits in america because, if i'm honest, the sizing’s are just fecked up! its either tent like, too long or its double breasted which i just don't like.

also been playing around in the world of psychological and physiological dynamics. really interesting stuff and how, just using really basic stuff you can change the way you are perceived. since i was at a conference there was ample opportunity to play with peoples heads that i would never see again and i got quite a lot of it working pretty quickly! think there is good applications in the poker world as well, obviously in the live game as opposed to the online one but should be worth exploring.

hopefully june will be a little better for my pokes journey, will update soon.

international jetsetter!

may has been a whirlwind. i've been travelling so much for work i haven't had time to catch my breath. i've been to sweden, ireland, france, germany, russia and on sunday i head off to seattle for a week. given the rediculous amount of flying and sleeping in hotel rooms my poker has suffered, in that i haven't played any! am really hoping to rectify that in the next few days to get one sess in before i fly out to the usa, but its touch and go.

on another topic, it looks like 88% concentration aka ed hollis' blog is the community's favourite, narrowly pipping the women adverse amatay. i've put up a new poll as we begin to build up to the wsop so please take a look and vote.

other then that i've just been enjoying the heat streak that seems to be over london at the moment. i don't know how long it will last but its so nice to get out of bed at 6am ready for the trudge to the gym and be greated by the nice warm rays of the sun. cheers me up a little.

anyhoo chaps, great to finally post and hope all is well out there in pokersville

babe of the month : april

i've jumped all over the place trying to decide who aprils babe pf the month should be and its a pretty tough choice. but after watching 'into the blue' again the other night i have decided that jessica alba should be aprils babe of the month.


so there she is, just lovely :)

how many employees does it take to hang a picture?

this isn't poker related but i think its a great way to highlight how rediculous big businesses really can be.

i currently work for a huge american company employing over 100,000 people globally, half of which in my opinion are wasted resource and here is some evidence to back that up...

on friday a guy came round to hang two pictures near our photocopier, which he did. later on friday 2 further guys came round to inspect the pictures and decided to rehang them 2 inches lower then they already were. today (monday) 2 women came round to check all the pictures that were hanged on all the floors, it didn't look like they were happy! later one of the women and 2 guys came back round and she showed them where they should be hung. then later still another guy came round to move one of the pictures from being next to the other to under the other.

so far, 2 days 5 visits and 7 different people have been required to hang 2 pictures.

wasted resource, of course not! and this may not be over yet!

a few days off

i've been feeling a little strange about poker the last few days. i feel like our relationship his hit a funny patch for no real apparent reason.

as i'm sure most poker players will agree, we have a love/hate relationship with the game. sometimes we love it (usually involves winning) and sometimes we hate it (mostly involves losing). for some reason i've slipped into the hate category with no significant losses to shout about.

i think these ups and downs are natural, amatay seems to go through 6 or 7 of these daily so i guess i'm allowed one! i'm probably going to take the rest of the week off playing and hopefully get my gggeeerrr-roove back and go from there. i've also got another idea in my head which i'm working on. for those of you who don't know me, i tend to come up with a fair few ideas/hair brained schemes to make some extra dolla and am currently trying to do that as well, hehe. none of them ever work but its normally fun finding out and i always learn a new skill.

cheers fishsters, oh and some nice voting action going down around my poll, keep it up!

your opinion matters

yes it does, and i want to take advantage of what you peeps out on the interwebs think. to do this i'm going to run a monthly poll, eyes right, which will ask a simple question for you guys and gals to vote on.

i've started with a simple blog poll but ultimately i'd like to hear your suggestions on what you feel are valid questions. the next poll will begin at the start of may and i'll share the results each month.

in the meantime please take 30 seconds to answer the current question and we will see where we end up.

hhmm, not fairing well

just finished a huge session for me and didn't perform as well as i had hoped. down just under a buy-in, which is not catastrophic but still a loss.

found a super huge mega fishie though, the whole tabl was there just to milk this guy playing aomthing like 85/50/2. i lost a buy-in early when his monster 6/4 off beat my a/k but managed to make it back with another a/k all in pre to his 8/9. picked up a few other pots here and there but even though he was a mega fish he was hard to play against because you never knew where you stood against him. plus with everyone else being so aggro with him you had to pick your spots pretty carefully.

on other tables i didn't have a great time either, a few pots here and there but in general i just wasn't hitting anything and there were too many calling stations to really bluff at a flop.

i did start noticing, more clearly then before, certain lines other players were taking and how strong they really were. if i had ben able to enter more pots i think i could have exploited them some more but i just wasn't comfortable opening with the mighty 7/3 or q/2. really need to forget my cards and just play the player but its a weird feeling!

thats about all for now. have a work night out tonight...which i'm paying for and won't be drinking at because i'm still on meds. boo!

slightly dying

no poker news to blog about but i have managed to get some evil sinitus infection from my never ending cold.

i caught a cold about a month ago which i got over about two weeks ago then instantly caught another one! aarrgghh, so annoying, the second one was a little worse but i thought i was getting over it. how wrong i was, i woke up on thursday night/friday morning and literally couldn't breathe. i've never had acute sinitus before but this was fricking awful. I mean, one side of my nose had swollen shut and the other was clogged with snot....nice! i kept thinking i was going to suffocate and it totally freaked me out.

since it was like 2am friday morning and there is nothing i can do i watched some tv, went on the net and then tried to sleep but had no luck so got up and wandered the flat until about 6am when i started to get ready to head to the docs. got to the docs at 7:45, had some antibiotics by 9, went to work, came home from work as i was fecked and have been slowly tried to get better.

i'm still a little fooked, can't breathe properly and had to leave the charlton match at half time because i thought i was gonna pass out but there is a little progress here and there which will hopefully see me right in the next couple of days. I managed to sleep for 5 hours last night for the first time since thursday which has made me feel a bit better but i really need to get some decent shut eye if i am to recover. so frustrating.

i might get some pokes in later if i feel any better but otherwise its another day away from the tables which is putting me behind my monthly goals. coupled with the time i have missed at work recently i've got tons to catch up on there which further fooks me up. mother feck sticks!! oh well, health first, pokes later.

stack a donk

today i performed my first ever proper stack a donk. the stack a donk play permeates a lot of the videos on card runners and up to this point i've never had the opportunity to perform it.

for those of you not familiar with the play its not simply getting it all in with the best hand or making progressive pot sized bets until its in the middle. its a play where you release the initiative with the goal of calling that lovely juicy bet you expect.

here is my hand history with an explanation,

Table Greycrest (6 max) - $0.25/$0.50 - No Limit Holdem

SB posts small blind [$0.25]
BB posts big blind [$0.50]
Seat 3 (BTN) has the button.
Seat 1 : MP with $41.70.
Seat 2 : CO with $98.30.
Seat 3 : BTN with $43.25.
Seat 4 : SB with $56.60.
Seat 5 : BB with $80.10.
Seat 6 : Hero with $52.25.

back to nl50

so after a horrid nl25 session i decided to have a little go at nl50, not in a tilty way but because i had already withdrawn my roll from pokerstars ready to go into my ftp account meaning i would be rolled for nl50 shortly. so although not officially set for nl50 i decided to go ahead anyway, bbbrrraapp!

so far so good, have been reviewing a few nl50 vids on cardrunners to get my head on right and eliminate some donkfish mistakes. going into nl50 though i was already 3 buyins down from my last escapade so need to get that back before it really matters.

second, first impressions are much the same. there are a few more iron men about but the play doesn't seem that much better. people are very hard to bluff (which has cost me) but i've been getting good action when it counts.

so stats since i have made the move are as follows, small sample size but am happy so far, i wouldn't go as far to say as i'm crushing, in fact i would say i'm no where near that, i've enjoyed 99% bad card which i've managed to lose a little on and 1% awesome, smack me square in the face with the deck and call me shirley good cards which i've managed to get paid off on!

nl50
442 at 14/11/3
+$115.80
26bb/100

the above also includes my first ever $100 day, woop, makes me wonder why i'm not a professional :)

thats about all for nows i guess. got no correct answers for my pop quiz, not even close answers so you can all stay in the dark and i'll have the slightest of edges over you all when we play, ah ha!

sometimes poker can be such a c*nt

Stacks:
UTG with $39.35
MP with $30.90
CO with $25.00
BTN with $34.85
SB with $24.40
BB with $25.00

pop quiz

fellow fishies, its pop quiz time. think you know your poker numbers? then post your answers in the comment field;


1. how many possible hands can you be dealt preflop?

2. how many possible hand combinations are there after the flop has been dealt?

3. how many hands beat your pocket jacks pre-flop?

over to you, if you dare!

poker and life

well i managed to escape any major embarrassment on april fools day, although i did believe that they had discovered flying penguins in the falklands for a little while. luckily i didn't mention it to anyone and my gullibility went undetected!

been doing quite a lot recently outside of poker which is good, been catching up with a lot of friends for a few bevs, been screaming at charlton a fair amount (not so much fun) as they throw away their chance at the play-offs, got a bbq on sunday with some buds although i hear its going to rain/snow, have booked a trip to go zorbing with my fiancee which is likely to be a laugh or make me sick and am heading away for a few days soon to stay in a castle up norf and just disconnect a little. so all in all been a good few weeks with even more planned in.

also back at the gym after a three week lay-off because i had the lurg. feels good and healthy again although i'm aching all over as well...but thats a sign of progress!

pokerwise i've just finished a little session and made just over a buy-in. quite happy with myself running at about 15bb / 100 which is above where i wanted to be. have also taken steps to consolidate my rolls so should be taking another better prepared shot at nl50 in the next few weeks.

also just watched a heads up match between green plastic and annette_15 which was pretty cool. green plastic was steam rolling over annette before he kinda out thought himself and made a few mistakes for annette to pull it back. i think green plastic was up by a little overall but could have been much much more if he slowed down a little towards the end.

thats about all at the moment. hope all else is well in blog land and thanks for reading

march results

cash games
nl25 (full ring)
1495 hands for -$4.55
-0.61bb / 100

nl50 (full ring)
1043 hands for -$148.90
-14.28bb / 100

nl25 (6 max)
2255 hands for +$36.70
3.25bb / 100

total
4793 hands for -$116.75
-1.77bb / 100


full tilt bonii +$40
full tilt rakeback +$4.19

total march -$71.86

---
2008 to date +$135.76

wow, not a great month really looking at the results, but if you looked at it from a learning perspective and an overall game improvement position this month would be far ahead of all the others combined. as you may have seen i completely ripped my game apart and started again and i'm feeling really good about it. every aspect of my game has improved and from a long term point of view i should be able to substantially increase my winnings from losing so heavily this month as it really kick started me to look at my game critically.

for me, next month is hugely important. hopefully it can really be a defining point in moving up the levels. my usual volume targets stand but once i've won about $50 more i'm going to combine my bankrolls and take another, better financed shot at nl50. hopefully with my game improvements over march i can make nl50 my new permanent home.

i'd also like to up my win rate from around 3bb / 100 to more like 8-10. i don't think this is gonna be a huge problem as i feel my new style of play can sustain this, but only time will tell.

so with that said i think i'm done for march now, hope everyone enjoyed better results then me and see you at the tables in april.

babe(s) of the month : march

its been a tough one this month, and i've actually had to settle on two babes of the month, oh no i hear you cry, two hot chicks :( sorry peeps

firstly due to her return in some awful yet sometimes lingerie-tastic tv ads i've decided that march's first babe of the month is myleene klass.

i'll probably post her infamous shower scene from i'm a celeb for your pleasure as well, but until then here she is!


secondly, there is a certain red hed out there that tickles my fancy and who sprung to mind after i saw her in an easter weekend movie, and thats the rather naughty lindsay lohan! enjoy people

retooling - review

so i've retooled my game now and i just wanted to really review the process and share my thoughts on my game as honestly as possible throughout the process.

before retooling:
looking back on the way i played before i'm surprised i made any money! hows that! i was really tight and selective about the cards i played and i never made a move on anyone unless i was tilting and just got lucky they didn't have the goods either.

the way i played, i really grinded, waiting ages for those premium hands only for everyone to fold to my raise as it was the only one i had made. i got lucky on some instances where some donkfish would play a long with me and i'd stack him but those occasions were pretty rare and i think playing at 3bb/100 provided that point.

so why did i play that way. well probably because of slansky and malmuth! play tight, play super tight. give credit and only show down the nuts. thats all well and good but in nlh you rarely get to see a showdown so waiting around for the cards and the play to align so i could show down aces really didn't help me on a path to a steady profit :)

looking back, i really sucked, and i mean really sucked! most poker players blame the cards, suck outs, bad beats or the poker gods and i did the same. but guess what, it was me. i was just a bad player!

post retooling:
right now i love my game. i'm really happy with the way i play, my reads, my aggression, my table awareness and many many other things. the retooling process was well worth the effort and the strange feeling of admitting to myself that i wasn't a winning player or would never move beyond the micro stakes.

i will however say that since i started retooling i have run bad in places and you only have to look at the two hands i posted a few days back to see that i'm not making it up and i'm not lying to myself. reviewing the session where i lost $46 or about two buyins you can clearly see that the biggest pot a lost outside of those to $25 a piece coolers was $2.25, there were no mistakes in between, no chasing draws, no calling when i was behind, i was just playing solid grade 'a' poker and it was working.

i had another little session just to see if the above wasn't true and to see if i hadn't learnt as much as i thought and the results are as follows

nl25
106 hands at 17/16/8
+$39
74bb/100

verdict: crushed!

so with that said i look back over the last week where i basically erased everything i had learnt right or wrong and approached the game as a total newbie. i invested about 8 hours running through videos in detail and probably the same playing 2 tables and my understanding of the game has increased sooo much!

there is still so much more to learn but right now i actually feel like i have the foundation of a game that i can build on, get better and ultimately move up the levels and make a profit. the futures bright, the futures poker, hehe!

retooling - report 4

so i've watched all of the videos on playing nl 6max as a solid tag player and i have learnt a shag load! seriously, all those hours spent on the train reading slansky and malmuth were wasted compared to watching 5 hours of solid video coaching!

after the last video there were a few more areas in my game that i in hindsight needed some work and they are

1) table selection: i was totally looking for the wrong things and now after a little experimentation i think i'm back on track.

2) slow playing: thought i was well cool, innit, for slow playing my aces. financially its not true, have had my eyes opened here.

3) value betting: i was either missing value or looking for it in the wrong spots.

so my final retooling session went pretty well and i think i plugged the holes from the last session

nl25
235 hands at 11/9/9
+$28.05
24bb/100

verdict: crushed once again! really felt on fire today. my play was solid, i kept putting the donks on hands, picked my spots and crushed anyone that tried to play back at me! think my stats were a little low but really wasn't picking up anything and as the videos said, forcing it at the micro stakes usually back fires, which is pretty much what happened last session.

key hands:
did i lose value here?

so with that said, i'm pretty pleased with how following the video series turned out. there is still a ton more to learn and there are loads more videos to watch but am pretty pleased with where i am. i think once i practice this style a little more and get really comfortable with the plays a good next step for me is to see where i can open up my range a little more. will let you know how that goes.

gonna watch rounders now and critique matt damons play...donkfish!

hurting a little at the moment

was completely motivated, fighting to get at the tables, ready to apply everything i have learned and then this happened. feeling totally dejected now :( did i play either of these hands wrongly?

i know that its variance and making donkfish calls keeps the donkfish coming back but come on, could i not have scooped one of these? all my hard work for the day gone plus more, meh

sat down, very first hand and this happened, total cooler

pocket snowfish

then after going on a little raising with nothing run and enjoying a little 3 betting i get this hand and i was praying the donkfish had seen me being aggressive so i could stack him

pocket cowfish

and to round it off, do i have any beer in the house, course i effing dont!

retooling - report 3

so i've watched the 4th video in the five part series i'm following and again its pulled out some seemingly obvious points that i need to tweak in my play

1) table image: i always thought that this was something only the high stakes players needed to worry about but as the micro players get better the more attention you need to pay to your table image.

2) hand reading: i also need to define peoples range a little more and use the turn card as the defining point in the hand where i can really narrow down a holding.

3) timing tells: again not something i have ever really looked at in detail but its another weapon in my armour.

so after watching the vids i hit the 6 max tables again but didn't fair as well this time

nl25
363 hands at 12/11/6
-$32.90
-18bb/100

verdict: overall i felt i played ok, there were some big holes in my game as i was trying to put 4 hours worth of videos in to practice and it backfired in places. i was also playing at some massively loose aggressive tables which didn't help my game at all, and i was defo not getting the help of the deck. however i think i learnt a lot from this and it will help me put down some stronger foundations as i move forward from here.

key hands:
why did i slow play this? stupid mistake
felt my aggression here was fine and just got unlucky

so yes, it was a loss, but i have identified my leaks and can move forward from here with them plugged. one video to go now and i should be back on track.