I am almost embarrassed to post it...

I decided to play an afternoon session today and I won one of the 7 tourneys I entered for just over $7k. I am obviously running just insanely good lately - whenever I play (which is rarely) I win. I realize the downswing will happen, but riding the upswing sure is nice.

Maybe Belichick's a poker player

On Monday Night Football this week, Coach Bill Belichick's Patriots went for it on 4th and 2 to go with a 6 point lead from their own 28 yard line with just over 2 minutes to play and the Colts left with only one timeout.

For those that don't know football, the situation basically boils down to this. If the Patriots gain 2 or more yards they win the game because the Colts will not be able to stop the clock. If the Patriots don't gain the 2 yards, the Colts get the ball back and only have to go 28 yards to try and get a touchdown to win the game in those last 2 minutes.

The other option for Belichick to have chosen is to punt the ball in which case he guarantees that the Colts will get the ball but they most likely will have to go closer to 60 yards in those last 2 minutes to score a touchdown rather than 30.

For Belichick the decision to go for it blew up in his face. The Patriots failed to convert, the Colts got the ball back and proceeded to score the winning touchdown in dramatic fashion. And the football commentators immediately gave him hell saying it was a retarded decision to go for it and they should have punted.

But according to this nytimes blog Belichick's decision mathematically was correct. The calculation used by this blogger is very similar to EV (expected value) calculations that poker players make all the time. According to the blogger, the EV of going for it was .79 and the EV for punting was .70. So going for it increased the Patriots' chances of winning by around 9%. If this were a poker decision, going for it would expect to gain you more chips and it would be an easy conclusion that going for it was the best play.

A common mantra in the poker world is to "stop being results oriented." A player's natural instinct after losing a big pot or getting busted from a tournament is to go back over the hand and figure out a way that he could have played the hand differently so that the bad outcome would not have happened. E.g. "If I had folded that AQ preflop instead of shoving my last 15 BBs I would not have run into AK and would still have chips left to play." But after playing thousands and thousands of hands, poker players finally begin to understand that as long as you keep making decisions which gain you chips in the long run, then you can shake off the times where those plays lose you chips in the short term on that specific hand.

I think the football world is being results oriented in criticizing Belichick's decision. If his team had converted the 4th down I don't think this controversy is even created. If anything, Belichick would be lauded for being ballsy. Is it common for coaches to go for it on 4th down in that spot? No. Does that mean it was the wrong decision? No.

I got my lazy ass out today

So I finally got myself out and going early today and went on a 1 1/2 hour bikeride. It was a beautiful fall day and it felt good to be out by the river but man I am out of shape. So it definitely was a good thing to get out and moving. If I actually remember I will try and take the camera with me tomorrow so I can take some photos.

Still just chillin'

I still haven't played an online tourney since I won that UB tourney 2 weeks ago. I just haven't felt the mojo to play, so I'm not going to until I do. So I cleaned the gutters, played some live poker today with my poker group and enjoyed watching one of my online buddies take down the 70k on pokerstars when I got home.

Wheee?

So I played in a cash game again last night. It was (for me) just a $20 tourney and there were 40 people who showed up. I ended up running like god late and chopped it when we got down to 3 players for like $270. But I feel a little bad about it because for me, I am just playing for fun, but for a lot of these guys $200 is more than they make on a daily basis so I would almost rather just break even or even lose a little bit than make money since the reason I am playing is more just to shoot the shit and get out of the house than anything else.

Anyhoo, I still haven't got the urge to get back to work online but I did finally vacuum and tidy up the house today and put in a little bit of a ghost session with one of my students so I feel I accomplished at least a little bit.

Tomorrow I play in another cash game and then I am planning on just taking everyday day by day.

Trying to find some motivation

I really haven't done anything since last Wednesday when I won the Sniper tourney on UB. I want to get the house cleaned up but haven't; I want to get back in shape but haven't exercised; I want to stockpile more money for my poker bankroll but haven't played...

It would be one thing if I was out living it up everyday and having a blast, but I am not even doing that. Instead I spend my days surfing the web, watching tv, and reading. And while it is always nice to veg out for a day or two it gets pretty boring when it goes on for a week... yet I still can't find the oomph to actually do anything.

The good thing this week is that my live home game group has 3 games this week, so I got to play last night, and will play again tonight and Friday night in a live setting with a good group of players where I always have fun.

I is bored!

So there is no way that I will be able to not play the rest of this month just because I would be way too bored. So the plan at this point is to get myself and the house back in shape and then play poker whenever I want. I am planning on playing quite a bit of homegames these next couple of weeks since I have no pressure on making money the rest of this month. But just sitting at home and not playing and watching my friends play is not very thrilling so the sit on my profits and not play plan is out.

I is Famous!

I got mentioned in the weekly roundup article on P5s. I am pretty sure when I signed up for pocket5s they asked where you were from, so I entered my birthplace, Nigeria, as my answer. So I am now the number #1 ranked (and only) player from Nigeria - in fact I am the #1 ranked player for the entire continent of Africa. The Nigerian Nightmare is back!!

Wheeeeeeeeeee

Not an FTOPs victory but I chopped the $215 sniper tourney on UB for $21k which is my biggest online score of the year. Always feels good to take down such a nice score. I'm sure I'll take tomorrow off and then I'll have the battle of making myself play or just being a lazy bastard. Not such a bad battle to have tho.

FTOPS

FullTilt's quarterly series of tourneys begins today and for the first time I actually have a bankroll where I can play the majority of the events on my own dime. I have taken a long enough break where I feel excited to play again, so hopefully I can pop off a big score at some point during this series.

First day back = sucky sucky long time

I got a full day in playing and a full session in coaching as well so that felt good. I only cashed one of the twelve tourneys I played, but I feel like I played well. The next three weeks should be pretty full in terms of playing so hopefully I can get on a hot streak quickly rather than having to dig myself out of a hole.

Should start working again for reals soon

I actually played a couple of small sessions this week and it felt good to get back to playing. The coaching is going well I think even if it is start and stop, but the students all seem like good players as well as good guys so they are a nice addition to the group of guys who I speak with whenever I am playing.

Charmian is off today and tomorrow and then she starts a tough rotation Sunday night. She has been on a relatively easy rotation these last 8 weeks so it has been nice to actually see her and spend time with her - and it will be weird going back to seeing her basically just for a brief period of time before she needs to go to bed. But at least she has a week vacation in the middle of this upcoming rotation to give her some relief.

I plan on playing a full session for the first time in a long time this Sunday and then to just try and put my nose to the grindstone and play/coach as much as I can the first 3 weeks of November before I go on another vacation.

I also played some tennis yesterday for the first time in a long time and it felt to just get out and run around a bit - my knee also held up which was nice too.

Off to a stop and go start with the coaching

I started coaching last week and I think it is going well. My students all have a decent grasp of the game but they all also are capable of picking up a few tricks from my bag o' tricks. The stop and start aspect of the coaching is due to friends visiting and dinners planned. Charmian's friend from med school came this weekend with her fiance so we spent the weekend out and about in the greater Sacramento area. We took them to the bike path on the river where we often walk Chula, we then drove to the natural waterslides hike, ate some good meals, went to the farmer's market and then biked around Davis and just had a good time hanging out and being active this weekend. Tomorrow we are hosting a dinner for some of the 4th year medical students who are applying to the Davis residency program that Charmian is in and then this weekend is Charmian's last weekend off for a while. So I will be coaching a couple of days this week and then get back into both playing and finishing off my 1-on-1 coaching stuff the following week(s).

The only other semi-news is that we are having one of those horrid run-around situations with a tv-stand that we bought online. When we bought it we were assured that it would be delivered by tomorrow. Turns out that the stand has not been shipped, that we were never given an update on it, and that we had to be proactive and put on hold a ton of times just to find that out. Meh - the frustration with situations like this is always high but in the end the stand will finally arrive.

Back to work tomorrow

Even though I retardedly forgot that most poker players who would want my coaching are either in school or have fulltime jobs, I was pleasantly surprised to get a good number of qualified and enthusiastic applicants. In fact the applicants were so good that I wasn't able to whittle the field down to 2 or 3. Instead I settled on 6 applicants who for whatever reason jumped out at me. Since I am not going to be playing at all the rest of this month, I feel like I will be able to give all of them quality one-on-one as well as group instruction. I also feel like this will be a good way for me to get excited about playing again. It has been nice to be lazy, but after awhile it just gets boring. I am that phase right now so I am excited to get back at it tomorrow.

Stepping back into the coaching pool

Instead of concentrating on putting in a ton of volume for the rest of this month, I have decided that I will step back into the coaching pool. I am looking to take on 2-3 students. If you don't know who I am - I am a professional MTT player and instructor on PokerPwnage.com with over a 133% ROI over my last 3000 tourneys.

Here's what I am offering:

My coaching will begin on Mon. Oct. 19. From the 19th-21 and the 26th-31st (I have friends visiting from the 22-25th) I will focus on ghosting/shadowing your sessions and making suggestions on your play. I am estimating that this will be pretty time intensive and will be anywhere from 4-8 hrs/day, so this should end up being anywhere from 30-50 hours of very focused, basically one-on-one coaching. Once November rolls around I will start playing again and you will be able to ghost me and ask any questions that you may have about my play - if I have free screen space I will also pull any of your tables up and give you my input. I am also part of a pretty tight knit group of great poker minds and talk with them on a daily basis - I will bring you into this group which will allow you to ask not only me but other great players whatever questions regarding hands or poker theory that you may have.

My requirements:

You must have a HUD.
You must have a working microphone so that we can talk with each other over ventrilo.

My cut:

You will pay me 33% of your net profits from when we start until the end of November. You will pay me 15% of your net profits for each of the following 3 months from December through the end of February. Payments are due on the 1st of each month - i.e. I expect payments on Dec. 1, Jan. 1, Feb. 1, and March 1 for this deal. If you don't profit, you don't pay me a dime. However, to make sure I do not get shafted by someone who I have never met and will possibly never meet, I am going to require a $250 deposit. Any profit you make will be deducted from this deposit and if you end up actually losing money over these next 5 months I will return your entire deposit to you.

How to apply:

Send me an e-mail to chardrian@hotmail.com and tell me why I should pick you. Include your screennames on all of the sites you play. I will pick my students on or before Sunday Oct. 18th so make sure to apply before then.

To Reno and Back

I went to Reno on Thursday for an extended weekend to play in some of the Fall Pot of Gold tourneys. I figured $45/nt to go and play some live poker and meet some people from an online staking site that I use was worth a 2 hour drive.

The tourneys were only averaging about 75 players for the $300+ buyin tourneys which was a little too small for my liking but I did win the $340 tourney on Friday for about $6k so the trip was profitable.

The casino itself was actually really nice. The room was huge, and the resort had a driving range, a bowling alley, and plenty of restaurants. The only bummer was that it was sort of an old style casino in that everywhere you went it stank of old cigarette smoke - there are actually quite a few non-smoking casinos in Vegas now that I really like and all of the poker rooms there are non-smoking. Whereas here the tournament was just played out on the casino floor so I was stuck in a blue fog the whole weekend.

Anyhoo, I am now back and with a profitable month I am of course feeling lazy again, so I am contemplating how much I actually want to play the rest of this month. I think I am going to focus on getting back in shape and keeping our house looking purty and will keep poker on the back burner. Maybe I'll even take on a student or two... We'll see.

Dinner with yo-yoers

I am finally used to getting weird looks and lots of questions when people find out that I am a professional poker player, but I will admit I found it a little humorous when one of my step-brother's cohorts was agog at my profession considering that he is currently "on tour" as a yo-yo player.

Anyhoo, they were in town doing their demos, and I met up with them last night and figured they probably hadn't had a real home cooked meal for a while, so I invited them over and made some roast chicken, mashed potatoes, garlic bread, salad, and fresh baked cookies for dessert. So I think I am now a hit with yo-yoers.

Besides getting my ego stroked it was also nice to shoot the shit with my step-brother since I do not see him very often. I think I will finally get back to actually working and playing some cards tomorrow.

Busy Weekend

We had a great time in wine country this weekend (we went to a town called forestville right on the russian river) kayaking, biking, and just relaxing at the beach and in the hot tub.

My step-brother Kent also welcomed his first child so I am an uncle again.

And my other step-brother, Mark, unexpectedly showed up in Sacramento yesterday in the midst of a yo-yo tour so I hung put with him a bit last night and am having him and his crew over for dinner tonight.

Delayed weekend post

Last weekend my family from L.A. and my cousin and her family from San Fran came for the weekend. We went and played at the river one day and then the next day we drove up into the mountains and hiked to these natural waterslides. I am a big family guy, so as always I had a blast just hanging out and having fun.





Pokerwise, I haven't played since last Friday (when they came into town) basically because I just haven't felt like it. We leave for a belated anniversary trip to wine country this weekend and then I am thinking of going to Reno next week to play some live poker at a casino that is having a series of tourneys in October.

Reflection

I am taking today off and just sort of evaluating where I am, where I want to be, and what I need to do to accomplish my goals. And to do all of that I always think it is good to look back and see where you have been.

It is hard for me to believe that I have now been playing professionally for over 2 years. When I started with my 30k bankroll I had dreams that I would consistently be making $10k+ every month, that my bankroll would steadily increase and that I could then move up in limits and my ROI would stay the same and then I would be consistently making $20k+ every month. That this cycle would just continue until I was a bazillionaire and life would be eeeeeeeeasy.

Instead I have found that I generally take 2 or 3 small steps back before taking one giant step forward that is big enough to jump over those backward movements. That the "consistent" 10k months are a pipe dream - I generally have one losing month for every 2 winning months.

If I had kept a bankroll graph it would be the spikiest thing ever. I have gone from 30k, down to less than 25k, back up to over 30k, up to 40k, back down to 30k, back to 40, up to 50, back to 40, up to 50, up to 60, back down to 40, back up to 60, back down to 40, then as recently as mid August I was back down to 32k and since then I have built it back up to where it currently stands at 68k.

I have learned that between downswings, monthly withdrawals, and laziness leading to low volume, growing or even maintaining my bankroll is HARD! So although I never thought I would still only be halfway to my goal of a 100k bankroll two years after I started this, I am not really upset with myself.

Here's what I am proud of:

I have kept my tilt in control and have not spewed off my bankroll playing in cash games over my head when I am in the midst of downswings hoping to chase my losses.

I have practiced good Bankroll Management and have looked for backing when I need it so that I can play in games that I know I am +EV in and give me the best shot of making huge money but I just can't afford to play on my own dime at the moment.

I have made and exceeded the monthly withdrawals that my wife and I have agreed upon and have still been able to (gradually) increase my bankroll.

I made a WSOP final table.

I have become an instructor on an up and coming poker instructional site.

I have not donked off my roll.

This is what I still need to work on:

volume, volume, and more volume. I am a lazy mofo. The more I play, the more I make - and yet I still find ways not to play. I can't help but think that if I had put in the volume I am capable of, that my bankroll would already be at the 100k point.

If I can continue to grow and play as well as I have these last two years AND I actually put in some significant volume I believe that my next two years can be even better than these last two. Here's to making that happen...