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| Saturday, October 17th, 2009 | | 2:32 am |
I said in my last entry that Mike Sexton would have my vote for the Poker Hall of Fame if I had a vote. I am happy to say he didn't need my non-existent vote. A hearty congratulations goes out to him for getting into the Hall of Fame this year. :) | | Tuesday, September 15th, 2009 | | 5:20 am |
My unworthy, brief take on the 9 possible inductees to the Poker Hall of Fame for this year: BARRY GREENSTEIN - He definitely deserves to be in the Poker Hall of Fame for both his playing the game and promoting it. DAN HARRINGTON - "Action Dan" I can't say why, but I took an instant liking to him from when I first saw him playing on TV. He prob. deserves to be in, but I think there are others on this list more worthy. PHIL IVEY - Because he's in his early 30's, I'm not sure he's met the "test of time" criteria. I have no doubt he will make it into the Poker Hall of Fame eventually, but I'm just not sure it should be this year. TOM McEVOY - While I've heard of him, in all honesty, I just don't know enough about him to comment one way or the other. MEN NGUYEN - Men "The Master," Hmm, I'm far from a poker insider, more a wantta be insider to poker, but even I have heard some unpleasant rumors about him that, if true, ... well, since I don't know I'll just move on to the next person. SCOTTY NGUYEN - I was a fan of Scotty's before his drunken performance in the 2008 WSOP. My opinion of him went down a lot after that. Although he is still a good player and has done a lot for poker. Should he be in the Hall of Fame? Maybe. DANIEL NEGREANU - He can get amazing reads on his opponents, and he does a lot to promote poker. I will make no bones about being a huge fan of his. However, like Phil Ivey, I think he might be a bit young to be considered for this year. ERIK SEIDEL - I know only slightly more about Erik Seidel than I do about Tom McEvoy. From what little I know, he is qualified to be on this list. Perhaps more qualified than some of the others. However, I'm not sure I know enough about him. MIKE SEXTON - If I had a vote, he'd definitely have my vote for this year. He's stood the test of time, and he's done as much or more than anyone I know to promote the game of poker. | | Wednesday, June 10th, 2009 | | 12:07 pm |
| | Monday, November 17th, 2008 | | 3:10 pm |
A special discount to PPA members for Daniel Negreanu's PokerVT is available after watching the video at this link: http://snipurl.com/ppa59 | | Wednesday, November 5th, 2008 | | 12:10 pm |
The WSOP final table is finally coming up. From what I'm hearing most of the professionals analyzing the game are predicting the Russian, Ivan Demidov, to win. In poker, it could be anyone's game. Even the extreme short stack, Kelly Kim, has an outside chance if he can double up a few times early on. So while I'm not going to predict a winner, I will say that for some reason I can't put my finger on Dennis Phillips is my favorite despite him wearing a St. Louis Cardinals baseball cap the whole tournament (I suppose he can't help being a fan of the oldest rivals to the Chicago Cubs, him being from St Louis and all). | | Thursday, September 11th, 2008 | | 1:27 am |
Scotty Nguyen disappointed me in his actions at this year's World Series of Poker. I'm still a fan of his, but he did lose credibility with his televised drunken behavior. The video below is Scotty Nguyen apologizing. | | Monday, August 4th, 2008 | | 2:44 pm |
from pokernews.com (taken from this webpage: http://www.pokernews.com/news/2008/08/us-postpones-trade-talks-with-eu.htm) August 03, 2008 Haley Hintze The United States abruptly announced a postponement in scheduled trade talks with representatives of the European Union that were to discuss online gambling and the stance of the current US administration, which in the EU's view is in violation of World Trade Organization treaty. The trade talks, scheduled for early August, were put on hold with little advance notice by officials of the US Trade Representative's office. This was the same federal agency that sent a curt two-page rebuttal to an extensive EU fact-finding inquiry that attempted to probe the exact reasons for the US's stance against international online gambling, including the Unlawful Internet Gambling Enforcement Act (UIGEA) and the US's unilateral withdrawal from its related WTO commitments. While the USTR was only one of several government agencies contacted about online gambling, its response seemingly superceded that of other agencies approached by the EU. For its part, the USTR office is increasingly under siege from several quarters regarding its trade stance. The USTR's recent talks with online-gambling haven Antigua & Barbuda ended in an impasse, and the agency has not yet responded to Congressional calls to release the specific terms of earlier agreements made with the EU, Canada and other countries related to its previous WTO battle with Antigua. All this comes as the UIGEA itself has floundered amid its own undefined terminology and the increasing and bipartisan pressure against the unfunded mandate on US businesses called for by UIGEA rules. | | Tuesday, July 22nd, 2008 | | 2:15 pm |
Just a quick administrative note. I added a couple banners linking to the Poker Players Alliance on my profile page last night after I renewed my membership with them. | | Saturday, June 28th, 2008 | | 12:42 pm |
The link below is a video of Howard Lederer talking about recent legislation and politics here in the Unite States. As he points out in this 26 minute interview, the ramifications go far beyond just online poker playing. I wish I could embed the video in this journal, but the best I can figure out how to do is have a link to it. http://www.cardplayer.com/tv/32858 | | Friday, June 6th, 2008 | | 2:31 am |
| | Monday, March 17th, 2008 | | 1:29 pm |
I've played 5 s&g's in the last couple of days. The first one, I didn't finish in the money. The other four, all 2nd place. I'm starting to think it's something psychological where I'm not letting myself come in first. update: The streak ended at 4. I finished out of the money in this last s&g. | | Saturday, March 1st, 2008 | | 1:45 am |
The following is taken from this webpage.46th Congressman Co-Sponsors IGREA: Regulation of Online Poker & Online Gambling in USA by PokerPages.com Fri, Feb 29th, 2008 @ 12:00am The signature of US Congressman George Miller to co-sponsor Barney Frank's Internet Gambling Regulation and Enforcement Act (IGREA) marks the first political support in 2008 for bill HR 2046 that aims to license and regulate online poker and online gambling in the United States. Representative Miller is the 46th Congressman to co-sponsor the bill. Miller is a very respected and distinguished member of Congress, starting his tenure November of 1974. He is currently serving his 17th term. He is chairman of the House Education and Labor Committee, a member of the House Natural Resources Committee and chairman of the House Democratic Policy Committee. Congressman Miller is the author of the College Cost Reduction and Access Act - the single largest expansion for federal financial aid for college since the GI Bill. He is also one of the four original authors of the No Child Left Behind Act in 2001 and is leading the effort to review the law to make it more fair, flexible and better funded. His interests include furthering Innovation and Technology, Science and Education, Retirement and Health Benefits for Americans, and strengthening America's economy to create good jobs that stay in the country. "The endorsement of this key legislation by Congressman Miller, one of the most influential leaders on Capitol Hill, further demonstrates the growing support for regulated Internet gambling," Gambling911 quoted Jeffrey Sandman, spokesperson for the Safe and Secure Internet Gambling Initiative as saying. "We expect continuing momentum in Congress as more people realize that the current approach to prohibit Internet gambling is a failure. Rather than leave consumers vulnerable in an underground, uncontrolled marketplace, regulation of Internet gambling would protect consumers and generate billions in revenue needed for critical government programs," Sandman added. According to a tax revenue analysis prepared by PriceWaterhouseCoopers, taxation of Internet gambling is expected to generate between $8.7 billion to $42.8 billion in federal revenues over its first ten years. Here are the 46 Congressional co-sponsors of HR 2046 to date: # Neil Abercrombie (D-HI) # Gary L. Ackerman (D-NY) # Robert E. Andrews (D-NJ) # Joe Baca (D-CA) # Shelly Berkley (D-NV) # Howard L. Berman (D-CA) # Earl Blumenauer (D-OR) # Michael Capuano (D-MA) # Russ Carnahan (D-O) # Julia Carson (D-IN) # Wm. Lacy Clay (D-MO) # Steve Cohen (D-TN) # Joseph Crowley (D-NY) # William Delahunt (D-MA) # Bob Filner (D-CA) # Vito Fossella (R-NY) # Raul Grijalva (D-AZ) # Luis V. Gutierrez (D-IL) # Alcee Hastings (D-FL) # Michael Honda (D-CA) # Steve Israel (D-NY) # Peter T. King (R-NY) # John Larson (D-CT) # Carolyn McCarthy (D-NY) # Jim McDermott (D-WA) # James McGovern (D-MA) # Charlie Melancon (D-LA) # George Miller (D-CA) # James Moran (D-VA) # Ron Paul (R-Texas) # Ed Perlmutter (D-CO) # Ciro D. Rodriguez (D- TX) # Steven Rothman (D-NJ) # Linda T Sanchez (D-CA) # Adam Schiff (D-CA) # Robert C. Scott (D-VA) # Adam Smith (D-WA) # Ellen O. Tauscher (D-CA) # Bennie Thompson (D-MS) # Edolphus Towns (D-NY) # Melvin L. Watt (D-NC) # Anthony Weiner (D-NY) # Robert Wexler (D-FL) # Lynn Woolsey (D-CA) # Albert Russell Wynn (D-MD) # Don Young (R-AL) DO YOU KNOW YOUR CONGRESSIONAL REP? MORE IMPORTANT- HAVE YOU CONTACTED THEM? Barney Frank repeatedly stresses the importance of poker players contacting their congressional representatives and asking them to support IGREA (HR 2046), as the biggest factor for getting sponsorship and support of the bill. | | Monday, January 28th, 2008 | | 2:29 pm |
The last 24 hours was a bit stressful. Three stressful events occurred in fairly rapid succession. Only one of which is germane to the topic of this journal however. I discovered the pokerstars application and the AVG anti-virus applications I use weren't getting along for a time. I wrote to Pokerstars support. Basically, the reply I got stated that the problem was on AVG's end, and if I updated my AVG virus definitions that should solve the problem. I did and the problem was solved. Apparently, the pokerstars support staff is not a big fan of AVG. They also sent me a few links to websites detailing failings of AVG anti-virus software in their reply. Given that I use the free version of AVG and the computer circles I travel in report that the free version of AVG is as good as any commercial anti-virus software, I think I'll stick with it. | | Thursday, January 24th, 2008 | | 2:19 pm |
You gotta love playing against someone who thinks over betting bad hands is playing poker. I just made a pretty good profit busting that person (considering the limit I was playing, anyway, in the "real world" it still wasn't that much). | | Thursday, January 10th, 2008 | | 3:09 am |
In general, I try to avoid politics at all costs. When the UIGEA was passed, I joined the Poker Players Alliance and came across the first political issue I was publicly willing to admit I supported. With the US presidential race now in full swing, I have to admit I'm undecided. However, the following article pushes me a bit closer to Mr. Obama. Although for those of you even farther isolated than myself (I can't imagine who that would be), he lost in New Hampshire to update the end of this article. --- From http://www.pokerpages.com/poker-news/news/poker-industry-given-hope-by-obamas-iowa-caucus-win-30261.htm: Tue, Jan 8th, 2008 @ 12:00am Democratic presidential candidate Barack Obama, who is a poker player, won the Iowa State caucus last Thursday, taking a huge step towards vying to become the 44th President of the United States, and giving the poker industry hope that prohibitions on online poker will be lifted. Obama, 46, who is a first-term Senator from Illinois, took part in regular poker games while a member of the Illinois State Senate, and according to fellow legislators he is known for his poker face and smart play leading to the chips coming his way. "When he was a young state politician in Illinois, Barack Obama played his cards right," iGamingBusiness quoted Toby Harnden, a journalist for the UK's Telegraph newspaper. "He had the stone face", said Senator Terry Links, who hosted weekly poker games at his home. "He didn't stay in hands if he didn't think he had a chance of winning." A huge turn out of Democrat voters gave Obama 38 percent of the vote last night while his closest rival, former North Carolina Senator John Edwards, finished with 29.8 percent. New York Senator Hillary Rodham Clinton, the front-runner going into yesterday's vote, finished third with 29.5 percent of the vote. iGamingBusiness positioned how Obama's victory was made even more significant as he is seeking to become the first black President in the history of the United States history and 95 per cent of Iowa voters are white. Nearly twice as many people voted in Iowa compared to four years ago, a fact that Obama's advisers say shows an appetite for change. The campaigning will now move to the smaller New England state of New Hampshire, where tomorrow voters will cast their vote to choose their candidate for President. | | Saturday, January 5th, 2008 | | 1:33 pm |
Some time ago, I saw a video interviewing one of the instructors of a famous poker bootcamp. He was talking about a professional player, and how that player is used to playing large tournaments. He commented that for a large tournament just playing tight and passive is the correct strategy and the professional he mentioned is very good at using that strategy. He then said he watched that same pro at sit and go tournaments where there isn't the depth of chips nor the amount of players that this professional is accustom to dealing with. He said the pro played as if he was still in a large tournament. The professional didn't do as well because these smaller tournaments require more aggression and actively building chip stacks; a different strategy in other words. Until he said that, I hadn't realize I was doing exactly what this pro was doing too. I do fairly well at the larger freeroll tournaments I've entered, and only so-so at the sit an go's. I thought about what that instructor said and thought it made some sense. So in s&g's, I've upped my aggression level and pushed my better hands more as well as bluffing *slightly* more (fyi, bluffing is an overrated part of this game and most beginning players seem to do it far, far too often). Sure enough, being more aggressive with fair to good hands has bettered my s&g play. I'll also restate something else I think I might have said in this journal a long time ago that deserves touching upon again. After a poker player reaches a certain level of skill, there is a tendency to think they are good enough and stop actively learning new aspects of the game. No matter how good a player is they can always learn more, and an attitude that you're "good enough" and don't need to actively learn more about the game will cause you to start losing to strategies you don't know or have forgotten because you're not actively learning and/or reminding yourself about certain aspects of the game by just playing in your own little part of the poker world. | | Thursday, January 3rd, 2008 | | 12:21 am |
Wireless routers and computer poker software don't get along together apparently. | | Saturday, December 22nd, 2007 | | 5:46 am |
I've been reading Zen and the Art of Poker by Larry W. Phillips. In that book, I stumbled upon a great quote about poker. "... you never quite control poker. It is more like rodeo riding, where you try to keep the bull under you as much of the time as possible. It is a kind of shepherding of one's luck toward a given destination -- something that is every bit as difficult as it sounds." Howard Lederer likes to call poker a game of incomplete information. I think the above quote is what he means. I had more to say, but I've been drinking and was distracted just now. I lost my train of thought. All I will say is even drunk I *can* ride the bull under me. ;) I just won't say where I was playing poker while drinking ... which I don't recommend doing! | | Wednesday, December 19th, 2007 | | 1:46 pm |
I told myself that I would tone down how much I post about Chip Reese's death. I have to add Doyle Brunson's blog entry about it here. From poker great Doyle Brunson's blog (December 17th, 2007's entry): A week ago my phone rang at 5:30 a.m. I answered it extremely irritated at being awakened so early in the morning. My nephew, Ken Hale said, “I think Chip just died.” It took a moment to sink in and then disbelief overtook me. How could my best friend, who was 56 years old and apparently in good health, be gone? It felt like a big hole in my body which could never be filled. I jumped out of bed and drove to Chip’s house as fast as I could. I went into his house and cried with his children Brittany, Taylor, and Casey. Chip had gone to the doctor that afternoon and had a chest x-ray which showed a shadow on his lung. The doctor gave him a shot, told him he was coming down with pneumonia, and sent him home. The doctor, who was a poker player Chip had been teaching, called him at 10:00 to see how he was feeling. Chip told him he felt fine and when the doctor told him he was at the Red Rock Casino playing poker, Chip asked him if he wanted him to come watch him play. The doctor said, “No, if they saw you sitting behind me, they wouldn’t play with me any more.” They laughed and hung up. Chip went to his room, talked to his girlfriend for 30 minutes, told his kids good night, and went to bed. Casey went to his room at 4:00 and Chip was dead. We haven’t got the results of the autopsy yet but the coroner said it looked like a massive heart attack and that Chip died peacefully in his sleep. Chip had rheumatic fever when he was a child and it left his heart in a weakened state. Another theory was that because Chip had high cholesterol his veins were soft and when pneumonia starts the blood thickens and that was the reason for the heart attack. After I find out the reason of his death for sure, I will put it in a future blog. Everyone knows what a great poker player Chip was. He played all the games as well and it seemed as though he would just refuse to lose. The man was just a winner in anything he did. I know he was the best player I have ever played against. He was one of my closest friends but we were fierce competitors at the tables. We didn’t take poker personally; we knew the object of the games was to win the other players’ chips. He was always a class act at the table, never losing his composure. Actually I can’t remember him raising his voice about anything. He was unbelievable. He was also a class act outside of gambling. He was a devoted family man and loved watching his son play baseball. Casey is on scholarship at UNLV and is considered to be a top pro prospect. If Chip had an enemy in the world I don’t know who it was. He was a generous guy who almost never said no to anyone who needed help. Chip and I invested in some really far out business ventures. We had race horses, TV stations, oil wells, mining companies, sports services, and diamonds. We even went looking for the Titanic and Noah’s Ark. None were successful and we always came back to poker. All I know is that my buddy is gone and I can’t stop mourning over our loss. He was always there for me and my life will never be the same. There are no promises for tomorrow for any of us. Chip said, “I will stop playing when you have my funeral. Then only God will know what I’ll be doing.” I’m sure God has a special place for a special guy like Chip. Rest in Peace my brother. - DB | | Thursday, December 6th, 2007 | | 1:08 am |
Memories of Chip Reese (1951-2007) Barry Greenstein has an audio blog entry about him. You can hear the emotion in Barry's voice over Chip's death. --> http://www.pokerroad.com/_/the_bear_blog/12-4-07/I was looking for a video to put in this entry too. I watched several honoring Chip Reese. To me the best one I saw wasn't one honoring him. It was an interview he did. Chip Reese in his own words: |
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