Hugo's Blogspotting: 6 September

Lucky Jim Goes to a GA Meeting

Lucky Jim’s blog continues apace with further missives from his wretched existence. From the 2nd September he posts his experience of the Luton branch of Gamblers Anonymous:

“A dozen people attend each week, drawn from a pool of twice that number. The average age is 40 and the look is life-scarred blue-collar…These men have had their share of divorce, imprisonment and desolation…newcomers howl with desperation of the unbearable misery gambling has caused them; "I've reached rock bottom" they declare, their first learnt phrase, and the next Tuesday they don't come back…Only once has a woman attended one of these meetings, and she did not come back either. This is a world of male misery, men whose small ambitions were thwarted, finding themselves enslaved to the God of gambling for decades which they now recognise as having been miserable.”

That’s a nice bit of light reading while you pass the time between hands playing an online SNG eh? Many addicts like to wallow in their addictions and wear them like badges of honour and Jim is no exception.

I remember many years ago whilst playing poker at the Vic I was seated next to Ramin Sai (now dead, he was a BIG winner in the cash games) who was studying the form in the Racing Post. David Mosely (considered by many as one of the best Omaha players ever and another BIG winner too) walked past and remarked, “Ramin, you are one sick gambler”. It has to be noted that he used the word sick (a very overused word these days, but still always on the money) admiringly; there was no doubt he was paying Ramin a compliment. Anyway, I digress, but the recollection of that is merely to illustrate the kind of environment we poker players live in and embrace, so it’s no wonder that Lucky Jim is looking for kudos with his tales of woe. That’s not to say Jim’s blog is boring or unreadable. This piece about GA does contain the best and most accurate line he has written:

“I always thought I was better than the people I saw there, but at least they had the self-respect to save themselves. All I ever listened to was the sound of my own voice.”

Shaniac Stays at Home

Shaniac has finally updated his blog and in it he’s his usual reflective self. His girlfriend is away working and for once the shoe is on the other foot:

“I'm… acquainted with the emptiness that she must experience at times, alone at home, with a boyfriend who is often on the road and unavailable”

There’s many a poker widow out there, but I wonder how many times the boyfriend/husband has stopped to think about the old lady at home, flicking between the TV channels waiting for their poker playing other halves to come home and bore them with yet another bad beat story? I think Shaniac hits the nail on the head about why it’s good to be in a relationship when you’re a poker player:

“it's always nice to have a partner who is bringing in $2k/week when you're losing $2k/day.”

Wasicka vs Annette

The legend of Annette_15 grows evermore. Once you reach a certain status in the poker world you don’t have to bother telling your pals bad beat stories – you let others do it for you on their blogs. Paul Wasicka (you know, he came second to Jamie Gold) has been playing in the EPT event at Barcelona and found himself at the same table as Annette. Now Wasicka is no slouch, but raising all-in after a player of Annette’s calibre limps UTG is maybe not the greatest play. To be fair he writes,

“I was next to act with 8,8. I normally would fold in this spot, but given the structure of the tournament and the range of hands she would have to put me on if I shoved, I decided to go with it and moved all-in”

Anyway, another player calls and when it gets back to Annette she goes all-in which the third player now feels obliged to call. In the words of Wasicka,

“…(which represented about 95% of his stack). Annette turned over the now obvious K,K, but to my utter shock the noob turned over A,T! A, 9, 8 flop! Wow, poor Annette. Even if I flop my eight she still wins a decent side pot and would still be sitting on 16k or so, but she lost to the guy who had her covered as well.”

Imagine if Annette had to tell her mates how she got knocked out of the Barcelona EPT; they’d all be rolling their eyes and making comments about her moaning. Instead she can steer them in the direction of this blog and now they can understand her pain.

Phil Laak on High Stakes Poker

I trust you have all been glued to the new series of High Stakes Poker? Check out youtube now for some great cash game poker with plenty of banter. Episode one contains an interesting moment where Phil Laak bets around 10 large on the river with a set of 7s. Todd Brunson, while debating whether to call or not, does a “fake”, moving his hand full of chips forward looking like he might call. This is also known as “forward motion”. Obviously Todd was hoping to elicit a reaction from Phil and get a read. Of course, Phil Laak has been around a while too and doesn’t fall for it and eventually Brunson makes the call and loses. Afterwards Phil asked for a ruling. There has been some debate about this on 2p2 with many calling Brunson an angle shooter etc.

Phil Laak has written an in-depth post on Always Bluff about this very coup which makes for interesting reading. By now you would think that we’d all be hip to the way editing a simple exchange between two people can actually make it look very different as to what happened in reality.

“Watching the show it is not completely clear that he called! But for the record, he did in fact call…The hand was edited poorly. It should have been clearer. He called of his own volition. No one ruled that he had to call because of his forward motion. Only after the hand was 100% over did I ask to know what the rule would be for the future. I was unsure of the rule at this casino. I was only waiting until he either called or folded before I was going to bring it up. To bring it up during the hand seemed like a very bad time.”

Laak goes on to compare the real time logs to what was broadcast as well as vouching for Todd Brunson,

“I hope that none of the readers out there think Todd is an angle shooter. He is about as far from an angle shooter as they come. That is a fact. If you need corroboration then just ask around. It is a no brainer.”

Laak also goes on to compare the forward motion rule between casinos in Vegas and California. All in all a very thorough first post for what is fast becoming one of the best poker sites around.

Antonio Esfandiari Enjoys Some Conspicuous Consumption

Also on Always Bluff is Laak’s good buddy Antonio Esfandiari. He has yet to write about poker in any of his blogs (not his style really and I don’t blame him. You play and you either win or lose, all the rest is bollocks). Most of his blogs are about nightclubbing and his latest entry finds him at the opening of Blush at the Wynn Hotel and Casino. Also attending is big time basketball star Kobe Bryant with a small entourage (that probably means about 100 hangers-on and various parasites). Antonio is with a rich pal who decides to order some Cristal champagne which is $1,500 a bottle. For $1,500 you not only get the bottle, but you get a bunch of hot waitresses serving it to you with a fanfare which everybody in the club can’t help but notice. Not long after this Kobe Bryant decides to order three bottles of Cristal. Can you see where this is going?

“The more bottles you order, the bigger the delivery. We were all pretty wasted and somehow Manny thought that Kobe was trying to outdo him…So he orders 6 more bottles! I don’t know what happened next because the next thing I knew Kobe ordered somewhere around 10 bottles!!! It was the battle of the Cristal between Kobe and Manny.”

That’s not the end of the story as now Manny feels obliged to order every last bottle of Cristal left in the joint! I know some poker players have big egos, but I think this Manny just outdid them all.

Hugo 'Chimney Sweep' Martin

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