The Home Game, a brief review

Well this weekend was poker night. But more importantly, it was eat like a pig night!

That's right, the Mrs and I are dieting. I need to lose about 50lbs, so we're doing Weight Watchers. We're not going to the meetings, just doing it online. It works pretty good. It's really just a fancy way of counting calories, and as long as you burn off more than you take in you're going to lose weight. The hardest part is preparing meals, we were already eating "healthier." So we are able to make our points go further. The good thing about Weight Watchers is that they give you extra points each week. So I saved up all week and was ready for poker night. Got a big ol' 12" chicken parm and an appetizer of Potato Skins with Bacon and Cheese. PLUS before that I stopped at Taco Bell and picked up a Steak Quesadilla. Overall I lost 6 pounds for the first week, not too shabby.

OK, now on to poker.
Tournament #1. I got no hands, except two.
First Hand. JJ. I raise it up and get 2 or 3 callers. Of course the flop comes an Ace. I'm not about to give up. Figure maybe a bet will get ace rag to fold (but not likely with this crowd). I bet about 2 bucks (blinds were .25/.50). Get a caller and know I'm beat. I check he bets, I fold my jacks up. Maniac of course asks, "How do you fold jacks there?" I'm thinking, "Easy, that's why I win more of these than you."

2 hands later, I get 77. I raise it up, get 3 callers... flop is all overs and I have to let them go.

Tournament #2. Early Bluff.
A few hands in, I wanted to show a little aggressiveness, so I decide to play the next hand big. The next hand is 3s-5s. I decide good hand to do so. I raise and get a couple of callers. The flop misses me completely. I bet $2. 1 caller. The turn is a blank, I bet $4, guy calls. At this point, I'm wondering if I'll be able to push him off his hand. I'm going back and forth when the river comes and still nothing. I look at him, think, think... I check. He looks at me, then checks himself. I don't even bother to wait, I just toss them in the muck, as I had the absolute Anti-Nuts (there was no hand that can lose to me) without even waiting for him to show. He showed top pair.

Tournament #3. I wake up, but then get bored.
I finally get some hands and make some things happen. Nothing major comes back to mind except the last hand. I was heads up and behind. Blinds were, as usual, high. I just wanted to end and start a new one. I was happy that I made 2x the buy-in. I'm in the BB with 56 off. SB raises, and I just push. Surprisingly I was 50-50. He had pocket 4s. Which held up. Not surprising. Pocket fours were a monster that night. They were hitting sets left, right and center!

Tournament #4. I turn up the heat.
Again, I continue to play well and get cards. One hand I have ATd. I raise it up and get 3 callers (I'm 3rd to act). It checks around on each street. On the river it checks around, I think about taking a stab, but figure someone has a bottom pair or something and would call a raise, I just check. The button looks at every with a weird look on his face and shrugs and throws in a dollar. He's relatively new to poker (he's been in the home game since I started, over a year, but that's the only times he plays), plays really tight and was easy to read. It folds around to me. I just raise it up to $4. I didn't think I had the best hand (I figure him for either an underpair or bottom pair) and after that shrug, I would have raised with two Uno cards, so I wanted him to fold. He goes into the tank. He says he wants to call with A9. Now I'm praying he calls. But he folds.

A few hands later Slappy (the host) limps in, and I raise, he calls. We're heads up. I've got a pretty good read on him. He's aggressive, but usually with draws he just calls almost any bet. So two hearts come out. The flop missed me so I bet. He simply calls. Right then I know he's on a draw. Turn doesn't help his draw, I bet big, he calls. River is a blank, I bet out again and he folds. Felt good to punish him for chasing a draw. Though he did change things up later. He was in a hand (I folded preflop) and he bet had 7c4c and flopped the flush draw and bet at it on each street, catching his flush on the river.

Later, we're three handed (top 2 pay). I get dealt A8s. One guy folds and I'm in with Slappy. He raises about 2x the BB (which, when the blinds climb, is a good bet). I push all in and he calls with K2 suited. The guy was playing horrible that night. But lucky. He won the first tournament (might have won another) and then was coming in 2nd. Basically he was seeing a lot of flops and hitting them hard. The flop comes QJx. Then the 10 on the turn. His King hits on the river and he jumps up. My heart sinks as now I'm crippled, then a second later, "WAIT! I got the straight!" He drops into his seat. He takes loses hard. I knocked him out and take a huge chip lead into heads up and take the win with little fight.

Tournament #5 (there also may have been a 6th), I don't remember what happened.

Last Tournament of the Night. It was getting late, some of us wanted to play a little more, but didn't want to inconvenient Slappy who had to pick up his girlfriend. So we decided on a $5.00 winner-take-all, blinds double every 5 mins. Was surprisingly fun. There were six of us and 2 got knocked out right away. I got to heads up and it was pretty much a back and forth all-in fest, which I managed to win.

I finished the night up about $20. Bringing me UP about $40 (but my food was about $20, so I was up $20) for the night.


That means for 2007, I'm down $60. Hmm.. should I deposit my $120 into FTP???