HUC 6, FTOPS I, and Blogger Cash Game

Well, it appears that the HUC6 is officially under way. PvanHaribo kicks off this thing with a pseudo upset (I say pseudo because considering her recent successes, it's really not fair to call her an underdog in any tournament) but considering that she was against the HUC5 champion, I think it's fair to call this an upset. Good thing because I woulda hated to have her get bounced and then question the "random function on RecessRampage's computer" as CK31 so cleverly put it. Well, you can see the updated brackets on the official HUC website. I'll try to keep that updated as the results come in. And speaking of CK31, congrats to her for knocking off Cmitch. On paper, it might seem like an upset but I think CK31 plays a pretty disciplined, aggressive game so even though my initial reaction was that of a slight surprise, I'm actually not that shocked anymore.

As for me... my first round match was against lifesagrind who admittedly, I didn't know much about. But, as the commissioner and HUC5 runner up, I wanted to make sure I had a respectable showing. So, I went to check out his blog, found out he's mainly a MTT/SNG guy but beyond that, I couldn't find much else about him, his playing style, etc. So, I played a few HU matches to warm up and then when he was ready, we kicked things off... sort of... these $5 HU matches are so hard to coordinate. I LOVE the new rematch feature that FullTilt now has on the heads up match. I think UltimateBet had that and I liked that about that site so I'm glad FullTilt finally brought that in. But that still doesn't solve the problem of being able to find a table where a random person doesn't jump in. As such, lifesagrind had to play a random dude because apparently, I didn't click on the "ok" button quick enough. Then, after he got done working over some random online donkey, we tried again... this time, I ended up with two tables... neither of which was against lifesagrind. I did win both of them so that was good. Eventually, we were able to land on the same table and finally, we were off.

I don't have the HHs or the number of hands or the stats on me. But I know that I had to adjust my game very early and quickly. Lifesagrind was much more aggressive than any of the opponents I faced in HUC5. In HUC5, I felt that I was the one applying aggression every round. In this one, I could tell that he was going to be the aggressor. So, I hunkered down a bit, played a little tighter and tried to keep the pot small unless I had a big hand. I got lucky in the first match when he had a 2:1 chip lead, I flopped a set with 55 against his overpair to the board, doubling me up and I was able to finish him off. 1-0. Next match, was kind of a blur but it was another instance where I flopped a better hand against his pretty good hand. Sorry, again, no detailed memory because I ended up playing 5 HU matches by accident so they're all kinda running together right now. But I think one was like A high flop, he has top pair, I have two pair, type of situation. Not much you can do in a HU match. I was able to take the second match and advance to the second round of HUC6.

Tonight kicks off the FTOPS. I know that a bunch of bloggers are playing in this thing. I qualified for it as well so we'll see how well I do. Admittedly, I wanted to play a few more MTTs over the weekend but I never got a chance to. Friday night, my buddies and I went out, got totally thrashed, so not much poker was played. Saturday night (though some of us were still struggling from the night before), we had "poker" night. Now I put quotes around that because I can't even call this poker... but it is the same game... I mean we all get dealt two cards and see a flop, turn and river... but really, there's no thought process involved, hardly any raises preflop, I don't think I ever folded preflop, etc. Anyways, so no time for MTT, just enough cash game online for me to earn 200 pts (having to work during the day didn't help). Sunday was Superbowl and catching up on sleep so again, no MTTs. As much as I talk poker, apparently, it's not as high on the priority list as I make it seem...

Ok, back to FTOPS. I wanted to play some more MTTs since I rarely play them and I also wanted to watch more videos on PXF. I'm in the middle of watching Rizen take down the Sunday Million on Pokerstars and he does a great job of explaining his thought process in the tournament. I wanted to complete all 11 or 12 installments of that series but alas... I'm only at part 3... So, I guess I'll just have to hope to get lucky if I want to do any damage tonight on that thing.

One last thing is the Blogger Cash game that gnome is organizing. It's $4/8 NL on Full Tilt. This should be interesting. I have mixed feelings about this game. First off, it doesn't start till 11:30pm EST which is quite late for me since I usually go to bed around midnight. Second, if I'm in the FTOPS still at this point, I would want to focus on FTOPS. But then again, I've seemed to have made quite a name for myself in the cash game blogger world... so it would look like I'm copping out if I'm online but not playing in this thing. Third, this would be an extremely -EV cash game. In other words, you hear everyone preaching table selection and how you want to be at a table full of donks. So why voluntarily sit at a table where everyone is a profitable cash gamer??? Of course, as a guy who wants to prove his worth, I am fairly eager to play in that sense... even if that costs me. So we will see where I'm at when the thing starts.

Good luck to everyone tonight in whatever they are playing.