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#1
01-03-2007, 12:58 AM
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First Post (Sorta) -
This post is going to be sort of long. So grab a coffee, or... skip it.
I started playing poker about a year and a half ago. Honestly, I didn't want to learn at all, at first. Poker was (as it still is) *everywhere*, and it was annoying as hell. My roommates (lived with three guys from college) played fairly regularly, maybe two times a week. As I worked 55+ hours a week, I always had an excuse - I was either going to work, or tired from working another long shift with a [censored] commute. Then I got two weeks off, and was pretty much cornered and coerced into playing. To cut to the chase, I was hooked. I'm a somewhat intelligent guy, and the subtleties and complexities of the game (of which I realize now I didn't comprehend the least bit), combined with the psychological aspects, had me pretty much isntantly. Within a short period of time I was regularly beating the home game and another home game I ended up playing. I started playing online, tentatively - I wasn't sure about the whole online thing, so I didn't bother putting any money into it. Naturally, the online game didn't interest me a bit since everyone went all in pretty much every hand. In the beginning, I seemed to intuitively grasp some of the basic strategic concepts - I was continuation betting (not that I knew what it was) and playing fairly TAG - and completely eff up on other basic concepts - typically slowplaying trips, not betting enough to scare people off their draws, etc. Eventually, it became a hassle to coordinate a regular time for a home game with my work schedule, and I dropped a small deposit on PokerStars. From there, I pretty much crushed the $5 Sit N Gos. That lasted a couple weeks. It seemed at that point that I wasn't getting hit in the face with the deck, I just seemed to realize that if I sat back for decent cards and played them aggressively and in position, it was pretty difficult to lose, except for the occasional (okay, somewhat frequent) bad beat and\or tilt. From there, though, I started getting bored with the pace, and already-long story short, blew through the small bankroll, and on and on. At this point, after about six months of playing online... I think I'm a decent player. What sucks is that I know my biggest leaks, and know when they're happening, but am frequently not able to stop myself - laying down when I know I'm beat, seriously overbetting when my blind steal attempt wasn't successful (and know I'm beat), getting scared when I know I have the best hand and overbetting, just stupid [censored] like that. Stuff I'm sure everyone goes through at some point. What kills me is that I know I'm doing it, and I think that's where I lose the majority of my money. So I know I need to control tilt and swallow my pride when my bluff doesn't work. I've read Super/System 1 and 2, Lindren's book, Phil Gordon's books, a bunch of random other books, and now I'm finally working my way through Harrington on Hold 'Em Vol. II (read Vol. I last week). Harrington seems to be the biggest help so far. On a funny note\brag, I was going to write this yesterday, and instead put in a deposit on PS after a two week hiatus, put $11 into a $10/180 SNG, and won! $500+, for my biggest cash so far. And I wrecked it. [img]/images/graemlins/laugh.gif[/img] I was in the lead most of the time, totally in control and aware of myself, getting decent cards here and there with some good moves and a bunch of luck, the typical formula for success, and entered the final table with around $120,000, compared with $35,000 for the second highest chip stack. It felt great, but I am under no illusions that I'm suddenly a monster (or even halfway good) player. I've been reading 2+2 for about two months now, and have had a great time in doing so. I know I need to post some hand histories, that's my next step after Harrington. I'd love it if someone would be willing to go over the hand history from the tournament yesterday because I'd like to see what leaks there were because I know I made some incredibly stupid plays as usual. I'd love coaching but can't afford it at this point. :-/ Ah well. For anyone who's still reading, thanks, and I really look forward to posting more and getting feedback here. - AM 
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