The Well: gobboboy (12.19.06)

[stevepa]

Throw me in the "straight edge" group.

Gobbo,

1. Why haven't you gotten back to me about Australia?
2. You seem to be self taught for a lot of poker...how exactly did you do that? Isn't it very difficult to not be ridiculously results oriented when you don't really know any better?
3. Do you like other gambling games other than poker? (casino games, backgammon, etc.)
4. Do you like other non-gambling card games?
5. Is there anything you'd really like to become good at? (I've always wished I was really good at pool)

Steve

[gobboboy]

[ QUOTE ]
I asked this of Nath and Steve, so now I pose it to you.

What concepts do you feel are misapplied and/or misunderstood the most? These can apply to tournies and cash.

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See my carpal tunnel post. I think too many people get stuck on doing one kind of thing and never make the adjustment towards doing something new if their instincts call for it.

[ QUOTE ]
Also, how do these concepts differ compared to short stack vs deep stack play? Tourney vs cash play?

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People can do this in cash or tournaments, sure, but it's much more damaging in tournaments because you're being forced to play hands. It really sucks to be deep in a tournament and you have a leak that destroys any chance you have of winning. This is a lot more dangerous in short stack play too because any mistake costs you your stack.

[gobboboy]

[ QUOTE ]
Throw me in the "straight edge" group.

Gobbo,

1. Why haven't you gotten back to me about Australia?
2. You seem to be self taught for a lot of poker...how exactly did you do that? Isn't it very difficult to not be ridiculously results oriented when you don't really know any better?
3. Do you like other gambling games other than poker? (casino games, backgammon, etc.)
4. Do you like other non-gambling card games?
5. Is there anything you'd really like to become good at? (I've always wished I was really good at pool)

Steve

[/ QUOTE ]

1. Just did.

2. Hence all the emotional trauma I went through. I learned basic things from books and 2+2 but otherwise had to go through it all myself. Luckily I'm a pretty logical person who understands that results oriented is not the way to be. I just played about 15 mtt's a day anyway, so I got the results I wanted very quickly. People suck at poker.

3. I've spent over 2 months of my life in casinos and have yet to play anything more than probably 15 hands of blackjack. I get pissed off at casino games and can't stand it when people I know play them.

4. Rat is a very fun game. It's based off of poker but just used with points. You can gamble if you want I guess.

5. Magic tricks.

[tedtodd]

What's the longest dry spell you've had without a FT?

What's your ideal field size for a tourney?

What is the smallest tournament prize pool that you'll play for?

[mlagoo]

[ QUOTE ]
3. I've spent over 2 months of my life in casinos and have yet to play anything more than probably 15 hands of blackjack. I get pissed off at casino games and can't stand it when people I know play them.

[/ QUOTE ]

[gobboboy]

[ QUOTE ]
What's the longest dry spell you've had without a FT?

What's your ideal field size for a tourney?

What is the smallest tournament prize pool that you'll play for?

[/ QUOTE ]

Probably 2 months?

I like a 400 person field. It's big enough that you can hunker down and dig your fingers into it but not big enough where you WANT to be busted out soon.

Hmm... 5 digits for first would be very desirable but I often play the $100 freezeouts that pay out less which isn't bad.

[RichC.]

Gobbo, I didnt realize you were self taught, thats awesome. I am too, but a slow learner, lol.

1. As you got better, did anyone take you under their wing and show you different ways to look at and approach different situations? Late game situations come to mind.

2. Have you ever been backed by someone?

3. Have you ever mentored and/or backed someone? If mentoring, how far along have they come? Results?

[Body Man D]

You mentioned the "shaundeeb syndrome" earlier. I feel like I might suffer from this and would like some advice. I have been playing for about a year and have a fairly solid track record. I work for a living and therefore my amount of playing time isn't as great as others. Because of this I try to maximize my $/hr by multi-tabling low to mid buy-in mtt's. This also helps reduce variance I suppose.

I feel like this has stunted my improvment though by playing in a very "programmed" way. I feel like I am missing +ev plays by not paying enough attention to stack sizes for reraise opportunities, getting reads on other players and the like because of the multi-tabling.

I think I discovered during the mtt challenge that there comes a point where I become a losing player when I have too many tables open at once.

I realize this is rambling so I will get to the questions. How many tourney's do you typically play at a time? And then assuming I am a winning player multi-tabling $10-$50 tourney's, do you think I(or anyone else) would therefore probably be a winning player if I(they) moved to higher buy-ins and reduced the number of tables to 1 or 2?

Any other advice you can give regarding the transition from low to mid level buy-in tourneys to higher buy-in tourney's would be appreciated.

[gobboboy]

[ QUOTE ]
Gobbo, I didnt realize you were self taught, thats awesome. I am too, but a slow learner, lol.

1. As you got better, did anyone take you under their wing and show you different ways to look at and approach different situations? Late game situations come to mind.

2. Have you ever been backed by someone?

3. Have you ever mentored and/or backed someone? If mentoring, how far along have they come? Results?

[/ QUOTE ]

1. Not really. I got some help from my friend BlindingLaser on 2+2, he was one of my friends who got me into poker... he hleped me out initially on one final table when I got deep. We had a few disagreements on how to play some hands so I started going on my own and did a lot better because of it.

2. I was backed for the WPT in fallsview, not going to say by who, but they're free to chime in. I also have something up on my blog asking for people to back me for the Aussie Millions. Anyone can buy a piece. Pls?

3. Furyshade is a protégé of mine who got into poker because I taught him how to play. He's done very well. He can talk about his results if he wants to. I've been helping out a few other people but I wouldn't consider them a student of mine. I just like helping people out. [img]/images/graemlins/smile.gif[/img]

[gobboboy]

[ QUOTE ]
You mentioned the "shaundeeb syndrome" earlier. I feel like I might suffer from this and would like some advice. I have been playing for about a year and have a fairly solid track record. I work for a living and therefore my amount of playing time isn't as great as others. Because of this I try to maximize my $/hr by multi-tabling low to mid buy-in mtt's. This also helps reduce variance I suppose.

I feel like this has stunted my improvment though by playing in a very "programmed" way. I feel like I am missing +ev plays by not paying enough attention to stack sizes for reraise opportunities, getting reads on other players and the like because of the multi-tabling.

I think I discovered during the mtt challenge that there comes a point where I become a losing player when I have too many tables open at once.

I realize this is rambling so I will get to the questions. How many tourney's do you typically play at a time? And then assuming I am a winning player multi-tabling $10-$50 tourney's, do you think I(or anyone else) would therefore probably be a winning player if I(they) moved to higher buy-ins and reduced the number of tables to 1 or 2?

Any other advice you can give regarding the transition from low to mid level buy-in tourneys to higher buy-in tourney's would be appreciated.

[/ QUOTE ]

It's good that you multitable a lot, but it's bad that you're almost resisting the urge to move up and play higher buyin tournaments. It's bad because your game should be improving and you shouldn't be stuck in low buyin tournaments because people are going to think differently. In MTT's, playing on the highest level will also help you on the lower levels. When I play something like the 10 rebuy or the sunday million on stars, it's laughable. I can be on autopilot the entire tournament if I want to.

The key difference between the medium and the high buyin tournaments is the fact that you won't get NEARLY as many courtesy doubleups from pure garbage after the flop. No one's calling your 50 bb push with ace high or calling river crams when you have top set and they have middle pair top kicker. That's a lot of chips in the long run and it makes it a lot more important not to bleed off chips and how to resteal from the good players in spots where they have to call you with a monster.

If you want, start to mix in the stuper in your daily lineup or if you're really adventurous, start to play the 100r. It's a great way to play with better players and the prize pool is always really really nice. You'll get better and you'll feel like you're improving.

The high limit tournaments require a pretty solid form of playing in my opinion. You're going to go back to basics once you make the jump.