Then it'd be perfectly acceptable for me to go on a massive bitch tirade about how microstakes is just a variance fest and how everyone just shoves over each other preflop and it's nearly impossible to have consistent wins because everyone's range is infinite.
But I like to think I'm more composed than that, so here's a video of Ronald McDonald murdering the fuck out of a bunch of people.
Edit: none of this is true. I just sucked real bad at time of posting. Suck less now and will suck even less in future ^^
Think About What the Author Will Readby failsafe, April 27
For the most part, I'd say we think recursively. If I do this, then my action will benefit me in some way. Perhaps the most important thing others teach me is what benefits me. Then to them I disclose questions in the form of answers. In return I receive answers.
"The most important things are the hardest things to say. They are the things you are ashamed of, because words diminish them-words shrink things that seemed infinite inside your head to no more than living size when they come out. But it's more than that, isn't it? The most important things lie too close to where your secret heart is buried, like landmarks to the treasure chest your enemies would love to steal away. And you may make revelations that cost you dearly only to have people look at you in a funny way, not understanding what you've said at all, or why you thought it was so important that you almost cried while you were saying it. That's the worst, I think. When the secret stays locked up not for want of a teller but for want of an understanding ear." -"The Body," Stephen King
When I was a teenager, I had basically three interests:
1) Starcraft (ever since I was 12-13)
2) Poker (since I was 17)
3) MMA (since I was 14-15, trained first time when I was 16).
Anyway, after I quit playing Sc2 professionally, I quickly found myself missing some kind of competitive outlet. A new MMA gym had opened up near me like 2-3 months prior, and I'd been going on and off... but around July last year I decided to get a lot more serious.
I'd been out with an injury for like 1-2 months and at the time I was about 90kg, 180~ cm. So I started training 5 days a week, 3~ hours a day... And yesterday I had my first fight, weighing in at around 77 kg.
The event is hosted by Top FC which is Korea's second biggest MMA organization behind Road FC (who also has their own amateur divsion, called Central League I think), and uses the moniker "Top FC Khan Amateur League". This was its 4th iteration.
The rules are quite friendly:
- 2x 3 minute rounds
- Headgear, 14 oz gloves*, shinguards
- No heelhooks, no knees or elbows to the head but OK to the body.
Rest is the same as pro mma, but referees try to stop fights much faster if a submission is on, to avoid serious injuries in an amateur event.
* They told us last minute that from now on we'd be able to opt for MMA gloves if we wanted to but I dont think anyone did since it was a last minute change and everyone had been sparring with bigger gloves.
The gameplan
When I first came to this gym, I had a little bit of grappling skill, but my striking was HORRIBLE. I'm still not a really competent striker (but I'd say I'm one of the best 3 or so regular students in terms of ground grappling --- then there's obviously the coaches and a couple of higher level guys who are a bunch better too), but I've made improvements. My cardio is also excellent since I train for so long every day and I run in addition to that.
So to summarize: striking relatively poor, grappling relatively good, cardio good. I also don't have much power in my strikes, which I need to work on.
I've got really long arms and legs for my size, and since my most glaring weakness striking wise is exchanges in the pocket, the gameplan my coaches made for me was as follows:
- Stay on the outside, use a lot of circling, use your jab and kicks to maintain distance.
- When he closes, clinch!
Oh and I've got a bit of a tendency to be too timid when sparring, and walk back too much, so I've been trying to work on that, alongside a gameplan that can work around that.
https://fbcdn-sphotos-c-a.akamaihd.ne...05087806927_7183647215183333112_n.jpg The opponent
Before the fight I didn't know much about him, except that he's a striker. Oh and that he looks a lot like Reis :D
After the fight I talked to him tho and found out he's 32 (I thiiiiink, maybe 31? cant remember), been training for a similiar time to me (a little less in mma, but he's done some boxing before), and funnily enough the dude is friends with one of the guys that trains where I train (neither of us had any idea about this until we talked tho).
The Fight
The Aftermath
In case you want to watch the fight before you read this, I'll spoiler it. + Show Spoiler +
So I lost, but I'm actually pretty happy with how I did. Before the fight I wasnt at all sure if I would want to do this again, whereas now I'm 100% sure I do.
The biggest thing I take away from this is a newfound appreciation for gameplans - watching the fight back I can really tell where I followed the gameplan and did well, and where I strayed and did worse.
Here's some things that went right/wrong:
Right:
- Clinch was good, he didn't know how to shoulder out of the thai plum. I should have tried for it a bit more probably.
- I kept distance... decently, not as well as in practice but decently. Front kick worked well.
Wrong:
- My coach has been trying to get me to take smaller steps when I punch, and I think I fell back into stepping too far with my jab, and stranding my back leg a little.
- I completely forgot to even try the main takedown I practiced from the clinch :D Instead I went for a silly un-practiced trip.
- Didn't jab enough!
- I think I tensed my shoulders a bit, because my arms gassed really hard in round 2, which I've never had happen before.
- Forgot to slow down my breathing when on the outside.
- When backstepping I only single stepped too much! I actually worked hard on making sure I always 2 stepped when I was training since there's a huge difference between backstep-circle and backstep, backstep, circle.
- The first low kick I throw, you can see it lands really slow. It's because when I stepped forward for my jab, I didn't follow it with my right leg properly.
Things I learned:
- I've never trained in a ring before, our gym has a cage! In round 2 when we are at the ropes, and I'm defending the takedown... I kind of froze because I had no idea how much pressure I could put on the ropes without falling haha. Also arms were so tired.
- When you are on your back and wearing headgear, the nose-guard blocks your downward vision, I couldnt see his legs haha. I wanted to do a situp sweep but I couldn't tell where the fuck his legs were. I definitely didn't roll enough with headgear.
- Too compartmentalized sparring. Because my standup is weak, I think I did a bit too much pure striking sparring... I think this is maybe why my arms got so tired. Next time I'll work more full MMA sparring.
- Nutshots are very painful.
I'm also gonna add some muscle for next time, I've been cutting for a long time just to get rid of all the fat, now its time to build up a bit
Oh and I guess you could put lack of combination punching in there somewhere, but it was actually part of the gameplan to not do that, since it necessitates remaining in the pocket a bit and we wanted to avoid that as much as possible. But in terms of training its definitely on the to do list hehe
Ah and headmovement! It's something I definitely want to work a lot on. I only really used any headmovement once in the fight haha
Various other things:
- One guy broke or separated his knee, didnt see how it happened but he had to be carried out on a stretcher. Looked reallly painful
- One of my team mates (the guy just above me in the pic below) is a beast. He looks like he's asleep in there then BOOM cracking thunder, boom submission. So relaxed haha.
So I finally got my hud restored and started spectating PLO tables and saw people running around 45vpip on average all the way up to 90+ and told myself "this looks fucking profitable", and it is. I'm up a bunch of buyins at NL25 hoping to move up aggressively as long as I'm not just a fish on a heater. My average stats are usually 30/23 or so which I think is pretty decent for a PLO player, so I know my results arent just due to maniacal play. But all of that is beside the point, what's really great about PLO is how deep it builds your understanding of other poker fundamentals.
For starters I have graduated into deepstacked play. I used to be terrified of playing more than 200BB's deep and even quit playing live poker for the last 6 months because I couldnt stomach big pots. All that is gone now because in PLO you end up playing 300-400BB's deep pretty quick so you have to sack up and get used to it. Whats even better is that in PLO you want to play deep. It gets deep for a reason as any PLO player knows because it is a "drawing game" or so I've heard. Draws make for big pots.
The other thing I've learned is just how desirable and down right fun value betting can be. In NLHE I've always had a slight case of MUBS or "Monsters Under the Bed Syndrome", whereby I'm paranoid of every turn/river thinking my opponent has probably sucked out on me somehow. So I make big bets and actually feel relieved when people fold instead of call. Almost satisfied really, which probably has more to do with my ego than fear sometimes. I never tap the glass, but in my head I'm always thinking "fuck you you piece of shit fish". Now they're just like warm cuddle bears that I want to snuggle with and never let go https://encrypted-tbn0.gstatic.com/im...1b2k3e49lutOuWi2H-CAwq1YpIssmrgEJ6JTH
But in PLO I find myself riding on the edge of my seat begging for calls. Why? Because in PLO you often make big hands, which puts me at a high degree of confidence. When you're flopping sets and turning flushes every other hand it's hard not to get excited about a payday, which is great for boosting confidence with your value bets. So many hands in holdem revolve around single pair scenarios that it's hard to be thrilled about getting it allin with just top pair. But in PLO it's like "oh shit I haz a boat! PLZ PLZ PLZ CALL ME!!!" Wanting calls and playing deep is like the perfect recipe for success.
And finally, I have dropped my winstop nonsense. For awhile I would set arbitrary goals like "win $100 today" and then quit no matter what once I got there. The idea was to give me something to aim for to stay focused, and to have something to feel proud about and finish each session on a high note. I knew I was leaving money on the table but it didnt matter, my mindset was so poor that I just had to win something to feel good about the session at all. Besides being counter-intuitive to general poker strategy 101, it's absolute blasphemy in PLO. So now I enjoy grinding out long sessions until the fish run dry. I often find myself the last one at the table before I quit. As long as you're not minbuying I'll play.
Anyway I know Joeingram is on some sick 20 year hustle to populate the PLO crowd for his grandkids, but it really is a good game and quite enjoyable once you learn the ropes. It's funny looking back at how I just now learn things that the rest of you have preached for 5 years.
it was a bunch of thought experiments that go like ....
"If one could live forever and had infinite time would you study and attempt to learn about the world with urgency or enjoy each day. On one hand you have an eternity so why not take it easy and enjoy each day. "
First few episodes are crazy. Main character sleeps with 3 chicks - we see 6 titties bouncing.
One of the chicks is 16 he finds out later.
In second episode he gets drunk and fucks with a scientologist chick and then they both throw up in his ex-wifes home.
Talking about getting attention of the audience. Not that I'm complaining, seems pretty good. Im up to episode 5 i think now.
And he probably had sex with like 10 chicks. Duchovny really slutting himself out.
Anyway, recommend watching it if you havnt already. Lots tits, lots sluts, drugs, 16 year old trying to seduce 30 something guy.
What else could you want?!?
Anyone a member of / keen to start a microstakes group on Skype?
Looking to:
- Sweat each other. The more the merrier.
- Weigh in on session reviews.
- Discuss hands.
- Be active.
- Post cool videos / interesting hand discussions you find for discussion.
I play NL10 at PokerStars. I seem to be a decent winner so I think I'll be at NL25 soonish. I play 13,000+ hands a week and study vigorously.
Have you noticed the pattern with hole cards on bovada? If you're two tabling zone, at least, you will usually get the same pocket pair on both tables. You'll also see the same hand or one card off or one suit off the very next on the same table. Probably more than half the time this happens.
Won the ftops leaderboard, prize was full tilt pro for 4 months which is 100% rakeback and choosing between 10k clearable bonus or 12k ftops tickets, I chose the tickets.
Key to winning these things is obviously (running good) playing every mtt which I have been doing for a while now, I was a bit apprehensive at first about playing the weird games, but it's a lot of fun to learn and useful, well for series at least.
Anyway gl at the tables and play those weird games except for stud hi that ain't no fun
Indepth into my PLO Podcasts by Joeingram1, April 22
Hey guys, I haven't blogged yet about the PLO podcasts that I have been doing for a couple of months now. I wanted to talk a bit more about the idea I originally had, the process so far, feedback I've gotten and what I hope to do with them in the future.
I wrote about the website idea I had a couple months back and with that I have been wanting to do some type of podcast for a long time now. I had wanted it to be focused on PLO because there isn't anything else out there that PLO players can listen to that is specific for the game. I'm not one to get in depth about poker strategy, as I have written about on my blog before. I decided that I would try to do a podcast focused around high stakes hands posted on 2plus2 in the NVG high stakes thread and would sometimes take hands posted in the PLO specific forums. I started doing the first one and went for a bit of strategy talk, level 1 type of stuff, and focus more on trying to make it entertaining. As I have alot of experiences with almost every player I had some good and bad things to say about almost every player in the hands I choose to post. I was hoping to put together something that high stakes regs could enjoy watching but also something that small stakes regs and casual fans of PLO/poker in general would be able to enjoy. I think finding that balance could have been a difficult thing but I think so far I have been able to do that. I had hoped that people would start listening to it and then become interested in playing more PLO themselves. It has turned out this is what has been happening as I have gotten many messages on all my social media platforms from people asking questions, telling me about there experiences with the game so far, and more. The feedback overall has been really good and its encouraging moving forward with doing podcasts. I think some of them have been a bit long for people but my thinking is that if you want to watch it all you can, if you want to stop after 25 minutes you can do that also.
My initial intent was that I wanted everyone in the world to be playing PLO, its such a fun game.... who wouldn't want to play . I've been posting my videos on my youtube channel and they have been getting linked in both PLO forums on 2p2 and also there was a thread in NVG made where new episodes have been posted. I've tried to communicate with everyone who has given me feedback good or bad. I wanted to try to be as interactive with people that are taking the time to listen to these because thats how I have wanted people to be to me that I might be a fan of. The pokertube guys have been putting them up on there website as well and it has gotten some extra views. Overall I am very pleased with the number of views on youtube that I have been able to get with these. For the first couple of podcasts some websites wrote up articles about them and linked to them but I figured that would happen initially and then would not keep happening with future episodes. The goal moving forward is to continue putting out quality content and also be able to put more people onto the fact that they even exist. I haven't done the greatest job so far in terms staying on a consistent schedule and blogging about my experience so far with it which I need to work harder at.
I'm going to start doing podcasts with people outside of PLO and the WCG podcasts in hopes that I can ultimately attract new listeners to my PLOcasts. I'm actually recording my first podcast today with Bart Hanson. His longtime NL podcasts were something I listened to every single week for years when I was coming up in the poker world and with his live poker training site I think I will have alot good things to talk about with him that will make for a great conversation. My hope with this new series is that I can talk more with people who I find interesting and would like to know more about but also that fans of that person will want to hear more about. Hopefully those fans can enjoy my content and become fans of mine and the listeners to my podcasts will become fans of theirs. I actually have no idea if this is sound logic when it comes to this type of thing but we shall see. My main focus right now is still putting in 4-8 hours/day playing poker and with the results I've been having, I don't need to worry about trying to monetize any of this. That also has lead to me becoming pretty lackadaisical with putting out new episodes. I've been spending some weeks playing poker and basketball all day and never even thinking about doing podcasts. I think moving forward that if I want to have the most success possible with this I will need to nail down a better schedule and put in more effort staying on that.
That also leads to the question, what kind of success does this even lead to? What is the point of doing these? I have asked myself that a couple of times and I'm not even sure what it means to be a success in poker podcasting. Hoping that I can get as many people as possible into playing the game I intend to play for a long time to come is what I think about the most. I think that some good networking possibilities could come from it but that remains to be seen. I really enjoy doing them so far as I think most of the poker content being put out right now is pretty boring and I am hoping I can provide a bit of entertainment in other poker players lives, even if its only for an hour/week. I think I went more in depth on this whole subject than I initially intended to
Here is a link to the first high stakes PLO podcast I did. I started having a guest with my last podcast which featured krmont22. If you watch the first couple episodes, I tried to do a good job on building up some players more than others. The last episode with Krmont I started live streaming for people that wanted to listen to things unedited and people have really seemed to enjoy that. I fucked up on capturing the audio doing this (still noob at editing) so it ended up being a veryyyyyy long live stream version but for the people that can make it through it all, i think its really entertaing. In the future I hope to do many more with guests because I enjoy that format much more. I like getting to know my peers better and being able to showcase them a bit.
The great thing about being a teacher are the amount of holidays. True, I put in the hours when working to make up for the time off but with 5 days left until I go back I am bored.
So far this holiday I have:
Done several large dog walks,
Seen friends and a couple of nights out,
Caught up on lots of sleep and errands / chores,
Started training again at the gym.
Today as been a lazy one - shopping, Dota 2 and catching up with Game of Thrones.
Highlight = half price (cooked) roast chicken breasts that were very tasty.
Tomorrow I am looking forward to going to the seaside with my friends Tommy and the Dogs, possibly plan the Yorkshire Three Peak walk at the end of May and gamble on some horses.
Poker
Not really bothered about poker at the minute so I will play a modest 1000k hands per day @ 25nl zoom with a starting BR of $475.
End goal - make a little bit of spend for summer holidays.
EDIT - 1023 hands down. BR $413.21. Pro.
Currently, as I type this I have a Weimeraner pretending to be my best friend. Sneaky one is after my sausage roll but I am wise to her tricks!
Vid commentary on my match by LemOn[5thF], April 21
Sup guys
I made it to a semi-final of a HUsng tourney and it just got released with a HUsng coach commentary.
needless to say I played like 15husng in my life before this still managed to play decent besides some mandatory spews,Lemon style
Apparently floating a large cr with J8o on KK4 is not standard 50bb deep?
I'll be in New York with my girlfriend for the first week of May. I would be really grateful for any help finding a cheap place to stay, apparently finding a not so expensive hotel on short notice is not to so easy. Can offer poker lessons in return. Thanks.
I'd rather not go into too much because I am really pissed right now.
But I got pulled over by a cop 2 months ago. She said all I needed to do was show up in court and that it was a no fine thing. I've been really busy and made the mistake of not showing up.
I get notice in the mail today of a massive fine amount + interest. What to do? I can't go into speak with anyone either on the phone or at the admin building because it is the weekend. But I'm going to try and speak with anyone I can to reduce the amount. Willing to do alot of community service as well.
Contact Users: 2811 Active, 0 Logged in - Time: 13:23
. I've been posting my videos on my youtube channel and they have been getting linked in both PLO forums on 2p2 and also there was a thread in NVG made where new episodes have been posted. I've tried to communicate with everyone who has given me feedback good or bad. I wanted to try to be as interactive with people that are taking the time to listen to these because thats how I have wanted people to be to me that I might be a fan of. The pokertube guys have been putting them up on there website as well and it has gotten some extra views. Overall I am very pleased with the number of views on youtube that I have been able to get with these. For the first couple of podcasts some websites wrote up articles about them and linked to them but I figured that would happen initially and then would not keep happening with future episodes. The goal moving forward is to continue putting out quality content and also be able to put more people onto the fact that they even exist. I haven't done the greatest job so far in terms staying on a consistent schedule and blogging about my experience so far with it which I need to work harder at.
,
,
,
,