The World Series of Ben Lamb

The wife was baby sitting her two nieces on Saturday, which let me get in a good few hands of poker and cross the 10,000 hands mark for the month. I don't feel that I have played that well of late, and have tried to open up my game and play a little more aggressively (I'm currently 22/19ish) and I have also added a couple more tables (to eight at a time), which I don't think has been detrimental to any significant degree. I played last night and when I woke up this morning I was having a think about the things that I thought I was doing right when I started playing six max. I think a lot of it was playing absurdly tight in a lot of spots when I just thought I was never getting bluffed. I have stopped doing this, and I think it is costing me money. Having been reading through some of the Baluga e-book, he does mention that you just aren't getting bluffed/three bet as often as you might think. With that, I have vowed to try and fix a couple of things (I probably need to do some study as well) and see how that goes.

The World Series Main Event is getting down to the business end. It is amazing that as I write this, Ben Lamb is still in with just over 20 players remaining. He has had such a sick series - I guess when you put being a great player, running hot and being full of confidence together, that's what happens. Personally I'd love to see Eoghan O'Dea (Donnacha's son) win it - a friend of mine that knows Donnacha always speaks of him in the most complimentary manner, so it would be good to see his boy ship all the gold.

I watched the John Murray vs. Kevin Mitchell fight on Saturday. The two fights on the undercard were a bit of a damp squib, but the main event was genuinely sensational. I like Mitchell, and not just because he's a West Ham fan. From the second round onwards I wondered if he had it in him - Murray was walking through his punches and threw a considerable volume himself, which didn't give Mitchell any room to breathe. Credit to him, he completely turned the fight in the seventh and Murray looked to have shot his bolt, finishing him off in the eighth. Both fighters were extremely complimentary about each other afterwards and seemed to be reasonably good mates. Hopefully Mitchell will get his career back on track, I think he was extremely brave to take this fight on as it could easily have been the end of his career had he lost to a dangerous and unbeaten opponent.

I booked a holiday with the wife over the weekend. We decided on 12 nights in Malta, basically sitting on our fat arses doing nothing. We looked at New York/Boston/Cape Cod, which would have been an awesome trip we felt that we really needed to put our feet up as we haven't had a week long break in over a year.

The football seasons starts in around two and a half weeks. Whilst our activity in the transfer market (inbound) has been limited, I'm still looking forward to it. The word is that the manager likes some of the kids that he has in the squad, but doubts their ability to do it for a full season. I think we'll do a good deal of business at the close of the window (there is some talk of Ryan Bertrand coming in on loan as part of a deal to take Parker to Chelsea, who can't be any worse than our current left back).

West Ham concluded a sponsorship deal for the West Stand (or Rio Stand, or Dr. Marten's Stand). Whilst it is small news, and the thing has been sponsored before, it does lead on nicely to last night's documentary on Channel 4 on how to buy a football club (and the prostitution of football in general). I was saddened to see Robson involved in this - he was a genuinely great England captain and shouldn't be short of a few bob. I did agree with what he said when he mentioned that football is no longer about sport, it's about business - and he's correct, as much as I don't like it. And when it became about business first and sport second, the people that genuinely care about the game suffer and a few people get rich. The Thai bloke was bigging up his contact with Ferguson, but is obviously mates with him and (as we saw with the Preston loan players thing), it's a grubby business where being mates with the right people count for a lot.

Speaking of grubby cunts in football, I think Redknapp is meant to be back up in court this week. If the judge is reading, I'm indifferent to either death by firing squad or lethal injection. Thanks.

I should probably take a moment to mention the whole phone hacking thing. The developments in the last two weeks have been incredible, and it wouldn't surprise me if the PM ended up going over this. I am glad to see that people now have the bit between their teeth, and this needs to be taken right to the bitter end. I saw some of the news last night about the murder of Daniel Morgan and subsequent stalking of two detectives (who were at the time married, one of whom went on to present Crimewatch) by the NOTW. The case has collapsed five times due to police corruption.

I read an article by Chris Bryant (who has done a fine job throughout the whole phone hacking thing) last week. He said a lot of things that I agreed with - that basically we need to be looking at whether Murdoch is a fit and proper person to own any UK media (including the 40% stake in Sky). He also spoke about Sky's monopoly position and that this needs to be challenged. I agree wholeheartedly - the idea that selling one of the three football packages to ESPN in some way represents competition is bollocks. You need to have different broadcasters with access to the same games. With any luck the recent EU ruling on TV rights could make a huge difference - EU regulations are not about protecting monopoly positions but about encouraging fair and free trade within the block of countries. Anything that might deflate the football bubble can't come soon enough.

Godspeed.

I have been fairly quiet on the poker front, although with this in mind July has gone pretty well. I'm currently up c. $500 after around 4,700 hands, which is not to be sniffed at. I have developed something of a worrying habit of winning a buy-in or two (what's not to like?) and wanting to quit and lock up a win. This whole way of thinking is of course nonsense, and I need to nip it in the bud. I managed to played around 1,000 hands last night over the course of a couple of sessions, and should play at least one more session tonight.

Whilst I was playing Kysus appeared at my table. For those that don't know him, he is a winning MSNL player and (despite being an Arsenal fan) a good guy. He said he was slumming it at $100NL because he doesn't keep much money online right now. I hope not to see him at my tables again, as his Nasri avatar makes me want to spite three bet him and he's really good at poker.

I am going to see Dylan Moran on Thursday. I have always quite liked him, it'll make a change from seeing Michael fucking McIntyre on TV every other day. Other than that we're looking at taking a couple of weeks holiday - we are considering Malta, as I'm not sure we can be arsed with a long flight and the pain that goes with it to go somewhere more exotic. Plus the hotel that we are looking at has a casino in it - don't tell the wife. When I'm there I will be sporting the Dad on holiday look, as modelled by Mr S. Allardyce, below.

West Ham's pre-season kicked off yesterday, with a mainly youthful side losing 2-1 to Young Boys (snigger) in Switzerland. We have lost a lot of players and signed two (two pretty good ones, I admit). The season starts in less than a month and we really need to get our skates on. I think it is going to be mainly a side of has beens and never will bes, which is what The Championship is all about. Leicester have signed well and should start as favourites. Our squad is very thin and with Cole having turned his nose up at a move to Leicester, we are supposedly reliant on flogging two from three of Cole/Parker/Green to get funds freed up.

These are interesting times, and we will be placing an awful lot on the shoulders of some young or unproven players and need to keep people fit. In Sam we trust, I guess. There is no need to panic as the window is yet to close, but I think we have five or six games before the end of August - that's a lot of points, and we face a few of the better sides in that time. I shan't comment on The Premiership as we're keepin' it real, down and dirty in The Championship here yo.

Godspeed.

Halcyon and on and on

I managed to grind out 16,000 hands during July, finishing up with a profit of around $600. I found myself auto-piloting a lot and probably playing some of my worst poker since I converted to six max. This disappointed me, and reminded me that I haven't really done any study of the game worth speaking of for the last six weeks. I have vowed to concentrate more at the tables and try and make some time to put in some more study.

It has been a while since I last updated here. The big news is obviously the shut down at Full Tilt (and gg $3k, possibly). Whilst there is the possibility of a new investor (as confirmed by their regulator), the longer they remain closed, the less valuable the business becomes. I hope they work something out, but my head tells me that this might be beyond them. Fingers crossed.

I haven't paid much attention to what has been going on at the WSOP, but I was delighted that Hellmuth didn't win his 12th bracelet, was disappointed that Chris Moorman didn't win his, and am impressed at how well Ben Lamb runs.

I went to Edinburgh over the weekend with a few friends. We had an awesome time, drank a lot, ate a lot and didn't get much sleep. It's a fine city, wasted on the Scottish ;) .

I am now into season three of The Wire, which seems to get more awesome as it goes along. I went with Lucy to see Butley at The Theatre (really, I did) with Dominic West and Paul McCann. I have never been to the theatre before (I don't think panto counts) and really enjoyed it.

I am meeting my old boss this week. He works for a new company that has just started up - it is a bit of a risk, but I'm interested in seeing what he has to say. It has the potential to be fairly lucrative and a lot more fun than my current job. I lose my messenger and 2+2 access at work this week (boo hiss), so I will see how that pans out.

Godspeed.

Warming Up

Poker has been slow of late. I was away for a few days (see below) and came back demotivated and didn't really feel like playing. However I have finally got my finger out and my luckbox seems to be working again, and am at 4,300 hands/+$600ish for the month so far. I was sat at the tables the other day with Gorvacofin (a very god player and great guy), who 4 bet shoved over my squeeze with 66. The button had set a tarp (obviously knowing that Hoopie1 in the big blind was an aggro mega-fish) with QQ. Gorv did what good players do and spiked a 6 on the river and apologised to the guy that had QQ, who is obviously someone that he knows as he said something about "I know you have been running bad". The guy replied that he was only 7 buy-ins off being 100BI below his AIEV number for the year. Imagine that? I think I'd kill myself. I made a note to shove crap on this guy more often, I'll probably win given that I run hot and he runs like shit.

Congratulations to Sadan Turker (the_snail03) for his second place in the $1k shoveament at the WSOP. Being smart he made a deal that guaranteed him $500k when it got to HU. Sadan is a rare creature in that he is an Arsenal fan that I actually like. Well done him, I'm just about to send him a begging PM on 2+2.

Not quite as good as this is what happens when you put Bill Chen, 2+2 and Photoshop together:
http://forumserver.twoplustwo.com/29/news-views-gossip/bill-chen-photoshop-potential-1049364/

I spent a few days in Cyprus with the wife for a friend's wedding. It was a decent do and I needed some time away, I haven't had a break for a long time.

I went to see the Senna documentary film on Sunday. I hate F1 but it was awesome, even her indoors liked it. The director did a Q&A afterwards and said some interesting stuff, despite some fuckwitted questions from the Hackney trendies.

Godspeed.

Downtime

I finished June up $1,700 or so, which is an amazing result (although I lost a good few BI towards the end of the month). Since then I haven’t played any poker – I was away for a few days at a wedding and haven’t really got back on the horse.

I came back from my break to see another non-statement from Full Tilt on returning funds. I have some funds on there, I’m sort of tempted to pull them out, but the games are soft so I might let them ride for a while. The whole Phil Ivey thing obviously has more to it than meets the eye. As far as I am concerned, Ivey is a cunt for pretending he is doing this for any other reason than his own interests, and Full Tilt are cunts for making out that this might delay the return of player funds.

It is becoming clear that Full Tilt are something of a cowboy outfit. Whilst Rainey’s claims on QuadJacks may have been somewhat overblown, and he is a little shit that loves the limelight too much, there is clearly something up at the company (the deposits that people played with that were never withdrawn is very worrying) and they are blatantly short of cash. I think they’ll try and keep the non-US players raking whilst attempting to get an equity injection from somewhere.

I was away in Cyprus at a friend’s wedding over the weekend. I don’t really like Cyprus, it is a long way away, quite expensive, the food isn’t great and the island isn’t so nice to look at. However it was good to catch up with some old faces and I haven’t really had anything approaching a proper holiday since the honeymoon last year.

The wedding was attending by the Crown Prince of Jordan (complete with security guards and entourage) - Samy’s family are fairly wealthy, I (obviously) don’t normally mix in those circles. His great uncle also attended – aged 91 and having been told not to fly by his doctors, Samy, and his daughter, he booked himself some flights and went on his own. What a legend.

I’m quietly reasonably happy with the appointment of Sam Allardyce. I think he’s a miserable northern cunt, but probably the best of the realistically available candidates – much like Craig Bellamy, I’d rather have him inside the tent pissing out than the other way around. He’d better not bring Diouf with him though, the spitting at our fans at Anfield will never be forgotten and he’s a waste of oxygen. I’m hoping that his desire for the England job will be enough to make him play a bit more football – as some pikey pointed out to me, he won’t let us get rolled at The Den in the way we did on our last two visits. We have also bought probably the best fake twitter account in football: http://twitter.com/#!/TheBig_Sam

I have just completed the first series of The Wire. What a totally amazing programme – probably the best thing I have ever seen on TV. The second series seems somewhat slower paced, but fascinating all the same. We’re going to see Dominc West in Butley later this month, which should be good (I have never been to see a play before, which will not surprise regular readers). If you haven’t seen The Wire, buy the box set, send the wife to her parents and book the week off work. Thank me later.

Godspeed.

If you can’t be good…

I remember looking back a couple of years ago at a post on Clarkatroid’s blog that said that when people convert from tournaments to cash (as many do), it is important that they run well, as many run bad, will simply think that they suck at cash games and quit them, without ever having the opportunity to discover whether they were winning or not.

Having run pretty hot and been winning at a decent clip at $50nl over 35k hands, I threw the “should I move up?” question out on www.raisetheriver.com. I wanted to get some feedback from people that I respected and that knew their stuff, and some of the RTR guys too. HONK! Joking, obv. Anyway, the general feedback was that the games don’t play too differently, the player pool between $50nl and $100nl overlaps and that if you are rolled, go for it. So I took a shot, and so far it has gone splendidly, I’m winning comfortably over 5k hands or so. I cleared the Stars SCOOP bonus and am hoping to try and clear some more of the Full Tilt bonus that I have before it expires at the end of the week.

Full Tilt provided another update on the current situation there. This really doesn’t bode well – I have no idea what the fuck is going on there, but they need to sort their shit out. If they have the cash, they have no reason not to pay it back, and given that they are taking a while to pay non-US players, I wonder if all is well. I’m going to leave the balance I have on there for now – it isn’t an earth shattering sum of money and the games are quite soft there.

West Ham confirmed their relegation yesterday by bottling a 2-0 lead at Wigan. I genuinely wasn’t that bothered when I found out, I will be glad to see the back of a lot of the players that were there and we have been living on borrowed time in the division for three seasons. Someone mentioned that we have dropped 21 points from winning positions this season, which explains a lot.

With Grant gone, there is a lot of debate over the next manager. A lot of people seem keen on Fat Sam. I think he would be the best choice to get us up at the first attempt, but I’d rather not have someone come in and fill the squad with guys on big wages in the event that we do go up. Allardyce isn’t exactly Mr Popular with some fans, and I think people would be quick to get on his back if it wasn’t going well. The last time we came up we did it with a young squad on a modest budget, had a cracking first season back and then fucked it when the Icelandics started bringing in big reputations on massive wages. I don’t want to repeat the second part again. Given that Paul Lambert is probably too smart to want to take a step down after promotion, I would like to see us go for either Malky Mackay, Gus Poyet or (rank outsider) Paul Tisdale.

I keep hearing about “the West Ham way” and stuff about tradition. The West Ham way is nonsense, we have played no more or less good football than any other mediocre top flight (most of the time) sides over the last 20 years. What the club needs is a kick up the arse and some strong characters to come in and shake the place up. The club’s scale and reputation should give us the pick of The Championship’s better players – I’d like to see us have a good look at the Swansea squad if we don’t go up, but I think Ashley Williams will be destined for the top flight either way.

Next week’s game at home to Sunderland should be fun. My prediction is for a lot of the more established names to pick up minor “injuries” in training this week and rule themselves out of the grief they will get from the crowd.

Godspeed.

Boomswitch

My plod along at $50nl was just that until Saturday, when someone at PokerStars must have accidentally flicked my boomswitch, and I won $500 in around 500 hands. LOL. Overall the six max is going well, I’m still running hot and my win rate is well above the expected number. I am currently at around 8,000 hands for May (34,000 overall) and will hopefully press on towards 50,000 hands, which I hope to read by the middle or end of June.

Full Tilt looks to have made some improvement to its pay out situation, although their PR is still piss poor. I hope they sort themselves out, Stars needs a competitor and Full Tilt has the edge in some respects, but lags badly in many areas where it counts (customer support, for example).

You can read various accounts of the Cereus situation at many places (I’d recommend Dr Pauly’s blog as a decent start). However, I’d also like to bring Joe Sebok’s blog to everyone’s attention, after Cereus apparantley ditched all of its pros.

http://www.pokerroad.com/blog/joesebok/129

The best description I have seen of Joe being dropped is “sinking ship deserts rat”. Joe – you really are a disgusting piece of shit. Your conduct since you joined Cereus has been nothing short of a fucking disgrace, and your defence so full of holes that it doesn’t even warrant being pulled apart, although many others have already done a better job than me.

The “I’m in the same situation as you guys” line makes my stomach churn. This is because you aren’t – you were pulling down (supposedly) $30k a month for churning out your bullshit and failing to answer any questions in a satisfactory manner. You said you would quit if you didn’t get the answers or meet your goals – you didn’t, you just kept on taking the money. In some ways, if you had just gone there as a site pro and taken what they were offering you like Devo, Roothlus or BaseBaldy, then I could understand. But when you started talking the talk, you opened yourself up to all the shit that is going to come your way over the next few years.

West Ham took a big step towards The Championship on Saturday by failing to beat Blackburn. We were crap, and despite Keane missing from inside the six yard box going into injury time, we don’t deserve to stay up. I won’t be sorry to never see most of our players in a West Ham shirt again.

David Gold was on Football Focus on Saturday and gave a pretty decent and frank interview. On Monday, Sullivan made a tit of himself in the press by pleading poverty and thoroughly fucked me off, saying relegation was going to cost him £20m personally. Perhaps if he had spent some of that £20m at the start of the season on a left back and a couple of other players, we wouldn’t be in this mess.

Godspeed.