all change!

poker is going well at the moment, but one of the things i like to do periodically is change the room i'm using. i usually find it helps keep me fresh, interested and allows me to hunt new fish! with online poker being a largely solo pursuit, a visual change can often refocus the mind and give your game a little kick up the backside. there is nothing worse than getting lazy, lazy costs money!

since poker is the same everywhere its a pretty easy thing to do, just my roll, neteller and away we go! i've decided to download the poker software over at 888 and give it a go. its been a room i've been meaning to try for a while now and it seems like a good time to kick it up a gear.

i'll let you know how it goes, probably post a review once i've put in some hands there.

Read more...

will obama free online poker?

while there were many regrets american citizens had about the policies of the bush administration, one of the toughest blows came to online poker players in the form of the uigea, the unlawful internet gambling enforcement act. this act made it illegal for banks in the united states to do business with online gambling sites, which spelled the end of online poker in the united states for a number of sites.

uigea and poker

online poker players were outraged, specifically feeling that it was unfair for online poker, which can be proven to have a vital skill element, to be lumped in with video poker and other online casino games that are entirely luck. this was especially grating to online poker fans when considering the fact that forms of gambling that benefit the government, such as horse racing and state lotteries, were still considered completely safe and legal.

obama’s response

many poker players whooped that obama would ride in to the rescue. as a democrat, it was hoped that he would be less morally conservative and as a poker player, it was hoped that he would recognize the merits and distinctive character of the game.

the future of online poker

it remains to be seen what will happen. it seems likely that the current question now is not “will obama free online poker?” but “when?” when the white house posted a website asking citizens to post their most important issues for consideration and for people to vote on these issues, legalizing online poker was voted the number one technology issue and the number eleven issue overall.

when will obama free online poker?

this is a new administration with much to do in the wake of the last administration’s failures with respect to the economy and other issues. obama needs to choose and time his battles carefully. however, when the time is right and the right bill is introduced into congress to restore the legality of online poker, it is almost certain that president obama will sign it. when he does, online poker players will be free to come out into the light once more, playing on their favourites sites with no fear of persecution, hopefully ever again.

Read more...

top 5 poker players of all time

a question that is often asked but almost impossible to answer. regardless of that i thought i would give it a go, here are my thoughts on the who the best poker players of all time are.

---

>phil ivey
after the 2009 wsop finished, all bar the returning final table of the main event, it has become clear just how good ivey really is. with 7 wsop bracelets and a chance to take down an 8th come november, plus an astounding record playing in the highest cash games around, ivey is the pinnacle of the poker illuminati. if ivey can keep his hunger alive then who knows where this man can go.

>phil hellmuth
love him or hate him, hellmuth, the most polarizing player in poker is also the most awarded player in wsop history with 11 bracelets to his name. each of his 11 bracelet wins may have been in hold'em but you cannot deny that that he is an incredibly astute player. his self awarness proabably exceed that of any other player and hellmuth, who has cultivated his poker brat image over the years knows exactly how to exploit it to his advantage.

>doyle brunson
one of the patriarchs of poker, brunson has defined the modern game. with skills honed on the dangerous and cut throat texas poker circuit brunson has seen it all. with back to back wsop main event wins in '76 and '77, 10 bracelets in total and the defining poker text to his name (super system) brunson has done more for the game than any other poker player alive today. he may be 76 years old but doyle is ever present at the big games in bobby's room and still teaching the young guns a thing or too about the game he loves.

>stu ungar
equally talented and troubled. stu ungar had a unnatural ability for all card games. winner of the wsop 3 times in 1980, 1981 and most impressively in 1997 after a 16 year absence filled with alcohol and substance abuse. ungar was a widely feared and highly aggressive player constantly putting his opponents to tough decisions. we will always be left wondering what he could have achieved if it wasn't for his self destruction. stu ungar, poker legend.

>tom 'durrrr' dwan
potentially a controversial inclusion but its hard to ignore the young internet juggernaut that are steamrolling the highest games online. durrrr has emerged at the forefront of the internet generation and his rise to the top has been both rapid and a roller-coaster. with daily 7 figure wins and loses a regular occurrence for the young poker star, its his ability to deal with his high variance style and maintain his a game when many others would have imploded. whether or not dwan will still be playing poker in 20, 10 or even 5 years time remains to be seen but right now its hard to ignore this raw talent.

---

i realize many of you will have your own opinion on who the top 5 poker players of all time are and i invite you to share your thoughts in the comments. as i said, its a nigh on impossible question to answer but given enough feedback we can get a better idea of what the overall feeling is.

Read more...

rounders to rounders 2

with rumours that a sequel to the seminal rounders is being thrown about in hollywood i thought it would be worth remembering what made the original the stand-out poker movie of our time.

> a great cast, norton, damon, malkovich, janssen, turturro, landau etc. a selection of a listers and legends coming together and delivering a believable and interesting dynamic on screen.

> it wasn't set in vegas. new york added emotion, grit and realism to the movie where as the neon lights of vegas would have blinded the audience to the real struggle portrait in the movie.

> actually watching people play poker took a back seat with the tension and bravery of the game coming to the fore.

> there was no ridiculous quad aces getting rivered by a royal flush moment

> its was about the grind, the emotional roller coaster, about trying to make it playing poker. something that all players can relate to on one level or another.

at the end of the movie damon went off to chase his wsop dream in vegas. i would hate to think the sequel would continue exactly where the last left off, i feel it would be an anticlimax to the power of the originals script. the story in vegas may make a nice intro or even form itself through flashbacks, but for me, the grind in new york is far more compelling than any bright vegas has to offer. here's hoping that rounders 2 doesn't become a traditional hollywood over the top sequel.

Read more...

music to watch the cards go by

poker can be a lonely game. you’re a lone warrior battling in solitude with only enemies for company. many a poker player therefore finds solice in music. a constant companion that can lift spirits or deepen despair.

but can music alter the way you play? can upbeat, high tempo music make you play more positively? and conversely can slow beat, angst esq music make you play more passively? recently i’ve been experimenting to test just this.

this morning i fired up some tables and chose some head candy to be my soundtrack of the session. i found myself tapping my foot to the beat and feeling high spirited. generally the poker session went well. there were no notable bad beats and i ended about half a buy-in up. good result.

this afternoon i continued my musical experiment and spun some placebo, one of the most teen angsty bands i have ever listened to. this time there was no foot tapping to be seen. instead i found myself screaming along to teenage dirtbag et al, and having a good time with it. the poker session again went well and i finished up about 15 bb.

this evening i thought i would try one more time and again the tables came up and i the needle went down on some matchbox twenty. being one of my favorite bands there was a fair amount of air guitar going on which was a little distracting. again the session went well. i played solid poker and finished up about 60 bb.

so what did i learn? well in regards to the genre of music affecting my play, very little. but i did realize the importance of poker to me as a solitary warrior on the felt covered battleground. good music can interrupt the monotony of playing poker, it can provide moments of escapism and distraction without you ever really losing concentration. it adds to the enjoyment of poker and is an undemanding companion to the grind. so fire up some tables, spin some tunes and let you and your music take on all comers!

Read more...

mac poker

i've always been a pc guy. ever since i convinced my parents to buy a pc back in the mid 90's, a gateway pentium 75. it ran windows 95 and i loved it! since then i've gone through one other desktop and 3 laptops. my last being a dell xps m1330 which was only purchased in 2007. in fact read my review of that purchase here.

unfortunately my lovely dell had a problem. deep inside its bowels the graphics chip, which was mounted on the motherboard, generated too much heat which eventually shorted its host. dell were kind enough to replace it the first time it happened but it has since happened again and although i'm sure dell would replace it once more i can't live with an erratic pc.

near where i work there is a big glass store with an enticing fruit mounted above the door. that store is the apple store. i popped in a couple of times during my lunch hour to play around with their machines and ended up falling in love! not only do macs look gorgeous but the operating system is so smooth and user friendly. applications open quickly and easily and nothing crashed or blue screened.

so guess what, i bought one! well i actually bought two as i bought my wife one as well so she wouldn't try and steal mine! i bought myself a 13 inch mac book pro and it is one slick piece of kit.

problem is with a mac is that there isn't a great deal of choice when it comes to poker software. only full tilt and pokerstars offer native support and none of the big hand analysis packages run on mac osx. i know you can run windows on your mac via bootcamp but to be honest, why would i slow down my system and eat up all its available resources to run windows.

luckily i'm a big fan of pokerstars so i have no problem placing my entire roll there, the hand analysis software however is something that i miss, even if its just for analyzing my own play as opposed to tracking others. poker tracker have mooted releasing a mac osx version of pt3 but no dates have been set. after a few searches however i came across a piece of software called poker copilot. it built for mac, and although it is fairly basic vs pt3 or holdem manager it does go someway to filling the void. i've only been using it for 24 hours but i have to say that i had zero problems setting it up, it hasn't missed any hands, hasn't frozen or had any other compatibility tantrums. something that neither poker tracker or holdem manager can claim, at least in my experience.

so all well so far then. i put in a couple of good sessions today and am up 2 buy-ins, nothing to do with the mac but at least i'm playing again. i'll definitely post a review of both my new mac and poker copilot as i log a few more hours with both, but in the meantime if anyone was considering a mac but was worried about their poker suffering, i wouldn't! poker lives, and it lives on the mac!

Read more...

watch out seymour is about!

i'm coming back!  after a prolonged absence, over a year really, i'm on the road home!  and when i return i aim to bring seymour:cards back to the top of the blog pile, lol!

i'm currently looking at freshening things up a little, dusting off the cobwebs, adding some more functionality and things.  you may, depending on how often you visit, see a couple template changes, although i think that i am close to deciding on the new look.

so whats gonna happen once i'm back, well firstly and most obviously i'll be sharing my poker exploits!  again i'm not gonna be setting the world on fire but i hope my passion for the game comes across and for once there won't be any mentions of bad beats!

secondly i want to help new players navigate the online poker world and find the love for the game that i have.  i'll be writing a series of posts on my poker journey and the things that i know now which i wish someone had told me when i set off.

thirdly i'll be sharing my view on the latest poker news and also posting some interesting insights into the world of online high stakes poker as the action has been pretty frickin insane so far this year and its likely to get better and better.

so make sure you come back soon, post you comments and enjoy the content.

all the best out there!

Read more...

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!

Read more...

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

Read more...

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"

how can i possibly turn this man down, he seems very nice and even wants to protect my good reputation in society. i'm going to contact him right now!

Read more...

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.

Read more...

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.

Read more...

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 ben able to play poker. 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

Read more...

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!

Read more...

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!

Read more...

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.

Read more...

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.

Read more...

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!

Read more...

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

Read more...

my first rakeback

so woke up this morning, saw i had a few emails in my inbox, rubbed my weary eyes and noticed they were both entitled full tilt poker fund transfer. panicked, screamed a little that someone was trying to hack my account, ran in circles for a few minutes, before discovering it was a transfer of funds into my account!

(this is leapfrogs 'my first computer' and my killa setup, bo!)

happy that money was going in rather then out i read a little more and saw it was my first rakeback payment of $4.19. i double checked to see if the decimal place should actually be one space to the left, and then when unfortunately sure it wasn't i still felt rather pleased with myself.

the question now really is what should i do with the money, i can't let my first rakeback payment just slide into my account unnoticed. i feel i should take a risk, stick it on a 180 sng or try and satellite into a bigger satellite, into a bigger mtt into the main event maybe?

suggestions welcome as i only ever play cash games so if people know of some small tornies etc that i can buy into on ftp then please let me know.

Read more...